//, /2 . i-j;
LIBRARY OF THE THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY
PRINCETON. N. J.
Presented by
'%
DiM\froH..rQ.sD.rri "T
Scction...).L^.L!J (P
Digitized by the Internet Archive
in 2010 with funding from
Princeton Theological Seminary Library
http://www.archive.org/details/genesisorfirstbo01lang
COMMENTARY
ON THE
HOLT SCEIPTUEES:
CRITICAL, DOCTRINAL, AND HOMILETICAL.
WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO MINISTERS AND STUDENTS.
BT
JOKN peter'
W OONNKCTION WITH A NOMBER OF EMINENT EUROPEAN DITima,
; LAJSTGE, D.D.,
TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN, AND EDITED, WITH ADDITIONS,
BY
PHILIP SCHAFF, D. D..
n OOHNICriON with AMERICAN SCHOLARS OF VARIODS EVANGELICAL DENOMINATIONS
TOL (.OF THE OLD TESTAMENT: COXTAININC A GENERAL INTRODUCTION,
AND THE HOOK OF GENESIS.
NEW YORK:
CHARLES SCRIP.NER'S SOXS,
1899
GENESIS,
OR,
THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES,
TOGETHER WITH A GENERAL THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
BY
JOHN PETER LANGE, D.D.,
pmoraseoR in ordinart of theology in the dnivbrsitt of bohb.
TRANSLATED FRUM THE GERMAN, WITH ADDITIONS,
Pbof. TAYLER lewis, LL.D.,
8C7HENECTAOT, N. Y.,
AKD
A. GOSMAN, D.D.,
LAWEKNCEVILLE, N. J.
NEW YORK:
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS,
1899
EnTSRKD, according to Act of Congrtss, in the je»r 1808 3T
CHARLES SCRIUNER &. CO..
Id tbe Clerk's OtBce of the District Court of tlie United States for the Southern District
of New York.
TBOW OIRECTORV
PftlNTIM AND eOOKQmOlllQ COMPANY
NCW YORK
PREFACE OF THE GENERAL EDITOR.
The favor with which the volnmes of the New-Testament division of Dr. Langk's " Bib ••
work " have been received by the American public, has encouraged the editor and pablisberi
tr midertake also the preparation of the Old-Testament division, on the same principles of
enlargement and adaptation to tlie wants of the English reader. A good tlieological and homi-
letical commentary on the Hebrew Scriptures is even more needed than on the Greek Testament.
Of the German work, the following parts of the Old Testament have so far appeared, and
have been assigned to cumpetent American scholars :
Genesis; by Dr. Langk. 1864.
Deuteronomy ; by W. J. Sciibodeb. 1866.
Judges and Rdth ; by Prof. Paui.us Oassel. 1866.
Tlie Pbovkbbs; by Dr. O. Zooki.eb. 1867.
Besides these,
The Books of Kings; by Dr. Bahb,
The Psalms ; by Dr. Moll,
Jkeemiah ; by Dr. Naoelsbaoh,
E00LE8IA8TES and the Song of Solomon ; by Dr. Zookler,
are in the hands of tlie printer, and will soon be pulilislied.
The Commentary un Genesis, which is now presented to the English reader, involves a vast
amount of labor both on the part of the author and on tiie part of the translators, and will, no
doubt, command, in no oidinary degree, the respectful attention of biblicnl scholars. No
otlier book of the Bible stands more in neeil of :in exhaustive commentary just at this time.
No one is so much exposed to tlie attacks of modern science in its temporary conflict with
revealed truth. We say, temporary conWict \ for there can he no es.iential or ultimate discord
between science and religion, philosophy and theology. Tiie God of reason and the God of
revelation is one and the same, and cannot contradict himself. The ilifBcnlty lies only in our
imperfect knowledge and comprehension of the book of nature, or of the Bible, or of both.*
The mighty problems which the interpretai ion of Genesis involves, are here discussed in a
manly and earnest spirit; and I venture to assert that no single commentary on this book pre-
sents 80 much original thought and research as the combined labors of the author and the
translators of this volume.
Professor Tatlkb Lbwis prepared the Special Introduction and the Commentary on Oh.
i.-xi., and Oh. xxxvii.-l. Dr. Gosman translated the General Introduction and the Commentary
on Ch. xiL-xxrvi. The original work numbers Ixxxii and 460, in all 542 pages. The English
edition has 665 pages, or fully one fourth more; the English pages being a little larger than the
• *' The abnegation of reason ia not the evidence of faith, but the confession of despair. Reason and reverence ar«
natural allies, though untoward circumstances may sometimes interpose and divorce them." — J. B. Liqhtfoot, D. D,,
91 Pauft EpittU to Oit Oalatians, 2d ed., London and Cambridge, 18G6. Preface, p, xi.
PREFACE OF THE GENERAL EDITOR.
German. Both translators have embodied the results of their independent study and extract!
fi^>ni works not noticed by Dr. Lange.
Prof. Tatler Lewis, so long and well known as one of the ablest and most learned classical
and biblical scholars of America, has scattered through this volume the fruits of long-continued
Btudy, with a freshness and vigor of thought and style that is truly surprising in one whose
feeble health has made such a work peculiarly difficult and laborious. For the convenience of
the reader I present a list of his principal additions, which touch upon the most interesting
and must difficult questions in the interpretation of Gbnbsis :
Special Introduction to the First Chapter, consisting of five parts: I. Essential Ideas of Creation.
II. The Hexaemeron in its Order. III. Creation in the Psalms, Job, and the Prophets. IV. Bible Ideu
of Nature and the Supernatural. V. How was the Creation- Account Revealed? pp. 125-159.
1. Excursus on the Paradise Rivers, 217-222.
2. Excursus on the Flood, its subjective truthfulness, its partial extent, 314-322.
3. Excursus on the Hebrew Chronology. Condition of the Primitive Man. The Rapid Beginnings of
History, 352-358.
i. Excursus on the Confusion of Languages and the Dispersion — a true supernatural event, 873-880.
5. The Relation of the First Verse in Genesis to the Rest. The Chasm-Theory, 167.
6. The Creation-Sabbath, 196.
7. The Jehovistic and the Elohistic Distinction, Int. 107.
8. Astronomical Objection to the Bible, 182.
9. Scriptural Heavens and Earth, 1S5.
10. The Creation-Summary, or the Account of the Second Chapter, 201.
11. Time-Successions of the Sixth Day, 210.
12. Idea of Future Life in the Old Testament, 214.
13. Abel's Blood Crying, 257.
14. Earliest Ideas of Death. Case of Enoch, 278.
15. The Spirit and the Flesh, Ch. vi., 285.
16. Early Announcement of Human Depravity. Psychological Distinctions made in Ch. vi 6, S8T>
17. The Divine Repentings, 2S8.
18. The Bible Idea of Covenant, 300.
19. The Week and the Seven-Day Observance in the Ark, 811.
2y. The Noachian Sacrifice, 324.
21. The Noachian Blessings and Cursings, 835.
22. The Law of Homicide, 332.
23. Arabian and other Oriental Traditions on the Destmction of Sodom, 440-442.
24. The Rainbow and its Appointment as a Sign, 328.
25. Development of the Idea of Sheol. Jacob's Language, Ch. xxxvi. 35, 584-587.
26. The Interview between Jacob and Pharaoh. The Patriarchal Theology. The Idea of the Ea'islj
Ijfe as a Pilgrimage, Ch. xlvi., xlvii., 637-640.
27. Jacob's Blessings, Ch. xlix.
28. Interpretation of the Words Goel, Malak-Haggoel, Redeemer, Angel-Redeemer, Ch. xlviii 16, 646 647.
29. Jacob's Dying Vision of the Tribes and the Messiah, Ch. xlix. 1-33, 651-654.
Besides, the translators have added a large number of marginal notes, many of which might
hare been placed in the body of the pages, aiid copious text-notes on Hebrew words and
phrases, with illustrations from a rich store of oriental and classical learning.
I congratulate my esteemed co-laborers on the successful completion of their difficult task,
and commit this first volume of the Old-Testament division of the " Biblework " to the blessing
of God, and the use of His ministers in the study and application of this most ancient and
wonderful book.
PHILIP SCHAFF.
6 Bible-House, New Yobk, March 10, 1868.
AUTHOR'S PREFACE.
The antbor has been mnch longer occupied in the preparation of •J^nesis for the
"Biblework," than he at first supposed would be necessary; and this, together with the
detention in reference to two of the New-Testament books, has seemed to bring the whole
work to a stand for a time. This delay, however, has only been apparent and transient, since,
in the meantime, different well-approved cii-wi>rkerB have carried on the work in the Old-
Testament divisions, and will now, right soon, it is hoped, present the public with the long-
wlshed-for results of their labors, wbile, at the same time, several New-Testament books ara
again in course of preparation. * ♦ •
I was especially detained upon the Introduction. The want of scientific method in tha
culture of biblical theology which has prevailed until the present time, appeared to me to
make it imperative that the questions necessarily belonging to the Introduction shovdd be
treated under the form of this branch of theological science, — presenting the points, however,
for the most part, merely in outline, with a reference to the authorities, but treating more
fully and thoroughly the great tlieolocrical lite-questions of the day. * * * In the preparatory
introduction, I believed that a proper view and statement of the character of the people of
Israel should occupy the very first place in arohssology, since an archseology which leaves
out of view the one vital, unifying, central point, the life of the people in question, must be a
mere lifeless, conglomerate mass of knowledge. Thus, e.g, no one can have a true conception
and estimate of the chronology of the people of Israel, who has not first rightly conceived
and appreciated the characteristics of the people itself. I was especially anxious to open the
question of Old-Testament hermeneutics, since the great and destructive errors, as to the
fundamental principles of biblical, and particularly Old-Testament hermeneutics, threaten to
make a very Babel of our modern Exegesis. The Sacred Scriptures never leave a doubt as to
the fact that they communicate to us only words of life, and tlius facts and doctrines which find
their expression in the light of their religious idea ; but this key to all exposition of the Scrip-
tures is thrust aside by both theological extremes. The letter is not only put under pressure,
but even strangled, lest it should say something more than it appeared to express according
to the most restricted and limited interpretation. In this thought the two extremes rival
each other in the effort to make a mere natural astronomical day of twenty-four hours oct
of the divine days of the creation (Gen. i.). The one side thus seeks to secure the most
complete orthodox locne of the creation, the other to make the Bible begin with a fictitious
legendary description of the creation, under the form of the Jewish sabbath-institution."
* Bishop Colenso reprei^ents this artithesia in one theological li/e ; iirst serving the letter with an orthodox ptirpoaa,
nd then nsing it for mere critical ends
AUTHOR'S PREFACE.
If I have succeeded n^erely in giving an inipnlse towards a proper and satisfactory r^.
of hermeneatics, I sLall hope for a special blessing from this part of my labor
In the preparation of my work I have consulted particnlarly the com.nentaries of D.
UTZ80H, &n., and Knobei, and, whenever it appeared necessary, those of Vox Bohlex and
others. I have frequently aUowod the authors to speak for themselves; whenever, indeed,
the briefest explanation of important remarks, or the peculiar characteristic expression of the
commentators made it proper and best. In thia respect, also, the "Biblework" must ba
naany-sided. But in the exposition I have never spared myself the labor necessary to ac
qmre and state my own personal views ; and unprejudiced readers and critics will find that
he work . not without its calling, nor . ithout its influence as one an,ong the independen.
laborers m this exegetical field. I have n.t permitted n.yself to be swayed by the singula,
and strong prejudice of the moment, which regards the sons of God (Gen. vi.) as an.els.
and the ifa^^A Jehovah as a ,nere creature-angel. In regard to both these questions I am
brought mto conflict with the interi .relation of Kuetz. * * »
I., the practical division of the work, as in the theoretical, we have found it necessary
to practise the utmost restraint in the use of helps. In this respect the work of J. Sohbooic;
upon G™ (Berlin, 1846) has been of essential service, partly through its well-chosen
extracts, and partly from the judicious remarks of the author; we have often, indeed, beeB
embarrassed by tlie very richness of its contents.
May this -'Biblework," in its Old-Testament division, meet with the same reception,
and enter upon the same path of usefulness, which the New-Testament divisions ha^e
already found; may this work upon Gexksis introduce a series of commentaries by ster-
hng and valued co-laborers, and stimulate the progress and completion of the joint work,
waich is faithfully devoted to the serrioe of the Ohnroh and the glory of the Loh.
Bonn, May 12, 18<U
THEOLOGICAL MD HOMILETICAL INTRODUCTION.
TO
THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Peeuminaby Remaeks.
THE RELATION OF THIS INTRODUCTION TO TEE INTRODUCTION TO TB»
NEW TESTAMENT.
We prefixed to the Commentary on Matthew a sketch of the General Introda©
tion to the Holy Scripture, since for Christians the New Testament is the key to the
Old (Lange's Matthew, pp. 1-20, Am. ed.). But it is necessary, in preparing a Special
Introduction to the Old Testament, that we should again proceed upon a survey
of the whole field of Biblical Science and Biblical Theology. For the Introduction
to the Old Testament, necessarily points back to the Introduction to the New. In
the Introduction to the New Testament, moreover, particular points were simply
alluded to, which must now be more thoroughly discussed. But to explain these
points in their systematic order, we shall have to make a general statement of the
questions of Introduction ; only so far, however, that we shall merely refer to
points already explained. The Introduction to the New Testament was modelled
upon the definition of Exegetics. For our present purpose it seems better to fol-
low the outline of a living Biblical Theology. We shall, however, ovenitep the
ordinary limits of Biblical Theology, and embrace the Sciences of Introduction
which Biblical Theology viewed by itself presupposes. For the Literature, the
following works may he consulted, in addition to those referred to in Matthew
(Lange's Matthew, Am. ei p. 17).
1. Introduction to the Bible. — ScnnMANN:
Praktisehe Einleitung in\ Alte und Neue Testament;
Steqlich : Bibelkunde, Leipzig (1853) ; Staudt : Firir
geneige in den Inhalt und Zwsammenhang der Hei-
ligen Schrift, Stuttgart (1854) ; Wetzel : Die Spra-
ehe L/uthers in seiner Bibelvhersetzung, Stuttgart
(1859); The Bible and its History, Wth edition,
mih a preface by F. W. Krommacher, Elberfeld
(1858); Watson: Apology for the Bible, Letters to
Paine, New York ; Eirchhofer : Leitfaden zur Bi-
belkunde, 2d ed., Stuttgart (1860). Similar worka
by Haqenbach, Leipzig (1850); Hollenberq, Ber-
lin (1854); Schneider, Bielefeld (1860); Lisco :
Einleitung in die Bibel, Berlin (1861); Bibelwegwei'
•er, Einleitung i » die Heilige Schrift, Calw (1861j ;
Bleek : Einleitung in's Alte vnd Nnn Testament,
Berlin (1860-'62); Nast: Critical <JMd Practical
Commentary, C'mcmv&t\ (1860), [HaiT:RNiCK's /n-
frodwdion, Edinburgh Translation (lJn2); Hokne's
Introduction, New York (1860) ; Davidson's Intro-
duction ; Jahn's Introduction, witli Referouces by
S. H. Turner.— A. G.]
2. Directions for Reading the Bible.— W.
Hoffmann : Ueher den rechten Gebrauch der Bti i,
Berlin (1854) ; OstertaO; Ziige aus dem Werke dti
Bibelverbreitung, Stuttgart ( 1 S57 ) ; Seelbach : Bibel-
sc^'en, Bielefeld (1851-'55) ; Hollenberq: Ermun-
terung und Anleitung zum Bibellesen, Berlin (1862^;
[Francke's Guide to the Study of the Scriptures ,
Talbot's Bible ; Locke's Commonplace - Book
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Towxsend's Arrangement ; the Paragraph Bibles ;
Collter: The Sacred Interpreter, Oxford (1831);
Companion to the Bible, Phila. (1852).— A. G.J
3. General and Special Bibleworkg. — See
Lange'3 Matthew, Am. Ed. pp. 19 ; Stabke : Allge-
meines Register itber die funf Theile seiyies Bibel-
werkes, pp. 1-46 ; Walch : Bibliotheca TJieol. iv.
pp. 182, 379. Danz : Universal- Worterbuch, pp. 126,
134 ff. ; Winer, i. p. 33 sqq. 162, Appendix,
K 9. ^
We call special attention to the well-known works
of earlier dates. Polus : The Critici Sacri ; Die
Berlenbcrger Bibel, new ed., Stuttgart (1856);
Das Bibelwerk von L. Maistre de Sact ; Seilkr:
Das grosse biblische Erbaumigsbuch, Erlangen (1788-
'92), in 17 vols. ; DieWurtemberger Summarien, Niim-
berg (1859). Die Prediger Bibel by Fischer and
WoHLFAHRT, marks the transition to our time. Th«
antagonistic works by Dinter and Brandt. The
Bibleworks of Richter, Lisco, Gerlach : Calweb
Handbuch; the unfinished jB/ft/cwfj-A; by Bunsen; 7%<.
Historical and Tfieological Bibelwerk, by Webeb,
Schaff hauseii (1860) ; the newly published Wirterbuch
of Oeti.nger; Die Bibel, an article from Ersch's and
Grober's Encyclopedia; Ij^jtrer's Explatiations of tin
Holy Scriptures, selected from his Expository Works,
Berlin. [Besides the Commentaries of Henry and
Scott, we may refer to those of J. Gill, Adam Clarke,
Patrick Lowth and WniTBy, Bcrder's Scripiurt
Exposition, Poole's Annotations, the Biblical Com-
mentarii, by Keil and Delitzsch, now in course of
pubMcation and translation in Clarke's foreign Ubrary.
D'Otly and Mant : The Holy Bible, with Notes, crit-
ical and explanatory, Loudon (1856). — A. G.j
FIRST DIVISION.
THEOLOGICAL INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTA.
MENT UPON THE PLAN OF BIBLICAL THEOLOCY.
Peefatoey Remaeks
Definition and Structure of Biblical Tfieology.
Biblical Theology, embracing the doctrines and ethics of the Holy Scripture, in
their unity as the biblical rule of life, is an historical science ; the history, i. e., of the
actual and periodic development of Biblical doctrine from its earliest form to its
canonical completion.
Its sources are the canonical books of the Holy Scriptures ; with which we may
connect the Old Testament Ajjocryjtlia, as a historical auxiliary, which furnishes us-
with the knowledge of biblical doctrine during its transition period, from its Old
Testament form to its New Testament completion. But to assign it its true worth
and position, we must compare the Bible with its surroundings ; a. with the Apo-
crypha, b. with the Apostolical Fathers, c. with the Talmud, and the Old Testament
text with the Septuagint. It occupies in Theology the transition ground between
Exegesis and Church History. Its last antecedent is Biblical History, its nearest
result the History of Dogmas.
As to its origin and history, it springs out of the total development of The-
ology. The way was opened for it through the whole Theology before the Ref-
ormation, through the biblical character of the doctrines of the Reformers, through
the dicta probantia which marked the Dogmatics of the 17th century, and through
the effort of the Pietistic school to confine the Christi.m dogmas to *heir Scriptural
THE SCRIPTURES IX THEIR DIVIXE ASPECT.
basis. In the second half of the 18th century it became an iudependeut science,
formed at, first upon the loci theologici, then regarded as purely historical, finally
assumed the form of an historical science, conditioned upon the grand norm or prin
ciple of Christian doctrine and of the Scriptures. [Upon the idea of the God-Mai
— the Incarnation. — A. G.]
Biblical Theology is the history of Biblical doctrine in its unity, and iu
its particular doctrines. It may be divided therefore into General and Special
but these are united again by the Christological principle, the idea of the God-man,
(vbich is the fundamental thought of Holy Scripture. We have the reflection
of the God-Man, i. e., the unity of the eternal divine being and its finite human
manifestation, of the one and absolute Spirit and the manifold life, In Biblical doc-
trine as in Biblical History. . It follows, of course, that General Biblical Theology
treats 1. of the divine unity of Holy Scripture, 2. of the human diversities of
Holy Scripture, 3. of the divine-human, Christological theology of the Holy Scrip-
ture, and its course of development. Accordingly Special Biblical Theology
embraces 1. the history of the Biblical doctrine of God, in its Christological form,
2. the history of the Biblical doctrine of Man, 3. the history of the Biblical doctrine
of the God-Man, and his redeeming work, 4. the history of the expansion of the life
of Christ in his Kingdom ; or Theocratology, the doctrine of the Kingdom of God,
to its Esehatological completion.
For the position of Biblical Theology in the system of Theological Sciences, see
Lange's Matthew, Am. ed., p. 17. It must be observed here, however, that Biblical
Theology, with its parallel science, Biblical History, is the result and crowning glory
of Exegetical Theology ; and further, that Biblical Theology is no more to be con-
founded with systematic biblical Dogmatics (/. e., the ground of Ecclesiastical Dog-
matics), than Biblical History with the history of the Kingdom of God, which latter
embraces the entire history of the Church and the world, to the end of time. We
must, therefore, avoid confounding with each other the periods of the history of the
Kingdom of God, of Biblical History, and of Biblical religion, which is still often
the case.
For the literature of Biblical History, me Danz:
Universal- Wm-terbwch, p. 135. Also the Biblical
Histories of Hdbner, Racschenbusch, Kohlraosch
Zakn. Biblical History is often treated under the
name oi the History of the Eingdom of God. See
Geobe : Characterbilder der heiligen Schrift, Leip.
zig (1853).
For the History and Literature of Biblical Theol-
ogy, see Haoenbach: Theol. Encyclopedia, p.
101.
FIRST SECTION.
THE CANONICAL CHARACTER OR DIVINE ASPECT OF THE HOLY
SCRIPTURES, ESPECIALLY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT, OR THE
UNITY OF BIBLICAL DOCTRINK
§1-
THE SACRED WRITINGS AS THE HOLY SCRIPTURE.
The records of Revelation, especially of the Old Testament Revelation, or tfu
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
aacred writbigs, notwithstanding their endless diversity, as to authors, time, form,
language, constitute one Holy Scripture perfectly consistent with itself, and per
fectly distinct from all other writings; yet entering into such a relation and inter
change with them as to manifest as perfect a unity of spirit as if they had been
written by one pen, sprung from one fundamental thought, in one year, in a single
moment. This unity of the Holy Scripture rests upon the unity of its eternal Spirit,
of its eternal norm or principle, its eternal contents, its eternal object. What-
ever is eternal forms a living, concrete unity under the diversities of time ; and thus
the eternal divine purpose of redemption in Christ — the soul of the Holy Scripture-
forms its living unity under the diversities of the sacred writings.
THE ONE PERVADING SUBJECT OF THE HOLT SCRIPTURE IN ITS OBJECTIVE ASPECT
The Holy Scripture in its objective aspect is one only through its one pervading
idea of God, or rather through the living revelation of the one personal God ot
revelation which runs through the Old and New Testaments. When, therefore, od
the one hand the Gnostics make the God of the Old Testament a subordinate deity
(Marcion : Sio% SiKaio?), or a God of a lower nature, a Demiurge, or even an Evil
Spirit (the Ophites), and the Rationalists distinguish the Old Testament Jehovah,
as a Jewish national Deity, from the New Testament God and Father of our Lord
Jesus Christ ; and on the other hand the Jews in the God of the New Testament,
the Ebionites in the God of Paul, could not recognize the Jehovah of the Old Tes-
tament, they simply foiled to perceive — owing to their spiritual blindness — the
one grand common life, underneath the great objective antithesis between the Old
and New Testaments.
The God of the Old Testament as well as that of the New is the absolute Spirit,
the Creator, Upholder and Ruler of the world, above the world and yet in it, the
God of all nations, the God of love, grace, and redemption ; although in a peculiar
sense the God of Israel, and although omnipotence, holiness, and righteousness are
the predominant features in his earlier revelation.
The God of the New Testament, on the other hand, is a God viewed in his
relations to man, the God of the Elect, primarily of the Elect One, as the God and
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the God of his own people, the Holy One, in his
justice a consuming fire (Heb. xii. 29), while love, grace, and mercy predominate in
his final and complete revelation.
The Jehovah of the Old Covenant is more illustriously revealed in the God
Amen of the New Covenant (Rev. iii. 14).
As the one biblical idea of God — imparting unity to the Scriptures — is thus en-
tirely consistent with itself, so it is clearly distinguished from the heathen idea oi
God, from all pure abstract Monotheism, post-Christian Judaism, and Mohammed'
anism (see Melanchthon's loci, the preface).
Compare the mythological systems, the Talmud, the Cabbalah, and the Korae
§ 5. THE OPPOSITIONS OF SCRIPTURE.
§3.
THE ONE PERVADING SUBJECT OF HOLY SCRIPTURE IN ITS SUBJECTIVE ASPECT.
The Holy Scripture in its subjective aspect is animated by one pervading, pecu
liar religious consciousness — Faith. Faith, as here used, is the knowledge of God
awakened by the self-revelation of God, and corresponding to it, of God not as exist-
ing merely, but as manifesting himself vividly afar off and near at hand ; and the con-
fidence in him having its root in this knowledge and agreeing with it, a confidence not
resting upon him in his general character, but upon him in the promise of salvation
in his word. In this confidence, as it includes the yielding of the will to the will and
Providence of God — not to any arbitrary human will— and thus to a living obe-
dience to the commands of God, lies the root of love and of all virtue. In this sense
the faith of Abraham and Paul are the same. Indeed, Abraham is the father of be-
lievers (Rom. iv. 1) ; although his faith both in its objective and subjective aspects
was the first living seed which, under the New Covenant, unfolded itself to the
perfect fruit of saving faith.
As the biblical idea of God is clearly distinguished from all untheooratic concep-
tions of the Deity, so this religious consciousness or the faith of the theocratic people,
is clearly distinguished from all heathen, Jewish, or Mohammedan forms of this
consciousness.
THE ONE PERVADING THEANTHROPIC SUBJECT OF HOLY SCRIPTURE, CHRIST AND THE
KINGDOM OF GOD.
Both the personal aspect of the Kingdom of God, the expectation of the Mes-
siah, until his appearance, and until the hope of his second coming, and the univer.
sal aspect of the Messiah; the old promise of the Messianic Kingdom, confirmed in
the covenant of God with Abraham and Israel, and the new promise of his appearing
in glory — after his appearance in the form of the crucified — confirmed in the cove-
nant of God with believers, runs throughout the Scriptures as the grand constituent
principle, and final aim of Revelation and the Holy Scripture. Still, there is an
endless development which lies between the paradisaic destination of man in Genesis
(chap, i.), especially in the Protevangelium (chap, iii.) and the completed City of
God of the Apocalypse (Rev. chap. xxi. xxii.)
The Kingdom of God, as the Kingdom of Christ, as the synthesis of the fflory ol
God and the blessedness of his children (since the glory of God shines in their bles-
sedness, and their blessedness consists in the open vision of his glory), is distinct
as possible from all the religious conceptions of the future of heathenism, Judaism
and Mohammedanism. It rests upon the eternal covenant o'" God with humanity,
which was prefigured in the old covenant, and fulfilled in the new. The Bible,
therefore, is the record of this eternal covenant in its twofold form.
§5.
THE OPPOSITIONS OF SCRIPTURE.
The revealed religion of the Bible stands in tne most direct and irrof^onoilable
INTKODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
opposition to the various unscriptural religions, considered in their darker aspect
t. e., so far as they are the false religions of false gods (Elilim) ; or dead, lifeless con
ceptions of God; but in a relation of friendship, as to the divine elements oi
those truths, they may embrace. This will define its relation to the different my
thologies, to the Talmud, and the Koran.
The recorded expression of this revelatim in the Bible, stands in a specific oif
position to all the derived forms, statements, and outgrowths of this I'evelation.
This is the relation which the Old Testament sustains to the Septuagint, and the
New Testament to the Apostolical Fathers, leaving out of view in one case the Old
Testament Apocrypha, and in the other the New Testament Apocrypha and the tra-
ditions of the Church.
But by virtue of its inexhaustible riches of life, embracing the whole history of
the world and eternity, the Holy Scripture itself is distinguished into the harmo-
nious antithesis of the Old and New Testaments : the Old, which points on to the
New, into which it passes and finds its ftilfilment ; the New, which is ever referring
to the Old, and in a historical sense is grounded in it.
§6.
raPOKT OF THE UNITY OF THE BIBLE IN ITS DIVERSITY.
The unity of the Holy Scripture according to its divine, theanthropic origin,
rests upon its Inspiration. (La^jge's Matthew, Am. ed. p. 11.)
Recent writers upon Inspiration, e. g., Bunsen, Rothe, and others, have not
sufficiently considered the Bible as to its full, harmonious, perfect teleology, through
which all its individual utterances are conditioned, and which binds all into one.
The perfect adaptation to its design points clearly to a perfect origin. The whole
Bible teleologically considered culminates in the New Testament, emphatically in
Christ : each particular book in its fundamental idea. To wrest any part out of its
connection, for subordinate purposes, is a misconception of the Bible. In its per-
. fectly definite design and end, agreeably to its sacred origin and contents, it is the
Holy Scripture.
The unity of the Holy Scripture according to its divine, theanthropic contents,
constitutes it the Canon. {See Lange's Matthew, Am. ed. p. 1 3.)
The Bible is beyond question the canon, but not merely the canon, not a canon
m the sense of a law-book. The canonical, as a rule and direction, always points to
that which is above itself, the principle of life, and the life of the principle ; to the
source of free love, free life, and free blessedness from which it flows.
Viewing the Holy Scripture as to its effects, its unity proves it to be the word
of God. It exerts a power within and beyond itself; it sheds light upon itself; it
radiates its light from its mighty living centre— the world-redeeming Christ — to
every part, and reflects it from each part to every other, and back upon the central
truth itself Thus by virtue of the analogy of iaith, and the analogy of Scripture
the Bible is the one indivisible word of God, in its total impression and operation,
more fully the word of God, than in its particular words or utterances.
Hence its external efficiency is pure and perfect. As a body of records it points
back from itself to its origin, the living revelation. As a word of life it points
beyond itself, to the living Christ. It is no idol which fetters the hearts of men to
itself in a slavish manner. Neither is it a meie canon, a writing of genuine author
§8. THE RICuJBs ur iHE SCRIPTURES IK THEIR ENDLESS DlV'ERSITr. 1
ity, which simply as a law, fixes the rule what we are to believe, and how we should
live. As the word of God, it is the book of life, in the authentic form of writing;
which gives testimony to the book of life in the hand of God — the purpose of re.
demption — to the book of life in the heart of the Church — Christ in us ; and awakens,
strengthens and enriches the life from God through Christ. It is not only the ground
upon which the Cultus of the Church rests, but the book through which it edifies
itself, and tnlfils its great mission to the world.
The unity of the Holy Scripture in the harmony of its great opposition con-
stitutes it the one book of the Covenant, or the Eternal Testament, in the opposition
of the Old and New Testaments.
THE BIBLE AS THE BOOK OF BOOKS.
The Bible then, as the Book of Books, is as the sun in the centre of all other re-
ligious records; the Kings of the Chinese, the Vedas of India, the Zendavesta of the
Persians, the Eddas of the Germans, the Jewish Talmud, and the Mohammedan
Koran ; judging all that is hostile in them, reconciling and bringing into liberty
whatever elements of truth they may contain.
It stands also, with a like repelling and attracting force in the centre of all
literature, as Avell as of Theology. In the same power and dignity it exercises its
critical authority upon all historical traditions.
As the ideal Cosmos of the revelation of Salvation, it forms with the Cosmos of
the general revelation of God an organic unity (Ps. viii. ; xix. ; civ.). It is the key of
the World-Cosmos, while this again is the living illustration of the Cosmos of the
Scripture.
But as that is subordinate to the living God, as an organ of his manifestation, so
IS the Bible to the living Christ. It holds the same relation to him as the copy to
the original, and is coordinate with the eternal word of Christ in the total life of
the Church — as a folly accordant testimony. But whoever will utter anything from
that mystical writing in the heart of the church, must derive his credentials from
the written word.
§8.
THE RICHES OF THE SCRIPTURES IN THEIR ENDLESS DIVERSITY.
The grand opposition of the Old and New Testaments, upon a closer view,
branches itself into an endless number of oppositions, distinctions, and differences,
which meet us not only in the Old Testament generally, but in its particular
divisions, and also in the New.
In this human aspect the Bible appears as an historical growth, and is open to
an historical examination and criticism. In this aspect is is connected with human
imperfections. But in this aspect alone, the endless riches of its all-pervading
divine fulness unfolds itself to our view.
From the reciprocal influence of the divine unity of the Scriptures, and its human
diversities, results the living force or mnvein('?it in the development of Biblical
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Theology; and thus it comes to be the authentic copy of the advent and life of
Christ, flowing out of the connection between the God of revelation And believing
humanity.
SECOND SECTION.
mTRODUCTION TO THE HOLY SCRIPTURES, ISAGOGICS, OR THE
DIVERSITIES AND HISTORICAL GROWTH OF BIBLICAL DOCTRINE.
Biblical Introduction treats of the Scriptures in their historical aspect. If we
distinguish between a preparatory (taking that word in its widest sense) and an
historical and critical introduction (which regarded as general includes both parts,
but as special only the latter), there is no room for the question which has been
agitated (Hagenbach's Encyclopedia, p. 140), whether the literary history of
the Scriptures as a whole and in their individual parts alone, or the scientific aids to
Exegesis also, properly belong to such ar introduction.*
FIRST CHAPTER.
Preparatory Introduction.
§ 2.
ITS CONSTITUENT ELEMENTS.
The direct auxiliaries to the Explanation of the Scriptures are biblical antiquities,
and the sacred languages ; and as regards the present form of the text, biblical
criticism and hermeneutics. Exegesis presupposes all these sciences, and they in
turn presuppose exegesis. The circle which is involved in this statement is not
logical but real, i. e., science must learn to know the particular through the uni-
versal, and the universal through the partiodar. From the central point between
the universal and the particular, it oscillates between the two extremes, which intui
tion harmonizes.
SECOND CHAPTER.
Pr^arOtory Introduction : Its constituent parts so far as the text is concerned.
L The Old Testasient Archeology.
§ 3.
BIBLICAL ANTIQUITIES OF THE OLD TESTAMENT.
It is defined mainly by the forming principle which constitutes its unity : here,
• Por ft general survey of the development of the sciences of Old Testament Introduction, «« Bleek, Hitdatung, p.
§4. THE ISBAELITISH PEOPLE AJSTD SURROUNDING ^iTIONa
the character of the Jewish people. Regarding this people in its local relations
we have Biblical Geography (especially physical), and in its relations to time
Biblical Chronology ; then in its relations to nature, the physical science of the Bible,
and in its relation to the race, Biblical Ethnography ; then in its more vital relations
the Theocracy, embracing the history of the Biblical Cultus and Civilization ; and
lastly in its relations to History, biblical history and international relations.
For the literature of the Old Testament Antiquities :
De Wette : Lehrbuch der hehraisch-jiidischen Arch-
Sologie (1842). — Ewald: Die AUerthumer des Vnlkes
Israel, 1848, 1864. [This is a very suggestive work.
—A. G.] Keil ; Handbuch der biblischen Archdologie,
18S8. Bertheav : Zur Oeschichte der Jsraelittn,
1842; Hagenbach's Miicyclopedia, p. 136; and ic
EIeil, p. 13. Lange's Matthew, Am. ed. p. Iv.
Archseology, [Preston : Studenl's Theological Man-
ual, London, 1850. Jaen's Biblical Archceology,
translated by Upham, New York, 1863. — A. G.l
§4.
THE ISRAELITISH PEOPLE AND SURROUNDING NATIONS.
Heathen nations, in their pride and presumption, trace their origin back througo
various steps to the Gods, or demigods (Tuisko, Brahma, Deucalion, <fec. ); but the
Israelitish people is satisfied to trace its origin from Abraham, the Friend of God.
Because it enters into the history of the world as the people of faith, therefore, also
as the people marked by humility in its claims.
Heathen nations speak of ancient historical glory which is entirely fabulous ;
the people of Isi-ael with a far truer historical sense, acknowledges the comparatively
recent date of its origin. According to Jewish tradition and history Abraham
lived about 2000 years B. C. China and Egypt were then thoroughly developed,
well-known historical kingdoms, with the traditions of a thousand years in the ])<>,.
In theii- historical name, as they are known in the language of other nations the
Israelites are Hebrews (n-i-ins) ; according to Ewald, Lengerke and others, from
the Patriarch Heber (Gen. x. 25; xL 16); but according to Hengstenberg, Kurtz
(Geschichte des Alten Bundes, p. 132), they were called by this name since they
came from the other side, i. e., across the Euphrates (i2S the land upon the other
side, here the other side of the Euphrates). It may be urged in favor of this
derivation that they were so called by foreign nations, who would naturally be
better acquainted with their geographical, than their genealogical origin. They
always caUed themselves after the theocratic honored name of their ancestor
IsraeL They were a people who wrestled with God in faith and prayer. After
the exUe, the name Jews passed from the tribe of Judah to the whole people, of
whom that tribe was the central point, and they were usually so called by foreign
nations.
See Winer : Article Hebrews. Bleek : Mnleitung | Kirchen-lexikon von Wetzee und Welte. Article
in's Alte Testament, p. 72. An article protesting Hebrder,
against tlie prevailing view, may be found in the |
The Israelites, as Hebrews, or immigrants into Canaan, may have exchanged
their original Aramaic tongue for the Hebrew as their first historical language
(Blbek's Mnleitung, p. 61.)
This would be only in accordance with what actually occurred under the New
Covenant, when the Hebrew Christians exchanged their own language for the
classic language of the Greek and Roman world. In both cases, is the appropriated
10 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
language moulded into an entirely new language, through the power of the religious
spirit. We leave it undetermined however how far this question must be regarded
as already settled.
[There is a very able article in the 2d vol of lue Biblical Repertory in which the author defends th«
antiquity of the Hebrew language. — A. G.]
As to their genealogy, the descent of Israel rrom Abraham, and more remotely
fi-om Shem, forms the very kernel and soul of their authentic traditions ; while tha
relation of other Semitic tribes to their ancestors is involved in uncertainty.
See Genealogical table Gen. Ch. 10. Kurtz : History of the Old Covenant. The origin of the CoTenanl
people, L p. 129.
The essential question here is this : what is the fundamental characteristic, tha
distinguishing feature of the Israelitish people. When God chose this people as his
own, although it was a stiff-necked people (Ex. xxxii. 9 ; xxxiii. 3) ; although it
possessed no art, science, political system, like that of the Greeks and Romans {set
Introduction to Rdhr's Geography of Palestine) ; it does not follow that the choice
■was arbitrary, without a reason in the divine mind. Corresponding to the divine
choice, there was a human disposition or quality, which God from eternity had
designed, for the individual or people of his choice, and which he actually communi-
cated in its origin.
The striking peculiarity of Israel is the great prommence of the religious (Semittcj
element in reference to God, vrhich is found in its highest and most genial form in
this people ; in contrast to the prominence of the Ethical (Japhetic) element in refer-
ence to the world. Israel therefore is preeminently a people of religion, not of art
and science like the Greeks, nor of politics and law like the Romans. We may say
indeed that it is a people of dynamic, not of dead formal forces or principles. As
the people of God, which out of a profounder originality, introduces and unfolds
among the hoary nations a new life, it places its living religion in opposition to the
formal and lifeless Cultus of the heathen ; its dynamic poetry, and its science of the
one all pervading principle of the world, to the formal poetry and science of the
Greeks ; and its warfare and politics, animated and exalted by the great principles
which actuate them, to the technical and unmeaning Roman politics and warfare.
As it is itself an element of regeneration to the nations, so are its gift.s for the gifts
and arts of the nations. Hence it follows that Israel must possess that comprehensive
nationality, in which all the peculiarities of the different nations must be mixed.
Thus it was destined and prepared to be the maternal breast for the Son of Man, the
man from heaven, the head of all nations. Thus for the fathers' sake, who repre-
sent its profoundest peculiarities, and for tlie root of Jesse, which shall bear the
flower of humanity, it is the beloved people, tlie Elect One, Jeshurun, the favorite of
heaven, the Apple of God's eye, the typical Son of God, the type of the true Sou of
God to come, who is the fulfilling of its deepest faith and desire. Hence too in its
darker aspect, its falls and crimes, it must represent the darkest side of humanity,
and its worst characters, just as in its peculiarly chosen ones, its patriarchs and
prophets, it may claim the noblest and most heroic spirits of the race. {See Laj^ge's
Verfinsterung der Welt, p. 119.)
Jewish State; in Fbdbrbach: TVadatt upon th.
The most distorted features of the Hebrew Nation-
al Character are found in Hitzio: Inirodudion to
Isaiah ; in Leo ; Prelections on the History of the
Nature of Christianity. The old heathen utterancei
of contempt for the Jews are recorded in Raumer'e
§ 6. THE LAND OF CANAAN AND ITS POSITION ON THE EARTH.
11
Pale»Htu, p. 396. Herder, Hegel in his Prelectimn
upon, the Philosophy of Religion, 2d part, pp. 42, 57.
EwALD, and others have contributed to a more
correct estimate of the Israelitish people. Franki's
Lihanon, the family book of poetry, forms a coUec
tion of the poetical glories, and exalted estimate foi
the Jewish people (1855).
The people of Israel must therefore from its very destination come into contact
with the most diverse nations, with the astrological Chaldees from whom the family
of Abraham sprang (Ur, Light in Chaldea. Abraham, in the starry night. Gen,
XV. 5) ; with the Babylonians and Syrians, ever oscillating between pleasure and
despair (devotees of lust and moloch) ; with the cultivated but depraved Canaanites
(Kurtz: History of the Old Covenant, I p. 120) ; with the wisdom and lifeless Cultua
of the Egyptians ; with the excitable and prudent Midianites ; with the kindred but
ritill dangerously hostile Edomites, Moabites, Ammonites and Samaritans ; with the
haughty and contracted Philistines (for whose origin, see Kurtz, p. 185); with the
skilful and ingenious Phoenician ; with the pride and haughtiness of the Assyrian and
Babylonian monarchies; with the moral intuitions, and tolerant spirit of the Persian
world-power ; with the culture and reason-worship of the Greek ; and at last with the
fateful, mighty, and cruel power of Rome. Upon this, as its fatal rock, after it had,
imder all these interchanges and influences, unfolded its whole character, in both
good and evil, it broke to pieces as to its historical form or nationality, in an exter-
minating contest between the Judaic religious, legal spirit, and the strong political,
and legal spirit of the Roman power.
§5.
THE LAND OP CANAAN AND ITS POSITION ON THE EARTE
The land of Canaan, or the lowlands of Syria, in opposition to Aram or the high-
lands (Gesenius, Lexicon, I'Js), the promised land, the Holy land, designated by many
names (Raumer's Palestine, p. 32), was appropriated as the chosen home of the chosen
people, as the land holding a central geographical position, connected with the
different countries of the civilized world by the Mediterranean sea, and yet insulated
from them (C. Rittbr : Der Jordan U7id die Beschiffung des Todten Meeres, Berlin,
1850); central also as to climate, lying midway between the debilitating tropical
heats, and those colder climates within which life is supported only by hard labor; and
central further as to its physical qualities between paradisaic fruitfulness, and sterile
wastes. But so much has been written upon this land, in so many respects different
from Asia, Africa, Europe, and yet so closely connected with them all, that we need
only refer to the literature here.
Haqenbach : Encyclopedia, p. 135. VoN Rac-
«ikr; Palestine, p. 2. 7%e Bible Atlas of Weiland
and Ackerman, 2d ed. (1845). Bernatz : Album
des heiligen Landes (1856). Bible Atlas, by Kiepert
(1858.) The plates, plans of Jerusalem, alluded to
in Raumer's Palestine. Also the Periodicals upon
this snbject. The Lands and States of Holy Scripture,
in selected engravings with an explanatory text, by
Frid'k and Otto Stradss (1861). The description
of the land in Kurtz's History of the Old Covenant,
i. p. 103. Zahn : Das Reich Oottes, i. Thl. p. 105.
ZiANQB: Life of Christ, ii. i. p. 24. Bible Diction-
aries by Winer and Zeller.
We would call special notice to the article upon
Palestine in Herzog's Real-Encyclopedia, Keil:
Handbuch der Biblischen Archdologie, p. 15 fif. Th«
Holy Land, by C. Tischendore (1862). Lasge's
Biblework upon Joshua. [Robinson: Researches,
with the maps. The articles by the same in the
BibUotheca-Sacra. The articles upon Palestine by
Thomson and Porter in the same periodical. Coli
MAN : Biblical Geography, Text-book and Atlas.
Wall-map by Coleman. Thomson : The Land ana
the Book. Article Geography in Angus' Hand-Book
Wilson : Lands of the Bible. Kitto : History of
Palestine. Travels by Olin, Durbin, Bausmaioi
12
INTRODUCTION TO THli OLD TESTAMENT.
BARTtETT: Walka about Jerusalem. Aiton: TIteHure. Bohr's Paleeiiie, Edin. (1848).
Lands of the ilesnah, London (1854). Bonar: TKt Sinai and FaUstitie. — A. G.]
desert of Sinai. Hacketi : Illustrations of Strip- \
8rAin.IT
§6.
CHBONOLOGT OF THE HISTORY OF THE OLD COVENANT, OK OF THE JEWISH PEOPLR
See Gattkber's, Ioeleb's, Brinkmeter's Chrono-
loffie. Die Biographien der Bibel (1858). Hoff-
mann : Aegyptische and fsraeliiisehe Zeiirechming
(1847). Archinard: A la Chronologic sacree^ bajiee
sai- les decouveries de Vhampollion (1841). Bibli-
sche Chronologie rmt Fortsetzung bis auf unsere Zeit,
Tubingen (1S51). Becker: Chart of Chronology,
Leipzig {1S51). Jieiirage zu.r Geschichie des Alien
Orients, by A. ton GnxsCHMiD, Leipzig (1857).
Ewald: Gesehichte des Folkes Israel, i. p. 274.
The Article Year in Winer's Bible Lexicon. Bunsen ;
Bibelwerk, i. p. 201 ff. Biblische Jahrbiicher odef
Vergleichende Zeittafeln fur die Alttestamentlichen
Geschichten vom Auazug der Israeliten aus Aegypten
bis auf Alexander den Grosser), Keil : Archaologi*
i. p. 345. [Browne : Ordo Saclorum. Waito.n :
Prolegomena. Bedford : Scripture Chronology.
The Chronologies of Usher, Hales, and Chrono-
logy, as Introductory to his Church History, bj
Jartis.— A. G.]
The Chronology of the Old Testament, as it lies in the records, was not intended for
the purposes of Science, but determined throughout by the religious point of view, to
which all geographical, astronomical, and scientific mterests are held subservient. Hence
it has been said by the author of the Biographies of the Bible, " that among the
mistakes of those who would find everything in the Bible, no one is more dangerous
and wide-spread, than the attempt to construct a chronology from its pages." In his
later investigations, however, he has seen reason to modify his judgment, and says
" In the Bible, Genealogy has far greater importance, and occupies much more space
than Chronology. The value which the Hebrews placed upon their genealogical
tables harmonizes with the w-hole system of their religion and law, and with their
expectation of the Messiah. They had their genealogists, from the time that they
became a definitely formed state, and this remarkable feature in their customs hag
acquired such a prominence, that they sometimes used the same word to denote
genealogy and history."
It is this very remarkable feature which imparts its distinguishing character, its
Hpecific religious worth, its perfection even, to Biblical Chronology. In regard to this
character the New Testament also in its dates holds closely to the Chronological
key-note of the Old Testament ; although in the Evangelists and Acts it frequently
connects the Biographical Chronology of primitive Christianity, with the Chronological
dates of contemporary general history.
We can thus speak of a scientific imperfection of Biblical Chronology, which is
perfectly consistent with its religious perfection, and which on this very account ia
of great service to the chronology of preneral history.
The first imperfection is the want or' an unbroken series of dates by years, starting
from some fixed point in the history. The second, is the absence ofa reference of the dates
in the history of Israel, to the contemporary dates of general history. The particular
enumeration of years of the Israelites are fragments, which are only joined together
with difficulty. The references of Israclitish dates to those of foreign nations, especi-
ally of the Egyptians, sustain the most diverse combinations. Hence the results .of
the later determinations of Jewish Chronology differ so widely. It is only subse-
quent to the exile that the Jews have placed tlieir mode of computation in connection
with the chronology of general history by connecting with that of the Seleucidsfe
g 6. CHRONOLOGY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE. 13
But in this precisely, consists the religious superiority of the Jewish Chronology
that it is throughout genealogical, just as the whole biblical monotheism is grounded
in the principle of personality. The Israelitish history proceeds upon the assumption
that persons, (we might say even personal freedom), are the prime forming element*
of history ; that the persons determined the facts, and not the facts the persons
Every nation, as indeed every religion, has its characteristic computation of time
through which it manifests its peculiar nature. Hence the Greek computes his
time after the Olympiads, the Roman ab nrbe condi/a, the Mohammedan from th«
flight of the prophet, with which the success of his religion was insured. The Israelite
computes time by the genealogy of the Fathers of the race (nisin), by the ages
of the Patriarchs, by the life of Moses, by the reigns of the kings. In addition tc
this there appear in the history general genealogies. But when all the Christiar
world reckons time from the birth of Christ, it only raises to its highest power tha
Old Testament principle of personality ; since the years of redemption are the years
of the universal life of Christ ; a continuous fulfilment of the word, " who shah
declare his generation ? "
But in this pecnliarity the Jewish chronology has been of essential service to
the chronology of general history. Just as generally the Old Testament has
given the death blow to heathen mythology, so the Old Testament chronology, by
fixing the antiquity of the human race to about 4000 years B. 0. (for the different
computations see the Biblical chronology, Tubingen, 1851, Preface, p. 1), has forever
refuted the fabulous chronology of various heathen nations, e. ff., the Indian, Chinese,
Egyptian. The general historical view of the periods of the development of the
human race before Christ confirms the correctness of the biblical assumption as to
the remoteness of its origin.
In Ewald's view, the determination of the yearly feasts, which was in the hands
of the priests, is of great aid in perfecting the Jewish method of computation.
To the determination of particular years, was added the regulation of the periods
of years, the Sabbath year (7 years) ; the year of Jubilee, which probably began
with the fiftieth year (see Note 3, Ewald, p. 276). Then the Exodus from Egypt
became a starting point for a continuous era, and (1 Kings vi. 1) 480 years were
counted from the Exodus to the founding of the temple in the fourth year of the
reign of Solomon. So the residence in Egypt was fixed at 430 years (Ex. xii. 40).
In establishing these points the Israelites could avail themselves of the guidance
of the Egyptian method of computation. According to Ewald, these two periods,
the residence in Egypt, and the interval between the Exodus and the building of
the temple, form the axes about which all the other determinations revolve. But
as to the relations of the ancient Israelitish history to the history of other nations,
Ewald points to the Egyptian Era of Manethon. To this Egyptian parallel Bun-
sen adds that of the Babylonian and Assyrian. After the exile the Jewish era runs
in close connection with the Persian, through the reckoning of the reigns of the
kings (Ezra iv. 24 ; vi. 15). Since the Syrian Empire the Jews fall more com-
pletely within the era of the Selencidje (1 Maec. i. 10).
It is not our purpose to form a new chronological system of the history of tha
Old Testament, but rather to vindicate the idea of Old Testament chronology.
We throw out here however some brief remarks upon the method of ascertaining
tome of the general points just alluded to.
1. It is -ipciJedly insorrect for the author of " The Dates of the Bible," in
14 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
regard to tht. chronology of the Old Testament, to place the Samaritan text of tht
Old Testament, and the Septuagint, by the side of the Hebrew text, so that from
their great diversities, he might infer that the biblical chronology was in the same
degree unreliable. It is impossible that the Septuagint should rest upon traditions
"rhich will bear comparison with those of the Hebrew text. The same is tme of
the Samaritan Pentateuch. The Hebrew text has throughout the priority, and
must therefore have the preference in any case in which they may be com-
pared.
2. It is incorrect again to attempt to rectify Old Testament declarations by
what are supposed to be diflerent declarations of the New Testament, as has been
done by Usher, Ludov. Capellus and others, more recently by Becker, in his Chart
of biblical chronology. The declaration of Paul (Gal. iii. 17) agrees with that
made (Ex. xii. 40), if we take into account that the promise was not only confirmed
to Abraham, but to Isaac and Jacob. The 430 years would thus date from the
origin of the Israelitish jjeople, after the death of Jacob, to the Exodus. It is
more difficult to explain the relation of the 450 years which the Apostle (Acts
xiii. 20) defines as the period of the Judges, to the declaration (1 Kings vi. 1),
that the period from the Exodus to the erection of the temple was about 480 years.
A diversity exists here in the Jewish tradition, since even Josephus (Antiq. viii.
3, 1) reckons 592 years from the Exodus to the building of the temple: thus as-
signing 443 years as the period of the Judges, while 1 Kings vi. ] fixes 331
years as the length of that period. Either the Apostle intimates in the i>-, that he
fell in with the traditional indefinite reckoning, or the declaration reaches back, and
includes Moses and Joshua among the Judges, (as they in fact were,) as it reaches
forwards, and includes Samuel. In the determination of the bondage in Egypt to
400 years in the speech of Stephen, it is probable that, according to the promise,
(Gen. XV. 13), the round number of 30 years at the beginning of the residence in
Egypt, was fixed as the period of the happy existence of the Israelites there, and
must be subtracted from the entire period of their residence.
3. It is not our province, nor are we in a position to criticise the assertions which
Bunsen makes in regard to the Egyptian, Assyrian and Babylonian chronologies
(compare the criticism by Gutschmid). In any case he has performed a great service
in bringing the Jewish era in relation with these chronologies ; which he has done at
a vast expense of learning and toil. We must, however, bring out more clearly the
doubt which a more complete scientific determination has to remove. In the fir.st
place, it seems without any adequate foundation that a chronology beyond the influence
of the Theocracy should be presented as an infallible measure for the biblical decla-
rations, as much so indeed, as if generally an unquestioned right should be conceded
to Josephus against the Old Testament, and Evangelic history. In the second place,
the determination upon this ground of the dates of Jewish history seems to us, to a
great extent, questionable. In the third place, it is a result which no one should
hastily concede, when the 480 years (1 Kings vi. 1), from the Exodus to the founding
of the temple are here reduced to less than 352 years. We must leave it to a special
investigation, to ascertain these points more certainly.
The most certain dates for the determination of Jewish Chronology, are those oi
Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus. The conquest of Jerusalem by the former moi.arch, or
the beginning of the Babylonian captivity, is assigned, not only by Bunsen, but bj
Scheuchzer and Brinkmeyer, to the year 586 (not 588) R. C The return of thfi
§ 6. CHRONOLOGY OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE.
Jews from Babylon, according to the ordinary computation, took place 636 B. C
according to Bunsen and Scheuchzer 538.
From that time downwards, the Jewish computation is determined by the Era of
the Seleucidae, which follows the era from the beginning of the Captivity in Babylon,
or the destruction of the first temple. It begins with the year 312 B. C. A follow
ing era, reckoning from the deliverance in 143 B. C, giv^s place igain to the com
putation used under the Seleucidae, upon which follows the present computation of
the Jews, the world era, beginning 3761 B. C, and divided into three great periods,
the first reaching to the Babylonian Captivity, the second from that event to the
destruction of Jerusalem by Titus, the third from that time to the present.
From the Babylonian Captivity, going backwards, we reach the first point in the
Jewish computation, through the sum of the reigns of the Jewish Kings. It has usually
been fixed at 387 years, and the beginning of the reign of Rehoboam placed at 975
B. C. Bunsen places it in 968, and thus, if we follow his method of determinations,
as it seems to be confirmed by the Egyptian dates of King Shishak (Sisak, who
plundered Jerusalem in the third year of Rehobt la, ) we bring out the round number
of 382 years for the reigns of the Kings. Solomon reigned forty years, and laid the
foundation of the temple in the fourth of his reign (1 Kings vi.) This would give 1004
as the date of the founding of the temple. Connecting the 480 years, the interval
mentioned between the Exodus and the founding of the temple, and the Exodus
must have occurred about 1484 B. C. It is usually placed in round numbers at 1500,
but more accurately at 1493. Bunsen, however, places the Exodus between the years
1324-1328, more definitely 1326, (Lepsius 1314.) But the confidence with which
this determination is fixed, is based principally upon the fabulous narrative by Man-
etho, of the events in the reign of the Egyptian King Mendphthah, (Bunsen, p. ccxii.)
It is not credible that the simple, sober narratives of the Old Testament, are to be
corrected by such a fabulous record as this (see Gutschmid, pp. 2, 10, 11, and 103, also,
Knobel, Exodus, 112, 116 ff. ; upon the more extended argument of Bunsen, 215, see
Gutschmid, p. 23). If we add the period of the residence in Egypt (Ex. xii. 40), 430
years, to the number (1 Kings vi. 1), the entrance into Egypt, or the death of Jacob
must have happened 1914 B. C. For the residence of the patriarchs in Canaan,
according to Knobel's computation, we may allow 190, or at the most 215 years.
Abraham must therefore have entered Canaan about 2129. Knobel is inclined to
reduce the 215 years, since in his view, the age of the patriarchs is placed too high,
but, with Beer, Koppe, Ewald, and others, defends the 430 years, as the period of
the residence in Egypt, against those chronologists, who follow the reckoning of the
later Jews, and especially of Josephus, in whose view the residence in Egypt was
only 215 years, with this remark, " that in these diverging computations too much
stress has been laid upon uncertain genealogies."
The date of the entrance of Abraham into Canaan points to a period still more
remote, which may be fixed with considerable accuracy, through the declarations in
Genesis as to the lives of the Patriarchs, and which, beyond question, gives a vastly
more probable age of the race than 20,000 years, assumed by Bunsen.
For the I'lnar year of the Ancient Israelites, see Winer's Real- mirterbuch. Article Ytar. For tkd
months, the article Months. Also Bbinkmxter, pp. 43, 44
16
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
§7.
THE NATUBAL HISTORY OP PALESTINE (PHTSIOA SACRA).
Upon this subject we refer to the works at hand.
Von Raumer's Palestine, p. 69 ; EJ:iL, p. 23, and
other Geographical works. For the literature, see
Hagenbach's Encyclopedia, p. 239.
Die Calwer Siblische Naturgeschichte may be rec-
ommended for its lirely and popular style. [Robin-
son : Researches ; The Land and the Book, by Thox
SON, a very interesting and instructive book ; Deu
Stanley's work. Upon this and all other kindred
subjects, the valuable Bible Dictionary by Soith, 9
vols. ; Harris : Natural History of tKe Bible ; 0»-
BORN : Plants of the Holy Land. — A. G.]
§8.
BIBLICAL ETHNOGRAPHY.
3m abore, § 4. Ettbti : BUKyry of the Old Covmant. ii. p. 444. Lisco : 0. T., p. 206, VolkerHum,
§9.
THE THEOCRACY.
We cannot comprehend the history of Israelitish civilization, without embraoitg
the history of its worship, which lies at its foundation ; nor this again without a prior
view of the common root, out of which spring both branches, the history both of
the worship and civilization of Israel, i. e., the Theocracy.
It is the faith of Abraham, that faith by which he left his home (Gen. xii. 1), mit
knowing whither he went, which makes him an historical personage. Israel, also, from
nameless, unhistorical, servile tribes, became the most glorious people of history through
the reception of the legally developed Theocracy at the hands of Moses, The obe-
dience of faith was the constituent principle of the people. Hence it is tht type of the
church, that one people which the gospel has gathered out of all nations. Josephus
ascribes the founding of the Theocracy, or the reign of God over Israel, to Moses ( Con-
tra Apionem ii. 1, 6, see de Wette's Archaologie, p. 179). But Moses stands to the
Theocracy, or the religious community of the Old Covenant under the immediate
guidance and control of Jehovah, just as he does to the Old Covenant itself, i. e.,
be is not the starting-point or founder, but one who develops it under its legal form :
who introduces for the people the grand theocratic principles, in the form of the fun-
damental laws of the Theocracy. The Old Covenant law or right, according to which
the Church of God, at its very beginning, recognized its conscious dependence upon
the Divine Providence, and entrusted itself with entire confidence to His marvellous
care, whil(5 it walked in the obedience to His commands which faith prompts and
works, began with Abraham, with whom the Old Covenant itself began. The symbols
of this supernatural order of things, are the starry heavens over the house of Abra-
ham, and circumcision, the religious and profoundly significant rite of his house. Abra-
ham was justified by his faith in the word of promise, and in this begins the germ-
like organic growth of the Kingdom of God, which hitherto only in sporadic portents,
like individual stars in the night, — in the saints of the earlier times — had irradiated
the night of the old world. Hence the term Theochacy, as Aristocracy, Democracy,
and similar terms, designates the principle of the government, not its form y* which ia
* Comp. Cnippn B rtVanei^nt Testa. Lanaanne, 1838, p. 79. Lanqb's opening address at Zurich treats of the sasM
iUUnctluu.
g 10. BELIGION AOT) WOKSHIP OF ISRAEL AND OF SURROUNDING NATIONS. p
designated by the terms Monarchy, Hierarchy, Oligarchy. It is not the outward form
of a political power or government. We cannot say, therefore, that the Theocracy
ceased in Israel with the erection of the Kingdom. The division of Jewish histoi,»
into the reign of God, the reigns of the Kings, and the reigns of the Priests, rests upon
an error, which confounds the distinction between the immutable Old Testament prin-
ciple of government, and the mutable political forms under which it appears. Th«
reign ef God does not exclude the reign of the Kings, as a form in which it appears !
on the contrary it blooms and flowers in its representation through the regal power oJ
David and Solomon, as before in its rejwesentation through the prophetical and judi-
cial power of Moses and Joshua, and in later times in its representation through the
priestly dominion of the Maccabean Judas and Simon. The organic principle of the
divine dominion branches itself into the three fundamental forms under which Israel
was led ; the prophetic, kingly and priestly. Hence the Providential leading of Israel,
we may say indeed, the consciousness of the dominion and leading of Jehovah, endured
in Israel, under the Kings as under the Judges, in the Kingdom of the ten tribes as in
Judah, by the rivers of Babylon as in Canaan, however much the prevailing unbelief
and apostasy of the many couid transiently obscure that consciousness; and it was
only when Jerusalem was destroyed by Titus, that despair filled the hearts of the
people, in the consciousness that for some long, indefinite period, it had been rejected
by Jehovah. But the typical form of the Old Testament theocrac)', as it was estab-
lished by Moses (Ex. xix. 6), has now passed into the real Nevsr Testament Kingdom
of God, the jiacriXua tu>v ovpavCyv, which had been already predicted by the prophets,
especially by Daniel (chap. ii. and viL). The typical appearance of a people formed
by God to the obedience of faith through His revealed word, led and protected by
Him, has reached its fulfilment in the people of God, founded by His saving virtue
and power, a holy commonwealth ; and in truth, by the word of God, united in a hu-
man, spiritual life, and led to an eternal glorious Kingdom, which, in its introductory
form, is begun here, and has its continuous, efficient organ in the Christian Church.
Thus Abraham, in his righteousness of faith, stands as the living type of the King
dom of God, but the type of the whole theocratic cultus is its altar, as the type oi
the whole theocratic civilization is the shepherd's tent.
§10.
RELIGION AND WORSHIP OF ISRAEL AND OF SURROUNDING NATIONS,
Abraham appears as an historical personage only through his religion, and the Is-
raelitish people takes its origin from religion. Other nations have formed their own
human religions in their own way, but here the divine religion, viewed in its relation
to general history, makes its own point of departure, the father of the faithful, and
the organ of its growth — the people of Israel. As the Greek tribes were formed into
a people through their Hellenic culture, and the Roman tribes through the city of
Rome and the Roman State, so in a more marked way has Israel grown to be a his-
torical j?*ople through its religious calling. Even its natural origin was conditioned
through faith (Gen. xv.).
It IS not our purpose here to dwell particularly upon the faith of Abraham an
Isaac ; we will only give those periods whioh are noticeable in m archseolo^ical point
of view. In the first place faith itself.
2
18 INTKODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
1. Monotheism and the Apostasy, or Symbolism
and its heathen form, Mythology.
2. Calling of Abraham and the heathen, or
SvTnbolical Typology, and SymboUcal Mythology.
Abraham separated from the people for their sal
ration.
8. The Patriarchal faith in its development, and
heathenism in its ramiiieations.
4. The Mosaic legal institutions, and their coiiii
terpart in the Heathen world
5. The development of the Mosaic law, and th»
idolatrous service of the surrounding nations.
6. The Prophetic elevation of the national spirit
and the Apostasy.
7. The rending of the common pubUc leligiou
spirit, and its true concentration.
Then follows the more direct solemn expression of faith, the Cultus : its pie-con
dition circumcision, its central point the sacrifice, its spiritual consecration prayer and
instruction.
The different stages of the Cultus are marked by the temporary and constantly
moving tents of the Patriarchs (simple sacrifice), the tabernacle of Moses (the legal
sacrificial system), the temple of Solomon (the fully developed liturgy), the second
tem2:)le (the martyr sorrows of the people pointing on to the real sacrifice).
All these points will be more thoroughly treated in
their proper places. For the literature of Biblical
History, see Hagknbach : Encyclopedia, pp. 189, 194,
and 197 ; for the literature of Biblical Theology, [k
200. Also Keil : Archceoloqy, p. 47.
§11.
SACRED ART.
We have already designated the sacred art as dynamic. It is clear, therefore, that
Poetry must here hold the first place, and after this the Song and Music : and then
the Sacred Chorus or religious dances. Symbolical Architecture and Sculpture close
the series, as painting seems to have been almost entirely neglected.
For a correct estimate of Theocratic Art, the following points are of importance :
1. The religious element always outweighs and controls the moral. It is framed for
the purpose of worship, not civilization. 2. The dynamic principle, as in all the theo-
cratic relations of life, is of far greater moment than the formal. 3. All Symbolic
Art has a typical signification, i. «., it not only serves the purpose of an aesthetic ritual,
and of philosophic contemplation, but by virtue of a real eflScient principle, of a seed
of true spiritual life, ever strives to give the beautiful appearance or representation
its complete corresponding reality in life.
For the literature of Hebrew Art and Music, see
Haoenbach : Encyclopedia, p. 139. Keil : Archu:-
olor/y, 2d vol. p. 182. Compare the articles Music
and Musical Instruments in Winek. Also the articles
upon the temple.
For the Hebrew Architecture, tee the article upon
tliat subject in Haoenbach : Encyclopedia; Schnaase
Gi-xchickte der bildenden Kunate, i. 241. [The ai^
tides Music and Musical Instruments in Kitto : En-
cyclopedia. Smith : Bible Dictionary. Also the Bibla
dictionaries of the American Tract Society, Presby-
terian Boards and Sunday Schoc. CJnion; Jahn : Ar
chwology. — A. G.]
§12.
THEOCRATIC LAW AND JURISPRUDENjI.
The fundamental principle of theocratic law and jurisprudence, is that esUmata
of personal life grounded in the vivid knowledge of a personal God, which leads first
to a recognition of the fully developed personal ''fe (personal rights), then to the i r-j
§ 14. THE HISTORY OF ISRAELITISH CIVILIZATION.
u
tecdon and culture of the undeveloped, or as a matter of histoiy, outraged (inarriagt
rights), then to the awakening of the suppressed (rights of strangers), and lastly to
the judgment upon those individuals and tribes who, through their unnatural sins and
abominations, have subjected themselves as persons to the curse and destruction.
See Haqenbach, p. 1S9, under the heading, Stoats-
vet'f^^sung {Michaelh^ HiHlma7in^ Saalschuiz) ; J.
SoHNELL : Da& israelitische Jiecht in seinen Gh'iind-
ziigen dargestellt, Basel (1853). Compare Keil :
Are/uBologie, ii. p. 196. [Commenkiries on the Laws
of Moiea, J. D. Micha.elis, English Translation, Lon-
don (1814), Commentaries on the Laws of the An
cient Hebrews, by E. C. Wines, 2d edition. New
York. The Biblical Encyclopedia and Dictionarie*
Jahn ; Hebrew Commonwealth, translated by 0.
E. Stowe, Andover and London ; Lowrie : The Ht-
brew Lawgiver, — A. G.]
§13.
ISRAELITISH WISDOM AND SCIENCE.
In no region is it clearer that all the developments of life among the Israelites are
preeminently dynamic, than in the intellectual. The wisdom of the Hebrews hag
upon its theocratic grounds failed to reach the true science, as Greek science, upon
its merely human grounds, has failed to reach the last and highest principles of true
wisdom. But the theocratic faith, working in its djiiamic direction, has laid the
ground for the new birth of the ante-Christian, heathen science, as it has thoroughlj
refuted the theory of two eternal principles, of the eternity of matter, or as it has estab
lished that one profound, all-pervading view of the world which rests upon the living
synthesis of the ideal and real, upon the assumption of the absolute personality. Since
science is the striving after the highest intellectual or ideal unity, it cannot dispense
with the Old Testament, if it would attain to its perfect freedom under the New Tes-
tament.
We must be careful not to confound the relation I science, with each other. For the Jewish science, set
of Theocratic Judaism, and post-CIiristian Judaism to | Keil : Archaeology, iL p. 162 ; Haoenbaoh, p. 134.
§14.
THE HISTORY OF ISRAELITISH CIVILIZATION.
Periods. — The Nomadic state — the Bondage — the Conquest — time of the settlement and agricultnn
commerce — the dispersion.
I. DOMBSTIC LlPB.
1. Marriage. — Its religious and moral signifi-
cance. The Law of Marriage, The Marriage cere- Agriculture,
mony. The Marriage state in its moral influence ! Mining,
and development. The famihj. Training of chil-
dren. Domestics. Slaves. The house.
2. The house as a tent. — The dwelling The
lillage. The market place. The city.
3. The care and ornaments of the family, —
(Sothing. Jewelry. Luxuries.
4. The work of the family. — Production.
Pastoral life. Hunting. Fishing.
6. The festivals of the family. — Hom«
pleasures and joys. Society. Sports. Hospitality.
Household sorrows. Siclmess. Death. Burials. Usagei
of mourning.
6. Food of the family. — Laws relaticg to
food. Meal times.
* We reserve the subject of Jealonay, and of the eexual offences, as indeed of the aaaomed diillonltles in the OU
reetament generally, for a separate Excursus.
20 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
n. IsKAEL AS A State.
The principle. — The Theocracy as above. 1.
The orgajiization of a community, a. The organic
anion of the tribes in the land. b. The organic
division of the land among the tribes, c. The law of
inheritance or primogeniture. 2. ITie establishment
of government. The three states or conditions. Priest-
establishment of law and jurisprudeTue, Law&
Judgments. Punishments. The place of judgment
The Sanhedrim. Law of the Zealots. [Nazarenes.—
A. G.] The Prophetic Judgments. Judgment an
act of worship.
For the literature, see Hagenbach, p. 138; Eui^
ly. Prophetic. Royal. Urim and Thummim. 3. The ii. p. 1
lU. Social Inteecouese.
1. Commerce. — Its conditions, weights, meas- i 2. Personal intercourse.— In the gate, TJaits,
ores, money. Its forms. Barter, caravans, traffic by
land, trade by sea. For the Israelitish measures,
BlBTBEAV, BUNSEN, 1. Vol.
journeys, modes of travel.
3. Intellectual intercourse. — Writings and
Uterature, theological schools, science, special
sciences, cultus.
4. Art. — See Cultus.
§ 15.
HISTORY OF ISRAEL.
See HAaENBAOH : Encyclopedia, p. 186. Lanof : I ing paragraphs upon the theological and homileti
Uatthew, Am. ed., the Introduction and the follow- | ical literature of the Old Testament.
§ 16..
THE INTERNATIONAL LAW OF THE ISRAELITES.
The root of this international law lies in the first promise (Genesis iii. 15), in tne
blessings of Noah (Gen. ix. 25), especially in the promise to Abraham: "In thy seed
shall all the nations of the earth be blessed (Gen. xii. 3-7) ; and in its fuller explana-
tion (Gen. xxii. 18), all the nations of the earth bless themselves." The first declara-
tion in what form this promise should fulfil itself, viz. through a holy Kingdom, is
found in the blessing which Isaac gave to Jacob (Gen. xxvii. 27) ; the second and more
definite declaration in the blessing which Jacob pronounces upon Judah (Gen. xlix.
8). After establishing the pre-conditions (Ex. xix. a legal separation from the nations,
and a legal association with them), Moses organized the tribes of Israel into a sacred
camp, a warlike host, destined to carry on the sacred wars of the Lord. It enters at
first upon the removing, or in a modified sense the uprooting, of a corrupt heathen
people, for the purpose of founding a free Israelitish nation.al life. The wider relations
of Israel to the nations must be determined through its contact with them — in war
and peace, according to the laws of war and treaties of peace.
The victories of David awakened in him and in 1\q people, for a time, the thouglit
that he was called, with a theocratic political power, to found a sacred world-power, to
which all nations should be in subjection. (2 Sam. xxiv.) But the thought met the
•evere punishment of Jehovah, who thus turned the miud of the Israelitish people,
before the declining of its political glory, to a spiritual conquest of the nations. Sol
omon entered this path as a Prince of Peace, and reached great results, but he rashlj
is 17 and 18 THE OLD TESTAMENT LAKGDAGES Z,
anlioipated the New Testament future, the premature individual religious freedom.
•jv'hich produced similar destructive results in Israel, with the later idolatrous intoler
arice. Since then the Jewish public mind has ever oscillated in uncertainty between
the two thoughts of a spiritual and political conquest of the world ; ever falling more
decidedly under the influence of the latter thought— which even prior to the extermi-
oatin"- Jewish wars had made them the odium generis humani ; — although the
prophets with increasing distinctness and emphasis bad made the external world-
dominion dependent upon the inward spiritual conquest of the world, and therefore
promised it only to the true seed of a spiritual Israel.
The strict legal separation of Israel from the nations stands in contrast with its
position between the nations, and its blessed intercourse with those who differed most
widely from each other, in their whole spirit and tendency.
Its Pharisaic and fanatical separation from the nations stands in contrast with its
outward geographical connection with them {See Lange : Geschichte des Apost.
Zeitalters, i. p. 208 ff.) and its mingling with heathen nations of the most diverse tend
ency and spirit.
It is by pushing its particularism to its utmost limits, that Israel has brought about
its own dispersion among the nations.
Concerning the Israelitish international law, its warfare, the celebration of its victories, and the treaV
.es of peace, see Keil, ii. p. 289 ff. [The popular works on Biblical antiquities may be consulted, but the
ioforniation which they give is — perhaps necessarily — imperfect and unsatisfactory. — A. G.]
2. The Lakguages.
§ 17.
THE PROVINCE OF OLD TESTAMENT LANGUAGES.
In determining the province of Old Testament languages, it is essential that we
should have a correct idea of the distinction between the genius of the Semitic
languages, and th.at of other languages, especially the ludo-Germanic family. It
appears from this, that the Semitic idiom, owing to its directness, heartiness, and so
to speak inwardness, possesses in a high degree a fitness to express the religious and
moral aspects of doing and suffering, the moral affections and distinctions ; while it
wants in an important sense, the opposite characteristic of indirectness and reflective-
ness. In particular, the Hebrew language, with the Greek, thus the language of the
Old Testament, with that of the New, forms the broad contrast of the most complete
direct method of expression, with the most perfect vehicle for expressing the results of
philosophic thought and reflection. But both peculiarities are fused into one, in the
language of the New Testament, as the higher new-creative form of the Septuagint.
For the literature, see Hagesbach, p. 122; Bleek: EirUeitung, pp. 37 and 103 [also Haternioi;
Introduction to th: OU Testameni. — A. G.]
§ 18.
THE OLD TESTAMENT LANGUAGES.— LEXICONS.
See the list of Hebrew Dictionaries and Con-
cordances in the Commentary on Matthew, p. 17
(Amer. ed.). J. FfiRST: Hebrew and Chaldee Die-
tuynary of the Old Testament, with an appendix
•ontaining a brief history of Hebrew Lexicography,
2 vols. Leipzig, 1857. [Second ed., 1863. English
translation by Davidson, London and New York,
1867. Fiirst does not supersede Gesenius. Comp
also B. Davidson and Bagster's Analytical ana
Chaldee Lexicon. London, 1848. — A. G.]
Z2
INTRODDCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
19.
THE OLD TESTAMENT FORMS OF SPEECH.— GRAMMARS.
Olbhaussm : Hebrew Orammar. Orammaire
B^aique de J.M. Rabbinowicz. Paris, 1862. See
Lasoe's Matthew. Am. ed. page 17. [Gesenics,
EwAtD, BcsH, Stuart, Nordhiimer, Gohaht, Tbb
GELLES, Green. — A. G.]
20.
REMARKS.
The development of the Old Testament forms of speech is pervaded throughout
by a profound, earnest, moral and religious spirit. Even if the heathen nations of
Canaan used this language, and notwithstanding all these moral treasures, have,
through their awful corruption, grown ripe for judgment, this does not alter the
fact. For these tribes may have put on the Semitic language as a strange garment,
or they may have fallen even from the heights of its spirituality, and therefore have
faUen so low. The Scripture itself testifies that their decline was gradual. We must
distinguish also between the elementary ground forms of the language, and its reli-
gious and moral development in Israel. We call attention here to a few striking exam-
ples of the profound spiritual significance of the Hebrew forms of speech, onj is in
Kal, to groan, sigh, be moved by suffering, in Niphal is to have compassion, in Piel
to comfort. The spirit of the language thus informs us, that the power to give com-
fort depends upon our compassion, and this in turn grows out of our suffering ; nni
is in Kal to eat, to consume, in Niphal mutually to devour, i, e., to carry on war ;
•]"ia is in Kal to bow, to bow the knee, to beg, to implore, in the intensive Piel to
bless, to secure one's happiness. The so-called different species have the peculiarity
that they bring into view the moral act, in all the distinctions of doing and suffering,
and of the reflecting self-determination of the man. And how rich moreover is the
Hebrew language in its expressions, fitted to convey the more direct life of the sou]
and spirit.
See Stier : Neugeordnetea Lehrgebaude der HebraUchen Sprache. For the literature of the Fbilologia
lacra, see Haoenbacb, p. 122 flf.
THIRD CHAPTER.
Fnparatory Introduction. Its constituent parts, so far as the form of the Text is concerned.
Old Testament Hermenectics.
§21.
LITERATURE.
Set Haoenbaoh: Encyclopedia, pp. 162 and 165 ff. [The principal English Worlo ire W. Van Mil
DEBT, An Inquirji into the general principles of Scripture Interpretation (Oxford) ; T. T. Conybeare'i
Bampton Leciuret ; Davidson; Sacred Hermeneutics ; Fairbairn : Hernieneutical Manual; Ernesti
Prmciplea of Biblical Interpretation, translated by C. ff. yerro^, Edinburgh (1843); Seiier: Biblical Her
wieneutics, London (1866). — A. G.]
§ 22. OLD TESTAMENT HERMENEUTICS. Sjg
§ 22.
TUB NECESSITY FOK A NEW CONSTRUCTION OF BIBLICAL, ESPECIALLY OF OLB
TESTAMENT, HERMENEUTICS.
That there is some reform needed here is clear from the fact that modem criticism,
as the assumed last sound result of the grammatical and historical explanation of the
Scripture, finds everywhere in the sacred records of the anti-heathen concrete raonothe-
iam, i. e., the Old and New Testaments, heathenish ideas or representations, or rathei
brings these same notions and representations into the whole sacred te.\t. As heathen-
ism springs directly from this, that the idolatrous mind lays undue stress upon the bare
letter in the book of creation ; that it separates and individualizes its objects as far
as possible ; that it places the sense of the individual part, in opposition to the sense
of the whole, to the analogia fidei or spiritus which alone gives its unity to the book
of nature, while it dilutes and renders as transitory as possible the sense of the
universal or the whole ; so precisely modern unbelief rests upon an exegesis which op-
poses aU analogy of faith, which presses and even strangles the letter until it is re-
duced to the most limited sense possible, while it suffers the more universal and his-
torical in a great measure to evaporate in emptj', general, or ideal notions.
As heathenism laid great stress upon the letter in the book of nature, it fell into
polytheism. The particular symbol of the divine, or of the Godhead, became a myth
of some special deity. A God of the day and the light was opposed to a God of the
night ; a God of the blessings of life and of happines.s, to a God of calamities and of
evil ; a God of the waters, to a God of the fire ; and finally, the God of one idea to
the God of another ; the God of one thing to the God of other things ; i. e., one
Fetisch to another. The final goal of Polytheism was Fetischism.
On the other hand, the grand unities of the text of nature, and with these of his-
tory, the revelations of mercy, truth, peace, and beauty were not embraced in one
living concrete unity, in the idea of a personal revelation, but were diluted into the
abstract unity of the one pantheistic one ; the one everywhere appearing and then
vanishing, formless, impersonal, divine essence. Pantheism ends, when pushed to its
legitimate consequences, in Atheism.
The two fundamental laws of human thought, a true analysis and synthesis, were
used in a false method, since they place in their room an abstract absolute analysis
and synthesis, and then to escape from the intolerable opposition, they mingled all
distinctions and combinations into a confused mass, and then separated the mass
again in the same fantastical manner. This could only issue on the one hand in a
pantheistic polytheism, and on the other in a pantheistic dualism.
Modern criticism presses the letter of scripture in a direction opposed to Cocceian-
ism. If Cocceius transforms all places in the scripture, from the seed to a tree, and
forces into it an utterance of the whole developed truth of revelation («. ff., the Prot-
evaugelium), this criticism inverts his whole method, since it circumscribes the letter
within the narrowest signification possible. Thus, according to its method, Christ,
according to the gospel by Matthew, must have ridden upon two asses at once ; the
Apostle Paul must have conceived of Christ as in his being, physical light ; John must
bave denied him the human soul and spirit, because he says : " the word was mada
flesh ; " Jehovah must have in heaven a literal palace ; and the speaking with tonguei
oust have been a mere stammering or Jarf^ou. Tlii^ i< the mere logomachy into which
24 tNTRODUCTIOX TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
this modern Talmudism relapses, like the Jewish Talmud, seeking to interpret tha
scriptures in a heathen method.
On the other hand, this same criticism evaporates the more general truths of sacrec
scripture, especially those which are at the same time historical, into mere abstract
generalities. Thus, e. g,, the birth of the Godman, is nothing more than the birth of
the theanthropic consciousness ; the resurrection of Christ only the re-awakening of
the idea of Christ ; the whole eschatology nothing more than the symbolism of the
immanent and pi'ogressing world-judgment.
The Alpha and Omega of Christianity, as indeed of all revealed religion, is the
living synthesis of spirit and nature, of idea and fact, of the divine and human, finally
of the Deity and humanity ; and the central point, the key and measure of all the doc-
trines of revelation, and of all true interpretations of scripture is the great watch-
word : " The word was made flesh."' The modern pseudological criticism consists in
the disruption of this synthesis. The letter is taken as the mere word of man, and
the historical fact as a purely human event, while, in truth, in the form of symbolical
declarations, the universal religious ideas, the eternal facts of the spirit, are brought
into Ught only through these ever varying human ideas and facts. There is no unity.
For both the personality lying at the foundation, the alpha, and the glorified personality,
the omega, are wanting ; and instead of this, there is only within the disturbing and
blinding influence of the niaterial world, the gradual progress from one ideal unknown
to another, lying still ft«rther in the region of the unknown. The last result of all
spiritual hojjes and expectations is the absolute riddle.
It must be granted that this exegetical method has its precursor in the poverty
and shortcoming of the orthodox exegesis. Even here we find to a great extent, an
extreme literal exegesis in a perpetual interchange with a fabulous allegorizing of the
scripture. What this literal exegesis makes comprehensible, and to some degree im-
presses, is the sense of the infinite importance of the biblical word, in its definite and
individual form. What, on the other hand, the whole history of the allegoric inter-
pretation of the scripture declares is, that conviction, living through all ages of the
church, of the divine fulness and symbolical infinitude of the scripture word. The
four-fold and seven-fold sense of the allegorizers of the middle ages, is the rainbow
coloring, into which the pure white light of the symbolical and ideal sense of scripture
is resolved, to the mediaeval longing and faith. But when adherence to the letter
becomes so rigid that it denies any room for poetry in the historical statement,
because it mistakes the idea, whose clothing is this symbolical poetry ; when, e. g., it
insists with stifi-necked obstinacy that the six creative days are six ordinary astro-
nomical days ; when it sees in the stojjping of the sun at the command of Joshua, a
new astronomical event : when it makes Lot's wife to become a real particular pillar
of salt, and Balaam's ass actually to speak in the forms of hmnan speech ; then it iij
justly chargeable with being dead and spiritless, and places weapons in the hands of
unbelief It is only pushing this view to its consequences, when the literal inter-
pretation involves itself in absurdity. Moving in its circuit, this same unspiritual
criticism changes the allegorical interjiretation of particular parts of the solid word»
of the bible, into an allegorical interpietation of the entire word, ami thus s])read
over the firm monotheistic ground of the holy scripture, the variegated cloud covering
of a jiantheistic view of the world and theology. Although the text sounds through-
out monotheistic, the idea must be taken in a jiantheistic sense, since the text is nothing
else than the polythei.stie dismembered form of the one pantheistic spirit. The spirit of
§ 22. OLD TESTAMENT HERMENECTICS. 2t
this criticism indeed so daringly inverts the true relation, that it transforms an entirt
historical apostolic letter, like that to Philemon, into an allegorical jjoint of doctrina
while it inversely interpi-ets an entirely allegorical and symbolical book, like th<
Apocalypse, as if we must understand it literally throughout. But the assumption of
the mythical character of the sacred books is the grand means by which this £>;iina
misty spirit of modern pantheistic ideas is bound in with the rigid crass literal sense.
In reference to the Old Testament, many theologians who are firm believers in
revelation, have iield that the theory of mythical portions could not be erroneous, if
they would not be involved in the untenable results of the literal exegesis. The
modern interpreter of the scriptures, in his explanation of large portions of the Old
Testament, thinks it necessary, as the only solution of difficulties, to choose between
the mythical, or purely literal theory. This alternative is accepted, especially as to the
creative days, paradise, the marriage of the sons of God with the daughters of men,
and points like these.
But even this alternative is fundamentally erroneous. It mistakes the ABC for the
full understanding of the principle upon which the bible is written, the truth, viz., that
the peculiar subject matter of the theanthropic revealed word must have a pecuhar
form. The bible contains airal Xeyd/xeva not only as to its subject matter, the mii-acles,
and as to its form, peculiar forms of expression, but is itselt. in whole and in part, an
aTTttf Xiyofi-ivov as to its contents, and therefore necessarily as to its form. We apply
this to the Old Testament.
The Old Testament, as containing the records of concrete monotheism, or rather
of the concrete monotheistic revealed faith, cannot contain any myths. It can and
must indeed contain historical statements, which so far and no farther, resemble
myths as the melon resembles the gourd, or the parsley the hemlock. But no one
need be deceived by the most striking resemblances.
Is it not true, in the first place, that mythology is the peculiar living garment, the
unalterable form of heathenism, especially of heathen polytheism ?
Is it not true, secondly, that the Old Testament, -nnth its monotheism, forms the
great historical antagonistic contrast to the heathen polytheism ?
Is it not true also, thirdly, as Hegel has said, that the true form can never be
separated from the contents, but must be determined throughout by them ?
But then it is inconceivable that the Old Testament should have carried out ita
antagonistic opposition to the subject matter of heathenism, by using the specific
form of heathenism, i. e., by (he use of myths.
It is inconceivable because the myth is a religious statement, in which the con-
sciousness has lost the distinction between the symbol and the symbolized idea. In
other words, the myth as such is never barely a form. In it the idea has lost itself
in the image, and is bound there until the day of future redemption. On the other
hand, the very nature of the Hebrew view and idiom consists in this, that it first
clearly grasps the distinction between God and the world, between his spirit and hie
ligns, and then establishes the distinction firmly. Hence even in all its individual
parts as a revelation of faith, it has kept itself ever awake to the consciousness of th
distinction between its images and the realities to which they correspond. To sucJi
an extent is this true, that to avoid being entangled in any one figure, even when it
is purely rhetorical, the Hebrew in some way changes his poetical statements and
expressions, a fact which appears strange to one acoustomed to the constancy with
which figures are used by classical writers, e. p., see the 18th and 21st Psalms
30 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Mythology not only elaborates iadividual figures, but strings one to another until it
forms a complete mythical circle.
Finally, the myth as such has no historical efficiency or results. It is the form oi
», passive lifeless religion. Religion, having life and activity, must have a form suited
to its inward nature.
The Old Testament, as the record of the revealed faith, contains no merely literal
historical statements, in the same sense in which profane history contains them, which
records facts for the sake of the facts, and in its practical instruction goes no further
back than to second causes, and oftentimes to those only which are most obvious aud
familiar. We must distinguish clearly between the religious history of the scriptures
and common history. Not of course in the sense that it is less historical, or less a nar-
rative of facts, but in the sense that it presents the fact in the light of its highest first
cause, its idea, its symbolical imjjort, and therefore in a somewhat poetically elevated
style. The biblical fact wears a poetical dress in its presentation, from a threefold point
of view; 1. through its relation to the fundamental religious thought or idea, in which
the writer comprehends it in the light of divine illumination ; 2. through its relation
to the fundamental religious thought of the book, i. e., its special connection with
revelation in which the writer states it ; 3. through its relation to the central thought
of divine revelation itself, with which the Holy Spirit has connected it, whether the
author was conscious of it or not. We take, e. g., the passage which speaks of the
Cherubim, who after the expulsion of Adam and Eve, guarded the gate of Paradise,
especially the way to the tree of life, with the ilaming sword. The fact is this, that
the first man as a sinner, was through the terror of God, driven forth from the original
place of blessedness which he had polluted by sin. Viewed according to the religious
thought or idea of the passage in and by itself, these terrors are angels of the Lord,
personal manifestations of the personal aud righteous God, who keeps man, guilty and
subject to death, from any return to the tree of life (Ps. xviii. and civ.). Viewed in
connection with the fundamental thought of Genesis, these Cherubim are destined to
keep man from the heathen longings after the old Paradise, and to impel him onward
to the new tree of life, the religion of the future as it came to be established in Abra-
ham (Gen. xii. 1, Go out of the land of thy fathers). Viewed, finally, in its relation
to the general spirit of the scriptures, these Cherubim introduce not only the doctrine
of '.ngels generally, but also the doctrine of the fundamental form of the Old Testa-
me>t revelation through the angel of the Lord, and the angel of the divine judgments
who is ever impelling humanity, through all history, from the threshold of the old
paradise, to the open gate of the new and eternal paradise. As to the relation of a defi-
nite fact to the special religious idea, e. (j., the expression, Lot's wife looked behind her
and became a pillar of salt, not only records, that through her indecision and turning
back she was overtaken by the storm of tire, but also contains the thought that inde-
cision as to the way of escape, begins with the first look after the old, forsaken goods of
this life ; and that every judgment of death upon those who thus turn back, is erected
along the way of escape as a warning to others. As to the relation of the particidar
expression to the individual book, i. e., the fundamental view or purpose of the author,
modern criticism would save itself a hundred vexed questions, from an inadequate
conception and treatment of the sacred text, if it would proceed from this funda-
mental thought, and thus underst-and the arrangement of particular books, what they
include and omit, their connections and transitions. These vexatious questions, e. g.,
— Which of the three evangelists is the original ? — Which of tlieni is correct ? — Wliicl'
§ 22. OLD TESTAMENT HERMENEUTICS. 21
preserves the true connection and the original expression ? would cease in a gieal
measure, if we will only concede to the sacred writer, what we usually concede t«
other writers and artists, viz. : that he has a fundamental thought — a prevailint
principle upon which he constructs his work. That the history of Joseph, e. g., ii
more particularly related than that of Isaac or the patriarchs, is closely connected
with the fundamental thought or principle of Genesis, that it should narrate the
istory of the origin of all things, dovvn to the origin of the holy people in Egyjit, aa
Jiat was brought about through the history of Joseph ; and not only the history of
the origin of this people, but of its exodus from bondage, which was inwoven with the
great crime of Joseph's brethren, who sold him into bondage. As to its connection
with the principle of scripture as a whole, this history is an expressive iraace of
divine Providence, in its relation to human innocence and guilt, as it is destined to
be the type of all the subsequent providential leadings of this nature, down to the
history of Christ.
In every particular fact, the religious idea of the absolute divine causality rises
into prominence above all natural second causes. As the heathen is entangled and
lost in second causes, so the theocratic believer must ever go back to the sovereignty
and providence of God. He does not deny the second cause, since be rejects all one-
sided supernaturalism, but clothes it in a new form in the splendor of Divine Provi-
dence. The Cherubim with the flaming sword appear later as the symbolic forms of
Divine Providence (Ps. civ.), as the Cherubim of the storm upon which Jehovah rides
(Ps. xviii.), as the seraphim, the angels of tire, who should consume the temple of hard-
ened and obdurate Israel (Isa. vi.). Even moral second causes, human freedom and
human guilt, must be placed under the divine causality, and this not according to the
assumption of a crushing fatalistic idea of Providence (Wegscheider), but according
to the fundamental law of Divine Providence itself. When the Bible records that
God hardened the heart of Pharaoh, it informs us also that Pharaoh was a despot
and hardened his own heart ; and further, that all his guilt was foreseen, and, under
the righteous judgment of God, set for the glorifying of his name in the execution
of the plan of his kingdom. That is a strong one-sided supernaturalism, which
utterly denies not only natural but moral second causes, when they are not made
prominent in the statement of Divine Providence, or, perhaps, notwithstanding they
are made prominent. For the same reasons, the authors of the books of the Bible
have not recorded all the facts of the sacred history remarkable to human view, with
the same minuteness, but only the principal points in the development of the king-
dom of God, through a given period of time. They devote themselves more to the
pictures of personal life than to the description of their impersonal surroundings ; to
the creative epochs, than to the lapse of time between ; to the turning-points of a
grand crisis, more than to the after progress and development ; rather to the great
living picture of individuals illustrating all, than to an external massing together of
particular things. The method of writing the sacred history of the Bible is like its
chronology, its view of the world, throughout living, personal, dynamic. As to the
connection of the particular books of the Bible, it is undeniable that the great pro
found, all-pervading formative element is the ideal fact of the saving self-revelatioi
of God even to his incarnation, i. «., the soteriological messianic idea. As the
direction of any given mountain range is determined by a certain concrete law of
nature: so, much more is the formation of any individual part of the Canon. But as
to its relation to the other parts, its outward connection and articulation, it cannot b«
Zb INTKODUCTION TO THE OLD TLriTAMENT.
denied that in the region of revelation, there must have been not only an inspiration of
the records themselves, but of the records in their present form, and that it is just at
one-sided to deny the traces of this inspired editing of the sacred records (Luke i
1), as to enfeeble their testimony, by the supposition of an uncanonical biblical book-
making ; of a painful and laborious compilation and fusion of diverse elements oi
parts into one.
Biblical hermeneutics cannot well deny that the monotheistic and theocratic tradi-
tions are older than the oldest written records. Neither can it deny that even since
the art of writing was known, the living discourse, the oral narrative, the revelation
through facts, is older, and in some sense more original, than the written word. But
it asserts and must assert, that the written word throughout belongs to the region of
revelation — to the very acts through which the revelation is made — and forms indeed
the acme and the limits of sacred revelation. And as to the sacred tradition, it is not
to be confounded with the idea of tradition as it is usually associated with the idea of
the myth. The sacred tradition, in its wealth of religious ideas, lies back of the myth ; the
popular tradition, in the ordinary sense of the word, lies on this side of the myth, nearer to
authentic history. The heathen myth is the heathen dogmatics, as they belong to the
earlier age of any given heathen people. The popular traditions are the heathen
ethics of the same people, an ethics exemplified in fabulous pei-sonages as they were
concerned in the chief events of that people during the transition period, from its
mythical to its historical age. We can trace this relation both through the Greek
and the German traditionary period. In the blooming period of the ethical traditions
the poetic, sceptical, trifling, even ironical transform.ation of the myth takes its origin.
We can now distinguish by certain fixed ch.aracteristics the Old Testament sym-
bolical statements from the mythical statements.
The acute attempt of Schmieder to deteimine the i minary to the Biblical history, 1837, does not lead to
relation between the religious method of writing his- 1 satisfactory results. See Lange : Positio Dogmatik,
lory, and the ordinary methods in his essay : Preli- \ p. 385.
The general distinction : — it is all true but is not all actual, — leaves the relation both
as to quantity and quality, between the ideal truth and the historical events, so un-
determined, that it will not avail to fix firmly the characteristics of Scripture, in its
distinction from all myths, as from all ordinary historical writings in which events are
traced to their causes. We have treated hitherto only of the biblical method of
writing history, but we must now treat of the biblical method of stating things
generally, in order that we may place in contrast the idea of the myth, and tl>e coun-
ter idea of the scripture word, according as they stand connected with, or opposed
to, each other.
We may distinguish the historical and philosophical (or, more accurately, physical
or philosophical) myths, and according to this distinction, we may view the Bible
word in contrast to them, as to its facts, and as to its doctrines.
The affinity between all mythology and the whole scripture, according to which
the scripture and especially the evangelical history, may be viewed as the fulfilling
of all myths; is the union of the idea and the fact, or of actual signs, or of words, to
a symbol of the eternal, in the language of poetry.
But even liere the biblica fact is clearly dislinguished from the historical myth.
The latter has the minimum of reality only, jicrliaps the mere moral longing or wish,
or it may be some facts of the popular or heroic natural life, brought by a poetical
§ 22. OLD TESTAMENT HERMENEO'TICS. 'H
symbolism into union with an idea, and made to be the bearer of that idea; while the
biblical fact always has an historical basis, whose greatness and importance is fell
throuiihout the history of the kingdom of God ; one particular event, which has reached
its peculiar definite expression in the light of its universal significance. The^biblical
fact through its ideal transparency has been raised from an individual to a general
fact, and tiius become a biblical doctrine. Its unessential individual form may have
disappeared in the splendor of its idea, but the total fact remains. On the contrary
the element of reality which lies at the foundation of the historical myth, is to sucl
an extent transformed by the ideal poetry, and its historical actuality is so far im
susceptible of proof, that it becomes more or less a question whether there is such ar.
element or not.
But as the biblical fiicts have throughout the splendor of ideal truths, so the
biblical doctrines have throughout the energy of facts. They are facts ot the active
religious consciousness, clothed with so decisive an energy and significance, that we
may view them as the eternal deeds of the Spirit, presented in the clear distinct light
of particular passages, e. ff., the Psalms, Proverbs, the Sermon on the Mount. This
historical character of efficiency is wanting in the philosophic myths. We under
stand them first, when we have rescued through Christianity the philosophical and
moral doctrines which they contain. The myth itself waits for redemption from its
bondage through the idolatrous sense, by the virtue of the scripture word. In its
free form it appears as an ancient symbol.
As to the chief distinction, we would prefer, for our own part, to distinguish in all
myths physical, historical, and religious elements, and hence would class them as
preeminently scientific, historical, or religious, as one or the other of these elements
might come into prominence.
To the style of the historical myth we would oppose the style of the Old Testa-
ment histories, to the style of the scientific (philosophical) myth the Old Testament
doctrinal writings, to the predominantly religious myth the Old Testament prophetic
word. As the preeminently religious myth forms the synthesis of the physical and
historical, so the prophetic word forms the higher unity of the historical and
didactic word. The science of hermeneutics therefore, as the hermeneutics of the
prophetic word, must bring out clearly, that in this region all the historical is in the
highest measure ideal and symbolical (e. g., the temple of Ezekiel, the concubine of
Hosea) and all the didactic is destined in its eternal actual energy and results to
reach beyond the Old Testament limits.
We trust that these suggestions for the wider culture of biblical, especially Old
Testament hermeneutics, may find useful illustration in our Biblework. But this
must be borne in mind : we hold that particular parts of the Old Testament must
remain to us in a great measure dark and inexplicable, so long as the distinction
between the ordinary style of history, and the higher religious style, is not more
firmly established, and consistently carried out. This holds true in our opinion
especially of the books of Chronicles and the book of Esther^ and, among the prophet-
ical books, of Daniel and Jonah.
Finally, as to the well-known distinction between the Semitic and Japhetic modeo
of speech, there is not only at the foundation, that misconceived and misapplied
difference, the opposition between oriental directness and occidental reflectiveness
and further the opposition between the religious and the secular or the mediate view
of the world, of the old and new time, i. e., of the spontaneous or original develop
30 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
ment of genius, aod the derivative culture of civilization ; but also the oppositioi
between the religious method of presenting history and doctrine, and the morf
pragmatic \'iew of history, and the dialectic mode of stating doctrine. It is evi-
dent, however, that such a distinction does not destroy the unity of the Spirit, the
communion of ideas and faith between the two spheres. By the faith, Abraham must
have understood essentially the same truths which auy enlightened Christian
whether a theologian or philosopher, understands to-day.
(For the promotion of Old Testament Exegesis through more correct hermeneutlcal
principles, see Appendix.)
OLD TESTAMENT CRITICISM.
§ 23.
BIBLICAL CRITICISM AND ITS RELATED LITERATURE.
Compare Hagenbach : JEncyclopedia, pp. 145, 150, 151.
Uagenbach makes the science of Introduction preliminary to that of Criticism
We hold that this order must be inverted, since Introduction is impossible without
Criticism. Biblical Criticism is the scientific examination of the Bible as to its
historical and traditional form. It decides according to historical or outward, and
according to real or inward, signs, as to the biblical origin of the sacred books,
as one whole, and as individual parts, i. e., as to their authenticity and integrity.
In the course of its procedure it passes from the examination and purging of the
text, to its construction, confirmation and its restoration to its original form.
It is thus, to follow Hagenbach, according to its sources of determination (or rules)
outward and inward, according to its results (decisions) negative and positive,
Criticism. We must observe, however, the manifold signification which has been
attached to the contrasts between negative and positive Criticism (used now in a
historical, and then in a dogmatic sense) ; between a lower and higher Criticism
(now as a question upon the integrity and authenticity, now as a decision according
to the existing witnesses, manuscripts, translations, or according to scientific com-
bination, upon the spirit of various writings and passages). There can be no ques-
tion that Criticism belongs to the most essential and vital functions of biblical
theology. It is, 1. Necessary ; 2. not merely a modern Criticism of recent date, but
has e-^isted from early time ; and 3. like every theological function, it has been sub-
jected to great errors, and requires therefore a criticism upon itself.
[There is a large class of English works here, among wiiich those of Hamilton, Jones, Walton : Prolego-
mena ; Kennicott : Dmertations ; Stuart : Ernesti ; Davidson : Criiieimt ; Gerard : Inalitvtes of
Biblical Criticism; Hoeslet: Biblical Criticism, London, 1810, may be consulted. — A. G.]
§ 24.
DESIRABLENESS OF AN ORGANON OF CRITICISM.
It is remarkable that Theology, with an immense activity of the critical processes,
IS still without any well-formed theory of Criticism. We have on several occasions
suggested that such an organon is still wanting. It should aim to establish all the
leading principles for the theological and critical process, and then to exclude all
g 24. DESIRABLENESS OF AN ORGANON OF CRITICISM. S]
officious critical assumptious. The first fuiKlainental position would be, thai
there must be an agreement as to tiie religious and philosophical criticism of
Revelation and of Christianity itself. Starting from the modern philosophica.'
assumptions of Deism and Pantheism, some have criticised exegetically and historically
the biblical records, i. e., they have mingled in an unscientific manner philosophical
and purely infidel prejudices, with real critical principles, in an unfair procedure,
thus it has occurred that the results of this critical blundering have been set forth
and commended as the results of a higher criticism of the historical view {see Lange
Apostol.Zeitalter, i. p. 9). It is most important therefore to determine first of all, in
order to meet satisfactorily the religious and philosophical preliminary questions,
whether one recognizes or not the idea and reality of a personal God, of his personal
revelation, of his personal presence in the world, and his personal communion with
the Elect, i. e., the souls of men awakened to the consciousness of their eternal per-
sonality. The organon of criticism places this recognition, or rather knowledge, at
the very portal of its system, and denies to those who reject the living idea of
revelation, the right and the power to engage in any scientific exegetical and historica,
criticism.
Then it would be the aim in this first division of the Organon of criticism, to fix
firmly the ideas of the originality, especially of the authenticity and integrity of the
Bible. The first fundamental characteristic of biblical originality is defined in the
Evangelic word, " the Word was made flesh," i. e., by the supposition that in the
whole region of revelation, we are dealing with an indissoluble synthesis of idea and
fact, i. e,, with personal life; but never with ideas without historical facts, and never
with historical facts without an ideal foundation and significance. This is the very
A B C of a sound criticism, over against which the latest spiritualistic critical fraud,
which has spread from Tubingen through a part of the Evangelical church, must be
viewed as a paganistic idealism, modified by its passage through Christianity ; and
according to which also the ultra supematuralistic interpretation of biblical history,
as a mere narration of events in their order from cause to effect, without ideal contents
or form, appears a lifeless and unspiritual. tradition of a fundamentally worldly
Empiricism. The succeeding question as to the authenticity, is determined accord-
ingly by this, that in every biblical book we must take into view its peculiar inward
form derived from the spirit of the book, as well as its historical declarations. Still
further, the different Genera scribendi must be determined as they are ascertained
from the actual appearance of the biblical books, and from the spirit of Revelation.
It is accordingly critically incorrect to insist that the book Ecclesiastes, according to
its declaration, must be regarded as the work of Solomon, since we are here dealing
with a poetical book, which may put the experience of the vanity of the world in the
mouth of the Son of David. But it is critically incorrect also to deny that the
Apocalypse is the work of John, since we are here concerned with prophetic announce-
ments, which rest expressly upon the authority of the Apostle. True poetry does
not assume a fictitious name, when it puts its words in the mouth of a symbolical and
fit personage, out prophecy would, should it resort to the same procedure. Then as
to the integrity of the biblical books, criticism must determine, as is evident fi-om the
countless variations in the text of the New Testament, and fi-om the free relation of
the Septuagint to the Old Testament, that from the earliest time the records of
revelation in the sanctuary of the church of God, were not regarded as literal and
inviolable documents, but as the leaves and words of the Spirit, and that notwitb
aa INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Standing this freedom the authentic word, as tc all essential points, was held sacred.
For with all the diiierenees of the Septuagint, it is not possible to bring out of the
Old Testament any essentially modified Old Covenant, and amid all the variations of
the New Testament, we still discern the same gospel in all its essential features.
In reference to both questions, however, it is evident from the relation of Genesis
to the original traditions, of the Gospel of L'lke to the records he had before him, of
the second Epistle of Peter to the Epistle of Jude, from the resemblance as to
thought and form in many passages between different authors (e. g., one between
Isaiah and Mic.ah), that we must explain not only the first origin and elements of the
biblical records, but also the theocratic and apostolic form in which we now have
them, as properly belonging to the region of canonical revelation.
With regard to the rules or criteria of biblical criticism, the idea of actual revela-
tion, i. e., of the effects of the living interchange between the personal God and the
personal human spirit, forms the first rule. This involves, first, the recognition of
historical facts belonging to true human freedom, as the Pantheist cannot regard
them ; secondly, the original religious facts, which are entirely foreign to Deism ;
thirdly, the specific facts of revelation as it rends asunder the suppositions of Dual
ism. Without the recognition of the historical, the religious, the theocratic heroism,
we have no rule for the critical examination of the contents of the sacred scripture.
Then, in the second place, we must fix firmly the idea of human personalitj
awakened and freed through the personality of God, as it involves a complete origin
ality both as to its own views and productions. As the Bible throughout is an
original work of the Spirit of God, so each individual book is an original work of the
chosen human spirit who wrote it. Innumerable questions which criticism is inade-
quate to solve, find their solution here. To ascribe, e. g., the production of the
second part of Isaiah to the Scribe Baruch, or to Mark the authorship of the original
Gospel, sifter which the other synoptics in a most extraordinary way have copied, or
the Epistle to the Ephesians to an imperfect impression taken from that to the
Colossians, or the Apocalypse to John Mark as its author, rests upon the failure
to estimate properly the originality of the biblical writer, the originality of his
works, and the connection between the two. It is clear th.at, with originality, we con-
cede to the writers of the Bible that thorough consistency of spirit which is peculiar
to a living, spiritually free personality.
From the originality of Revelation as a whole, in its connection with the original-
ity of the writers of the particular books of Revelation, arises the originality of the
collection of the biblical books. They are the closely connected products of one
peculiar intellectual creative forming principle ; and therefore form one complete
Canon, as they are one complete Cosmos, i. c, the organon of criticism presupposes
the analogy of faith.
But as it presupposes this analogy, it has at the same time to ascertain its essential
elements out of its fundamental thoughts, i. e., the peculiar fundamental truths of
biblical theology.
With the existence of the ar ilogy of faith, which reveals itself further m th«
analogy of the Scriptures, is determined the human side of the Holy Scriptures,
agreeably to the historical differences and manifold forms, i. e., the germ-like incipi
ence, the historical gradual growth, the regular development, the indissoluble con-
nection, finally the perfect completion of its facts and doctrines according to the
idea c f revelation.
g 26. CRITICAL QUESTIONS IN THE TREATMENT OF THE OLD TESTAJIE.NT a3
§ 25.
THE PRINCirA.L CRITICAL QUESTIONS IN THE TREATMENT OF THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Tn the introduction to the Old Testament the following important critical que*
tions hold a prominent place: the unity of Genesis, the Mosaic authenticity of the
Pentateuch, the authentic historical character of the historical books following the
Pentateuch, the age of Job (also as to its historical basis), the limits as to time of the
collection of the Psalms, the authenticity of the writings of Solomon (and tho import
of the Song in particular), the relation between the first and second parts of Isaiah
(ch. xl.-lxvi.), between the Hebrew text of Jeremiah and the text of the Septuagint,
between the book of Daniel and Daniel himself, the import of the book of Jonah, and
filially the relation ot the first part of Zcchariah to the second (ch. ix.-xiv.).
The ecclesiastical and theological interest in these questions will be essentially met
and satisfied, if, in the first place, genuine historical records of revelation, flowing from
the time at which the revelation was made, are recognized as the foundation, iind to
some extent essential component parts, of the writings in question ; and if, in the second
place, it is firmly held that the bringing of these records into their present form took
place on canonical ground, within the sphere of Old Testament revelation, under the
direction and guarantee of the prophetic Spirit. Under the energetic influence of
these two positions, the canonical faith in the Bible, and a free critical examination,
have approximated each other, ami under their more perfect influence they will cele-
brate their full reconciliation. And if in the process some prejudgments of the
ecclesiastical tradition must be conceded, so criticism in its turn must yield up a masa
of thoughtless errors and exaggerations. Traditional theology will come into liberty
through a proper estimate of the historical character of the biblical books ; and
criticism itself will be freed from the mistakes into which it has thoughtlessly fallen
through a low estimate of the ideal contents of the sacred writings.
^^lthou<?h there is much in Genesis in favor of the distinction of Elohistic and
Jehovistic records, yet the fact made prominent by Hengstenberg and others cannot
be denied, viz., that the names Eloliim and Jehovah are throughout so distinguished,
that the one prevails in those passages which speak of the general relation of God to
the world, the other in those in which the theocratic relation of God to his people and
kingdom rises into prominence. This contrast, embraced by the unity of the con-
sciousness of faith in revelation, not only runs through the Pentateuch, but appears
in a marked form in the opposition between the general doctrine of wisdom as viewed
by Solomon, and the Davidic theocratic doctrine of the Messiah. It pervades the
Old Testament Apocrypha, in the New Testament celebrates its transfiguration in the
contrast between the Gospel of John, his doctrine of the logos on the one side, and
the synoptical and Petrino-Pauline view on the other ; and finally, in the opposition
between the Christian and ecclesiastical dogmatism, and the Christian and social human
itarianisra, runs through the history of the church, manifesting itself in the Reformation
through the twin forms, Luther and Melanchthon, Calvin and Zwingle. The full
influence of the increasingly perfect view of the great harmonious oppositions or con-
trasts in revelation, and the history of revelation, upon the minute analysis of tht
biblical test, is yet to be OAperienced.
On the present state of the investigation, see Bleee : EinUUung, p. 227 £
S4
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
As to the Pentateuch, we recognize the following limiting positions of Bleek, while
we differ from him in many particulars: 1. That there are in the Pentateuch very
important sections which were written by Moses and in his time, in the very form io
which we now read them. 2. That Moses did not compose the Pentateuch, as one
complete historical work as it lies before us. The clearest instance in favor of the
last position is obviously the record of the death and burial of Moses (Deut. xxxiv.). Am
to the marks in Deuteronomy which point to a later origin, we must bear in mind
that Moses was not only the Lawgiver, but the Prophet, and that at the close of his
career in life, in the solemn review of his work, he would have a motive to prophetic-
ally explain and glorify the particularism of that economy which he had founded un
der the divine direction, by bringing out into bolder relief its universal aspect, which
he does in Deuteronomy. In the essential portions of Deuteronomy, which we ascribe
to Moses, he obviates, as far as possible, that pharisaic particularism which might
grow up from a barely legal and literal interpretation of the books of the law, Exo-
dus, Leviticus, and Numbers. Deuteronomy is the repetition of the law, under the
illumination of the prophetic spirit, in the light of the future of prophecy.
As to those older records quoted in the Old Tes-
tament itself, as a basis for its statements, compare
Bleek, p. 148 ff. We refer here to 1. ITic book of
the wars of Jehovah (Numbers xxi. 14, IB, compare
V. 17, 18 and 27-30); 2. The book of Jasher
(Josh. X. 13; 2 Sam. i. 18); 3. The book of
the history of Solomon (1 Kings xi. 41) ; 4. 1 Chron.
xxix. 29, 30, for the history of David, a. The book of
Samuel the seer, b. The book of Nathan the prophet,
c. The book of Gad the seer ; 6. For the history of
Solomon, 2 Chron. ix. 29, a. The prophecy of Ahijali
the Shilonite, b. the book of Iddo the seer against
Jeroboam the son of Nebat ; 6. For the history of
Relioboam, 2 Chron. xii. 15, the book of Shemaiah
the prophet and Iddo the seer ; 7. For the history
of Abijah, 2 Chron. xiii. 22, the story (commentary)
of the prophet Iddo ; 8. There are constantly cited
in the books of Kings : a. The book of the history
of the Kings of Israel ; b. The book of the history of
the Kings of Judah. The latter seems to be that re-
ferred to in the books of Chronicles, as the book of
the Kings of Judah and Israel : cited also 2 Chron.
xxiv. 27 ; 9. 2 Chron. xx. 34. The historical book of
the prophet Jehu, which is inserted in the book of
the Kings of Israel ; 10. 2 Chron. xxxii. 32, a book of
Isaiah, upon the Kings of Judah and Israel; 11.
For the history of Manasseh, the histories or sayingt
of Hosai or seers; and in 1 Chron. xxvii. 24, a book
of the Chronicles of David the King.
If the jjost-Mosaic historical books of the Old Testament are rearrangements of
original records, which belong to unknown authors, still the supposition of contra-
dictions, of mythical portions, of the extremely late dates assigned as the time of
their origin, is closely connected with a failure to estimate their more recondite histor-
ical relations, and their ideal and symbolical aspect. This is esiiecially true in regard
to the judgments formed upon the two books of Chronicles, and the book of Esther
That in the military sections of the book of Joshua he alone is spoken of, while in
those which j-ecord the geographical divisions of the land, Eleazer acts with him ,
that in one place the official elders and judges cooperate, and in another the natural
heads of the tribes; that under the military point of view the tribes are otherwise
described than under the geographical, — these are distinctions groimded in actual
differences.
In the long period which the book of Judges embraces, the orthodox criticism
obviously injures its own cause, when it denies the basis of more historical sources;
«nce the 8up])osition of such sources, so far from weakening, actually strengthens the
trustworthiness of the book. That the point of view of the episode, ch. xvii.-xxi.,
is untheocratic, is entirely untenable.
Th(! two books of Samuel, which are i)lainly distinguished by the contrast between
§ 26. CRITICAL QUESTIONS IN THE TREATMENT OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 3S
Saul and David, the rejected King, and the man after God's own heart, point back
through their ingenious and throughout characteristic style, to rich original recordi
lying at their source. The books of Kings and Chronicles refer in various ways to th«
records upon which their statements rest.
The books of Ezra and Nehemiah bear these names especially (as the books of
Samuel), only because they speak of these men. This is obvious, first, because they
were originally bound in one whole, and secondly, because in their present form the}
contain portions which point to a later date. It is equally clear that the original part
of these books must belong to the men whose names they bear.
The book of Esther, in the regulations for the feast of Purim, refers back to a re-
markable historical event. It contains too many historical indications to be regarded
with Semler as fiction, and too much which appears literally improbable, to be re-
garded as pure history. It is probably the fruit of a fact, represented allegorically for
the illustration of the truth, that the true people of God, even in its dispersion, ip
wonderfully preserved, and made victorious over the most skilful assaults of its
enemies.* In this respect the book of Esther forms a contrast with the book of Jo-
nah, which also represents allegorically a wonderful event, in order to illustrate the
mercy of God to the heathen, and in opposition to the narrow-minded exclusivenesa
of the Jews. Hence we are able to explain the fact that the name of God does not
occur in Esther, as indeed it scarcely occurs in the Song.
The connection of an allegorical and poetical explanation, with the basis of histor-
ical fact on which it rests, is now generally admitted in reference to the book of Job.
But here the character of a didactic poem comes into prominence. In the critical
examination of this book, doubts in regard to the speech of Elihu will have to yield to
any profound insight into its nature, since it obviously forms the transition from the
preceding speeches, to the closing manifestation of God. From its universal charac-
ter in connection with its theme, the innocent suifering of Job, it is well-nigh certain
that its origin belongs to a time when the glory of Israel, culminating in Solomon,
was on the decline: the time of the fading glory of the Kingdom.
That the Psalter in its original portions belongs to David, as the Proverbs to Sol-
>mon, is conceded even by the modern criticism. But it is evident from the division
-nto five books, that the collection grew gradually to its present form. The existence
of Psalms originating during the Exile is beyond question (Ps. cii., cxxxvii.). But the
attempt to place a large part of the Psalms in the time of the Maccabees, has been
triumphantly refuted by Ewald and Bleek (Bleek, p. 619). The supposition that
the heroic uprising of a people for its faith, must always have as its consequence a
corresponding movement of the poetic spirit, is groundless. The Camisards, e. g.,
have sung the Old Testament Psalms of vengeance. But the Maccabees stand in a
similar relation of dependence upon the Old Testament Canon, as the Camisards.
Solomon stands beyond question as the original prince of proverbial poetry, as
David is the first great master of lyric poetry. They shared in founding the highest
glory of the sacred poetry and literature of Israel, just as they shared in the highest
[* The internal cliajacter of any book must of course have great weight in deciding the question whether it is to be
reoeived as the word of God or not ; but having so received it, the mere improbability to us of the events it narrates wiU
not justiiy us in holding that to be an allegory which claims to be a history. This is certainly dangerous ground on
which to stand. For if the mere fact that there is .so much that is improbable here, authorizes us to assume that the booh
Is an allegorical representation of an important and precious truth, it will be easy to reduce large portions of the Biblioa.
Historv to allegorical renreaentations. Nor is the supposition in any sense necessary here, since the narrative, viewed HI
ateral history, teaches the same truth with eaiial or greater force.— A. O.I
96 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMEPn-.
glory of the theocratic and political kingdom — in war and peace. They have indeed
through their sacred poetry transferred the typical character of their political power
into a prophecy of the true Messianic Kingdom, militant and peaceful. But just as the
later Psalms have been grafted on to the original stock of the Davidic Psalms, so
later proverbs have been added to the collection of Solomon. (1 Kings v. 12 fl") On
this ground the didactic poem — the Preacher of Solomon — in the use of poetical license
is represented to be the work of Solomon. That the book is of later origin is cleai
both from its language and its historical relations (Bleek, p. 642). That the Song
also is not correctly attributed to Solomon as its author may be inferred from it?
fundamental thought.* The virgin of Israel — the theocracy — will not suffer herself
to be included among the heathen wives, religions, as the favorite of Solomon,
but ever turns to her true beloved, the Messiah who was yet to come. We hold,
therefore, that this poem takes its origin in that tlieocratic indignation which the
religious freedom of Solomon — going in this before his time — and his uumerous mar-
riages through which he mingled with heathenism, occasioned. We may trace clearlj
the expression of a similar sentiment in the nuptial Psalm. (Ps. xlv. 11—13.)
Modern criticism doubts less as to the originality and authenticity of the Prophetic
writings. But it exercises its analyzing activity especially upon the prince of all Messianic
prophets, the Evangelist of the Old Testament, Isaiah. We pass over here the dif
ferent exceptions which have been made in the first part of the book which is re-
cognized in the main as belonging to Isaiah (ch. i.-xxxix.). We remark in general that
all critical grounds growing out of the prejudice against any prediction are un worth j
of notice. The whole first part is throughout organically constructed upon that pro-
foundly significant fundamental thought of the prophet, viz., that out of every judg
ment of God there springs to the same extent a corresponding redemption, so that
we cannot easily assign the construction of this main part to a stranger. As to the
second part of the book (ch. xl.-lxvi.) we hold that the collected reasons urged against
its genuineness wUl not stand the test. The first reason is this : the prophet would
in these prophecies have placed himself upon that, to him, far distant standpoint of
the Babylonish captivity as in his historical present, in order from that point to pre-
diet events still more distant in the future. This is not the method of the prophets,
but it is the method of the Apocalyptics. If we distinguish the definite, artistic form
of the apocalyptic vision from the more general form of prophecy, the first distinctive
feature, as to form, is clearly the all-prevailing artistic construction, with which a
poetical and symbolical expression corresponds. The second distinctive feature, as to
form, appears in the regular progress from epoch to epoch in such a way that the seer
ever makes the new point of departure in his vi3ion, his ideal present. This latter
formal distinction points to the first real, or material distinction between the two.
Apocalyptic prophecy, more definitely than general prophecy, looks beyond the first
I* In reg^ard to the authorship of these books there is a wide diiferenco. The name of Solomon appears in the title to
the Song, it does not in that to the Preacher. There he comes into view as Kohdeth, a term which, as Henfrstenberg
argues with great force, shows that he is viewed only in his representative character, as the highest Old Testament re-
presentative of divine wisdom, in distinction from mere worldly wisdom. The real author of the book puts these wordi
Into his mouth, as one who was well known to hold this position. Those to whom the book came wouhl understand this at
once. There is more here than mere " poetical license." Ileneslenberfj thinks that the book does not profess to be fnna
Solomon. But the .Song does. And the title here is confirmed, 1. liy the (reueral cuirectness of the titles ; 2. By the his-
torical references in the Song which point to the time of Solomon; 3. liy the entire thought of the poem itself. Even
Lange's view as to its fundamental thought does not justify the inferences which he draws fiom it. For there is nothing
imnatural in the assumption that Solomon himself should have felt " the theocratic indignation * against his own crrori
■nd sins, or that tho Holy Spirit should have used his experiences in giving form and expiession to the truths len
taiw|bt.-A. 0.1
5' 25. CRITICAL QUESTIONS IN THE TREATMENT OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 31
restoration of Israel and the first coming of the Messiah, to the final restoration and
completion. But with the more developed Christology, is closely connected a clearei
and more definite statement of the great Antichristian power, which enters betweer
the first and second coming of Christ.
We regard then the second part of the book of Isaiah (ch. xl.-l.xvi.) as the first
Old Testament Apocalypse. That pecaliar and easily distinguished part of the
prophecy of Jeremiah (ch. xlv.-li.) is clearly an apocalypse representing especially
the typical Antichrisliau power. The apocalypse of Ezekiel presents in contrast
the deep valley of death (and indeed the valley of death of the people of God stiU
lighted by hope, and that of Gog and Magog into which hope sheds no ray of
light) and the high mountain of God with its mystical temple thereon (from ch.
xxxvii. to the close of the book). The book of Daniel is one peculiar Apocalypse.
Among the minor prophets, Obadiah, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah, may be
viewed as apocalyptic books, which portray in a peculiar style the judgment of
God upon Antichrist, as whose type, the first regards the people of Edom, the second
Nineveh, the third Babylon, while the last sees the day of wrath breaking out upon
the whole Antichristian jjower of the Old world. Edom is viewed also as the type of
Antichrist in Isaiah (Ixiii. 1-6) and in Jeremiah (xlix. 7-22). The entirely apocalyptic
nature of Gog and Magog in Ezekiel (xxxviii., xxxix.) is recognized and fixed in its place
in the New Testament Apocalypse (ch. xx. 8), as indeed the stream issuing from the
temple (Ez. ch. xlvii.) is there again taken up in its New Testament completion. As to
the time which Isaiah in the second part of his book views as present, he has the pro-
phecy of the Babylonian exile (ch. xxxix.) as a presupposition. He takes his departure
from this. In a similar way we find the future viewed as present in the Apocalypse
of John ; indeed, in the form in which he introduces the vision, I saw, the whole
eschatological future in ideal progress passes before him. The most serious difliculty
which meets us, in the second part of Isaiah, is the prediction of Cyrus by name, un-
less Cyrus is a symbolical and collective name. As to the diflerences in style, it would
be a matter of some moment if the first part was marked by a soft, flowing expression,
while the second was more intense, fiery, violent. But as the reverse is the case, the
style of the first part belongs evidently to a young man, that of the second to riper
years. Now and then indeed the youthful, ingenious play upon words, which marks
the first part, appears in the second. It has been objected, that, upon the supposition
of the genuineness of the second part, it is impossible to explain why in the justification
of the threatenings of Jeremiah (ch. xxvi. 17, 18), the elders did not refer to Isaiah
as well as to Micah. But if according to tradition Isaiah suffered martyrdom in his
old age under Manasseh, such a reference would have been out of place. That re-
ference to the example of Micah seems to say, pious kings would never allow a bold,
true prophet to be executed. The king of .lereraiah still claimed to be a pious king.
The example of Manasseh therefore (we speak only of the possibiUty that the tradi-
tion was true) could neither be a proper measure, nor a fitting reference iu the case.
In favor of its genuineness we present the following argument. Men of the in-
tellectual heroism of the authors of the second part of Isaiah, and the New Testament
Apocalypse, cannot attribute their ui rks to a name already renowned, if these works
are presented as historical or prophetic testimonies. They must from their greatness
stand in their own time as acting persons, who could not conceal themselves if they
would, and would not if they could. A city set on a hill cannot be hid. There is
the widest difference between the wretched apocryphal works, and such works ol
88 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
the highest grade in their kind. It is entirely another case also, when a poet intro
duces some historically renowned person as speaking. In his own time he was know»
generally as an author, and if a later time is not careful to preserve his name, but
allows a poetical speaker to take his place, that is a peculiar literary event, fi-om which
no general principle can be drawn. As to the case of the poems of Ossian, McPherson
owes his best thoughts to the old Celtic popular songs ; his mystifying of his content'
jioraries was connected with peculiarities of character, of which we find no trace ia
the canonical apocalyptics.
For the difference between the Hebrew text of Jeremiah and the teit of the Septuagint, compare
Bleee, p. 488.
Our point of procedure in the decision of this question is the principal difference,
viz., that the Septuagint inserts the peculiar Apocalyptic close of Jeremiah (ch. xlvi.-
li.) after (ch. xxv. 13). We regard this interpolation as a decided weakening of the
peculiar significance and importance of that whole section ; and we think that as with
this chief point of difference, so all the others must be decided in favor of the Masoretio
text.
Since the prophecy of Daniel, as a whole, makes the impression of an apocalyptic
work, retaining its unity throughout, this circumstance must not be left out of view
in the critical examination of the book. It does not however enable us to decide
between the original predictions of the prophet, and the casting of them into their
present form. Three cases are possible. First, that a later prophet has attached his
visions to the name of the historical Daniel. Against this supposition see the re-
marks above upon the second part of Isaiah. Secondly, it may be held that some
later person has wrought the original prophetic works coming down from Daniel, into
a new apocalyptic form. The perfect unity between the contents and form of the
book lies against this supposition. Then it remains that the book must be from
Daniel himself The diflSculties which oppose this supposition are the following :
1. Why does the book stand among the Kethubbim and not among the prophets? It
seem? probable, that at the time of the collection, the highly apocalyptic nature of the
book, which connects it closely with sacred poetry, determined those who formed the
collection to distinguish it from the prophets in a narrower sense, with their less
highly colored apocalyptic works. It may be urged in favor of this, that it has been
interpolated by portions,* — most probably at the time of the Maccabees — which in
their style are plainly in contrast with the rest of the book. The entire paragraphs
(ch. X. 1 to xi. 44, and xii. 5-13) are thus interpolated. Grave circumstances of
the time have probably occasioned this interpolation, drawn from actual appearances
m history, as also an interpolation in the second Epistle of Peter (ch. i., xx.-iii. 3) from
the Epistle of Jiide, was occasioned by similar circumstances. It grew out of this
interpolation, that the book should have its place among the Kethubbim, if it had not
always stood there. 2. Why has Jesus Sirach (ch. xlix.) not even named the book of
Daniel ? — This would be decisive certainly, if there were not generally serious de-
ficiencies in this author, and if in making his selection he had not in his eye those men
who had gained renown, in respect to the external glory of Israel. In his view Daniel
had by far a too free — unrestricted by Jewish notions — universal character and tepd
•?ncy. 8. Why do we not find some trace of the use of Daniel by the later prophets I
111 this connection it should be observed that the four horns (Zech. i. 18) and th«
• [Compare, however, upon thle point Henosteniirro : Authentic dea Damiel,~~A. G.l
8 26. CRITICAL QUESTIONS IN THE TREATMENT OF THE OLD TESV/xMENT. 3J
four cpposers of Zion (Zech. vi. 1) appear certainly to presuppose the representation
of th£ four world-monarchies (Dan. ch. ii. and vii). And so also the more deiinitt
revelation of the idea of a suffering Messiah in the second part of Zechariah presup-
poses the previous progress of that idea in prophecy (Isaiah liii. ; Daniel ix. 26),
4. The difficulties which some have raised from the historical particularity of ch. x.
and xi , are met by the supposition above — that these chapters are a part of the in-
terpolation. The intimation of Antiochus Epiphanes, in the little horn (ch. viii.), con-
tains certainly a striking prediction, although not a prediction of Antiochus Epiphanea
himself, but of that one despotic Antichristian power which should arise out of the
third world monarchy (not out of the last) which was fulfilled in that Antiochus
But it is certainly incorrect to identify the preliminary Antichrist Antiochus (ch. viii.
8) with the Antichrist imaged in ch. vii. 7. This last springs out of the ten horns
of the fourth beast. On the contrary the goat (ch. viii.), i. e., the Macedonian
monarchy, has one horn, out of which come the four horns, the monarchies into which
the kingdom of Alexander was divided. Since the number/bwr is the number of the
world, this can only mean that the one, third-world power should divide itself into
its chief component parts. With this goat of four horns, whose form is clearly de-
fined throughout, the fourth animal (ch. vii.), whose form is very indefinite (and in
which, in the face of the modern exegesis, we recognize the Roman world power), haa
no resemblance, but the third animal (ch. vii.), the leopard with his four wings of a
bird, and the four heads. The wings of the leopard correspond to the swiftness of
the goat, and the number four of his wings and heads with the four horns of the goat ;
while the fourth animal (ch. vii.) has ten horns. The image of uhe final Antichrist
(in ch. vii.) and of his judgment is much more significant than the image of the typi
cal Antichrist (ch. viiL) and his judgment — which forms only an episode.
Since at the time of Antiochus Epiphanes the Maccabeean family of the tribe ot
Levi gradually attained regal power, and therefore the announcement of the Messiah
out of the tribe of Judah must have been thrown into the background {see the timid
clause in favor of the future Messiah, 1 Mace. xiv. 41), it is very bold in the critics to
refer a book so full of the Messiah, and in which all hope in any temporal Jewish
dynasty disappears, to this very period of the Maccabees.
In regard to the controversy as to the authenticity of the second part of Zechariah
(ch. ix.-xiv.), it deserves to be considered, that the first suspicions against this section
arose out of a purely theological misunderstanding. Since the quotation of the pro-
phet Jeremiah by Matthew (ch. xxvii. 9, 10) is not found verbally in Jeremiah, but
appears to be taken from Zechariah (ch. xi. 12, 13), Mede conceived that the section
(Zech. ix.-xi.) was written by Jeremiah. But Matthew actually intended to refer to
Jeremiah, since for his purpose the chief thing was the purchase of the potter's field,
of which he found a type in the purchase of the field at Anathoth made by Jeremiah
'ch. xxxii.). In this citation he now inserted the allusion to the passage in Zechariah
which speaks of the thirty pieces of silver, without any express reference to it («ee
Lange: Leben Jesu, ii. Bd. 3. Thl. p. 1496). Out of this erroneous supposition that
Zech. ix.-xi. must have been written by Jeremiah, has arisen the prevailing question
as to the second part of this prophet. Later, it was not so much the New Testament
citation, as a collection of internal marks, which occasioned the doubt of the critics.
But the criticism is so unfortunate as to undertake to transfer the second part of
Zechariah to a much earlier date, and hence comes into collision with an important
principle of biblical hermeneutics.
10
IMTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
The principle is this : The great biblical idea makes no retrograde movement in the
course of its development, i. e., no movement from a more to a less developed, oi
from a more to a less definite, form. But as it would be a retrograde movement of the
Messianic idea, if the Servant of the Lord (Isa. liii.) should be taken merely for a col-
lective name for the prophets, while already a definite developed announcement of a
personal Messiah existed in the first part of Isaiah, so it would be a much more strik-
ing retrograde movement of the Messianic idea, if the second part of Zechariah were
to be regarded as an earlier composition than the first. For here, in the second part,
we have nearly a continuous biographical portraiture of the personal Messiah in typical
images. In ch. ix. 9, the Messiah comes to his city Jerusalem as an humble king of
peace, riding upon a peaceful animal, the foal of an ass; in x. 11, he goes before his
returning people through the sea of sorrow, beating down the waves of the sea ; in
xi. 12 he is as the shepherd of his peojjle valued at thirty pieces of silver, and the
silver pieces were left in the potter's chest {see Lange: Leben Jesu, ii. 3, p. 1494); in
ch. xii. 10 is the deed done, because one has pierced him, and they begin to mourn
for him as one mourns for his only son ; in xiii. 6, 7, he complains : lo ! I have been
wounded in the house of my friends ; the sword has awakened against the shepherd
of God ; the flock is scattered, and now he gathers his little ones ; in xiv. he appears
for judgment upon the Mount of Olives ; it is light at the evening time ; a new holy
time begins, in which the bells upon the horses bear the same title as that upon the
mitre of the High Priest : " Holiness to the Lord."
The critics propose to transfer this fully developed Christology back to the time
of Uzziah, when the doctrine of a personal Messiah began to unfold itself If some
critics remove the section in question to a later date, or divide it into two parts and
two periods, they do not change the case at all. They still deny the above-quoted
fundamental principle of hermeneutics. If they turn us to the fact that the symbol-
ism, which so clearly marks the first part, is less prominent in the second, we may
remark the same receding of the symbolic text in Jeremiah and Hosea. But if ch.
X. 6, 7, speaks of the kingdom of Judah and Israel as still in existence, ch. xii. 6 of
Jeinsalem as still standing, it must be observed, that for the symbolical, not for the
purely historical, view of the prophet, these forms are permanent in the kingdom of
God. We can only refer briefly to the fixct, that, with respect to the original mysteri-
ous coloring, their obscurity and profoundness of statement, and other similar marks,
the first and second parts of Zechariah have the same type and character.
§ 26.
CRITICAL AIDS FOR ASCERTAINING AND CONFIRMING THE INTEGRITY OF THE BIBLICAL
BOOKS.
Here belong the records which form the internal
hutory of the text of the biblical books : the Hebrew
M>xt. the SanMritan Pentateuch and the translations,
tlie Chaldee paraphrases, the Greek translations, thi
Vulgate, the Masoretic text, and the printed text
Compare Bleek: EinUiiung, p. 746 S.
} 2f ELEMENTS OK THE HISTORICAL A_ND CRITICAL SCIENCE OF INTRODUCTION. 4)
FOURTH CHAPTER.
Historical and Critical Exegetics in the tiarrower sense, or the human side <if tht
Holy Scriptures : the Holy Scripture as Sacred Literature.
§ 27.
LITERATURE OF THE HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL SCIENCE OF INTRODUCTION.
See Bleee : Einleitung in das Alte Testament, p.
5; Keil ; Einleitung in das Alte Testament, p. 6;
Haoenbach : Encyclopedia, p. 139 ; Hartwig : To-
bellen zur Einleitung in die kanonischen und apo-
kryphitchen Sucker des Alten Testaments, Berlin
(1856, p. 1 ); [ Haternick : Introduction, of which
there is an English translation ; Borne : Introduction ;
the recent edition. An Introduction by Prof. Stowe
of AndoTer. — A. G.]
§ 28.
ELEMENTS OF THE HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL SCIENCE OF INTRODUCTIOJJ.
The two essential elements of exegetics, both in reference to the Old Testament
and the New, are general Introduction, or the history of the contents of the books
in question, of the Old and New Testament Canon, and special Introduction, or the
history of particular books. We now inquire in what order these parts should scien-
tifically be placed. De WettP places general Introduction first, and this seems to be
Bystematic. On the other hand it appears more scientific, according to the genesis
of the Canon, to treat first of individual books and then of the whole. Hagenbacb
says the method of Reuss is preferable, but Reuss in his introduction to the New
Testament furnishes a general substructure for the literature of individual books.
This is undoubtedly the correct method which Bleek and Keil have followed. First
we have the fundamental Introduction, which treats of the historical region, origin,
character, limits, and means (language and writing) of sacred literature. Upon this,
special Introduction proceeds in its work, as it treats of the history of particular books.
Finally ^rewera^ Introduction embraces all the results attained, in the history of the/brm-
ation of the Canon, in the history of the preservation of the Canon, in the history of the
text, in the history of the spread of the Canon, of translations, in the history of the
explanation of the Canon, or of the exposition or interpretation of the scriptures, and
m the history of the energy and results of the Canon, for which still the greater part
remains to be done.
In regard to these different elements we must here limit ourselves to a few sug
gestions.
As to the introduction which is fundamental, in that it underlies both special and
general, the first question is as to the sphere of revelation, as to the ground and limits
ivithin which the sacred literature has grown up ; then as to the homogeneous rela-
I ion of the sacred word, as the word of the Spirit, to the scripture, as the language
of the Sjjirit ; then as to the specific character of the sacred writings as such, of theii
limitations, or of their opposition to apocryphal writings ; and then finally of the
means used in its formation, of the language itself, and of the art of writing, in theii
reciprocal influence and development.
«3
INTRODtJCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT
The history of the individual books must be introduced by a definition and distino
tion of the ditFerent modes of statement, the historical, poetic, didactic, and jirophetio,
ments in den Jahrbiichem fiir Deutsche Theologia
1858 (iii. Heft, p. 419) Sf. ; Keil, p. 638 ff. ; Bunsem
p. 51. [Lakdner's Credibility, Jones, Wordswortb
Alexander, Gadssen, McClelland, on the Canon
—A. G.]
For the critical part of this history, compare the
paragraphs upon criticism above. For the or-
ganic part, see the following paragraphs. For the
History of the Old Testament Canon, compare Bleek:
Einleiiunff, p. 662. A. DillmaiNN : Ueber die Jlil-
dung der Sammlung keiliger Schri/ten Alien Tesia-
On the history of the text, see Bleek, p. 71'/; Keil, p. 567.
This history for a long time runs parallel with the periods of Hebrew literature. We
may distinguish a Jewish period of the history of the text, in the behalf of Christians,
and a Christian period, in behalf of the Jews. The first period may be divided again
into the period in which the canonical text assumed its present form, the period of the
formation of the Synagogue manuscripts (Babylonian writings), of the Targums, of the
Talmud (division into Parasha and Haphtora), of the Masora (punctuation), of the
Hebrew grammarians, and of the transition in the study of the Hebrew text to tht
Christians (division into chapters). The latter period falls into the history of the trans-
mission of the manuscripts and of the printed editions.
For the history of the translations, tee Bleek, p. I
760 ; Keil, p. 594 ; BuNSEN, p. 72.
For the history of the interpretation of the scrip-
ture, see paragraph hermeneutics ; Keil, p. 710;
BuNSEN, p. 94 ; the full list Lance's Matthew, Am. ed.
p. 18.
For the history of the results of the Old Testament
or of the Bible in an ecclesiastical and practical point of
view, see the references under § 1, and also the para-
graphs on the theological and homiletical hterature
to the Old Testament. The articles Bible and Bible
text in Herzoo : Realencyklopddie, by Danz and
Winer — [which is in course of translation. — A. G.].
§ 29.
THE DATES OF THE ORIGIN OF THE BIBLICAL BOOKS.
We must defer the discussion of these dates, to the works upon the particular
books, but give here a table of the different dates accepted by De Wette, Keil, Bleek,
tnd add a closing remark.
De WjtTit
The Elohistic writing lying at the
foundation of the Pentateuch dates
after the death of Joshua and the
expulsion of the Canaanites.
The Jehoviatic portions originate
daring the Icings, down to Joram,
but not to Ilezekiah.
Deuteronomy dates after the exile
it the two tribes.
Km.
Xosaio oompontion.
Bleek.
Genesis. The Elohistic original
writings, which reach down to the
possession of Canaan. Revised with
Jehoviatic interpolations. The first
originated probably in the time of
Saul. The revision and enlarge-
ment before the division of the
kingdom.
The following books were a con-
tinuation of the original Elohistic
writings. Their revision probably
by the same writer who made the r©.
vision of Genesis. Leviticus as in-
deed Exodus (so far as the giving
of the law is concerned) containi
much that is originally Mosaic.
Deuteronomy belongs to the Jehov-
istic revision. Distinction between
Deuteronomy and the earlier books.
The rearrangement belongs to a
later time, but took place beforf
the Babylonian exile.
§8V. THE DATES OF THE ORIGIN OF THE BIBLIOAL BOOKS.
43
De Weite.
The book of Joshua also comes]
down from the time of Ahab |
to the time of the origin of Deuter- I
onomy. J
The book of Judges doubtful."!
The original esseotial portions be-
fore Deuteronomy. J
The books of Samuel later than ~|
Judges. The last form after the
composition of Deuteronomy. J
Keil.
Not later than the beginning of
the reign of Saul. Probably ear-
lier.
At the latest at the beginning
of the reign of David.
Blkek
The work of the Elohistic author
Revision in the time of David. Re
edition by the author of Deuter
onomy. Separated from the Pen
tateuch at a later period. Lad
redaction.
Not before the time of Beho-j AAer the division of the two king
boam or Abijam. ( doms, but not long after.
The books of Kings during the I In the last half of the Babylo- ( In the last half of the exile. Per.
\ haps by Baruch.
Babylonian exile.
The books of Chronicles low
down in the Persian period.
i .1° . .
) man captivity.
[ In Ezra's time.
f Probably the same author, who
-I made the latest revisionof the book»
(^ of Ezra and Nehemiah.
Book of Ruth a long time after ) Not before the last years of I Centuries after the period of th«
David. ) David's reign. j Judges.
Ezra and Nehemiah the work of
. late collector.
y Ezra, Nehemiah.
■j The last revision quite late.
s;aF"'-'---}.i?»-^^^^
Isaiah from 759-710, B. C. The] From the year of Uzziah's death f
second part of Isaiah during the Vdown to the lothyearof HezekiahK i ^9^^^<=?°<
surly times of Cyrus. J (758). |^ yloman exile.
}
The second part during the Bei>
Jeremiah from the 13th year of "l
Tosiah to the subjection of the >
kingdom (588).
The same.
)The Alexandrian recension pr«f
'
Ezekiel. From five years before "1
the destruction of Jerusalem until V
16 years after. J
Hosea presupposes the state of
things under Jeroboam II.
Joel. Under Uzziah about the )
year 800. \
Amos. About 790. A few years )
after Joel. j
Obadiah. After the captivity of )
the Jews. After 588. f
Jonah. One of the later books.
Uncertain whether before,
or after the exile.
;er books. 1
e, during, \
Micah. The first years of Heze- >
kiah (768). f
Nahum. After the 14th year of )
Hezekiah. r
Habakkuk. A younger contem- )
porarv of Jeremiah. f
The same.
790-726.
867-838.
810-788.
889-884.
824-788.
768-700.
710-699.
660-627.
erable to the Masoretic text
< After the taking of Jerusalem.
)
Probably in the last time of J«^
roboam II.
i During the reign of Uzziah.
' About 800 B. C.
I Nearly contemporary with JoeL
I Immediately after the destruction
I of Jerusalem.
Commonly referred to the time
of Jeroboam II. The origin of the
book falls at least in the Chaldaio
period ; perhaps in the beginning
of the Persian.
j In the reign of Hezekiah. Th
\ declarations in the title not reliable.
{Before the year 600, or before
the conquest of Nin<;veh.
J Probably during the reign of
Jehoiakim.
(4
INTHODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
De Wkttk.
Zephaniah. In the first years of )
Josiah (639). )
Haggai. At the time of Zerul>- )
babel and Joshua (636). /
Zechariah. Some months later"!
than Haggai. The second half of I
Zechariah probably belongs to the I
time after the exilo. J
Keil.
640-626.
519.
From 619 on.
Blee£.
The time of Josiah, 642-611.
The second year of Darius Hys
I taspes.
The second half (ch. 9) proba-
bly earlier than Joel. The oldest
part of written prophecy '? Time
of the king Uzziah ! ! Ch. 1 0. Time
■{ of Ahaz. Ch. xi. 1, aud 2, later
than the foregoing and foUoaing.
Ch. xi. 4, 17, same as ch. ix. and
X. With a full misconception of
symbolical representations.
' The collection at the time of
Nehemiah. A somewhat earliei
[ origin.
Probably not long after the
erection of the altar of burnt offer
ing in the temple of Jerusalem fo.
the worship of Jupiter. The Mac
cabeean age.
The Psalms. Down to the exilel p^^^ p^^^ j^ jj^^ ^^^ ^j.^^,, ^ ^ -^^^ jj^^ reception of Mac-
and probably after. Not to the )- ,' . o _ . r
Maccabeean period.
Malachi. Probably in the time ) 433.424.
of Nehemiah (444). )
Daniel. At the time of Antio- )
chus Epiphanes. (
At the time of the exile.
I From UaTid to the tune alter S Agamst the n
^ r the exile, but not after Nehemiah. ^ cabeean Psalms.
Lamentations by Jeremiah (588). [ The same. -j
The Song. The time of Solomon. (■ Solomon.
Proverbs of Solomon. The time "1
of Solomon. Time of Hezekiah. I From the time of Solomon to
Last chapter probably three years f Hezekiah.
later. J
The same.
( The time of Solomon.
1 Solomon.
Not by
*" fmia
Ecclesiastes. Belongs to a late, 1 m, i- r i^ j xt t,
, . \ : ■• •" J i-i M The times of Ezra and Nehe-
unhappy, but m rehgious and bte- > .V
rary culture, advanced, age. ' °"* '
The book of Job. The time of
the decline of the kingdom of
Judah, near to the Ghaldaic period.
The time of Solomon.
The oldest collection Many
genuine proverbs of Solomon. Still
the collection not by Solomon.
Collection at the time of Hezekiah.
The rest probably later.
r It falls perhaps in the last timt
of the Persian dominiou ; but per-
haps still later in the time of the
(Syrian dominion.
{Probably between the Assyrian
and Babylonian captivity. The
speech of EUhu a later interpolar
tion.
Concluding Remarks. — In the investigation
of the dates of the biblical books, the history of
the development of the biblical ideas has not been
allowed sufficient weight. This is true emphatically
of the idea of a personal Messiah. In its more de-
finite form it enters with the prophets Isaiah and
Uicah, t. «., about the middle of the eighth century,
B. C. It is perhaps credible that the idea of the
Messiah should not .appear in a later historical book.
But it is incredible that the Messianic idea in a later
book should recede again to the idea of a typical
Messiah, which meets us in 2 Sam. Tii. Indeed, since
the idea of the typical Messiah first appears here, and
a whole period lies between the appearance of the
typical Messianic image, and the ideal Messianic
image, the origin of the 2d book of Samuel must be
this whole period earher than that of Isaiah and Micah.
Generally the prophets form the strongest bulwarks
against the excesses of the critics. Hengstenbcrg,
Delitzch, aud others, show how frequently they use
the historical books, especially the Pentuteuch, in.
eluding Deuteronomy, and how therefore they pre-
suppose the existence of these books. But what
loii;.' periods must have elapsed betiveon the founding
of the let/al theocracy, between its culminating point
uiii er David aud Solomon ; and the prophetic doiihi:
§ 30. PERIODS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT BOOKS. 4ij
and despondency as to its external and legal appear-
ance ! — Let us take the idea of personal repentance
as the measure. II', on good grounds, we view the
SlBtPsalm as the penitential Psalm of David, is there
•ny Bimilar deTelopment of the idea of personal re-
pentance in Deuteronomy ? So likewise there is n<
similar statement of a personal experience of grace
Critici.'sm rightly uses the citations of the prophet^
but it should use also with greater care the histof
of religious ideas.
§30.
THE PERIODS WHICH THE OLD TESTAMENT BOOKS EMBRACE.
1. Genesis. The time of primary history from the beginning of the human race,
to the death of Jacob.
2. Exodus to Deuteronomy. The interval between Jacob and JMoses. {See above,
§ 6, Chronology.) Then 40 years. (Numbers with a space of 37 years.)
3. Joshua. A period of about 17 years.
4. The books of Judges and Ruth. Various estimations. See the § 6. Chronolo-
gy. Das Calwer Handbuch, 320 years.
5. The two books of Samuel. About 100 years.
6. The two books of Kings. About 380 years.
7. The two books of Chronicles. From the beginning of the world to the end
c'f the Babylonian exile.
8. Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther. Omitting the period of the Babylonian captivity {70
years, or deducting the 14 years of the removal before the destruction of Jerusalem,
66 years), a period of about 130 years.
§31.
THE ORGANIC STRUCTURE OF THE BIBLICAL BOOKS.
See the IV. Division.
THIRD SECTION.
THE THEANTHROPIC CHARACTER OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURE AS
TO ITS FORM AND CONTENTS, OR THE BIBLICAL CHRISTOLOGI-
CAL THEOLOGY, ESPECIALLY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Geneeal Biblicai, Theology of the Old Testament.
§32.
CONTENTS.
It treats: 1. Of the nature of the revealed salvation, its fiindamental forms, and
Its foundation ; 2. Its development, and the steps in that development ; 3. Of its aim
and tendency.
46
INTEODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
A. The revealed Salvation, its fundamental forms and its foundation.
§33.
THE REVELATION OF GOD IN THE WIDEST SENSE.
The revelation of God is both objective and subjective, i. e., the God of revela
tion, in revealing the knowledge of himself, stands over against the minds fitted ta
receive the revelation. God cannot reveal himself, without placing over against him
self the glass upon which the rays of light fall, viz., angels and men. No created mind
can know God, unless he reveal himself to him. But in the mutual action and influence
between the spiritual and human world, the revelation of God progresses through
diflferent stadia.
1. The most general revelation of God; objec-
tiTC : The creation. Kom. i.
2. General revelation of God ; objective : The
history of the world. Rom. ix.-xi.
8. Special revelation of God, or the revelation
of salvation in its progress; objective: The old
covenant.
4. The most special revelation of God, or the
rL'volaiicjn of salvation, in its introductory perfec-
tion ; objective : God in Christ reconciling the world.
5. The final, complete, introductory perfection of
the revelation of God in Christ; objective: The great
epiphany. God all in all. The consummation and
transfiguration of the general revelation through the
upecial.
1. The most general revelation of God ; subjec-
tive : The mind and conscience. Rom. ii.
2. General revelation of God ; subjective : Livet
of individuals.
3. Special revelation of God, or the revelation of
salvation in its progress ; subjective : The faith in the
promise.
4. The most special revelation of God in its in-
troductory or first consummation ; subjective : Jus
tifving and saving faith.
5. The final, complete consummation of the
subjective revelation of God in Christ. The in-
tuition of God in Christ, and in the whole city of
God.
Through the sin of man the first most general revelation of God is blinding to him
(Isa. XXV. 7). Even the more definite, moral revelation of God in history, and his
own destiny, becomes to man a farther obscuration of the Deity (Ps. xviii. 26). Thii
blindness or darkness appears in the views of man concerning the enigma in history,
and man's evil destiny.
Through the objective side of the special revelation this darkening of the minds
through unbelief often completes itself in hardness. The world is hell, viewed from
the stand-point of hellish spirits. On the contrary, all the subjective and objective
circles of revelation meet in ever increasing splendor, in the special sphere of revela-
tion, in faith. But the special revelation, in its objective and subjective aspects,
not only facilitates the knowledge of the general revelation, but carries on the gen-
eral revelation to its consummation and glory.
§ 34-
OPPOSITION AND DISTINCTION BETWEEN GEJTERAL AND SPECIAL REVELATION.
General revelation is the foundation on which the special rests ; the special is the
• eproduction and realization of the general.
WHhin the historical circle of the general revelation there arises, in consequence
of the fall, the obscuration of the revelation of God, through nature and conscience,
fdnce the primeval religion of man was thus chaneed into a mere capacity for religioD
§35. THE SUBJECT OF REVELATION. 47
But within the same circle are formed the sources of special revelation, since the
primeval religion of the chosen becomes an active, practical exercise of their religious
nature.
General revelation as a natural revelation, looking to the past, is an unveiling of
the foundations of the world and life ; of the original divine institutions. Special
revelation, looking to the future, is a revelation of salvation, and therefore alwayi
both an ideal revelation and an actual redemption.
General revelation uses as its instruments symbolical signs and events, vehose
bloom and flower in the life of the spirit is the divine word. Special revelation
makes use of the divine word, whose bloom and seal is the sacramental symbol and
facts. There the symbol is prominent, here the word.
§35.
THE SUBJECT OF REVELATION.
In the most general sense, the subject of revelation is the relation of God to man,
as a foundation for religion, which is the relation of man to God. God reveals him-
self to man according to his living relations to him, according to his will in reference
to him, hence in his purpose of salvation, the actual salvation, the promise of salvation ;
but also according to his claims upon man, in his law and in his judgment. He makes
plain to man his peculiar destiny, his sinful nature, his guilt, since he plainly reveals
bis own will to man in order to prepare him to receive bis salvation. This salvation is
thus the central theme of revelation, and indeed as a fact, as a personal life, as an
eternal inheritance, is destined to extend from the chosen until it becomes the com-
mon good of humanity. The subject of revelation is, therefore, redemption.
§36.
THE INTERCHANGE BETWEEN REVELATION AND REDEMPTION.
As the eternal living spirit, God communicates himself, his life, when he com-
mtinicates the living knowledge of himself. Man, as a spiritual being allied to God,
cannot rightly know God without receiving into himself the divine life. But as man
is sinful, he is blinded as to his intelligence, to the same extent that he is perverted
and enslaved in his will. Hence there cannot be a revelation of salvation to him with-
out redemption, nor redemption without revelation. It follows also that the intro-
duction of this revelation must be very gradual. With the spiritual eye the heart
must be purified, with the heart, the eye. Revelation is the ideal redemption, re-
demption the actual revelation.
In this interchange between revelation and redemption, in general, revelation
precedes redemption, biit at the same time it must, through its preliminary redemp-
tion, prepare the way for every new stage in its development. And just as in the
chosen spirits, the channels of the revelation of saving truth, revelation precedes re
demption, so with the great mass of those who are the subjects of redemption, tb
redemption precedes, as a preparatory discipline, the illumination through revelation
48 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
§37.
THE OBJECTIVE FORM OF THE REVELATION OF SALVATION.
The objective form of this revelation is throughout the Theophany, as it rises
from the form of the ideal, dynamic theopbanies, to the grand real Theophany of God
ill Christ. It manifests itself in the elements of human faith, strengthened to open
vision or sight. Its first form is the miraculous report, the divine voice, the word,
whose dull echo — the Bath Eol — meets us only in the region of the Apocrypha. Its
second more developed form is in the miraculous vision, in a narrower sense, angelic
appearances, as an ideal dynamic Christophany, surrounded and even represented by
wider encircling angelophanies and symbolical signs. Its third and perfect form is
the incarnation of God in Christ. Its eflect throughout is prophecy ; the miracle
of prophecy. But the Urim and Thummim is the theocratic, legal enlargement ot
prophecy ; in which it was made permanent, and accessible to the people whenevei
it might be needed.
§38.
THE SUBJECTIVE FORM OF REVELATION.
This is throughout the vision, whose basis or real aspect is ecstasy, the sudden
transposition of the mind from the stand-point of faith to that of sight. The vision
generally appears as a day-vision, during which the usual consciousness of sense is
shadowed or suspended as in the night. But it appears in children, in common la-
borers, or men sunken in fatigue, as a dream of the night, in whom, however, the
moral consciousness shines as clear as in the d.ay. Its pre-condition is the higlier in-
tuition possessed by chosen religious minds, by the spirit of God made fruitful in
some great historical moment, which indeed contains the seeds of the future, which
the seer filled by the Theophany prophetically explains.
There is no conceivable theophany without a corresponding disposition for the re-
ception of visions ; no vision without the energy and effect of a theophany. But
the one form may prevail at one time, the other at another. In general, revelation
advances from the Old to the New Testament, from the prevailing objective form, or
theophany, to the prevailing subjective form, or the vision. Hence the succession in
♦he names of the prophets : Roeh, Nabi, Chozeh.
§ 39.
THE OBJECTIVE FORM OF REDEMPTION.
The objective form of redemption appears in a series of saving judgments, intro-
duced through revelation by means of theophanies. Its fundamental form is the
miracle.
§40.
THE SUBJECTIVE FORM OF REDEMPTION.
It manifests its. 'If in a heroic, divine act nl' (;iiiii. ulios" symbol is the sacrifice,
whose result is conversion.
§41. THE mSTORlCAL GRADUAL PROGRESS AXU FORM OF REVELATION 4'(
§41.
THE HISTORICAL GRADUAL PROGRESS AND FORM OF REVELATION.
The realization in history of the revelation of salvation is gradual, fundamentallj
the same with the gradual growth of history itself. ' This gradual progress is con-
ditioned: 1. Through the fundamental law of all human growth, into which th«
divine revelation aS a revelation of salvation necessarily enters. Thus the develop-
ment of revelation is the grandest nature, the crown and glory of nature ; for the
regular unfolding of the Old Testament advent of Christ, of the personal life of Christ.^
and of that kingdom of heaven founded by him, reaches from the beginning to the
end of the world, and transcends all the limits of the events of natural history.
2. This gradual growth is conditioned through the necessary interchange between a
hoiy God and unholy men, in whom the grace of God first gradually forms according
to the law of freedom for itself a point of union and a point of departure for its wider
progress, *'. «., it is conditioned through the constant interchange between revelation
in a narrower sense and redemption, we may say even between prophecy and miracle,
between the vision and the sacrifice. 3. Then it is conditioned through the slow
process of the interchange between the chosen as the starting-point of revelation, and
the popular life, or the interchange between the apocalypse and the manifestation
(phanerosis). Generally, however, its history is embraced in two periods. 1. From
the beginning of the introductory revelation to its completion, i. e., to the completion
of the personal life of Christ, i. e., to the introductory or first end of the world. This
is the special history of revelation in the narrower sense. 2. From the beginning of
the final complete revelation, or the historically introduced revelation, i. e., from the
beginning of the church to its completion, the second advent of Christ, i. e., the final
end of the world.
We now speak only of the periods of revelation in the narrower sense.
1. The period of that in one aspect symbolical, in the other mythical, primary reli*
gion : from Adam to Abraham, 2000 years B. C. The lighter aspect of this period is
the symbolical religion, the knowledge of God in the fight of nature and history, with
sporadic lights of revelation through the word.
2. The period of the patriarchal religion of promise in its genealogical descent,
mtroduced and established through the word of God and human faith : from Abra-
ham to Moses, 1500 B. C. In the first period the symbol is prominent, the word
subordinate ; in this the word holds the first place, the symbol the second. In the
first period faith was sporadic ; in Abraham and his seed it becomes genealogical.
3. The period of the Mosaic legal religion : from Moses to Elijah, or to the de-
cline of the glory of the Israelitish kingdom. The symbol preponderates above the
word. The internal character of the religion of promise at the beginning, is now
surrounded by the external forms of the law, for the purpose of bringing a whole
people to share in the Abrahamic faith, and at the same time secure its wider develop
ment. Elijah turns himself to the past, as the last restorer of the law through th«
miraculous judgment by fire.
4. The period of prophecy, or in which the law began to be viewed in its internal
character, in which the word preponderates, not the symbol : from the miracles of
Elisha, marked by their design to save, pointing to the future, and from the Mes-si-
anic prophecies of Isaiah (Hosea, Joel, Amos) t(5 Malachi.
4
50 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
5. The period of national piety, or of the national realization of the prophetic
faith, introduced in a hiijtorical manner, under the disappearance of canonical iuspira.
tion, but also under the appearance of the idea of martyrdom : from Malachi to
the time of Christ.
fi. The period of the concentration of the Messianic longing of Israel, or the seed-
like formation of that state of mind which was fitted to receive the Messiah, whose
very heart or central point is the Virgin, and around her the truly pious, especially
the Baptist, enveloped, as in a shell, by Pharisaism, Sadduceeism, Essenism, Sama-
ritanism, Alexandrianism, and Hellenism, which in a general sense may be viewed
as springing from one another. The history previous to the New Testament.
7. The period of the life of Christ to its completion in his ascension, and to the
great seal of its completion in the founding of ohe Christian church, through the out-
pouring of the Holy Spirit.
§42.
THE CONTRASTS BETWEEN THE ANNOUNCEMENT AND THE FULFILMENT OF
SALVATION.
As nature found its goal in the first man, and the primeval time in Abraham and
the Old Covenant, so the Old Covenant itself, as the preannouncement of the salvation
in Christ, has found its goal in Christ. Christ is the end of the law, the preliminary
goal or end of all things. But the introductory revelation of Christ in the time of
the New Testament, must reach again its comprehensive final goal in the eternity of
the New Testament, the eternal gospel, the second coming and epiphany of Christ
with its eternal results.
The Old Testament is the religion of the future. As to the word of promise, it
finds its fulfilment in the word of the New Testament ; as to its types, the shadowy
images of good things to come, in the facts of the New Testament salvation.
Hence it follows that the Old Covenant, as to its national, legal, external value,
is abrogated through the New Covenant, but that the Old Testament, as the word
of God, is exalted through the New Testament, to be a constituent part of the eter-
nal revelation, as it furnishes the foundation, introduction, and illustration of the New
Testament.
As the gospel itself is a provisional law for the unbeliever, so the Old Testament
law was a provisional gospel for the believer.
§43.
THE FUNDAMENTAL FORMS OF THE PREFIGURATION OF SALVATION.
These forms, in words, are the original traditions, the promise, the law, prophecy^
the testimony of martyrs.
These forms, in facts, are the allegories, symbols, tyjies, i. e., the dawn, the repre-
lentatio'ni,, and the germ-like preparations for the New Covenant.
Typology commences with the jx'rsoual types (Adam, Melchizedec, Abraham,
fcc), passes on to the historical types (the sacrifice of Isaac, the exodus from Egypt),
finds its tentral point in the types of the law (the Mosaic cultus), and coniplett^
g 45. THE DEVELOPMEXT OF BIBLICAL THEOLOGY. 5l
itself in the mental type, and types in disposition, the preannouncements in the in-
ward state and feeling, of New Testament states (Ps. xxii. ; Isa. vii., &c.).
The types and the word stand in relations to each other, similar to those betweet
redemption and revelation.
§ 44.
THE FULFILLING OF SALVATION.
The fulfilling of salvation is the completion of the theanthropic life of Christ, in
its world-atoning, world-redeeming, and world-glorifying power and result. It may
be divided into the introductory fulfilling and the final completion, i. e., into the time
of the first and of the second advent of Christ. The first period embraces the history
of the one peculiar completion of the life of Jesus, and its development in the four
fundamental forms of the four gospels, and the varied doctrinal fundamental forms in
the different apostolical types of doctrine, especially of James, Peter, Paul, the author
of the Epistle to the Hebrews and of John, to which, however, we must add, in theii
historical significance, the doctrinal types of the other apostles.
The wider and final completion of the life of Christ extends through the different
periods of the New Testament kingdom of heaven. {See Lange : Matthew, Am. ed.,
pages 3, 4, 5.
B. Hevelation of Salvation / its Development and its OooL
§45.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF BIBLICAL THEOLOGY.
Biblical theology develops itself in essentially the same way with biblical reli
gion. But it develops itself according to its nature after the following fundamental
principles :
1. Biblical doctrine proceeds in its essential development, as in its chronological
divisions, from a ftindamental Christological principle : Man destined to the image of
God, or to the perfection of his life in the revelation of the God-man.
2. The essential development of biblical doctrines, e. ff., the doctrines of the name
of God, of his attributes, of man, of sin, &c., advances in the same measure with the
chronological development of biblical doctrine in dififerent periods of time.
3. Every biblical doctrine in its germ -form existed already in the earliest period
of revelation, e. ff., the doctrine of immortality.
4. No biblical doctrine reaches its perfect form untD the latest period of revela-
tion, i, e., the New Testament fulfilment ; and this fully developed form is reached
m the apostolical period, e. g., the doctrine of the Trinity.
5. Every biblical doctrine in its course of development presents a marked, distinct
continuity ; although one doctrine may now rise into prominence, and then another.
Bence a break and opposition between the Old and New Testament would be a
monstrous supposition, if, e. g., the central part of the revelation of God in the Old
Testament (the angel of the Lord), should be regarded as a created angel, and not
as Christ himself in the preparatory stages of his incarnation, while the central ■*'gur«
11) the New Testament revelation is the God-man.
INTKODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
6. Heterogeneous, uot, strictly speaking, theocratic doctrines, may prepare the
way for the development of revelation, and promote its progress. They have served
this purpose fi-om the beginning inwards (Chaldean, Syrian, Palestinian, Egyptian,
Persian), but the grand forming principle of revelation would never allow any in-
trusion of foreign elements. It is only in the apocrypha that we find any traces of
Buch an intrusion.
V. The development of biblical doctrine is ever in the direction of an onward
progress, an unfolding, from the germ, of a growing spirituality, of a rejection of
temporary forms, but never the form of a progress and growth through opposition
All the antitheses of sacred scripture, even that between the Old and New Testa
ments, are harmonious, not antagonistic or contradictory oppositions.
8. Within the period of any individual biblical doctrine, there is an opposition
and a progressive movement, and between the most diverse periods there exists every
where the unity of the spirit, and hence an indissoluble connection.
9. The word of God, or the principle of revelation, rules and shapes the books of
scripture, as a strong, active, moulding principle. But in the relations of that word
to humanity, it is ever in its unfolding, breaking through the bonds of human error
and in its spirituality proceeds from one stage of revelation to another, to realize its
divine fulness, in a more complete, transparent human perfection.
10. The word of God in its development never destroys human nature, while it
dissolves the shadows within which it lies. It rather sets free, in the measure of its
development, the original powers of the human nature. Hence these marks of origi-
nality, as they were already evident in the characters of the patriarchs, appear in
their most striking forms in the lives of the prophets. It is an absurd and monstrous
supposition, therefore, of which they are guilty who, denying the perfect originality
of the four gospels, view the gospels of Matthew and Luke as copies from the original
of Mark.
11. The doctrine of Jesus passes through well-defined periods of development.
We can distinguish : 1. The explanation of the law in its inward all-prevailing sig-
nificance. 2. The explanation of the Old Testament idea of the kingdom of heaven.
3. The explanation of the Old Testament types of circumcision, and the Passover.
4. The explanation of the Old Testament cultus. 5. The explanation of the entire
Old Testament symbolism, .and of the whole symbolism of creation. These chronolo-
gical stages of the development of the doctrine of Christ are made the essential
fundamental forms of the doctrine of Christ, in the doctrinal types of the apostles,
James, Peter, Paul, the Epistle to the Hebrews, John. These types of doctrine sup-
plement and complete each other, but they are as fiir removed as possible, in their
harmonious agreement, from correcting each other.
12. In the book of Genesis biblical doctrine is a union of the word of God with
the purest expression of human artlessness ; in the Apocalypse, it is the union of the
same word with a conscious, and, as to the Hebrew form, perfected, sacred art.
Remark. — The fundamental laws of the develop-
ment of (he introductory revelation in the sacred
■cript/ires are also the fundamental laws controlling
the introduction of this revelation into hun anity, ig
the course of the development of the ChiMt^u
Church.
§ 46. BIBLICAL DOCTRINE OF GOD, OR THEOLOGY IN TUE NARROWER faENSE. 58
SPECIAL BIBLICAL THEOLOGY IN OUTLINE.
§ 46.
BIBLICAL DOCTRINE OF GOD, OR THEOLOGY IN THE NARROWER SENSE.
Biblical theology in the narrower sense, or the doctrine of God, may be divided
Jito the doctrine of the knowledge of God founded upon his revelation of himself; of
the name of God, which has its ground and reasons in his nature ; of the demoustra
tion of the being of (iod, resting upon the evidence of his universal existence, perfec-
tion, and power; * of the method of his providence, and of the attributes of God, or the
fundamental form of his vital relations to the worhl and man, grounded ultimately in
his peculiar personality, or the threefold personal distinction in his essence.
Remarks. — 1. The revelation of God is theground
upon wliich all our knowledge of God rests. 2. The
name of God is not the nature of God, but designates
objectively the entire revelation, and subjectively the
whole of religion. 3. The nature of God is designated
by the fundamental distinctions : The Lord, Love, Spir-
it. 4. The name of God, proceeding from the uni-
versal to the particular, passes through the names
Elohim, Eloha, El Eljon, El Schadai, Elohim Zeba-
otL, to the name Father in heaven ; and proceeding
from the theocratic to the universal, it passes from the
names Jehovah, Adonai, Jehovah Zebaoth, to the
name God and Father of our Lord Jesua Christ.
5. The Holy Scriptures recognize and distinguish defi-
nite fundamental forms of the revelation of the di-
vine Providence, which lay the foundation for the
proofs of the divine existence. The general relation
of God to the world may be divided into creation and
providence. The creation may be viewed as the
original creation and as the new formation of that
which was originally created. Providence may be
regarded as the supporting, ruling, co-working ; and
the co-working as judgment, redemption, and glon-
fication. 6. With the unfolding of providence, the
definition of the divine being according to his attri-
butes comes clearly into view, in which, however,
we must carefully distinguish between the essentia]
and merely nominal marks or designations. In every
period there prevaiLs a peculiar definition, determined
according to the divine attributes. In the primitive
period God is designated as the exalted one (EI El-
jon). In the period of the promise as the Almighty
(El Schadai). In that of the law as the Holy one.
In the transition to the prophetic as the righteous,
wise, good. In the period of the prophets as the
most glorious, the Majesty. In the national period
as the condescending ; and in the New Testament as
the gracious and merciful. 7. The distinctions in the
divine nature or essence pass through different stages
God and his Angel ; the Angel of the Lord (Gen.
xvi. 7 ff.) ; of his countenance (Exodus xxxiii. 14 ff.) ;
of the covenant (Malachi) ; God and his own Son ; God
and his threefold name.
§ 47.
BIBLICAL DOCTRINE OF MAN, OR ANTHROPOLOGY.
The world as the basis and birthplace of man comes first into view here, and the world
as Creation, as Nature, as the Cosmos, as the Aeon, or as the natural world defined
through, the spiritual. Then man in his normal state, in his nature (Biblical Anthro-
pology and Psychology), in his destination, his paradisaic origin and condition, and
his fitness for trial. Then further, man in his sin, his tall, his sinfulness, and his original
sin ; and corresponding to thi«, on the one hand, the guilt, judgment, death, condemna-
bility, and on the other his inward discord and strife, his fitness as a subject of re-
demption, his outlook into the spiritual world, both as one of wretchedness and bliss,
'lis cooperation with divine grace, or his preparation for the Advent of Christ.
[ * This is a very inadequate rendering of the expressive terms wliich Dr. Lange uses : Daseins, Soseins, Hierseins, is
which he includes the whole field &om which we draw the argruments for the being of God : not merely his existence, hoi
lis existence Much as he is, the concrete idea of God given us in the Bible. — A. G.l
54
INTKODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Remarks. — 1 The creation ia a. a single act, b.
lets, works, c. a continuous energy or work, d. it
marks tlie world as conditioned in the highest sense.
2. Nature is the relative independence of the world.
Its first feature calling for notice is the principle of
oatura Its second, the law of nature. Its third, the
stages in the development of nature. Its fourth, the
goal of nature ; the sphere of freedom in which the
grand nature of the kingdom of God is developed.
8. The Cosmos is the beautiful harmonj- of the world.
It hold."" its celebration in its ideal perfection. The
sacred reflection of the Cosmos is the Sabbath — the
sacred human festivals. 4. In the Aeon the living
spiritual principles of the world are represented. We
must distinguish first the spiritual and human world,
and then further the Ontology of the spiritual world
from the experience of man in regard to it, as it first
enters with the fall. 5. Biblical Anthropology is
both dualistic and a system of trichotomy. As to
its dualism man belongs in one aspect to the ma-
terial, in the other to the spiritual, world. Accord-
ing to the trichotomy man is, as to his divine quality
or nature, spirit, as to his heavenly or superearthly
form, soul, and as to his earthly organism, body.
6. In the destination of man to the image and like-
ness of God, we must maintain, that man, as the
image of God, is destined to his self-reahzation in
communion with God ; and that particularly, as to his
bodily nature, he is destined to a generic self-realiza-
tion in the spread of humanity from one pair, and as to
his spirituality, to his ideal self-realization in the God-
man, and as to his soul, to his social self reallzatict
in the kingdom of God. 1. With the paradisaic stat«
of man comes into consideration tlie pure beginning
of his life, which is both potential aad actual, i. «.,
in one aspect innocence, in another righteousness ;
then his need of being tested, and finally his fitnesi
for the lest. 8. In the doctrine of sin we must dis
tinguish the ideas of sin, of evil in the wide sensBi
and strict moral evil. Then the nature of sin, iU
genesis, and its development. 9. The consequences
of sin may be viewed as natural and positive, or as
death and as judgment in the following stages:
Guilt and its imputation. This again branches it
self a. into the continuation of sin :
1. Sinfulness, or the status corruptionisy and pun-
ishment ;
original sin, and the curse of sin ;
the hardening (stage of unbelief) and the r»
jection, fitness for condemnation ;
The second death or condemnation.
b. into the reaction against sin ; the natural reaction,
or the consciousness of guilt on the part of man, tha
positive reaction, or the preparative grace of God :
1. the desire after the lost Paradise and the Cher-
ubim;
2. the desire sifter a new and higher salvation and
the Protevangelium ;
3. faith and the promise ;
4. the stages of faith and the stages of the advent
of Christ,
2.
3.
4.
§ 48.
BIBLICAL CHRISTOLOGY, AND SOTERIOLOGT.
Ohristology may naturally be divided into the typical and prophetic Old Testament
messianic Christology, the evangelical Christology, or the history of the conscious being
and revelation of Christ in his life, and the apostoHc Christology, or the biblically com-
pleted doctrine of his person.
Soteriology embraces the doctrine of the three Messianic offices of Christ, of the
historical unity of the work of Christ, and of his eternal theanthropic work, in which
he descends into the abyss of human judgment through his compassion, and raises
believing humanity to the inheritance of his Sonship and blessedness.
Remarks. — 1. The Old Testament Christology
Sows from the fact, that from everyjudgment of God
(here springs a divine promise, and that thus the re-
ligion of the past is transformed i.ito a religion of
the future. This religion of the future, under the
providence of (iod, eve' moves onward to the future
in acts and in consciousness : in the one througli the
miracles, or in the atlegoi'ical, symbolic, and typical
history of salvation ; in the other through prophecy
ni its diili'icut stages. As to the allegory, the forms
of the higher nature are in opposition to the formii
of the lower nature, and thus represent the opposi-
tion of the kingdom of God to the kingdom of dark-
ness. In the symbolical acts and works, the human
civilization becomes the image of the divine cultus.
In the region of the types, i. e., of the germlike pre-
figuriition of tliat which is to be comjileted in the fu-
ture, we must distinguish the typology of the Covenant
(Covenant or Testament), the typology of the kingdom
and tlic typology of the Messiah. Messianic prophect
§49. THE DOCTRINE OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD.
Sf
proceeds from the prophecy of the human conflict, the
iemitic revei'ence for God, the blessing upon Abraham,
the warlike and peaceful sceptre of Judah, the typical
Messiah in the genealogy of David, to the prophecy
of the ideal personal Messiah ; and again from the
one prevailing form of the Messiah, it advances to
the distinction of the lowly and suffering, and the
exalted glorious Messiah. But with the idea of a
suffering Christ there appears the idea of Antichrist
and his typical signs or marks. With the prophecy
of the Messiah there is unfolded also a prophecy
of the redemption and transfiguration of the world
through a series of saving judgments proceeding from
those which are introductory, to those which are uni-
versal and complete. 2. In the Evangelical Christo-
logy, or the Christology of the hfe of Christ, we may
view the Christology of the stages of his personal
life (his miraculous birth, baptism, transfiguration.
resurrection, ascension), and of his self-consciousnesi
in his teachings, of his Christological acts, his miraclea
and his redeeming work. .S. In the biblical Soteri-
ology we must distinguish the unity of the work of
Christ, from its division into his three offices. The
one entire work of Christ has been profoundly de-
scribed by Luther and others as an exchange of r^
lations. Christ has taken our sin, i. e., the conscious"
ness of condemnation, upon himself, in order that
he might make us sharers in his righteousness ; i. «.,
in his great compassion he has entered into our con-
sciousness of guilt, as a consciousness of judgment,
that he might take us into the consciousness of his
righteousness. As to the offices, we must distinguish
his prophetic redemption or world-atonement, his
priestly expiation, and his kingly redemption in «
narrower sense. (See Lange : Poiitiv Dogmatik, p.
793 ff.)
§49.
BIBLICAL PNEITMATOLOGY AND THEOCRATOLOGY, OR THE DOCTRINE OF THE
KINGDOM OF GOD.
This embraces the doctrine of the Spirit of God, and his works, or of the Old Tes-
tament typical kingdom of God, based upon his universal and absolute kingdom over
the world, in its friendly and hostile relations to the kingdoms of the world (Daniel,
ch. ii., vti.) ; of the New Testament kingdom of heaven established by Christ, in its
opposition to the kingdom of Satan, and of the final appearance of the perfected king-
dom of God, in the glorified world, and in its complete triumph over the kingdom of
darkness.
The doctrine of the Old Testament kingdom of God treats of the historical signifi-
«iance and importance of the opposition between Judaism and Heathenism.
The doctrine of the New Testament kiiiirdom of God branches into the doctrine
of the personal definite method of salvation, of the ecclesiastical and social institu-
tion of salvation, and of the application and spread of this completed salvation to
the utmost boimdaries of the world.
Its stages are the following :
1. a. individual death ;
8. a. social death, or the fall of
Babel ;
t. a. death of the old world. End
of the world ;
b. intermediate state ;
b. Anti-Christendom ;
b. the final completed resurrec-
tion, and the separation in
the judgment;
e. the individual progressive re-
surrection ;
c. the appearance of Christ and
the millennial kingdom ;
e. the eternal energy and result
of the city of God, and itl
glory to the honor of God.
(Rev. xxii.)
The doctrine of the completed kingdom of God rests upon the biblical disclosura
of the Aeon of the blessed, and the Aeons of the condemned, over which rules, im-
partii-g to them unity, the absolute fulfilment of the divine purposes, of the end of
the world, and the glory of God.
56
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Remarks. — 1. Pneumatology is more widely de-
reluped through the doctrine of the Spirit, for which
theology has as yet done comparatively little (see
Lange : Theol. Dogmatik, p. 926), [see also Owen :
Work on the Spirit. — A. G.]. 2. The doctrines of
the absolute dominion of God, of the kingdom of the
grace of God, and the kingdom of glory, must be
more accurately distinguished than has been done
hitherto. 8. The interchange between the progress
of the kingdom of God and the kingdom of darkness,
how they serve to facilitate each other's progress,
how in critical moments they reject and exclude each
other, how the apparent subjection of the first is al
ways the real subjection of the last, how the victory
of the kingdom of God, through the cross of Christ,
is as a preliminary victory decided, how the two
kingdoms move on side by side to their widest com-
fletion, and how the last apparent triumph of the
kingdom of darkness, in the revelation of Antichrist,
introduces his final judgment under the triumph of
the kingdom of God ; all this needs a more adequatt
estimation, explanation, and statinent. 4. The sig-
nificance of the historical opposition between JudSf
ism and Heathenism, Hebraism and Hellenism, re
quires a clearer and more detailed statnient. Beyond
the hostile opposition between Shem and Ham, there
may be seen also the friendly opposition betweer
Shem and Japhet, tending to supplement each other.
5. For the organism of the individual method of sal-
vation, which generally lies still in great confusion
(see Lange : Positiv Dogmatik, p. 950). [This ia
less true perhaps in England and in this country,
than in Germany. — A. G.] For the Christological
structure of the church in its various stages — the
same, p. HOT, and finally for its organism durinf;
its eschatological stages, p. 1225.
SECOND DIVISION.
FR ACTIO AL EXPLANATION, AND HOMILETIOAL
USE OF THE OLD TESTAMENT
In the apostolic communities, and through the entire apostolic age, the reading
of the Old Testament was confessedly an essential foundation for the public solemn
edification of Christians. Hence we find, in the New Testament writings, the first
fundamental outlines of the practical explanation of the Old Testament. We may go
Btill further back, and say, that ju-^t as the New Testament gives a doctrinal and
practical explanation of the Old, so the later writings in the Old Testament serve to
explain the earlier and more fundamental portions. But as Christ enters, or is intro-
duced, in the New Testament, as the absolute interpreter (Matt. v. 17), so his Apos-
tles carry on his work as interpreters of the Old Testament. We call special atten-
tion, in this view, to the Gospels by Matthew and John, the Acts, the Epistle to the
Galatians and that to the Hebrews.
The apostolic Fathers also have proved in a large measure interpreters of the
Old Testament. Besides some allegorical fancies in the epistle of Barnabas, we re
cognize some very valuable and profound suggestions. Clemens of Rome, in his first
letter to the Corinthians, after ho has e.vhortcd the Corinthians to repentance, quotes
testimonies and examples from the Old Testament, from cli. viii.-xiii. and passing
over other citations, even in reference to the life of Christ, ch. xvii.-xix. and still
farther on, he constantly mingles quotations from the Old Testament witli those from
tho New. This is true also in some measure of the second epistle boaiit;g the same
name. The Ignatian epistles are in this respect remarkably reserved, perhaps out of
regard to the Judaizers. In Polycarp «i.lso the citations from the New Testament are
tery prominent. The anonymous lettei to Diognetus represents still more strikingly
PRACTICAL EXPLANATION AND HOMILETICAL USE OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 5;
in this respect, an anti-judaistic stand-point, although there is no necessity for im
puting to its au .hor a Gnostic antagonism to the Old Testament. In the Pastor of
Hernias there are not wanting Old Testament allusions, still he is more closely related
to the Old Testament, in his imitation of the prophetic forms, and in his leg.al vieW;
than in that living appropriation of it which characterizes the New Testament. The book
of Hermas points to the great Christian apocryphal literature, in which the Jewish
Apocrypha perpetuates itself, and in which indeed the most diverse imitations of the
Old Testament writings are continued. (The Sybellines, the 4th book of Ezra, the
book of Enoch, and others.)
Among the Apologists, Justin Martyr, about the middle of the second century,
appears as a Christian philosopher who was familiar with the Old Testament. ThiH
is clear from his dialogue with Trypho. But also in his Gohortatio nd Graecos he,
as also others of the Fathers, not recognizing the better peculiarities of heathenism,
traces back the monotheism and wisdom of Plato to Moses and the propliets. In his
apologies, which were directed to heathens, he makes use of Old Testament prophe-
cies. Tatian, notwithstanding his Gnosticism, refers to the Old Testament. Theophi-
lus of Antioch {ad Autolycwn) contrasts the Old Testament account of the creation,
with th.at of Hesiod (ii. 13), in which, although an Antiuchian, and before that school,
he explains the historical facts symbolically, while retaining at the same time the
historical sense. He continues the history of Genesis, and of the Mosaic system, with
constant reference to heathenism. Generally speaking, his representation moves
upon the line of the sacred scriptures from the Old to the New Testament. Besides
the general free use of the Old Testament in the Fathers, which even becomes exces-
sive, in so far as the Old Testament conception of the cultus, its hierarchical and
sacrificial ideas, and certain leg.al precepts, have been adopted in a more or less ex-
tern.al way into the New Testament doctrine, order of worship, and constitution ;
there are special portions made prominent, in which the Old Testament continues its
life in the New Testament theology, and in the cultus of the church. The first of
these is the manifold exposition and explanation of the work of creation, especially
of the six days' work, by which we oppose both the heathen dualistic view of the
world and Polytheism. The second is the Christian development of the doctrine of
the kingdom of God, especially of the Messianic prophecies. The third is the
Christian, human, pastoral, and catechetical development of the decalogue. The
fourth is the transmission of the Old Testament Psalmody in the New Testament
Hymnology and Cultus of the Church. To these we must add th.at allegorical method
of exposition, which culminated in the Alexandrian school, by means of which the
Christiiin consciousness appropriates to itself and reproduces in a Christian way the
whole contents of the Old Testament. Finally the culture of the biblical method
and style of preaching, under the influence of the Old Testament, in connoction with
the Greek and Roman rhetoric. As to the first point, Clemens of Alexandria li.ad
in view a commentary upon Genesis. There was a work of Tertullian, now lost,
npon Paradise. About the year 196 Candidus wrote upon the hexwuieron. Besides
a work upon Genesis, Hippolytus published several works upon the Old TestamcBt
scriptures. Origen prepared a commentary npon Genesis, and also a series of mystical
homilies upon the same book, as also upon a large number of other biblical books.
Cypiian published a song upon Genesis. Victoriiius, about 290, wrote a Tractatus dt
Fahrica mundi. Methodius, about the same time, CommenUirii in Genesin. Hie
racns (the heretic), in 302, Lucubrationes in Hexcemeron. Eustathius, 325, Com
5B
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
meiitarius in Sexwmeron. James of Edessa, about the same time, HexoBmeron aa
Constant inani. Basil the Great, about 370, nine Homilies upon tlie six days. His
brother Gregory of Nyssa also wrote upon the six days' work. About 374, Ambrose
wrote six books upon the same theme. Jerome, towards the end of the 4th century,
prepared questions upon Genesis. Chrysostom wrote 67 Homilies upon Genesis.
Augustine wrote upon Genesis in many of his works. These works show clearly how
important Genesis, the doctrine of the creation, the statement of the six days' work,
appeared to the Fathers, in their controversies with heathenism.
That the explanation of the ten commandments was in like manner, next to the
gradually perfected apostles' creed, one of the oldest branches of Christian catechet-
ical instruction, needs scarcely any proof.
The idea of one prevailing view of the Old and New Testament kingdom of God
appears already in the apology of Theophilus of Antioch. The Chronography of
Julius Africanus, the Chronicon of Eusebius of Cesarea, as well as his arrangement
and demonstration of the gospel, lay a wider foundation for the same idea. The great
work of Augustine, De Civitate Dei, belongs here, as also the sacred history by Sulpi-
tius Severus, and generally the prevailing character of the historical statements or
chronicles of the West, running down through the middle ages, since they all go
back to the Old Testament and even to Adam.
As to the importance of the Old Testament Psal-
ter, and its history in the Christian Church, com-
pare Otto Straus : The PaaUer as a Song and
Prayer Book. A historical tractate. Berlin, 1859.
Through the allegorical explanation of the scripture in the Alexandrian School,
and still more in the middle ages, the entire Old Testament assumed a New Testa-
ment form and meaning, as to the inner Christian life and spiritual experience, while
at the same time, as to the organization of the church and the cultus, the New Testa-
ment became simply a new publication of the old.
On the Mediaeval exposition of the scriptures,
compare TTie A Uegorical Explanation of (he Bible,
especialli/ in Preaching, by Von Mogelin (1844).
Elster : The Exegetical Theology of the Aliddle Ages
(1855). Tholdck: The Old Testament in the yew,
4th edition ^1864). J. G. Rosesmuller : History
of Interpretation in the Christian Church (1795-
1814). Meter : Gesehichte der Schriflerkldrung,
5 vol. 1802-1899. Sciiuler: Gesehichte der Ver-
Snderung dee Geschmackes in Predigen, 1792. For
the critical and theological exposition of the Old
Testament generally, consult M. BAnMOARTEN : Com-
mentary upon the Old Testament, the General Intro-
duction to the Old Testament. [See also upon the
use of tlie Old Testament in the New. Fairbairn:
Typology, 2d edition, aud Hermeneutical Manual.
Alexander, W. L. : Connection and Harmony of tht
Old and New Testament. London (1853). Pri-
DEADx: (Ponnection, new ed. London (1866). —
A. G.]
The mediaeval mystics especially gave the widest limits to the letter of the Old
Testament, and brought out into the light the multiplicity of the ideas lying at its
root, as they rightly conjectured, through the theory of the fourfold sense of scrip-
ture.
Littera geata docet, quid credos allegoria,
Moralis quid agas, quo tendas anagogia.
The Song of Solomon was a favorite book for spiritual exposition, even in the
time of the Father?. It was still more so during the middle ages, and has retained
its position in the field of homiletical and ascetic literature to this day. The cats
logue of tlie literature of this book alone would make a small volume.
PRACTICAL EXPLANATION AND HOMILETICAL USE OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. 5a
There has lately been republished : The word* of St. Bernard upon the Song ; German, by Fern
bacber, 1862.
The exposition of the Bible was generally, during the middle ages, to a great ex
tent practical, or designed for edification, and this indeed for the most part in a mys-
tical way. This was true even with the expositions of the scholastics. This is in
accordance with the practical direction of the middle ages, with the ignorance of the
riginal languages, with the prevalence of dogmatics and church institutions and
laws, and with that resulting, repressed respect for the Holy Scriptures. Gregory
the Great, in this |)oini of view, opens the middle ages, when, after the canon of Origen
as to the threefold sense of scripture, he composed his Moralia in Jobwn, after hav-
ing provided in a collection of excerpts (Procopius of Gaza about 520 ; Primasius of
Adrymettum about 550 ; Aurelius Cassiodorus after 562), the so-called Catenifi for
a necessary aid to the learned exposition of the scripture. Isidorus of Hispalis, the
venerable Bede, and others, follow later. A certain peculiarity attaches itself to the
British method of exposition, as it was founded by the Archbishop Theodore ol
Canterbury ; to the German exposition as it, e. g., is represented in the Saxon Evan
gelical poetry of Heliand ; and later to the French and German mystics, who take
their origin from the mystical writings of the Pseudo-Dionysius. The clear reference
of the Holy Scriptures to the inner life, especially as a contemplative life, may be re-
garded as the great acquisition of the middle ages.
This prajtical exposition of the Scriptures, it is true, as practised by Claudius of Turin,
Alcuin, Paul Warnefried, Rabanus Maurus, Christian Druthmar, Peter Lombard,
Cardinal Hugo, Abelard, John of Salisbury, Thomas Aquinas, Albertus Magnus, but
especially by the mystics Bernard of Clairveaux and his followers, was used for the
advantage of priestly and monkish classes.
Meanwhile the reformation of the exposition of the Scriptures was prepared dur-
ing the middle ages. It must first of all be brought back to the original languages
and the grammatical sense. The learned Jews of the middle ages, with their lin-
guistic studies and expositions of the Old Testament, provided for this return (Aben
Esra, Jarchi, Kimchi, and others). As to the New Testament, whose learned expo-
sition in the spirit of Chrysostom, Qilcumenius, Theophylact, and Euthymius Ziga-
benus, had prosecuted, that human learning, transplanted from Greece to the West,
and awakened and cultivated in the West itself, served the same purpose which the
labors of the Jews did for the Old Testament. Thus there was prepared, since
Nicholas of Lyra (who died about 1340), Wicliffe, Huss, with Laurentius Valla,
Reuchlin, Erasmus, a scientific exposition of the Scriptures, which began at once by
its critical process to free itself from mediaeval traditions.
But the exposition of the Scriptures must at the same time be made popular, and,
in tlie form of Bible readings, sermons, catechisms, household instructions and training,
be introduced among the people. Besides a few great popular preachers (Berthold,
the Franciscan, 1272, John Tauler, 1361, Vincentius Ferreri, 1419, Leonard of Utino,
1470, and others), the pious sects of the middle ages, especially the Waldenses, and
the well-known forerunners of the Reformation, labored to secure this result.
The last-mentioned class prepared that introductory, profound, and scientifia
)sposition of Scripture in which the Reformation arose, and through which alone
it could 8U'>cessfully assert that full, new unveiling and revelation of the Holy Scrip
ture as it lived in the heart, the word of justification by faith, and thug established
its sole authority in matters of faith.
50 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
With the great reformers, that introductory exposition of the Bible, purified
through its critical processes, brought back to the grammatical and historical sense,
while at the same time mystical and inward, on one side learned, on the other popular
first entered into the popular life, however the fetters of ecclesiastical exegetical
tradition may have restrained the freedom of individuals. This exposition in its
scientific aspect led to a new construction of the entire theology, in its ecclesiastical
aspect to the laying anew all the foundations of church institutions and order, in
its popular aspect to the production of countless sermons and hymns. Flaccus lUyr-
icus reduced these acquisitions to their rules in the first protestant Hermeneutics in
his Clavis Seripturce Sacrce, 1567.
From this time onward the history of the exposition of the Scriptures is so com
prehensive that we can only describe it after its periods. To the period of the Re-
formation, in which the prevailing principle was the Anodogiajidei, and during which
the Lutheran Exegesis struck into a synthetical and critical direction, and the Re-
formed into an analytical and practical, succeeded at first the period of interpreta-
tion according to the Orthodox symbols, and in which the different confessions
shaped and determined the exegesis. This period extends through the ultra-critical
exegesis of the Unitarians, and partially also that of the Arminians, and through the
allegorical exposition both of the Catholic and of the Protestant mystics (Madame
Guion, Antoinette Bourignon, Jacob Boehnic), which here again, as in the middle
ages, forms the side-stream to the new scholastic main current. This last tendency
passed over partially into the subjectively practical pietistic school, whose principle
of interpretation was the word of God, the word of personal salvation, as the seed of
person.ll regeneration. The Lutheran interpretation, as it was pre-eminently dog-
matic, was ever seeking to find the New Testament dogmas in the Old Testament,
i. e., it distinguished less accurately the times. The Reformed, with a more correct
estimate of the historical, distinguished definitely times and economies, and found,
therefore, in the Old Testament the typical profigurations of the New, but fell also,
in the Cocceian school, into a typology which knew no rules, or into allegorical fan-
cies and excesses. This distinction was reversed in their views of the law. Luther
made the opposition between Moses and Christ too great, while Calvin suffered him-
self to be influenced by the Mosaic system even in questions of ecclesiastical law. For
the orthodox the Bible was a mine of dicta probantia, for the mystics it was a record of
a visionary, inspired, mysterious, all-pervading view of the world. Pietism strove
to unite these in its method of interpretation.
That Rationalism, in its period, has both corrupted and promoted criticism, has
made exegesis more shallow and superficial, while it has made it more pure and
simple, has both falsified and uprooted scripture doctrine in its reference to life, as it
has developed it practically and morally, is now confessed, i. e., it is confessed that it
forms in one total representation a revolution of unbelief, and a reform of the believ-
ing consciousness. But if it advances from that grammatical historical principle, illy
understood (since the bibliqal letter was not seen in its peculiar depth, the biblical
facts or persons in their complete originality), to the last destructive results of the
pseudo-criticism, so also it has in its interchange with supernaturalism from the same
principle, correctly understood, wronglit a more profound exposition of the scripture,
according to the fundamental principle of scripture. It has introduced the Christ olog-
ical explanation of the scripture, which forms the living centre of the present exposi-
tion of the Bible. However, it har not interrupted the flow of biblical investignlior
rKAOTlCAL EXPLANATION AND HOMILETICAL D3E OF THE OLD TESTAMENT, fl]
and exposition, but urged it on more rapidly, since it was animated by the idea, that
the doctrine of the Bible would prove the most efficient means of overthrowing th«
churchly dogmatics. A striking testimony for the extraordinary activity in the inter-
pretation of the Scriptures, from the Reformation until our own time, is found in th«
commentaries, the collections of sermons, concordances, systems of biblical theologr
and especially the Bibleworks, which are now appearing so rapidly.
Catalogues of collected Bibleworks, exegetical and
bomiletical, maj be seen in Walch : BMinlheca theol.
vol. iv. p. 181. Winer: Handbach der iheologhchen
IMeratur, i. p. 186. The Supplement, p. 11. Danz,
p 134. In Starke: Biblework we find named as his
predecessors the Bibleworks (Lutheran) of BI'.ne-
MANN, Cramer, Dietrich Veit, Xicolaus Hasics,
Joachim Lanre, Horch (Mystical Bible, Marbuigh),
Olearius, the two Osianders, Zeltner (Reformed),
Castellio, Tremellics, Piscatue, Tossands (Cath-
olic), Walafried Strabo, Lyra, Padlcs a Sancta
Maria. Further, the Ernestine Bible, theVViirtemberg
Summarien, Die Tiibingische Bibel, under the direc-
tion of Matthew Pfaff (Lutheran). — Reformed works :
Die Berleburgische Bibel, the English, Belgio, Ge-
nevan (with notes by Maresics) Bibles. Das Deut-
Bche Oder Herborn'sche Bibelwerk. — Besides these.
Hall: Practical Applicaiions,'FTi\heT^sc\iC Parallel-
bibel, Il'enii thesaums. Also a series of speci.il
Bibleworks upon the New Testament. Hedinoer,
Majus, Muller, Qoesnel, Zeisios. Of modern
Bibleworks we name: Von Hetzel (10 Theile, fSO
-1791), with 2 Theile iiber die Apokryphen (von
Fdhrmann in seinem Handbuch der theolng. Literatuf
ungiijixtig beurtheilt). Altenburger Bibel-Commeu
tar fiir Prediger, 1799 (von einem Verein von Pre
digern). Those of Oertel, Fischer, and Wohl-
fahrt. Dinter and Brandt. Also the list in Lange
Biblework, Mattheic, Am. ed. p. 19. For the great
number of works, preparatory to the Holy Scriptures,
Lexicons, Concordances, and similar aids, see Danz
and Winer. Lange: Matthew, Am. ed. pp. IS, 19.
English Bibleworks : Nelson : Antideistic Bible.
Burnet: Xew Testament. Henry: Exposition [in
England, the general commentaries, by Poole, Gill,
the two Clarkes, S.amuel and Adam, Patrick Lowth,
and Whitby, Scott, Burder, and others of less note.
In this country the literature is rich in special com-
mentaries, wliile there are no general commentaries,
unless we include in the teim popular works, like
that published by the American Tract Society. — A.
G.]
The practical exposition of the Scriptures was limited, in the Lutheran church by
the order in which they were read in the church service, in the Reformed by its stronger
dogmatic tradition. But in the end the more profound view of the Analogia Jidei
there, and of the Analogia scripturae here, led to the great reform in biblical criticism,
exposition, theology, preaching, and catechetical instruction, which places us to-day
on the very threshold of a new epoch. (See Remarks, § 1.)
Recently the study of the Old Testament centres again upon Genesis, the Mosaic
records of the creation, the six days; since the conflict with modern unbelief, for the
defence of these principles of the kingdom of God, which are here laid down in the
beginning of the Scriptures, must be met and settled here.
For the literature: .5feLcDwiG; Ueber die prak-
tische Atmlegunff der heilic/en Schrift,FranM}ivt, 1859.
Dickinson : Phi/sica vetus et vera, sive tractatu» de na-
turali veritate Nexaemeri mosaici, London, 1702.
[The works of Hitchcock, Hugh Miller, Dana, J.
Pyk Smith. The Bridgewater treatises. Lord, the
articles in the Bibliotheca sacra, urging the view of
Prof. Gcyot. 7%e Commentary on Genesis, by Ja-
50Brs. Wiseman : Lectures. Tatlkr Lewis : Six
Days of Creation, and The Bible and Science
MtjRPHY: Bible and Oeology. Pattison : The Earth
and the Word. Kurtz : Bible and Astronomy.
Sdmner : The Records of the Creation. Birks : On
die Creation. Hancock : On the Deluge. The con-
troversy, started by Golenso, has already been fruitful
in its literary results. See Mahan : the spiritual
point of view. Green; The Pentateuch vinditMai
(against Colenso). — A. G.]
«2
INTKODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
THIRD DIVISION.
THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL LITERATURE
UPON THE OLD TESTAMENT.
See Lanoe : Matthew, Am. ed. pp. 17, 18. For the
older literature consult the catalogue in Starke:
BiUework, the appendix to the fifth part, entitled
General register, &e., pp. l^l. Also Heidegger: £n-
chiridion, \>p. 16, 16. Waloh: Bibliotheca theolog.
Tol. iv. p. 205. Fdhrmann : Haiidbuch der theolog.
Literatur, li. p. 3. Danz : Worterbwch, p. 938, Supple-
meut, p. 10. Winer: i. p. 67, Supplement, p. 31.
Hagenhach : Ene.yclopadie, p. 176, to which is added
the literature of biblical Philology, p. 122. Compare
also a sketch of a history of Old Testament exegesis
in Bleek : Einleitung, p. 129. KuRTZ : History of
the Old Testament, p. 62. De Wette : Einleitung,
p. 159. [See also the comparatively full lists of the
older literature, given in Horne : Introduction, and
the partial lists in Kitto : Cyclopedia, and Smith ;
Bible Dictionary, Davidson : Hermeneutics, the his-
torical part. — A. G.]
1. Introduction.— De Wette, Haevernick,
Bleek, Stakhelin (1862). — Special critical works.
Stakhelin : Kritische Untersuchu7igen uher den Pen-
tateuch, Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings (1843). Koe-
Nio: Alttestamentliche Studien, 1. Heft: Authentic
desBuches Josua(1836); 2. Heft: Das Deuterono-
mium uud der Prophet Jeremias (1839). Also G. A.
HAnFF, RiF.HM, Caspari : Contributions to the intro-
duction to Isaiah. Henqstenberg : fieft-ai^e. Geiger
(Jew) : Urschrift und Uebersetzungen der Bibel, &c.
(1857). [DkYiviSOii: Introduction. McDonald: /ti-
Iroduclion to the Pentateuch. The Introduction to
Baumgarten: Commerdary — in the 1st vol. Hamil-
ton: The friend of Moses. — A. G.]
2. General examination of the Old Testa-
ment.--CiiAPPLiis, L.auganne(1838). Koiildruegge,
Elberfeld (1858). Boehner, Ziirich (1859). Fried-
rich, GoMPACH, Westermeyer, Schaffhausen
(1860).
3. More general Commentaries. — Kurzge-
fasstes exegetisehes Jlandhuch, by HnziG, IIirzel,
Olbhaiisen, Thenids, Knobel, Bertheab, &c.
(Leipzig, 1841, ff., embraces also the Apocrypha).
The Commentary now in progreBS by Keu. and
DKLITZ9JB. For special commentaries : sec Lance:
Sfattheu, Am. ed. p. 19. [Besides those referred
(o, there may be consulted : On the Old Testament,
on Genesis, and the Pentateuch : Bonar, Cum-
MINOH, Gkavkh, Hamilton, Jacodds, Jamieson,
Mi.-HPHV Wordsworth. — Also Abbott: On Jonah.
BiRDGES : On Proverbs and Ecclesiastes. Rev. J
Bcrrodghs: On //b»ea. Bi:rrows: Otit/ie Song. Ca
RTL: On Job. Davidson: On Esther. Drake: On Jo
nah and Hosea. Greenhill and Gdtbrie: On Ene
kiel. Horslev : On the Psalms. Moore : On the Pro
phets of the Restoration. Tregklles : On Daniel
Young : On Ecclesiastes. — A. G.]
4. Bibleworks. — Ehrmann : The five books of
Moses down to Esther (1733). Michaelis : Transla-
tio7t of the Old and New Testament, with explanations.
Berger and Augusti : Praktische Einleit. in's Altf
Testament (1799). Bleckert : Das Oesetz vnd die
Verheissiiiig {1S52). PnitippsoN : Die heilige Schrifl
in deutscher Uebersetzung, &c. 3d ed. (1862). The-
saurus biblicus, 1 Dan., Suesskind (1856). General
Bibleworks, Lange : Matthew, Am. ed. p. 19.
6. Works embracing the principal points io
question. — a. TTie kingdom of God ; Jewish History :
JosT (1859). Dessacer (1862). Da Costa (1855).
Chr. Hofmann. Kdrtz: Sacred History of the Old
Covenant. Hofmann : Weissagung und Erfullung.
BiiEHRiNQ (1862). [Edwards: History of Redemp
tion. Alexander ; History of the Israelitish Nation.
Blakie: Bible History. Coe: Sacred History and
Biography, London, 1860. Fleetwood: History of
Ijie Bible. Kitto, Johnston : Israel in the World. 6.
Smith: Hebrew People. Utahley : History of the Jew
ish Church. — A. G ]
6. The History of the kingdom of God. —
WiiATELY : Kingdom of Christ. Histories of the king-
dom of God, by Hess, Zahn, Brakm, and others.
Structure of General History, by Weitbrecht, Eh-
renfeuchter, Etth, and others. Apelt : Die Epochen
der Oeschichte der Menschheit. (The Gospel of the
Kingdom, Leipzig.) Ehrlich : Leitfaden fiir Vor-
lesnngen iiber die Off'enbarnng Gottes (1860). Lisco
(1830). Kalkar (1838). Kircher (1845). Apel
(I860). Cairo and Lctz (1858). Thecrer(1862).— b.
Christology. Naeoelsbach: Der Gottmensch,the(\m-
damental idea of Revelation in its unity and historical
development (1853). Trips: Die Tluophanien in the
historical books of the Old Testament (1858). Badb
Christoloqie des Altcn Testaments. Sciioi.z : Hand-
bueh der 'Ilieologie des Alten Bundes (1S61). Theo-
logia dogmatics Judaiorum brevis Expositio, by
RoEiii. Bkrthoi.iit: Christologia Judaiorum. Ew.
ALD, Henostenberg, Hofmann, Coquerkl, Ldt«,
Stkudel, Okmi.er, IIak.vernick. Mayer Die patri
THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL LITERATURE UPON THE OLD TESTAMENT. 03
archd/ischen Verheissungen und Mesxianischen Psal-
men. HiTZiG: Die prophetischen Biicher des Alten
Testaments (1854). Sohegg; Die kleinen Propheten
(1854). — c. Messianic ti/pes. Kanne : Christus im Al-
ten Testament. HiLLER ; Die Reihe der Vorbilder Jesu
Christi im Alien Testament, new ed. by A. Knapp.
Lisco : Das Ceremonial gesetz des Alten Testaments
(1S42). Baeur : Sipnbolik (\SS1). Baf.hr. Salo-
monische Tempel, — also Kurtz, Fkiedricm, Sarto-
Eins, Keil, Kliefoth, and others. — A more partic-
ular leference will be made in the Biblework upon
Leviticus. [Fairbairn: Topology. Marsh : iecteres,
and works of less note and importance. Matthews,
Keach, J. Taylor, Gould.-A. G.] — d. Messianic pro-
phecies. 'Sev:ton: Lecture on the Prophecies. K(ESter,
Knobel, EwALD, Tholitck. Staehelin : Die Messia-
mschen Weissagungen, &c. (1847). Meinertzhagen :
Vorlesungen iiber die Chriatologie des Alten Testa-
ments (XHi?,). Reinke: Die Messianischen Psalmen
(1857). — Die Weissagungen(\66'i). — Henostenberg :
Christologij, 2d ed. Baur: History of tlie Old Tes-
tament Prophecy {1861). [Smith: Scripture testimony
to the Messiah ; Magek : On the Atonement ; Faber :
On the Prophecies ; Warburton ; Divine Legation;
Hdrd : Introduction to the Study of the Prophets ;
Jones : Lecttires ; Graves : Lectures on the Penta-
teuch; McEwen: Essay ; Samuel Mathers: On the
figures and types of the Old Testament: KiDD : Chris-
tophany; Steward : Mediatorial Sovereignty ; Turn-
bull: Theophany. — A. G,]
1. Principal writers of recent times J. D.
Michaelis, Rosenmullkr, Dathe, Meurer, J. J.
Hess : Of the kingdom of God (1774-1791). Heng-
Btenberg : Chnstology; Beitrage ; Authenticity of the
Pentateuch ; of Daniel ; Books of Moses and Egypt ;
History of Balaam and Ms prophecy ; on the Psalms ;
work upon the sacrifices ; on Job ; Ecclesiastes ; the
Song of Solomon ; and a work upon the Apocrypha.
Ewald: History of the people of Israel ; Poetical
book ; Prophets ; Jahrbucher der biblischen Wissen-
tchaft, 11 vols. Umbeeit : Praktischer Commentar
zu de?. Propheten. Hopfeld : Die Genesis ; die Psal-
men. Delitzsch : Genesis ; Psalms ; Song of Solo-
mon. Baumgarten : Commentary upon Pentateuch
and Zachariah. [On Genesis: Bush, Hackett, Jaco-
bus, — on Psalms : J. A. Alexander, — on Job :
Barnes, CoNA NT, — on Proverbs: M. Stuart, Bridges,
—on the Song: Burroughs, — on Ecclesiastes : Young,
— on Isaiah : Barnes, Henderson, Drechsler, Alex-
ander,— on Ezekiel : Haevernick, Fairbairn, — the
minor Prophets: Henderson, Percy, Moork. — A. G.]
■S. Sermons upon Old Testament Books S.
Fdbbmann : Handbuch, p. 263. Hohnbaum ; Prcdig-
(«n, 2 vols. (1788-1789). Beyer: Die Geschichte der
Urwelt in Predigten, 2 vols. (1795). The History of
Israel in Sermons (1811). Predigten, von Sturm
(1785). [Graves: Lectures on Pentateuch. Ful
LER : Discourses on Genesis. Lauson : Lectures on
Ruth a7id Esther. Scott : Lectures on Daniel. Mc
Duff: On Elijah. Norton and Chandler: On David.
Blunt : On Abraham ; and a very wide literature of
this kind in the works of the older English divine*,
—A. G.]
9. Homiletical and practical 'writings on th*
Old Testament. — Beykr : Predigten, an attempt to
guard the unlearned against the attacks of enemies
and scoffers. Bender : Old Testame/it examples in
S«i-mo««, 3 vols. (1857-1858). Gollbard: Outlines
of sermons upon the historical books of the Old Tes-
tament (1854). W. HoFMANN: Predigten, vols. 4 and
5. F. W. Krummacher : Neue Predigten, book of
the advent (1847). H. Arndt: Christus im Alten
Bunde (1861). G. D. Krummacher: Predigten.
Emil Krummacher: Gideon, der Richter Israeli
(1861). Natorp: Predigtenvhei- das Buch Ruth (\mS).
Akndt: Der Mann nach dem Herzen Goftfs (1836).
DissKLHOF (1859) : Upon Saul and David. Baum-
garten: David der Konig {\8&2) ; Introduction to the
book of Kings, Halle (1861). Paulus Cassel: Ko-
7iig Jeroboam (1851). F. W. Krummacher: Homilies
upon Elijah and Elisha [published by Tract Society,
N. Y.— A. G.]. Diedrich: Das Buch Hiob (1858).
Ebrard: The same. The Psalms, by J. D. Frisch,
new ed. (1857). Burk: Gnomon Psalmorum (11 6i>).
Oetinger: Die Psalmen Davids, newly revised (\86(>).
Veillodter: Predigten (1820). Iken; Trostbibel far
Kranke, in einem passe7iden Auszug aus den Psalmen
(1835). Psalmen von Thalhofer [Catholic] (186(i).
Taube and Gcenther : On the Psalms. Hammer: Di»
Psalmen des Alten Testaments ; The words of St. Ber-
nard upon the Song (1S62). F. W. Krummacher,
Jahn, Maydorn : Das Hohe Lied. W. Hofmann : Die
grossen Propheten, explained in the u^itings of the
Reformers. Schroeder : Die Propheten Hosea, .Joel,
Amos, iiberselzt und erldutert. Diedrich : Daniel.
Hosea, Joel, Amos, briefly explained (1861). J.
ScHLiER : Upon the Minor Prophets. Lavater : Pre.
digten iiber das Buch .Jonas. Brieger : The 53d Ch,
of Isaiah (1858). Rinck: Der Prophet Haggai (1851)
[Chandler: Life of David; Hall: Contemplations;
Faber : Horae Mosaicae ; Ryder : Family Bible ;
Blunt : Coincidences of the Old and New Testament.
The Royal Preacher. Hamilton. One of the volumes
in Edwards' works contains suggestive notes upon
various passages. Guthrie: Go.'spel in Ezekiel.
Brown: Evenings ivith the Prophets. Burt: Redemp
lion's Datvn. Caldwell: Lectures on the Psalms
Chalmers : Daily Readings. Ccmmings, Kitto, Hun-
ter: Sacred Biography. Maurice: Prophets ciuJ
King' Patriarchs and Lawgiver!. — A. G.j
M
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
Remark. — The literature upon Genesis, and io a great measure for the Pentateuch, will be found m
the special Introductions.
10. Apocrypha. — Beckhaus: Bemerkungen
iber den Gebrauch der apokryphischen Bucher.
Das Exegetische Handb^ich von Fritsche and
Geimme. — (Volkmar: //aWiuoA, 1. Theil.) Against
the Apocrypha by Mann (1S53). Keerl (1855).
Wild (1854). Oschwald, and others. For the
same Hengstenbero. Fiir Beibehaltung der Apo-
kryphen (1853). Stier (1853). Scheele (1865),
and others. [Jones: On tht Canon. Axexandke:
On the Canon. Wordsworth: On the Canon.
Thoenwell : On the Apocrypha. Prideaux : Con
nection. — A, Gx]
FOURTH DIVISION.
THE ORGANISM, OR THE ARRANGEMENT OF THE
BIBLICAL BOOKS.
a. Names of the Bible.
The Ola Testament: the Law, Josh. i. 8; Matt.
ixii. 36; Ps. cxix. 92; Matt. v. 18; Luke xvi. 17 ;
John X. 34; xii. 34. The Scripture, or Holy Scrip-
ture, John V. 39 ; Rom. xv. 4 ; Gal. iii. 22. — The
word of God. — The law and the prophets : Matt. v.
17. Moses and the prophets: Luke xvi. 29, 31. The
law, prophets, and other writings, the prologue of
Jesus Sirach. The law, prophets, and the Psalms:
Luke xxiv. 44. The book of the law : Jos. viii. 34,
&c. The law in many cases designates the giving
of the law in the narrower sense.
6. The Different Bibles.
When we speak of the Bible it is presupposed that we are treating of one definits
fixed object. But this is not the case. In reference to the Old Testament, we must
distinguish the Bible of the Jews in Palestine, the Bible of the Alexandrine Hellenists,
the Septuagint, and that Christian arrangement of the Bible already introduced b;
Josephus.
We apprehend the Bible first preeminently as the book of the Religion of the
future. Hence upon the basis of the Thorah, law (the five books of Moses), there is
laid the great grou]) of the prophets, Nebiim. The earlier or former prophets follow
upon the earlier histoiical books, Joshua, Judges, the two books of Samuel, and the
two books of Kings, not only because these books were written by the prophets, but
much more because the Israelitish history was recognized as typical and prophetic.
Tiien follow the Later iirophols — our minor and greater prophets — with the exception
of Daniel. The third division includes the Kethubbim, i. e., the writings regarded
purely as writings, not so named merely as the latest collection, writings in a general
sense, but destined from the very beginning to work as writings in a higher rank.
To the later historical books, Chronicles, Ezra, Nchemiah, are added the [loetical
books : Psalins, Job, Proverbs, then the jjrophet D:iniel, and the Megilloth (rolls), th«
Song, Ecclesiastes, Ruth, Lamentations, Esther. The introduction of the theocratic
life, the unfolding of th.at life to the New Covenant, the bloom and flower of the
theocratic life, this is unquestionably the ideal ground and source of the arrangement
That the Alexandrine Bible rests upon a theory of inspiration, more free and wide;
than the canonical limits, is evident from its embracing the Old Testament Apocryphi
ORGANISM OF THE BIBLICAL BOOKS. 66
with the canonical books, which the Septnagint could never have done, had it held
fast the pure Hebrew idea of the Canon. From the circumstance that the Seventy
have not made the canonicity of the apocryphal books of special impoitance, soma
have drawn the groundless inference that they held the same position as to the Canon
with the Hebrew Jews. They were kept from asserting the canonicity of the Apoc-
rypha by their ecclesiastical prudence, just as the Sadducees were prevented by the
same prudence from denying the canonicity of the Old Testament books beyond the
law. The Christian arrangement of the Old Testament into historical books (from
Genesis to Esther), didactic books (from Job to the Song), and prophetic books (from
Isaiah to Malachi), corresponds better with the Christian point of view, since a paral*
lei is thereby secured to the arrangement of the New Testament. The term, didacti'
books, answers better to this parallel, than the expression poetical books.
But even as to the Hebrew Jews, and their judgment upon the Hebrew Bible,
the Pharisees had a different Bible from the Sadducees, and these again from the
Essenes. The first enlarged and obscured the Old Testament through their tradi
tions. Their direction ended legitimately in the Talmud. The second emptied the
law of its deeper living contents, since they expounded it as exclusively a moral, and
in that sense only a religious, law-book. They were the forerunners of the modern
deistic Judaism. The third allegorized the Old Testament and divided it, with
thorough rationalistic arbitrariness, into canonical and uncanonical portions. In their
dualistic theosophy, as the Alexandrine philosophy of religion, they were the fore-
runners of the Cabbalah.
That the Bible of the post-Christian Jews, i. e., the Old Testament obscured and
enlarged by their traditions, is an entirely different Bible from the Old Testament
which unfolds and glorifies itself in the New Testament, is as clear as day.
The injurious effects of the Catholic tradition upon the Holy Scripture, which is
obscured by the attempt to place the Apocrypha upon a level with the Old Testa-
ment, is confessed. The Greek church at the synod at Jerusalem, 1672, emphatically
adopted the same view of the Bible, as the way had been prepared for this, through
its traditional development.
It cannot be denied, indeed, that the evangelical Protestant Bible may be and has
often been obscured, e. g., when it is explained in accordance with a one-sided view
of the Lutheran doctrine of Justification, or the Reformed doctrine of Predestination.
The manifold sufferings, obscurations, disfigurations, and crucifixions of Christ in
his church, are reflected in the entirely homogeneous sufferings of the Bible. In the
evangelic sects of the middle ages and the forerunners of the Reformation, the buried
Bible was unearthed from its tomb. With the profound development, spiritual quick-
ening, and culture of the church, will it first be recognized in all its glory.
c. The Old and New Testaments.
The one word of God, or Holy Scripture, lalls into the records of the Old and
New Covenants, into the Old and New Testaments.
The unity of the two as the word of God is conditioned upon the nisus of the Old
Testament towards the New (tlie promise, the prophecy of the Messiah, Jer. xxxi. 31
&c.) and upon the reference of the New Testament to the Old (Matt. i. 1 ; ii. 5, &c.
Isa. vi. 39, and similar places).
In this way the absolute superiority of the New Testament to the Old is as cer
INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
tainly preannoimced in the Old (Ps. li. ; Jer. xxxi. 31 ; Isa. Ixvi. 3 ff. ; Dan. vii.), as h
b expressly declared in the New Testament (Matt. xi. 11 ; xii. 41, 42 ; John i. 17, 18;
Acts XV. 10, 11 ; 2 Cor. iii. 6 ; the Epistles of James and the Hebrews).
With this it is taught, on the one hand, that the value of the Old Testament aa
to its external aspect and for itself, in reference to the Jewish national and exclusive
religion, is abolished. (Gal. iii. 19 ; iv. 5 ; Ephes. ii. 15 ; Col. ii. 44 ; Heb. viii. 13.)
But it is taught also, on the other hand, and with the same distinctness, that th
New Testament firmly establishes the Old in its eternal value, as the foundation, the
preparation, the introductory revelation, on which it rests. (Matt. v. 17 ff. ; John v
39; Rom. iii. 31.)
d. The Oboanish of the New Testamxht.
Bee liAwas : Matthew, Am. ed. p. 24.
e. The Oroanism or the Old Testamebt.
The book of the Old Covenant as the prefiguration of the New Covenant, or of
the Advent of Christ.
ll The Announcement of the New Covenant in the Old. The Thorah (the law).
a. Genesis, or the universal foundation of the theocratic particularism, and of
the particularism in its universal destination or aim and tendency.
b. Exodus, or the prophetic and moral form of the law of the Old Covenant (the
tabernacle in Exodus is regarded chiefly as the place for the law, and the
law-giver. It is the place of the human cultus only in a secondary point of
view. Hence the tabernacle appears here, and not first in Leviticus).
c. Leviticus, or the priestly and ritual form of the law of the Old Covenant.
d. Numbers, or the kingly and political form of the law of the Old Covenant
(the martial host of God and its march. Typical imperfection).
e. Deuteronomy, as the reproduction of the law in the solemn light of the pro-
phetic spirit.
S) The actual typical development of the Old Covenant until the decline of its
typical glory and the preparation for its ideal glory. Historical books.
a. The book of Joshua. The introduction of the theocratic people into the
typical inheritance of the people of God. The conquest. The division.
b. The book of Judges. The independent expansion of the Israeliiish tribes in
the land of promise. The stages of apostasy, and the appearance of the
theocratic heroes, judges, in the different tribes. The tribes after their dark
side. As an appendix, a gleam of light, the little book of Ruth.
e. The books of Samuel, or the collection of the tribes and the introduction of
the kingdom by Samuel, the last of the judges (the desecration of the priest-
hood, the introduction of the kingdom, the j)reparation for the prophets in
the stricter sense, through the schools of the prophets). The first hook, Saul
the rejected king. The second book, David the king called of God.
d. The two books of Kings. The theocratic kingdom from its highest glory to
its decay. The first of Solomon, the type of the Prince of Peace, and of tlte
kingdom of peace, until Elijah, the type of the judgment by fire; the second
from the ascension of Elijah, or the apotheosis of the law, to he decline of
the kingdom, of the people of the law.
ORGANISM OF TUE BIBLICAL BOOKS. Ql
e. The two books of Chiouicles. The Old Testament history of the kingdoir
of God, in a theocratic point of view, from Adam until the order for the re-
turn of Israel from the Babylonian captivity.
/. The book of Ezra. The priestly and ritual restoration of the holy people an**
the temple.
g. Nehemiah. The theocratic and political restoration of the people and tht
holy city.
h. Esther. The wonderful salvation and change in the history of the peopl*
of God, during the exile, dispersion, and persecution.
3) The preliminary New Testament bloom of Old Testament life in its course of
development.
1. The theocratic and Messianic Lyrics. The Psalms.
2. The didactics of Solomon in their universal scope and tendency,
a. Job. The inscrutableness and vindication of the divine wisdom and
righteousness, especially in the trials of the pious.
b. The trilogy of Solomon.
a. The foundation and regulation of the natural and moral world in th«
wisdom of God. Pi-overbs of Solomon.
§. The vanity of the world in the folly of human designs, which do not
recognize the eternity, in tiie divine element. Ecelesiaste?.
y. The transfiguration of the world through love (as the Old Testament
church was turned away from Solomon and his polygamy and mixed
religion, to its New Testament friend).
4) The prophetic images or representations of the New Testament in the Old.
a. The four great prophets, or the fundamental relations of the Messianio
prophecy.
1. Isaiah. The personal Christ as prophet, priest, and king. The Apocalypse
of Isaiah (ch. xl.-lxvi.).
2. Jeremiah. The prophetic Messianic kingdom (ch. xxx.-xxxiii.). The
prophetic Martyrdom. The Apocalypse of Jeremiah (ch. xlv.-li.). The
Lamentations.
.1. Ezekiel. The priestly Messianic kingdom. The Apocalypse of Ezekiel.
The death-valley of Israel, and that of Gog. The glorious life of Israel.
The new temple, and the living stream issuing from it for the heathen
world.
4 Daniel, Throughout Apocalyptic. The royal Messianic kingdom. The
world-monarchies in the light side (ch. ii.), and in the dark side (ch. viL),
Christ and the typical and final Antichrist. This and the other world.
i. The twelve minor prophets, or the special relations of the future of the
Messianic kingdom.
1, The portal of the prophetic period. The book of Jonah, or the raising of
the universalisni above the particularism.
i. The oppositions of the old sins and the new salvation.
a. Hosea, or the marriage covenant broken by the people, and the new
marriage between .Jehovah and his people.
/S. Joel. The locust-march as an image of the march of the hosts of the
Lord for the destruction of all the glory of flesh. The new blossoming
of the world through the outpouring of the Spirit of God
68 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
y. Amos. The completed sins and the completed punishment upon tht
old world, even upon the glory of the old temple, and the redemption
and collecting of all the remnants fiom the Heathen and Jews, into the
plain tabernacle of David.
S. Micah. The judgment of God upon the mountains, and all the high
places and things of the earth, and the appearance of the new Savioui
and salvation out of little Bethlehem, for the exaltation of the lowly.
3. The visions of judgments.
a. Obadiah. The judgment upon Edom — as the type of Antichrist — filled
with envious joy over his fallen brother.
yS. Nahum. The judgment upon Nineveh as the type of the fleshly Anti
christ, the apostate world-power.
■y. Habakkuk. The judgment upon Babylon, as the type of the demoniac,
self-deifying Antichrist.
8. Zephaniah. The day of anger upon the whole old world. The judg-
ment of Judah, introducing the dawn of salvation.
1. The three prophets of the second temple, as the clearest revealers of the
advent of the Messiah.
o, Haggai. The glory of the second temple in contrast with that of the
first. The coming of the Lord to his temple. The polluted people.
The necessity for purification.
p. Zechariah. The future of the Messiah in contrast with the duration
of the world-kingdoms. 1. The Messianic kingdom in opposition to
the kingdom of the world (ch. i.-viii. 2). The Messiah in his progress
from his humiliation to his exaltation, ch. ix.-xiv.
y. Malachi. The coming day of the Lord. The forerunner of the Mes-
siah. The Messiah. His day a fiery oven for the godless. A sun of
righteousness for the pious. The turning of Fathers to the Children,
of Children to the Fathers ; the connection between the Old and New
Covenant.
APPENDIX.
THE OLD TESTAMENT APOCRYPHA.
1) In relation to the canonical books of the Old Testament.
Additions to the books of Chronicles : the book Judith, Tobiah, Baruch, the
prayer of iNIanasseh.
Additions to the book of Esther.
Additions to the writings of Solomon: the wisdom of Solomon.
Additions to .Toroniiali : the book Baruch.
Additions to Daniel: history of Susannah, of the Bel at Babylon, of the Dra-
gon at Babylon, the prayer of Azariah, the song of the three men in the furnace.
Viewed as original writings through the claims of the Septuagint: the books
of Maccab('(^<^, the wisdom of .Tesus Sirach.
2) In the opposition of Hebraism and Aicxaiidrianism.
Hebraic : Judith. Hellenistic : Tlie wisdom of Solomon.
The book Tobiah. The 2d book of Maccabees
Jesua Sirach.
APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 6il
The 1st book of Maccabees.
Additions to Esther.
Additions to Daniel.
Additions to the prayer of Manasseh.
8) In the division : historical books, didactic books, prophetic books.
a. Historical books : the books of Maccabees.
h. Poetical or didactic books : the book Judith, wisdom of Solomon, Tobiah,
Jesus Sirach. Additions to Esther, to Daniel, the prayer of Manasseh.
c. Prophetic books : elementary parts of Tobiah, the book Baruch.
There was a complete disappearance of prophecy until its last point, John the
Baptist. The repression of Messianic hopes was due to the eminence of the Macca-
bean house of the tribe of Levi, in consequence of which the expectation of a Messiah
out of the tribe of Judah was only a secret hope of the pious in the land.
See the timid clause 1 Mace. xiv. 41. Compare the Introduction to the Old Testament, by Kichtib,
LiBco, Gkelach, in the Calwer Handbook.
FIFTH DIVISION.
AN APPENDIX ON THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT
PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT, AS THE CEN
TEAL POINTS OF THE GLORY OF THE OLD TES-
TAMENT RELIGION*
To the paragraph Archaeology (see § 14).
The so-called difficulties in the Old Testament have been brought out with special
distinctness in modern times by the Freethinkers and kindred opposers of the doctrine
of revelation : these, namely, the acquisition of the Egyptian jewels, Balaam's ass, and
the arresting of the sun by Joshua. Although the most renowned attacks upon these
and similar places bear upon their face the character, partly of careless malevolence,
partly of childish absurdity, still it cannot be denied that these difficulties lie as
hindrances in the way of faith, to many cultivated persons, and even to many honest
and scientific thinkers of our day. But these honest sceptics find themselves in a
truly critical position. For, while on one side they are driven over into unbelief by
hypercritics and witlings, there is offered them from the other side the helping hand
of an apologetic exegesis which has created in many cases the very misconceptions
from which it would free doubting spirits. Thus, on the one side, stand the sceptical
investigator of nature, who brings the nebulie of the heavens and the strata of the
earth as witnesses for the boundless antiquity of the world, in order that he may
charge the Bible, even in its first line, with error in its computation of time ; the pan.
theistic worldling, who finds in the human-like tongue of the biblical God the
characteristic mark of childish tradition ; the deistic moralist, who, in the history of
ths marriages of the patriarchs, and in the supposed robbery of the Egyptian treasures
Kt the command of God, detects with boasting the original conflict of the Bible with
* Taken from the dullior's article in *he German Journal for Christian Science and Chrlatiau Life for 1857.
70 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
pure morals; the infidel, who from of old has always taken his most cheerful ride upoc
Balaam's ass; the swaggering skirmisher, who uses the arresting of the sun by Joshua
in order that he may put the host of the Lord to flight. But, on the other side, the
apologetic exegesis seeks in nearly all cases to rescue the assaulted positions only by
the most modest defensive, while it brings into view now the incorrect exegetical
understanding of the word, then the figurative allegorical expressions of the writer,
then the natural side of the extraordinary events, and lastly the wonderful power ot
God. It cannot be denied indeed that in this way very important aid has been gained
to the clearing and justification of the Old Testament text. But neither can it be
denied that these isolated processes leave the difficulties in their totality esser*ially un^
removed, while in many ways they contribute to them, and confirm them. We are
very far from demanding that the Apologetics in this field should make the darkest
secrets unobjectionable to the unbeliever, or plain and comprehensible to the sceptic.
The oflfence of the cross of Christ will have its eternal significance for the ungodly world,
even in these questionable places. But this isolated, disconnected method of defence
can never bring into clear view, that it is the divine understanding of revelation itself
which brings forward these very facts, at which the human understanding in its
worldly direction must take ofience. The generic, that which is common in all these
difficulties, and the divine reason and wisdom which appear distinctly in them — in a
word, the positive glory of revelation is not sufficiently insisted upon. The studied
way in which they (the apologists) only defend, but do not glorify them as the great
proof of the work of God, the hurried joy with which they pass from them, the em-
barrassment with which they gladly avoid the dark riddles, in that they rest in general
upon the almighty miraculous strength of God, neither meets the necessities of inquir-
iig spirits, nor the requirements of faith in the church, nor the necessities of knowledge
.11 theology. It is only when the central point of the ofience at the Old Testament
in our day, has been proved to be the central point of the glory of the Old Testament
revelation, that we can satisfy the honest doubt, or the very end of the Old Testament.
A glance at the most considerable difficulties in the New Testament will illustrate
what has been said. Here truly we meet, first of all, the mir.acles of Christ, his super-
natural birth, his resurrection, in a word the chief facts of his life, and the doctrines
connected with them of his deity, the trinity, the atonement, and his coming to judg-
ment, i. e., all the great mysteries which appear to the sceptic as pre-eminently an
ofience and foolishness. The old apologists have limited themselves here generally to
a discursive defence; they have taken refuge even here on one side in evasions and
mere attempts to invalidate objections, and on the other side in the direct support of
God, and for the most part passed as rapidly as possible, and at any price, by the
great riddles which they should have solved. But the modern churchly theology has
long since risen above this miserable defensive. It brings out the mysteries and those
things full of mystery, at which men stumble, as the very heart of the history and
doctrine of Christ; it shows that the very glory of the New Testament reveals itself
in them.
The same must be altogether true of the difficulties of the Old Testament. Bj
how much more remarkable the phenomenon, darker the riddle, stronger the objection,
by 80 much greater must be the significance of the fact in question, so much richei
its revealed contents, so much more glorious its divine fulness of the spirit.
The difficulties in the Old Testament are the central points of the glory of the
Old Testament religion. Each difficulty marks a peculiar rejection of false heather
APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 71
views of the world, through the very point of the difficulty, in which the true revealed
view of the world is discloaed. We will endeavor, from this point of view, to sketch
tliL- chief elements in the development of the Old Testament religion.
The Account of the Creation. The Records of the pure idea of the Creation, of the pure idea of God, of the
ideas of Nature and the World in opposition to the heathen view of the World, especially to the Theo
gonislK, Cosmogonistic, Deistic, Naturalistic, Pantheistic, and Dualistic Assumptions (Gen. i.).
The Pantheist takes offence here, because the record speaks of an eternally present
God, and, over against the same, of a temporal world which the eternal God has
called into being through his word ; the dualist stumbles at the assumption that even
matter itself, the original substance of the world, has sprung from the creative
power of God ; the deist, on the contrary, finds in the assumption that God, after the
days' works were completed, had then rested, a childish dream, which ignores the
idea of omnipotence ; the naturalist believes that with the co-working of omnipotence
from moment to moment the idea of the natural orderly development of things is
destroyed ; philosophy generally thinks that it is here dealing with a myth, which ia
arranged partly through its orthodox positiveness, and partly through its sensuous
pictures or images ; the modern sceptical natural philosoper makes it a matter of
ridicule that the sun, moon, and stars should first be formed in the fourth creative
day, and indeed that the whole universe is viewed as rendering a service to this little
world ; that the heavenly light should have existed before the heavenly lights, but
esjsecially that the original world should have arisen only 6000 years ago, and that
its present form, for which millions of years are requisite, should have been attained
in the brief period of six ordinary days. But the opponents who diffier most widely
agree in this, that it is fabulous, that the Bible should make a perfectly accurate
report of pre-historical things, with the most perfect assurance.
We shall not enumerate the insufficient replies made from the stand-point of the
earlier apologetics. It is worthy of remark, however, that the theology of the schools
has here occasioned a circle of misconceptions, which the latest theology of the church
has in great measure removed.
The deciding word as to this first doctrinal portion of the Holy Scriptures has
already been uttered long since in the epistle to the Hebrews. By faith we under-
stand that the world was made (prepared) by the word of God, so that the things
which are seen were not made of things which do appear.* The record of creation
is therefore a record of the very first act of faith, and then of the very first act of rev-
elation, which, as such, lies at the foundation of all the following, and in its result
reproduces itself in the region of faith, from the beginning on to the end of days. It
is the monotheistic Christian creative word, the special watchword of the pure believ-
ing view of the world. Ex ungue leonem. The first leaf of scripture goes at a
single step across the great abyss of materialism into which the entire heathen view of
he world had fallen, and which no philosophic system has known how to avoid, until
* When Delitzech (Gen. p. 42) opposes to the view of Kurtz, that the account of the creation is the result of a circl<
ftl visions, looking bacliwards, the assertion, that it is an liistorical tradition, flowing from divine instruction, Ihc qnet-
tii.li ?till remains open, by what means that instruction was made available to man. We, with Delitwch, are her«
•ppoeed to the vision. For in the vision there is a voluntary subjective state, wishing to see, when there should b«
■>nl7 a 8ubje«tivity oi possibility of sight.
72 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
perfected by this. Pantheism here meets its refutation in the word of the eternal
personal God of creation, and the world established by his almighty word ; abstract
..heisra, in the production of the world out of the living word of God; dualism, in the
doctrine that God has created matter itself; naturalism, in the clear evidence of the
positive divine foundation of the world, in the origin of every new step in nature
With the pure idea of God, we win at the same time the pure idea of the world, and
with the pure idea of creation, the pure idea of nature. Creation goes through all
nature, in so far as God, from one step in nature to another, ever produces in a crea-
tive way the new and higher; at last man, after his bodily organic manifestation. On
the other hand also the idea of nature runs through the whole idea of creation, in so
far as God has endowed every creative principle which he has placed in the world
with its own law of development, and with a conditioned independence ; to plants, to
animals, and to man. The creation reaches its perfection and glory in the human spir-
ituality, since in this it approaches or is a revelation of the divine life ; in his freedom
nature is glorified, since its relative independence is here laised to the free blessed life
of men in God. Just as the biblical idea of God is free from the heathen element of a
passive deity, who suifers the world to flow out from himself, so the biblical idea of the
world is free from the heathen assumption that the world is some magical transforma-
tion of existing material, or even of a positive nonentity. And as the biblical idea of
creation will not tolerate the absolutist's assumption of an abstract deified omnipo-
tence, which neither limits nor communicates itself, so the biblical idea of nature cannot
be reconciled with the naturalistic assumption, which derives all the forms in nature
out of one general creative act, and holds that one step in nature produces another.
We will not dwell upon the objections which the most illustrious and popular
natural philosophers have raised against the work of the fourth creative day. That
the light was before the light-bearers; that the appearance of the firmament to the
earth was first manifested in the same day in which the earth was discovered to the
firmament; that for man, from his stand-point, the eartli foruicd an inijiortant contrast
with the vastness of the heavens ; this does not require many words. But the day-
works and the age of the world? The Mosaic computation, it is said, allows about
6000 years for the history of man. For the entire universe there is then the
higher antiquity of — an added week — -the six creative days. But these six days, the
most recent scientific churchly exegesis * says, are symbolical days, i. e., six periods
of the development of creation. The evenings, it is said further, mark the epochs
of destruction, the revolutions of the world in its progress; on the other hand, the
mornings mark the epochs of the new and higher structure of the world. The fact
that, in the Hebrew designation, day often denotes a period of time, and that these
days are here spoken of before the cosmical organization of the world into the planetary
system, favors this view. To this we must add the prophetic biblical style of the nar-
rative. Bearing this in mind, the defender of the pure sense of scripture can hear
these natural philosophers speak of the thousands and millions of years of the earth's
development with a serene smile, as an investigator of the Bible, n.amely : but whether
B8 an investigator of nature is another question. For the recent natural philosophy ap
• Baumgarten ludeei] atill holde ..o the ordinary dayn (Cora, upon the Pentateuch L 14). "The word day (cVl
It primarily day and not period, and here thieword iH uai-d for the lirnt time." But we say that juet for this ver^
leaflon th<; word day must here deaignatc a period. Tlie ordinary day of the earth is not the original form of tile day,
tjot llie day of God, the day of heaven. Thus even the liglil prccedeH the iight-bearers. Uow endleeely diversitiect
tre the dayH in the universe I But the original form is the day of Qod. Compare also Dblitzsoh, GentsiSf p. 61.-
But also Keil, in his Commentary uimn Oeneaia. — A. U.J
AFPENDIX- THE So-GALLED DIFFICDLT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 73
pears extremely rash in surrounding itself with its millions of years, not in the spirit
of nature, nor in accordance with its formation. The defender of the biblical text, as
the friend of nature, may be allowed the word : We grant you wiUingly your thou
sands of years for the formation of the earth and the world. But betliink yourselves
well. According to the laws of present nature, it develops itself very rapidly in all
the first effusions and stages of its life ; on the contrary, you require for the first glow
ing seeds of life and living structures an endlessly slow lapse of time. In nature we see
all subordinate things arise and disappear quickly ; jou require ffions for the first rudest
fundamental forms of creation. If the spirit of scripture absolve you in this lavish use
of millions of years for the cooling of the globes of gas, and the formation of primitive
monsters, ask yourselves whether the spirit of nature will grant you absolution!
But, from the records of creation, you can learn that nature rests upon the prin
ciples of creation, unfolds itself in living contrasts, completes itself in ascending lines,
and is glorified in man and his divine destination, i. «., in other words, that nature
springs out from the miracle, through miraculous stages (new principles of creation),
ascends from step to step, and in the miracle of the perfect image of God reaches its
new birth.
U.
Paradise, or the Records of the original ideal state of the Earth and the Human Race. (Gen. h.^
Paradise, it is said, is a beautiful myth, growing out of mythical ideas of the earth
which the oldest geographers entertained. Thus also the tree of knowledge of good
and evil, the tree of life, and the serpent are regarded as mythical traditions. Thus
the great theocratic element, which lies in the account of Paradise, is entirely lost.
Of the first great historical type we have only left a fantastic philosophic hypothesis
concerning the commencement of the race, and the origin of evil. The theology of
the schools, which views the account of Paradise not only as throughout historical,
but as barely historical, in opposition to its symbolical import, has here pre-eminently
prepared the way for misconceptions and misinteri)retation.
As the fourth stream of Paradise, the Euphrates and its source cannot be a myth,
so neither can the four streams generally. And as the first man is not a myth, so
neither is his first residence. But on the other side also the streams and trees of
Paradise are just as little to be regarded as barely natural, or belonging to the nat-
ural history of Paradise, or the mere individual forms, particularities, of the pre-histor-
ical world.
The significance of Paradise is this, that it declares the original ideal state of the
earth and the human race, the unity of the particular and the general, the unity of
spirit and nature, the unity of spiritual innocence and the physical harmony of nature,
the unity of the fall and the disturbance of nature — lastly, the unity of facts and their
symbolical meaning, which both the barely literal and mythical explanations of the
record rend asunder.
There was a paradise and it was local, but it was also the symbol of the idea]
paradisiac earth. The same thing is true of the fom- streams. Whether the origi-
nal source of the four streams is not marked by the stream in the midst of the
garden may be lefl undecided; it is enough that it was actually one, and at the same
lime the symbol of aU the fountains of blessing upon the earth. Whether the tree
if fife was one physical plant, or rather the glorification of nature, with the definite
74 IXTRODUCTIOX TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
form of tlie manifestation of God in the garden, is a matter of question ; as a symbo
it designates the total healing and living strength of nature under the revelation of
the Spirit. The tree placed as a test of obedience existed in some one form, but
with it all nature is in some measure designated as a test. But the serpent as a
tempter of the other world is not only the type of temptation and of sin, but, as a
primitive reptile, the type of its brutality, its degradation, and its subjection.
A> iliL- ;icconnt of the creation declares the opposition and harmony between God
uiiil the world, so the account of Paradise declares the opposition and the harmony
bet weun the spirit and nature. Here you have the connection between the actual
primitive man and tilt' ideal ni:in. hotween man and the earth, between the fact and
the idea : the consecrated bodily nature, tlie consecrated senses, the consecrated,
indeed sacramental, pleasure, and on the other side human talent, freedom, and
responsibility.
Break this golden band between spirit and nature, between the actual fact and
the symbol, and you fall back into that old accursed opposition between spiritualism
and materialism, which burdened the heathen world and will run through all your
moral ascetic and philosophic ideas as a fatal clefl.
nL
Tfie First Human Pair : the Records of the ideal and actual Unity of the Human Race, and of the male
and female Nature in the true Marriage (Gen. ii.).
With a stroke or two of the pen, the biblical view of the world places itself abov«3
the aboriginal doctrines of every heathen people, and all national pride and haughti-
ness, with the barbarism and hatred which are connected with it. In a few lines it
records the equality by birth of the male and female sexes, the mystical iiature of
true marriage, the sanctity of the married and domestic life, and condemns the hea-
then degradation of woman, the sexual lawles.sness or lust, as also the theosophic and
monkish contempt of the sexual nature. Weighed in this balance, Aristotle, Gregory
VII. and Jacob Boelim have been found wanting.
Strauss asserts that the generic varieties of the human race, as the foundation of the
old aboriginal traditions, has now become anew the common doctrine of the natural
philosopher, and philosophy. Then it would follow that Blumenbach, Cuvier, Shubert,
Karl Von Raumer, John MuUer (the anatomist), and Alexander Von Humboldt, who
Lave taught the generic unity of the human race, are not natural philosophers.
rv.
7%e Full and Judpment, or the Records of the historical as opposed to the ideal and natural charactcf
of the Sin of tlie Creature, of the Holiness of the Divine Judgment, and of the connection and oppo-
aition between Sin and Evil (Gen. iii.).
The record of the actual fall stands there as an eternal judgment upon the tlie-
oretical fall, the human view of moral evil, especially upon the errors of Dualism and
Manicheism, Pelagianism and Pantheism. This explains the numerous and strong
objections which the nio.st diverse systems in old and modern times have raised
against this record. The earthly origin of evil out of the abuse of freedom offends
Dualism, which derives it from an evil leity, from dark matter, or from the suprem
APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICrLT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 78
acy of sense. Although the serpent sustains the doctrine that, prior to the fall ol
man, siu had existed in a sphere on the other side, working through demoniac agencj
upon this (for the serpent was not created evil, Gen. i. 25, generally not even fitted
for evil, and can only be regarded therefore as the organ of a far different evil power),
yet the visible picture of the fall in this sphere, is a certain sign that the fall in that
could only have risen through the abuse of the freedom of the creature. But, if wi
observe the progress of sin from the first sin of Eve to the fratricide of Cain; if we
view the opposition between Cain and Abel, and the intimation of the moral freedom
of Cain himself, so the Augustini.an view, raising original sin to absolute original
death, receives its illumination and its just limits. But how every Pelagian view of
life falls before this record, as it brings into prominence the causal connection between
the sin of the spirit world and that of man, between the sin of the woman and the
man, between the sin of our first parents and their own sinfulness and the sinfulness
of their posterity ! If we take into view the stages of the development of evil In the
genesis of the first sin, how limited and vapid appears the modern view, which re-
gards the senses as the prime starting point of evil ! But when Pantheism asserts
the necessity of sin, or rather of the fall, as the necessary transition of men from the
state of pure innocence to that of conscious freedom, the simple remark, that the
ingenuousness of Adam would have been carried directly on in the proper way, if
he had stood the test, just as Christ through his sinlessness has reached the knowl-
edge of the true distinction between good and evil, and has actually shown that sin,
notwithstanding its inweaving with human nature, does not belong to its very being,
clearly refutes the assertion. But how clear is the explanation of evil, of punish-
ment and of judgment, as it meets us in this account. That the natural evil does
not belong to the moral, but, notwithstanding its inward connection with it, is still
the divine counteracting force against it ; that punishment is to redeem and purify ;
that from the very acme of the judgment breaks forth the promise and salvation ;
these truths, which are far above every high anti-christian view of the world, make it
apparent that the first judgment of God, as a type of the world-redeeming judgment
of God. has found its completion in the death of Christ upon the cross.
The Macrobioi, or the long-lived Fathers and Enoch, or the Revelation of the Difference between the ideal
and historical Human Death.
The long lives of the Fathers, the years of Methuselah, the translation of Enoch.
are difficult riddles to the ordinary worldly view, which recognizes no distinction
between the ideal death (i. e., the original form, resembling a metamorphism, of the
transition from the first to the second human life), and the historical death. But
this difference is here clearly made known in these facts. Originally, there was grant-
ed to man a form of transition from the first to the second life, which is closed
through the historical death, until it appears again in the glorification of the risen
Christ and the declaration of the Apostles (l Cor. xv. ; 2 Cor. v.). With sin the
historical death makes its inroads upon humanity. But it can only, slowly creeping
from within outward, break through the strong resistance of the original physical
human nature ; hence the long lives of the primitive fathers. Here the spiritual
power of death has first gradually penetrated the physical nature ; this is the sig
7fi INTRODCJCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
nificance of the long lives of the antediluvians. The spiritual power of the life of Chiist,
as it runs parallel with the old death in its progress from within outward, will at the
last permeate the physical nature again ; and then will the long lives appear again.
But, as the last Macrobioi shall attain the original form of the ideal death, the trans-
lation, so in an exceptive way Enoch through his piety obtained it of old. Therefore
he stands also as the citadel of immortality, of the victory over death, and of the ideal
form of translation, in the midst of the death periods of the primitive fathers; in him-
self alone a suflBcient voucher, that the Old Testament in its very first pages la
stamped with these ideas.
In these leaves also we possess the records of that idea of death by which the
faith of revelation strides victoriously away from all the ordinary ideas of death 11
ancient or modern times.
TL
The Flood, and the Arl\ or the Glorification of all the great Judgments of God upon the World ; and
of all the counter-working fonna of Salvation, aa they begin with the Ark and are comple ted in the
Church (Gen. vL-viii.).
The great water-flood is established, through the concurrent testimony of ancient
people, as the great event of traditionary antiquity. But the deluge and the ark !
Let it be observed here, however, that just as the idea of punishment explains the
undeniably existing natural evil, so the light of the deluge illuminates the wild waves
of the great water-flood. And just as out of the first curse sprang the blessing of
the promise, so salvation, the saving ark, was borne upon the waves of the first final
judgment. In this light the deluge is the great type of all the judgments of God
upon the earth, and therefore especially of baptism, which introduces the Christian
into the communion of the completed redeeming judgment of God, the death of
Christ upon the cross.
The first general world judgment was introduced through the universal dominion,
and the unshaken establishment, of human corruption. But this was brought about
through the ungodly marriages, the misalliances between the sons of God and the
daughters of men, i. e., the posterity of Seth and of Cain. It is evident, indeed, that
the Alexandrian Exegesis and that of the earliest Church Fathers have introduced
the difiiculty into the text, that the sons of God were angels. Kurtz still asserts
that theBni Elohim are elsewhere only used of angels. But if the vicegerents of God
on the earth (Ps. Ixxxii. 6) are called Elohim, and Bni Eljon, they may even much
more be called Bni Elohim, in a position in which they should have defended the di-
vine upon the earth, but ratlier betrayed it. The connection, according to which the
fourth chapter treats of the descendants of Cain, and the fifth of those of Seth, author-
izes us to expect that here both genealogies are united. After the history has shown
how the curse of sin has spread itself with the human arts, in the line of Cain
namely, even polygamy and murder glorified through the abuse of poetry, how
on the contrary the blessing of the Lord advanced for a long time in the line
©f Seth, and with it the hope of redemption, it now shows how, through the
misalliances referred to, the corruption became not only prevalent but giant-like and
incurable. These false unions, based upon a principle of apostasy, .and which made
evident the profound connection between idolatry and whoredom, produced a race of
spiritual bastards, who turned tlie very spirituality inherited from their fathers int(
APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. TJ
Bin. To look away from the fabulous in the assumption of a marriage connection be-
tween angels and men, it is inconceivable that the deception of the daughters of men
through heavenly .angelic forms, should be stated .as a phenomenon of obduracy, and
a cause of the flood. Here also the idea of apostasy, the yielding of the kingdom
of God to the ungodly world, .and the judgment springing therefrom, was intro-
duced in the first gre.at historical type ; a significant portent, for the history of Israel aa
for the history of the Christian Church, to the end of the world. But that, in the very
moment of the breaking forth of the judgment upon the world, .an election from all
creatures should enter into the ark, furnishes an example of the fact, that with the
election of humanity a pure kernel of the creature world should be carried through
the last final judgment, into a higher order of things. It should be observed by th(
way, that the three birds, the raven and two doves, must be regarded as the symbols
of the three diiferent exodes from the external church, so soon as we view the ark
itself as the symbol of the church of salvation. This significance is not far-fetched
In the Roman Catholic view only ravens flee from the Church, in the assurance of
antichristian spirits only doves, or the children of the Spirit.
VU.
TKe Tower of Babel, the Confusion of Tongues, and the Teleology of Heathenism (Gen. xi.).
The monotonous Augustinian view of the hereditary relations of humanity finds
already its correction in the opposition between Cain and Abel, and still more in
that between the line of Seth and the line of Cain. We see, indeed, how de.ath
reigns through sin, in the line of Seth, and how at last corruption, working in the
ine of Cain, brought it to destruction. While, however, the typical saviour of the
race and of the earth, Noah, came from the line of Seth, and out of its ruins, and
while before him there was opposed only a line of blessing and of the curse (both
moreover only in a relative degree), there is formed in the sons of Noah a threefold
spiritual genealogy : the line of the curse, of which Ham or more definitely Canaan
is the representative, stands opposed not only to a genealogy of divine blessing in
Shem, but also of worldly blessings in Japheth. Still, both are girt around by the
circle of sin and death. And as in the primitive race the earliest development appears
in the line of Cain, so now in the new race in the line of Ham. Nimrod founds the
old Babylonian kingdom. But the people assemble at Babel in order to found, in
the tower reaching to heaven, the symbol of an all-embracing human world mon
archy.*
Beauty, lust, anarchy, brought the first race to destruction ; an enthusiastic civili-
zation, lust of empire, glory, desire for display, and despotism threaten to destroy
the second. And now Shem and Japheth are in danger of losing their blessing in the
earliest development of the power of Ham, in the Hamitic phantom of human glory.
Hence the dispersion of the people, which as truly springs out of the deep spiritual
errors of the people, as it was positively sent from .above. Now Shem and Japheth
could each in their own direction cultivate the blessing of spiritu.al piety which waa
* Delitzsch says of Nimrod (p. 223). " through his name "11533 (from "ms, to rise up, ilisturb), he represents th<
revotntion, ia his dominion the despotism. These two extremes, the monarchical stafe has never bt-en able Ic
remove, from its impure beginning onwnrds." What he i-iiye, however, ;uailB only in its fall sense of the gret'
vorld monarshies
1Q INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
their inheritance. And even within the race of Ham the curse of impiety was inter
rupted through the mutual relations and influence in which it was placed with Shem
and Japheth. Scattered around the tower, the people spread themselves into the
world, according to their peculiarities, after the outline of the table (Gen. x.). The
great value of this table has been recognized again in recent times. But this also
must be kept in view, that in the dispersion of the people we have revealed the pecu-
liar teleology of heathenism. It has a prevailingly admonitory, and yet preserving
character. The people should not lose their peculiar character under the despotism
of imperial uniformity. They should develop themselves according to all their
peculiarities, in their different languages. Above all, the way was prepared for the
development of Shem.
vm.
The Separation of Abraham, and of the Israelitish People in him ; the Teleology of Judaism (Gen. zii. ff )^
The mere worldly culture, down to the most recent times, has found great
difficulty mth the biblical doctrine that God had chosen Abraham from among the
people, and in him chosen the people of Israel to be an elect people, above all the
most cultivated nations. Critics, who usually find no diificulties in the diversities of
the nations, and praise beyond measure the peculiar prerogatives of the Greeks and
Romans, will not see in these facts, that Israel was in Abraham the chosen people, in
a religious point of view. But even here historical facts correspond to the divine
purpose, and bear practical testimony to it. Israel has realized the blessing of its
peculiar religious disposition in its revealed religion. But in this blessing the good
pleasure of God to Abraham and his seed has been made known.
The later Jews have indeed preverted their election into the caricature of phar-
isaic particularism. And, in many cases, unbelief and doubt have been contending
with this caricature, while they supposed that they were contending with the scripture
doctrine itself But the word of the scripture runs thus : " In thee (Abraham) and
in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." (Ch. xii. 6.) That this pas-
sage does not say : " In thee shall all the nations of the earth bless themselves, or
wish themselves blessed," is evident from the preceding words : " I will bless them,
that bless thee" (Ch. xii. 3 *). This then is the teleology of Judaism. As the heathen
are scattered into all the world, in order, through their peculiar forms of culture, to
prepare the vessels for the salvation of the Lord in Israel, so Isi-ael is separated from
among the nations, to be a peculiar people of faith, in order to become the organ of
salvation for all nations.
IX.
Jlu Offering of Itaac, or the Sanctifieatiou of the laraelitiah Sacrifice, and the Rejection of the Abomina-
tion of the Heathen.
We have here the most striking instance, in which the orthodox school theology,
through its insufficient, narrow, literal explanation, has brought into the Bible difficul-
ties at which even the noblest spirits have stumbled. The actual liislory of the
offering of Isaac forms the peculiar stalling point of the Israelitish religion, the
glorious portal of the theocracy, the division between the sanctified Jewisii sncritices
•The hef> rejeeftfl explanation may ccrtai'ily be recnived where the Uitbpael of T^S i^t UMt^d. (Cb. \\\.. Jg
uvi. 4.)
APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IX THE OLD TESTAMENT. 71,
in their nature Messianic, and fulfilled in the atoning death of Christ, and the
abomination of the human sacrificial worship of the heathen. What has tht school
theology made of this glorious history, the type of the whole Old Testament cultus? It
has changed this in the highest sense isolated pecuUar remarkable fact, into a dark
aud frightful riddle, which indeed appears like the heathen sacrifices, and through
which already more than one has been betrayed into the path of fanatical sacri
fices.
The author here refers to the exegetical treatise of Hengstenbeig, who has the
merit of establishing the correct interpretation of this passage in his explanation
of Jephthah's vow.* Hengstenberg has in our view proved clearly that Jephthah did
not kill his daughter, when he sacrificed her to the Lord, but devoted her entirely,
under the usual consecration of a sacrifice, to perpetual temple service as a virgin,
and he illustrates his method of proof through a reference to the sacrifice of Isaac.f
The special proof lies in a reference to the fact, that the Hebrew cultus distinguishes
between the spiritual consecration of man as a sacrifice, and the killing of a beast rep-
resenting it. Thus, c. g., according to 1 Sam. i. 24, 25, the boy Samuel was brought
by his parents to Eli tlie priest, and consecrated at the tabernacle, since the three
bullocks were slain there as burnt offerings. The special grounds for the correct
understanding of the sacrifice of Isaac are these : the root of the sacrifice, as to its
nature, is the concession of the human will to the will of God (Ps. xl. 7-9) ; tallen man
cannot make this pure concession, therefore he represents it in a symbolical and
typical way in the outward sacrifice. He brings at first to the deity fruits ana
animals. But a vague feeling assures him that Jehovah has claims upon the life of
man itself Meanwhile, however, he has lost the spiritual idea of sacrifice. The no-
tion of sacrifice, or consecration, has become one to him with that of to slay and burn.
Hence he falls upon the literal human sacrifice which he must offer the deity as a
personal substitute. But the Old Testament rejects this literal human sacrifice
throughout as an abomination. The Canaanites were punished especially for this
•abomination. This is not, as Ghillany thinks, that they themselves were offered to
God as human sacrifices, as a punishment, because they had slain human sacrifices.
The devotion of such idolaters to the curse and destruction, proves that the human
sacrifice was the greatest abomination. Thus also the law treats this heathen cor-
ruption. But this corruption is thus unquestionably great, because it is the demoniac
distortion of that thought of light, that God requires the sacrifice of the human
heart, and in default of this the spiritual sacrifice of the substituted life of the
atoning priest, or of the first-born in Israel, at last the absolute atonement of the con-
cession of a pure man for sinful humanity. Hence this thought of light must be
rescued from its distortion, and through the sacred care for its fulfilment, be pre-
served. The sacrifice of Isaac was destined to this end. God commanded Abraham:
" Sacrifice to me thy son." Abraham, as to the kernel of his faith, is the first Israel-
ite, but, as to his inherited religious ideas, he is still a heathen Chaldee, who knowa
nothing else than that to offer, is to slay. But as he already, by his germ of faith,
has distinguished the spiritual sacrifice from the abomination of the heathen, so in
the critical moment he received the second revelation, which enlarges the first, sine*
* HENOSTEKBEiia : Beitrdge, 3d vol. The moral and religioas life of the period of the :indge9, especially 02 j Jpb
thah'B vow, p. 127 fif.
t Delitzsch follows the traditionary view of the schools, and is not Inclined to fall ir with the modern cliurcMj
•o»re^ti'-o of that view (p. 300). The objection of Kurtz is answered in the places quoted below
80 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
it prohibits the bodily killing of his son, with the declaration that he had already
completed his spiritual sacrifice (Ch. xxii, 12). Nothing remains for him now, to
meet his fullest religious necessities, than that he should enlarge and complete sym-
bolically the spiritual sacrifice of his son through the coi'poreal sacrifice of the ram
which the foresight of God had provided at hand {without commanding him to take
its life). Now, the distinction and connection between the ideas of to sacrifice and
to kill, which forms the peculiar consecration of the Israelitish sacrificial death, is
m.ide perfect. In this sense the human sacrifice of Abraham runs through the whole
Israelitish economy, down to the New Testament (Luke ii. 23, 24). And the distinc-
tion between the holy saci-ifice of the people of God, and the sacrificial abominations
of the heathen, is completed. In the crucifixion, these two sacrifices outwardly come
together, while really and spiritually they are separated as widely as heaven and hell.
Christ yields himself in perfect obedience to the will of the Father, in the judgment
of the world. That is the fulfilling of the Israelitish sacrifice. Caiaphas will suffer
the innocent to die for the good of the people (John xi. 50). and even Pilate yields
him to the will of men (Luke xxiii. 25) ; this is the completion of the Moloch-
sacrifice.*
X.
The Sexual Difficulties in the History of the Patriarchs, as they arise out of the Israelitish striving after the
true ideal Marriage, and after the consecrated Theocratic Birth; in Revolt against the cruel service
of Lust, and the unsanctified Sexual Unions and Conceptions in the Heathen World.
In criticizing the known sexual difficulties also, it is the Israelitish rejection again
of the heathen nature, on which one sits in judgment, with the modern view in-
woven still with that of the heathen. But here the Apologists believe that they
have fully met the demands of the case, when they remark, that we must not measure
the life of the ancient saints by the standard of Christian morals. But that the germina-
ting .-ieeds of the Christian ideal life and morals occasion these very difficulties, that we
are thus here also dealing with the phenomena of Old Testament glory (which stands
indeed far below the spiritual glory of the New Testament), this is evident from the
very contrasts in which these facts are brought before us.
The spirit of the Old Testament places the natural sexual desire in opposition to
the unnatural ; the object of the sexual desire, procreation, in opposition to the pas
sion for its own sake ; the true marriage — based upon the mind's choice, to the com-
mon or even barely external union of the sexes ; the consecrated holy birth, in oppo-
sition to the birth or conception " after the will of the flesh." In other words, it seeks
the true sacred marriage, perfected indeed through its destination, the conception of
the consecrated child of promise. It sanctifies the traditional marriage through the
true sacred character of the higher union of soul, and the sexual desire through
spiritual and conjugal consecration.
Thus tlie espousal of Hagar into the life of Abraham, which indeed Sarah, the wife
of Abraham, suggests, is explained by the unlimited desire for the heir promised by
Jehovah. The fruitless marriage falls into an ideal error which is far above fiiithless-
aess or lust, subordinated to the end of the union of the sexes, the attainment of the
Deir. In this ethical thought we must uuderst.and the error of Sarah and Abraham.
• For tho untunablencua of the ordinary view I refer to Hknostesbeho : Bdtragc ; Lahob : Poti iit Dogmalik, |
118. Compare also the Ic^iU Cattiulic Ctiurcti. p. no.
APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DrFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 8>
But then tlie Lord brings the true sacred marriage of Abraham with Sarah into op
position with the transient sexual union of Abraliam with Hagar, when he opposes the
consecrated spiritual fruit of the first union, to the wUd genial fruit of the last, Isaac
to Ishmael. It is remarkable how Jacob under the dialectic form of the Israelitish
principles obtains his four wives. He seeks the bride after the choice of his heart.
Then was Leah put into the place of his beloved Rachel. Now he wins in Rachel bis
second wife, his first peculiar elected bride. The idea of the bridal marriage leada
him to his second wife. But now enters the still stronger idea of obtaining ctildren.
Leah is fruitful, Rachel unfruitful, therefore she will establish her higher claims upon
Jacob with the jewels of children. She imitates the example of Sarah and brings to
him her own maid Bilhah. Then Leah appeals to the sense of justice in Jacob, and
strengthens her side in that she enlarges it through Zilpah. The sin, the error, is
here abundantly clear. But we must not overlook the tact that Jacob obtains his
four wives under the impelling dialectic force of noble Israelitish motives misunder-
stood. The first is the pure sacred marriage, the second the theocratic blessing of
children. If now, we view the most serious difficulties, the incest of Lot with his
daughters, of Judah with his daughter-in-law Tamar, we name as the first explana-
tory principle element the overlooked facts, that in both cases the morally proscribed
union of sexes stands opposed to the most unnatural and revolting crimes. The op-
position to the sin of Lot was sodomy, which he shunned with holy horror ; in this
respect he escaped the judgment, and is a saint. Thus also the act of Judah stands
in opposition to the sin of his son Onan (Gen. xxxviii. 9). He was punished with
death for his, even in a natural sense, abominable misdeed, just as in a similar way the
people of Sodom were destroyed. But Judah and Lot live. And even in their error
they defend the judgment of the Israelitish spirit over the sodomy and onanism and
the like abominable lusts of the heathen world. Moreover, they were ignorant in both
cases of the incest which they committed, although the one in drunkenness, and the
other in the joyful exultation of the feast of shearing, fell into lewdness. But the fe-
males, who in both cases knew of the incest and come into view as the chief figures,
did not act from lust, but from fanatical error, under which lay the moral motive of
the theocratic desire for children. Lot's daughters, after the destruction of their
home, fell under the delusion that the world, at all events the theocratic race, was in
danger of perishing. Tamar plainly fanatically seeks, under the noblest impulse, aa
a heatheness, the house of Judah, and the promises which were given to him. Hence
the unwearied perseverance with which she repeatedly, at last in the boldest form,
pushes herself into this family. Finally, we may notice here still the well-known writ-
ing of divorcement of Moses. According to the way in which the Romish church,
or even the latest legal spirit in the evangelic church, identifies the churchly or conse-
crated union of the sexes, with the perfect marriage, Moses, in the permission of
divorce, comes very nearly into conflict with his own law, "Thou shalt not commit
adultery." They say this law, minus the writing of divorce, constitutes marriaga
The Bible on the other hand teaches that the theocratic marriage institution rests
upon the seventh command, plus the ordinance for writings of divorce, under the
permission of separation. That is, Moses knew a higher perfection of marriage than
the barely legal and literal, and this he strove to attain, just as the whole Old Testament,
with the higher spiritual marriage, strove also after a higher spiritual procreation.
Under this spirit and its moral motives, the patriarchal families in succession fell into
fanatical errors ; but in these errors the ethical spirit of the whole sexual life w re-
Ii2 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
fleeted, which corrects the heathen disorderly sexual life, and its low view of the natort
of conception.
XI.
71l« Mosak System, the Giving of tte Law, the Threatening of the Curse, or the Glorification of all the Dl
vine Education of Men, through the Teaching and Leading Power of the Free Religion of the Covenant.
A very wide-spread prejudice, since the days of Marcion, confounds the Old Testa-
ment religion of faith with the Mosaic giving of the law, and then caricatures this
law-giving itself, since it regards it as a despotic or dictatorial bending of an unwilling
people under absolute statutes, which were strengthened by intolerable curses which
should pass over to children and cliildren's children {see Hegel: Philosophie der It&
liffioH, ii. pp. 70 and 74).
History and the scripture teach on the contrary: 1. that it is not the Mosaic giv-
ing of the law, but the covenant of faith of Abraham with God, which is the founda-
tion of the Old Testament religion (Gal. iii. 19) ; 2. the Mosaic law is not the first
thing in the Mosaic system (viewing it as a stage of development of the Abrahamio
religion, in its transition as a system of instruction and training to a neglected people),
but the Mosaic typical redemption, the miraculous deliverance of Israel out of Egypt
(Ex. XX. 2) ; 3. the Mosaic law-giving itself rests upon repeated free communication?
between Jehovah and his people (Exodus xix. 8 ; xxiv. 3) ; 4. the Mosaic commands
are not immediate abstract and positive statutes, but are mediate, as religious funda-
mental commands, through the religious spirit, as moral, through the conscience ;
5. transgressions were not visited immediately with the curse, but so far as they were
not bold and obstinate, were taken away through an atonement ; 6. to the curse
which was spoken against the obstinate persistence in sin, stands opposed the super-
abundant blessings which were promised to the well-behaved Israelite ; 7. the Mosaic
system, with its own peculiar stages of development, proclaims its own goal, in the
prophetic continuation and Messianic completion, and forms in its impelling strength
the direct opposition to all laws of an absolute nature. " Moses wrote of Christ."
As to the addition to the second command, which visits the misdeeds of the fathers
upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me (Ex. xx.
5), this threatening is opposed by the promise which extends the blessing of the pious
to the thousandth of his successors. But in their violent passion over the threaten-
ing, these ungracious humanists have overlooked that it is the same law of tragical
connection between guilt and the curse, which the tragic poets of Greece, in a much
more cruel form, have poetically glorified. Let them first come to an arrangement
with the idea of the tragedists, they will then find, that even here the partially fatal-
istic element of lieatlien tragedy, is laid aside, while its sad features are glorified.
But the Mosaic system generally stands as the system of instruction and prepara
tion for the religion of promise, as it trains an uninstructcd people to the culture of
Christendom, and hence also as the glorification of all divine systems of preparatory
instruction and training.
XII.
TTu Zff'/ptian Afiraden and Plagues, or the Typical Revelation of the Fact, that all the Visitations of God
upon the Nations are for the Good of the People and Kingdom of God.
Hengstenberg has shown in his thorough and learned work (Egypt and the book*
APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 8>
of Moses, pp. 93-129) that the Egyptian plagues and miracles are not to be regarded
as absolute miraculous decrees of God, but as extraordinary divine leadings and judg-
ments, conditioned and introduced through the nature of the land of Egypt. There
was a natural foundation for the miracles, for the blood-red color of the Nile, the ap-
pearance of the frogs, the plagues of flies, murrain, sores, the hail and thunderstorm,
the locusts, the Egyptian darkness (the darkening of the air through the sandstorm),
and the death of the first-born (the plague).
This connection of natural events in an extraordinary succession, form, and extent,
is not obscured but strengthened through their reference to the providence of Je-
hovah, and the redemption of his people. Rather the dark events of the earth are
explained and glorified in the idea of punishments, and the judicial punishment glori-
fies itself in its purpose and goal to awaken and save.
But in this form, the visitations of God upon Israel serve to bring out clearly the
final end of all his judicial providence over the individual kingdoms of the world, ip
their opposition to his church.
XIII.
7%« Egyptian Treasuret, or the Inheritance of the Goods of this World by the Kingdom of God, at the
culminating Points of the Redemption of his People.
In the first place, as to the text, it does not say that the Israelites borrowed the
gold and silver jewels of the Egyptians, but that they demanded or by entreaties ob-
tained them.* In favor of this may be urged first the expression Schaal (istJi), which
retains the same sense throughout the passage in question (Ex. iii. 22 ; xi. 2 ; xii. 35).
The signification : to ask, demand, entreat, is the prevailing sense of the word. The
signification : to borrow, is scarcely ever used. In the usual acceptation, indeed, the
Hiphil of the word (nsibisui'i), in the sense, they lend to them, would seem to require the
corresponding meaning of the Kal : they borrowed the jewels. And Baumgarten in
this view calls (i. p. 473) Hengstenberg's explanation (Authentic, ii. p. 524) very arti-
ficial f The word in question, in the mouth of Hannah (1 Sam. i. 28), cannot well
mean : I lend him (the son prayed for) to the Lord for the whole of his life. The
Hiphil, in its correspondence with the Kal, to entreat, must still mean to give richly
or freely, to grant, especially to encourige the prayer. Moses, moreover, if he had
been speaking of borrowing or of theft, would not have announced it so long before-
h.and, as a prominent event in the freeing of the people (ch. iii. 22); and the attain-
ing of the desire would scarcely be explained by the fact that the people found or
should find favor in the eyes of the Egyptians (ch. iii. 21 ; xi. 3 ; xii. 36). Thus it can
only be an entirely extraordinary asking which is here spoken of, and the expres-
sion which records the result can consequently hardly be to steal. The term (bxj)
points in its various forms rather to a strong and violent snatching than to a stealthy
thefl.J And since in this case it cannot be violence which is spoken ol, so the term
must express the intellectual ascendency of those who gained the inheritance, a mighty
appropriation to themselves.
• Compare HBKGaTEHBBRO : Authenticity of the Pentateuch, 2 vol. p. 507.
t "The verb (bxiTJ), to desire, can only be in Hiphil to cause another to desire. It deslgnateB then a freely of
fered gift, iu opposition to one which is given only from outward constraint, or only from shameless begging. Who-
ever freely gives thereby invites the other to ask; he cannot ask too much, not enoagh indeed." This is snrely ic
perfect accordance with the spirit of the language, if the Hiphil is explained according to the Kal. Baumgarten &v-i
the traditionid exposition explain the Kal after an hypothetical HiphiL
I Hengstenberg, p. 525
94 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
The situation itself is not in favor of lending. The first demand of Moses foi
Israel was only for a brief journey into the wilderness, for the purpose of holding a
feast (Ex. oh. v. 1) ; but afterward the demand increased in the same measure in
which Pharaoh was hardened (ih. viii. 1 ; ix. 1 ; x. 2-t). But after the judgment
upon the tirsl-born there is no need of any supposition that they would return, as
indeed it had not been promised before. The Egyptians drove the Israelites out,
because they, under the protection of their God, had become a terror to them. The
reservation which Pharaoh could perhaps have made, he abandons immediately after-
wards, since he pursues the Israelites, makes war upon them, and perishes.
We pass in review the different explanations of this passage. The older, ex-
tremely positive and favorite explanation, proceeds from the assumption that God
suspended in that case the prohibition of theft and deceit. The Apologists do not
spend much labor here in the defensive. They have a greater work ; they have the
glory of this fearful moment to show, in which the despised slaves, the Jews, in the
eyes of their proud oppressors, now humbled by God, pass into a people of God,
or sons of God, who only need to ask, whether as a favor, or as a loan, or as a demand,
for the gold and silver treasures, and they are cast before them as an acknowledg-
ment of homage, a tribute of reverence and fear. Their sons and daughters are loaded
and burdened with them. That Moses so long foresaw this moment marks th«>
great prophet ; that Israel uses it shows not only his human prudence, but even his
sacred right ; but that God brings about this result, reveals him as the protectoi
of his people, who will provide for him, after his long sorrows and deprivations, the
richest compensation, and at the very foundation of his kingdom appropriates with
majesty the gold and silver of the world. Thus before this time Abraham had been
blessed among the heathen, thus Jacob by Laban, and thus since the church of
Christ, at the time of Constantine, after its victory over the Roman empire ; and
in like manner the church of the middle ages, after the irruption of the barbarians.
But at the end of days all the treasures of the world shall become serviceable to the
kingdom of God, and civilization shall fall as an inheritance to the cultus.
XTV.
lioui the Prophet, and the Prophetic People of God in opposition to the Magicians of Egypt and Balaam,
or the Spirit of Magic, and the Prophecy of Heathenism, as it involuntarily does homage to the Spirit
of the Kingdom of God. Balaam's speaking Ass.
We believe there is good ground for placing the magicians of Egypt in relation
with the Aramaic seer Balaam. Just as the history of the magicians (Ex. vii. 11 ff.)
records the victory of the theocratic prophets over the antagonistic position of real-
istii! wisdom and magic, so the history of Balaam (Num. xxii.) proclaims the triumph
of the theocratic people over the hostile position of that idealistic wisdom of the
world, the worldly prophecy and poesy represented by Balaam. It would be dif-
Scult to distinguish accurately between the symbolic and the purely actual elements
in the account of the contest of Moses with the Egyptian conjurers. Moses was
endowed with miraculous power for this contest, whc«e sign, in any case, wore a
symbolical colorhig. Ilengstenberg regards it as the central point in this endow-
ment, that he could thus meet and defeat the Egyptian serpent-charmers upon iheii
own lield, in the region of their most cultivated magical art, and with higher meant
APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT 8ft
at his command.* Moses, with his miraculous rod, or staff, works in tlie three re
gions of life miracles of punishment and salvation ; iu the region of elementarj
nature (changing water into blood, bitter water into sweet) ; in the region of organic
nature (making the rod to become a serpent, and the serpent a rod) ; in the region
Df human life (calling Ibnh the leprosy and healing it). He can do this truly only
m the service of the Lord, and therefore only in decisive preordained moments. But
then he can do this with an evidence which puts to shame all magical art and
worldly culture. Thus gradually, and step by step, the Egyptian conjurers were
put to naught before him. The first distinction is, that they could only imitate
what Moses did before them ; the second, that they could only do upon a small scale
what Moses did upon a large ; the third, that they could imitate in the destructive
miracles, not in those which delivered and saved ; the fourth, that they could not
imitate the great destructive miracles; the last, that they themselves perished in the
destructive miracles of Moses. At the very beginning, their rods were devoured by
the terrible rod of Moses, and at the end they stand there without power, they
themselves filled with sores, and their first-born given to death.
Balaam undoubtedly represents the ideal character of the art and culture of the
world ; f as it places and defines itself, in its common or ordinary life, as in the
sphere of its conscious thought or piurpoxe, it opposes the people of God and his
kingdom, and especially, by the device ot lustful and drinking banquets, it could work
great injury to the church of God ; and yet must ever, in the sphere of it.t con-
<:cious feeling, in the impetus of its inspiration through the Spirit of the Lord, be cai--
ried beyond itself, bless the people of the kingdom, and testify of its salvation and
victory. This opposition between the purpose and the inspiration in the spheres
of worldly genius and culture is world-historical, not less so than the fact that even
the woi'ldly genius in its philosophic systems, with its poetical and artistic culture,
prophesies of Christ and blesses his kingdom.
But Balaam's ass is destined to portray the fact, that the ass itself must become
a prophet, when the worldly prophet, who rides him, will become an ass. This
grand irony, according to which Genius in its fallen state is more blind and dumb
than the ass which it rides, according to which the prophet who rides the ass is
changed into an ass who rides the prophet, does not stand there as a perplexity to
the believer and a sport to the unbeliever. And it is truly the guilt of the apologetic
school theology if it falls into distress about the ass of Balaam, when the free-thinkers
lustily ride upon it.
That the species of the horse, to which the ass, especially the oriental ass, be-
longs, is inclined to be timid, and through ita fright can draw attention to bidden
dangerous circumstances — indeed, that it has an inexplicable power to recognize
ghost-like appearances, or even in its way to see spirits, all this is confirmed through
the strangest things. More than once has the stumbling of a horse been an evil
omen to his rider, and Napoleon played the part of Balaam on the other side of the
Niemen.
That the voice of an act or event, thus even of the mighty utterance of the animal
loul, may become, in the plastic forming impulse of a visionary genius, a miracle of
vision, and most easily the Jiath Kol, the voice, this needs no detailed explanation, J
• The books o*" Moses, p. 71.
t Especially the wisdom of the Chaldees upon the Eupbrutps, 5m Baumoarten, ii. p. 349.
1 We may not here think of a barely inward event. The way, however, in which Baumoarten, it p. 359, defendf
86 INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
But that, finally, repeated terrors of conscience may awaken the inward life of the
spirit and preserve it watchful, for the reception of the higher and clearer manifest-
ations of the Spirit, thus in the prophetic region, even for angelic appearances, this
•xperieuce teaches.
Balaam's ass is no subject for ridicule; least of all in a time when the noblei
animals have a sensorium more open to the signs of the invisible world than
materialistic geniuses, whom the hostility to Christianity has raised to temporary
honor. The Spirit of God has made this ass to be a standing irony upon the thought-
lessness (to speak euphemistically) of the knights of free-thought, as they go upon
the expedition to destroy Christianity.*
XV.
The Arretting of the Sun by Jothtia (Joshua i.).
We will not speak here of the great exegetical history of this place. The papal
chair, which esteems fish not to be flesh, and once rejected the doctrine of the anti-
podes (according to which all the Jesuit missions in America rested upon a flagrant
heresy), compelled, it is well known, the philosopher Galileo to forswear the theory,
that the earth rolls round the sun. Modern Catholic theologians hold a modifica-
tion of the old view, that Joshua arrested the earth in its course. The spiritual
primate of Ireland (Cullen), however, has returned to the orthodox view, and quite
recently some Protestant voices are heard, which even in this point will recall " the
good old time." f
The presupposition of the established exegesis is the hermeneutical principle thai
the Bible throughout uses language in the same way only, in which it is used in
ordinary records. In that case the symbolical contents of the record will be denied.
It will be emptied of its true religious, indeed historical character. Thus here the
peculiar triumphant feeling of Joshua will be entirely mistaken, since in that case
they only find the thought that he, through an unheard-of astronomical and mechani-
cal miracle, had arrosteil the rolling sun (or the rolling earth, as the case may be)
for about a day (v. 13). They thus gain perhaps what they cannot use, indeed
wherewith they are in the deepest trouble ; while on the contrary they lose the
glorious typical event, which brings out into bold relief the fact, that all nature,
the outward speaking of the ass against Hengstenbebo, appears to us without weight or importance. If it is allowed
to the prophi't to apeak in his own dialect, then surely it may be to the ass.
[• Hengslenberg holds that there is a real miracle, but that it is inward in the mind or vision of the prui)h6t, not
oulw;ird i.i tlic ;ibs. He deft-nds his view— wliich is ctiunected with a general theory as to the nalure of prnpbecy or
.he stale of the prophelw — with great ingenuity and aljility. But there are serious and insuperable objections to it.
Bui even this view is preferable to that given above. Dr. Lange comes down here from the high vantage ground from
which he ha--* dirtcusaed so al>ly the previously btated dltflcultu-s, aud stands very nearly upon a levL-1 with those who
merely seek to explain the miracle. If there is nothing more here than the naturally limid disposition of the animal,
and the working of a plastic fancy or g4'nius upon the bra\ing ot the frightened and refractory ass, leading the pro-
phet to imagine that he soea spirits or angels, and awakeniUL' his moral and spiritual powers, then the whole narrative
Is easily explained, but then the miracle is lost. It is vastly better to hold that the record narrates the fact literally,
Nor Ih thi-re anything improbable in such a miracle, tliat the ass should really use the words of men, if we regard the
clrcuro"'.anc*-s of the case, and the ends which were designed to he reached. It is a iitting way to rebuke this prophet,
Hho had yielded Inraself ti> tlie blindntss and brtitatity of his sm, that the iynoriint brulc siniuld reprove him. And the
'iveiit thus view(-d, stands, as Lange shows, only with far greatt-r signitieaiu-e and lol-ce than it ca!: have upon bU
heoi-y, as a perpetual rebuke to those who, with like hatred lo Ihe people of God, and with similal blindness, undel
tte hrutalizinff i)Ower of sin, carry on their wai-fare against Cliristiauity. Tliose who would see this i cord vindicated,
%Dd its real slgniflcance brought out fully, may consult Uaumqakten : C'omineniary. — A. U.J
t For the different explanations compare Wink a, Artidr. Jnxliiui.
APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMEXT. 8'.
deaven, and earth, are in covenant with the people of God, and ever aid them tc
victory in the wars of his liingdom.
Although we do not share the view of those interpreters who think that we are
only dealing here with a poetical and symbolical style of expression (which the
papal exegesis could not use), which, in the sun of Gibeon and the moon of Ajalon,
glorifies the sunniest and through midnight protracted, brightest day of victory, we
would not deny the relation of the text to a song of victory. It has been overlooked
perhaps, that in our history the storm of hail which terrifies and follows the hostile
Amorites, is placed significantly over against the svm and moon of Joshua, which
give light to the people of Israel. When the theocratic hero and conqueror, in the
view of such a terrible storm of hail, on the part of heaven, utters the prophecy :
we shall have the clearest sunshine upon our line of battle, and at the evening the
light of the moon, that is a peculiar miracle, which is closely joined as to its stamp
and character with the great Mosaic miracles of victory.*
XVL
ITte Old Testament TTieocratie Miracles of Salvation, as parallel Miracles, or as extraordinary Phenomena
of Nature, which the Spirit of Prophecy recognizes, announces and uses as Saving Ordinances of God,
and in which it proclaims the Truth, that the rniraculoug points in the Earth's Development, from the
Flood on to the Final Grand Ciitastrophe at the End of the World, runs parallel with the Development
of the Kingdom of God in its Great Eventful Moments, and promotes its Salvation and Glorification.
That I may not unduly enlarge this essay, I remark that the above paragraph,
while it may be regarded as clearly intelligible in the outline given, finds its de-
tailed explanation in the work of the author upon miracles {Leben Jesit, 2 Bd.). In
some particular Old Testament miraculous deeds, the signs of the New Testament
miracles appear, i. e., the signs of the absolute victory of the theanthropic spirit
over the human, natural world.
xvn.
Tlie Destruction of the CanaaniHsh People.
This must be viewed as the symbol of the continuous destruction of malefactors
in the Christian state. They were destroyed so far as they, as Ganaanites, that is
here as the servants of Moloch, claimed the holy land, and would live under the
establishment, or in defiance of the establishment of Israel. Two ways of escape
were opened to them : the way of flight from the land, or the way of conversion
to the Faith of Israel. The cunning of the Gibeonites found a third way (Josh,
ix.).
[ • The great Mosaic miracles were wrought indeed in connection with natural agencies or forces, but were none the
less real miracles. The fact, that the storm was miraculous, does not meet the demands of the narrative of the arrest*
4ng of the sun and raoon. There are great difficultiei^, uuquestiunahly, involved in such a miracle as this, but difficul-
ties are not a matter of great weight, ta any one who admits the miracle at all, and when therefore the question ia
merely one of the power of God. Keil, who holds strongly that if the passage in question is to be taken as a part ♦f
the hi-torical narrative, we are not to tie troubled by the difficulties supposed, contends with great ability, and aa a
mere exegetifrJ question, that ttie passage must be regarded a-i a quotation from the pnc-tical book of Jasher, which
is introduced into the narrative, -lot as a historical statement, but as a poetical description of ihe great victory. Sm
Eeil The book nf Joshua. If, however, we may take the passage as historical, and then of course hold to the literal
miracle, that the earth was stayed in its co"r-*e by the hand of Gud, how grandly it brings out the fact, as Lange stat««
lt» "that heaven and earth are in covenant with the people of God, and ever help them to victory in the wars of hii
Ungdom.*'— A. G. "
98 IXTRUDUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT.
XVIII.
TOf Aseemion of Elijah in a Chariot of Hre, as the culminating Point of the consistent Developmjnt ol
the Mosaic Law.
Tlie consistent unfolding of the Mosaic law, in its judicial punitive righteous-
ness, is completed in the form of the prophet Elijah. Hence the punitive miracle ia
the prevailing type of his work. He punishes the people of Israel for its apostasy,
with a three-years' drought and famine, he slays the priests of Baal, announces to
the hou!~e of Ahab its destruction, and calls down fire from heaven upou the two
captains of Ahaziah with their companies. In this consistent unfolding of the pro.
photic judicial procedure, he is on the way to the final calling of the fires of the
judgment upon the corrupt of the world. The third captain of fifty, sent by the
king of Israel to bring the prophet, weeps and clings to his knees praying for mercy,
and Elijah feels that he must arrest the judgment. But therewith he has the pre-
sentiment that he is about to leave the earth. He can no more endure the earth,
nor the earth bear him, and the fiery spirit is borne to heaven in a storm of fire.
The first persecution by Ahab drove him into the loneliness of the heathen world ;
the second by Jezebel, when she threatened him with death, drove him to Horeb,
the cradle of the law, where he would willingly have died. In his fiery triumph
over the officers of the third persecution, he appears already as a lofty Cherub with
a flaming sword, who sends down from the mountain the fiery judgments of heaven.
And still this is only the consistent fulfilling of his true Mosaic office. He has a
tolerant heart, otherwise he could not have dwelt with a heathen widow and among a
people that had given to his land the corrupt princess Jezebel as queen ; a loving heart,
as is shown in his miraculous raising of the dead, a heart opened for the jwesent hnents
of the gospel, which appears in his trembling and awe at the still small voice, in the
feeling that Jehovah was now to appear, which he had not experienced in the storm,
and earthquake, and fire; a merciftd heart, and therefoi'e he ])auses in the midst of
his fiery judgments and takes his departure from the earth. But the Lord prepares
for him a worthy end, when he permits him to vanish from the earth in a fiery
sign from heaven. We cannot so paint this history for ourselves as that scliool
which speaks even of the hoofs of these fiery horses. Had the friends of Elijah seen
the hoofs of the horses, they would surely not have sent fifty men lor three days to
search for the vanished prophet. But just as little are we to understand the nar-
rative as a mere description of a disappearance in some peculiar storm. If we see,
in this grand moment, a kind of end of the world, we shall also recognize in this
chariot of fire the mystery of a primitive original phenomenon.*
The opposition between Elijah and Elisha marks the turning point in the history
of Israel, with which tlie judicial office and rank of the law retires into the back
ground, and the providence of mercy comes into relief, out of which the prophecy
of salvation unfolds itself. Elisha inherits a double portion of the spirit of Elijah,
and this appears clearly, since he with his niirnclcs of liealing and salvation (in o])po-
»ition to the punitive miracles of Elijah) forms the type of the coming gospel. The
punitive miracle indeed still appears in his lite, but the essential and determining char
icter of his work, forms a circle of helping, healing, and delivering miracles. Elijat
enters the lustory as a glorified Moses, Elisha as the type of the Christ to come.
[• That '«, perh.-ipii, the mvKtiTS of tlm Ideal demh or of the modu of transition to the higher life. Sti pp. 7» W
-A. G •
APPENDIX— THE SO-CALLED DIFFICULT PLACES IN THE OLD TESTAMENT. 8«
XIX.
77i« T)/pes of the Nev 2'estamerU Miracles, and of the Victory of the New Testament Spirit. Book ol
Daniel.
Tliere appears very early in the Old Testament a definite kind of helping and
Having miracles, which grows more distinct in the life of Elisha, and reaches its
highest culture and perfection in the book of Daniel. Elisha appears as one who
raises from the dead, in a greatly liigher measure than Elijah ; even his grave
restores the corpse to life. He heals the fountains of bitter waters with salt, and
the poisonous meal in the pot, makes the waters of Jordan a healing bath to
Naaman the Syrian, raises the lost axe from the bottom of Jordan in a miraculous
way, proves himself a spiritual reprover and saviour of Israel, triumphs over the
hostile hosts who were besieging him, by the help of the hosts of the Lord, and
sends away his enemies who fell into his hands, with mercy, to their homes. In
the miracles of the book of Daniel, which bear more distinctly the character of the
New Testament miracles, because they are the victorious miracles of suffering, the
New Testament time, the victory of the kingdom of Christ over the monarchies of
the world, is clearly announced. The three men in the fiery furnace, especially, pr&
claim with the greatest clearness^ and in the grandest symbolism, tbe victory of the
Christian martyrdom.
GENESIS {tene^i^, n^irjNin);
OB,
THE FIEST BOOK OF M0SE3.
INTRODUCTION.
»1. GENEEAl INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS
Ltenesis is the record of the creation of the material world, of the founding of the spimna.
(world, or kingdom of God, and of general and special revelation ; as such it stands at the head
of all Scripture as the authentic basis of the whole Bible. It is consequently, in the first place,
I the basis for all the books of the Old and the New Testament in general, a root whose trunk
• extends through all Scripture, and whose crown appears in the Apocalypse, the now Genesia,
■or the prophetic record of the completed new, spiritual world and city of God.
In the special sense, then, it is the basis of the whole Old Testament; in the most special
sense it is the basis of the Pentateuch. The Introduction to the Sacred Scriptures in general,
we have already given in the "Commentary on Matthew." The Introduction to the Old
Testament precedes the present exposition. We have yet to treat of the Introduction to the
Pentateuch, or the Five Books of Moses.
Observation. — Compare the beginning and the end of the Introduction of the " Commen-
tary " of Delitzsoh. The author ha^ said many valuable things of the deep significance of
Genesis. For example: "Genesis and Apocalypse, the Alpha and Omega of the canonical
(vritings, correspond to each other. To the creation of the present heaven and the jiresent
earth corresponds tlie creation of the new heaven and the new earth on the last pages of the
Apocalypse. To the first creation, which has as its object the first man Adam, corresponds
the new creation which has its outgoing from the second Adam. Thus the Holy Scriptures
form a rounded, completed whole; a i)roof that not merely this or that book, but also the
Canon, is ii work of the Hnly Spirit."
But Delitzsch confound-^ here and elsewhere (as also Kurtz) the significance of the biblical
book of Genesis, with the significance of the living Divine Revelation that thmnghout precedes
the biblical liooks themselves and their historical covenant institutions. It might be going too
far to say: "The edifice of our salvatiun reaching into eternity, rests accordingly on the pillars
of this book." This edifice rests, indeed, on the living, personal Christ, although the faith in
Him is efiected and ruled by the Holy Writ. In a similar manner it must appear one-sided,
when the Pentateuch, as a book, is made the basis of the Old Covenant, or even of the New;
although it is, on the other hand, quite as wrong if we do not count the records of divin*
revelation within the sphere of revelation.
LiTEEART Supplements to the Bible in general. — See Literary Catalogue in Hertwiq's
Tabellen ; Kuetz: "History of the Old Covenant," Introduction; Kirohhofee: Bihelkvnde,
pp. 1, 2, 19 fi". ; Winer, i. p. 75. Works on this subject by Griesinger, Cellerier, Kleuker. —
Koppen: "The Bible, a Book of Divine Wisdom." Prideaux, Stockhonse, Lilienthal, etc
Beam: "Surveys of Univers:il History," Strasburg, 18*'." : Bkrtsob: " History of the Old Coto
nant and its People," Stuttgart, 18.57.
tH DfTRODUCTION TO GENESIS.
A. THE PENTATEUCH.
» J. TILK rjs^iAXJSUCH, OB THE FIVE BOOKS OF MOSES— THE THORAn. OBGAJflO UNITr AMD
AKRANGEMENT.
Tlie Hebrew Thorah (i. «., doctrine, especially doctrine of the law, — law), or the record of
the covenant religion of the Old Testament (t) TrnXnm SiadrjKrj, 2 Cor. iii. 14; 8i(i5i7kij = n''"ia),
lias its real principle not so much in the Mosaic law as in the Abrahamic covenant of I'aith as
effected by tlie first preparation of the kingdom of God in the creation of the world and of man
(see Rom. iv. 1, ff. ; Gal. iii. 17).
Genesis is, therefore, not the introduction to the five books of Moses, especially to the law
giving portion, as Kurz supposes ("Compendium of sacred history," p. 94; it is true, with the
restriction: "For the Israelitish standpoint the first book has only the import of an liistorical
introduction "), for this would correspond to a specific and Judaistic view of the Old Testament ;
but it is tlie zinirer.ml foundation for it ; i. «., for the temporary economic particularity of the
patriarchal state and of the law-giving. Genesis is the special root of the Thorah, and the gen-
eral root of the Holy Writ.
Hence the Pentateuch, including this basis, is developed in five books; (Hebraice:
m'inn ■'traiin niran. the five fifths of the law in rabbinical notation. Grece: r^ TifvTUTfvxoi
sc' /3i/3A.,i-. ' Latin: liber Pentateuchus). 'I'he number five is the half number ten. Ten is the
nninber of the perfect moral or historical development; five is the number of the hand, of
action, of freedom, and so then also of their legal standard.
The founding of the law in Genesis unfolds itself in the triple form of legislation. Exodus
(liber Exodi; ij ?|oSof ; Hebrew: niiam) presents the prophetic side of the law throughout.
Even the Tabernacle, whose construction is described from ch. xxxv.-xl., belongs not mainly
on the side of the priestly service, but on that of the prophetic legislation of God, as the place
of the living presence of the lawgiver, and of the law itself (in the ark of the Covenant ; hence :
Ohel moed, Ohcl haeduth, tent of meeting, tent of testimony).
Leviticus (Heb. : xnp»1 • Gr. : Xt kitikoi') embraces the priestly side of the law, the holy
order of service for the Israelitish people, according to its symbolical and universal significance
in its most comprehensive sense.
The book of Numbers (Heb.: -i3"ia3, Gr. : d^iS^io/) is ruled throughout by the idea of the
princely or royal encampment of the people of Israel as an array of divine warriors, in which
are i)resented its preconditionings and its typically significant characteristics, revealing, as they
do, by manifold disorder, that this people is not the actual people of God, but only the type of
that people.
These three fundamental forms of the symbolical Messianic law, namely the prophetic, the
priestly, and the royal, are embraced in Deuteronomy (Heb.: c-ia"!, Gr. : hfVTfpmmti'inv), or
In the siilemn free reproduction of the whole law again as a un ty. in order to point from the
Bphero of the legal letter into the sphere of tlie inner prophetic, force of the law (ccim|)are Deut.
iv. 25 ; ch. V. 15, 21— the ordering of house and wife ; ch. vi. 5 ; x. 18-19 ; xi. 1 ; xiv. 1 ; xviii.
16 ; ch. xxviii. ff. xxx. 6; xxx. 2-14; ch. xxxiii. 2-3).
As in Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers, the historical period of Israel is opened, so Deuter-
onomy jioints forward to the prophetic period.
From the foregoing it appears that we can divide the Pentateuch into threi^ main divisions;
namely, into Genesis as the universal foundation of tlie law, next into the particular law that
lliows, with its Messianic, significimt, tri|ile division, the symliolical liackgrouml of its whole
^pcaranco (i. e., into the divisions Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers), and fin illy into Deuteronomy,
In «hich, along with the intrinsic character, the universal import of the law again prophet.
Icallj ajuiears.
Obbkhvation 1. For the more genonal category. Historical books of the Old Testament, Kt
the division in the general Introduction. In resiieot to the literature, see Literary Catalogue.
g 2. THE PENTATEUCH, OR THE FIVE BOOKS OF MOSES. yg
Observation 2. The present division into five books is considered l)y some (Borthold) !i»
original and peculiar to the Hebrew coUectioi} ofihe Canon. According to others (Huvernick,
Lengerke) it proceeds from the Ale.xaridrians. In lavor of the first view is the fact that Josephus,
who retained the Hebrew cauon, was acqiiainti-d with this di\isioM {coidra A/non. i. 8, alsu
Phih). De W tte seems also to incline to this opinion. Michaelis considered this division
older than the Septnagint. bnt not original. According to Vaihinger {see the article Pentateucli
in Heuzog's Real-LexiciiH), the division of ihe Pentateuch into five books was made before the
captivity. But tlie s.irae L'arned aithority supposes it not lo have been made until afier thu
division of the Proverbs of Solomon into four [larts, lieeause the conscious infiuence of symbol-
ical numbers had not favored tlie innnber five until after that period, as with the division of the
Psahus into five books, and the presentation of the five Megiiloth.
We do not consiiler this argnment cimclusive against the earlier division of Moses into fiv«
books. The Jew could distinguish a significant number lonr. and a significant number five,
even according lo this numerical symbolism. In the l-'entateuch the number five seems to have
been indicated from the beginning by the variety of the originals. That (iene>is is actually in
contrast witli the following books, and that Deuterunomy is quite as specific, is evident. The
fundamental ideas of the three middle books, do nut contrast less specifically with each other,
as appears from our division.
It serves even to a better appreciation of the import of the Tabernacle, when we consider
"hat it is an annex of the Decalogue, and of the whole fundamental lawgiving connected there-
with, and that, in accordance with this, it is repre ented in the second book as the [ilace where-
in Jeh.ivah, as lawgiver, is present to his people. The contents of the fourth, again, are in
strong contrast with Leviticus (as the book of the tribes). The ethical prophetical book of
Exodus is especially the book of God and his prophet. Leviticus, or the book of the divine
office, refers especially to the priests. Numbers, or the book of the tribes, more especially con-
cerns the people in a theocratic, political sense.
OBSEiiv.\TtoN 3. If we mark the number ten as the number of perfection, or completion,
and con-^equently the number five as the number of half completion (Vaihinger), such classifica-
tion seems nmoh too general and inilefinite, since the numbers three, seven, and twelve, are also
numbers of perfection, or completion, each in its kind. It u ill be our duty to treat of symbol-
ical numbers in Exudus. Here we will simply anticipate that clearly " the ten words " * indicate
moral completion, or perfect develo])ment, and so also the ten virgins in the gospel parable.
When, however, there appear five as foolish and five as prudent or wise, the number five may
indeed mark the number of the freely chosen religious and moral development of life. Five
books of Psalms indicate the moral and religious life-prime of the Old Testament, just as the
five Megiiloth indicate five periods of the development of Israelitish life. The five fingers of
the hand are the symbol of moral action, as the five senses symbolize the number of the moral
reciprocity of man with nature. — Vaihinger rightly concludes from the significancy of the num-
ber five, tfiat the Decalogue should not be divided into three and seven, but into five .'nd five.
Observation -i. Our theological naming of the five books (Genesis, &c.) is the Alexandrian
naming of the Septnagint, followed by the vulgate (only that the gender of Pentateuch and
Exodus in Greek is feminine on account of ;ill:i\ns and 6Sdt, in Latin masculine on account of
liber).
The five books, which were comprised by the Jews under the above names: the five fifths
of the law, were individually designated by them, according to the initial words: Breschith, &o.,
as this naming has passed into the Masoretic Bibles. But the Jews had ahso a designation for
the five books, according to the contents, i. e., Genesis was called the book of the creation {see
Vaihin"OEB in Herzog's Encyclopedia, Art. Pentateuch, p. 293).
Observation 5. Vaihinger seeks fir the five books of Moses a second half, and finds it in
the prophets (law and the prophets. Matt. xxii. 40). Thi^ division is interfered with by the inter-
vention of the Kethubim. Then he finds the second half in the additional idea of the law aa
promise in the New Te.stament. Without doubt, the New Testament is the converse of the Old;
that, however, the number five, as such, requires a complement, becomes doubtful by the num-
ber of the bo ika of the Psa'ms, unless we are to consider the writings of Solomon as the comple-
ment of these five books of Psalms. It is true, a complement follows the five historical books,
m the Apostolic writings of the New Testament.
Observation 6. It has been maintained by Ewald, Bleek, Knobel, and others, that the basis
of the Pentateuch was origiuidly connected with the book of Joshua, and that the work was iu
six parts (see Vaihingek, p. 293; Keil, Introduction, § 42, p. 143). It is curious that the sam«
criticism which on the one hand considers these books of Moses too Urge to have been original,
un the other hand again thinks them dismembered out of larger, and comparatively modern
historical writings.
• |The Hebrew phrase for the ten commandments, Oi'ia'nn tTlCS. ExodUB xxav. 28.— T. L.]
M INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS.
I S. ORIGIN AND COMPOSITION OF THE PENTATEUCH.
In the introductory paragraphs on the Old Testament criticism, it has been said. th«t ii
treating the point in question, we neither feel dependent on tradition and the orthodox rale,
tha' it is necessary for the belief of the canonical word of God to attribute to Moses all the fivt
books of Moses iu the present form (except the report of his death), nor on the critical con-
jectures which in various ways, through their false suppositions, their want of intelligence of
the more profound relations of the word, and their great divergence from each olhtT, prove
themselves unripe efforts.
That one must adopt a canonical recension of the originals of Moses (i. e., a recension falling
within the prophetic sphere of the Old Covenant), appears from the manifold indications o(
criticism. To these indications belongs, above all, the account of the death of Moses ; the judg-
ments on Moses, however, as of a third person, which is the object of the statement Ex. xi. 3 ;
Num. xii. 3, seem to us to decide nothing. Then there is the great chasm of 38 years in the
history of the wanderings of Israel through the desert (Num. xx.), as also other enigmatical
obscurities (see Vaihinger). Farther, the manifold indicationi of the combination of variona
originals in initial and concluding formulas; the marks of a later period (Gen. xii. 6; xiii. 7;
xiv. 14 ; xxiii. 2, at that time the Canaanites were in the land ; Dan, Hebron, seem no conclusive
characteristics) ; the presumption of a book of the wars of Jeliovah (Sum. xxi. 14) ; the great
development of the genealogy of Edom carried even to the appearance of its kings (Gen. xxxv.
11). The arabiiuity of the expression •'■unto this day" (Gen. xix. 37; xxii. 14, ff.), is also
noticed by Vaihinger.
From many f;dse presumptions of criticism on the other hand, it is clear that we cannot yield
to its past views. Here place especially the rationalistic starting-point of most critics, and their
dogmatic prejudices. This is 1. the prejudice against supernatural revelation in general ; con
sequently 2. against miracles ; and 3. against prophecies; through these many are impeUed to
deny to the Pentateuch not only authenticity, but also its historical character. On this point
tee Delitzsch, p. 4(5. Here belongs also the ignoring of the great contrast between the names
Elohim and .Jehovah, which in its essential significance extends not only througl] the whole Old
Testament (the Solomonic universalism, the Davidic theocratic Messiani^m), and through the
whole New Testament (the Johannean doctrine of the Logos, the Petrine doctrine of the Messiah),
but also through the whole Christinn church to the contests in the immediate present (ecclesias-
tical confession and Christian humanism).
At a later period we may s|ieak of some valuable references of Sack and Hengstenberg, to
the contrast between Elohim and Jehovah. We also reckon here the supposition, that Moses,
the lawgiver, on account of this his peculiar office, could not also, at the end of his career, and
in his prophetic spirit, have given a deeper meaning to the law, as he looked out from the legal
sphere and over into the prophetic, even as from the mountain Nebo he looked over into the
proTnised land (see the quoted article of Vaihinger, p. 315 ff.). The office of John the Baptist
was to preach repentance in the name of the coming Messiah; before his death, however, he
became the pro]ihet of the atonement with reference to Christ: Behold the Lamb of (Jod which
bears the sins of the world. It is everywhere wrong to assume that a law^'iver has known
nothing higher than what he finds within his calling to announce in form of law, according to
the degree of culture to which his people have advanced.
After these remarks we give a survey of the various views of the origin and the composition
of the Pentateuch, with reference to Bleek (p. 161 ff.).
1. The (dder supposition among Jews and Cliri'^tians, that Moses was the author of the entire
Pentateucli. This is also the judgment of Philo and Josephus. Thus the Talmud: "Moses
wrote liis book, the Pentateuch, with the exception of eight Pesukim, the last eight, which were
Indited by Joshua. Philo and Josephus even assume that Moses wrote the section concerning
is deatli in the spirit of |)rophccy.
2. The views of the Essenes, according to which the origmal theocratic revelation was falsi
I 3 ORIGIN AND COMPOSITION OF THE PENTATEUCH. 95
fied bj later interpolations, passed naturally over to the gnostic writings of the Jews, and iL<
Alexandrian gnostics. From this we may expLiin a similar account of Bleek, relative to the
gnostic Valenrinus, the Nasnrffians (as given by Epiphanius and Damascenus), the Cleinentinei
and Bogomiles. The source of these views is everywliere the same gentile, dualistic representa-
tion. They also coincide with those judgments uf the gnostics, which in their various gradei
are so inclined to throw away the Old Testament.
3. Doubts of certain Jewish authorities of the middle ages about the authorship of the whol«
Pentateuch by Moses, Isaac, Ben Jasos, and Aben Esra. The commencement of a genuine crit'
icism is seen with them. They accepted, however, only later additions in certain passages, i. e.
Gen. xxxvi. 31.
4. The first critical doubts after the reformation, 16th century: Cablstadt: De canonicU
icripturis, Moses non fuisse scriptorem quinque lihrorum. Andreas Masics: "The Pentateuch
in its present form is the work of Ezra or another inspired man." — 17th century: Hobbes in his
Leviathan: "The Pentateuch a work ahout Moses, not hy Moses, yet based on originals by the
hand of Moses." So also Isaac Petreeitts, at first a reformed divine, then Roman and Jesuit :
Systema theologicmn ex Prxadimitorum hypnf.hesi,\6f)b. Spinoza in his Tractatm theologico-
politiciis: "Ezra is the author of the Pentateuch and of the remaining liistorical books in their
present form." Richard Simon : " Critical History of the Old Testament " : " Moses wrote the
laws ; the history of his time he had written hy annalists, from which followed the later com-
position of the Pentateuch." Cleekhjs, in his Sentimens, went still further, though in his " Com
meiitary on Genesis" he took it mostly back, holding that only a few additions are Post Mosaic.
Anton Van Dale, Menonite : " The Pentateuch was written by Ezra on the basis of the Mosaic
book of the law, and other historical documents." — 18th century: At first a long-contiuued
reaction in favor of genuineness : Carpzov, Michaelis, Eichhorn (Introduction, 1-3). Then fol-
lowed renewed attacks: Hasse, Professor at Konigsberg: "Prospects of Future Solutions of the
Old Testament," 1785 ; at the time of the exile the Pentateuch was composed from old rec-
ords." Later retractations (following the example of Clericus), according to which he accepted
only additions to the documentary Pentateuch. Fulda, whose conjectures are like Bleek's;
Corrodi, Nachtigall (pseudonym, Otmar), whose sweeping assertions were modified by Ecker-
man, Bauer, aud others. — 19th century : To great lengths now went Severin the father, and De
Wette; these then were variously opposed under the confession of adduions and interpolations
by Kelle, Fritzsche, Jahn, Eosenmiiller, Pustkuchen, Kanne, Hug, Sack, and others. Reconcil-
ing or medium views were presented by Herbst, Bertholdt, Volney, and Eichhorn, 4th Edition.
We then have the investigations of Bleek : " A few aphoristic supplements to the investigations
of the Pentateuch" (in Rosenmijllee's Bepertorium, 1822). Later: "Supplements to the
Investigations of the Pentateuch " (Studies and Criticisms, 1831). The proof that a great number
of the laws, songs, and similar pieces, were originally Mosaic, was not recognized by Hartman,
von Bohlen, Vatke, and George. Bleek wrote against von Bohlen : De libri Oene«eo» Origine,
&c., Bonn, 1836. The complete Mosaic composition of the Pentateuch was on the contrary
again maintained by Ranke, Hengstenberg, Dreohsler, Huvernick, Wette. Keil, and Ludwig Konig.
Movers and Bertheau here follow with peculiar investigations and views. Tuch, in his com-
mentary on Genesis, follows in all material respects tlie views of Bleek, who also designates the
labors of Stiihelin, De Wette, Ewald, and von Lengerke, as the latest investigations of the Pen-
tateuch. The latter is eclectic, leaning on Bleek, Tnrh, Stiihelin, Ewald, and de Wette.
Stiihelin passes over the authorship of Moses himself, and makes as tlie basis of the Pen-
tateuch and the following books an older writing, which extends from the creation to the occupa-
tion of the land of Canaan. The recension of the day falls in the time of king Saul, and may
have been by Samuel or one of his pupils.
De Wette, in the edition of his Introduction, 5 and 6. supposes a threefold recension of th
whole work, at the same time with the book of Joshua, 1. the Elohistic, 2. the Jehovistic,
B. Deuteronomistic. The latter made at the time of Isaiah. The sources of the first treatise
nould have been partly Mosaic, though it is questionable if in the present farm.
Ewald (History of the People of Israel) : "by Moses, originally, there was but little — merelj
9S INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS.
the tables of the law and a few other short utterances." Bases of the present form of the Pen
tateiich : four or five books involved in each other. See below the treatises on Genesis.
Ktktz, in the ''History of the Old Covenant." in the supplement to Delitzscli, has taken th«
view that Moses did not write the Pentateuch, but only tlie passages in the middle books where
something is expressly given as written by him, and besides that, Deuteronomy, ch. i.-xxxii.
the Pentateuch, however, was written partly under Moses, and partly under Joshua, or not long
after Joslnia.*
Bleek (pp. 183 If.) has given very interesting and evident proof of genuine Mosaic originals
in Leviticus, Numbers, and Exodus. At first it is shown of the sacrificial law, Leviticus i.-vii.,
tliat it comports in its literal acceptance only with the relations in the wilderness, as appears from
the contrast expressed in such phrases as "in camp and outside the camp," "Aaron and his
Bons," " heads of their fathers' houses " (Ex. vi. 14), &c. In Leviticus xvi. it is commanded that
one of the goats shall be sent into the wilderness. Similar indications of originality are found
Lev. xiii., xiv., &c. Bleek judges in the same way concerning the relations of the camp in Num-
bers, ch. i. ff. Here may be added single songs, viz., the three songs. Num. xxi. — Then are
quoted, however, many signs as traces of the later composition of the whole : Gen. xii. 6 : " and
the Cauaanite was then in the land" (comp. Gen. xiii. 7). Gen. xxsvi. 31 : "and these are the
kings that reigned in the land of Edom, before there reigned any king over the children of
Israel" Gen. xl. 15, Joseph says: "I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews." In
Gen. xiii. 18, the city of Hebron is mentioned. According to Joshua xiv. 15; xv. 13, the city
was formerly called Kirjath Arba (com|i- Gen. xxii. 2 ; xxxv. 7 ; see also the note on Hengsten-
berg's declaration, according to which it is possible that Hebron was the oldest name of the
city). In Gen. xiv. 14, the city is called Dan, on the contrary we read Judges xviii. 29 : " The
Dauites gave to the city of Laish the name Dan." Ex. xvi. 35 ; Num. xv. 32, 36 ; Deut. i. 1 ; ii-
12; iii. 2, &c. Bleek counts here also the law respecting the king, Deut. xvii. 14-20. Again,
laws in Deuteronomy, which seem to anticipate the sojourn in Canaan: Deut. xix. 14; ch. 20.
Besides these the repetitions: Ex. xxxiv. 17-26; comp. ch. 21-23; Ex. xvi. 12, comp. Num. xi.
&c. Then there are apparent disagreements, such as Num. iv. : " Period of service of the Levites
from the 30th year to the 50th ;" —again, ch. viii. 23-'i6: "From the 25th to the 50th year."
Still further : " unnatural position of separate sections," e. g., Ex. vi. 14-27. Also the chasm in
the account from Num. xx. 1-20, where a space of 37-38 years is omitted. Finally, the im-
probal)ility that Moses would leave behind an historical wortc of such extent. "We have already,
in the (ieneral Introduction, given the results of Bleek's investigations, which we cite as fruit
of tlie untiring diligence of an honest, acute, and pious investigator, without considering them
absolutely evident fnamely, what concerns those parts where the force of th« prophetic predic-
tion seems ignored, or where the acceiitance of repetitions and contradictions might be the
result of a want of insight into the construction of the books). The article Pentateuch, by Vai-
niNOEE, in Heiizog's Real-Encyclopedia, appears to us very noteworthy in a critical point of view.
With respect to the present cimdition of the discussions in question, we refer to the aforesaid
labors of Bleek in his Iniroduction, to the article by Vaihinger, to the supplements by Hengsten-
berg, to the Introduction to the Old Testament by Keil, and to the Introduction to Genesis by
Delitzsch. A carefully prepared tabular pnisentation of the various views, may be found in
Hertwig's " Tables to the Introduction to the Old Testament," p. 26 S.
After the above general remarks, we might, for the present, here come to a close, since we
have again to treat of the separate books of the Pentateuch in the proper place. One consider-
ation, however, which seems to us of special importance, and which might not receive its full
attention, is the internal truth of the religious i)erioda of development, as ecclesiastical theology
has long shown it in the outline*. That the Jewish religion does not begin with the Mosaic
legislation, but with the Abrahamitic promise, is presupposed in the New Testament, and is
»l80 based upon the nature of the case. The patriarchal religion is characterized as tlie original
• Wo make curwry mention of the oritiobm of SSronBon, who, with his Commentary on Qenesis, forms a partDel to
the fiBKJrtionn of Bruno Bauer on the gospels of the New Testament. See Kohtz : HUtory <ff the Old Cmenant, pp. 41
Mid 93.
§ 8. ORIGIN" A.VD COMPOSITION OF THE PENTATEUCH. 97
of an inner life of revelation and faith, accordinj^ to ita beginnings in the sphere of life, as devel-
oped in chosen heads of families. It is clear that this theocratic religion of promise must ba
distinguished again from the earlier universalisiic reli(,'ion, which it presupposes. It must also
present itself objectively in a form of Inw, externally commanding for a wliole nation grown up
in slavish oppression and moral desolation. Since this rested, however, on the basis of an inner
character in the chosen ones of the people, it was necessary that there be a transition period,
(by means of the impulse of the inner life of faith), from the legal stage to the period of a new
and more general internal feeling, (. e., to the prophetic period. When finally the spiritual lift
of this prophetic period became more general, according to the popular measure among the
pious of the nation, then it was necessary to make the records of it, in their entirety, eftectfTe
for the canonical guidance of the national life. The course of the development of the Christian
church forms throughout a parallel to this legal development of the Old Testament economy,
and it lies in the slow manner of this development, that its separate stages must be indeed last-
ing historical periods. But what follows from this, in reference to the literature of the individual
periods?
It is clear that Genesis, in its essential character, does not point, in the least, beyond the
patriarchal standpoint. It consists of originals, which partly represent the universalistic view
of the primitive religion, partly the theocratic view of the religion of promise. Though these
originals may not have been conceived until the age of Moses as fixed and lusting traditions ic
the house of Abraham, it appears settled that a Genesis could not have been invented in the
prophetic period, nor even in the transition period (from Samuel to ElijaJi), nor, indeed, in the
legal period. The intercourse of the Abrahamites with the Oanaanites, the relations of race,
the religious forms, everything speaks against it. The book of Job, it is true, transfers its rep-
resentations from a later period into an earlier one, or into what is still a universalistic relig-
ious faith- view; but with all the art of representation, how openly appears the more developed
relidous stage which points to the period after Solomon. In view of the sacrediiess of the
originals of Genesis it is not probable that their compilation into one work should have fallen
beyond the age of Samuel, or even that of Moses.
As regards further the three books of the law (Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers), they bear in
their entire contents so decidedly the impress of the stern legal standpoint, that only the com-
pilation of them (not, however, the collection of their material parts) could fall beyond the
Mosaic aije.
Finally, as above shown, it is not all inconsistent with, but corresponding to, the spiritual
life, if we suppose that towards the end of his days, and in his prophetic character, Moses may
have prepared the way, through a series of original writings, for the mediation of his legislation
with the future period of prophetic subjectiveness, and thus laid the foundation of the transi-
tion period beginning with Samnel. The moulding of these originals then belonged to a later
period. Should, however, Deuteronomy have been made in the prophetic period, it must have
unfiiilingly betrayed itself through Messianic traits, if not in reference to the personal Messiah,
at least iu reference to the Messianic kingdom, wliich is not in the least the case.
The freciueut quotation of Mosaic passages in the jn-ophets {see Delitzsch, p. 11 ff.) may cer-
tainly prove the existence of such written originals, not, however, the existence of tlje respective
books in their present form (Vaihinger, p. 313). The fulness of these quotations ever remains
a proof that the written sources in question had such a degree of sacredness and respect, that we
cannot easily a.ssume th.xt at a period, later as compared with the quotations, they had been dis
menibered in the most various manner, and then again, as new material, been worked up into
new books. That the service in High Places was not completely abolished until the time of
Hezekiah. is no proof that Deuteronomy, with its prohibition of this service, did not appear until
his time (Vaihinger). In the same manner the manifold apostasy of the people from Jehovah
would speak against the authenticity of the legislation from Sinai itself.* It must be taken into
consideration, that the legal nature of the Mosaic faith would urge, in the most decided mtmner,
* The silence about Korah, Deut. id. 6, is explained as forbearance towards the remaining children ol Korah, tht
ieTont Korahites, who afterwards appear so prominently as psalm-sincrers.
V? INTKODUCTION TO GENESIS
to thes putting in writing and settlement of till detiniticns and explanations of the law. But froDc
this it ilces not follow, as Delitzsch maintains, \\ 6, that the Post-Mosaic history shows mi trace*
of developments of law. The sacerilutal reguhitions of David, mid many other things, contra-
dict this. It is perhaps also taken too little into consideration, that the contact of the Israelitish
traditions with Egyptian refinement and the art of writinc, must hare exerted an immense
infiurnce. The periods of Joseph and Moses were certainly, therefore, more given to wHting than
many a later one. According to the degree of its religious development, its marks of inward
depth, and its indications of universality (as it appears, notwithstanding the great theocratic,
severity of the book), acconling too to its stately, poetic, auu sententious style, has Deuteronomy,
as It seems to us, an unmistakable affinity witli the literature of Solomon in its wider sense, a»
it, together with the three works of Solomon, comprises also the book of Job (comp. also tlie
Prayer of Solomon, 1 Kings viii. 22).
We must, therefore, suppose that the recension of it belongs to the transition period from
the legal to the prophetic era, wliich extends from Samuel to Elisha. The stern vindication of
the unity of the place of worship, ch. 12, appears even to presuppose the founding of Solo-
mon's temple; as the regal law, oh. 17, certainly appears in its coloring to point to the errors
>f Solomon. The same is true of the strong and zealous words against those who mislead to
apostasy. If we adhered to this point of view we might set Deuteronomy beside the Song of
Solomon and the 45th Psalm (v. 11). On the other hand, it is hardly credible that a Jewish
author, after the apost.-isy of the ten tribes, should have invented such a superabundant blessing
on Joseph as we find pronounced in Dent, xxxiii. 13.* Moreover, it is also not easily credible
that a theocratic spirit which, toward the end of the period of the Judges, compOed the originals
of the lawgiver Moses, should not also have compiled the Deuteronomic originals of his later
days. On the ancient character and Egyptian recollections of Deuteronomy, see Delitzsch,
pp. 23 ff.
At the time of Jesus Sirach (180-130 b. o.) the Old Testament was extant in its tripartite
form as a closed canon (Preface, ch. 7). At the time of Nehemiah (444 b. o.) Deuteronomy
was already compiled, also the constituent parts of the Pentateuch (Neh. xiii. 1 ; 2 Mace. ii. 13,
speak only of a collection of holy books on the part, of Nehemiah). At the time of Ezra (468
B. o.) there was developed a documentary learning, which extended to the law, i. «., to the legal
writings of Moses (Ezra vii. 6-10). For this reason tradition has placed the closing of the canon
in the time of Ezra and Nehemiah.
At the time of Josiah (639-609 B. o.) Deuteronomy was again found in the temple as a law-
book of an older period (2 Kings xxii. 8; 2 Chron. xxxiv. 14). It is not at all improbable that
just this book, with its emphatic curses of idolatry, was the one tliat was forgotten or concealed
in the depths of the temple at tlie time of the idolatrous king Manasseh (comp. ch. xxxiii 7).
The various conjectures which modern criticism has connected with this circumstance proceed
from the nimriiv \|^€i"8of that the Old Testament theocrats were at tliat time hierarchs in
the medieval sense, and might have permitted a pia fraiis. And so, according to Vatke,
must the law have been made about this time. At the time of the king llezekiah (726
ff.) "his men" collected tlie addenda to tlie proverbs of Solomon (ch. xxv. 1) ; thi.s, however,
was not its beginning. Such a culloction of the proverbs of Solomon presupposes far earlier
* (This remark, and the thought with which it is prcRiiant, are ahundantly sufficient to do away all the reasons pre-
MQted just above for assitniinK the book of Deuteronomy to the literature of the Sohunonic peiiod. What is said atwnt
the cojjnection of Deut. 12th with the founding of Solomon's temple, and of Deut. 17lh with the law respectinK the
royal office, and other thinffa of a similar kind, would, if true, show something more than a mere recension with oc-
casional scholia. The remark of Lango, that Moses towards the close of his life wrote an'l spoVo in the prophetic spirit,
which, wheO_er real or imagined, is most evident from the style of the last part of iJeutcronomy, fully accounts for all
this to one who receives the Bible as containing the prophetic and supernatural. What is said, too (p. 97), of the absence
of Meiwianic allusions in Deuteronomy, though intended to prove, as it does most conclusively, that the writing of it could
not have been as late as the express prophetic period, would also exclude it from the Davidic or Solomonic. That the
Mo<*,ianic idea had then come in is evident from such passages as 2 Sam. vii. 13-16, the last words of David, 2 Sam. xxiii.
t, together with 1 Kings ii. 4, 2:1. It was, at least, the idea of a Jlessinnic kingdom and of a never-emlii^ royal snccee-
■Ion. If the book of Deuteronomy had been written, or even compiled and corrected, in the time if Solomon, or 'atflr
•Qr.h an idea would never have been omitted, or left without any trace. — T. L.l
g 4. THE PENTATEUCH 01: THE SAMARITANS. i>|
«ollectioD8 with respect to the Psalms and the books of the law. Hence Isaiah can about thii
time go bacli witli his prophecy to the predictions of Uemeronomy. With the wonderful dis-
appeaniiKe of Elijah (89ij B. o.) is in realir.y the purely legal period closed. His shower nf fire
prefiguring the end of the world, is followed by the pniphetio period, which ihe vision of Elijah
on Horeb, and much more the labors of Elisha in his healing miracles, had presignMlled. Elijah
looks backwards as the fin;d landmark of the death-bringing and destroying influence of tht
law; Elisha looks forwards %vith evangelical omens which the evangelizing words of the Messi
anic prophets must soon follow. When David was departing this life (1015 B. c), he couli
already lay to the heart of his sun Solomon, the law of Mooes as a written one (1 Kings ii. 3)
The promise of the typical Messiah-king (2 Sam. vii.) presup|joses already the promise of the typ-
ical Messiah-prophet (Deut. sviii. 15), and the promise of the Messiah-priest (Deut. sxxiii. 8 If.),
i. e., determinate originals of Deuteronomy ; since the prophets and priests are present in Israo'
before the kings.
Opseevation. It is not with entire justice that Kurtz remarks (History of the Old Covenant,
1, p. 46) : •' It is an historical fact that stands more firmly than any other fact of antiquity that
the Pentateuch is the living foundation, and the necessary presumption, (jf the whole Old Testa-
meut history, not less than of the entire Old Testament literature. Both of these, and with them
Christendom, as their fruit and completion, would resemble a tree without roots, if the composi
tion of the Pentateuch were transferred to a Later period of Israelitish history." • Doe^ th<
Old Testament theocracy rest then on the completed compilation of scriptural books, or, indeed,
on writings at all, or does it n 't rather rest on the living, aoiual revelation of God, which pre-
ceded all writings? And now all Christendom! The church also rests, indeed, nut on the
authenticity of the New Testament books, but on the living revelation of God in Christ, although
it is regulated by the canon of the New Testament. Moreover, it is well verified that the Pen-
tateuch, as the earlier foundation, is attested by nil the followin-j; scriptural books. The inter-
nal testimony of the Pentateuch to the written compositions of Moses, to which Kurz, after
Delitzsch, refers, is also of great import. He has also justly remarked that the canonical charac-
ter of the scriptural books would stand firmly, even if Ezra were to be regarded as their com
piler.
The whole of the present question is largely influenced by the distinction between the re'
ords of Elohim and Jehovah, to which we must return in the introduction to Genesis.
5 4. THE PENTATETJCH OF THE SAMARITANS.
It is a fact that the Samaritans (see article in question in Herzog, Winer, &c.) distinguished
themselves from the Jews by having a Pentateuch different from theirs in many particulars,
* [The importance of this remark cannot be overrated. The Old Testament is a unity of designed &lsehood through-
cut, or it is a unity of historicjil truth. The patched-up legendary view of mingled traditions, subjective fancies, pure 1
errors, and later compilations made from them, cannot account for it. Tlie idea of an entire and continued forgery might I
theoretically explain its existence, were it not for one thing, namely, its utter incredibility beyond any of the marvellous
contained in it. It would require a superhuman power of inventive falsehood. The supposition of a forged Pentateuch, j
at whatever time made, demands a forged history following it, a forged representation of a consistent national life growing I
out of it, a forged poetry commemorative of it and deriving from it its most constant and vivid imagery, a forged ethics
grounded upon it, a forged series of prophecy continually referring to it, and making it the basis of its most solemn warn-
ings. There must have been a speciiic forgery of an incredible number of minste events, episodes, incidental occun'ences,
having every appearance of historical truth, of countless proper names of men and places, far too many to be carried down
by any tradition, — a forgery of proverbs, national songs, memorials, apothegms, oath-forms, judicial and religious observ-
ances, &c., &c., all made to suit. It is incredible. No human mind, or minds, were ever capable of this. Th.^re is no place for
It to begin or end, unless we come square up to an admitted time of an existing, historical, well-known people, for whom
all this is forged, and who are expected to receive it, and who do receive it. as their own true, veritable history, antiquity,
and national life-development, although they had never before known or heard of it.
The idea of compilations from the legendary jind the mythical explains well those early fabulous, indefinite, and
unchrouological accounts of other nations, which are .^ontctimes spoken of as parallel to what is called the mythici»l, of the
Hebrews. Nothing, however, could show a greater overlooking of what is most peculiar in the Hebrew Scriptures. The
rtatistical and strictly chronological character of the Old Testament utterly forbids the parallel. It shuts us up to the
ar>nclusion of its entire forgery, or its entire truthfulness and authenticity. If the first is incredible, as even the Rational
irts are compelled to acknowledge, the second must be true. There may be points, here and there, where such a general
view may be supposed to be assailable, but the mind that once fairly receives it in its most general aspect, must find in it
a power of conTictionthat cannot easily be disturbed. It compels us to receive what may be called the natural facts o1
the Bible history, and then the supernatural cannot be kept out. Such a people and such a book lying in the very het./*
^f history, and regarded in its pure human aspect, or simply in its natural and historical-marvellous, demands the «upci
ostuial as its most fitting and we mav even s.ay, it.s me^' natural, accomp.animent and explanation. — T. L.l
100 INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS.
and that tliey possessed, and still possess this, regarding it as the only Holy Writ (other neparat*
writings, e. g., a Samaritan book of Joshua, difter'snt from the canonical, are of no special im-
portance). This is to be mentioned here for the reason that the existence of this Pent.iteuch
might, rn tiie one hand, support the authority o'" our canonical Pentateuch, and on the other
hand might also create a prejudice against it.
The earlier composition of the Pentateuch has been inferred from tlie circumstance that th«
Samaritans had a Pentateuch in common with the Jews. The Samaritans, it was supposed,
received their Holy Writ as a relic of the Israelites of the ten tribes, whose remains mingled
with theirs ; this explains why they possess only the Pentateuch.
The Israelites, as separated from the kingdom of Judah, accepted from the Jews no otl\er
sacred writings, in consequence of their national hatred. Therefore the Pentateuch must ha?e
been extant before the separation of the two kingdoms (Jahn). If now Vaihinger is of opinior
that this demonstration is contradicted by the proof of Ilengstenberg that tlie Samaritans pro
ceeded solely t'rum heathen colonists, and not from a mixture of Jews and heathen, the argument
itself is not duly established; for this matter compare the article "Samaritans" in Winer. Again^
the circumstance that the Samaritan Pentateuch contains elements which are intended for the
glorification of their mountain Garizim, does not oblige us, with Petermann {see article "Sama-
ria " in Hekzog's Real-Encyclopddie), to transfer the whole present compilation of the Pentateuch
to the time of the separation of the Samaritans from the Jews, that is, between Nehemiah and
Alexander.
If we presuppose among the Samaritans a far earlier existence of the Pentateuch, according
to its present entirety, nevertheless the paganizing character of the people, which vacUlate*
between overstrained jutlaistic institutions and a heathen fondness for fables, would prefer the
interpolations which are peculiar to their versions. On the other hand, it is not easy to per-
ceive why the ten tribes, on the separation from Judah, should have been in possession only of
the Pentateuch. Moreover, the great harmony of the Samaritan Pentateuch with the Septuagint,
permits the inference of earlier Jewish revisions, which would make the old text more pleasant
to the pagan culture of the period, by avoiding anthropomorphisms and anthrt)popathisni8.
Therefore Vaihinger assumes that the Samaritans first received their Pentateuch through Ma-
nasseh, son of the high-priest, as Josephus calls him (Arcbwology xi. 7, 2 ; comp. xiii. 9, 1), wlio
fled to them and drew many Jews with him to apostasy. Welte also assumes {see tlie article
"Samaritan Pentateuch" in the Church-Lexicon of Catholic Theology, by Wetzeu and Welte),
that the Samaritans first received their Pentateuch through that Jewish priest, who (according
to the account of Nehemiali), went over to them as the son of the high-priest Jehoiada, and be-
came the first higli-priest of their newly-erected worship on the mountain of Garizim. At the
time of this priest, or later, a more acceptable, falsified compilation of the Pentateuch might easily
have crowded out a purer and more ancient one ; for it is neitlier historical that the Samaritans
until then had been pagans, nor probable tliat they, as worshippers of Jehovah, had remained
without a book of the law. The Israelitish priest, sent to instruct them in the religion of the
land, might also have taken charge of the Hebrew service under the form of image and calf-
worship. So much, however, is certainly clear, that the careful perseverance of the Samaritans
in tlie legal stage, even after the coming in of an imperfect hope of the Messiah, their want of
a living development under the influence of a prophetic spiritual life and prophetic writings,
with tlieir careful reverence for the Pentateuch, is very significant testimony that the Pentateuch
belongs essentiiilly to a legal period that far preceded the prophetic one.
That tlie deviations of the Samaritan Pentateucli cannot injure tlie authority of the Jewish
masoretic one, appears from their manifold harmony witli the Septuagint, from their moderniz-
ing character, as well as, finally, from the manifest falsifications, which have not spared even
the Decalogue. For further particulars in reference to this subject, see the articles in the Reah
Encyclo]jedia» of Uehzoo, and of Wetzeh and Welte; also the article " Samaritans" by Winer
which latter refers especialiv to GisENirs : Be Psntuteuchi Samaritani origine, indole et aucto-
ritaU. Halle, 1846.
§ 6. THE CHABACTER OF GENESIS. 10)
i 6. THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL LITERATURE ON THE PENTATEUCH.
See Waloh, Biblioth. theol. iv. p. 444 ff.
The Universal Worterbuch, by Danz, under the article " Pentateuch," p. 754 ; also the suppl*
ment^ p. 81. — Winer, Theol. Literature i., p. 196 tf . ; Supplement, p. 31 ft'. — Kufiz, History of
the Old Covenant, pp. 22 and 53. A survey uf the writings on the Old Testament in Keil's In
troduotion (p. 61) to the Peutateuoh, p. 64. — Separate works: Glerici Cominentariug in J/osit
Prophetce libros r., Tiibingen, 1733. MoLDENnAUER, Translation and Erplanntiom of the Boolct
of Moses, Quedlinburg, 1774 to 1775. Jerusdlem, "Letters on the Mosaic writings aud Philoso-
phy," 3J ed., Braunschweig, 1783. Hess, "History of the Israelites, and Moses in particular,"
tee Danz, p. 675. Vater, "Commentary" (1802-1805), 3 vols. Ranke, "Investigations of the
Pentateuch," 2 vols., 1834-1840. Henostenberg, "Authenticity of the Pentateuch," 1836-1889
The same: " The most important and difficult sections of the Pentateuch explained," 1 vol
"History of Balaam and his Prophecy," Berlin, 1838. The same: "The Books of Moses and
Egypt," with supplement ; " Manetho and the Hyksos," Berlin, 1841. E. Bertheau, " The seven
Groups of Mosaic Laws in the three middle books of the Pentateuch," Gotdngen, 1840 (tlie
writings of George, Bruno Bauer, The Religion of the Old Testament. Vatke). Baumgaeten,
" Theolog. Commentary on the Old Testament," 2 vols., Kiel, 1843. Kurz, " History of the
Old Covenant," 1 and 2 vols., 2d Ed., Berlin, 1853. Bahr, '■^Symbolik of the Mosaic worship,"
Heidelberg, 1837. Also other works to be hereafter named, referring to the Mosaic worship.
Knobel, " Genesis, Exodus, and Leviticus ;" also " Xumbers, Deuteronomy, and Joshua ; " " Con
cise Manual," Leipzig, 1861. Delitzsoh and Keil, " Biblical Commentary on the Old Testa
raent," 1st vol. " Genesis and Exodus," Leipzig, 1861 ; 2d vol. " Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuter
onomy," Mecklenburg. Scriptura ac Traditio, Covimentarius perpetuus in Pentateuchum, Leip
zig, 1839. Schuscftan Eduth, i. e., "Exposition of the five books of Moses," Heb. and German,
with notes by Abnheim. — Herzheimer, 1853-1854. Thorath Emeth, "The five books of Moses,"
by Hbinemann, Berlin, 1853. The works on "Church History," by Natalis Alexander, aud
many other older theologians, especially of the refoi'med church ; also Lutheran, Buddeus, &c. ;
Catholic, StoUberg, &c. — Homiletieal, see Winer, ii. p. 115 ft'. "Sermons," by IIohn-baum, Bal-
DAUF, Sailer, &c. Zinzendorf, Extracts from his "Discourses on the five books of Moses and
the four Evangelists." Published by Clemens, 9 vols., 1763. Beyer, "History of the Israelites
in Sermons," 2 vols. Erfurt, 1811. G. D. Krummaohee, "The Wanderings of Israel through
the Wilderness," Elberfeld, 1828. Metjeer, "Moses, the servant of God. Spiritual Discourses,"
Leipzig, 1836. Appuhn, "Moses, the servant of God," Magdeburg, 1845. Oosterzee, "Moses,
12 Sermons," Bielefeld, 1860. Treatises on the Doctrine of Immortality of the Old Testament,
especially that of Moses, and on the separate books, wUl be mentioned in their respectiv*
places.
B. a SPECIAL VIEW OF GENESIS.
I 6. THE CHARACTER OF GENESIS.
If we can regard as the conclusive mark of the genuine canonicity of the scriptural books,
the fact that the spirit of divine revelation (which in the historical sphere has gradually entered
into human nature until the perfect union of the Godhead and humanity) has appeared, and that
this spirit, consistently progressing, has entered into human writing belonging to revelation
then it appears quite in accordance with nature that such a spirit of revelation has, in Genesis,
anitcd with the very earliest and most cliihllike form of human authorship, and that it does not
manifest itself as a completed sacred work of art of theocratic Christian authorship, until the end
of the whole biblical literature in the Apocalypse. The accounts of Genesis, taken in their
human aspect, seem like Inosely arranged and simple narratives of childlike sjeech, in con-
trast with that perfect symbolical composition of the Apocalypse, whose deep significan:e
surpasses the comprehension of the most celebrated judges. But though Genesis forms a self
102 INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS.
Inclusive and connected whole, which sheds a bright, divine, infallible light over all begicuingi
of primitive time (see § IJ, we nevertheless see therein the fact that here the living God has, in
•he moat emphatic sense, prepared liis praise "out of the mouth of babes and sucklings." At
the same time this fact gives us a satisfactory solution of the character of inspiration; how at
every ijeriod it is perfect in the sense, that on tlie divine side it is continually the voice of the
same divine spirit (and in truth of a spirit wliich cimipletely commanded, in their respective
tasks, those human minds that were apprehended and held by its influence), whilst, on the
human side, it was to proceed from the imperfection of childlike, pious utterance and story
through a series of degrees, until it had reached the full adult age in the new covenant; and all
this the more so, as on the line of its chosen ones it had continually to break through the opposi
tinn of human sinfulness, which ever surrounded its nucleus of liglit witli colored borders and
shadows. With respect to what is centrally fundamental in the Old Testament books, it ma^
be said, that one Godlike thought, or thought of God, ranges itself on the other, in proportion
to the degree of divine revelation, or to that of human development. As regards the outer circle
of these writings, we may find them burdened with all kinds of human imperfections, if we will
judge them according to the New Testament, or draw them on the model of practical historical
writing, or of natural science, &o. We must then, however, at the same time, well understand
that those supposed imperfeotione are controlled by the principle of revelation in the books, and
that, in our criticism of the style of revelation, we toil towards heterogeneous points of view.
Such a process has a relative justification only in presence of an orthodoxy which emphasizes
the said literal meanings in order to make from them abstract history, geography, natural science,
&c., for the authoritative belief.
Genesis corresponds now to its design, according to which it is the revelation of God con-
cerning the origin of the world, of mankind, of the fall, of the judgment, and the redemption.
Not only that it presents these origins purely in their ethical idea and physical development, in
accordance with the monotheistic principle, but also that whilst on the one side it clearly brings
out the periods in the economy of the preparatory redemption (Adam, Seth, Enoch, Noah,
Bhem, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph), and connects these |ieriods with persons, uholl-" in ac-
. cordance with the principle of personality in the kingdom of God (according to which estch par
ticuhir form of religion is the form of a covenant between the personal God ;ind the personal
man) ; it also presents practically, on the other side, the great contrast between nuive"'salism
according to which God is Eluhim for all the world and all mankind, and theocratic particular-
ism, according to which He is Jehovah for His chosen ones. His covenant people, and Hip king-
dom of salvation, in its full redemptory historical significance. Thus the history of Genesis
passes through a series of contra-ts, in which that particularism, which in the second book of
Moses becomes legal, appears ever more defined, whilst, at the same time, there is seen more
clearly the mutuality of this economic particularity and of the teleological universalism as it
rests on principial universalism (Genesis, i.-iii.). Thus the promised seed of woman, ch. iii.,
confronts the fall of the human race. Then the line of Cain with its God-forsaken, worldly
culture (ch. iv.) is confronted by the line of Seth with its sacred worship, elevating the duration
of life (ch. v.). The line of Seth was to become a salvation to the line of Cain, but the former
conduces to the perdition of the hitter through its overhasty carnal and spiritual intercoursf
(ch. vi.). The house of Noah in the ark forms then a contrast to the mass of mankind sinking
in the flood; but even to these the saving of the ideal humanity in Noah's house was to be of
advantage, acc^ording to 1 Peter, iii. 19, 20. A new and twofold contrast is then formed amonf
the sons of Noah ; to the contrast of piety, and pious culture, and barbarism (Shem and Japhetb
as opposed to Ilam), is presented now the contrast of a one-sided wcrship (Shem) blest of God
and nf II one-sided culture, also blest of God (Jaiihoth). The culture of Japheth is no longei
accursed, as that of C'ain ; after its |iropagation in the world, it is to return to the tents of Shem
•lid be bnjught into unity with the perfected faith of revelation (ch. ix.). Thus is the forma-
lion of the contrast between tlieocracy and heathendom introduced, as it is unfolded on th«
basis of the universal genealogical table (ch. .\.). With tlie develojiment of heathendom (ch.
li.) is contrasted the founding of theocracy (ch. xii.). That, however, the contrast thus opened
§ 6. THE CHARACTER OF GENESIS. 108
is no absolutely hostile one, appears not merely from the preventive thought of the dispersioB
of nations (Gen. -\i. 6-7), but rather from the whole series of antitheses against heathendom, ot
heatlienish characteristics, which now runs througli the life of Abraham. The first antithesis
is formed between Abraham and his father's house, witli its heathenish indecision in respect t<
tlie true faith (ch. xii.). His father, Terah, was already on tlie way to Canaan ; but he let him-
self be detained by tlie fertile Mesopotamia. The secotid antithesis of Abraham is Pharaoh in
Egypt and heathen despotic caprice (ch. xii.). The third antithesis is Lot and heathen selfish
ness and worldliness (ch. xiii.). In the fourth, Abraham meets the heathenish, robber-like wai
fare, with the liberating holy war of freedom, and, in consequence of this, is greeted by the
prince of lieathen piety, Melchisedek, as the prince of the theocratic faith (ch. siv.). Then the
antithesis enters into the very house of Abraham himself. Not the son of his faitliful servant
Eleazer s'lall be his heir (ch. xv.), not the son of his body begotten of Hagar the maid (ch. svi.),
not even his posterity itself in unconsecrated birth ; no, — circumcision must distinguish between
the consecrated and the unconsecrated in his own life and race (ch. xvii.). So far the contrast be-
tween Abraham and the heathen world is clearly softened through the light of peace, as he, in
deed, has been separated from the heathen world, in order that in his seed all races of the earth may
be blest (ch. xii.). Pharaoh and Lot, and the men allied to him in war, were no godless heathen ;
Melcliisedek could even surpass him in certain respects. But now the contrast opens between
Abraham and a Sodom ripe for judgment. Abraham, the highly favored confidant and friend
of God, pleads fii- Sodom in an extremely persistent manner. His intercession shows in what
sense he is chosen, and at least profits Lot and liis daughters (ch. xix. xx.). The position ol
Abraham in lespect to Abimelech of Gerar is again no contrast between bright day and dark
night; the weakness of Abraham in the duty of protecting his wife, is contrasted with the ar-
bitrariness of Abimelech in matters of sex (ch. xx.). In what a mild light, however, appear
Ishmael and Abimelech (ch. xxi.), and Hagar, to whom also the angel of the Lord as such ap-
peared at an earlier period in her great necessity (ch. xvi.)! And later, Abraham must distinguish
between the human sacrifice, as otfered in the heathenish spirit, and the theocratic devotion of
the soul (ch. xxii.), as he was previously obliged to distinguish between unconsecrated and con-
secrated connection of sex, generation, and birth. The manner in which Abraham buries Sarah
is not the heathen manner of interment; and so also his seeking a wife for his son has its the-
i>cTatic traits (ch. xxiii. xxiv.). The antipathy against heathendom, together with a friendly
relation to the heathen themselves, runs throughout the life of Abraham, as this meets us finally
in the children of his second marriage. Here follows now the great contra-^t between Isaac and
Ishmael. Ishmael cannot be the theocratic heir; he has his inheritance, however, and also his
blessing. The same may be said of the contrast between Jacob and Esau. The latter is only
rejected under the point of view of the theocratic hereditary power ; he also has his blessing.
Finally, a contrast is even formed between Joseph and his brethren. And then also between
Joseph and Judah ; and Judah becomes inferior to -Joseph the very moment he gives liimself up
as security for Benjamin (ch. xliv. 18 ff.). Thus in Genesis throughout there is presented the
relation between theocratic particularism and heathendom. The heathen element is rejected,
what is noble and pious in the heathen is acknowledged. The bond of humanity in relation to
the heathen is retained in illustration of real sympathy, just reception, and kindly treatment
But where the economic particularism, ordered by God, tends to become a human or inhuman,
pharasaical fanaticism (as in the crime of the brothers Simeon and Levi at Shechem), there the
spirit of revelation pronounces through the mouth of the patriarch a verdict of decided con-
demnation (ch. xxxiv. 30 ; xlix. o-T).
Already, therefore, does Genesis constitute an economic and conditional contrast between
ludaism and Heathendom, and consequently also a religion which is at the same time theocratic
la its particularism and human in its universalism, resting, as it does, on a self-revelation ol
God, according to which he is, on the one hand, the God of the whole world and all nations ;
on the other hand, the God of the chosen ones, the God of Israel, of his covenant people, of hia /■
kingdom.
The simplicity with which Genesis presents the whole history of antiquity in biographica." /
104 IKTRODUCTIOX TO GENESIS.
forms, is, at the same time, its sublimity. Its God is a personal God, and its world and historj
do not consist of persons who are puppet imatjes of impersonal things, but of personalities fron;
whose reciprocal action with God are de%'eloped the real relations. Thus is unfolded that his-
tory of the heroic acis of faith, with which the did heroes of the faith introduce the revelation,
piece by piece, into the world, according to Heb. xi. The faith of Adam and of all primeva'
mankind in the creation, is followed by Abel's faith in sacrifice, Enoch's faith in immortality
Noah's faith in judgment and deliverance, Abraham and Sarah's faith in promise, the faith ol
A.braham in a resurrection, and the faith in hope and blessing of the patriarchs in general.
Abraham, however, is especially the father of the faithful, because he not only believed for hira-
Belf, as Melchi>edek did, but also for his race (Rom. iv.). He is, consequently, at the same time
the man of active obedience to the faith, the man of deed or doing. Isaac, on the contrary, is
the type of all sufferers or waiters in faith. In the life of Jacob finally, acting and suffering in
the faith alternate in the most manifold style, i. «., he is preeminently the faith fighter, or one
who fights the fight of faith ; his name Israel implies this. In the wonderful story of providence
which expresses itself in the history of .Joseph, we meet, more decidedly than in the life of Jacob,
the type oi humiliation and exaltation, which hereafter continues to be tlie basis of the conduct
of the faithful, and which finds, therefore, its last and highest fulfilment in Christ.
The characters of the twelve sons of Jacob are individually presented to us in such firm and
practical features, that we receive the decided impression that we have everywhere to do with
persons, not with personifications. Those critics who will transfer the personifications of
heathen mythology to patriarchal history (Nork, Redslob, &c.), overlook the great world-histor-
ical contrast, according to which the heathen consciousness has lost itself in the impersonal,
the material, the worldly ; whilst the history of theocratic consciousness is the history of the
religious spirit raising itself above nature, or of the self-comprehension of significant personalities
in the commnnion of the personal God. For this consciousness, the remembrance of great per-
to-ng was more indelible than that of great masses of people ; the remembrance of great personal
e.xperience of faith, andof deeds of faith, more important than that of great events. As the mono-
theistic faith was peculiar, so also was the monotheistic memory. The faith of the patriarchs
could not have become the religion of the future, had it not struck correspondingly strong roots
in the past. Their faith in the futore went beyond the end of the world ; their faith remindiugs
were, therefore, obliged to go back beyon<l the be.ninning of the world.
We must not forget that the illumination of God corresponded, throughout, tn the inquiries
and efforts of the religious spirit of man. Therefore visions were seen backwards as well as
forwards, and the power of personal interest explains the gradually retroceding prophetic
significance of many names.
Supplement. The nomenclature of Genesis, see in the translation itself.
J 7. SOXIECES AND COMPOSITION OF GENESIS.
A. Pateiaechal TRAnmoN.
Genesis, which in its age surpasses all monuments of old religious literature, although the
oldest manuscripts of it do not go back of the ninth century after Christ (see Delitzsoh, p. 5)^
comprises a space of more than 2,000 years (according to Delitzsoh, p. 4, comp. p. 15, 2,306
years). In its contents it touches only the beginnings of the an of writing; * its real basis can
therefore be no other than tradition, or sacred legend, and even this is not sufficient, in so far
it goes b.ack beyond the origin of the human race to the beginning of the creation.
Genesis has, therefore, in the first place a basis, which precedes all human tradition. Thi
basis rests without doubt on divine communication ; tlie only question is through what hnmat
mediation. These communications of the earliest chapters of Genesis, which precede all prime-
• For Iho art of writing among the Holjrews, compare ITfnostenbehg : " Authenticity of the rentatcuch," l. p. 415 ■
Wi!«F.tt : " Article ; the Art of Writing ; " Df.mtescb, pp. 20, 21 (especially against Von Bohlen and Vatke . The Bgyj
r ana bad at that time already a priestly and uccular literature.
g 7. SOURCES AND COMPOSITION OF GENESIS. lOf.
val traditions, Kurz has referred to a prophecy looking backwards. Delitzsoh does not contest
the prophetic, but the vision conception (609). This contrast does not rest on a good prophetl*
psychology, for it appears from many passages of the se-ipture that the human side of the factt
of revelation is always the vision, — the vision, as in so fir the human mediation of all prophecy
See Introduction, § 38.
Sacred legends are ranged beside the visions of tlie past; legends, not in the sense of tht
mythological system (in which legends follow myths, as a concrete heathen morality follows
concrete heathen dogmatics), but narratives of the patriarchs in a religious symbolical form.
The process of this tradition would in the highest degree be placed in doubt, if we were to sup-
pose a series of ordinary generations through 2,000 years. But we are here speaking of long-
lived men who continued through centuries (concerning the subsequent abbreviation of the line
of generations, that commnnicated the ancient sacred legends, see Zahn, " the kingdom of God,''
p. 33, and the precious words of Luther and Hamann, p. 24), oi patriarchs, whose favorite think-
ing was religious contemplation, hope, and recollectiun, oi heirs of the faith, whose most sacred
inheritance was tlie religious legacy of their ancestors, of soier anti-mythological spirits, by
whom, with the fable-matter of heathendom the fable-form also was hated in their very soul.
It lies, however, in the nature of the case, that for the beginnings of the art of writing thera
could be known no more pressing use than the fixing of the sacred legends in sacred memora-
bilia.
B. The Diffeeej'ce between the Sections op Elohiu and those of Jehovah.
The character of Genesis itself seems to refer to the dift'erence of said memorabilia in con-
nection w^th the fact that in it the name Elohim (God) alternates in a very remarkable mannef
with the name Jehovah (to which neither the translation : the Lord, nor the Eternal, clearly
corresponds). It is the same in Exodus to ch. xiv. 6.
We have first concisely to present the fact, then the critical endeavors to explain it.
With respect to the fact itself, Delitzsch distinguishes from three to four classes of sections,
p. 63. Comp. also the supplement to his commentary.
1. Sections in which the name Elohim either pre- 2. Sections in which the name Jehovah either pre-
dominates or is exclusively used. dominates or is exclusively used.
Ei.oHisTic Sections. Jehovistic Sections.
Ch. i.-ch. ii. 3. The world and man under the Ch. ii. 4-ch. iii. 24. Man, the Paradise world, the
universal cosmo-genetic point of view. loss of Paradise, and the beginning of the economy of
salvation. Theocratic point of view.
Ch. V. Tholedoth of Adam. The Sethites. The Ch. iv. Eve's theocratic hope. Abel's theocratic
religious men of the universal religion of the first era. sacrifice. Cain's banishment and the Cainites under
Verse29. Glance at the Judgments of Jehovah. thebanofsin. At the conclusion (ver. 25) Eve thanks
Elohim for her son Seth, because her theocratic hope
seems darkened. The calling upon Jehovah revives
with Enos, son of Seth, ver. 26.
Ch. vi. 9-22. Tholedoth of Noah. He with his three Ch. vi. 1-8. The destruction of the first race of man.
sons and thuir posterity are to be saved. Therefore The Lord rejects the old race, but Noah tinds favor with
universalistio. him.
Ch. vii. 10-24. The beginning of the flood. The Ch. vii. 1-9. The deUverance of Noah, through eu
entrance ot Noah with the pairs of all flesh is ordered trance into the ark, guaranteed on account of his up-
by Elohim, but Jehovah, the deliverer of the theocracy, Tightness. The special command, that the clean ani-
shuts him iu, as God of the Covenant. Ter. 66. mats shall enter the ark by seven pairs, with reference
to the theocratic covenant of sacrifice.
■ Ch viii. 1-19. The egress of Noah from the ark as Ch. viii. 20-22. The thank-oS'ering of Noah and
•gi-ess of mankind and of the beasts ; universalistio. the resolution of Jehovah to have mercy on men. Th«
order of nature now theocratic.
Chap. i-i!. 1-17. Blessing on Noah and the new race Ch. x.-ch. xi. 31. The genealogical table. Jehovab
jfman. Universal right of man. Universal covenant only twice mentioned, ch. x. ; with reference to Nim
»f divine mercy with men. Universal sign of peace, rod, ch. x. 9 ; and twice, ch. xi., with reference to th(
ibe rainbow. Universalistic. confusion of languages at Babel. Theocratic.
106
INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS.
Ch. xvii. 9-27. The order of circumcision on the
part of Elohim. The founding of the covenant of cir-
cumcision for all the posterity of Sarah («. g. Esau) and
also for Ishmael. Unirersalistic.
Ch. xii. 29-38. A glance at the destruction of Sod-
jm, with reference to the deliverance of Lot, and the
incest with his daughters. Moab. Ammon. Univer-
■alistic.
Ch. xxi. 1-21. Ishmael's expulsion. Only ver. 1,
Jehovah. Mostly universalistic.
Ch. xxi. 22-24. Abraham's covenant with Abime-
lech. Only ver. 33, Jehovah.
Ch. XXV. 1-18. Sons of Keturah. Abraham's death.
Tholedoth of Ishmael. Ver. 11, Elohim blesses Isaac.
Also with reference to Esau.
Therefore universalistic.
Ch. xxvii. 46-xxviii. 9. Jacob's wandering. Esau's
marriage. Once Elohim, once El Schadai.
Ch. XXX. Rachel. See the mixed Sections.
Ch. xxxi. Jacob's departure from Laban. Only
ver. 3 and 49, Jehovah.
Ch. xxxiii. Jacob's return.
Ch. XXXV. 11. God blesses Isaac. Universalistic,
with reference to Esau.
Ch. xli-1. History of Joseph in Egypt. (Only ch.
xlix. 18, Jehovah.)
Exodus, i. and ii. Israel's oppression in Egypt.
Universalistic.
" With Elohim alternate in these sections El Scha-
dai, and El in combinations, as El Elohe Israel, ch.
xxxiii. 20 and El Beth-El, ch. xxxv. 7 (comp. Jehovah
El Olam, ch. xii. 33), or El by itself, ch. xxxv. 1, 8;
only one single time Adonai, ch. xx. 4."
Ch. xii. 1-ch. xvii. 8. Abraham's call, ch. xii. 1-8.
The protection of Sarah in Egypt, ver. 10-20. Abra*
ham's settlement in Bethel and separation from Lot,
ch. xiii. The deliverance of Lot, ch. xiv. It does not
alter the character of the section that Melcbisedek
calls on El Elion. Abraham praises Jehovah as El
Schadai (a name which forms the transition to the
name of Jehovah, according to Ex. vi. 3). The cov-
enant of Jehovah with Abraham, its condition, the
righteousness of faith, ch. xv. Sarah and Hagar, with
reference to the heir of promise, ch. xvi. The Lord ai
the Almighty God, ch. xvii. 8. Throughout theo-
cratic.
Ch. xviii.-xix. 28. The appearance of Jehovah to
Abraham in the plains of Mamre. Jehovah's judg-
ment on Sodom. Theocratic.
Ch. xxiv. Isaac's marriage.
Ch. XXV. 19-26. The twins.
Ch. xxvi. 2, 12, 24, 25. Theocratic testimonies and
promises.
Ch. xxix. 31-35. Jehovah takes Leah into favor.
The covenant God in reference to the covenant sens.
See the mixed sections.
Ch. XXX. 25-43. New treaty between Jacob and
Laban.
Ch. xxzviii. Jehovah punishes the sons of Judah.
Ch. xxxix. Jehovah with Joseph in Egypt. One*
Elohim. See the mixed sections.
8. Mixed seotions, in which there is the use
a. 18-27. Important passage: "Blessed be
enlarge Japheth."
Exodus iv. 15-31. Return of Moses to Egypt. Theo-
cratic.
Exodus V. Pharaoh's scornful treatment of the
messengers of Jehovah. Theocratic.
'• Among these sections. Gen. ii. 4 till ch. iii. is dis-
tinguished by the predominance of the name Jehovah
Elohim, which in the whole Pentateuch only again oc-
curs in Ex. ix. 30. The name of Elohim is found in
that section only in the mouth of the serpent and of
the woman. There are very few exceptions to the pre
vailing use of Jehovah in the remaining sections, and
these are partly necessary, or of easy explanation.
Adonai alternates most frequently with Jehovah (al-
ways in the address), ch. xviii. 3, 27 ; 30-33 ; ch. xii.
IS. Both combined, Adonai Jehovah, is Jehovistio
Deuteronomic, Gen. xv. 2, 8; Deut. iii. 24; ix. 2G, and
nowhere else in the Pentateuch. The two sections are
also distinguished by the alternation of the Elohietie
with El as the Jehovislic with Adonai (comp. however,
Adonai in the mouth of Abimelech, ch. xx. 4)."— Db.
LITZSCH.
of Jehovah and Elohim as equally divided. Ch.
Jehovah, the Elohim of Shem. May Elohin
g 7. SOURCES AND COMPOSITION OJ' GENESIS. 10'(
Ch. xiv. Mcloliisedek is a priest of El Elion, and blesses Abraham iu this name. But Abra
ham speaks in the name oi Jehovah El Elion.
Ch. X.X. Elohhn punishes Abimelecli. The latter addresses him as Adonai.
Oh. XX. 1-19. Also Abraham speaks of the fear of God (Elohim). He prays to Elohim foi
Abimelech's house; for Jehovah, the protecting God of Abraham, has closed up the wombs of
the mothers.
Ch. xxvii. The words of Isaac as reported by Rebecca: to bless before Jehovah. Jacob:
Jehovah, thy God. Ver. 27 and 28 remarkable. Jacob is already theocratically blei-sed bj
Jehovah, Isaac gives him universalistically the blessing of Elohim.
Ch. xxviii. 10-22. The angels of God. I am Jehovah, the Elohim of Abraham and th«
Elohim of Isaac. Jacob: Jehovah is in this place. Here is Elohim's house. Further on: St
God will be with me.
Cli. xxix. 31-xxx. 24. Jehovah takes Leah into favor with reference to the theocratic sons.
And tlius she gives the honor to Jehovah. The blessing of fruitfulness in itself is the concern
of Elohim. Ch. xxx. 2. Rachel speaks of the blessing of Elohim (comp. ch. xsxi. 34). Elohim
gives ear to Leah in reference to the birth of the fifth and sixth son. Rachel thanks Elohim for
Joseph, but she pleads for another son from Jehovah.
Ch. xxxii. Elohim of my father Abraham, Jehovah. — Thon hast wrestled with Ood and
with man. He named the place Peniel, for I have seen Elohim face to face.
Oh. xxxix. Jehovah is with Joseph in Egypt. Joseph says to the wife of Potiphar : How
should I sin against Elohim ? — Jehovah is also with Joseph in prison. Ver. 21.
4. Latent sections, in which no name of God appears.
Ch. xi. 10-32; xxii. 20-24 ; xxiii. (exception ver. 6: Thou art a prince of God [Elohim]
among us. Oh. xxv. 1-10: God blesses Isaac. Universalistic with respect to Isaac's entire pos-
terity). Ver. 12-20; 21-24; 27-34; ch. xxvii. 41-t6; xxix. 1-30; xxxiv. ; xxxvi. ; xxxvii.; xl. ;
Ex. ii. 1-22.
"The name of Elohim as characteristic of entire large sections disappears from Exodus vi. 2
to eh. vii. 2 (the preparation of Moses and Aaron for their calling). Nevertheless a few aiiusioiis
are still found, among which is prominent the small Elohistic section Ex. xiii. 17-20 (beginning
of the wanderings of Israel)." — Delitzsoh.
According to the foregoing, the name of Jehovah appears so entirely in a theocratic relation,
and the name of Elohim so entirely in an Elohistic one, that we might easily assume these
various relations to be there intended where their Hebrew and canonical subtiliiy escape the
eye of the critic.
[This exegetical distinction in the divine name is quite old, but it is only of late that it has
been made to assume much importance in interpretation. It has been favored in Germany by
two widely different schools. Those wlio set tlie least value on the idea of iiispiration find here
a fancied support, not only of what is called the documentary the(jry of Genesis, but also of their
favorite notion of earlier and later periods in the composition of the whole, and even of particular
parts. The other school, denying this inference, at least in the extent to which it is carried,
are still fond of the distinction as favoring the notion, or rather, we may say, the precious doctrine,
of a twofold aspect in the divine relation to the world, or universe at large, in contrast with
that which is borne to a divine people chosen out of the world from the very beginning, and
continued in its subsequent history, as a means of the ultimate regeneration of the world, and
of nature regarded .as disordeied, nr under the curse. Hence the terms universalistic and
theocratic. Elohim has regard to the first aspect ; Jehovah, or Jahveh, to the second.
Admitting the distinction, we may still doubt whether it has not been carried, on both sides,
to an unwarranted extent. The first view is already curing itself by its ultra ratiimalistic extrav
tgance. It reduces the Old Scriptures not only to fragments, but to fragments of fragment*
it most ill-assorted and jumbled confusion. Its suppurters find themselves at last in direct
oppositi(m to their favorite maxim that the Bible must be interpreted as though written like
other books. For surely no other book was ever so composed or so compiled. In the same
portion, presenting every appeara.nce of narrative unity, tl.'ey find the strangest jnxtapositioni
108 iNTRODDCTION TO GENESIS.
of passages from different authors, and written at different times, according as the one name oi
the other is found in it. There are the most sudden transitions even in small paragraphs liaving
not only a logical but a grammatical connection. One verse, and even one clause of a verse, \*
written by tlie Elohist, and another immediately following by the Jehovist, with nothing besidea
this difference of names to mark any difference in purpose or in authorship. Calling it a com-
pilation will not help the absurdity, for no other compilation was ever made in this way. To
make the confusion worse, there is brought in, occasionally, a third or a fourth writer, an editor,
or reviewer, and all this without any of those actual pruofs or tests which are applied lo otiit-r
ancient writings, and in the use of which this "higher criticism," as it culla itself, is so uuuh
inclined to vaunt.
The other school is more sober, but some of the places presented by them as evidence of such
Intended distinction will not stand the test of examinatiim. What first called attention to thit'
point was the difference between the first and second chapters of Genesis. In the first, Elohim
is used throughout ; in the second, there seems to be a sudden transition to the name Jehovah-
Elohim, whicli is maintained for some distance. This is striking; but even here the matter has
been overstated. In the first chapter, we are told, the name Elohim occurs thirty times, with-
out a single interruption ; but it should be borne in mind that it is each time so exactly in the
Barne connection, that they all may be regarded as but a repetition of that one with which the
account commences. We should have been surprised at any variation. In this view they hardly
amount to more than one example, or one use of the name, carried through by the repetition of
the conjunctive particle. Thus regarded, the transition in the second passage is not so very
striking. It is not well to say that anything in the com[)Osition of the scriptures is accidtnt.-d
or capricious, yet, as far as " the Bible is written like other books," we may suppose a great
variety of causes that led to it as well as the one assigned. It might have been for the sake of
an euphonic variety, or to avoid a seeming tautology. It might have been some subjective feel-
ing which the writer would have found it diflicult to explain, and that, whether there was one
writer or two. Again, it might have been that the single name suggested itself in ti.e first as
more simple and sublime standing alone, and, in this way, more universalistic, as it is st\ led ;
whilst in the second general resum6 the thought of the national name comes in, and the writer,
whether the same or another, takes a holy pride in saying that it was the national God, our God,
our Jehovah-Elohim, that did all this, and not some great cavsa causarum, or power separate
from him. There might be a feeling of nearness in respect to the one name that led to its use
under such circumstances.
So in the New Testament, Christ is a wider name than Jesus, less near, less tender and per-
sonal ; and this difference may have led to the almost unconscious, yet still real though subjective,
choice of the one rather than the other under varying circumstances. Something niaile Paul
especially fotid of the name Jesus, though he generally attaches it to Christ. So this name occurs
alone more freciuently in John tlian in the other Gospels. It is found more in some parts of one
Gospel than in others, and yet this would be very poor evidence that such parts were by different
authors. The cases may not be perfectly parallel, yet they present sufficient resemblance to
show how insecure is any argument for or against authenticity that is based on such a distinction.
In the parallelism of passages presented by Lange, some are quite striking, and it would seem
rational to suppose that the more general or the more national feeling, as it predominated in one
or the other, may have occasioned the difference in the suggestion and the use of the names.
Again, tljere aro other cases given, in which it is not easy to discover this, and even some
where the reasons assigned would seem capable of a direct reversal. Tims, in Gen. x., the
genealogical table of l/ie nations has the name Jehovah and is pronounced theocratic. Of itself
it would seem to l)e just the other way. So the mention of Niiniod becomes theocratic, and yet
what name more remote from the idea of the people of God. Ecjually inconsistent would be
that view, or that argument, which ranks the ordinance of circt.mcision in Abraham's ftimilv .-a
tniversalistic. Surely if there is any one thing preeminently theocratic, it is this, and yet iht
name here u-ii-d is Elohim. Another example: the blessing of Isaac by Jacob is put in the uid
rersalistic or Elohistic column. The inconsistency ol this, with any rigid theory of the naniei
§ 7. SOURCES AND COMPOSITIOX OF OENESIS. 101
<8 attempted to be explained by saying that it was with relation to Esau. This only shows,
licwever, if it has any weight at all, that the same event may stand in relation to either aspect,
according as it is viewed fmm this or that standpoint — a concession that would destroy t.'j*
esegetioal value of a large number of these references, although enough might remain to 8ho»
that there was ^^oule good ground for the distinction. — T. L.]
C. The Old Testament Names of God.
The diversities of the name of God presented in the preceding paragraphs, induce us to pref
ace the funlier discussion with a short treatise on the names of God in the Old Testament. W«
divide them into three classes.
1. Universalistio : Elohim, El Eloah, El Elion, El Sohadai, Elohim Zebaoth.
In respect to n'rtix , see below, bx, very old Semitic name of the Godhead. A name of
Jehovah, "Num. xii. 13 ff., &c. .'Mso of the gods or idols of the heathen, Isa. sliv. 10, 15, &o,
For .Jehovali, usually Ha-el bsn (Gen. xxxi. 13), or El Elohim. Jehovah El Elohim. El Elim
Dan. xi. .36. Or El with epithets: •i-'br, "'■n-r, cbii", &o., on account of the universality of the
name itself. Thence also El Isr.ael, El Jeshnrun. Usual derivation from bix to be sti-ong.
According to Furst bl.^t, a primitive. It occurs in many proper names, nibs is predominantlj
poetical, instead of the plural Elohim; namely, in the Psalms, Job, Isaiah, Habakkuk, as also in
later writings: Daniel, Nehemiah, Chronicles. Additional formation from bx mainly occurs
with secondary attributes: God of Jacob, God of strmig-hold*, strange God, &c. Most frequentlj
in the plural, oTibx . 1. It is used of the true God, especially with tiie artic.e. It is construed
with the singular of the verb, though also with the plural, Gen. sx. 13. Afterwards this con-
struction with the plural was avoided as sounding polytheistic. . 2. As protecting God or
covenant God, referring to Abraham, Israel, &c., with other epithets, indicating the absolutism
and universality of God : God of the heavens and the earth, God Zebaoth, &c. — In such relations
t was also used adjectively, in order to indicate tlie highest, e. g., mountain of God. 3. Of
eathen gods, when more closely defined by the context. So also, 4, though only conditionally,
of vicegerents of (rod ; kings, judges, angels ; such examples very doubtful. In these cases tliere
is, hnweve:', an adjective, symbolical signification. Concerning the derivation, Delitzsch says,
p. 30 : " Elohim is plural from Eloah, customary only in the higher poetic style, and this is not
from the verb nbs, to be strong, formed from bix but is an infinitive noun from pibx in the
signification of the Arabic aliha, to fear." *
We decidedly prefer the objective derivation to this subjective one (from the fear of God);
since all other n.'\mes of God have an objective derivation ; this is especially so with the prefix
• (The subjective deriv.atiOD of Cnbs, whicli connects it with the ideas of /ear, or terror, has an interest for some
interpreters, because it reduces the old Hebrew feelin*; to the level of the heathenish SciinSat/ioi'ta, or superstition, which
is 30 different a thinff from the mn^ rX^"^, the loving reverence, or " fear of the Lord," of the Old Testament. The
connection with the Arabic aliha is far-fetched. It is the same root, doubtless, but worship, or religious service, in alaha,
and terror in aleha, are later and secondary senses ; just as that of swearing is a later or derived meaning both in the
Hebrew and the Artibic usage. The idea of creative power is most fundamental in the word : a great being dwelling in the
He;ivens above, and who made and rules the world. With this are easily associated adoration and awe, but the idea of
terror is foreign to every conception that Genesis gives us of the Sethitic and patriarchal life. Enoch's " walking with
God," the calm, holy communion of .\braham and Jacob 1 nothing could be more opposed to the idea and the leeling of
the Greek ^etcrifiai/xoi'ia.
Power, greatness, vastness, height, according as they are represented by the conceptions of the day, carried to the farthest
ext«nt allowed by the knowledge of the day ; this is the idea of El and Elohim, as seen in the etymological congrulty of tha
epithets joined to them in Genesis. There are three especially th.at Lange has mentioned and which thus denote power
or greatness in its three conceivable dimensions of space, time, and sublimity (or rank) : •^"Itl? 5X (El Shaddai), De*u
vmnipottns, ox Dens sufficiens, cb"" bx (El 01am), i>eu5 c/ernj7a/is. "vb" 5X CEl Elion), Dens altissimus — irairoKpaTiij^
•-«paTi(rfo9, aiotvuKf vi^KTTo?. Our terms infinite, absolute, &c., add nothing to these in idea, though modem scienof
»lay be said (and yet even that may be doubted) to have enlarged the attending conceptions of the sense or tb«
fanagination.
For the derivations of Allah by Arabic writers and philologists, see Spbexoer : ** Leben und Lehre des Mohammed,'
»ol i. p. 286.- T. I..1
no INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS.
El. — El Elion •"■'bs, svperior, suprenius, v\j/LtTTos; El Schadai, •'flf potentissimvs. Plur. Excell
a Tr , rad. -[-iw, Septuaginta^ Trai>rnKp:iTu>p. Vnlgate, omnipotens. Elohim Zebaoth, r"s:s
Singular n3S . 1. The host of heaven, the angels, 1 Kings xxii. 19; 2. Sun, moon, and stars,
Deut. iv. 19 ff . ; 3. generally all beings. Gen. ii. 1; Neh. ix. 2. God can make all things hit
hosts. Elohim Zebaoth is in so far the must universal designation of God.
2. Theocratic: Jehovah, Jah, El Schadai, Adonai (Maleaoh Jehovah), i^!'^' •
a The pronouncing the name: the very sacred name of God as the covenant God ol
Israel. Through superstitious fear, the Jews early began to avoid pronouncing this name
Such a motive seems to be the ground of the translation of the Septuagiiit (ni/pios foi
Jehovah).
Subsequently a prohibition of the utterance of this name was, by false exposition, supposed
to be found in the Commandments, Ex. xx. 7, and Lev. xxiv. 11 (Philo, Vita llosis, torn. iii.).
Thence they designated this name as Tetragrammaton, as o'ii simply, or as a^ssn cuJ and read
in place of it -;-ix . Hence also the Masorites punctuated the text-name rr.n^ with the vowels
of Adonai, whereby the compounded Sohewa became, according to the rules of Hebrew gram-
mar, a simple Schewa. On the combination, however, of the word with prefixes, the A-sound
again appeared. Instead of Jehovah the Samaritans said Schiniah, that is Schem (namp). But
where Adonai Jehovah occurs in the text, there they read Adonai Elohim. In conseq lence of
thus avoiding the utterance of this name, the original pronunciation of it has been called in
question. On this point compare the lexicons (Diodorus on the word Jao ; the Samaritans, ac-
cording to Theodoret, Jahe; Jao in Clemens Alex. ; in Michaelis and Hiilemann Jehovah, Relan^
Jahve) and Delitz^ch, p. 68. According to Caspari (on Micha the Morathite) one has the choice
between nin;^ {^'^i'.) "ja: ("".H-)- Delitzsch decides for Jahavah.
b. Origin of the name. For its derivations from foreign religious names, compare Gesenius,
Delitzscli, but especially Tholuck: "Miscellaneous Writings," 1 vol. p. 377. — Here the deriva-
tion of the name from foreisrn names of gods is distinctly denied. But the origin of the name,
as the full development of its significance, coincides clearly with the origin of the theocratic
consciousness. 3. Etymological signification of the name. The verb lying at the bottom of it
is an ancient one, but subsequently became prominent again, mn = niJi. Delitzsch asserts that
hig word does not signify hvai but yiyi/fo-Sut, Jehovah, tlierefore, him " whose Ego is an ever
self-continuing one." Is then this the signification of yi'-yxftrSai? And might not a future of
yiyvtiT^nt contain the progressive idea of an ever becoming God ? But the future of mn cannot
exactly indicate the existing one (Henpstenberg). It indicates one who is ever to be or to live; who
is ever going to be or live. With the future, in eftect, its present is at the same lime fixed, as
in Elijeh ascher Ehjeh (Ex. iii. 14). And this then also refers back to a corresponding past.
Hence the true realistic interpretation of Revel.ition i. 4, 8: 6 &iv Koi 6 ^r Kni 6 f'pxdiJifvoi (a cor-
lespondence with the inscription of the temple at Sais: ('yti dfii to yeyorar Km w khI ((T6fi€viw).
In earlier times some were disposed to find the three tenses in the form of the word itself; but
this was an ignoring of the grammar. 4. Theocratic signification of the word. We have
already observed above, that the name Jahavali expresses the theoeratic relation of God (as the
God of revelation and the covenant) to his people, in contrast with tlie universalistic designation
of the name Elohim. For more on this head, see below. — pii abridged from nin^ or proceeding
from an older, or aliridged pronunciation of the word nrf . It occurs espe"i illy in the poetic
and solemn style, hence Hallelu-Jah. Besides. Jah, like EI is found in many proper names.
^inx Lord. In this form it is used only of God, while the human possessor or lord is called
•jins (from --s allied to "ti). The form Adonai is explained by many as Pluralis majeatatu, by
others as a sullix of the plural : my lords = my lord, and further lord absolutely, which explana-
tion Gesenius prefers, for weighty reasons. The word especially occurs 1. m addresses of God,
2. in self-presentations of God, 3. in treating of God generally, and, indeed, frequently with the
»ddition of Jahavah or Elohim. — About the phrase ~j'^? T*^'? tee the proper place.
3. Thflocratic universalistic designations. JEitovAti Ei.otiiM, Jkhovaii Zkbaotii, Fatiieh.
lehovah Eloljirn imlicates the covenant God of Israel as Giid of all the world (i Kings xviii
91\. From thp *ignification of Jehovah it is plainly evident that Elohim is also Jehovah. Oorapt
§ 7. SOURCES AND COMPOSITION OF GENESIS. Ill
Ex. vi. 3, Jehovah Zebiioth. When the God of the kingdom of salvation summons the hosts of
heaven and of earth to realize his judgments and the aims of redemption, he is called Jehovah
Zebaoth. — :s Isa. Ixiii. 16 ; xiv. 7, &c., God as the source of the spiritual existence of Israel,
especially of its spiritual life.
D. Elohju and Jebotab.
The scholastics of the middle ages were mainly of opinion that the Trinity was indicated in
the name of Elohim, i. e., the idea of the God of revelation (Petrus Lombardus, espeoialh). Th«
Jewish author of the book "Oosri" Rabbi JehudaHallevi, of the twelfth century, taught, on the
contrary, that the name Elohim had a relation antithetical to the heathen plurality of Gods
which had arisen because the heathen made a God of every appearance of godlike power in the
world). The name Elohim was thus tlie most general name of the Godhead ; Jehovah, on the
contrary, the covenant God. Tiiis distinction has been brought back again in our time by
K. H. Sack : De uati nominum dei n^nbs et n'n"' in libra Gene^eoa, in his Commeiitationes ad
theologicam kistoricam, Bonn, 1821. — To this may be added the treatise of Hengstenberg in his
work : " Contributions to the Introduction to the Old Testament," vol. 2d, entitled : " The Names
of God in the Pentateuch," p. 181. Uengstenberg makes the word Jehovah, as future form,
Jahve from the Hebrew mn=n-'n . But that this future shall have only the signification " tfit
Being " does not appear from the examples connected with it, Jacob, Israel, Jabin.* Ratlier do
these examples give to the future here the significance of the being which is continually realiz-
ing itself, consequently of the being who is going to be, and thus also the passage, Eev.
i. 4, interprets the name. Jehovah is the God who becomes man in his covenant-faith-
i'ulnes^, or that which is, and which was, and which is to he. Accordingly then as the
name Elohim (not as plural, but as denoting intense fulness) expresses the truth that is
found in heatliendom, or the concrete primeval monotheism, whilst Jehovah, on the contrary,
expresses the peculiarity of the Jewish religion, whose God, in the power of his being ever re-
maining the same with itself (that is his truthfulness) enters into the absolute future form in the
becoming man, so again does the name Jehovah Elohim embrace in its higher unity both Judaism
and heathenism, whilst it so far represents Christianity as already budding in the Old Testament
fLANGE: "Positive Dogmatics," p. 56).
The plural t Elohim has been variously explained. 1. BAtrMGARTEN (Eichers) : It is numerical
• [The names to whioh Dr. Lange here refers are all Hebrew fatures in form, 3p5^, bsi^"*, '^2^, but it is not eaay
*o see how any inference could be drawn from them in respect to the divine name. The letter ^ in some cf them may be
merely prosthetic— in others it may merely indicate something hopeful or prophetic in the naming. — T. L.]
t [There may be a question whether it is strictly a plural at all, as thxis frequently used, and not a very early euphonic
abbreviation of the construct phrase a^nbi<~b5<, as we find it occurring in all its emphatic fulness, Ps. 1. ,"11 H^ D^il jN bx
God of Gods Jehovah (El-Elohim Jehovah) God of all superhuman powers, or of all that may be called Gods. The easy
doubling of the b, of which the Hebrew furnishes such plain examples, and its being, from its peculiar liquidity, pro-
nounced as one, would be in favor of such an idea. It is thus in the word ^'l~^bb^, which is pronounced hallelujah, if
we give to the 3 its double sound, though it is written rT^'lbbn, as though it were to be pronounced ha-lelu-jah. The
regular piel-form would be ibsH hal-le-lu. An analogous case is furnished by the manner in which the divine name has
come to be written and pronounced in the Arabic. It is in full 2U jf f Al-elah or Al-alah, with the article, and so it is un-
derstood etymologically, whilst it is not only pronounced, but written, gju\ Allah. So D^H'bx bs El-Elohim, by vowel
changes easily explained, might come to be pronounced rapidly D^H'bi X El-llo-him, then El-lo-him, and finally Elohim,
•o as to become identical in appearance with the simple plural form of H'pX . We are reminded here of that unusually
eolemn invocation Josh. ixii. 22, twice repeated, mfl^ O^nbs bs. El Elohim Jehovah— El Elohim Jehovah. The
qu>.'sti('n is whether the two first are to be taken as septirate, or to be read together as one name, Deus deorum. Kaschi and
IKimchi take the latter view, though Michaelis thinl£i) it is forbidden by the accent pisik, which is very slightly disjunctive.
We need not, however, pay much attention to it when it is thus disregarded by the best Jewish commentators. This wal
he solemn pionunciation, resorted to on very solemn occasions ; but this does not forbid (it i,ither iavois) the idea, thai
the ordinary pronunciation was but a rapid abridgment of the formula. The name ^^^bs bx El-Elion might have
Buffered the same abridginent, but for two reasons : it is much less common, and the more indelible guttural 3 stands in
the way. There is something like it in the joining of H^ with n^PI^ or H^n^j so as to make it Jah-jah-vah, as we find
it in a few places of more solemi and emphatic import.
The fact that plural verbs or plural adjectives, as in Josh. xsdv. 19, are in a few cases joined with D^nbx, where il
undoubtedly danotes the One God, does not militate seriously against this view. The phrase by such abbreviation hav.
112 INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS.
or collective, and denotes originally God, including the angels, or God in as far as te reveali
himself and works through a plurality of spiritual heings. The first definition has a sense dif
ferent frum the second and sounds almost polytheistic. 2. Hofman, partly opposed and partly
agreeing : The plural is abstractive, neutral ; it is the Godhead including a s|)iritual plurality aa
the media of an immundane efficacy. 3. Aben Ezra : An original designation of the angeis, then
Plur. majestaticiui as a designation of God. 4. Origin.-il designations of the Gods, then designa-
tion of God (Herder). 5. Delitzsoh : Plural of intensity. God as he who in his one person
unites all the fulness divided among the Gods of the heathen. Finally, Delitzsch again
approaches Petrua Lomhardus: One cannot say, without effacing the distinction of both Testa-
ments, that r-'nbx is Pluralis trinitatis; but it may be said with perfect correctness, "the Tri-
nitaa is the plurality of Elohim which becomes manifest in the New Testament " {see Delitzsch :
Genesis, p. 66 ff.). We assume, on the contrary, that Elohim relates to the circumferential rev-
elation of God in the world and its powers (Isa. xl. 28), as Jehovah relates to the central rev-
elation of God in Christ. — -Concerning the name .Jehovah, Delitzsch declares: " I am, notwith
standing Ilengslenberg (Revelation, i. p. 8<)) and Holemann (Bible Studies, vol. i. p. 59), still of
the opinion, that mni indicates not so much the becoming as the being (this should read : not
80 much the heing as the beco/ning), or naturally nut him whose existence, but whose revelation
of existence, is still in the process of becoming." According to Baumgarten and Kurtz, Elohim
designates the God of the beginning and the end, Jehovali the God of the middle, i. e., of the
development moving from the beginning to the end. Delitzsch coincides : " The creation is the
beginning and the completion of everything created, according to its idea, is the end. The
kingdom of power is to become the kingdom of glory. In the midst lies the kingdom of grace,
whose essential content is the redemption, n^n^ is the God who mediates between middle and
end in the course of this history, in one word, the Redeemer." And yet the name moreover of
the unfolded trinitas ? How then could Jehovah, he who was, is, and is to be, be analogous to
Jesus Christ, yesterday, to-day, and in eternity ? Jehovah is also in the beginning of things and
from eternity (see Ev. John, i. 1), as also at the end of days (Ehje ascher Elije, Ex. 3) ; Elohim
reigns also through the whole course of universal historj'. We repeat it: the pure and harmoni-
ous cnntrast of Elohim and Jehovah will be recognized only in the contrast of the universalistio
and the theocratic revelation of God and idea of religion, — only in the combination of ilelchise.
dek and Abraham, of human culture and theocracy, civilization and churchdom (not civilization
and Christianity, because Christianity embraces both, just as the religious consciousness of faith
in the Old Covenant).
Therefore it is worth the while to follow the change of the two names through the Old
Testament beyond Exodus, vi. 3. We can only give hints for this. It is to be expected, accord-
ing to our distinction, that the nniversalistic books, Koheleth, D.iniel, Jonah, have Elohim
almost exclusively. And also that the strong theocratic historical books, Joshua, Judges, Samuel,
Kings, have mainly Jehovah. In the Proverbs of Solomon the wisdom of God is represented
as tending from the founding of the world to tlieocracy {see ch. ix.) and to the founding of a
right tlR-iicj-atic deportment; hence we find Jehovah. Also the book of Job, in its prosaio
introduction, proceeds from the basis of the Jehovah faith ; it becomes, however, in its poeiio
element nniversalistic with the name El Eloah. The change in the Psalms is remarkable. De-
litzsch remarks on this point, p. 33 (comp. also Gesenius, Thesaurus) : " We meet in the Psalter
with a similar appearance as discussed in my Syrnhnlm ad Psalmos illnstrandus (1846). The
Psalter is divided into two halves, into Elohim-Psalms (Ps. 42-84), which mainly, and almost
exclusively, use the name cnbt* and besides are fond of compound names of God, and into Je-
hovah-Psalms, whith include these, and with few exeptions use the name Jehovah. To infer
ing got the form and mnu>\ of a plural, grummatical euphony might, in a few cases, produce its syntactical connectioi
with a plural verb or adjective.
The idea of there hoing anythint? polytheistic in this common use of Elohim, even if we regard it aa a plural, is not
only at war with the whole spirit of Genesis, but also with the inference to bo derived from all the Shemitic lanpruages.
AUah in the Arabic, Kloha in the Syriac, are fdngular, like the Hebrew Eloah, an<i there is to be found, neither in theij
•arlier or their later U6U(;c, any trace of a plural as thus used. Surety the religion of Abraham, as given through the
Arabic >iy Mohatnmed, is not more monotheistic than as given tl. rough th*- Hebrew by the author of tlenesis. — T T..1
§ 7. SOURCES AND COMPOSITION OF GENESIS. 113
different authors from the use of Elohim or Jeliovah, would here be an error; for though th«
Asapli-Psahns are all Eluhim-Psaliiis, we have from David and the Korahites Psalms of Jeho-
rah as well as of Elohim. One and the same autlior at one time (?) pleased himself in the
use of the divine name Elohim and at another time in the use of the divine name Jehovah. Thia
cannot be explained from any inner groimds lying in the contents of the Psalms. Ilengsten-
berg explains the use of Elohim in the Psalms from this, namely, that in the Davidical-Solo>
monian times, when the honoring of Jehovah was predominent in Israel, the absoluteness of
''ehovah wiis made prominent as against tlie heathen ; whereas in a later time (when even in
Isruei itself the honoring of the heathen Elohim was pressing in), even the divine name Elohim
became distasteful to the worshippers uf Jehovah. But this does not explain hciw just such and
guoh psalms have the name Elohim." The Elohistic Psalms extend from the beginning of the
second book of Psalms (xlii.) till towards the end of the third book (Ps. Ixxxiv. ; the end ia
Ixxxix.). If we examine the Elohistic Psalms more closely, the universalistic feature of them
soon meets us in manifold ways. Longing for the living God, Ps. xlii.; xliii. The contrast
of the people's God with the heathen, Ps. xliv. ; xlv. ; xlvi. The calling of the heathen, Ps.
xlvii., and the victory over their resistance, Ps. xlviii. ; xlix. A lesson for all nations in the
fall of the godless, &c.
That the love of both sacred names has induced the writers alternately to honor God under
both, and to adorn themselves with both, as Delitzsch maintains, is not confirmed by the pas-
sages quoted by him. For example: Gen. vii. 16 : They went in (into the ark) as Elohim (the
God of prominent natural events) had commanded him, and Jehovah (the God of the covenant
faithfulness, or of the yet to be delivered kingdom of God) shut him in. Genesis, xxvii. 27:
" The smell of my son is as the siiiell of a field which Jehovah (the God of the theocratic
inheritance) has blessed." Therefore "Elohim" (the God of every universal blessing of heaven
and the world) " give thee of the dew of heaven, and the fatness of earth," &c. " Nations must
serve thee." Ex. iii. 4 : " Then Jehovah (the covenant God founding the holy awe in Israel)
saw that he turned aside to see, and Elohim (the God of the world-fice in the bush Israel) called
unto him out of the midst of the bush." Still more clear is the distinction between the protect-
ing Jeliovah and Elohim as ruling in the dispensations of nature. The temple is Jehovah's, the
ark of the covenant Elohim's (the moral law embracing all mankind). 1 Kings, iii. 5 : The Lord
appeared to Solomon; and God said, "Ask what I shall give thee; " because it is permitted hiia
to ask for worldly things. The passage Ps. xlvii. 6 is explained by Ps. xlvii. 7. We would
observe as especially significant, that Eve in her enthusiastic hope on the birth of Cain names
Jehovah, but in her depression at the birth of Seth, Elohim, the God of the universal human
blessing. In this spirit also Rachel speaks, oh. xxx., of Elohim's blessing the birth, while it ii
Jehovah, the God of the theocratic blessing, who gives Leah her first theocratic sons. At Bethel,
however, Jacob exclaims : Jehovah is in this place, meaning he who appears as the covenant
God ; here is the house of God (Beth-El), and the gate of heaven.
With the consciousness and significance of the distinction between the two names, is then
also naturally connected the consciousness and significance of their combinations a& they so
frequently occur in the Psalms and the Prophets.
Moreover it must be remarked that the distinction of a twofold record in Genesis favors the
originality of the Mosaic tradition rather than the supposition of a direct composition of it, in
which naturally, along with the other indices of later additions, the recoidg lying at the base
are also removed from their original sphere. But the question also arises on the distinction of
the records, or in how far the same author at a later period of his life can have assumed modifica-
tions of style which were not found in him at an earlier date. This transition of style to new
oTraj 'kfyojj.fva in the process of composition, is mainly to be noticed in the letters of Paul. A
relation similar with that which exists between Isa. i. ff. and Isa. xl. ff. could obtain between
the Mosaic records before and after those appearings of Jehovah which form a turning-point in
the life of Moses.
In their respective places we will treat of the oTibx "ija (1 Mos. vi.) and the i.vba ,-n,-i'
(oh. xvi. 7).
114 miRODDCTION TO GENESIS.
B. The Cetticai. Tbsatises oh the Elohim axd Jebotah Sections in Genesis ahd at the BsoQfNnio or BxoDCt
The Compodtion of Genesis.
Various hypotheses: 1. The documentary hypothesis. Astbuo, physician of Louis XIV.,
published m Brussels, 1753, an article entitled: Conjectures sur les memoires originaui dont il
parait que Mo'iae s'est servi pour composer le Here Oinese. He sought to prove that Moses Rirmed
Genesis from an Elohim record and a Jehovah record, with the aid of ten Bmaller memoirs.
Representatives of this view, under various modifications, were EicLhorn, Jlgen, Gramberg,
Stiilielin (''Criticnl Investigations of Genesis," Basle, 1830), Hupfeld, Bohmer.
2. The fragmentary hypothesis. The basis of Genesis was nothing but single, small frag-
mentary pieces. Michaelis, Jahn, Vater, Hartmann, Griinde. Various superscriptions, conclud-
ing formulas, repetitions, and varieties of style.
3. The complementary hypothesis. The author of the Pentateuch, the Jehovist, had before
him an older document, extending from the creation of the world to the death of Joshua, that
of the Elohist, and remodeled and extended it. Ewald, de Wette (later view), Bleek, von Boh-
len, Stahelin (later view), Tuch, &c.
4. Ewald's developed hypothesis. Designated by Delitzsch, as the crystallization hypothesis.
Four constituent parts form mainly the basis of tlie Pentateuch: 1. the book of the covenant,
written at the time of Samson ; 2. the book of the origins (Tholedoth), composed at the time
of Solomon; 3. a prophetic narrator of the earliest histories, a citizen of the kingdom of Israel
at the time of Elias or Joel ; 4. a second prophetic narrator from the period between 800 and
750. Ewald distinguishes two Elohists and two Jehovists. The fourth narrator divides him-
self again into a fourth and fifth, and his compilation of the earlier books receives yet material
additions at the time of the Jewish king Manasseh, and of the Jewish exile. It must be ob-
served, that in comparison with these the critical hypotheses on the New Testament are always
quite simple in their appearance, and that this has decidedly the character of a book-making
hypothesis.
5. The hypothesis of original unity of Genesis (and of the books of the Pentateuch in com-
mon). The Rabbins and the older theolojjians (with exception of Vitringa, Clericus, Richard
Simon). Ewald: "The composition of Genesis," Braunschweig, 1823. Retracted since 1831
(see Bleek, p. 232). Sack, in the work previously quoted. Hengstenberc. : "The Antljenticity
of the Pentateuch," 1S36 to 1839. Havernick, Ranke, Drechsler, Baumgarten, Welte, Kurtz
(at an earlier date), Keil.
6. Modified complementary hypothesis. A middle standpoint between the older complementary
hypothesis and the unity hypothesis has been taken by DelitzsDh, and after him by Kurtz (Vol. ii. of
the history of the Old Covenant, p. 1855). According to the view of Delitzsch, the author of the Elo-
hi.stio sections composed these first, and avoided, or at least seddom used, the name of Jehovali, until
the passage Exodus vi. 2, where Jehovah declares that he was known to the fathers under the name
of El Schailai, not under the name Jehovah. The name El Schadai formed in these sections a con-
necting link between the name Elohim and Jehovah. The Elohistic parts are distinguished,
however, from the later appearing Jehovistic ones, not merely by the diversity of their mmjCB
of (Jod, but also through a series of otherwise peculiar expressions (.lee Delitzsch, p. 37). Ac-
cording to this there is formed the following presentation : The nucleus of the Pentateuch is the
scroll of the covenant. Exodus, xix.-xxiv , written by Moses himself. The remaining laws of the
wilderness Moses gave orally, but they were written down by priests in whose calling it lay
(Deut. xvii. 11 ; xxiv. 8; xxxiii. 10; Lev. x. 11 ; xv. 31). These parts were codified soon after
the posHCBsion of the Holy Land. A man like Eleazer, llie son of Aaron, (Num. xxvi. 1: xxxi.
21), wrote the great work beginning with N-3 n'^tax^a, in which he took up the scroll of the
covenant, and perliaps made hut a short report ot'thc last speeches of Moses, because Moses had
written thein with his own hand. A second, as Joshua (iJeut. xxxii. 44; Jos. xxiv. 2G ; comp
I Sam. X. 2.'5J, or one of those Elders on whom rested the spirit of Moses, comnleted this worb
g 8. THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL LITERATURE OF GENESIS. lit
and embodied in it the whole of Duuterouoray, which Moses bad mainly written himself, and
•ndeed a Jehovistic recension of the whole (p 23), p. 38.
The adherents of the complementary hypothesis lie under manifold imputations of having
abandoned the presumption of Mosaic originals ; the adherents of the unity hypotliesis arf
chargeable with permitting the canonical authorship to commence at the beginning withouD th«
originals forming the basis. The hypothesis of Delitzsch is injured by tho improbable assiimp-
tion that Deuteronomy is to be attributed to Moses iu great part, and amch more early and
literally than the preceding books. On the contrary, we can by no means set aside the supposi-
tion of the representatives of the unity hypothesis, that the names Elohim and Jehovah alter-
nate with each other in consequence of their internal significance. We believe rather that this
significance will receive new importance when we more clearly appreciate the contrast between
the univerealistic and the theocratic designation of the Old Testament covenant God, of the
covenant and the spirit. Without this contrast, the significant names yet want their substruc-
tion. Delitzsch distinguishes thus : " This only is true, that the two narrators brin^' out diverse,
yet equally authorized sides of the one truth of revelation. The Jehovist seizes with preference
whatever brings out the world-historical position ami destiny of Israel, its mediating calling in
the midst of the nations of the world, and the universalistic (!) tendency of revelation. He
notes just those patriarchal promises of God, which extend beyond the possession of Canaan,
and pronuunoe the blessing of all nations through the mediation of the patriarchs and their
seed (ch. sii. 3, &c.). On the contrary all the promises of God, that kings will descend from
the patriarchs, belong to the report of the Elohist (ch. xvii. 6, &c.). He has more to do with
the priestly royal glory, which Israel has in itself, &c." This apyiears to us to be just about the
opposite of the real state of the case. The universalistic relation is the relation of God to the
Logos in the whole world, to the Sophia, to the godlike in the foundation of humanity and the
creation, the circumferential form of revelation. The theocratic relation is the central form
of revelation, its relation to the covenants, the theocracy, the historical api>earance of the
kingdom of God.
We leave it undecided, how far this contrast here also, separately taken, might give an
insight into the dilference between the Elohistic and the Jehovistic Psalms.
If Moses, as a learned man, according to the Egyptian cultivation of his time, and familiar
with the art of writing, could write down the basis of his legislation, or could cause it to be
written down (according to Bleek), then we may confidently distinguish two perinds iu the
writing of Mo-es, the composition of Elohistic memorabilia before the new period of revelati.m
(Gen. vi. 3), and Jehovistic memorabilia and laws after it. By considering the effect of Egyptian
culture, we can easily explain how (apart from its great significance in itself) the memorabilin
of the life of Joseph, on whose life-history reposed the origin of the nation in Egypt, and all
right and title <if Israel iu Egypt, have received so wide an extension. The settlement of the
Israelites in Egypt may have also been an inducement to gradually fixing the sacred legends of
the people. We permit ourselves therefore to assume a fourfold group of memor.ibLlia (nut of
complete books), as the foundation for the first four books of the Pentateuch. First, jirimitive
legends reduced to writing; secondly, memorabilia of the life of Joseph; thirdly, Mosaic
records from the Elohim or El Schadai period of Gen. vi. 3 ; fourthly. Mosaic records from the
Jehovah period. The last group is continued in a fifth, namely, in the Deuteronomic prophesies
of Moses. The recension of those parts in the form of the Pentateuch would fall, then, at the
latest, into the time of the prophets of the school of Samuel, i. «., into the last days of the era
of the Judges ; and the recension of Deuteronomy, perhaps, into the period of the development
sf the Solomonic mode of view.
S 8. THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL LrTEaATITRE OF GENESIS.
See the General Commentaries preceding. Then, Waloh: "Biblioth. Theol." iv. p. 452 ft.
Wineh: "Theol. Literature," i. p. 199. Supplement, p. 31. Danz: "Dictionary," p. 312.
Supplement, p. 38 Blebk: " Introduction." p. 110 ff. Keil: " Introduction," p. 64. Kurtz
lie INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS.
"History of the Old Covenant." "Introduction," p. 37 ft'. Especially Delitzsch : Gen^it
p. 71 ft". Tlie Patristic literature; mainly Irenaeiis, Origen, Eusebius. Cyriilus, Ale.\;indrinus,
Hieronymu^, Augustinug, &c.. p. 73. The Rahhinic literature: Solomon Isaac (liaschi, undei
the erroneous name .Jarchij, Aben Ezra, David Kimsohi, &c. P. 57, more general view. The
Patristic period and the middle ages. The era of tlie Reformation, &c. — Here Luthur and Cal
vin precede all (newly published by Heiigstenberg, Berlin, 1831). We name Oalvinus and Ger-
hard of tbe Lutherans, and the Reformed, Mercerus, Groiius, Spencer, Olericus, &c. We misa
especinlly Zwinirli, Coccejus. Venema, IJissertationes ad Oenenin, 1747. Speciidly quoted and
justly blamed ; Jacob Boiime ; ilysterium magnum (an accompaniment, Sohwkdenboku, Arcana
caelestia. ilainly what is found in Genesis German by Tafbl, 1855). — I'ecently : Micliaelis,
Severin Fatlier, von Bohlen, Rosenmliller's Comments, Schuman, and then the more weighty
commentaries of Tuch and Knobel. With respect to the deeper investigation of Old Testament
Exegesis are named : Heider ("The oldest Record of the Human Race," Riga, 1774), Hamann,
Dr. Leidemit by Moser, F. A. Krummacher's "Paragraphs on Sacred History" (1818), the
unfinished Commentary of Tiele (Erlangen, 1836), the Theol. Commentary on the Pentateuch by
Michael Baumgarten (Kiel, 1843 and 1844), Hoftaann, Prophecy and Fullilment. Bible lessons
on Genesis by Htim (Stuttgart, 1845). Exposition of Genesis by F. W. J. Schroder (Berlint
1846), "A collection in which all remarkable things ever said of Genesis are arranged on the
thread of the author's peculiar and fimdamental understanding." Le^s prominent names are
numerous, viz., in respect to criticism and isolated articles ; for instance, modern : Giesebreoht,
Riidiger, Ilgen, Larsow, Berlin, 1843. Pustkuchen, the Primal History of Mankind, Lemgo,
1821. 'ihe same. Historical Critical Investigations, Halle, 1823. — Critical Investigations: Heng-
Btenberg, Supplements, Ranke, Drecbsler, Kurtz, 1846. (Sorenson, profane, eccentric.) IIupv
feld, 1853.— Bohmer, liher Genesis, Halle, 1860. The same, the first book of the Thorah, Halle,
1862. Rahmer, Quaestiones in Oenesin, Breslau, 1863. Also von Sclirank, Commeutarius in
Geiiesin, 1835. Delitzsch, Commentary on Genesis, 3d ed. Leipzig, Frauke, 1860. Delitzsoh
and Keil {see Pentateuch). Wright, the book of Genesis, London, Williams and Norgate, 1859.
Leipzig, Hartmann.
Thkobetical pbactical Literature.
See Winer, Theological Literature, p. 115 S. — Val. Herberger, Beyer, History of the Primal
world in Sermons. Leop. Schmid, Explanations of the sacred writings, 8 numbers to Genesis
XXV. 18, Munster, 1834. Heira, Bible lesions (Stuttgart, 1845 ; see above). Wunsche, Bible
essons, Ist and 2d part (1st part: Genesis, 2d part: Job), Berlin, 1858. Scliwenke, Bible
.essons on Genesis, 2 vols. Erfurt, 1800. (Dietrich, Old Testament Bible lessons.) Tnube, 43
sermons on running texts of Genesis, Breslau, Diilfer, 1858. See Literature of the Old Tes-
tament and the Pentateuch.
[To this list of .special works on Genesis add the following: English; The Holy Bible, Genesis
and Exodus, by Charles Woedsworth, D.D., Canon of Westminster, London, 1864. A critical
and exegetical commentary on the book of Genesis, by James Murphy, Professor of Hebrew,
Belfast, Edinburg, 1863. American : Questions and notes on Genesis, by Geoegb BnsH, 1832.
Notes, critical and explanatory on the book of Genesis, from the creation to the covenant, bj
MsLANOHTON W. Jacobus, New York, 1865. Exegetical Commentary on Genesis, by Samdei
H. TcBNEE, D.D., Professor of Biblical Learning, Columbia College, New York. — T. L.]
THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
thb obbation. thb 80biptubal view of the woeld, and nattmal soibnob. thb six
days' work.
See the paragraphs of the Introduction on the prtn'ical Exposition of the Old Testamens
Also "Matthew," p. 11, Damtk, p. 313. Winer, i. p. 200 Joh. Philoponus, in caput i. Oeneseot
S 8. THEOLOGICAL AND HOMILETICAL LITEKATURE OF UEXESIS. 1 1'.
edit. Corderms, Vienna, 1630. Eichhorn: Primeval History, 2 vols. Altorf, 1790. Hasse: L'iscover
ies in the Field of the Oldest History of Earth and Man, 2 [its. Halle anil Leipzig, 1801. Wer
ner. Historical Comprehension of the first three chapters of Genesis ; with a Supplement on th«
Genuineness of Deuteronomy, Tubingen, 1829. Hno: De opere sex dierui?i, Freiburg, 1827. Beke:
Orignies biblicae, or Researches in Primeval History, London, 1834. Buckland: Geology and
Mineralogy, considered with reference to Natural Theology, London, lS3fi. Hitchcock: Th«
Religion of Geology, &c.. (Glasgow, 1857. Hugh Miller : The I'estimony of the Rocks on Geolo^'y,
Edinburgh, 1857. Reginald Stuart Poole : The Genesis of tlie Earth and of Man, &c., London,
1860 {see the notice of ZOckler: Periodical of Theol. Literature, N. 5 and 6, 1801). Kalisch:
Historical and Critical Commentary of the Old Testament Genesis, London, 1858. Godefroy :
La Cosmogonie de Reeilatiun, Paris, 1861. Marcel de Senes: The Cosmogonie of Moses, in tier-
man, Tubingen, 1841. Waterkeyn: Kosmos hieros. Quoted by Delitzsch (p. 609): American
writings of Hitchcock, Smith, Crofton ; especially tlie Treatise by Means: The Narrative nf tha
Creation in Genesis, in the American Bibliotheca Sacra, with special reference to Guyot's Lec-
tures on the Harmony of the Mosaic account of the Creation with modern Science, delivered in
New York, 1852. Tholuck: What is the result of Science in reference to the primeval world?
At the same time a catalogue of the most important writings on this subject. In his miscella-
neous writings, 2d part, p. 148 if. Lange's Miscellaneous Writings, vol. i. p. 49 ft". ; p. 74 ff.
Lange: The Land of Glory, with reference to Pfaff: Man and the Stars. Kurtz: The Bible and
Astronomy. (Scliaden : Theodicy, Karlsruhe, 1842.) KeU: Apologia Mosaicne Traditionis, &c.,
Dorpat, 18.39. O. Heer: Harmony of the Creation, Zurich, 1847. Fred, de Rougemont {set
"Matthew," p. v.) : Fragmem d'une Histnire de la terre, d'npres la Bible. Neufchatel, isil. The
same : Dv monde dans ses rapports avee Dieu, Neufchatel, 1841. Eistoire de la terre, 1856, Ger-
man, by Fabarius Mutzl : Tlie Primeval History of the Earth, Landshut, 1843. Hugo Reinsch :
The Creation, 1856. Euen : The History of the Creation, according to the Researches of Mod-
ern Science in its Connection with the Faith and the Church, Referat, Stettin, 1855. Flashar:
Whether the astronomical contradicts the Christian View of the World, Berlin, 1857. Ebrard:
The Faith in the Holy Writ and the Result of Researches into Nature, Konigsberg. 1861. iThe
writings on this subject by Riehers. Wolf: Primeval History of Genesis, ch. i. ver. 6-8.) Jahn:
Nature in the Light of Divine Revelation, and the Revelation of God in Nature, Berlin, Schulze.
Nature and Revehition, org.in for tlie mediation between natural researches and faith (a period-
ical), Munster, Aschendorf, 1855 tf. Bohner: 1. The Freely Inquiring lUble Theology and its
Opponents, Zurich. Orell, Fussli. 2. Researches of Nature and Civilized Life. 3. Ko-mos, Bible of
Nature, Hanover, Rilnipler, 1862. Zockler: Theologia naturalis. Plan of a systematic natural
Theology, Frankfort on the Main and Erlangen, 1860. Moller: History of the Cosmology in
the Greciiin Church until Origen, with Special Investigations of the Gnostic Systems, Halle, 1860.
Keerl : Man the Image of God. His relation to Christ and the world. An Essay on Primeval
History, Basle, 1861. Wisemann : On the Connection between the Results of scientific Investiga-
tion and Religion. Pianciani (of the Collegium Romanum) : Elucidations of the Mosaic History
of the Creation. Von Schrank: Hexaemeron, Augsburg, 1838. Gfrorer: The Primeval History
of the Human Race, Schaft'hausen, 1855. Reinke: The Creation of the World, 1859. Reusch:
Lectures on the Mosaic History and its Relation to the Results of Investigations in Nature, Bonn,
Freiburi.', 1862. Works on the Creation from the scientific stand-point, by Andreas Wagner
(Neptunisui), and others. See Delitzsch, p. 110. Schubert: The Structure of the World Quen-
stedt: Epoclis of Nature, Tiibingen, 1860. Pfatf: History of the Creation, Frankfort on the Main,
1855. (Hudson Tuttle: History and Laws of the Process of Creation, German, Erlangen, 1860.
A flood of kindred pojiular writings and periodical articles.) Treatises, see Kurtz, p. 55. Of
great merit is the recension of the work of Buckland, Geology and Mineralogy, con.sidered wit!
reference to Natural Theology, by W. Hoffmann in Tholuck's Literary Advertiser, 1838, Nr. 44 fit
Baer: Which comprehension of animated nature is the just one 2 Berlin, 1862.
118 INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS
WOBKS OONOERNING MATEBIALISM.
Materialistic : Moleschott, ' Buchner, Vogt, Czolbe, &c. Mayer in Mentz, Materialism anc
Bpiritualism, GieBsen, 1861. Periodicals, Treatises, Articles.
Counter-publications: R. Wagner: Creation of Man and Substance of the Soul. A.Wagner
Liebig, Fabri: Letters against Materialism. Scbellwien: Criticism of Materialism. Woysch:
Materialism and the Christian View of the World. Ewen, Berlin, 1856. Schaller, Weber : Ma-
terialism and the People's School, Stendal, 1856. Alb. von Gloss (especially against Buchner
andVogt). Michelis: Materialism and Implicit Faith. " Circular to the Representatives of Mod-
ern Materialism in Germany. Cotta, Burmeister, Roamlissler, Muller, Uhle, Czolbe." Baltzer :
The new Fatalists of Materialism. Froschamer: WalhaUa of German Materialists, Miinster
1861. Bona Meyer : Critical View of materialistic controversial Literature, Evangelical Church
Gazette, 1356, June, &c.
Homiletics: Harms: On the Creation, 9 sermons, Kiel, 1834. (Free discursive texts. The
treatment of the subject occasionally extravagant.) See the more general collections to Genesis,
Deuteronomy, and the General Introduction.
SECOND CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
See " Matthew." The article Eden in Winer's Real-Lexicon. Monographs by Hnetms,
Hopkinson, Schulthess, &c. Bertheau: The Fundamental Geographical Conceptions in the
Description of Paradise, Gottingen, 1848.
Comp. Kurtz : History of the Old Covenant, p. 57 if. K. von Raumer : Palestine. Maydorn :
The Gospel of Paradise. Eight Lent-Sermons, Breslau, Diilfer.
Malt and female sex. Anthropological Works. Works on marriage.
Unity of the Human Race. See " M.itthew." Liicken : Unity of the Human Race, Han-
over, 1845. See A Catalogue of the Opponents and Defenders of the Unity of Descent, Kurtz,
p. 61. Lange's Positive Dogmatics, p. 330.
Anthropology and Psychology. Hug : The Mosaic History of Man, Frankfort and Leipzig,
1793. Outlines of the Doctrine of the Soul from the Sacred Writ, by Roos. From the Latini
Stuttgardt, 1857. Rausmann. Beck: Scriptural Doctrine of the Soul, 2d ed. Zeller: Concise
Psychology, 3d ed., Cahv, 1857. Delitzsch: Scriptural Psychology, 2d ed. Von Rudlnlf : The
Doctrine of Man, founded on Divine Revelation. Anthropology of StefFens, by J. H. Fichte»
Leipzig, 1858. Schubert : History of the Soul. H. A. Hahn: Comm.entatio Veteris Testamenti
de natura hominis exposita.
Language. Ft. Schlegel: Philosophy of History, p. 44 ff. Schmitthenner : Primitive Gram-
mar. Herder, H.imann, W. von Humboldt: On the Kavi-Language. Introduction. Jacob
Grimm: The Origin of Language, Berlin, 1852. Stiivesand : The Mystery of the Language of
God in Man, Goth.a. Perthes.
Immortality. See Dantz : articles Immortality, Sleep of the Soul, Migration of Souls. Add
Supplement, p. 108. Oehler: Veteris Testamenti sententia de rehus post mortem fvtnris, Stutt-
gardt, 1846. A. Schumann: The Doctrine of Immortality of the Old and New Testamenti
Bottcher. Brecher : The Doctrine of Iinmortality as held by the Jewisli People, Leipzig, 1857.
Engi-lhert: The Negative Merit of the Old Testament in Relation to the Doctrine of Immortality,
Berlin, 1857. A. Fichte : The Idea of Person.ility and continued Individual Existence, Fiber-
feld, 1834. Lange's Philosophical Dogmatics, p. 243. Weisse: The Philosophical Mystery of
Immortality, Dresden. Kori. H. Ritter: Immortality. First volume of Entertaining Instruction,
Leipzig. Brockhans, 1851. Gumposch : The Soul and its Future, St. Gallen, 1849. Schultz
Sidittgerber: Death, Life after Death, and Resurrection. A biblical apologetical Essay, Hallfl
1862.
Religion See Winer: Theological Literature, i. p. 28. Supplement, p. 45 &o.
I 8. THEOLOGICAL AND HOUILETICAL LITEKATCRE OF GENESIS. Hi
THIRD CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
THE FALL. LOST PAEADISB. DEATH.
Nysa : Philosophic-historical Treatise on Genesis 2<1 and 3d. Eleutheropolis, 1790. Sohel
ling: Antiquissimi de prima malorum humanorum origine Philosophe?natis Gen. 3 explicatio,
Tubingen, 1792. Writings on the Sin of Man, Krabbe, J. Miiller. See also the catalogue in
Kurtz: History of the Old Covenant, p. 61. Umbreit: Sin. Supplement to the Theology of th«
Old Testament, Hamburg, 1853. Bram : The Fall. Illustration of the 3d cliapter of Genesiri,
Barmen, 1857. Graber : Sermons on the Lost Paradise.
FOURTH CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
ON SACBinOK.
See Literature, Enrtz, p. 71. On the extension of the Human Race.
FIFTH CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
On the Macrobians. See Kurtz, p. 73 ff.
SIXTH CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
Fr. de Rougemont : Le Peuple primitif. Several volumes, Paris and Geneva. H. Kurtz :
The Marriages of the Sons of God with the Daughters of Men, Berlin, 1857. The same: Tha
Sons of God, in Genesis vi. 1, 4, and the Sinning Angels, in 2 Pet. ii. 4, 5, and Jude, ver. 6 and
7. Polemic treatise against Hengstenberg, Mitau, 1858. See also Kurtz: History of the Old
Covenant, pp. 76 and 77.
SIXTH TO NINTH CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
THE FLOOD.
Buttmann : On the Myth of the Flood, Berlin, 1812 ('19). Stollberg: History of Religion
and the Church, 1vol. Further literature: Kurtz, p. 80 ff. Croner: 18 Sermons from the
History of the Flood, Erfurt, 1568. Gessner : Noah, Five Addresses to Christians, Basle, 1823.
TENTH CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
THE GENEALOGICAL TABLE.
See Kurtz: History of the Old Covenanr, p. 88 ff. A. Feldhoff: The Line of Epochs of the
Holy Writ, from Adam to the Pentecost, Frankfort on the Main, 1831. The Genealogical
Table of Genesis in its Universal Hi.^torical Significance, Elberfeld, 1837. Krilcke : Illustrations
of the Genealogical Table, Bonn, 1837. Knobel : The Genealogy of Genesis, Giessen, Ricker,
1850. Breiteneicher : Nineveh and Nahum. With reference to the latest discoveries, Munich.
1861. Layard : Popular Report on the Excavations at Nineveh, German by Meissner, Leip-
»ic, Dyk, 1852.
ELEVENTH CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
BUILDING OF THE TOWER OF BABEL. GENEALOGY. OONFUSION OF TONGFES.
Kurtz, p. 86 ff. Kaulen: Confusion of T.ingiies .it P>:il.el. >rainz, 1861. Niebuhr- Babylon
120 KTRODUCTION TO CEXESIS.
Heathendom. Dollinger: Heathendom. Stiefelliagen. Writings of Lasanlx, Nfigelsbach.
Wnttke, Mohler, and others. See Kurtz, p. 91. Fabri : The Rise of Heatljendom and th«
Problem of Heathen Missions, Barmen, 1859, Lubker: Lectures on Civilization and Christian-
ity, Hamburg, 1863.
TWELFTH TO THIRTY-SIXTH CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
THE BISTORT OF THE PATEIAE0H8.
See Kurtz, pp. 104 and 116, especially 119 an J 129. Heidegger: Be historia sacra Patriar
eharum, Eiercitationes selectae, Amsterdam, 1667. J. J. Hess: History of the Patriarchs, with
maps, 2 vols. Zurich, 1776. Mel: The Life of the Patriarchs, 2 parts, Frankfort, 1714 (on the
last Chapters of Genesis).
A. Abraham.
See Danz : Abraham, p. 14. Winer: Scrtptnral ffeal-leTicon. Biblical Dictionary, oy Zel-
ler. Herzog : Theological Encyclopedia. So also tlie following names. Uoos: Footsteps of the
Faith of Abraham in the Description-; of the Life of the Patriarchs and the Prophets. Newly
published, Tubingen, 1837. Bachmann : Sermons on the History of Abraham. Passavant:
Abraliam and Abraham's Children. By the author fif N.ienian, 2d ed. Basle, 1861. W. Heu-
ser: Abraham's Doings, in 12 sermons. A parting Gift, Barmen, 1861. Boswinkel: Fourteen
Sermons on the Life of Abraham, Barmen, Bertelsman. Bram : Traits of the Domestic Life of
Abrah.im, Neukirchen and Solingen, 1855. — On the angel of the Lord. Knrtz, p. 144, and the
treatise in its respective place. Ishmael. See Kurtz, p. 203.
B. Isaac.
See Kurtz, p. 203 ff. The Talmud accounts of him in Otho : Lexicon Talmud. Passages of
the Koran in Hottinger's Biblioth. Orient.
C. Jacob. The Blemng of Jacob.
See Danz, p. 315. Jacob's History, by Seeger (in Klaiber's Studies i. iii. 60-81). G. D.
Krummacher: Jacob's Contest and Victory, 4th ed. Elberfeld, 1857. Alting Schilo, Franeker,
1660. Chr. Schmidt, Giessen, 1793. Friedrich. Hoffmann (Andreas Wilhelm), Stahelin. Wer-
lin, Zirkel, Petersen (see Danz: Genesis, and Winer i. p. 199). Diestel: The Blessing of Jacob,
Braunschweig, Schwetsche, 1853.
D. Joseph.
See Danz, p. 815 and p. 4713. Winer: Biblical Dictionary. Zeller: Biblical Dictionary.
Herzog. Felix Herder: The History of Joseph in Sermons, Zurich, 1784. Teachings from the
History of Joseph. First part, Frankfurt on the Main, 1S16.
i 9. THE FUNDAMENTAL THOUGHT AND DIVISION OF GENESIS.
Under the univergo-cosmica! point of view, Genesis is divided into two main divisions: the
listory of the primeval world before the flood (ch. i.-viii.) and the history of the theocrati
wimeval period .iftcr the flood (ch. viii.-l.).
Heidegger: Encliiridion; 1. J/istoria originis rerum omnium, ch. i. 11. 2. Historia miind%
prioris, ch. iii.-viii. 8. Historia posteriorls mundi, ch. ix.-l. Delitzscli: "If we divide all
biatory into the two great halves of a liistory of primeval time and a history of tiie mid-world,
•eparated by the beginning of sin and the i)lan of redemption going into effect (Cocceius), Genesis
embraces the complete hist'^ry of the early world (ch. i.-iii.). It also follows the history of th«
g it. THB FUNDAMENTAL THOUGUT AND DIVISION UK UKXESIS. 121
after-world through three periods, whose first extends from the Fall to the Flood (ch. iv.-viii
14), the second from the covenant with Noah to the dispersion of the human race in nations and
languages (oh. viii. 15-ch. xi.), the third from the choosing of Abraham to tlie settlement of the
family of Jacob in Egypt (ch. xii.-l.). These first three periods are the first three stages of th«
history of salvation, into which, through divine mercy, the world and the history of nations i»
shaped "
In the mean while the theocratic point of view predominates, and under it also Genesil
appeiirs to fall firstly into two halves: The history of primal religion, from ch. i.-xi., and the
history of the patriarchs, ch. xii.-l.
Thus Kirohofer: Bibliology, p. 16 : " Genesis is consequently divided into general and special
history."
If wo look however more closely, there are three main divisions in contrast with each other
1. The history of the primeval world and earliest period of the human race, a« the history of the
primal religion (or the Tholedoth of heaven and earth (Gen. ii. 4), and the Tholedoth of Adam
(ch. V. 1) until the development of heathendom (ch. xii.)). 2. The history of the patriarchal
faith or the religion of promise, or the Tholedoth of Shem, &c., to the Tholedoth of Jacob, from
ch. xii.-ch. xxxvi. 43. 3. The history of the Genesis of the people of Israel in Egypt out of the
twelve tribes of Israel: from the Thuledoti of Jacob, ch. xxxvii., to the death of Joseph in
Egypt, under the prophetic iirospect of the return of Israel to Canaan (ch. 1. 26).
Schneider: Oompendiuni of the Christian religion (Bielefeld, 1860): "We would divide Gen-
esis most simply according to its five heroes: Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, did it
not contain in itself a decimal division (the ten Tholedoth)."
If we keep in view their ditferent relapses into sin and their turning again to redemption, it
may be appropriate to d'stinguish : a. the foundation-laying in creation, ch. i. and ii. ; b. the gen-
eral fall of man, ch. iii.-v. ; c. the fall of the first human race, ch. vi.-x. ; d. the building
of the tower of Babel (heathendom and the patriarchal state), ch. xi.-xxxvi. ; e. tlie sin of the
brothers of Joseph and its event, ch. xxxvii.-l. (Isaac's error and its event, an episode, ch. xxviii.
-xxxvi.)
The name Genesis, referring to the initial word of the book (r''":3S"'2) and to its foundation,
may indicate in the first place the origin of the world and the human race. But we can also
conclude from the frequent headings ■•Tholedoth" (p-nbir) which mark individual sections,
that it is especially chosen in reference to the contents of the entire book, or the human origins
in general (origin of sin, of judgment, salvation, final judgment, renewal of the world, heathen-
dom, covenant religion, and the Israelitish nation). Hence Vaihinger (in Herzog's Beat- Lex icon)
and Delitzsch in his Commentary have divided Genesis according to the separate Tholedoth.
Delitzsch counts ten Tholedoth. 1. Tlioledoth of heaven and earth, ch. i. 1-ch. iv. 26 ; 2. Tho-
ledoth of Adam, ch. v.-ch. vi. 8; 3. Tholedoth of Noah, ch. vi. 9-ch. ix. 29; 4. Tholedoth of
the sons of Noah, ch. x. 1-ch. xi. 9; 5. Tholedoth of Shem, ch. xi 10-26; 6. Tholedolli of
Terah, ch. xi. 27-ch. xxv. 11 ; 7. Tholedoth of Ishmael, ch. xxv. 12-18 ; 8. Tholedoth of Isaac,
oh. xxv. 19-ch. XXXV. 29; 9. Tholedoth of Esau, ch. xxxvi. 10; 10. Tholedoth of Jacob, ch.
xxxvii.-l.
Besides the headings Tholedoth, ch. ii. 3 ; v. 1 ; vi. 9, &c., the fact, that the Bible tn. jughout
has the point of view of the personal life, and that the Tholedoth as generations seem to cor-
respond to it, would especially favor this divisicm. But in that case we should not, at least,
speak of the Tholedoth of heaven and earth before the Tholedoth of Adam, as Delitzsch does.
And it is just this Genesis of heaven and earth, which cannot properly be designated by the
word Tholedoth, that has, nevertheless, mainly given to the book its name. We ought also to
distinguish between the documentary genealogical foundations of Genesis, its ideal unitary com-
position, and the ideal construction which proceeds from it. Therefore we seek sucn a divigioi,
of Genesis as results from the actual distinction of its principal periods, and the essential arrange
ments of these periods.
122 INTRODUCTION TO GENESIS.
FIRST PEB.IOD.
History of the primeval world, of the earliest period of the human race as history of the
earliest religion till the development of lieathendom and its contrast in the budding patriarch-
dom, ch. i.-xi.
I. DIVISION. The Genesis of the world, of the contrast between heaven and earth, and of th«
first man, ch. i. and ii.
1«< Section. Heaven, earth, and man. The physico-genetical creation and world development,
ch. i.-ch. ii. 3.
'2d Section. Man, Paradise, tlie pair, and the institutions of Paradise. The reversed principial
development, proceeding from man. The symbol of the Tree of Life, ch. ii. 4r-25.
II. DIVISION. The Genesis of the world-history, of the temptation, of the sin of man, of the
judgment, of death, of salvation, of the contrast between a divine and worldly direc-
tion in humanity, of the common ruin. The anomism of antediluvian sin, cli. iii. 1-ch.
vi. r.
\8t Section. The Lost Paradise, ch. iii.
2<i( Section. Cain and Abe). The Oainites. The ungodly, secular first culture, ch. iv. 1-24.
Zd Section. Adam and Seth. The Setliites or Macrobians. The living worship and the bless-
ing of renewed life in the line of tlie sons of God, ch. iv. 25-ch. v. 32.
4iA Section. The universal godless ruin in consequence of the mixture of both lines, ch. vi.
1-7.
ni. DIVISION. The Genesis of the judgment of the world and its renewing by means of tha
separating flood. The flood and the drowned race. The arl£ and the saved humanity.
(The ark a type of the pious house, of the pious state, of the church.) The first typical
covenant, ch. vi. 8-ch. xi. 19.
lit Section. Tlie calling of Noah and the ark, ch. vi. 8-ch. vii. 10.
2d Section. The flood and the judgment of death, ch. vii. 7-24.
3(£ Section. The ark, the saved and renewed humanity, ch. viii. 1-19.
4<A Section. The first typical covenant. The original moral law (commandments of Noah)
The symbol of the rainbow, ch. viii. 20-ch. xi. 19.
rv. DIVISION. Genesis of the new world-historical human race; of the contrast between the
new sin and the new piety, as they respectively appear, between curse and blessing. The
Genesis of the contrast between the blessing of Shem (worship, germinating tlieocracy)
and the blessing of -Japlieth (culture, humanism), of the contrast between the dispersion
of nations and the Babylonian union of nations, between the Babylonian dispersion of
nations, or the mythical heathendom, and the united symbolical faith in God orpatriarch-
dom, ch. xi. 20-ch. xi. 32.
\.»t Section. The revelation of sin and piety in Noah's house. The curse and the blessing of
Noah. The double blessing and the blessing in the curse itself, ch. si. 24-29.
2d Section. The genealogical table, ch. x. 1-22.
Zd Section. The building of the tower of Babel, the confusion of tongues, and the dispersion of
nations, ch. xi. 1-9.
\:th Section. The history of Shem, and the wandering, commenced and interrupted, of Tenih
to Canaan. The Genesis of tlie contrast between heathendom and the budding patriarch-
dom, ch. xi. 10-32.
SECOND PERIOD.
The G-enesis of the patriarchal faith in jiromise, and the covenant religion ; of the hostil*
ocBtrast hetween faith in promise and heatliendom ; of the friendly contrast between the patri-
archs and the Immanity of the heathen world. Patriarchal religion and patriarchal custom, oh.
ziL 1-cb. zxxvi. 43.
§ 9. THE FUNDAMENTAL THOUGHT AND DIVISION OF GENESIS. hi
A, Abbaham thb Feiend op God and ms Acts of Faith, Ch. xii. 1-Ch. xxt. 10.
l$t Section. Abraham's journey to Cauaan. His call. The first promisb of God. His fellow-
ship with Lot. First appearance of God in Canaan, and first homeless alienage in tht
promised land. Abraham in Ei^ypt, Pharaoh, ch. xii.
V Section. Abraham as a testimony of Go 1 in Canaan, and his self-denying separation froni
Lot. New pnimise of God. His altar in the plains of Mamre, ch. xiii.
d Section. Abraham and his war of deliverance for Lot against heathen robbery. The vic-
torious warrior of the faith and his greeting to the prince of peace Melchisedek. His bear-
ing towards the king of Sodom and his confederates, ch. xiv.
ith Section. Abraham the tried warrior of the faith, and God his shield. His longing for an
heir, and his thought of adoiitiou. Tlie great promise of Gud. Abraham's laith in view
of the starry heaven. The symbol of the starry heaven. The righteousness of faith, tha
covenant of the faith, and the repeated promise, ch. xv.
6th Section. Abraham's yielding to Sarah's impatience. Abraham and Hagar. Hagar's flight.
The angel of the Lord. Hagar's return and Ishraael's birth, eh. xvi.
6tA Section. Abraham and the repeated promise of God. The name Abram changed to
Abraham. The personal covenant of faith now a covenant institution for him, his house
and his name. Circumcision. The name Sarai changed to Sarah. Not Ishmael but
Isaac the promised one, ch. xvii.
Jth Section. Abraham in the plains of Mamre and the three heavenly men. Hospitality of
Abraham. The distinct announcement of the birth of a son. Sarah's doubt. The an-
nouncement of the judgment on Sodom connected with the promise of the heir of blessing.
The angel of the Lord, or the friend of Abraliam, and the two angels of deliverance for
Sodom. Abraha7n''» intercession for Sodom. Sodom's fall. Lot's deliverance. Lot and hi."
daughters. Moab and Ammon, ch. xviii. and xix.
Sth Section. Abraham and Abimelech of Gerar. His and Sarah's renewed exposure througl
his human calculating foresight, as in Egypt in the presence of Pharaoh. Divine preserva
tion. Abraham's intercession for Abimelech, cli. xx.
nth Section. Isaac's birth. Ishmael's expulsion. The covenant of peace with Abimelech at
Beer Sheba, cli. xxi.
loth Section. Sacrifice of Isaac. The sealing of the faith of Abraham. The completion and
sealing of the divine promise, ch. xxii. 1-19.
\lth Section. Abraham's family joy and snflfering. News of birth in the home land. Sarah's
death. Her burial at Hebron; the germ of the future acquisition of Canaan, ch. xxii. 20-
ch. xsiii. 20.
I2th Section. Abraham's care for the marriage of Isaac. Eleazer's wooing of Rebecca for
Isaac. Isaac's marriage, eh. xxiv.
13iA Section. Abraham's second marriage. Keturah and her sons. His death and burial, ch.
XXV. 1-10.
B, Isaac and his Fatth-Endubahce, Ch. xxv. U-Oh. zxnn. 29.
1st Section. Isaac and Ishmael, ch. xv. 11-18.
Sd Section. Jacob and Esau, ch. xxv. 19-34.
Zd Section. Isaac in the tenitory of Abimelech at Gerar. Appearance of God and confirmed
promise. His constrained imitation of the maxims of his father. Exposure of Rebecca.
His yielding to the injustice of the Philistines, ch. xxvi. 1-22.
4«A Section. Isaac in Beer Sheba. Treaty of peace with Abimelech, ch. xxvi. 23-3.3.
%th Section. Isaac's sorrow at Esau's marriage with the daughters of Canaan, ch. xxvi. 34
and 35.
ith Stction. Isaac's prepossession in favor of the first-born, Esau. Rebecca and Jacob deprive
him of the theocratic blessing. Esau's blessing. Esau's hostility to Jacob. Rebecca's pro-
paration for the flight of Jacob and his journey with a view to a theocratic marriage
124 INTRODCCTIOX TO GENESIS.
laaac ^ commandB for the journey of Jacob (counterpart to the dismissal of Ishmael). Esan'i
[)retended correction of his injudicious marriages, ch. xxvii.-cli. xxviii. 9.
C. Jacob-Israfl, the God-"\Veestlee and his Wanderings, Ch. xxvui. 10-Ch. xxxyi. 43.
Ut Section. Jacob's journey to Mesopotamia and the ladder of heaven at Bethel, ch. xxviiL
10-23.
2<i Section. Jacob and Rachel, Laban's younger daughter. First and second treaty with La-
ban. His involuntary consummation of marriage with Leah. The double marriage. Leah's
sons. Rachel's dissatisfaction. The strife of the two women. The concubines. Jacob's
blessing of children, ch. xsis. 1-ch. xxx. 24.
3i Section. Jacob's thought of returning home. New treaty with Laban. His closely cal-
culated proposition. (Prelude to the method of acquiring possession of the Egyptian ves-
sels.) God's command to return home, ch. xsx. 25-ch. xxxi. 3.
ith Section. Jacob's flight. Laban's ])ersecution. The alliance between both on the mountain
of Gilead. Departure, ch. xxxi. 4-55.
6th Section. Jacob's journey home. The appearance of the hosts of angels (as on his setting
out). Fear of Esau. His wrestling in the night with God. Tlie name Israel. Meeting
and reconciliation with Esau, ch. xxxii. 1-ch. xxxiii. 16.
6th Section. Jacob's settlement in Canaan At Suceoth. At Sichem. Dinah. Simeon and
■Levi. The first appearance of Jewish fanaticism. Jacob's reproof, and departure for Bethel,
ch. xxxiii. 17-ch. xxxv, 15.
7th Section. Journey from Bethel to beyond Bethlehem. Benjamin's birth. Rachel's death,
ch. xxxv. 18-21.
Sth Section. Reuben's transgression. Jacob's sons. His return to Isaac at Hebron. (Rebecca
no more among the living.) Isaac's death. Burial of him by Esau and Jacob, ch. xxxv.
22-29.
9th Section. Esau's family record and the Horites, ch. xxxvi.
THIBD PERIOD.
The Genesis of the people of Israel in Egypt from the twelve tribes of Israel, or the history
of Joseph and his brothers. Joseph, the patriarch of the faith-guidance, through humiliation tc
exaltation, ch. xxxvii.-l.
\st Section. Jacob's error in respect to Joseph. Joseph's dreams. The envy of the brothers.
Josepli sold into Egypt, oh. xsxvii.
id Section. Judah's transient separation from his brothers (probably in dissatisfaction at their
deed). Ilis sons. Tamar, ch. sxxviii.
Zd Section. Joseph in the house of Potiphar and in prison, ch. xxxix.
ith Section. Joseph as interpreter of tlie dreams of his fellow-prisoners, ch. xl.
hth Section. Joseph as interpreter of the dreams of Pharaoh. He is advanced and cared for,
ch. xli.
fith Section. The famine, and the first journey of the sons of Jacob to Egypt, cb. xlii.
1th Section. Second journey. With Benjamin. Joseph makes himself known to his brethren.
Their return. Jacob's joy, ch. xliiii.-xlv.
BtA Section. Israel goes with his house to Egypt. He settles in the land of Goshen. Jacob
before Pharaoh. Joseph's political economy. Jacob's arrangement for his burial in Ca-
naan, ch. xlvi. and xlvii.
#(A Section. Jacob's sickness, his blessing of his grandchildren, Joseph's sons, cli. xlviii.
lOt/i Section. Jacob's blessing on his sons. Juddh and his brethren. Jacob's last cliarge. His
burial in Canaan. His end, ch. xlix.
Wth Section. Joseph's mourning. Jacob's funeral in Canaan. The fear <rf Joseph's brethreri
and his word of peace and faith concerning them and his history. Joseph's last charge'
provision for his return to Canaan in deatli. similar to the provision of his father, ch. 1.
SPECIAL INTRODUCTIOIN
FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS
By the American Editok.
A8 there is no chapter in the Bible more important than the First of Genesis, so also maj
it be said that there is no one whose interpretation is more likely to be affected by the prejudg-
ments, popular, scientific, or philosopliioal, which the reader brings with him. Dr. Lange is
remarkably full and clear on this portion of Holy Writ, but as its great subject has given rise to
much discussion in this country, the American Editor has deemed it no disparagement to the
learned author of this commentary to present a few general and fundamental ideas by way of
special introduction to the American reader.
It has been found convenient to divide it into five parts.
PART I.
Essential Ideas of Creation. Creation as the origin of matter. As the giving form to mat-
ter. Relative importance of the two ideas. Question in relation to the principium mentioned
in Genesis. Whether to be regarded as the absolute or a particular beginning. Opinions of
Jewish interpreters. Is the creation mentioned in the first verse intra sex dies f
PART II.
The Hexaemeron. Nature and duration of the days. The distinction of Augustine. Th«
account self-interpreting. The Light, the Darkness. The word Day. The Morning and the
Evening. Each Day an Appearing. Each Day a Beginning, but its work continuing in those
that follow. Ps. cxxxix. 15, 16.
PART m.
Helps in the interpretation of the First of Genesis to be derived frcm other portions of
scriptnre. The Fourth Commandment. Proverbs viii. Micah v. 1. Psalm civ. Job xxxviii.,
zzviii., &o.
PART IV.
The Ideas of Law, of Nature, and the Supernatural, as found in the Bible. Distinctioii
between the Idea of a Law and its Science. Distinction between the Supernatural and th«
Miraculous. " The Finger of God." The Great Natural.
126 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
PART V.
How was the creative account revealed ? Its Grandeur and Simplicity. Otlier Gosmogoniei
copies. This an Original Picture. The Vision theory. Internal Evidence. Compared witli
the Apocalypse. Objective and Subjective Revelation. Vision of the Pa-t analogous to Propb-
»oy, or Vision of the Future.
PART I.
ESSENTIAL IDEAS OF CREATION.
He who made one world in space, made all worlds in space. He who made one world in
tune, made all worlds in time. He who gave matter its forms, gave it its origination, or that
which is the ground of all its forms.
These truths are so inseparably linked together by the laws of our thinking, that the revela-
tion of one is tlie revelation of the rest; since we cannot believe one speculatively without
believmg all the rest, or deny one logically without losing our faith in all the rest. Whatever
riew, then, a true exegesis may most favor, — whether the account in Genesis be found to have
in view, mainly or solely, a universal or a partial creation, whether the principium there men-
tioned be the particular beginning of the special work there described, or the principium prin-
cipiorum, the beginning of all beginnings, — the Bible is, in either case, a protest againt the
dogma of the eternity of the world, or of the eternity of matter. In the fact clearly revealed
and believed that a personal divine power was concerned in the creation, even of a plant, we
have the essential faith. As a dogma merely, the great truth might have been here expressed
in a single sentence: "God made all things to be, and without liim there was nothing made that
is" — even as it is given to us in .John i. 2. Why then this most graphic and detailed account
of the creative work ? It is the same design, we answer, that appears in the otlier historical rev-
elations that are made to us in the Scripture. It is to impress us with the glory of the creator,
to make the thought something more than a speculative belief, to give it strength and vividness
BO as to become a living power in our souls. Whatever exegesis has the greatest tendency to
do this, is most likely to be true in itself, and is the most favorable to the absolute verity.
The best Jewish commentators, such as Ahen Ezra and Rabbi Schelomo, attach much im-
portance to the fact that r''U)j<i , Gen. i. 1, is grammatically in the construct state, and there-
fore limited by something of ifhich it is tlie beginning. It really is so in form here, ind in
actual regimen everywhere else, except in Deut. xxxiii. 21, which Lange cites. Even there,
however, the construct form has its limiting meaning: ib r'^CX" s^^i "and he provided the
chief part for himself" — that is, the chief part of the territory. It was no poverty of language
that compelled the choice of p-'irs'i . A word used absolutely, and of the undoubted absolute
form, such as nr!r«i or n5"u;!<~2, might have been employed to denote an absolute principium,
•mliinited, ante omnes res alius, unconditioned by any other things or times, — first, and first of
all. The construct form (since tliere is nothing .arbitrary in language) must dennte, or would
best denote, the beginning of a creation, or of some creation, or some assumed point of commence-
ment in it, which is determined by the context. Thus these learned Jewish commentators here,
»lthough of all theists the most free from any tinge of pantheism, or belief in the eternity of mat-
ter, interpret this account as setting forth simply the creation of our world and heaven,
regarded too as commencing with them in a certain unformed condition. So that by these writers
creation (the Mosaic creation) is regarded as formation rather than as ])rimal origination of
matter.
Id aco rdance with this view of p-trx", Rabbi Shelomo (liasbi) interprets the whole pas-
••ire ■ M' If njn o'sic ns'"i3 r^iCX"3. " In the beeinning of the creation of the heavens and the
PART I.— ESSENTIAL IDEAS OF CREATION I'i'!
earth, when the earth was tohu and holiu, and darkness wa8 upon the face of the deep, and the
spirit was brooding over tho waters, t/ten God said. Let there be light," &c. Or, " In the begin-
ning when God created the heavens and the eartli, and the earth was, &c., God said ; " that,
according to them, was the beginning with which we liere have to do. All before is descriptive
and determinative of it. Rabbi Schelomo compares it to Hosea i. 2, mrT< isn nbnn "In the
beginning of God's speaking by llosea," or literally (for -an is the preterit and not the infin-
itive), " The beginning God spake," that is, which he spake, or when he spake.* So also Esodua
vi. 28, nin-' lai oi^a , " iu the day when the Lord spake," where the construct state of the nonn
may be regarded as in like manner put in regimen with the verb. Aben Ezra supports the same
view of r-'CXT being grammatically in regimen with the verb x^3, or rather with the whole
following context, by the example of Isaiah xxix. 1, nn n:n rr'ip, where the construct rr'^p
seems to stand in precisely the same relation to the verb nsn as r"'Bs-i to s^:.
But the word xn:, it is maintained, denotes primal origination, and some would even con-
tend, in defiance of etymology, that such is its primary and radical idea. It is certain, however,
that everywhere else in this account it must mean something quite ditferent. It is constantly
afterwards used of divine acts or works which could only have been the giving form to matter
that already is. In all the dividings, the gatherings, the evolutions of the plants and animals,
the ordaining and disposing of the heavenly lights, the firmament, and even the making of the
human body, there is no new matter. This is well represented by Aben Ezra in his comment
on the word x^3. "There are those," he says, " who maintain that nsi^2 creation, is (ety-
molngically) the bringing out of nothing, and they refer to Numb. xvi. 30, n^rr' x^2"' ns^"i3 cs
'if the Lord make a new thing' (literally create a creation, &c.), but they forget how it is said
here that God created the great monsters (Ang. whales), and how it is said three times in one
verse (27j, God created man, and how also it is said, He creates the darkness (Isai xlv. 7, sit
-jcn), though the darkness is only the negation of light, which is the real existing thing." Com.
meutary on Gen. 1.
All these are constructions, formations, dispositions of matter ; and this is certainly creation,
whilst there is no evidence, except an assumption (not exegetical but rationalizing), of its mean
ing something else quite difterent in the first verse. It does indeed denote, as its most usual
sense, a divine supernatural act, such as man, or any nature of itself, could not do, — although in
the distinct piel form, and in its primary sense of cutting, it is sometimes applied to human
works, as in Joshua xvii. 15. It is the divine supernatural making of something new, and which
did not exist before. But new yorTws, especially as divinely established, are new things; and
this, in fact, is the only proper sense in which they become things, res. realities, manifestations
of something, vehicles of ideas, by which alone any material object becomes an object of thought,
that is, a thing. The opposite notion is born of the prejudice which would make the forms of
matter lower things than the formless matter itself, — if that can be called a thing instead of 8
Bubstratum, power, or capacity for receiving forms, and thus becoming things.
Besides, this idea of primal origination of matter could have been otherwise well exf)res8e<]
in Hebrew. Such language as we have, Psalms xxxiii. 9, "He commanded and it was" (though
that also may be used of formal creation), would have been better adapted to such a purpose.
By contrast, at least, with the decided structural or formative style that succeeds, it might have
made it less doubtful whether the creation mentioned in the first verse was really and essentially
difterent from that of the verses following. So also the language, Isaiah xlviii. 13, "I call to
them, they stand up," which probably was intended to express this very idea of primal origina-
tion: though in the context it may be taken as simply a reference to these Mosaic formations :
" They stand up together" [—irr or at once, aun as the LXX. render it, Vulgate simul), or it may
mean tne whole cre.ation, from first to last, as brought into being by the divine commanil,
epresentetl as one and instantaneous, though running through a vast chain of sequences. Jnsl
• In the same way tne Judaico- Arabian translator, Arabs Erpenianus, as he is commonly called, r ^ ^ *^ \jO ,J«1
ijO\jl|« *•■ ' » ■■• " I *' Tne beginning of God's creatinp the heavens and the earth"— or the first creating of the hea.eut
and the earth which God createa.
J 28 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
before this, however, the prophet's language is in the higliest degree formative and structural.
"My Ijand hiid the foundations of the earth, my right hand spanned the heavens."
It may be admitted tliat the author of the account in Genesis probably regarded himself as
describing the creation of the all, since to his knowledge our immediate eartli and lie:iven, with
the phenomenal luminaries appearing as fixed in it, ami belonging to it, were the all ; but that
he meant to tell us of the first matter, even of this, or of its coming out of nothing, cannot be
certainly determined by any etjinology of words, or by any infallible exegesis of the passage.
There are certainly some things that look the other way. The implication, however, of the
great f ict is enough for us, even though the bare words of Moses might be thoiiglit to confine
themselves to a more 1 mited sphere. So Lange holds to the creation in the Bible being tne
absolute first origination, yet, from some things he has said, he seems to be content with the
idea last mentioned as answering the theological inquiry, without enlarging the words in Genesis
by any exegetical strain which they may not be able to bear. This is shown particularly in
what he says, p. 165, about " the earth-light, or the earth becoming light," as being the analogue
wherein is presented the primal origination of light, just as in the creation of man there is sym-
bolized the creation of a spirit-world collectively. The argument or implication is : He who
made light to be at one place or time, made it to be at all times, even at that time which was
the absolute beginning of its existence ; He who made the hutnan spirit must have made idl
spirit, whether coeval with or immeasurably more ancient than man.
Since then it is very diflicult to make the fair verbal exegesis speak decidedly either way,
may we not infer from this that we overrate the importance of one aspect of the question as
compared with the other. Besides the clear implication aforesaid, which would make the
recognition of a structural creation at some particul.ir time inseparable from the recognition of
an absolute first origination of matter in its own time or times, there may be a question as to
which is really the greater work, or more worthy of revelation, or which ought to have tha
greatest place in our minds,— this bare origination of the first matter, or the giviiig/orm to that
matter. The first, many would say, unhesitatingly ; the second, they would regard as the lower,
the less important, the less manifestive nf the divine power and glory, or, in a word, as the easier
work. Our philosophical thinking, in which we so much pride ourselves, and which we would
fain ascribe to God, whose " ways are so far above our ways and his thoughts above our thoughts,"
leads to this. It is favored by certain metaphysical notions which are not recognized, or but
little recognized, in the usual style of the Scriptures. This first matter, hyle, force, heat, nebular
fluid, world-dust, call it what we will, goes beyond all our sense conceptions, and, therefore,
we think it must be something greater, more important, more diflicult, requiring more of power
and wisdom, and therefore higher in the divine estimation, than that informing, structural,
architectural, idealizing, systematizing, developing work which builds up, and builds out, this
first matter, force, &c., into glorious forms for the contemplation, and magnificent worlds for
the indwelling, of rational, spiritual beings. If we do not greatly mistake, both the style and
the manifested interest of the Sc riptures are the other way. The Bible does not talk to us, like
Plato, of the hyle, the mother of matter, the substance that has none of the properties of mat-
ter yet is capable of receiving them all, or of matter itself as something distinct from body; it
does not speak to us in the language of Aristotle about the first motion, the first mover, and the
first moved, nor does it, after the more modern manner, have much to say of the first cause and
the first causation, tlirowing all causality after it into the inferior place, or burying it in a godless
nature. On the other hand, its high design is to impress us with the superior greatness of this latter
outbuilding (ktIC(ii>, Eph. iii. 9, Kan/fjTiVSdt, Heb. xi. 3) as the peculiar work of the Logos, or Word,
which gives form and life, and, in this sense, its higher or more real being, to this conceptionless
first matter, or first force. This was the great work, if we may judge by the importance the Scripture
attaches to it ; this was pre-eminently the work of creation as carried on by the artistic Wisdom,
Prov. viii. 22-.'?2 ; and to this well corresponds what is said, John i. 3, 4, according to the old patris-
tic division and interpretatior of the passage, o yiynviv in nvna fw^ t'l/, " that which was made (or
orii^mated) in Him was life "—became life in Him. It is easy to see what is prominent in the
Bible. It is not God the first motion, or the first force, or the first cause, or even as the oriRin-
PART I.— ESSENTUL IDEAS Of CREATION 12W
ator of force and matter, but God the Great Arcliitect; this is the idea which the Scriptnr*
languaiie aims to impress so as to make it a living and controlling power in the soul, fiiving life
and value to the otiier ideas, and preventing them from becoming mere scientific abstractions
on the one hand, or dead naturalistic or pantheistic notions on the other. The abstract notioa
is ever assumed in the Bible as included in its creative representations, whilst it makes vivid the
other and greater thought as the quickening [lower of all personal theistio conceptions.
The only notion we can form of matter in its lowest or primal entity is that of resistance i
space, or the furnishing bare sensation to a supposed sentiency, without anything beyond it, either
as form for the intellect, or iis qualifying variety for the sense. The manner of putting thia
forth, we may not know, but that does not give it the higher rank. Taken as a fact it is th«
lowest thing in the scale of the divine works, if we may be allowed to make any relative com-
parisons among tljem. It is simply an exercise of the divine strength. On the other hand, the
giving form to matter, which is so clearly and sublimely revealed as the true creative stage, is
the work of the Divine Wisdom, and might be supposed worthy of God, as an exercise of his
infinite intelligence, even if it had no other than an artistic end. The carrying these forms into
the region of the moral, or the impressing moral designs upon them — in other words, building
the world as the abode of life and the residence of moral and spiritual beings capable of witness
ing and declaring the glory of the Creator — is the work of the divine Love. In reversing this
scale of dignities, the actually lower work comes to be regarded as the higher and the greater
merely because it is the more remote from us. Nothing but some such feeling as this could
have led to the strong desire, in modern times, of finding here a revelation of the metaphysical,
as though this alone were creation proper, or as though the divine power and wisdom were not
even more sublimely manifested in the creative evolution and formation of the physical. The
painting is a much greater and Iiigher creation than the canvas, even though the making of
both were admitted as belonging to the same artist.
In discussing these questions exegetically much also depends on the correct interpretation of
ihe substantive verb nir'n (and was) in the second verse. Does it denote a time cotemporaneoua
with the verb x-ia in the first verse, or does it denote something succeeding, either as state or
event, — namely, that the earth and heaven which had been created by a distinct and separate
act there related, was afterwards (whether as having been left so, or as having become so by
some cause or causes not mentioned) tohu and bohu ? Or does it mean (as the .Jewish authorities
maintain) that this condition, whose time is denoted by nn-'n, was the beginning of the creation
described, or the clironological d.ite when this creation (called the Mosaic) began ? In other
words, can the expression nrr'n •,—xm denote, grammatically, a succeeding instead of a
cotemporaneous event? Certainly the far more usual form, if an after event, or an after state, had
been intended, wou^d have been Tin^, with "i conversive, as in all the steps following, each
distinctly marking succession, or one event coming out of and after another, as -^n^' hnz^^ — •
SI""" — XT'! — "Jjr^l — iBX-'i and so throughout. The usage in this very chapter is sufficient to
establish the rule, even if it were not so common everywhere else when a series of successive
acts iire thus laid down.
Another question arises. Was all the creation that Moses intends to describe intra sex dies,
within six days, or was that part mentioned in the first verse extra dies, as it must be if the six
days chronologically began in the evening, that is, in the tohu and bohu, or when darkness was
npon the face of the deep ? But such exclusion would seem to be in the face of the express
declaration in the fourth commandment : '" in six days (within six dnys) God created the heavens
and the eartli." If, then, there was anything extra dies, or before the chronological beginning
of the first day, which is so distinctly marked by its evening, it could not be intended here as
part of this account; for, from the time God began this creative work (wh.ntever it might include)
until he rested in the evening after the sixth, there were six days, be they long or short, and no
more. The reasoning is plain. The six days began with the evening of the tohu, followed by
the ^^s-', or command for the shining of the light, which was the first act in the formation of
the heavens and tlie earth afterwards described. If, then, the first verse denotes a beginning
before thb. it mast have been extra sex dies. If we would bring it within, then it must ht
9
130 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
legarded as caption to the whole account, or as a summary of the process afterwards in detail se*
forth. If it is without, then what is meant by the heavens and the earth (especially the eartli(
therein mentioned? Or it might be asked (and it would be very difficult to answer the question)
'vhat part of the first day, or how are we to get any part of the first day, or first night, betweer
the x-i: of the first verse and the nrr'n of the second ?
Again — in the expression nn"'n r-xm, it is to be noted that the subject stands befr^e the
Terb, which makes it empharic, or is designed to call atteutiun to it as being the very same earti
Inentiiined before, and whose creation is now going to be more particularly described : and a
for the earth (or, but as for the earth, as there is abundant authority for rendering the particle
1), it was so and so, — in such a condition, as tliough to separate it from the heavens (the earth
heavens) which is not created, th?t is, divided from the general mass, until the second day, when
God first named it historically by calling the firmament heaven.
But can we conclusively rest on such a grammatical exegesis ? Certainly not. The usual
law of the Hebrew tenses, though strongly favoring it (aided as it is by the other considerations
mentioned), is not sufficiently fixed and without exceptions, seeming or real, to warrant any inter-
preter in speaking positively from such data alone; hut certainly this applies with still greater
force to those who would be dogmatically positive in ni:iintaiaingtlie other view. Grammatical
exegesis, even when most thoroughly pursued, may fail of reaching the absolute trutli, fur that
truth may be in itself ineftable. It is, liowever, the true way, and the only way, of getting at
the order of the conceptions as they existed, or as they arose, in tlie mind of the writer ; and
this is of the utmost value, even though it may have to be determined by the bare collocation
of a word or a particle. Still, the conception is itself but a species of language representing the
idea even as it is itself represented by the words. It is the last thing in language to which we can
reach, and we must take it as standing most immediately, if not most infallibly, for the truth
that lies still behind it.
"And darkness was upon the face of the deep," the niiin, or formless waste. Darkness is
nothing of itself, yet still it denotes something more than a mere negation, or a mere absence.
It indicates rather the obstruction of something that already /«. As its Hebrew name implies
(with the slightest etymological variation ^ian for "i'rn), it is a holding back, like the Latin tene-
brm from teneo (the m in vnibrce, e?nbrcB, being phonetically lost in its kindred labial b, as in
lambda, labda), and the Greek (tkoVos with the same ultimate radix (8K=nsK). This darkness was
chronologically the first or commencmg night of the Uexaemeron, just as the light that follows
is, beyond all question, the first morning of the first day. It was even then the shadow of some-
thing coming (its skadus, Gothic, or shade, same as Greek sk, o-kotos). During all this night it was
the obstruction of a power, or the sign of such obstruction, until the brooding spirit loosed its
a-fipiti (6(t>nv, or "chains of darkness" (2 Pet. ii. 4), and the voice of the Word was heard com-
manding that power to come forth. Nothing is more certain than that in the Mosaic account
tlie light there mentioned comes phenomenally, and historically, after the darkness, and even
after the water of the teliom, whether we regard it as gas-form or liquid-form, that is, water
proper, according to Lange's distinction. What a most serious difficulty is this for those who
say that the Mosaic account in its first mention of light has respect to its primal original, or first
being, — whetlier it be the material or dynamical entity merely, or that glorious fo)-m of power
which is called God's garment (Ps. civ. 2), and in whicli he is said to dwell (1 Tim. vi. 16) as in an
element most real yet unajiproachablo by human vision ! Can we doubt that light was even
then a latent power in the tehom liefore it was commanded " to .shine out of darkness," ik <tk6-
Tovs a Corinth, iv. 6), and upon the darkness, and that it had existed before this edrtJihj morn-
ing, and that, too, not as a formless hylo merely, or first matter, but in forma inetl'ably briuht
and glorious, — not as a mere force or dynamical entity which never before had had visibility, but
E8 recognized by the angels and sons of God who shouted for joy (Job xxxviii. 7) at this its new
form, and that first appea/rajtce upon tlje earth which God called dav?
rAKT U.— THE UEX^iEMERO.V, OR THE CREATIVE DAYS. 131
PART II.
THE HEXAEMERON, OR THE CREATIVE DAYS.
What mean these days, says the great fatLer Augustine, long before geology was born — thes«
•trange sunless days: quid tolunt dies transacti sine luminaribusf An ista dierum enumeratit
ad distinctionem vaht inter illam naturam qua non facta est, et eiis quce facta sunt, ut mant
riominare?itnr propter speciem, vespera vera jjrnjiter jjrivntionem : " does the enumeration of days
and nights avail for a distinction betwei'n the nature that is not yet made (not yet formed o?
brought into form) and tho<e which are made, so that they should be called niorninL'', prvjiter
sp-^ciem {i. e., in reference to manifestation, coming out, receiving form, or species) and evening
pj sifter privationem (i. «., their want of form, or formlessness, total or comparative)." De Genesi
aa Literam, Lib. ii. ch. 14. Hence he does not hesitate to call them natnrce, natures, births or
growths, also morce, delays, or solemn pauses, in the divine work. They are diei ir,ejfaiihs ;
their true nature cannot be told, — dies cvjusmodi sunt, aut per difficile nobis autetiamimpossihiU
est cogitare, quanta magis dicere. Hence they are called days as the best symbol by which the
idea could be expressed. They are God-divided days and nights, inter qum divisit Deus, in
dislmctiou from the sun-divided, inter qum dixit ut dividant luminaria. Common solar days,
he i>ays, are mere vicissitudines coeli, mere changes in the positions of the heavenly bodies, and
not spatia morarum or evolutions in nature belonging to a higher chronology, and marking their
epochs by a law of inward change instead of incidental outward measurements. As to how long
or how short they were he gives no opinion, but contents himself with maintaining that day is not
a name of duration ; the evenings and the mornings are to be regarded not so much in respect
to the passing of time (temporis prmteritioneni), as to their marking the boundaries of a period-
ical work or evolution, per queruiam terminum quo intelligitur quovsque sit natural propriut
modus, ei unde sit naturae alterins exordium. This is not a metaphorical, but the real and proper
sense ot the word day — the most real and proper sense, the original sense, in fact, inasmuch as
it conuins the essential idea of cyclicity or rounded periodicity, or self-completed time, without
any ot the mere accidents that belong to the outwardly measured sohir or planetary epochs, be
they lodger or shorter: ac sic unus est dies (one day, a day by itself) non istorum dierum intel
ligendijij quos videmus eircuitu solis determinari atque numerari, sed alio quodam modo.
It is sometimes said, if Moses did not intend the common solar day here, why did he not give
us some intimation to that effect? The devout, scripture-loving and scripture-revering Augustine
saw SUCH intimations in abundance, saw them nn the verv face of the account. There wa>^ no
doubt-raising science then, nor anything in jihilosophy, that drove this most profound yet most
humble and truth-seeking mind to such conclusions. He could not read the first of Genesis and
'iiink of ordinary days. It was the wondrous style of the narrative tliat affected him, the
wondrous nature of the events and times narrated ; it was the impression of strangeness, of vast-
ness, as boming directly from the account itself, but which so escapes the notice of unthinking,
ordinary i-eaders. Wonderful things are told out of the common use of language, and therefore
common rurms are to be taken in their widest compass, and in their essentinl instead of tlieir
accidental laea. It is the same feeling that affects us when we contemplate the language of
prophecy, or that which is applied to the closing period, or great day of the world's eschatcilogy.
No better term could be used for the creative mnrce, pauses, or successive natures, as Augustine
styles them; and so no better words than evening and morning could be used for the antithetical
vicissitudes through which these successions were introduced. See Augustine wherever the
iubject comes up, in his books De Genesi ad Literam, Contra ilanichceos. and De Ciritate Dei.
Carrying along with us thes? thoughts of the great father, we get a mode of exegesis which
IB most satisfactory in itself, and which need not fear the assaults of any science. It transcend*
icience ; it cannot possibly have any collision with it, and can, therefore, never have any need of
what is called reconciliation. It treats of origins or beginnings in nature, — things to which science
cai. never reach. It is a mode of exegesis most satisfactory as being most exclusive,--that is.
132 SPEOUL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENhSlS.
from the very nature of the things related, based directly on the account itaelf as mainly aa<
lecessarily self-interpreting. Notions in science, notions in philosophy or in theology, tliat
stand outside of it, and even etymologies or modes of naming that become fixed in language
at later periods, may suggest ideas, but they are not to control tlie interpretation of a document
10 isolated from all other writings and of such exceeding antiquity.
As with the account as a whole, so is it, in great measure, with each part. It interprets
itself Thns in the first day : each name is so connected with the others as to present little cr
no difBculty in determining their general meaning in such relation, though on a scale which, of
itself, separates them f om their ordinary use in other applications. Keep within the account
and there is light; the obscurity and the difficulty increase when we res(irt to helps outside of
it. If we seek for the meanings of yom, ereb, bo(ier, day, evening, and morning, we tind them
in the very order, and mutually interpreting significance, of the facts presented. These are clew
as facts, however ineffable in theii' comparative magnitude and evolving causalities.
"And the earth was tohu and bohu." What was that? It was the opposite of the form-
assuming conditions and evolutions immediately afterwards described. !inn occurs, besides this,
eighteen times in the Old Testament, but the general idea, to which we are led by the context
and contrasts here, furnishes the best exposition of their special applications elsewhere. It is a
striking illustration of what may seem a paradox to some minds, but which is, nevertheless, s
fundamental law of language, that the general precedes tlie particular in the naming of things.
Tlie word is applied to a desolate city, Isai. xxiv. 10; xxxiv. 11, to a desert in which the waters
evaporate and disappear. Job vi. 18, to a wilderness in which there is no way, -\-n xb inn, Job
xii. 2i, Psalms cvii. 40, to the earth and heavens going back to ruin, as seen in the prophetic
vision, Jerem. iv. 23: "I saw the mountains, and they were trembling, and all the hills were
moving fast ; I looked and behold there was no man, and all the birds of the heavens were gone ;
1 beheld the earth, it was tohu and holm ; I looked to the heavens, there was no light." Hence its
moral applications, Isaiah xli. 29; xxix. 21 ; and especially Isaiah xliv. 9; idolatry is moral con-
fusion, an obliteration of all moral forms and distinctions. These places, instead of being necessary
to explain Gen. i. 2, get their meaning from it. The first is lexically the key passage. The words,
however, that immediately follow are, to some extent, an exegesis of these names. And dark-
ness was npon the face of the deep. It was formlessness in its two modes of invisibility and
indivisibleness. It was an undistinguishable wasteness. There was no liglit whereby to see, and
there was a want of that division and separation into distinct objects, without which there is no
true visibility, even if the light were present. Hence the LXX. well renders ■rn^'i inn lioparof Kn\
attnTao-itf I'aoTor, invisible and unfirmed. Next, we have the first mention of the separating, fonn-
giving power. — "The Ruah Elohim, the Spirit of God, was brooding upon the waters." Then
comes tlie Word, and morning breaks. Light is the first separation. It is divided/wOT the darkness,
which ^hows that it had before existed in the tohu, and in combination with it. And (Jod calls it
day whilst the former state he calls night. It is his own naming, and we must take it as uur guide
in the interpretation of the words. It is not any duration, but the phenomenon, the appearing
itself, that is first called day. Then the term is used for a period, to denote the whole event, or
the whole first cycle of events, with its two great antithetical parts. And there was an evening
and there was a mnrniny, one day. We hiok into the account to see what corresponds to this
naming. What was the niglit? Certainly tlie darkness on the face of the waters. What was
the morning? Certainly the light that followed the brooding spirit and the comiiianding word.
How long was the day? IIow long the night, or the darkness? The account tells us nothing
about it. There is something on its face which seems to repel any such question. The whole
spirit and style of the account are at war with tlie narrowness and arbitrariness of any such
computation. Wliere are we to get twelve liours for this first night? Where is the point of
commenceinent, when darkness heijan to he on the face of the waters? All is vast, sublime,
vmrneasurable. The time is as formless as the material. It has indeed a chronology, but on
(.iiother scale than ttiat which was afterwards appointed (v. 14) to regulate the history of 8
Cfjmpleted world with its sky-gazing human inhabitant. One who thinks seriously on the diffi
•vAtj of accommodating this first great day t^ p twenty-four hours, as we now measure them, needs
PART II.— THE HEXAEMEKO.N, uK THE CREATIVE DaYS. 13?
ao other argument. And yet the decision iiere settles the whole question. This first day is th«
model, in this respect, for all tlie rest. There is certainly no determined time here, unless wt
assume that a fixed duration, as now measured by the sun, is not merely an incident, but th€
essential .ind unchangeable idea of the word day, never departing from it, whatever may be the
condition and circumstances to which it is applied. And for this, neither the essential laws of
language, nor the usages of language, give us any authority, whilst everything looks tlie otlier
way. All is indefinite except the fact of the great separation accomplished, « ith its two con-
trasted states and one completed period, to which the names ereb, hoqer, yom, evening, morning,
day, are respectively given. Our English translation of the closing formula is deficient. It fails
to present the reason of its own introduction, and the relation it bears to what preceded: "And
t/ie evening and the morning were,^' — there is no article to justify this; there is no mention of
evening and morning before to which it might be supposed to refer. The evening ami the
morning may indeed be said to have made the day quantitively, but that is not what is here
expressed; otherwise the verb should liave been plural, as in ch. ii. 24, nns "'r:b i^n, " tliey
shall be one flesh." Neither is day the predicate after inii, but stands by itself as the time
when. The Hebrew, to correspond to the English as given in our version, would be
■irx ST' ~p:m mrn 1•'r\^^. The true rendering is: ''and there was an evening, and there was
a morning, the first day." So theSyriac and the Septuagint: xai lyiveTo ia-nepn rai f'yfi'ero npwi.
In like manner Maimoiiides: "and there was an evening and there was a morning of the first
day." But why is the assertion made here, and what is its force ? It is not a mere tautology,
such as our English version would seem to make it. It is exegetical ; it is designed to give ua
an intimation of something strange and peculiar in the language, and to explain its application.
This ante-solar day, marked by no sunrising or sunsetting, or any astronomical measurement,
and without any oomputetl duration, had still an evening and a morning of its own, and might,
therefore, be justly called a day. What this evening and morning were, is left for the reader t(
discover in the account itself. As applied to a supposed ordinary day, the assertion, especially
as it reads in our version, would have little or no discoverable force. On the other supposition, it
has a most emphatic meaning, and this we may regard as the reason of its formal utterance, and
its solemn repetition at the close of each similar period. In a similar manner they all had an
evening and a morning, however strange it might seem, without a shining sun. Each is marked
by tlie same great antithetical distinction; each has a new appearing; but as this is somewhat
dift'erent in each creative stage, so is there a demand in each for the same essential announce-
ment. And there was an evening, and there was a morning, second day, — third day, — fourth
day, and so on.
The clear apprehension of the first day opens up all the rest. The same exegesis would bear
repetition in every one. " And God said : ' Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters^
and led it be a dividing between the waters and the w.aters, &c. ; ' and it was so ; and Gud Cidled
the firmament heaven ; and there was an evening, and there was a morning, day second." We
look back to find them. Where was the morning here? It was this second dividing and the
appearing of this new glory as its result. It is the sky, the atmosphere, with its auroral light.
It is the causality represented in this purely phenomenal language by which Moses describes it,
according to the onceptions he had of it, and whicli no more guarantees any vulgar notion, than
it dnes any science or philosophy, perfect or imperfect, that might be brought to explain it.
The more cle.ar determines that which is less so. The new appearing of the firmament being
the morning, that from which it had been divided, or that preceding state in which the earth
had been left after the separation of the light, and in which the fluid masses of air and water
yet remained in their chaotic formations, is the night. And so, as the formula seems to imply,
each time it is repeated ; in this way there wsis also an evening and there was a morning, second
day, — in this way, or the only way that exegesis will allow ; for there was no visible sunrising
or sunsetting, no astronomical measurements to make a morning and an evening of any other
kind. The ap])earing of the dry land as it rose out of the waters, and the quick growth of bloom-
mg vegetation that covered it, was the third morning. And then that scene of glory, the first
appearing of the sun, moon, and stars in the firmament, now prepared for their revelation, —thit
134 SPECIAL INTRODUOTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER Of GENESIS.
was the fourth great morning to which the name is given, and not to any particular rising of th»
BUD in the east as the beginning of a common day. As there had been a commencement of light
of life, so now there is a commencement of astronomical time with its subordinate ])eriods of
sun-divided days, not to be confounded, as Augustine says, with the great God-divided days of
■vhich the fourth was one as well as the rest. Life moving in the waters, and soaring in the
air, this was the fifth appearing; and so, according to tbe ever-preserved analogy, the fifth great
oiorning of the world.
Ag;iin a solemn pause, with nature left to its repose, how long or short is not revealed, and
the sixth morning brealis. It is the latter portion of the sixth day. Now man appears, whether
in its earlier or later stage. He is snrrounded by the animal world, over which he is to exercise
his more immediate doujiuion. The seventh is the morning of the divine rest. The evening
that precedes is not named in the first chapter, but perhaps we may find it in the supplementary
account of the second, where there are mentioned two remarkable evolutions that seem to have
no other period to which they can be assigned. They are the naming of things, or the divine
aiding the human in the development of language, and that mysterious sleep of humanity (was
it long or short?) in which by a process most concisely symbolized, but utterly inefiable in
respect to the manner, the female human is brought out as the closing work, and man awakes
complete in the likeness of God. " In the image of God created he him ; male and female created
he them.''''
It may be said that such a representation seems to make the days run into each other. This
may be admitted without regarding it as any valid objection. The darkness still left is the
remains, gradually diminishing, of the primeval chaos. Each night is a daughter of the ancient
Nos, whilst each new morning is a rising into a higher light. In other words, the evening to
each day, though still a disorder and a darkness, is a diminution of the darkness that went before,
whilst the positive light of each new morning continues on, adding its glory to the mornings
that follow, and " shining more and more unto the ci^n •psj, the perfect day," or perfection of
the day (Prov. iv. 18), tlie finished and finishing day — the all-including day, mentioned Gen. ii.
4, as the day wlien God made the heavens and the earth. And so, as Lange observes (and it is
a most important remark, both for the scientific and scriptural view), each is " a glory that ex-
celleth," but still a building on, and a carrying on, the energies that preceded. Each is a new
swell of the mighty organ, combining all the former tones, and raising them to a higher and still
higher chorus, until
The diapason closes full on man.
Each day is a new beginning, bringing out a new state of things to be blessed, or called good
but it is not nece-.?arily a finishing of that work until the "heavens and earth are finished
with all their hosts," and there is pronounced that closing benediction (tx's z^:;, all good, " very
good ") which ushers in the sabliath. Each day, as a beginning by itself, contains the incipient
powers and elements of its peculiar work, but does not exhaust those energies. The light ia
still evolving in the second day ; tlie fluids are still parting in the third ; the firmament, though
having its auroral light before, is becoming still brighter in the fourth ; vegetable and aninial
life are coming to still greater perfection in the fifth and sixth.
May not the same be said of man? On the sixth day, his "bringing into the kosmos" be-
comes complete ; the divine allocution, " Let us make man," receives its accomplishment, and
the process Ijy which his material and physical structure is educed from the earth is finished;
but may we not suppose that the preparation for this last and crowning work, and so the work
itself, runs through all the previous cycles? " Thine eyes did see my substance yet unfinished, and in
thy book all my {members) were written, the days they were fashioned, when there was not one in
them," Ps. cxxxix. 16. This remarkable passage may apply primarily to the individual genera-
tion ; it doubtless includes it ; and yet there is something about it which seems to indicate a widei
and a deeper application to the origin of our generic physical humanity, and to its first germ ci
material, as it lay in the formlessness of the cliaos.
^ne Septuagint has rendered ^oba (Ps. cxxxix. 16) by a word very similar to that by which il
PART m.— ALLUSIONS TO THE SIX DAYS IN OTHER PARTS OF THE UIBLE 13:
describes the tohu, dKaTtpyaaniv IJ.UV, my unformed or unwrought— Vulgate: imper/eetum meum.
my unmade. i5ut the most striking resemblance is suggested by the ca"', the days, which oni
translators have rendered 'in continuance," thereby greatly impairing the furoe and significanc*
of the language. " Thine eyes saw it then unfinished," during all the days in which it was receiv-
ing formal ion, 1131 o^a", when ihey were being formed, or written down in thy book,
ona injt xb\ These last words liave puzzled all the commentators. If the passage may be
referred to the primal formation of humanity, then it would be, not only a fair view, but even
the most legitimate one, grammatically, to refer nnx, as also the pronoun in ona to o^v just
preceding — '■^during the days they were formed, and even when there was no one (no first day)
among them." "Even before the day" (compare Isaiah xliii. 13) God was writing or preparing
this book of the human record ; it dates from the very foundation of the world — Epii. i. 4, Heb.
iv. 3, Rev. xiii. 8.
The full formation of man in the sixth day does not oppose the idea that the powers and
evolutions of matter that were finally sublimated into the imperishable germ of the human body,
and the types from lower forms that finally went into the human physical constitution, were
being prepared during all the days. This was his being farmed out of the earth, that is, out of
nature in its evolving series. Here, too, it may be said (though with the difiidence that becomes
every exegetioal attempt to penetrate these creative mysteries), we have some liglit upon that
dark and puzzling language, '' when I was made in secret and curiously wrought in the lowest
parts of the earth," Ps. cxxxix. 15 — i/i. inferioribus terr(e, — in profundissimia naturce. The
common explanation that refers this language to the maternal womb does not satisfy, and it has
no exegetioal authority in any similar use of such a metaphor in the Bible Hebrew. It becomes
more easy, if we regard it as the womb of nature, the earth out of which the Lord God formed
man. In the language, too, of the thirteenth verse "'JSon (compare Ezek. xxviii. 14, 16 — 21"id
nsion — eVio-Kiao-fi, Luke i. 35), "thou didst overshadow me in my mother's womb," there is a
striking resemblance to the image of the spirit brooding or hovering over the formless tehom.
It is not strange that the author of this most sublime Psalm should have had in view, either
primarily or suggestively, this remoter generation. Man, generically, in his appointment to
dominion, is clearly the subject of Psalm viii. 4, 5, 6; why should his generic origination be
thought too remote an idea for the profound and contemplative cxxxixth?
PART III.
ALLUSIONS TO THE SIX DAYS IN OTHER PARTS OF THE BIBLE.
The most clear and direct is found in the Fourth Commandment, Exod. xx. 11 : "Six days
shalt thou labor and do all thy work, for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth." This
language is held to be conclusive evidence of the latter having been ordinary days. They are
of the same kind, it is said, or they would not have been put in such immediate connection.
There could not be such a sudden change or rise in the meaning. This looks plausible, but a
careful study shows that there is something more than first strikes us. It might be replied that
there is uo ditference of radical idea — which is essentially preserved, and without any metaphor
in both uses — but a vast difference in the scale. There is, however, a more definite answer
furnished specially by the text itself, and suggested immediately by the objectors' own method
of reasoning. God's days of working, it is said, must be the same with man's days of working,
because they are mentioned in such close connection. Then God's work and man's work must
»lso be the same, or on the same grade for a similar reason. The Hebrew word is the same for
both: "In six days shalt thou labor and do (r''r~) aU thy «iort; for in six days the Lord made
-r" made, wrought) heaven and earth." Is tliere uo transition here to a higher idea? And
«o of the resting : "The seventh shall be to thee a sabbath (r:o, a rest), for the Lord thy God
rested (njii) on the seventh day," — words of the same general import, but the less solemn ot
more human term here applied to Deity. What a difference there must have been between God'r
136 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
trork anil man's work, — above all, between God's ineffable repose and the rest demanded fi>i
human weariness. Must we not carry the same difference into the times, and make a similai
'Jiefiable distinction between the divine working-days and the human working-days, — the God
divided days, as Augustine calls them, and " the sun-divided days," afterwards appointed to us
for " signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for years," of our lower chronology? Such a point-
ing *D a higher scale is also represented in the septennial sabbath, and in the great jubilee period
of seve7i times seven. They expand upwards and outwards like a series of concentric circles,
but the greatest of them is still a sign of something greater ; and how would they all collapse,
and lose their sublime import, if we regard their antitype as less than themselves, or, in fact,
no greater than their least ! The other analogy, instead of being forced, has in it the highest
reason. It is the true and effective order of contemplation. The lower, or earthly, day is mado
a memorial of the higher. "We are called to remember by it. In six (human) days do all thy
work ; for in six (divine) days the Lord made heaven and earth. The juxtaposition of the words,
and tlie graduated correspondence which the mind is compelled to make, aid the reminiscence
of the higlier idea. An arc of a degree on tlie small eartldy circle represents a vastly wider
arc as measured on the celestial sphere. A sign of our swiftly passing times corresponds to one
inetiably greater in the higher chronology of world-movements, where one day is a thousand
years, and the years are reckoned from 01am to 01am (Ps. xc. 2), whilst the Olams themselvep
become units of measurement (aiii/es riov nlavav) to tlie Malcuth col Olamini,* or •' kingdom of
all eternities," Psalm cxlv. 18, and 1 Tim. i. 17. There is a harmony in this which is not only
sublimely rational, but truly Biblical. It is the manner ui the Scriptures thus to make times
and things on earth representatives, or under-types, of things in the heavens, — uTroSfi'-y/juTn rav
fV Ttiii uvjiai'uU, Heb. ix. 23. Viewed from such a standpoint these parallelisms in the language
of the Fourth Commandment suggest of themselves a vast difference between the divine and the
human days, even if it were the only argument the Bible furnished for that purpose. As the
work to the worli, as the rest to the rest, so are the times to the times.
But what was the impression on the ancient Jewish mind? It is important to understand
this, if we can. Had the Jews commonly conceived of these creative days as being of the ordinary
kind, could the fact have been so utterly uanoiiced in the frequent references we find to the
account of creation, and the frequent use of its imagery, in the Ilebrev poetry. Almost all the
other wonders of the narrative are alluded to in Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Isaiah, Amos, and such
passages in the historical books as Nehemiali ix. G. Every other striking feature of the account
is dwelt upon but this wondrous brevity, the greatest marvel of them all, as it would impress
itself upon the mere human imagination picturing it on its sense-scale. All creation begun and
finished in six solar days! The earth, the air and seas, with all their swarming splieres of life,
the hosts of heaven, sun, moon, and stars, angels and men, all called from non-existence, from
nothingness we may say, and their evolution completed in one week, such weeks as those that
are now so rapidly passing away! — a week measured, as to extent, by our present time-scale,
though the index of that scale — and this adils still to the wonder— had not yet been set in its
commencing stages. It is hard to believe this. Not the fact itself, we mean, of such a creation,
— for there is nothing repugnant to reason cither in its shortness or its instantaneousness, if God
had so willed it — out the utter silence respecting such a wonder in every other part of tlie Bible.
There must have been something in the most ancient conceptions of time, especially of seonicor
world-times, that led to this. It is shown by their use of the great Olamic plurals before
referred to, and the transfer of tlie same usage to the aaoiis of the New Testament. Our most
modern thought of eternity is that of blank, undivided duration, ante-mundane and po^t-mnndane,
with only a short week (measured, too, on the scale of the thing yet uncreated), and the brief
secular human history intervening like a narrow istlimus between two unmeasured and iiiimeasur
ible oceans. Without our saying which is the true view, it may with great confidence be mair-
tained that a mode of thinking and conceiving, so blank in the one aspect, and so narrow in the
* C"iwb> bD r"::bT3. Ps. cxlv. 13. Our translators have rendered this, cuer/asiin^ ftm^dom. It is a spocimen ol th«
(Qunuor in which these mighty Hehrew pluralities are covered up, and their vast significance obscured by vague and coo
*epti?&l0i8 temu.
FART 111.— AlXaSIONS TO THE .SIX DAYS IN OTHER PARTS OK THE BIBLE. l;{',
otLer, would never have given rise to such an Olaiuio language (if we may call it so) as w«
actually find in our Hebrew Bible, even in its most ancient parts. The very fact that oui
modern translation everywhere avoids expressing, or covers up these Olamic and £Bouio plurals
shows the change in the modern conception. Our authorized version is more detective her«
than the old WicklifFe, which being made irom the Vulgate, resembles more in this the old
versions.
The Jewish mind, prophetical, contemplative, and poetical, seems always to liave conceived
of creation as va^t, indefinite, and most ancient. We see this especially in that sublime passage
Prov. viii. 22 : " The Lord possessed me," says the eternal Logos, or Wisdo.n, ym iv^p-Q " from
the antiquities of the earth," — as though tliat, instead of being abnut three thousand years and
one week over, were the remotest conception to which the human mind could reach. I was
with Hiin, cv — ni',— day — day — day after day, even with "the Ancient of d&ys,'' bi-fore each
of his '• works of old." Before the tehom, before the springing of the fountains, before the
mountains were settled, before the hills arose, before the b:n n"lES ITX", or prime\ al dust of
the world, — when be was preparing the lieavens, when he was setting a compass upon the
face of the deep, wlien he made the rakia, or established the clouds to stand above, when he
made strong the fountains of the deep, and put his law upon the sea; during all this time I was
there, yom, yum ; I was tlie Architect (the Mediator, 6 KaTapria-Tiip, as yo}t should be rendered,
aee Heb. xi. 3), rejoicing always before Him. But the greatest joy of the Logos was in the human
creation, "My delight was in the Sons of Ada'ii," — he "loved us before the foundatiims of the
world." How it fills the mind to overflowing with its ever-ascending, ever-expanding climaxes,
Its mighty preparations, and preparations for preparations! How it goes continually back to
the more and more remote! How it seems ti) tax language to convey a conception of vast and
ineffable antiquities! What a chain of sequences! If we would fix it still more impressively
on the mind, in one all-embracing declaration, turn to Hebrews si. 3 : " By faith we understand
that the worlds were formed {KarripTiaZai. rovs alojvai) by the Word of God." How has it escaped
80 many commentators here, that the word f jr worlds is not Knirpovs, worlds of space, and never
used thus in the plural, but alwvas, corresponding to the Hebrew n^'abs, and presenting an idea
unknown to its classical usage, or worlds in time? "By faith we understand tiiat the ages,
the eternities, the sfecula, or great world-time)^ were mediated (KarT/pTiVSji), or put in order, by
the Word of God."
There is an allusion to the creative days in Micah v. 1, although it is unnecessarily obscured
in our Engish version: "And thou Bethlehem Epbratah, — out of thee shall He come forth
whose goings forth have been of old,/roni the days of eternity" — or "from the days of the
world " : obis ^O'la, dn-' np^^s e'^ fifj.epati aiMi/os, Vulg. : egressus ejiis ah initio, a diebus eternitatis.
Both of these expressions, nip^ and obis ■'•o'^, may denote an ancient time generall.v in the
history of the earth, or of the chosen people, as in Isaiah Ixiii. 9, 11, Micah vii. 20; but here, if
the passage refers to the Logos, as it is understood by all Christian commentators, tlie reference
to the still greater antiquity of the creative times, or the creative days, is unmistakable. It is
the contrast between the humble going forth at Bethlehem, and those ancient outgoings of the
Word, which are recorded each day in the First of Genesis, from the first emphatic ■nos"'! of
ve". 3, until the crowning one, ver. 26, where the plural is used in the solemn allocution
mx narj oTibs -iiax", " and God siid. Let us make man." Thus regarded, the parallelism
between it and Prov. viii. and Hebrews xi. 3, seems very clear. We need only revert to the
(vell-known fact, that the ancient Targumists or paraphrasts explain the<e declarations by the
STCiia (Mimra), ovVerbum Dei, which is doubtless the same with what is intended b)' the Logo<
in John i. 1, 2. The language of Prov. viii. 22 ff. and the dn-' apxh^ of the LXX. in Micah v. 1,
re suflScient to explain the origin of the phraseology in John i. 1, Heb. xi. 3, and Oolossians i. 16,
'^•ithout the aid of any Platonic or Philonic suggestion. So Rabbi Schelomo (Rashi) interprets
Micah V. 2, of the Messiah, and explains rnp-2, and obis ■'S'^s, by a reference to Psalm Ixxii.
17, -oo '5131 ■cj'a'ij 'ssb, which the Clialda c interpreter renders, "before the sun his name was
jreordainei'." ob"j •'aiia "from the days of ettrnity ; from everlasting was I anointed (^raoi
tet the SI me word Ps. ii. 6\ from the beginning, or ever the earth was."
.38 SPECIAL INTROUUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTEK OF GENESIS
The manner in which the creative days appear in the civ. PsaJiu has drawn the attention of
commentators ancient and modern. It is noticed by Steir, H engstenberg, and Ewald. It ii
dwelt upon by Geier and Kimchi. It is expressly admitted by Hupfeld, one of tlie most rational
izing of German interpreters. The author of the Psalm set ms to have had it in mind throughout
though he does not. present the days in the formal methodical order, but gives much more prom
.nence to some parts than to others. It colors his cunceptions, and give mucli of its sublimity
to his pictorial language. Here are the creative days in all the greatness of their evolutions, but
BO mention of the brevity, no hint of any such impression on the mind of the writer, nothing tc
buggest anything of the kind to the mind of the reader. There is the feeling of vastness,
power, immensity. We recognize great works and great processes, but without any signs of
measurement or computation, such as could hardly have been kept out by one who cariied with
him all along the limited time-conception of one ordinary week, or of six ordinary solar days.
There is no wonder expressed, no sense of the difficulties that we experience in the attempt to
reduce the first great movements to such a scale, — i. e., to think of measurement without a
measure, or of solar days without a sun. From the Psalm itself, certainly, if we carried nothing
else into the interpretation, no such impression of brevity would be obtained. All is the other
way. There is the formless abyss, the light taking the place of darkness upon the face of the
waters, the building of the upper chambers, the separation of the air, the spreading out of the
sky, the establishment of the firmament* with the clouds therein, the calling into ministerial
agency of the new forces of nature, the making the winds his messengers, his servant tiie flam-
ing fire. There is the going fortlt again of the mighty Word, "the thunder of his power," in
the dividing and gathering of the waters that before had stood above the mountains, or the places
where they afterwards appeared. The abyss had covered them as a garment, but now the hills
emerge, the valleys sink, the process goes on imtil they reach the " places /brme/i for them."t
Then comes the era of life, and it should be remembered that they are not Promethean plastic
formations here ce ebrued, but life in its long-settled habits and locations; the beasts of the
fields are drinking of tlie waters that run in the valleys, the wild asses are roaming the desert,
the birds are flying in the air and singing between the branches. It is a most vivid picture of
the luxuriant growth of the early species, both animal and vegetable, with the rich provisions
for its support, ver. 13-18. Again, there is the appointment of the moon for seasons, the giving
to the sun his law for rising and setting (ver. 19), and at last man going forth to the work and
labor of humanity. Throughout it all there is the one animating life, the Ruah Elohim, from
whose quickening power proceed all these lower orders of vitality, and at whose withdrawal
they gasp (-issiii) and return again to their dust, ver. 29. The creative doxology too is not
omitted: "How great are thy works, O Lord! in Wisdom (or by Wisdom nasna, through the
eternal Logos') hast thou made them all." {See John i. 2, Coloss, i. 17, to Trnvra iv avrm rrvvfaTtiKf.)
It is but the repetition of the tst: a-a r^i^, the " good, lo, very good," of Gen. i. 31 : " The
glory of the Lord is forever, the Lord rejoices in his works." |
Tliere is no mistaking hero the outline of the creative picture, and of the creative times, yet
* AJl this, it is true, is expressed in optical langruage in respect to spacey but there is no conceptual limit in regard to
ime. The reason of this may be inferred from the very position of the ancient mind. Their want of outward science
Jmited their space conceptions, but time bclonf^np mainly to the inner sense, there was not only no conceptual hindrance,
but an actual freedom of thought leading on to those vast Olamic ideas which are a characteristic of the Hebrew language.
And thus it is that the space conceptions of the Bible fall greatly behind those of science, whilst its time ideas went so far
beyond them. This was the case, at least until quite lately, or since certain discoveries of the world's antiquities have
given us a new impression of the Olams and *^ons, the :iges and ages of ages, or the aiCive^ rajf atwfwf, of the Scriptures.
t Nothing can more clearly denote a process extending far beyond a solar day than this kind of language : mo^ HT
Cnb, the very places they now occupy, and which were of old appointed for them. There is the same significance in the
•'settling of the mountains,'' Prov. viii. 25, TS3b3n C^in cni3", Asrenduril muntps, descendunt campi. Our version,
which is the oppoait* of all the ancient, and directly opposed to the Hebrew (m?p3 1T"1^ 0^"in ^bS^J, could only
ha/ve come from an erroneous prejudgment that this language referred to the flood. Even in that case it would have been
false to the optical conception.
I It might not do to rely upon it alone, but after such a clear reference to creation and the creative days in other
parts of the I'salm. it does not seem forced if we regard ver. 33, 34 as suggested by the thought of the creation-aabbath, and
611ed with the emotion it would naturally inspire : '* I will sing unto the Lord ; I will rejoice in the Lord ; and my meditar
tion shall i» « weut," — 2nP ^, it shall bo like the tvening time, the hour of calm yet joyous feeling.
PART in.— ALLUSIONS TO THE SIX DAiS IN OTHER PARTS OF THE BIBLE. 13>
the impression is not one of brevity. There is order here, succession and evolution on a vast
■cale ; but no intimation of a crowding into times out of harmony with the conception of the
works, or the scale of duration which the conceptual truthfulness of the picture demands. If
we had nothing but this passage, no one would think of solar days in connection with its great
transitions. Now, what we want to get at is the thought of the writer, the subjective state out
of which arose such language and such a mode of conceivvng. We study him as a very old
interpreter of Gen. i., who is the best witness to us of the ancient feeling. Rationalizing com-
mentators rec ignize here the creative days, but they somehow fail to see that the writer's con-
ception of the work, and his manner of setting forth the vastness and sublimity of its successions,
are not easily reconciled with the notion of common solar days, — a meaning these commentators
are determined to fasten on Gen. i., for the obvious reason that it discredits the account, and
seems to give them some gr,)und tor calling it a myth. It was a similar blindness that led Rosen-
miiller to derive the Bible cosmogony from the Persians, whilst at the same time contending
for the interpretation of short 24-hour days. According to his own showing the Persians (Zen-
davesta) held that the world was generated in s\x periods (sex temporibus), or times, left altogether
indefinite. If the Mosaic account must be traced to a Persian paternity, let it at least have the
Persian width.
There is the same grandeur of i)o\ver and causality in the creation-pictures we find in the
latter part of Job; and if we had nothing ab extra to give us a different thought there would be
the same impression of vastness in the times. How utterly different this early style from the
later Talmudic and Mohammedan trifling about the times and imagined incidents of creation I
The o'd impression had been lost, and there took its place the petty wonder which grows out of
the narrow conception ; just as in modern times every kind of fanciful hypothesis has been
resorted to to account for the first three days, and their morning and eveninj; phenomena, so
puzzling, so inexplicable, it may be said, on the supposition of their being ordinary solar days.
There is nothing of tiiis trifling in Job. In a style of highest poetry it gives us ideas and sug-
gestions that yet transcend any discoveries in science: "Where wast thou when I laid the
foundations of the earth? Who appointed its measures, and stretched the line upon it? Upon
what are its piUars settled, and who laid the corner-stone thereof? when the stars of the morn-
ing sang together, and all the sous of God shouted for joy. Or who shut up the sea with doors
in its gushing forth, when it issued from the womb? when I made the darkness its robe, and
thick darkness its swaddling-band ; when I brake * upon it my law, and set bars and doors, and
gaid, Here shalt thou come, and no farther, and here shalt thou stop in the swelling of thy waves.
Hast thou given command to the morning? hast thou caused the dawn to know its place j
Knowest thou the way where light dwelleth? Dnderstandest thou the path to its house? Hast
thou entered into the treasures of the snow or the hail? Hath the rain a father? and who hath
begotten the drops of the dew?" Job xxxviii. Ancient as these challenges are, science has not
yet answered them, probably never will fully answer them. Congelation is not yet understood
in its essential mystery; there is a store of unrevealed science in the snow-drop, and as for light,
though it has been shining on us for 6000 years, we do not yet "know the path to its house."
We stand in awe of such language ; we recognize it as superhuman speaking. There are no
narrow computations here, no petty fancies, or ingenious hypotheses. Neither is there any
filling up of what is left blank in the great outline given by Moses, except that we have occa-
sionally the intimation of a law or process when the other gives us only the bare fact ex[)ressed
in the plainest phenomenal language which was adapted to be the vehicle of its conception. Thus
also in another passage. Job xxviii. 25, 26, God is represented as determining the quantity and
• SoiLe would give "IS^rs here the sense of appointment or decision merely, as that idea, in most langruages, u
eoondary to that of cutting. But ^3^ is never so used in Hebrew, although such general idea suits the passage. Tht
Itrength of the word, and the vividness of the imagery, are lost in what is after all bu t a smooth tautology. There is in-
dicated a conflict of forces. There was a terrible disturbance in the old nature of the lehom before the sea became obedient,
md the watera quietly settled to their established bound. "There is something hard about it," says Umbreit, " if we giv*
it the usual Hebrew sense ; '* but this is the very reason for preferring the literal image. The word is emphatic, and their
la an importance m its choice as showing the real conception in the mind of the writer.
140 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESln.
force of the elenii ntal powers, and appointing the method of their physical action. It is anothei
of the Scriptural allusions to the Creative Wisdom : " God knew the place thereof when he made
for the winds their weight, and fixed for the waters their measure, when he made a law for the
rain, and a way for the thunder flames: " Vulgate: mam procellia sonantibus, a passage for tht
founding storms.
In this connection no portion of Scripture is more worthy of attention than Psalm xc. It is
especially important as being, on the best authority, ascribed to that same Moses who gives us,
vhether through direct aiithor.shi[i or tradition, the account of creation: "O Lord, thou hast
been our dwelling-place in all generations." The words -m ti- here cvidi.ntly refer to old his-
torical times upon the eartli, but it is equally clear that what lollows carries us back to the
creative or ante-creative periods. He was "his people's dwelHng-place," they were 'chosen in
Him before the foundations of tlie world." "Before the mountains were horn, before the earth
and the tebel were Irrought forth bs nrx Dbis nsi cbira, from 01am to 01am, from world * to
world, thou art God," or " thou art, 0 God." bbinn here is wrongly rendered by the second per-
son. It is the third feminine, and li.as for its collective subject iani 'J'tn, earth and tlie world,
or earth and the orhU terrarum. Both •nb"' and bb-rir denote a generative process,- — both
words, as remarked in another place, presenting the siime radical etymological conceptions of
birth, growth, parturition, with the Latin natus, natura, and the Greek <^iw, c^urju, ycwaui, ylva-
y.ai, -ye'i'fcris.t For this parturitive sense of sb^nn see such passages as Isaiah li. 2, Job xv. 7,
Prov. viii. 25, Ps. li. 7, Isaiali Ixvi. 8, where this word (in Ilophal) and ibi come together
nns cs'E ■'15 ■ibT' OS IPS m^3 ■j'lSt bm^n, numquid partiiriet terra, the Vulgate renders it;
but it is passive, "shall earth be brought forth in a day, shall a nation be born at one time?"
It is used of one of the common generative processes of nature, as Prov. xxv. 23, "the north-
wind generates (bbinn) rain" (verb in the active conjugation)- It is applied to Deity, Deut.
xxxii. 18, and in connection again with nb-^ : " Wilt thou forget, "[nbi t'S, the Rock that begat
thee" (Deum qui te genuit. Vt'lg.) ibbTna bx, who bore thee, literally who travailed with thee
in birt!i. The expression may seem a harsh one, but it denotes the tender love and care mani-
fested in the formation and culture of the divine people. So when applied, in its more literal
sense to natural or creative movements, it denotes a travailing in nature, strong processes, indic-
ative of convulsions, violence, and opposition, in passing from one form of matter, or from one
stage of life, to another. We dwell upon this, because the power and significance of such words
have been so slighted in our translation, and are, therefore, so overlooked by the leader. It
amounts to nothing to say that they are figures, even if this were true. Tkey are certainly not
fancy figures or rhetorical figures merely, but used because no other language could so well
convey their vast and tremendous import. When the Scriptures use poetry it is not for the sake
of ornament, but from necessity; it is because all other language fails. But it may be said that
the poetry here is in the style and in the collocation of ideas. The words themselves meet un
in their most literal etymological conceptions; just as such words, and such primitive concep-
tions have formed the roots of all philosophical and scientific language, as it has been developed
in otlier tongues.
• The sense loortd, Riven to this wont abl!?, it is said, belonps to the later Hebrew, but there are quite a number of
passages in the Old Testament, besides Eccles. iii. 11, where this sense is the most apposite (see Ps. cxlv. 13, cvi. 48), and the
later nsage (if it may be so called, for it ia undoubtedly most ancient in the Syiiac ^ V^V x 1 jp-ows directly out of the
primitive conception. The Rabbinical usage differs in this, that it is employed for space-worlds (wdcr/ios) aud thus pei^
vcrt«d from that original idea of a timt-morld which it has friven to the New Testament aiii>v,
t Hence, from "tb^ the noun p^tblr , used in Gen. ii. 4, of "the ^pn^ra/ions C-yet-ftrei?, wn/uraf) of the heavens and
the earth.*' The idea of Ae earth at^ a gr'iwlh, hirth, or gerifriiUun, did not shock either the Jewish or Patristic feeling
13 is shown by the reception of the LXX. word Genesis as a name for the first book of Moses. Gen. i. abounds in this
■ind of guteration lanpuaRe. The earth brings foTlh TsS'n), the waters hrt'^O (^3E1UJJ (swarm with life), the grast
fei-minatn (XwTP), and the trees and plants seminuh {v'''''['0\ each after its gtuus or species (I^B). which is the result
of the generative law or process. Nature is everywhere, but Gud over all, the Logos in all, commencing a new nature,
thanging, modifying, or elevating an old one. The Hebrew writers employ such terms without scruple, and without any
ixdiiA of naturalism, 'i'he natural and supernatural were not so t-harply drawn as in modem times. Nature had its super,
natural, and the supernatural showed itself in nature. These are the /i7er«/ meanings; but they would have ~«eD tbi
KCnns et a philosophical and scientific tankage had the Hebrew been ever so developed.
PAKT ni.— ALLUSIO-'^S TO THE SIX DAYS IN OTHER PARTS OF THE BlfiLE. U,
"Before the mountains were born, and the earth brought forth," — before creation was fin-
ished, and brought to its full birth, — obis n;"! nbij'a "from 01am to Olara, from world to world,
an-o Toil luaii'os kiu emt rnv mtivus Qi itecnlo et usque in swculum), thou nrt, 0 Mighty El." ijns
in the first verse is the name uf administration; bs is the older name of power and causality
"From everlasting unto everlistiiig," sa.vs can- translation, as tliougli both expressions made merelj
a general phrase for eternal duration, regarded as blank continuity, to the entire neglect of th«
plurality and the transition. Some might fancy it tiie idea of a past and a future eternity, but
this past had its divisions. It was before the creation, or before the completion of tha
creation, that El existed thus from 01am to 01am, from £eon to teon, a sceculo in sceculum, from
world to world; ju-^t as our word world is used as a time- word in the oldest English. Set
Wicklitfe's translation of 1 Tim. i. 17 " kynge of worldis, fiumXevs tuu aloivav.'^ It is intended
here to mark most emphatically the contrast between God's times and our times, the brevity of
which is so atFectingly set forth in verses 9 and 10 below: "The days of our years are three-
score years and ten." We live fmm year to year; God lives from Olam ti) 01am.* The times
of oar history are reckoned as annual, centennial, millennial ; God's times are Olamic or seonian,
. — ald)i/Lo< being an adjective whose unit of measurement is alav (i. e., time mea-^ured by feons),
just as annual is time measured by years. The divine life-time (not in itself, but as given to
oar conceptions) i* reckoned by worlds, and worlds of worlds, until, tlir(jugli their mighty
reduplications, rather than by any couceptionless abstract or negative terms, we approach, as near
as the human imaging faculty can approach, to tlje thought of an absolute eternity. All this if
confirmed, as sober and rational exegesis, by that remarkable declaration in this Psalm (ver. 4),
which furnishes the key of interpretation for all passages that speak of the greiiter chronology,
whether it be the immense jiast; as intimated in the phiralities of the Old Testament, cr the
unknown periods of the Olamic eschatology as referred to in the New (see 2 Pet. iii. 8, 2 Thess.
ii. 2, Heb. x. 37): "For a thousand years in tliine eyes are as a day (D'-'S), as yesterday when it
is past, and a-s a watch in the night." t How slow to us, and yet how sublimely the faith of
this D''nbx li"}*, or man of God, waits and watches for the day (ver. 14) : '• O satisfy ue (-pan)
ill the morning with thy mercy." npn here may very easily mean an ordinary morning, if one
s contented with it, or chooses to render it adverbially (as our translation does: "O satisfy us
""''.'/,") but certainly there is much in (his wonderful Psalm, and iu the general scale of its
language, that points to the higher idea and to the higlier day. The most careless reader can
hardly fail to sec that it abounds in great contrasts : " We spend our years as a sigh," % but tlmn
art from Olam to Olam." "Our life is as a watch iu the night compared with tby millennial day."
" We are as a sleep." " O satisfy us in the morning with thy mercy ; " then " make us glad
acc'irding to the days wherein thou hast afflicted us, the years wherein we have seen evil." Si>
'.ii another place, Ps. xxx. 6: "Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy (nj-i a shout of jubilee)
Cometh in. tlie morning.'''' "I shall behold thy face in righteousness, I siiall be satisfied when
1 awake, with thy likeness," Ps. xvii. 15. Tbe rationalist may interpret all these on the lower
scale and give consistent reasons for his philology. Let him be content witb it, but there is
* Whether such language is used of mundane, ante-mund.ane, or post-mundane ages, or of all together, must be deter-
oiincd by the context ; the word obl? being in itself wholly indefinite. It is distinguished simiply froin ordinary astix)-
comically computed time. Here, in Ps. xc. 2, it can have no other than a creative or ante-creative referenco. In Ps. ciii,
17, however, the primary thought would be Olams of thi.i present Olam, or what would be called mundane ages ;
ob'SJ ISI cbin3 nin^ IDH. "the mercy of Jehovah is from Olam to Olam upon them that fear him." Though
«J7en here it will be according to the reader's faith. TliLs precious promise may take in the atatca? toii* alutviaVf the ages of
the ages, the eternities of the eternities, to come. There is the same contrast in Ps. ciii. 17, as in Ps. xc. 2 — our deeting
days and the duration of Him who liveth from Olam to Olam. See the verses above.
t The idea is found in the Koran, and is applied to creation. See Surat sxsii. 4, " the day whose length is a thousand
^ears such as ye reckon." Compare also Surat Ixx. 3, 4, "the degrees by which the angels and the Spirit ascend to Him,
each a day in which there is 50,000 years. They are the intervals between the going forth ot the word (the ruah or si irit,
toil is called) in creation." There is no reason for supposing that Mohammed got this notion from tbe Scriptures. It
belonged to the ancient oriental thinking, and seems to have come down, in its own way, from the earliest ages, when mea
had little science or knowledge of worlds in space, but vast conceptions of times.
: T^^T^ 1^3. Like a low murmuring sound, — like a long-drawn sigh, commencing with th»} first inhalation and end.
mg with the last gasp of the departing breath. So the ?>iiac "I—, ca.^ .^1 as tt should be pointed aik ffu-wo-gOf likf
t groan, like a murmur.
142 SPECIAL IiNTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
nothing to prevent, there is mnob to favor, that higher and wider view which the ever-asceaii
ing style of Scripture (even wlien it teems to speak of temponil things) and the ever-expanding
power of Hebrew words, otfer to the spiritual mind. Again, tliere is "the morning (Ps. slix.
15) in whicli the righteous shall liave the d' ■minion." Uuw frigid is tlie comment of the rational
isthcre! and iiow far it falls short of all the ideas suggested by the context I " npab, max subito,''^
Bays Rosenmiiller ; and then he refers to Ps. xlvi. 6 (God shall help her, the Church, the civita*
Itei. rp2 n":E3 at the turning of the morning), which he has in like manner to diminish from
the higher scale before it will answer his purpose. So Hupfeld : '\Stiperstilc8 simt." Accord
l'-^ to him, all this striking imagery, and this ^trong word m"', mean no more than that good
njeu shall survive the wicked ; they shall visit their graves the morning after they have been
buried.
The morning, in Ps. xlix. 15, when " the righteous shall reign," is the great dies rctiibutionix
so prominent in Scripture, and acknowledged too (like the conception of great times) in the
earliest language aud thinking of the race.* Such an interpretation may seem forced to one
who looks at it from the lowest stand-point, and feels the need of nothing higher. It was other-
wise with the early, musing, meditative mind. The more dim aud indetinite their faith in another
World, the more vast their conception of its times and its parallelisms (in these respects) with
the present vicissitudes of our being. To such minds, even without revelation, the idea rose
naturally out of the most obviously suggested contrasts. The brevities of our present state gave
birth to the idea of the eterniiies. From this there grew a corresponding language which in modern
times we have failed justly to interpret. The shortness of the human life was more thought of
in the earliest days than it is now, although men then lived longer. Hence that wailing language
respecting it, we find in Job and in the Psalms. Away back in the patriarchal time<, when, as
some say, this world was all they knew, men confessed more readily and more feelingly than
they do now, that they were pilgrims and sojourners on earth. Nothing, therefore, was more
natural I'or such souls than the attempt to transfer these brevities and the language that
represented them, to the higher scale. Their very desiiondency in respect to their having any
share themselves in this higher chronology, would the more strongly suggest to the mind its
vast durations. Hence the c^iabi" n^JUi "the years of the eternities," Psalm Ixsvii. 6, the
■l^br ■'IS'' mata, '"the years of the right hand of the most High," Psalm Ixxvii. 11. Hence
the thought of the aaon, or higher world-time, of a greatei- day, of a more glorious morning.
* The use of the word morning for the great day of light and retribution is very marked in the early Arabian poetp,
before the time of Mohammed and the Koran. It has no appearance of having been invented by them, but oarries the
evidence of long-established UBage, — a mode of speech which no one thought of explaining because of any obscurity or
novelty in it. There is no reason why we may not suppose it as ancient as any phrase in the language, and to have gone
ba/;k to the days of Job, as well as many other Arabic expressions, which the Neologists always find in abundance for that
time when it suits other purposes they may have in view. Thus Lokraan, us quoted in the Kitab ul-at^any ; '* O my son,
despise not small tilings ; for they shall be great in t/i^- morning " a*) also the old poet and orator Koss, as given by
Sharastani 437 (Cureton's Ed.) ttXi *— >L«JI &aJI* iCjot. oLftt (\2kt> iJt sJJ\ "God is one j He
began (life) ; He causes it to come back (from death) ; to Him is the reluming in the morning." See also Sprenger**
*• Leben des Mohammed," vol. i. p. 97.
For examples in the Koran, see Surat lix. 18 : *' (J believers, fear God, and let every soul see to it what it sends before
it for ihe jntiriiin^ " (or the morrorr^ in pnslerum diem). It is used as an ancient and settled phrase for " the day of judg-
ment," according to that frequent Koranic idea that a man's sins are sent on before him, and that they will be ail there to
meet hui. in the uiuinhis of retribution, or the dies it a:. .See also the commentary of Al-zamakhshari on the passage ; *' It
is the day of the resurrection, ' he says, " called the morning, to impress us with a sense of its nearness."
Hariri uses tiie same ancient form of speech, not merely as a chance poetical phrase, but as having place among the
lettled idioms of the language. The vagrant Abu Zeid is represented as saying of the man who will give him a robe io
lover his nakedness, that in return for it he shall be well clad in the morning, — that is, both in this world and in the
Uy of retribution lihat is to come.
c < ^ ' " ' ^ , , '
*He shall b« covered to-day (thai is, in thia world) with ray grateful praise, and in th6 morning (or the morrow) blmH 111
be enrobed with the silk of paradise." Hariri Seance, xxv. p. 3<^0, ed. of l)e Siicy.
The idiom, traopd in this way from the earliest Irabian iiouts. hbows the antiquity of the langtiage and of tL.» idea
PAKT IV.— IDEAS OF NATURE AND THE SUPERNATURaU 14i
Messiah's throne is to be niao ■'B^s, "like<Aedo2/«of Heaven," Psalm Isxxix. 30, "hiskingdum,"
g,^i3„ 1,3 r-isia "a kingdom of all Olams." Hence, too, the ancient cyclical ideas of grea*
times when all things should come round again, and that belief in a future renovation of th«
earth and heavens that Pareau has shown to have belonged to the early Arabians and Egyp ■
tians,* and which, though in another form, is not obscurely alluded to and sanctioned in thf
Scriptures themselves.
This latter idea is plainly enough presented by the Prophet: " Behold, I create new heavens,"
or rather "I create the heavens new, Di'ijnn Qiaiu xti3, and the earth anew; " ain denoting
rather the idea of renewal t than that of an origination de novo. We find it elsewhere, all the
stronger because it comes in incidentally, as a thing firmly believed. Thus Pa. cii. 26, which
Paul, it should be noted, applies to the creative Logos, Heb. i. 10 • " Of old didst thou lay the
foundation of the earth, and the heavens (the atmosphere, the rakia, the sky,j are the work of
thy hands. They perish (it is not a prediction, but a description in the present)," they flow or
change ; there is no stability in nature, whatever science may say ; it is necessarily finite in time
as well as in space. "But ihou standest (Tosn, permanes, abidest through) ; yea, all of them
wax old as doth a garment, and as a garment thou shalt renew them, and they sh;iil be renewed,"
Ci'iinn • it is ever in such connection the change of renewal, of regerminatiou, of reviviscence.
Pcming, or succession, is the radical idea of the root in all ihe Shemitio tongues; it is one thing,
or one state, taking the place of another, but it is ever a passing from death to life, from loss to
gain, from decay to vigor, from torpor to activity. See such passages as Psalm xc. 5 : -ipaa
C)bni iisns, " in the morning like grass it groweth up,'''' Job xiv, q-iiini TiSI nis'' ox, " if it be
cut down it shall sprout again," and Job xiv. 14, where the noun from the same verb, just before
applied to the regerminating plant, is used by Job to denote his own renewal: "O that thou
wouldst lay me up in Hades ; " " all the days of my set time would I wait until my halipah come."
Compare also Isaiah ix. 9, and the places where it is used of the renewal or change of raiment.
Gen. xli. 14, xxxv. 2, and others, — also of moral or spiritual renovation, as Isai. xl. 31-xli. 1.
There is no mistaking these Scriptural analogies of the past and the future. Earth shall be
rehabilitated; nature shall put on her new robe; there shall be anew creative day, a new light,
a new atmosphere, a new firmament, a new glory in the sun and stars, a new Adam, Prince of
a new life, a new human kind over whom death shall reign no more, a new Eden-world,
"Therein dwelleth righteousneBs."
PAKT lY.
THE IDEAS OF NATURE AND THE SUPERNATURAL AS I RESENTED IN THE
SCRIPTURES.
The idea of law in nature is given .a the Bible in its own peculiar language, but it is as
distinctly to be fraud there as in Newton's " Principia." The details were unknown, as they
are yet in their vast extent unknown to our be>t science, but both the idea and the fact were
none the less firmly held. ;' For ever, O Lord, thy Word is settled in the heavens " (Psalm cxis.
89), that is, in the remotest or highest space ; " from age to age is thy truth " (thy tr\ithfulne-8),
i. e., throughout all time. That the language has reference to natural things may be seen by
comparing it with Psalm xxxiii. 6, " By the Word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all
their host by the breath of his mouth " (i^s rn-iV the utterance of his month, that is, the origin-
ating Word, and its going forth or prolonged sounding in the nature originated, the Xdyof 77po-'
^opixis of Ooloss. i. 17, ev a ra TTavra (Tvvea-TijKf, " in whom all things consist,^'' or stand together
Bo here. Psalms cxix. 89, -im is the word of God, giving law, as it gave origin, to nature ; nr":*
* Johanni^ Henrici Pareau, theol. Doct. et Ling. Orient, in Acad. Harderv. C&mmenfalio de Immortalitatis ac Vita
/uturts nnti/iis ab antiquissimo Jobi Scriptore. Davtntrist MDCCCVIJ. A most rare yet valxiable work.
t This is the piel sense almost exclusively (the word not occurring in Kal). Hence it furnishes a name fcr the moon
and the month, the renewal. It is almost wholly in this sense that it is used by the Rabbinical writers. Creation is
nnewal, though, when the necessities of the reasoning require, it is used for absolute origination.
144 SPECIAL DJTRODUCTIOJI TO THE FIRST CHAPTEK OF GENESic.
is the divine faithfulness in the preservation of that law, and the constant execution of that
word. Tlie uuinerical ratios of this hoh olam, or cosmical ordinance, were nndetemiined oy the
early mind ; it was not known whether its energizings were according tcj the squares or the
cubes of the distances, but of such a harmony existing; in the heavens there was no doubt.
'■ Th^.•i^ line had gone out into all the world ; " the author of the 19th Psalm was as sure of this
8S Kepler, who derived his scientific inspiration from it. A mighty law, a nniversal law, was
ihe.u. That was known to David as well as to Newton. The same idea appears in what fol-
lows: ''Thou also hast founded the earth," pjji; atatuhti ; thou hast given it an order, a genesis,
an establishment. Hence, from this ssme loot, the Syriac ji ■- (ke-yo-no) natura, conditio na-
turalix. Again, in the verse following (Psalm cxix. 91), " they stand (that is, things stand) accord-
ing to thine ordinances ; for are they not all thy servants? "' This is not a mere figure to denote
i mere mechanical forcing; there is a real law, and a real natural obedience. " lie constituteth
the wind his minister, the flaming fire (the lightning) his servants," Ps. civ. -1. "Thou eendest
them forth ; they go and return to thee, say tig. Behold ns, here we are." Job xxxviii. .35. Poetical
as the language may be, there is something more than a fact represented, or a phenomenon. There
is an abiding nature, an obedience to law, a command and a response, — not a capricious move-
ment, but an invariable doing. " He appointeth the moon for seasons, the sun knoweth hia
going down."
Our modern science has discovered much in respect to the manner, but has revealed nothing
new in respect to the essence of the idea. We have similar language. Job xxviii. 25 : " Me made
a weight for the winds" {fecit ventis pondus), — ho determined the gravity of the most seemingly
impimderable substances, — "lie established ("r, regulated) the waters in their measure," their
[iroportions, their relations, their quality, as well as their quantity. " When he made a law for
the rain, n::Tjb pn (quando poneliat plaviis leyem) uni nwin/ (^-|-n a constant course, an iiijmutable
rule) for the lightning and its voice." It is the same idea in that most sublime declaration. Job
XXV. 2, n^sin^sn dim n'rs, " He luaketh peace in his high places," concordiam in guhlimibus suis,
he hath established a harmony in the heavens. Compare Ps. six. 6 ; Hos. ii. 22, 23.
It was this style of thought and language that led to nature's being called a covenant^ whether
such covenant or law was regarded as made with nature, or with man, and for man's sake. See
Jeremiah xxxiii. 20. It is God's " covenant of the day and night ; " they are expressly called
vnxi B"'BO nipn the statutes, "the laws of the heaven and earth," in their relations to each
other, a.^ compared with the higher covenant of the Messiah. One of the most invariable things
in the physical world is the rainbow, ever appearing when the sun shines forth after a storm;
»nd it is this beautiful phenomenon that is made the symbol of nature's constancy, — not as a new
thing, when pointed out to Noah, but chosen, from the very fact of its invariableuess, as the best
representative of the great idea thus grounded on the eternal promise.
There is a twofold idea in creation which the mind cannot separate, and which the Bible
does not separate. It is the giving form by the immediate operation of the Word, and then the
infixing that form as a permanent principle working on until the whole is finished, and afterward
remaining as an unchanging law. The rudimentary expression for this we find in that repeated
formula of Gen. i. id-tiii, rendered, "and it was so." That would simply denote the fact; but
it is more than this. The particle p (or the adjective rather) never loses the primary idea of
fixedness, establishment, order, that is everywhere prominent in the verb •jid, from which, as
before remarked, comes the earliest Shemitic word for nature, unless we may regard it as rep-
resentrd by the Hebrew mbin. " And it was so," — rather, " and it became firm, fixed.
established."
Another germ of the same thought we find in the nbmaa of Gen. i. 16, the ride or law of
the heavenly bodies in the regulation of the seasons, and their general influence upon the earth.
It appears still more clearly in Job xxxviii. 33: "Knowest thou the ordinances of heaven; canat
thou set the dominion thereof in the earth." Here we have again the o-'Btl) mpn, the statutes
or laws of the heavens (Vulgate, ordinem cali, LXX. T/iimas avpamv, the turnings or tropics of tlie
heavens), —jiiiv is a still more significant word than ry::^^. It denotes a canon, a rule, a marked
series or ordo. Taken in connection wih what is sail ali ve of the influence (or bands) of Plei
t-ART IV.— IDEAS OF XATDRE AND THE SUPERNATURAL. 145
ades, it might seem to refer to the old belief in astrology; but this had in it nothing of the
magical. Wliatever scientific errors it involved, it was precious as containing the idea of the
unity of tiie Kosmos, or of a whole, in which each part had an influence upon tiie whole anc"
upon every other part.
This faith in nature which the old Shemitic mind possessed, was all the stronger, it may be
said, in proportion to the want of exact knowledge. David, and Isaiah, and Moses, had a belief
in the constancy of nature, founded on better grounds than that of the sceptical naturalist. It
was, too, more truly a recognition of law than that generalization of mere inductive science
which can only regard nature as simply that which is, or appears, and law as nothing more than
a state of present facts, or relative sequences, that might have been any other state of facts, or
any other order of sequences, and which would still have been nature, still have been law, from
the mere fact of its being so. The natural law of the Bible, on the other hand, was a real
causative power, a real ruling or dominion in itself, though inseparable from the will and wis-
dom of a lawgiver.
The true notion of the natural cannot be held without the complementary idea of the super-
natural, since nature can have no beginning in itself (the thought involving a contradiction),
and, therefore, demands a power older than itself, beyond and above itself. It is thus that the
Scripture not only gives, but necessitates, the idea of the supernatural, although there is no parade
of philosophical language in setting it forth. There are also to he found therein the specific
diversities of the idea. The supernatural, as origin, is described as the Word going forth. It is
thus all throutth creation acting /(art passu with the natures it originates. "When it is referred
to among post-creative acts it is characterized as "making something new upon the earth "
(nx'i:) ; >ee Numb. xvi. 30 ; Jerem. xxxi. 22 ; though this, as before remarked, denotes a new
event, a new form of things, r.ather than new matter. As a change, interruption, or metamor-
phosis in nature, in distinction from a permanent new power introduced into it, it becomes
simply the idea of the miraculous. For this there is a peculiar expression. It is called "the
finger of God," intimating that the merest touch of Deity can cause a deflection in nature, though
nothing in nature is really broken or de.-troyed. See Exodus, viii. 16, the language of the baffled
magicians, who thereby confessed that their art, whatever it might be, was not the finger of
God, — that is, had nothing of the supernatural about it. See also Exod. xxxi. 18 ; Deut. ix. 10.
Sometimes the figure contained in the expression ia applied to some great natural event of the
more sudden and stupendous kind, as to the volcano, I\salms, civ. 32: "He touches the moun
tains and they smoke,"— the lightness of the effort implying the mightiness of the power.
The smgl- term, however, for the miraculous, or wonderful, is sis whose primary idea v,
that of a tiling, or an act, separate and standing by itself, out of the'chain of causation, thougK
the term is sometimes applied rhetorically to a stupendous natural event.* And this le.ads us
to the main thing we wish here to remark, that though, in idea, the Scriptural distinction
between the natural and the supernatural is clear, there is not, in practical speech, that sharp
line drawn between them that distinguishes our modern thinking. In celebrating the praises
of God xbE nas, " who doeth wonders" (Ex. xv. 11), the Bible writers are as apt to take one
class of acts as another, though one or the other may predominate in certain books in conse-
quence of the peculiar connections. In the Law, and in the Prophets, tlie supernatural is more
dwelt upon ; it is the passage of the Red Sea, the fire and voice from Sinai, the smiting of the
rock in the Wilderness, &c. ; in Job, it is the great natural as exhibited in the elements, the storm,
the thunder, and the marvellous productions of the animal world. So also often in the Psalms—
tee especially Ps. xxix. One class of events is regarded as much the work of God as the other.
In both representations, moreover, is there a mingling of the two ideas. In the supernatural
* There is another Hebrew term, of a very peculiar kind, used to denote the bringing about an event, special and
remarkable, by a series of causes strictly natural or moral, or mainly such, yet continually deflected, or turned round, to
the production of a certain result. There has been nothing startling, or sudden, but the finger of God has been upon tht
•eries all the way. It is called nap (Sibbah), the etymology itself being its clearest definition. It is a bringing about oi
iround (from 330 ) a causality, yet with a constant deviation produced by other causes, physical and moral. Foi
examples, see the story of Rehoboam, 1 King, xli. 25, also 2 Chron. x. 15, and other passages. In Arobic tbe primary seoM
»f 330 is lost, and the secondary ide'- of causation, thus derived, becomes predominant.
10
140 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
displays, such as that of the flood, the crossing of the Red Sea, the Egyptian plagues, the pro
riding food in the Wilderness, there is more or less of natural intervention linked in and di»
tinctly mentioned as forming a part, at least, of the process. And :hen again the great natural
is so described in Job wnd the Psalms, that the awe of the supernatural is upon us, and w«
receive the impression of a divine presence as distinctly as though it had been all miracle.
But it is in the creative account that this blending becomes most reiiiarl<able. The young
nature, though strictly a nature, seems as near to God as the supernatural. SliU are they clearly
distinguishable. Two false notions have warped our thinking here. It may be said, too, that
they are as anti-biblical as they are false. All in creation we have been accustomed to regard
as supernatural ; all since creatiuii as the uninterrupted natural, with the exception, here and
there, of a few interspersed miraculous events. An excessive naturalism on the one hand ha»
been the counterpart to an excessive supernaturalism on the other. Now the more thoroughly
we study Gen. i. the more it will be found that the strictly supernatural is in the beginnings, or
rather in the mornings, of each day, whilst the carrying on, or the completion of each process,
is strictly nature, the mora, as St. Augustine calls it, the pause, quiescence, or evening in creation.
There is in each of these days, or these mornings, whether we regard them as following or
preceding the repose, a word going forth, and then a process of obedience to a new law. Thus
each word is a new power dropped into the stream of a previous nature which Ijad, in like man-
ner, a word for its beginning. Hence creation is a succession of growths, generations, r-nbn.
This word is derived from ib^, to give birth, just as natura from nascor, (j>Cais from (piia, or
genesis {yeveais) from yiynotiat. Had the old Hebrew become a philosophical language this
would have been the order of development. Lange intimates that toledoth, as applied to the
generations of the earth and heavens, was taken retroactively from the human genealogies after
mentioned. We cannot tliink so. It would seem to be a starting or model name for all generative
successions. First the genesis of the heavens and earth, then of tlie human race, as involving
ever in their reproductions the same mingling of the natural and the supernatural.
We find a nature in the very beginnings of life. It is all prepared and waiting for the word,
but it is nature when it moves. "Let the earth bring forth" — "let the waters bring forth."
The first plants grow, whether slowly or suddenly. They are a production from tlie eanh.
They are brought forth according to their species, with their order or law in tliem. As mbip
corresponds to (fivcns and natura, so does the Hebrew -p^ to the Greek dSnt, tSia, and the Latin
tpecus. This is etyuiologically clear in the derivative nj'an. It is tlie outward form, as
representative of and produced by the inward form which is the real idea, or species. Thus it is
law from the start, producing organization, and not law as a mere name for, and life as a mere
result of, an outward mechanically formed organic structure. Th:it would be sheer materialism.
The [irocess presented in the Scriptures, however difiicult to be understood conceptunlly, is the
opposite of the idea of mechanical formation. As Cudworth forcibly though quaintly expresses
it in his distinction between human and divine art, God does not stand on the nutsido like a
human artist, and raoliminously, by means of shaping tools and processes, introduce his idea into
the work. It is the word and the idea working from within. The outward material organiza-
tion is its product instead of its cause.
It matters n A that this is in another place spoken of as a making. That is merely a summary
ot the manner of making as here set forth in the more detailed account. God's making a thing
intends every step in its production. Thus the whole creation of the heavens and earth is set
forth as a making (Gen. ii. 4), and a making in one day ; yet the whole of the first chapter is
nccupied with the six great days, or successions, that intervene between the darkness and the
oliaos on the one side, and man and [laradisc on the other.
Again, there are cases which might seem the reverse of this, where God is represented as mak-
ing, forming, <fcc., in processes whicn are not only natur.al — so supposed to bo — but ordinary.
Thus not only the geneiio production of humanity, but the individual generation is ascribed to
\iiin, just as though it were a creative process; and in fact we do not see how the idea of their
being the creative or the supernatural somewhere in each individual human generation can be
denied by those who condemn tradiicianism. "Before 1, formed thee in the womb," Jer. i. T\
PART v.— HOW WAS THE CliEATlVE HISTORY REVEALED? \^',
It is that same word nsi which has been regarded as peculiarly employed of direct outward oi
mechanical formation, as the artist forms a statue or a picture. It is so only when applied to
hnman works, where the artist, as Cudworth says, stands on the outside, but a-s used of Gnd it
is ever the inward formation, the f iSof, or idea, of which the outwanl shape is but the image or
etSwXoj/, the mere representative of the unseen. •See also Isaiah xliv. 2, 24; Isaiah xliii. 1, where it
is used as synonymous with sia. See especially Ps. csxxix. 16 : i-is"' c^«"|, " the days they were
formed when there w.is not one in them," which carries the same idea, whether it refers to th«
generic or the individual formation. Had there been no other place in the Bible where the
human generation is spoken of than the one cited from Jerem. i. 6, it might have been thought
(if we follow the mode of interpretation which some will insist upon applying to Genesis) that
the prophet was directly and mechanically created. Hence the idea as well as the interpretation
is capable of reversal. If it means a process, as it undoubtedly does when thus used of the
individual gestation, it may denote, and probably does denote, an analogous process in the creative
account, where it is used of man, just as nas and sia, with no more of the outward or mechan
ical ill the one case than in the other.
Only let U8 keep to the old Hebrew modes of thinking and speaking, and we need not be
afraid of naturalism. It is God's nature that we read of in Genesis. If life is said to come from
the waters, let us remember that it was upon these same waters the Spirit brooded in the first
inystei-ious night of creation. If it is naturalism, it is the naturalism of the Bible ; and the
wonder is that such plain declarations of birth, growth, succession, law, generation— one thing
coining out of another — should have been so much overlooked. It is because the Scripture
doctrine of the Word, or Logos, in nature, has bo fallen out of our theology, that we dread so
much the appearance of naturalism. In proportion as we have lost that true Scriptural idea of
supernaturalisin, which sees no inconsistency in such blendings, are we driven to the dogmatic
or arbitrary supernaturalism to defend our religious ideas from the equally dogmatic and arbitrary
naturalism of modern science. We have endeavored to be brief, but the reader is requested to
compare the hints here given, with the unmistakable language of the Scripture. Instantaneous
creations there might have been, for anything our reason could say to the contrary; but the
actual creation in the Bible is set forth as a succession. It is a series of n'.ibr, or generations,
each one revealing those unseen things of God from which are made the things th.it do appear.
The other mode would have been to us the revelation of a fact or facts alone. As we have it
given unto us, it is a revelation of something more and higher,— of law, of process, — of artistic
beauty, — of architectural wis<lom. It is not the power alone, but the very mind of God, that is
shown to us. The one would have been a creation simply in space ; God has seen fit to reveal
to us a creation in time, as well as in space, and this is inseparable from the ideas of succession,
series, causation — in a word, of nature, beginning in the supernatural, yet having its law given
to it, and capable of yielding obedience to that law.
PART V.
HOW WAS THE CREATIVE HISTORY REVEALED f
Holiness, sublimity, truthfulness, — these are the impressions left upon the mind of the
thoughtful reader of the First of Genesis. There is meant by this its subjective truthfulness
It is no inventioTi. The one who first wrote it down, or first spoke it to human ears, had a per.
feet conscious conviction of the presence to his mind of the scenes so vividly described, — whether
given to him in vision or otherwise, — and a firm belief in a great objective reality represented
by them. It is equally evident, too, that it is the ofi'spring of one conceiving mind. It never
grew like a myth or legend. It is one total conception, perfect and consistent in all its p.arts
It bears no evidence of being a story artificially made to represent an idea, or a system of ideas.
There is, in truth, nothing ideal about it. It presents on its very fece the serious impression of
'let believed, and given forth as thus believed, however the original representation may havt
148 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
Deen made to the first Imman soul that received it. Mytlis and legends are the prodncts ol
time ; tliev li.ive a growth ; we can, in general, tell how and whence they came, and after what
manner they have received their mythical form. Thus, other ancient cosmogonie'^, though bear-
ing evidence of derivation from the one in Genesis, hiive had their successive accretions and
deposits of pliysieal, leu'endiry, and mythological sirata. This stands alone in the world, lik«
the primeval granite of the Himalaya among the later geological formations. It has nothing
national about it. It is no more Jewish than it is Assyrian, Ohaldsean, Indian, Persian, oi
Egyptian. It is found among tlie preserved Jewish writings, but there is nothing, except its
pure monotheistic aspect, which would assign it to that people rather than to any other. If the
Jews derived it from others, as is often affirmed, then is it 8i)mething very wonderful, something
utterly the reverse of the usu.d process, that they should have so stripped it of all national or
•ect features, and given it such a sublime aspect of universalism, so transcending, apparently,
ill local I'r partial history.
It is no imitation. Copies may have been made from it, more or less deformed, but this is an
original painting. Tlie evidence is f 'und in its simplicity, unity, and perfect consistency; whilst
in all others the marks of the traditional derivation are to be detected. Overloaded .additions,
incongruous mixtures, inharmonious touches, all prove that the execution and the original
design, the outline and the deformed <ir crowded filling up, are from different and very dissimilar
sources. Take the Scriptural representation of the original formlessness, the primeval darkness,
the brooding spiiit, the going forth of the light, or the first mtrning, the uprising of the
firmament, tlie emerging of the land from the waters, and compare it with the Greek fables
derived from the Egyptian, and which Hesiod has given as the traditional cosmogony. How is
all this snblime imagery transformed and deformed in the mythic.il genealogy that tells us how
from Chaos (the yawning abyss) were born Night and Erebus, and how from them arose the
^ther and the Day, and how afterwards Earth was born, from whom, and "like to itself oii
all sides surrounding," came "starry Ouranos! " There is enough to show that the Greek or
Egyptian cosmogony had its origin in this ante-historical, ante-mythical account, but no less
clear is it that the pure, the holy, the consistent, the sublimely monotheistic narrative was the
most ancient, and that these defoimities grew out of the nature-worship, whether pantheistic
or polytheistic, which, in the course of human depravity, succeeded the earlier, more grandly
simple, and less a~sumingly philoso|ihic idea of the world and its one creator.
It is greatly in favor of the Bible account that it has no philosophy, and no appearance of
any philosophy, either in the abstract form, or in that earlier poetical form which the first
philosophy iissnmed. Its statements of grand facts have no appearance of bias in tavor of any
class of ideas. Its great antiquity is beyond dispute; it is older, certaiidy, than history or
philosophy. It was before the dawning of anything called science, as is shown by the fact that
everything is denoted by its simplest phenomenal or optical name. There is no assigning of non-
apparent causations, except the continual going forth of the mighty Word. It is impossible to
discover any connection between it and any mythical poetry. The holy sublimity that per-
vades it is at war with the idea of direct and conscious forgery, designed to impose on others,
and the thought of it as a mere work of genius, having its interest in a display of inventive and
descriptive talent, is inconsistent with every notion we can form of the thinking and aims of that
early youth of the human race. It was not the age then, nor till long after, of literary forgeries
or fancy-tales. We are shut up to the conclusion of its subjective truthfulness, and its subjective
auttienticity. At a very early day, to which no profane history or chronology reaches, some
man who was not a philosopher, not a poet, not a fable-maker, but one who " walked with God,"
and was possessed of a most devout and reverent spirit — some such man, having a power of
conception surpassing the ordinary human, or else inspired from above, had present to his soul
in some way, and first wrote down, or uttered in words, this ujost wonderful and sublime account
of the origin of the world and man. He believed, too, what he wrote or uttered. He wai
sonscious of some source, whether by words or vision, whence he had received it, and he hat'
BO doubt of its relation to an outward objective truth which it purported to set forth.
Even as a mere snbiective reality, such a picture, in such a soul, and at such an ea:ly day
PART v.— HOW WAS THE CREATIVE HISTORY REVEALED? 14S
presents a question of deepest interest. But whence came it? Not simply, wlio first wrote itl
but who or what first put iuto the human mind the wondnms ideas C"ntaiiied in lliat early writing
y^xn nsi n^'Taon ns o^'nbx x^~ r-'CX":, "In the beginning God created tlie lieavens and the
earth?" To ascribe it to tradition ammints to nothing. It is only going b.-ick upon our steps, to
come at last to one whn first gave it a< a whole; for, as before remarked, there is no appearanca
iif growth about it. No knowledge of it could have come from tradition. Other parts of
8cri[)tnre either fall within liistorical times, or they narrate events whose story might have com
down from eye-witnesses. This oouI'J liave had no witnesses, and could appeal to none. I
relates to things transcending all hoinsin experience, all possible human knowledge. Tlie very
assuming to narrate is a claim to in'spiration, or of knowledge believed to have been obtained in
some divine or praeternatural v, ay. As something thought out by the human soul alone, even
in the highest exercise of its liighest genius, it could have commanded no reS])ect. It would
immediately have been met by the challenge. Job xxxviii. 4: "Where wast thou when God laid
the foimdations of the earth ? Knowest thou it because thou wast then born, or because the
lumber of thy days is ^real? "
We are driven than to the same supposition that is indulged in respect to prophecy. If that
is vision in the future, this is vision in the past. It was an impression made upon the soul,
whether regarded as wholly subjective, or as connected with some outward vocal cansality
Viewing it as f, revelation, there comes strongly to us the conviction that it must have been
something more than a message in bare words. Without the vision conceptions which they call
up, words are powerless, and, though necessary in the ordinary transmission to other minds,
would hv^T been an inferior medium for the first conveyance of the ideas or images to the first
cimoeJnTg human soul. We are always to remember, too, that tlie image or co7icep(ion is itself
a langu;^gc representing the remoter fact, or the remoter idsa, even as it is itself represented to
others by understood wordi". In ordinary historical revelation, words, articulated or suggested,
may be first, j-ince the conceptions linked with them are familiar and easily follow ; though in
this case it would still be revelation, still entitled to the name inspiration, even if the higher
divine author employed merely the truthful memory of holy truthful men. In considering, how-
ever, the ca85 of the original presentation of facts utterly unknown, and of which the human
mind h;id piPfinusly no types or conceptions, the question assumes a new aspect. It comes to us
in this fonr, • '^\\\ revealing words, merely, call up the most vivid picture (for in either method
it is only a. rxture that the mind has), or will revealing pictures, on the other hand, necessarily
suggest tho 'jost words as the only medium of transmission to other minds? Will word-painting
give the mi'3t distir.ct conceptions of this terra incognita, or will vi.sion-paintiug call out the best
language wherewith to describe it? If the latter view seems the mo-it r.ational, as well as more
in analogy with the style of the prophetic Scriptures, then may we believe that creation was
thus presented to this prophet of the past, this seek of the unknown, or rather of the utterly
anknowfible, ante-creative history. We may go farther than tliis. It may well be doubted
whether, without vision in the first place, or as dependent solely on naked words, it would not
have given tlie dimmest images to the first imaging mind, if it had not, rather, failed to impart
Bny conception.
Behind this picture, or this vision repreaentatioti, lay the ineffable ideas; and, therefore, the
bare facts in their grand outline, or the bare succession, are thus vividly limned, as best repre-
senting what words, without such successive scenes, would have much less adequately conveyed.
Or we may suppose it presented subjectively to both senses. There were vision voices as well
as vision sights. Certain awfid words were heard, and the callings and the namings, about
which there has been so much speculation, ami which, when regarded as actual parts of creation,
have g"iven rise to so much difficulty, were as subjectively real (that is, real ])arts of the vision),
as the gatherings .and the dividings They were heard as John "he.ird a great voice out of
heaven," or as Daniel heard "tlie speaking between the banks of Ulai," or as Ezekiel heard
" the noise of the cherubic wings, like the noise of great waters, as the voice of speech, the voice
of the Almighty." So Balaam "heard the words of God and saw the visions of El Shaddai; "*
be '^beheld that which was not nigh, and saw that which was not now." Remote time anc
160 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIKST CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
remote '■pace were brought together upon the canvas. May we not believe this of the greatei
and ho.iei- prophet of creation, in liis vision of the ineffable past?
If tl» tlieorv may be indulged, then may we also reverently endeavor to imagine something
of the process in this creative representation, as we may gather it from the language in which
it has been described. The vision opens with what the seer can only paint in words as a thcdiD
wabhobu, a void and formless earth. The terms themselves, thongh well translated, show tbt
imperfection of language, and yet they are, doubtless, the best that cuuld have been employed.
They are inspired language, too, because most directly 8ugge>ted by the inspii-ed vision. The
SKEE was in that state of initial contemplation to which the prophet Jeremiah is carried back in
the reversed picture, where he sees the earth returning again to the primeval descilation : " '
beheld the earth, and Id, it was without form and void, ir\zi inn ; and I looked to the heavens,
and they had no light," Jerem. iv. 23. This is the beginning. It is a vision of darkness resting on
a formless abyss. There is something, whether sound or vision, or both combined, that gives
the iinpression of a Spirit hovering over the waters, or breathing upon their vast surface, ot
commencing the pulsations of life in their deep interior. It is the beginning of nature. And
now he hears a mighty voice saying: "Let there be light." Obedient to the Word the light
comes forth (« ctkotovs, says the Apostle in his interpretation of this pictorial language, 2 Cor
It. 6) out of the darkness. The first elemental division is seen taking place. It is a dividing of
the light from the darkness.
Again, a voice that calls it good, and is heard giving the names D'f, nbib, yom, la-y-la, Bay,
Night, to this first creative contrast. A solemn pause succeeds. One creative period, one great
time succession, is past, and again goes forth the Word. And now a sky, a heaven, presents
itself, thougli all is fluid still. It is a phenomenon as strange as it is beautiful and sublime.
There is an appearance of waters above and waters below, with an optical firmament, like the
Revelation sea of glass, seeming to divide them from each other. We may regard it .as a phe
nomenal, or optical, rejiresentation of the atmosphere with the clouds sailing in it, and the rain
mysteriously su^^pended in the upper spaces, — a matter which even now science finds it diflicnlt
to understand.* Or, with Lange and others, we may interpret it as denoting the separation
between the lower waters i)roper and the upper »thereal fluid. In either case, that which is
beheld is the actual appearance, or the optical word representing the fact, or state in nature^
lying back of it, conceived according to the science, real or supposed, of the seeb, and expressed
in articulate or written words according to such conception. Thus we may take "waters above
and waters below " as simply the expression of such conception, the grand fact revealed being the
production, on the second day, or period, of that natural state of tilings which is actually repre-
sented l.y the sky and atmosphere. Or we may take it without such explanation as denoting a
nature or state i>f things long g'ine, and which has little or nothing corresponding to it in any
present aspect of the world. The '' waters above and waters below " may have been an actual
condition, an actual stage in the creative process thus revealed in vision, as no science could ever
have revealed it — an " old heavens," in fact, that passed away at or before the introduction of
the "new heavens" and new firmament of the fourth day. For it seems clear that in the skeh'b
view, and accjrding to the very consistency of the account itself, this vision of " waters abuve'
Would not bo in harmony with the firmamental phenomena of that later period. Sliculd any
one, in the name of science, declare this to be impossible, or deny that there coidd ever have
been any reality in nature, or in the history of our jdanet, represented by such a conception, let
him take one of the largest telescor'es and turn it to the rings of Saturn. Why might not such
a phenomenon have been exhibited by our "earth and heavens" in that early senii-chaotic state
to which Saturn, according to our best science, now l)cars so close a resemblance? How nra
these rings supported, whether liquid or aerial ? If licpiid, the state of things would correspond
• "Undcretandest thou the balancings of the clouds?" Jobxxxvii. Ui,— the law of gravity in the donds, 31' "'trSEO,
ithraliona nuiium, the weighings or suspeiiaions of the clouds,-how they uru supported in the air, and how their coutonti
are condensed and poured upon the eatlh t Sec Unil>reit ; also ch. xxxvi. 27 : " When be makoth em:M the dropt of
irater, iind for vapor they distil rain." There is something yet to be learned before this ancient challenge la fijl;
iiiFWfTed.
PART v.— now WAS THE CREATIVE HISTORY REVEALED? IjJ
exactly to the Innguage of the text, and, if so, the possibility of our earth having once preaentei'
a similar apiiearnnoe would not be unworthy the attention either of the Biblical student or tb*
man of science.
But to rt'turri to the creative scene; at this stage again there comes in the imago voeii. —
'• And God called the firmament heaven " (n-iao, heights). There is aiiotljer naming, anoihei
voice of benediction, another solemn pause; the second vision closes, and thus "there is ae
evening and a morning, day second."
And now a third command is heard, like the voices that attest the opening of the Revelation
seals, and a new earth appears emerging from the waters. It should be remarked that there is
no time here, — time, we mean, as estimated or measured duration ; for there is nothing whereby
to measure it outside of the events themselves. Tnere is no fixed index of movement, whether
constiint or changing, or of any constant or varying rate of change. It is time only as successicm,
or rather the successions are themselves the times, — the great dividings, the solemn pauses, the
new appearing*, making the evenings and the mornings of the numbered days. It is "from
Olam to 01am " (Ps. sc. 2), from age to age. The unit of measurement is the change in nature
produced by the Word, and the number and order of these changes and successions is the great
matter of revel.ntion. "Not ?u>to long," as Delitzsch well says, "but Tiow many times God
created," is the essential idea intended to be set forth. There is no absolute standard either of
time or space. An hour, regarded as blank duration, has no more reality than an unrelated
inch or foot. Since, then, an outside measured time is one of the things created, it cannot be the
measure of creation itself.
But again the vision changes, and lo, a new heavens and a new earth. The old rakia has
passed away, and a new firmament appears, with its sun, moon, and stars. They are lights in
the heavens (nmsis). So the seer calls them, — lights of greater and of lesser splendor. He
does not speak of them as globes, or solid bodies, according to the ideas derived from our modern
astronomy, of which he had no knowledge, no conception, and, if we may trust the simplicity
and silenca of the account, no revelation. They were to him simply lights in the firmament,
and mithing more; even as to us, with all our science, they are still but images in our near
heavens, — optical ajipearances comparatively close by us, though made by a far-oft' causality.
Such a statement may not seem easy or natural to some minds afieoted by certain scientific pre-
judgments ; but that does not prevent its being literal fact. The sun we see is simply an appear-
ance. These heavenly lights, as they are reflected and refracted in our near atmospherical sky,
or rakia, are just as much images as the spectram that is artifioally cast in the astronomer's observ-
atory. Their ruling or dominion, as mentioned Gen. i. 16, is not, primarily, a physical or dy-
namical [lower (though this may be included in the language when science discovers it), but a
time-regulating, and, in this way, a life-regulating dominion. As lights tn this earth, the only
point "f view in which they are earliest regarded, the seonic date of their appearance is all that
is given in this creative vision, whilst their antecedent materiality in time, as well as their remote
causality in space, are left to the inference of human reason, and the discoveries of human science.
The one of these ideas, namely, that the material origin of the sun and stars dates from the
earliest creative period, antecedent, remotely antecedent, perhaps, to their appearance in our
terrene firmament, is commonly received without diflicnity, and seems to be demanded by the
literal consistency i>f the account itself. It has never been maintained that the matter of the
sun was created, or even organized, on the fourth day. This being so held in respect to the
remote time origin of this firmamental light, there is really no more difficulty in regarding in a
similar manner that distant power, or entity, in space with which the pi lenoinemm is connected.
Both are extra visionem; both lay equally on the outside in this account of the fourth d:iy liav.
ing relation only to the phemimenal changes which took place in our earth or its near surround ■
!ng atmospherical heavens. The connection between this light in the celestial mirror, and a vast
sody 95,000,000 miles distant, was left to the progress in, knowledge to be made by the human
faculties which God meant should he exercised in such discoveries. We see in this a reason, it
may be reverently said, why the time element, especially as order of sueces-ion, enters so much
more into the creative account than any revelation in sp ice. The rehitive distances and magni-
152 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
tinles of the worlds lie more within the range of human knowledge; the ages or periods of th«
ko8mos, involving as they do the supernatural, are almost whoUy beyond it. " By faith we under
stand that the worlds (the almvic or time worlds) were framed (put in order, Kcn-ijfjriVSai) by the
Word of God," Heb. xi. 3. Scieace can never get out of the natural as a fixed course of thingo
once established and now continuing, of which it may be said -js tiii, '' and it was so," or became
firm. She can never attain to the supernatural, and therefore it is that slie has ever had mora
t'j do with the space than with the time process, witli things as they are, than as they came to
be. The ten times repeated way-yomer (and God said), the mighty utterances of " Him whose
outgoings are of old, from the days of eternity " (Mic. v. 1), the six great evolutions in the
earth's genesis, no science could ever determine, or hope to determine ; although, " from tha
things that are yet seen," or from footprints that are left of those "outgoings," siie might inter,
in general, that the earth bad a vast antiquity, immeasurable by any computations drawn from
present astronomical arrangements.
And so we might proceed throu;;h all the subsequent pictorial stages in the su|iposed visioo
process, but reverence would require us to stop with what is sufficient to give an intimation of
the probable method of revealing. It closes with the appearance of man, the divine iii-e<ence
in the contemplation of the completed worlv, and the solenm benediction, as it is now heard ris-
ing to the superlative in the utterance: "all good," nsn 3ia, "exceeiling good." Thus "the
Heavens and the Earth are finished, with all their hosts," as these appeared in the optical firm-
ament tliat bounded the seek's view, as it does, in strictness, all human vision. Science claims
to have pierced beyond it, — to have thrown back the flammantia mcmia mundi, and to liave
brought tlie far-off nigh. All that she has yet discovered, liowever, is relative distance,
magnitude, motions, dynamical laws, and mathematical latios. She has constructed a splendid
orrery in the heavens ; but in all that relates to life, and rationality, and spiritual being, the
skies are as silent as of old. They still ^hiit us in, — onr earth and near surrounding optical
heavens. Of their real hosts we know no more than God has seen fit to reveal to us in other
ways. Of anything above man, or lieyond man, we have, from science, no greater facilities of
conception than belonged to David, or Daniel, or Pythagoras. Number, motion, space relations,
optical clianges, serving as diagrams for the exposition of mathematical ideas, — these are all we
tee in the heavens, all we kmw. It is indeed much, scientifically, but it adds little or nothing
to our knowledge of substantial being. For this, in all beyond our earth, we are as much
dependent on revelation, or on the imagination, as the first recipients of the creative vision.
It is generally admitted that the language used in reference to the fourth day is phenomenal,
but a careful study, we think, will discover that this feature exists, more or less, throughout,
making it all the more easy to receive the vision theory of its inspiration. It is " by faith in the
thingn unseen,'" as defined in a later Scripture (Heb. xi. 1, 3), or faith in the raou/ifra, as distin-
gnishi'd from the ipmvnueva, "that we understand (mnififv, perceive intellectually) that the worlds
(the ah.wti) were put in order by the Word of God, so that the things that are seen (phenomena)
were made from things that do not appear" (ex inuisihiUUis visibilia fierent). But the earlier
revelation in Genesis is made through the seme, and to the sense, primarily, leaving to the later
faith, and to snience as employed by it, to divine a priori, or to discover by induction, the more
interior causalities, or the more remotely distant powers which these primary universal plien-
oinenii rejiresent.
With tlie science, however, of this ohl narrator we have little to do. Fi>r the purposes of
interpretation all that is necessary to he inaint.'iiiied is the subjective trutlifulne^^s and consistency
of tlie picture. It was not a theory, not a fancy, or a guess, — much less a desiiined forgery.
Buch sights were seen, such voices were heard, by some one in the early time, and he has most
faithfully and grajdiicnlly narrnted them to us. The style bears the strongest testimony to this.
It carries the internal evidence that it is a telling from the eye, whether the outward or the
inward eye, ratlier than from the ear, C'alling it a dream, or a vision, does not detnict from ite
lignilicance or its glory. But we are not (concerned with that here. The view tjikeii of the
protable subjective jirocess is simply in aid of interpretation, wlii(di is nothing more nor lest
than getting at the true conception ot the writer from the language employed, whether tha^
FART v.— HOW WAS THE CkEATIVE HISTORY REVEA-EU .' 15j
language %ra8 the effect or the c;iuse of such conce|)tion. The absolute truthfulness of ttt
account, or nf tliat wliich it represents, presents another question. This is connected with tlie
absolute verity of the Holy Scripture in general, as grounded upon its whole external and
internal evidence.
We have already alluded to the analogy of prophecy. If the vision theory is in liarraonj
irith the beat view of prophetical inspiration, as sanctioned by so many passages of Scripture, it
is still more demanded in the present case ; since the future is not so sharply divided from th
present, as the present and the future both from the ante-creative past. In both the propheti
and the creative representation words may t\)rm a part of the vision, as res gestm, whilst the
general narrating language is that which is prompted by the vision. In such case, though called
the writer's own language, it is none the less the language of revelation, and none tlie less may
the Scripture that records it be said to be verbally inspired. Ihe sights seen, the voices heard,
the emotions aroused, are just those adapted to bring out the very words the seer actually uses,
and, in both cases, the very best words that could have been used for such a purpose. Hence
we may truly say it is the language of the divine inspirer as well as that of the human narrator.
The description being given from the bare optical, rather than from any reflexive scientific stand-
point more or less advanced, becomes, on this very account, the more vivid as well as the more
universal. It is a language read and understood by aU. What lies behind it will be conceived
according to the state of knowledge, true or false. We may confess the inadequacy of such
language, not because better could have been employed, or other words could have done as well,
but because the best words which the inspired mind can use, or the uninspired njind receive,
necessarily fall short even of the vividness of the vision reality, and still farther short of the
ineffable truth which that vision represents. Any use of scientific language, whether the Ptol-
emaic, or the Newtonian, or that of a thousand years hence, would be still remote from this
ineffable truth, whilst it would be a seeming endorsement of its absolute accuracy. Indeed, the
language may be rightly said to be inspired, though no words at all are used, or even wlien the
inspiration itself may be pure vision, or even pure emotion elevating tlie thoughts and concep-
tiou'^. In either case, the words which are the result aie God's words, the last best product of
the inspiring power, all the more vivid and emotional in tlie reader from the very fact of their
having come through such a process of spiritual chemistry (as we may call it) in the real human
life and human emotion of the inspired medium. In this way ;dl the words of the Holy Scripture
are inspired words, — " pure words, as silver tried, purified seven times," Ps. sii. 7.
Whatever be the human faculty employed as the medium, whether it be the understanding
elevated and purified by a divine emotion, or a vivid imaiinn power supernaturally aroused in
a state of trance or ecstasis, or simply a holy and truthful human memory, the words resulting,
have passed through a refining process in which they carry with them the divine truth, not as a
mere mechanical massage, but in all the vividness and fulness of the human conception. Thus
they are divine words, although at the same time, most human. We may therefore study them
with confidence. They are not arbitrary, and open to disparaging criticism, except as to their
textual accuracy. Human as the language of the Bible is, it is stiU God's medium, and we can
never exhaust its meaning. The process of learning from it, therefore, must be the reverse of
that by which it is communicated. It is a going back, up the stream, and towards the fountain-
head. Through the words of the inspired writer we get at his images, from these we ascend to
his thoughts and their inspiring emotions, and in these, again, the soul draws nigh to that higher
life and verity of which the inspired conception is the best human representative.
Words suggesting images, or images suggesting words: the first would be called the
objective method (whether such words were miraculously articulated to the ear, or whispered
to the mind), and yet it is not easy to see why it would not be, to a certain extent, as subjec-
tive as the other, — since in both cases, the imperfect human conception, whether of words or
things, or of words or images, must make a necessary part of the revealing process. In this
objective view there remains, in all its force, the great difficulty arising from those passages in
which God is represented as speaking, calling, naming, &c. We are compelled to take it as an
internal articulate speaking, in the Hebrew, or in some other language, or else to hold that there
154 SPECIAL INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST CHAPTER OF GENESiS.
IB in the account a mixture of the figurative and the literal style. In the subjective, or visioc
view, the diflSculty vanishes; and this is a great argument in its favor. In vision, one part is ai
.'CmI, tliat is, as much seen and heard by the seer, as the other. A great power dividing, a great
voice speal<ing, a great presence surveying the efl'ects produced and pronouncing it good, are al
represented tn his ecstatic consciou-ness, and he rehites it just as it was beheld and heard. Thus,
too, there vanishes all tliat ditfloulty which so much perplexes Delitzsch (see p. 86) in respect to
the particular language employed. It was the seeb's own language, whether the Hebrew, or
Hny older tongue.
If it be said that speech or "Word, as thus used, denotes something more than mere articulate
language, it may readily be admitted. This is, in fact, the substance of the distinction made by
Parens (Comment. Gen. p. 91) and many others, ancient and modern, between the 'cerium essen-
tiale, and the son-us evanidua ex ore Dei non procedens. It is, however, something more real than
a comparison. Nature as a motion, a pulsation, a continued throbbing energy in time and space,
may well be called an utterance, and the primal power by which it is commenced and prolonged,
a Word going forth. Without any figure, it is an articulating voice in the great cosmical medium,
even as our human voice sounds through the prolonged undulations of the terrestrial atmosphere.
It may be conceived as spoken, and at the same time as continually responding to the primal
utterer, thus constituting the verbum essentvile of wliich the vision voice {imago vocis, Heb.
ip na), as uttered in human language,* may be regarded as the representative. It is like
the essential day. or cycle, of which the phenomenal solar cycle is tlie type. If such a mode ol
interpretation Is good for the one case, what right has any one to deny its fitness in the other?
Whatever be the smaller scale of representation, there must be harmony and analogy in the
things represented. There must not be a transcending vastness in the one direction, and a
narrowness out of all proportion in the other. The inefi'able voice, the inelfable work, the ineffable
rest, demand as their fitting accompaniment the ineffable evening and morning, making the
ineffable day.
Thus regarded, Gen, i. is an apocalypse of the great past, even as the revelation to John in
Patmos is an apocalypse of the great future. Had the latter not used the first person in stating
what he saw and heard, we should none the less have regarded it as a vision. It has tlie vision
♦ Metaphors in other writings are for ornaments or for rhetorical impression. Such language in Scripture has a highei
use. It is t o express ineifable truths (or vivid emotions in view of such truths), for which other modes of speech are inade-
quate. " 2'heir It'ru hath gone out to the ends of the world" Ps. xix. 5. D^lp— the LXX. have rendered it their voice,
(^oyyos) their sound, whether reading cblp, or regarding 1p here as equivalent to it in the expression of protonged utter-
ance. Synimachus, ti\os; Vulgate, sonus. It suggests the old idea set forth in the Orphic or Pythagorean myths of the
music of the spheres, and wliich appears in the Hieronomian or Vulgate Version of Job xxxviii. 37, concentum cceli (the
song or harmony of heaven), where 523 is taken in its other and more usual sense of cithara or harp. Ip, in Ps. xix. 6,
may be also rendered a measuring tine, or even a wriiing (Limen — Schriftzvge'), according to Calvin and Cocccius (see
Hupfeld). This would correspond to the opening language of the Psalm, n^"^BDB C^nlU , " the heamns are telling," which
may also be rendered jjic^urmf/, describing (~ED , primary sense, scatpsit, scripsit), "and the firmament declareth (T^J?:)
\is handy work," literally the work of his fingers. What follows is in exquisite harmony with the same idea : " Day xinto
Day (we think of the great days) uttereth speech (poureth it out), and night unto night showeth knowledge," — niin*^ , primary
sense, e^flavit — whence the sense pronuntiavd, fortasse prirprie, as Gesenius says, de rebus arca?iis— that is, breathes forth
knowledge, whispers knowledge, (compare "SI "j'Bir , Job xxvi. 14), and hence the sense of the cognate Arabic ,^^m
to reveal mysteries. It is a tjausccnding or inetfable voice : " No speech— no voice (that is, no audible voice)— and yet, their
line has gone out to the ends of tiie world." It vil,ratcs through all space.
Compare also Flosea ii. 22, where there are the same thouglits and images. Nature, through all her departments, ii
represented as listening for the divine voice, and responding to it, whiUt God is represented as listening to its petitions :
" I will hoar, saith the Lord, I will hear the hoiivons (the skies or clouds), and the heavens shall hour the earth, and the
earth shall hear the com, and the wine, and the oil, and they shall hear Jezreel." It describes the ordinary course of hi«
providnnr:c as one continuous chain of utterances and rosponses. God listens to the heavens petitioning for the rain, that
they m;iy send it down upon the petitioning earth, that the earth mny transmit its influonoe to the petitioning corn and
oil, that they, in turn, may supply the wants of Jcjrcel. So the Chaldee Targum, with Rashi and the Jewish commontatore
generally : " I will hear and command the heavens," &c. It is not a broach of nature, like the miracle used as a sign or
nttestation, but the divine proceeding in the general providence made up of all particulnr providences. It is the constant
living Word, 'O \6yot fii- kiii eVepY"!'. " 'ho quick and powerful word," penetrating all the recesses of nature, yet breaking
no law, pwsing over no link. It Is all law, all nature still, through all the length of the mighty chain, and yet the Word
of God, as distinct and sovereign as when it first went forth in creation. Science is atheistical until she acknowledges thu
doctrine of the Logos in nature, not as a metaphor merely, but as the most vital and most important of bu pbyrioai
tantha.
PART v.— HOW WAS THE CREATIVE HISTORY REVEALED y 15^,
style in its mystic numbers, its solemn repetitions, its regular successions of voices, seals, and
vials. There is not so much of this in Genesis, but there is a great deal that reminds us of it in
the regular dividings and namings, in the sublime enunciations, in the p.irallelism of day and
night successions so constantly given in the same language, in that rhythmical movement which
ever seems more or less an accompaniment of the ecstatic condition,* in the heraldic annonnco-
ment of an established order (la-^n-'l), like a responsive amen succeeding each new going
forth of the Wi>rd, and in the solemn benediction at each close, until the great finale, where it
is all declared good, — "very good." Another resemblance is in the time aspect. In Genesis &r
in Revelation tljere is the same impression of a strange chronology that cannot be measured bj
any historical or scientific scale out of its own movement. It is like distance in a picture. It
is there, but we cannot bring it either into miles or inches. It has succession ; height appears
beyond heiglit, but there is no estimating the valleys, the immense valleys, it m.ay be, that lie
between. In view of all this, it might be said, on the other hand, that had the author of Gen. i.
nsed, like John, the first person directly, it would have made little or no diflference in the style
of the narrative, or in the pictorial eftect produced by it.
This analogy between the opening and closing portions of Scripture may be carried through
out. As the scenic or vision view in the prophetic picture does not warrant us in regarding iv
as .scene merely, or do away with the idea of a great reality lying behind, so neither does such
a vision theory of the creative account detract, in the least, from a like reality in the great past,
and of which such vision was the most fitting representative to our limited powers of conceptiou
as well as to our ever imperfect science regarded as ever falling short of the ultimate facts of
origin, whether called creative or purely pliysical. We may suppose it, therefore, chosen on thi«
very account, as not merely the best, but the only way in which the ineffiible facts might bt'
made shadowly conceptual to the human soul. Still, the fact, whether we rightly conceive ii
or not. is in the representation, and he who takes the two as in all respects identical, or reduces
them to the same measurement, has the essential faith, only he should not condemn as heretical
)r unscriptnral the one who preserves tlie same ultimate facts but interprets the representatioD
of them on the vaster and remoter scale.
In most cases, however, it is not diiBcult to separate between what we have called the mods
of representation and the ineffable truth (believed, though in a great degree unknown,) that lies
back of it. We read, for example, in Genesis, that God " formed man in his own image." Now,
none bnt the grossest gnosticizing heretics have regarded this as a T^Aastio /or7nation of clay into
an outward molded likeness. So also when we are told that " God ireathed into man's nostrils
the breath of life," the representation is most clear and perfect ; we have a distinct image of a
divine mouth breathing into the as yet inauimate human nostril ; there is something very tender
in it, denoting, as Lange poetically says, the Father of Spirits awaking man to existence with a
kiss of love ; but, after all, the mind goes back of the representation in both these cases. The
mere language is transcended even by the mystery of the human physical life as expressed in the
one instance, much more so by that of the rational or spiritual life as set forth in the other.
Now there is nothing to forbid — in fact, there is everything to require — a similar mode of inter-
pretation when it is said "God formed man from the earth," or out of the dust of the earth.
The image is similar to that employed in the other cases, and we may suppose that the seek
hehehJ, even as the r^&Aev conceives, a plastic formation, a mold, shaped but inanimate, beginning
to move under a pneumatic inspiration; but the thoughtful mind, again, goes back to something
beyond it. It is helped by this picture, but it does not rest in it. It finds little or no difficulty
in taking this coming "from the earth," or this being "formed from the earth," as denoting a
divine process in nature, resembling the other processes similarly represented in this wonderful
account {see Remarks, p. 135 on Ps. cxxsis 15) It is a mode of setting forth the contrast between
aoul and body, between the physical and the rational, the animal and the pneumatical, — one from
the divine life and the divine spirit, the other from nature, — "from the earth earthy " (tV y^i
* See this exemplified in the Visions of Balaam, Nymb. xxiii., xxiv., and in the prophetical Scriptures generally. Ii
may not be easy to explain, but it is a fact of deep significance, that, in all high or ecstatic states of soul, there is this tend
«nc7 to rhythmical motion ami >'***>rance.
156 SPECIiL INTRODUCTION TO THE KIKST CHAPTER OF GENESIS.
}(oiK<>s, 1 Cor. XV. 47), even as the plants and the animals came originally from the e;irth and
the waters. Time is not given us here, whether long or short. All that we have is the fact
that hy some process (necessarily involving some idea of causality, succession, and duration,) the
human body was brought from tlie earth, — or that thus the human physical, coining from th«
lower physical (from the lowest parts of the earth, Ps. cxxxix. 15), and through the connecting
links, types, or molds, as carried upwards by the divine formations, was at last brought into the
state in which it was prepared to receive that divine inspiration wliich alone constitutes the
tpeciea, and makes it man. Thus the true creation of man, as man, was an inspiration. The
primus homo was the first man thus inspired, and who became the progenitor of the species.
The first Adam was made by the divine life raising the physical or animal into the rational
The second Adam represents a higher inspiration, elevating the rational human to a closer
union with the divine. Such is the analogy of the Apostle. Christ elevates the human, evec
as the first human, "by the inspiration of the Almighty," is the uplifting of the merely animal
or physical that lay below. The second mystery is the greatest, and our belief in it should take
away any wonder or difficulty that may attend the first.
Again, in that mysterious account. Gen. ii. 21, had it been said: "And I saw the man cas»
into a deep sleep, and lo, the Lord God took from him a rib," &c., we would have recognized
the vision style, and separated itumediatelv between the representation and the ineftable fact
involving the ineffable process through which the female nature was originally divided from the
one generic humanity. AH this is intimated in that mysterious language of the first chapter
(ver. 27} of which this may be regarded as the scenic representation, or filling out of tlie picture:
"So God created man in his own im.ige, in the image of God created he him, miile and female
created he them.'''' The him and the them, the inx and the crs, are one generic being, oi,e
creation. This is given to us in the first language. There is, however, necessarily a derivation
in the process, not menti'ned in the first, but repre.'^ented to us in the second and more graphic
picture. Here, too, if any one is inclined, or feels himself compelled to take the fact and the
scenic representation of it as identical, he has the essential faith, and the essential dogma, woman
derived from man ; but why should we find difficulty iji adopting, in this case, a mode of inter-
pretation whi-h we not only find easy hnt even regard as demanded in the two first-mentioned
cases of the image and the inbreathing?
Again — let ns take Gen. ii. 19: "And out of the ground God formed every benst of the field,
&c., and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them, &c. ; and Adam gave names
to all cattle, and to every fowl, and to every beast of the field." This has nothing of the myth-
ical ifi its style. As literal narration it has a difficulty, but this consists chiefly in its strangeness,
which is wholly a matter of sense conception, whilst there is nothing in it, even as thus taken,
to ott'end the reason or a rational faith. That God sliouhl thus teach the first man hy bringing
■suggestive oljjects before him, even as a father teaches his cliild the letters of the alpliabct, is in
perfect harmony with the best view we can form of the providential and the supernatural, if
these ideas are tn be admitted at all. When the account, however, is regarded as a vision, or a
picture, all difficulties vanish, whether in regard to the style or the matter. As an objective
narration, it would seem to represent a second creation of animals for this special purpo-e ; as
something given in vision, it sets itself wholly free from the necessity of any such inference. It
Ix'comes similar to the trance vision of the animals as seen by Peter, Acts, xi. 5, 6. L
is the method of revealing to us that there is an ineftable mystery in language, that man wag
led into it by the divine guidance, or that the superhuman is demanded to account for its origin
AS the signijirnnt naming of tilings and ideas in distinction from those mere animal cries of the
sense from which snme wotild derive it. Language is required for the invention of language, if
regarded as merely human, and that involves a paradox. Some divine or supernatural power,
therefore, must liave helped man in his first iiamings and olas-ifyings. Such is the conclusion
of tLe profoundest philological science, and such is tlio teaching of the Scriptures.
Hew far this is to be carried must be determined by intrinsic evidence. We are not to resort
to It merely to escape difficulties. The snljer question is, whether the scenic representation, oi
•he vision theory, is in harmotiy with the style of Scripture as employed in other cases wher«
VABT v.— HOW WAS THE CREATIVE HISTORY REVEALED? 151
transcendent facts are set forth, and whether there is that in the very thought and aspect of the
passage which favors the idea. We know tliat the great future transition from the present
irorlil, alwv or 01am. to the alav or world to come, is thus set forth, and it may be deemed in
accordance with the analofry of Scripture, that the origines or great beginnings of the present
01am, as it proceeds from those that are past (un-o tuv alosvaw^ Eph. iii. 9 ; Col. i. 26 ; 1 Cor. i L 7),
ibould be given to ub in a similar apocalrntic lorm
GENESIS,
OH THE
FIRST BOOK OF MOSES
FIRST PERIOD.
The Genesis of the World and of the Primitive Time of the Human Race, as the
Genesis of the Primitive Religion until the Development of Heathendom, and
ol its Antithesis in the Germinating Patriarchalism, Ch. I. -XL
FIRST PART.
THE GETfESIS OF THE WORLD, OF THE ANTITHESIS OF HEAVEN AND EARTH, AND
OF THE PRIMITIVE MEN. Ch. L and II.
FIRST SECTION.
The Heavm, the Earth, and Man. The Creation and the World in an Upward Series of Phyiieal and
Generic Development. Universaliatic.
Chapter I.-IL 8.
A.— The Antithesis of Heaven and Earth, the Symbol of all Religion.
1 In the beginning God created the Heavens and the Earth.
B. The Three First Creative Days. The Great Divisions (by means of Light, Heat, and Chemical Affinity),
or the Three Living Contrasts : Light and Darlmess (or the Darli Spherical Material) ; the Athena.
Waters (or the Vapor-Form) and the Earthly Waters (or the Fluid Precipitate) ; the Water Proper and
the Land. The nearest Limit of these Divisions : the Vegetable World as a Symbolic of Commencing
Life analogous to the Result of the Three Last Creative Days in the Appearing of Man,
2 And the earth was without form, and void ; and darkness was upon the face of the deep.
3 And the Spirit of God moved [hovered, brooded] ' upon the face of the waters. And God
4 said Let there be light, and there was light. And God saw the light [the beauty of the
light] that it was good [niS, good and £a,ir ; as the Greek «aAbi', fair and good] ; and God divided
5 the li^ht from the darkness [made a division between the luminous and the dark element]. And God
called the light Day and the darkness he called Night [sourceof day, source of night]. And
i60 GENESIS, OR THE i"IBST BOOK OF HOSE!-
the evening and the morning were the first day [i. e., by this division is measured one divine day
6 or day of God— <m« day here is for J!rj( day]. And God said: Let there be a firmament [extension,
expansion] in tliO midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
7 And God made the firmament, and divided tiie waters which were under the firmamenl
8 from the waters wliich were above the firmament; and it was so.' And God called
the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.
9 And God said : Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together into one place,
10 and let the dry land appear; and it was so. And God called the dry land Earth, and
the gathering together [combining] of the waters [as water proper] called he Seas :
1 1 and God saw that it was good [second pause of contemplation]. And God said : Let the
earth bring forth grass [grow grass], the herb yielding seed, and the fruit-tree yielding
1 2 fruit after its kind, whose seed is in itself upon the earth ; and it was so. And the
earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding
fruit whose seed was in itself after his kind. And God saw that it was good [third
.3 pause of contemplation]. And the evening and the morning were the third day.
C. — The Three Last Creative Days. The Three Great Combinings: 1. The Heavenly Luminaries and th6
Earth generally ; 2. the Heavenly Luminaries and Water and Air ; 3. the Heavenly Luminaries and
the Earth-Soil as a Pre-Conditioning of Individual Formations. Or the Three Parallelisms of the
Three First Creative Days.
Ist day, The Light ; 4th day. The Luminaries ;
2d day. The Waters under and above the Firma- 6th day, The Fishes in the Seas and the Birds of the
ment; Heavens;
8d day, The Liberated Earth-Soil, and the Plants 6th day. The Land-Animals, and over them Man.
upon it;
14 And God said : Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven, to divide the
day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for
15 years. And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon
16 the earth. And it was so. And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule
1.7 the day, and the lesser light to rule the night; he made the stars also. And God set
18 them in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth ; And to rule over
the day, and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness. And God saw
19 that it was good [fourth pause of contemplation]. And the evening and the morning were
20 the fourth day. And God said : Let the waters bring forth abundantly [Lange:
Let the waters swarm] the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly
[Lange and English marg. rendering: Let fowl fly] above the earth in the open firmament of
21 heaven. And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which
the waters brought forth abundantly after their kind, and every winged fowl after his
22 kind. And God saw that it was good [fifth pause of contemplation]. And God blessed
them, saying: Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas; and let fowl
23 multiply in the earth. And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.
24 And God said : Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and
•25 creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind. And it was so. And God made
the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that
creepeth upon the earth after his kind. And God saw that it was good [sixth pause of
contemplation],
D. — The Limit, Aim, of all the Creative Days (especially of the three last), the Antitype of the Vegeti»hl«
Creation at the End of the T'lird Day : which Antitype is Man, the Likeness of God, and the Sabbalh,
in which God rests from His Work.
Z6 And God said: Let us make man in our image after' our likeness; and let them
have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowls of the air, and over the
cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the
2" earth. So God created man in his own image ; in the image of God created he him ;
28 male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said untff them
CHAP. I.— n. 8.
IG
Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it ; and have dominion
over the fish of the sea, and over tlie fowl of the air, and over every living thing tl.ai
^9 moveth upon tiie earth. And God said : Behold, I have given you every herb bearing
seed which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree in the which is the fruit
30 of a tree yielding seed ; to you shall it be for meat ; And to every beast of the earth,
and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein
31 tfiere is life, I have given every green herb for meat. And it was so. And God saw
every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good [seventh pause of contemplation |
And the evening and the morning were th^; sixth day.
Ch. 11. 1, 2 Thus the heavens and the earth were finished and all the host of them. And
on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made, and he rested on the
3 seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day,
and sanctified it; because that in it he had rested [had begun to rest] from all his work
wllich [he as] God created and made [Lange : um ea zu machen ; English marg. : created to
make].
{^ Ver. 2. — Brooded (HSnitt). Lange has here in brackets betebendt vivifying, though he afterwards rejects the meta-
phor of incubation. — T. L.]
[* Ver. ~.^Aiid il was so. Lange : ttnd es ward also, rather better than our translation, since also differs from our sb
as denoting more of reason and consequence. Both, however, fail of the full forct; of the Hebrew ^S. This, to be sure, is
most commonly a particle, ita, ovtw9, etc., but it never loses the other or adjective sense of Jlrmness, Tightness, sotindnest
(integer), as more allied to the primary sense of the verb "(ID which becomes the Arabic verb for being. And it was Jirm :
the word wa^ accomplished; the firmament stood just as commanded. It was the beginning of a nature. Compare Ps.
jixxiii. 9 : " He commanded and it was, he spake and it stood." So Maimonides on the passage : " And why does he add :
^;~^n^ ! It is equivalent to saying that it was to be so continually all the days of the world as cohering with that which
comes after it." It takes its Jixcd place in the system. So also the verb "pD itself, in the Pilel foi"ni, is used as a word
of creation. See Deut. xxx'i. 6 : T53D"1 Tiw!? S^il, He made tl.ee and established thee. — T. L.]
[3 Ver. 26. — Lange renders here, als'unser Gleichniss, as our likeness, and in a sentence in brackets denies the correct-
ness of the other rendering, after our lilceness. The Hebrew 3 in ISP^tlSIS may give either shade of meaning. The dif-
ference may seem slight; aid yet it may be a quet^tion of some theological importance, whether man is the image of God,
primarily, or made after that image — the word image j)er se being reserved for Him who is called, Hcb. i. 3, the erpress
image, vaptucTijp T^s uTrocTTdtreoj?, the image of the substance ; Col. i. 15, the eikon, or image of the invisible God, fLKtui' tow
©«oy Toy aopdrov (compare 1 Cor. si. 7 ; 2 Cor. iv. 4), and who is styled, John i. 9, the light tliat lighielh every maji. If we
regard Him as pre-eminently the image, or eikon, in this hi;ih and perfect sense, as carrying with it the very substance or
being of that which was imaged, then it would be more reverent as well as more in accordance with the test, we think, to
say (with our English version) man was made after that image ; his light is a retiection from that eternal mirror, or the
a.TTavya.tTiJLa T^9 fiofijs, the " Brightness of Glory," ihe " Outbeaming of (Jlory," as it is called, Heb. i. 3. — T. L.]
* Ch. ii. 3. — 1 he farther words : these are the genealogies [Aug., generations] of the heavens and the earth, are not the
conclusion of the first piece (as held by Delitzsch, Bunsen, etc.), but the commencement of the one that follows, as is alst>
•thown by the use of the name Jehovah Elohim.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL.
1. See on the Introduction to Genesis, and under
the head of Literature, the catalogue of cosmological
works that belong here. Compare, especially, the
r.iterature Catalogue given by Knobel and Delitzsch.
'.. The passages of Scripture that have a special
connection ; Job ; Ps. viii., six., and civ. ; Prov.
viii. ; Is. xl. ; John i. 1; Col. i. 16; Heb. i. 2; xi.
S ; Rev. xxi. 1.
3. This account of the world's creation evidently
forms an ascending line, a series of generations
whose liighest point and utmost limit is reached in
mail. The six days' works arrange themselves in
orderly contrast ; and in correspondence to this are
the sections as they have been distmguished by us :
a. The creation of heaven and earth in general, and
which may also lie regarded as the first constituting
of the symbolical opposition of the two ; b. the three
first creative days, or the three great divisions which
constitute the great elementary oppositions or polari-
ties of the world, and which are the conditioning of
all creature-life: 1. The element of light and the
dark shadow-casting masses, or the concrete dark-
ness, and which we must not contbund with tlie eve-
ning and the morning; 2. the gaseous form of the
tether, esptcially of the atmosphere, and tlie fluid
form of the earth-sphere ; 3. the opposition between
11
the water and the firm land. In respect to this ii
must be observed that the waters, of ver. 2, are a
different thing from the waters of vers. 6 and 9,
since it still encloses the light and the matter of the
earth. Moreover, " the waters " of ver. 6 is not yet
properly water ; since it encloses still the earth ma-
terial. The first mention of elementary water iu the
proper sense, is at ver. 9. c. The three last creative
days, wherein the above parallel is to be observed ;
d. the limit or aim of creation — man — the sabbath
of God.
4. Vers. 1 and 2, the ground-laying for the crea-
tion of the heaven and the earth. Considered cos-
mologically and geologically — In the beginning. —
The construction maintained by Bunsen and others
(Raschi, Ewald, Aben Ezra) is as follows : In the
beginning n'fi€7i (rod created heaven and earth, and
w/if7i the earth was waste and desolate, and darlvuess
was over the primeval flood, and the breath of God
moved upon the waters, t/itn God said, Let there be
light, and there was light. This construction is, in
the first place, opposed throughout to the language
of Genesis, as in its brief yet grand declarations it
proceeds from one concluded sentenci: i.i another.
Secondly, it contradicts the context, in which the
creation of light is a significant, yet still ar isolated,
moment. If we were to follow Uunsun, it would be
the introduction of the Persian light religion rathe!
than the religion of the Old Testament, And, final
itia
GKNESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
It. id the third place, it obliterates that distinguish-
big ground-idea of the theocratic monotheism with
which, in the very start, the word of revelation con-
fronts all pagan dualism, — in other words, the truth,
that in regard to the manner of creation, God is the
sole causality o( heaven and earth in an absolute
»ense. The view of Abeu Ezra that n^UJX"i3 is ever
in the construct state, and that it means here, "in
the beginning of the creation of the heavens and the
earth," etc., is contradicted by the occurrence of the
word in the absolute state, Deut. xxsiii. 21. —
P^irs-13 (from msn — ITN-i). The substantive
ivithout the article. It is true, this cannot be ren-
dered iu the beginning, taken absolutely, so that the
beginning should have a significance, or an existence
for itself. It would be, moreover, a tautology to say
in t/ie beginning of things when God created them,
etc., that is, when there was the beginning of things ;
or else we must take bereshith mystically : in prin-
cipio, that is, in filio, as Basil, Ambrose, and others
(see Leop. Sclimid, Explanation of the Holy Scrip-
tui-es, p. 4), which is not allowable, although it is
true that the New Testament doctrine advances at
once to the determination that God created all things
through the Son (John i. 3, 11; Heb. i. 2; comp.
Ps. xxxiii. B). It is not easy to take the word ad-
verijially: originally, or in the first place (Knobel);
for the immediately following enumeration of the
creative days shows that the author would have time
begin with the creation of the world. According to
Dehtzscli the author does not mean " to express the
doctrinal proposition that the world had its beginning
in time, and is not eternal, but only that the creation
of the heavens and the earth was the beginning of
all history." This interpretation seems arbitrary.
Bereshith relates especially to time, or to the old, the
first time (Is. xlvi. 10; Job xlii. 12). It may be
further said that 3 can mean with or through. It is,
therefore, the most obvious way to interpret it : in a
begijinhtg, and that, too, the first, or the beginning
of time, God created the heavens and the earth (with
the time the space ; the latter denoted through the
antitheses of heaven and earth). From that first
beginning must be distinguished the six new begin-
nings of the six days' works; for the creating goes
on thiough tlic six days. In a beginning of time,
therefore, that lies back of the six days' works, must
that first foundation-plan of the world have been
made, along with the creation of the heaven and the
earth m their opposition. The first verse is there-
lore not a superscription for the representation that
follows, but the eomplet-^d ourauohigy despatclied in
pne general declaration, .Ithough the cosmiciil gene-
ration, which is describe ' ver. 3 and ver. 11, is again
denoted along with it. That the sun, moon, and
stars are perfected for >he earth on the fourth day,
is an indication tliat God':, creating still goes on in the
ueavens, oven as the cieating of the jieriod^ of devel-
opment in the earth, alter its first condition as waste
and desolate, when it went forth from the hand of
(iod as a splieiical tbim without any distinct inward
configuration. — X13, in Piel to cut, hew, form; but
in Kal it is usually employed of divine productions
ucw, or not previously existing in the " sjihere of
nature or history (Ex. xyxiv. 10; Num. xvi. 3ii, and
frequently in the I'rcjphetf), or of spirit (P.s. 11. 12, and
the rre<|uent uTiftir in the N. T. ) ; but never denoting
..'inian production.s, anit »iever used ^vith t!ie accusa-
tive of the material." JJelil/.scli. And thus the
waception of creatiiij; >► .kin to that of the miracu-
lous, in so far that the former would mean a creanD||
ill respect to initial form, the latter in respect to nov-
elty of production. (On the kindred expressions in
the Zendavesta, see DeUtzsch.) It is to be noted how
K-;a difiers from Hit's and ^S"; (ch. ii. 2 and ver. 7).
That iu this creating there is not meant, at all, any
demiurgical lorming out of pre-existing material,
appears from the fact that the kind of material, ai
something then or just created, is strongly signified
in the first condition ot the earth, ver. 2, and in the
creation of Ught. This shows itself, in hke mu'iner,
in the general unconditioned declaiation that God ij
the creative author, or original, of heaven and earth. —
Elohim, see the Divine Names in the Introduction. —
n"i;ll"n . According to the Arabic it would denote
the antithesis of the High (or the height) to the
Lower — that is, the earth. The plural Ibrm is signiti
cant, denoting the abundance and the variety of the
upper spaces.* This appears still more in the ex-
* [There must have been something more definite in tha
early conception that gave rise to this form of the word. It
looks like a dual, and this would suggest that the thought
of the heavens, out of which it arose, may have been that of
a hemi-sphere, and of the whole mundus .is havmg a spheri-
cal foi-m. The phenomenal shape of the sky would give the
idea of a counterpart. The roundness of the mundus, and,
as a necessai-y inference, the roundness, or two-sidedness of
the earth, must have been a conception much more ancient
than we imagine. It must have occurred to a thoughtful
mind every time there was witnessed the phenomena of the
sun Siting (the sun going under) and the sun rising (its
coming up from the world or sky below the earth). Comp.
Ps. sis. 0 ; Eccles. i. 4 ; Job ssvi. 7. Such a notion, how-
ever, would be more for the reliesive thought than for
the sende ; but its early esistence is perfectly consistent
with other langua.ge drawn from the more direct and near
appeai-ance of the earth as an estended plane. A dual idea
may also have been suggested by that of the waters above
and waters below (Gen. i. 7), thus giving the notion of a
double heavens divided by the rakia.
The word, however, is more probablv a plural. This
appears from some of its connections, and from a compari-
son of its form in all the other Shemitic languages. The ^
is in the place of the Jl' as it appears in the root niS'iJ ,
to be high. Since there is nothing arbitrary in language,
especially in early language, this plural form must represent
the notion that would very early arise, of something above
the 3?''pn , or that the rakia itself was merely an optical
appearance in which were shoisTi the forms of things that
were really at vast and vastly varj'ing distances beyond it.
Such a thought was earlier in the Hebrew mind than in the
Greek, though the latter, as usual, when they cjune to enter-
lain it, made much more of the idea in the way of definite-
ness, number, and locality,— treating it with less reverence,
and giving it up more to the license of the imagination. 8o
was It with the idea of a spirit-world. It was older m th«
Shemitic than in the Javanie mind ; but the Greeks gave ic
more of topography and scenery, whilst upon the Hebrew
thought there seems to liave been ever thrown a holy re-
serve, or rather, a providential restraint upon the imagina-
tion, until the coming of Him who was the itesurrection and
the Life. In both cases the latter were content with the
general thought, namely, another life, especially for ihe
people of God who *'is not the God of the dead but of the
living" (Matt. sxii. 32; Exod. iii. 16), and other hearem
beyond that which i>rimarily presents itself to the sense.
We may, thcrefjrc, ascribe this early pliu-al form to that
vivida vis unimi which first pierces through the seen into
the unseen. From the single appearing rakin, or exp,tnse,
above, lame the thought of a heaven over that, an'l of a
"heaven of heavens" higher still, from which Got looks
down to'Mehold the things that are ;n hcM.endhe uear
heavens) and the earth." Ps. csiii. 5: TVho dwellelh 8C
high (naijb "'n^S.IB ), who Btoopet'-i so iow { 'b-'ECr),
even to look down into these lower enrth hfarei? ( t^1S<^.»
C'^alira), as though immensely remote .ii* r**.l: from *bo
superlative a height. Tlio very anthropt-piitb.'.^c: adds to
the grandeur of the conception. Ue "stoot'Oth down to
look," as though not only tl.o earth and ii\wn, but the
heavens that surround them, were so far o.l, or so Ihi
below, as to be hardly visible to the divine eye.
I'rom such a germ the conception gre^ in tli* Hebrew
CHAP. 1.— a. 3.
16)1
ftression, the heaven of heavenis fDeut. x. 14, and Ps.
iviii. 84).
5. Vers. 2-5. Preparation of the geologieo-
cosmological description of the days' works. First
mind, until there came out of it a number of other words
leautini; different supposed departments of the great spaces
above. Still lat«r the Jewish Rabbins got from these their
notion of the GilgalUm, or seven heavens (regarded as
wheels, Ezek. i. 16, or spheres), and to which they give
distinct names having, most of them, some philological iind
conceptual ground in the old scrip:urcs. They are thus
reckoned by them : "iiyr!, bl2T, □■'pniD, r'^p^, "p5'^%
n^^fS", "2^^ Vilon, Bakia, Shehakim, Zebul, Maon,
Makon, Ar6both. The first of these is the only one not
found in the Bible. It is a Rabbinical word from the Latin
velum. It is used for the very lowest heavens, or the sup-
posed sphere below the nkia. It is the veil, or sky of clouds
which mtercepts the light but permits the heat to pass
through, and m this sense Jarchi alludes to it in his inter-
pretation of Ps. xix. 7 : "there is nothing hid from the heat
thereof." So also Rabbi Jehoshuah says, Berach 58, 1 : "the
""b^l is that space or sphere through which, when broken
and rolled away, there appears the light of the open espanse."
All the rest ot these names belong to the old Hebrew, and
are found in the Old Testament Scriptures '.n such connec-
tions as to ju>tify the Rabbins m reganling them as denoting
different regions, to say the least, in the upper spaces or
heavens. See Ps. Ivii. U ; xxxvi. 6; Job xxxviii. ;i7 ; xxsvii.
18; Ps. Ixxxix. 7; Hab. iii. U; Ps. xxxiii. 13- 14; Isaiah
Iviii. 13; Ps. Ixviii. 6; Deut. xxvi. 15; 2 Chron. xxx. 27 ;
Ps. xc. 1 ; Isaiah Ixiii. 15. The word HI 3*^51 . Ps. Ix^i. 5,
is rendered heavens in our version : To Him who riddh upon
Arahoth in his name Jah, Jehovah; ride h upon the highest
or outer heaven, according to the Jewish scale. Almost all
the modera commentators give it a ditferent sense here, and
with apparently fair reasons. Our English translation,
however, is countenanced by the old versions, besides being
fully sustained by the traditional rendering of all the Jewish
commentators and translators, ancient and modem. Accord-
ing to them, it is the highest sphere corresponding to the
Se&efjLixevTj of the Greeks, or the fixed sphere, where all is
Immovable, whilst everything below is undergoing change.
It is where God specially dwells, IS' '^ZW^inhabidngefer-
nit)jy sedens in perpeluum. Is. Ivii. 15. Hence they render
it, not riding^ though that would give a most sublime ini^ige
jf we regarded this great sphere as rolling, but sitting, like
Dne throned, and that corresponds well to the primary sense
of "Dl in all the Shemitic tongues, which is not motion, a
meaning which it never has, unless demanded by something
else in the context, but super-posilion. Comp. with Is. xl. 22,
•/"*!;< a^rrbS niB'n , "He that sitteth upon the orb of
the earth," though so high that "the inhabitants thereof
are as grasshoppers." The other words are also used to
denote the divine throne or the divine dwelling. This Rab-
binical astronomy may be said to have its germ in the
Scriptures, though its expansion and arrangement are to be
ascribed to the later imagination. It was the natural out-
growth of that mode of thinking and conceiving that first
gave rise to the plural C'^'OC . Comp. also the word I^T^yS ,
2 Kings xxiii. 5, as used for the heavenly spheres or houses
(from bT3 with its Arabic sense of dweUing)^ and rllTTD j
Mazzaroth (which is the same word etymologically), Job
ixviii. '62. See also the Aiabian tradition of the seven
neavens as given in the Koran, Surat xvii. 46; more fully,
Surat xli. 11; also xxiii. 17, with Alzamakshan's comment
on the upper stories or gradations of the heavens. These
Arabian tradition^ have every appearance of being ancient,
and of having aid^.d the Rabbinical scheme, rather than of
having been derived fi-om it. The Shemitic languages are
certainly peculiar in these plural words for heaven. Tiie
New Testament ovpavol is a pure Hebneism. The Sboniitic
Word excels also in its radical significance. Ovpavo<; (6po?
oupos) has simply the idea of limit. It is the vertical hori-
zon, or the hoiizon above. The Latin caehim U simply con-
cavif'i (to KolXov) ; so is the Saxon heaven (heave arch). In
the Hebrew, the natural image is height, and this reduplicated
and carried upward by the plural form. In this respect the
Hebrew words for the great spaces are like the great time
pliualitie^ to which we have referred in the Introduction to
Uie first Chapter of Genesis. The heavens and heavens of
heavens, the D*T2',U and Z^TSII,' "^TaC , are like the D3^3?
and the C^Tsb? ^ the olam, and olam of olams, so frequent
m the Old Testament, yet so obscured in the translations.
There is another Shemitic plural equally suggestive, and
Creative Day. — ^nh^ ^nn. The earth was. Th\i
is spoken of its unarranged original or fundamt-ntal
state, or of heaven and earth in general. Thohu
Vabuhu, alUteratives and at the same time rhymes,
or like sounding; similar alliterativea occurring thus
in all the Pentateuch a3 signs of very old and popu
lar forms of expression (Gen. iv. 12; Exud, xxiii. 1
5; Numb. v. 18; Deut. ii. 15). We find them alsc
in Isaiah and elsewhere as characteristic feature* of a
poetical, artistic, keen, and soaring spirit. Thej
are at the same time pictorial and significant of tlia
earth's condition. For, according to Hupfeld and
Delitzsch, inri passes over from the primitive sense
of roaring to that of desolateness and confuaioiL
The last becomes the common sense, or that which
characterizes the natural waste (Deut. xxxii. 10) as
a positive desolation, as, for example, of a city (la.
xxxiv. 11). It is through the conception of voidness,
nothingness, that Thohu and Bohu are connected.
DeUtzsch regards the latter word as related to cni ,
which means to be brutal. Both seem doubtful, but
the more usual reference to nri- in the sense of void
or emptiness is to be preferred. We have aimed at
giving the rhyming or similarity of the sounds in oui
translation (German: oden-wiist and wiisten-od).
The desert is waste^ that is, a confused mass without
onler; the waste is desert, that is, void, without dis-
tinction of object. The first word denotes rather the
lack of form, the second the lack of content in the
earliest condition of the earth. It might, therefore,
be translated form-less, matter-iess. '* Rudis indi-
gestaque moles, in a word, a chaos,*' says DeUtzsch.
It would be odd if in this the biblical view should so
cleanly coincide with the mythological. Chaos de-
notes the void space (as in a similar manner the old
Northern Ginnun-gagap, gaping of yawnings, the
gaping abyss, which also implies present existing
material), and in the next place the rude unorganized
mass of the world-material. There is, however, al-
ready here the ivorld-form, heaven and earth, and
along with this a universal heaven-and-earth-fonn is
presupposed. It is not said that in the beginning
the condition of the heavens was thohu and bohu, —
at least of the heavens of the earth-world, as De-
Utzsch maintains ; at all events, the earth goes neither
out of chaos, nor out of "the sime chaus" as the
heavens. It is clean against the text to say that the
chaos, as something that is primarily the earth, em-
braces, at the same time, the heaven that exi-t:; with
and for the earth. For it is very clear that the lan-
guage relates to the original condition of the earth,
although the genesis of the earth may serve, by way
of analogy, for the genesis of the universe. "jlUPI'j
the first condition of the earth was cinn (from ^In ^
to roar, be in commotion), wave, storm-flood, ocean,
abyss. The first state of the earth was itself the
liiehom, and over this roaring flood lay the darkness
spread abroad. It is wholly anticipatory when we
say that " this undulating mas* of waters was not
the earth itself in the condition of thohu and bohu,
but that it enclosed it; for on the t./ird day the firm
which is not found in other families of languages. It ip tl «
word for life (C^n , lives), denoting a plurality in this J&a
as well as in the words for heaven and eternity. Instead
of being despatched as a mere i^f*s loquendi^ this, and other
peculiarities of the earliest tongues are well worthy 0U3
deepest attention. The plui-ality of life, of the gi'cat spi02s.
and the great times, seem all to have come from a way of
viewing the works of God which has no parallel 'n the rip
resentations of other human languages. — T. L.l
1C4
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OK MOSES.
iind (7";s<) goes forth from the waters," Delitzsch.
Further on, Ps. civ. 6 is cited to show that, original-
ly, water propei surrounded the firm earth-kernel,
and Job xxxviii. 8, according to which the sea breaks
forth out of the mother's womb (the earth) — poetical
representations that are t'-ue enough, if one does not
take them according to ihe letter ; in which case
they are in direct contradiction to each other. The
waters, of ver. 2, is quite another thing than the
water proper of the third creative day; it is the fluid
(or gaseous) form of the eartli itself in its first condi-
tion. 2 Pet. iii. 5 is not opposed to this ; for as the
water takes form, the earth breaks out of the water,
just as the water comes foith from the earth in con-
sequence of the creative division. The darkness is
just the absence of the phenomenal, or the absence
of light (for the vision view) in the condition of the
earth itself, — in other words, night. — n^*1 , But
the spirit of God hovered over (Aug., 7noved
upon). The breath of man, the wind of the earth,
and the spirit, especially the spirit of God, are sym-
boUcal analogies. The breath is the life-unity and
life-motion of the physical creature, the wind is the
unity and life-motion of the earth, the spirit is the
unity and life-motion of the life proper fro which it
belongs ; the spirit of God is the unity and hfe-mo-
tion of the creative divine activity. It is not a wind
of God to which the language here primarily relates
(Theodoret, Saadia, Herder, and others), but the
spirit of God truly (wherefore the word Dm, De-
jtzsch; comp. Ps. xxxiii. 6). From this place on-
ward, and throughout the whole Scripture, the spirit
of God is the single formative principle evermore
presenting itself with personal attributes in all the
divine creative constitutions, whether of the earth,
of nature, of the theocracy, of the Tabernacle, of the
church, of the new Ufe, or of the new man. The
Grecian analogue is that of Eros (or Love) in its
reciprocal action with the Chaos, and to this purpose
have the later Targums explained it : the spirit of
love. It was rBn"'2 (hovering) over the waters.
The conception of brooding cannot be obtained out
of Deut. xxxii. 11 (Delitzsch), for the eagle does not
brood over the living young, but wakes them, draws
them out (educates), makes them lively.* The mytho-
logical world-egg of the Persians has uo place here.
Should we adopt any view of this formative energy
of the spirit of God (which may have worked upon
• [Still the conception of brooding, cherishing (fovens), is
/"Dudamental in the word Z\T\^ . Its primary sense is a vi-
brating, throbbing motion, most emblematic of the bcgin-
BinK of life — csjiecially as ti-aced in the epg-form — the first
fteginning of heat and pulsation. Its primary significjince
is onomatojiieal — rahap, to flutter (regular pult-atile mo-
tion). Hence it becomes very early one of the verbs of lov-
ing, being closely allied, both in sound and sense, to the
Hebrew cm . In Syriac it is the common word for lovinp,
warming, cherishing. In the Arabic the middle guttui'al
baA Roftened down to alcph, and we havev^K, denoting
intense and cherishing love. Ko word could have been bet-
ter adapted to the idea, intended in this place, of an inwiird,
Ufe-giving power, rather than a mere mechanical outward
motion, sucli as is given by the translation "blew" or
••moved upon." Xowherecliie in all the usage of the He-
brew or Syriac ia TiH"! ever employed in the sense of hhw-
irifi. The PieJ form hero makes the inward sense of throb-
hini; the more intensive. We see no harm to the Scriptures
Croiu (he supposition that this idea of the cherishing spirit
was the origm of the fable of EroH, or of the mytboiogical
world-ogg, whether regarded as Persian or Greek. Sec
AiivtopbanefS Aves, 694.-1'. L.]
the unorganized mass through the medium of a gretH
wind of God) it would consist in this, that by iti
inflowing it diflferentiated this mass, that is, con-
formably to its being, called out points of unity, and
divisions which fashioned the mass to multiplicity in
the contrasts that follow. It separated the hetero-
genous, and bound together the homogenuus, and m
prepared the way fur the dividing the hght fiom th«
darkness. It cannot be said, however, that "all th«
co-energizing powei-s in the foinaation of che world
were the emanations or determinations of this spin!
ot" God." For we must distinguish the creative wordi
with Nl- from "^^ , or \\ni forming by the spirit of
God.* The ol^ect, however, of this forming is not
* [The word "*?7 ^ ii^ore formative than X"13 , lut not
less creative. The latter is used more of the primary divi-
sioHs, if not of the primary matter itself. The foimer de-
notts generally the more artistic ur architectural work, th«
handy work, 1">-1^ nt-'?.^, Ps. six. 2, or "'iiria
7)^P153SK , Ps. viii. 4, "the work of thy fingers." It is,
according to one view we may take of creation (see Introd. to
Gen. i. p. 128), the higher work, the greater work of the divine
artistic wisdom as distinguished from the mere divine poioer.
In its most outward primary applications, "13i'^ denotes the
elaborate shaping formations, such as that of a statue, oi
idol, Hab. ii. 18 ; Is. xliv. 9, 10. Hence it becomes the
appropriate word to express inward formation— ybrm in the
more interior sense — law, structure, constituting state— in a
word, idea in distinction from idolon. As a word of physical
creative constitution, it is variedly and impressively used to
denote the appointed arrangements in the seasons, as Ps.
Ixxiv. 17, om^J" nnx C)^H^ V^|?» "summer and win-
ter thou hast /orwicrf them "'—Is. xlv. 7, Nll^^ nix "ISI^
~^|n, "who formed the light and created darkness" (the
ligiit the more ideal or artistic creation). " He made the
sea, ITC*", and his hands /ormed, 11^" , the dry land,"—
gave it its greater variety and beauty of form. So Amos iv.
13, ** who created the wind, or air (5<"^3^), who formed the
mountains" C^SJV). It is used to denote the formation of
a people by law and providential guidance: Is. xliii. 21,
■•b TllS*' !|T"C2?, "this people that I have tormed for
myself." Is. xlv. 18, 5<"l3 is used of the heavens, and "2jt^
of the earth. This might seem opposed to the distinction
we hnve made, but the context that follows shows why the
more ideal or formative word is thus used of the earth—
^nrrxb i'n33iD— "who formed the earth and made it,
who established it (gave it a nature, Syr. X3^D) that it might
not be a tohu (a formless waste), who made it t" be inhab-
ited." It is used of the human body, or rather nf the whole
human physical constitution. Gen. ii. 7 ; " And the Lord
God Ibime'd man," (ver. 8) "and he put the man whom he
bad formed." It is, in like manner, most impressively
applied to the most exquisite and divine processes in tht
human structure. Ps. xciv. 9 : ::''3^ xbn "j"? nSEi"^ CX ,
" He that formed the eye, shall he not see ? " Ilcnnc, in a
more interior sense still, it is used of the very constitulion
of the soul : Zach. xii. 1, "who stretcheth out the heavens,
and foundeth the earth, and formeth the spirit of man
within him," i2'1p3, in interionbus ejus. Deeper btill, it
is used of the hearty or the moi-al constitution : P&. xxxiii. Ii,
C3b "in^ ->STn , "that forms their heart alike." It
carries the pamp idea as a noun, and this gives lise to its
u>e a^ denoting the forming or imaging faculty of the soul,
as in the striking passage. Gen. vi. 5 : P'i^tUn'C ~i3t"?31
"^25 I "and everj" imaging of the thoughts of his heart."
12C^ is the form of the thought, as the thought is the form
of the emotion, or of the deep heart that lies below all.
One of the must noteworthy uses of the verb "iSt*^ is iti
np]>lication to the human generative process ; it is also to bi
ubscrved liow this is a-^cribed directly to God, as though, in
every cjise uf lUe individual gestation m the womb, there
was something of a creative power and prorosp ■ see Jer. i. 5,
^^23 "^SK D")C33, " before I formed thee in the womb.*
Compare Krcles. xi. 5, where this formative process is pro
8cnted as cjne of the deep mysterious things known * nly u
CHAP. I.— II. 3.
161
the primitive matter, but the flowing earth-sphere.
Just as little can one say that the six da_v.<' works
have their beginning in Ter. 3 ; for the result of the
tirst day is not the light merely, but also the dark-
ness (see Is. xlv. 7). Concerning the theosophic
interpretation of thohu vabohu as a world in ruins
whicli had come from God's judgment on the Fall of
ihe Angels (see ver. 3). — Ver. 3. Let there be
light. — Here begin the geologico-cosmical creative
periods. This new beginning, therefore, must be
distinguished from that first creation of the heavens
and the earth which is to be regarded as having no
creative beginning before it. Heuoeforth the treat-
ment is that of a sacred geology, yet regarded in its
bibhcal sense as geologico-cosmological. Hence, in
ver. 3, the ci-eation of the Ught-heaven ; ver. 8, the
creation of the air-heaven; ver. 14, the creation of
the star-lieaveu ; ver. 26, the creation of the he:iven-
ly core of the earth itself.* — And God said. — " Ten
times is this word, ^^ST i repeated in the history
of the seven days." The omnipotence of the creative
word^ Ps. sxsiii. 9 : He spake and it was done, he
commanded and it stood (Rom. iv. 17). The creative-
word in its deeper significance : Ps. xxxiii. 6 ; Is.
xl. 26; John i. 1-3; Heb. i. 2 ; xi. 3 ; t'ol. i. 16.
Tli£ light, the first distinct creative formation, and,
tlierefore, the formation-principle, or the pre-condi-
tioning for all further formations. Of this forntative
dividing power of light, physical science teaclies us.
It is now tolerably well understood, that the light is
not conditioned by perfected luminous bodies, but,
on tlie contrary, that hght bodies are conditioned liy
a preceduig luminous element. Thus there is set
aside the objection taken by Celsus, by the Mani-
cliajans, and by rationalism generally, namely, the
supposed inversion of order in having first the light
and afterwards the luminous body. And yet the
light without any substratum is just as little con-
ceivalile as the darkness. The question arises, how
the author conceived the going forth of the light,
whether out of the dark bosom of the earth-flood, or
out of the dark bosom of the forming heaven ? As
the view of the heavenly lights (light bodies) ver. 14,
is geocentric, so may the same view prevail here of
the heaven-light itself By this is meant that in the
fact of the first illumination of the earth the author
presents the fact of the birth of Ught generally in the
world, without declaring thereby that the date of the
genesis of the earth's light is also the date of the
genesis of liglit universally. But we may well take
the birth of light in the earth (or the earth becoming
light) as the analogue whereon is presented tlie birth
of liglit in the heaven, just as in the creation of man
there is symbolized the creation of the spirit-world
collectively. \Ve let alone here the question whether
the light is an emanation (an outflowing) of a lumi-
God, and especially Ps. cxxxis. 13-16, whether the language
there denotes the individual or gcnci-ic formation, or both —
"when I was curiously wrougliL,*' etc.; "and in thy book
all my members were wi-itten, ^^22^ ^"'^7' *^^ '^^^ *^*^y
were being formed " (see remarks i'n Introd. to Genesis, p.
135).
If the Hebrew had developed itself into a philosophical
Unguage, from this root would have come their n.ame for
formal cause, causa /onnalis, that wliich gives idea to any-
thing, or Mia/.v5 il what it is, in distinction from the causa
finaiis, or ':ausa efflcifns. In fact, it is in this very way
that such a term lias been formed in .\nibic, and m the
Habbtnic.'il Hebrew, only they have employed for this pur-
pose the kindred "11^ , which connects the idea oi formation
with that of biiidinij or inward unity. — T. L.]
• I .Man is thus called by Lange as the causa Jinalis of all
tLe other earth formations. — T. L.l
nous element, or an imdulation from a lumluoui
body; only it may be remarked that sound goes oi
all sides, and may, therefore, be supjiosed to undu
late in sonorous waves, whilst the ray of light, on th«
other hand, goes directly, for which reason the appU
cation to it of such an undulation of sonorous ivavef
would seem unsuitable. The idea of an letheria
vibration may make a medium between emanation
and undulation. Without doubt, however, the mean-
ing here is not merely a light-a|)pearing which goes
forth out of the heaven-ground,* and breaks through
the dark vapor of the earth, or from heavenly clouds
of lighi (such as the primary form of the creation
may have appeared to be), but an immediate lighting
up of the luminous element in the earth itself, some-
thing like what the Polar night gives rise to in the
northern aurora; enough that it is said of the
contrast presented between the illuminating .and
the shade-producing element. The light goes, how-
ever, in the first place, out of the dark world-forms
(not the mere world material) after that the spirit of
God, as I'ormative principle, has energized in them.
The spirit of God is the spiritual light that goes out
from God ; therefore its working goes before the
creation of the outer light ; and therefore, too, it is
that this light is t.ie symbol, and its operation simi-
lar to the operation, of the spirit — that i.s, the forma-
tion and the revelation of beauty. — And there ■was
light. — The famed sublimity of this expression as
given by Longinus (in a somewhat doubtful text)
and others, is predicated on the pure simjilicity and
confidence with which it sets forth the omnipotence
of the creative word. — And God saw the light
that it was good, — The first beauty is the light
itself For the Hebrew 3ia denotes the beautiful
along with the good, even as the Greek icaKbi' de-
notes the good along with the beautiful. The sense :
t/ial it was good, does not seem easy ; and therefore
TertuUian (and more lately Neumann) have accepted
the quia of the Itala. On the other hand, DeUtzsch
remarks : " The conclusion is that to God each sin-
gle work of creation appears good." The conclusion
lies, perhaps, in the pause of solemn contemplation,
out of which, at the end, goes forth the perfect sab-
bath. It is because the religious human soul recog-
nizes the fair and the good in the event of the ap-
pearing, that there is therein reflected to it the foun-
tain of this spiritual ethical satisfaction, namely the
contemplation of God Himself Still the contempla-
tion of God does not regard the object as though
captivated by it because it is fair, but it rejoices
therein that it is fair ; or we may say that, in a cer-
tain manner, it is the very eflicacy of this contempla-
tion that it becomes fair. — And God divided
between the Ught and the darkness. — Although
it is farther said that God named the light day and
the darkness night, still it must not be supposed
that here there is meant only the interchange between
day and night as the ordaining of the points of divi-
sion between both, namely morning and evening.
Although hght and darkness, day and night, are
called aftei their appearing, yet are they still, all the
more, ver^ day and night, in other words, the very
causahties themselves. The Ught denotes all that is
simply illuminating in its eflicacy, all the luminous
elemeni; the darkness denotes all that is untrans
* [Ilimvtelsgrundi'.. "We fail in translating this to gel
any better word to represent the frequent tieiman Grunt
(m composition) than our word ground. Foundation pr&
scnts an incongruity of figure which is less in the more gen
eral tciin ground. Plane wf ild be too indefinite. — T. L.l
itm
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
parent, dark, shadow-casting; both together denote
the poliiritv of the created world, as it exists between
the light-formations and the night-formations — the
constitution of the day and night. " One sees," says
Delitzseh, " how false is the current and purely pri-
vative conception of darkness ; as when, for exam-
ple, a mediseval interpreter (Maxima Bibl. Lugd. vi.
p. 868) says: sicut siienlimn nihil est, sed icbi vox
non est mlcntiuyn dicitw, sic tenebra nihil sutU, sed
ubi lux non est teitebr<E dicuntury It is true, there
must be presupposed for the daylight an illuminating
Bource or fountain of light, and so for the darkness a
§hadow-casting causality (Jas. i. 16); but it would
be quite wrong to say that light and darkness are
two principles (according to the course of the earlier
theosophists : Jacob Bohm, and a later school :
Baumgarteii and others). If it is farther said that
the darkness has not the witness 3ia (good), it may
be replied that it certainly has it mediately, ch. i. 31.
It is indeed said still earlier : " We do not read that
the tohu and bohu, that the tehom with the darkness
lying over it originated in the divine call into being
(fiat), therefore they had their origin in some other
way." This is a very unwarranted conclusion ; so
also, then, must the heavens have originated in some
other way. The heaven, however, has its origin in
the word of the Lord (Ps. xxxiii. ), and so also the night
and the darkness (Is. xlv. 1) as well as the abyss
(Ps. civ. 8). It is, therefore, a hard inconsequence
when Delitzseh, following the mythological views,
regards the thohu wabhohu as the chaos enclosing
even the heaven in its birth (p. 93), and still farther
regards it theosophically as the ruined habitation of
condemned demons. In the historical derivation of
the last opinion (p. 105) Delitzseh appears to have
confounded two distinct views : the scholastic, that
God had formed the human world for the purpose of
tilling up the void that arose in heaven after the fall
of the angels, and the theosophic, that the terrestrial
region of the world was, in the earlier time, the abode
of Lucifer and his companions, which afterwards,
through their guilt, became a thohu vabhohu out of
which God laid the foundation of a new world. In
this view the thohu vabhohu is " the glowing mate-
rial mass into which the power of God's wrath had
melted the original world after it had become cor-
rupted by the fall of the spirits (pp. 105 and 114
below), — or it was the rudis imiit/estaqiie motes into
which God had compressed and precipitated that
spiritual but now ungodly world condemned to the
flames in consequence of its materializing, and this
for the purpose of making it the substratum of a new
creation which had its beginning in the fact that God
had placed the chaos of this old fire-invaded world
vholly under water." One might well ask ; shall
.he tiie-brand itself (the old bumt-up earth) be the
chaos, or the divine reaction through the quenching
in watery Was the fire-brand the work of the
demons, or did it come through (iod's judgment and
counteraction ? All such resolutions ot the difficulty
ire in a state of mutual confusion. And this is no
wonder, for a certain theosophic hankering after
dualism with ita two principles can only veil itself in
Jark and fantastic phrases. In opposition to these
gnostici.sing representations of matter, the demands
jf a pure monotheism require of us an acquiescence
m the idea that matter too is good, because it is from
(iod,— in 30 far Mideed, as we can speak of pure
•Matter in general terme. The more particidar foun-
tain of this view — after certain older preludes and
)opular representations (Delitzseh, p. 1U6) derived
from Gnostic traditions — is Jacob Bohm (Myst
Magn. p. 67) and the Gnostic teachers that aros«
after him, Friedrich von Meyer, Baumgarten (Gen&
sis), and others. With peculiar zeal hath Kurtz also
taken part in these theosophic phantasies, as also ic
those other of the miscegenations er sexual confu-
sions between the angels of heaven and the daugh-
ters of earth (Gen. vi.). The grounds presented by
Delitzseh, in opposition to his earlier contrary view
(as given in the first two editions of his Commentary),
are the following : 1. In the interpretation aforesaid
one would, to be sure, expect "'nFii instead of nn"'ni
but the conscious connection need not lie precisely
in the consciousness of the writer ; he relates simply
a matter of fact. And yet he must have been more
enlightened in respect to the nature of things than
our scientific man. A bUnd narration of facts would
here be as inconsistent as a pure indication of a
theosophic sense in thohu vabhohu. 2. Thohu has,
indeed, a predominating privative character ; it
arises, however (Is. xxxiv. 11 ; xxiv. 10; Jer. iv. 23),
from a positive destruction. But how natural was it
to apply the pictorial thohu vabhohu to such a condi-
tion. What more purely privative than the word
nothing ? and yet we say it of positive states of de
struction. According to Delitzseh, in the method?
of its construction (world-brand, quenching-water)
must Plutonism and Neptunism have reached their
deepest grounding. The grounds that follow are in
no respects better (p. 104). What have rendered
the hypothesis suspicious from its beginning hitherto
are its apocryphal or popular origin (Delitzseh, p.
105), its Gnostic coloring, and its affinity to that
other scholastic pbantasma that God had created
men to fill up the vacuum in the fallen angel-world.
It must, however, become very evident that the
representation of an "overcoming of the darkness,"
in the physical sense in which it here presents itself,
is utterly foreign to the holy text ; it is like the
mingling of conceptions, namely of a physical and
an ethical darkness. The representation, then, of
ver. 2 will be clearly a picturing of the primitive
condition of the earth, as it became in consequence
of the first general creation, ver. 1. Besides, this
hypothesis obliterates that line which everywhere
else appears between the angelic and human regions
and natures. Finally, ver. 2, as a representation ot
the flowing, form-receptive condition of the eartL-
mass gives the bases for all farther ascending forma-
tions. Add to this that, in such case, the region o)
Lucifer would have been visited by the fire-judgment
earUer than Lucifer himself — a representation which
runs counter to the usual order of things — not to
say, that, on such a supposition, Lucifer himself
should have been rightly banished from the whote
extent of the earth-region. Or, can it be that God
has built the new house of humanity upon the foal
beams of a demoniac power ? But it is not worth
our while to dwell more fully upon a representation
which is so characterized by its own sharp contradic-
tions.— And there was evening and there wns
morning. — Uere, in the first place, we must not
suppose that the evening and the morning were
merely the sequence of the preceding darkness and
of the light that followed it, notwithstanding' tha'. the
first evening and morning so fittingly appenJ them-
selves to such a contrast. Still less are wr to thick
of the usual evening and morning, since .he earti,
had not yet been astronomically arranged. Evening
and morning denote rather the interval ol a creativ*
day, and this is evidenJy alter the Hebrew mode ol
CHAP. I.— n. 8.
le:
reckoning ; the day is reckoned from sunset. The
morning that foUowa stands for the second half of
the day proper. In the same manner was the day
-eckoned by the Arabians, the Athenians {t'vxd-q-
u ,./y), the Germans, and the Gauls. It is againiit
the text for Delitzsch to put as the ground here the
Babylonish reckoning of the day, namely from the
dawning of the morning. The earlier theological
representation, that by the creative periods were to
be miderstood the usual astronomical days, is now
only held by individuals (Baumgarten, Calwer Hand-
bucb, Keil's Genesis). It is opposed to this, in the
first place, that the creative days are already mun-
bered before the determination of the astronomical
relation of the earth to the sun, although on other
grounds must we hold that the days from the fourth
onward were not astronomical ; there are in the way,
secondly, the idea of the first day whose evening had
its beginning in that dark thohu vabhohu which had
no evening before it, as well as the idea of the sev-
enth day, the day of God's rest, which is not defined
by an evening and a morning, but runs on through
the ordained course of the world ; there is, thirdly,
the idea of the da;/ of God as it is given to u.s in the
90th Psalm, which is traditionally ascribed to Moses
(ver. 4). That this time-determination of a thousand
years does not denote an exactly measured chiono-
logieal period, but still a period defined by essential
marks of time, appears from the converse of Ps. xc.
in 2 Pet. iii. 8 (a thousand years as one day, and one
day as a thousand years), and also from the thousand
years of the judgment-time as the transition period
from the present state of the world to that which lies
beyond (Rev. xx.). This comprehensive significance
has the divine day (God's day) or the judgment-day
pre-eminently in the Old Testament (Is. ii. 12 ; Joel
i. 15 ; Ezek. xiii. 5). Delitzsch, who also holds that
the creative days are periods, reckons, as another
argument, that in Gen. ii. 4 the six days are denoted
as one day. Add to this the very usual mode of
speech, according to which, day in the Old Testa-
ment often denotes a longer duration of time, for
example, in the formula even to this day. We are
not, however, to conceive of the evening and morn-
ing of the single creative days as merely symbolic
intervals of the day of God. According to the
analogy of the first day, the evening is the time of a
peculiar chaotic fermentation of things, whilst the
morning is the time of that new, fair, solemn world-
building that corresponds to it. With each evening
there is also indicated a new birth-travail of things,
a new earth-revolution which elevates the old forma-
tion that went before it — a seeming darkening, a
seeming sunset or going down of the world ; and so
later with this same appearance came on the flood ;
and so, too, in Zach. xiv. 7, the day of the com-
mencing judgment is, with the highest significance,
denoted an evening. No less significant is it in the
eschatological words of our Lord : and the sun shall
withdraw its light. Matt. xxiv. 29. With each morn-
ing, on the contrary, there is a new, a higher, a fairer,
and a richer state of the world. In this way do the
evening and morning in the creative periods have
the highest significance for an agreement of the
sacr3d geology with the results of the scientific geol-
ogy. The meaning would seem to be incorrectly
taken by DeUtzsch when he says : " With each effort
of the divine creating is it morning, with each remis-
sion it is evening" (p. 106). The most peculiar
work of God, we may rather say, would appear to be
Mch of 'hose stormy revolutions, in which the spirit
of God hovers like an eagle over the chaotic fermen
tations ; in the creative mornings, on the contrary
come in the holy rests when God surveys the nen
work and sees how good it is. (Comp. Vox Rocas
MONT, History of the Earth, p. 7: "Evening: a dara
return of chaos." Doubtless the designation lacks
propriety in all respects, and yet it may lead to th«
right.)
[Note on the Relation of the First Ysrsi
OF Gen. I. TO the Rest of the Chapter. — Among
all the interpretations of Gen. i., the most difficult aj
well as the most unsatisfactory is that which regards
the first verse as referring to a period indefinitely
remote, and all that follows as comprised in six solar
days. It is barely hinted at by some of the patris-
tic writers, but has become a favorite with certain
modern commentators, as furnishing them with a
method of keeping the ordinary days, and yet avoid-
ing the geological ditBculty, or seeming to avoid it,
by throwing all its signs of the earth's antiquity into
this chasm that intervenes between the first and sec-
ond verses. The objections to it may be thus
stated :
( 1 ) Besides the peculiar difficulties that attend any
view of ordinary solar days, such as a morning and
evening without a sun, or the language of succession,
of growth, and of a seeming nature, vrithout any con-
sistent corresponding reaUty, there is another and
greater incongruity in connecting this with a former
and very different state of things, or mode of pro-
ceeding, with which, after all, it has no real conneC'
tion either in the realm of nature or of divine provi-
dence.
(2) It is a building of this world on the rums of a
former, without any natural or moral reasons there-
for. The states preceding, as understood by this
hypothesis, were in no sense preparatory. The
catastrophe which makes way for it seems entirely
arbitrary, and in no sense resembles the pauses
described in Genesis, each one of which is in the
upward order, and anticipatory of the work that
follows.
(3) It is evidently brought in as a possible escape
from the difiBculties of geology, and would never
have been seriously maintained had it not been for
them.
(4) It has to make the heavens of the first verse a
different heavens from that of the eighth, without
any exegetical warrant therefor. This is a ratiorial-
izing interpretation, carrying with it a conception of
our modern astronomy, and almost wholly unknown
to the Scriptures, which everywhere speaks of the
heavens and the earth therein mentioned as one sys-
tem. It is the heavens of our earth, built upon it as
described in Gen. i. 6, 8 ; Ps. civ. ; 1 Sam. ii. 8, etc.,
and always taken in connection with it ; not a far-off
astronomical heavens, thouglr the rudiments of such
an idea come afterwards into the Hebrew. Thus in
predictions, whether of destruction or of renovation,
the heavens and the earth go together. " I create
new heavens and a new earth," Is. Ixvi. 22 ; Ps. cii.
27, and other passages. The language is exactly
parallel to that of Gen. i. 1, and yet we cannot sup-
pose that there is included here the asironomical
heaven of stars and planets, at least accordi."ig to tha
conceptions of our modem astronomy. It 1,^ a re-
newal of the earth, in some way, together with tuosf
celestial or sky phenomena that are in connection
with it, as parts, in fact, of the tellurian system. Il
is the same language, the same mode of conceiving
as late down in Scripture as the 2d Epistle of Pet<tf
.68
oENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
lii. 5-7 — the " earth and heavens " that were of old
before the flood are put m contrast with " the earth
and heavens that are now," and which are to be
changed for *' a new earth and heavens " *' accordiu;^
to the promise (ver. 13) to which we look." It is
the same language that occurs repeatedly in the
Revelations (xxi. 1), and which, whatever we may
think of its prophetic meaning, shows the fixedness
of the conception down to the latest times of the
scriptural canon.
(5) It violates the principles of a rational and
grammatical exegesis, in making a separation between
the first and second verses, of which there is no trace
or reason in the language itself. If used in the same
way in narrating historical events, in any other part
of the Bible, no one wovdd have thought of the verb
X^3, in the first, and nr"n, in the second verse,
othermse than as cotemporaneous or, iti direct con-
tinuation at least, with no chasm of time between
them long or short. It would have been interpreted
like the precisely similar sentence, Job i. 1 : " There
teas a man in the land of Uz, and the man was, etc.,
STKn n-^r^'^ yis-y^itz c^x n-^n. Who would
think of separating the second rt'^rt here from the
first, or sundering the evident continuity? If it be
said that the context in Job controls, and the very
nature of the subject, so should it also in Genesis,
unless we make a new context after our own imagi-
nations, especially as there are clear ways in Hebrew
of expressing such a parting of the terms, had it been
designed to do so.
Besides this, it is opposed to the usual force of
the conjunction "i . Taken even as a mere copulative,
it would not allow of such a sharp and remote sever-
ance. But ^ is much more than this in Hebrew.
It is seldom without a time sense, or an inferential
sense, showing a connection, not only of mere event,
but also of reason and causality. So here it shows
the reason for the use of S"i3 in the preceding verso.
" In the beginning God created^'' formed, fashione<i,
the earth ; for it was formless and void, or when it
was formless and void, etc. Let one take Noldius'
(/oncordance of the Hebrew Particles, and see iiow
often (in the great majority of cases, we may say) the
conjunction wau has this close-joining inferential
sense. It is much njore usual than its bare copula-
tive force, but even this is out of harmony with the
hypothesis of severance as commonly presented.
See al.so Introd. to Gen. i. pp. 129, 130.— T. L.]
C. Vers. 6 — S. Second Creative Dat/. — Let
there be a firmament. — Rakia (from Spn , to
stretch, spread out, beat out) an extension or ex-
pansion, rendered in the LXX and by others, uTepe-
wMo, and in the Y nh^ateJirwamerUum, — names which
arc more material than 5^p"i. Knobkl ;
'The
heaven was to the Hebrews a material substance
(Exod. .\xiv. 10), a fixed vault establi.shed upon the
waters that surrounded the circle of the eaith (Prov.
viii. 27), firm as a molten mirror (Job xxxvii. lis),
*nd bornii up by the highest hills, which are tliere-
Jbrc called llie pillars and foundations of the heaven
(2 Sam. xxii. 8; Job xxvi. 11); openings or doors
»re ascribed to it (ch. vii. 11 ; xxviii. 17 ; Ps. Ixxviii.
23). There are the same representations elsewhere."
But we must not forget that Hebrew modes of ex-
uression for objects that have a religious bearing, do
ever contain a symbolical element wiiich disdains the
iteral pressure. Therefore the stars which in Gen.
i. 17 are fixed in the heaven, can nevertheless, accord
ing to Isaiah xl. 26, set themselves in motion as a
host of God ; and hence it is that the one heaven ex-
pands itself into a heaven of heavens. And thus th*
heavens bends down to the earth (Ps. xviii. 10), or ip
spread out like tapestry (Ps. civ. 2), or its beams ar«
waters (ver. 3), whilst the same heavtn agidn is called
the footstool of God. — In the midst of the waters.
— We must beware here of thinking of a mass of
elementary water; quite as little could a tiuid mass
which is yet identified with the light be elementar?.
and just as httle can it be a flood, or collection oi
water, which consists of the tliree factors air, earth,
and water. At this point then is completed the
second division. The true standpoint of contempla-
tion would seem to be the view, that in the azure
welkin of the sky the clouds appear to give out their
evaporation, and to withdraw themselves behmd the
blue expanse like a supercelestial gathering of water
(Ps.civ.3, 13). It follows from this, however, that the
visible clouds and the rain may be assigned to the
lower collection of waters, and that there is meant
here the gaseous water as it forms a unity with the
air, and so makes an ethereal atmosphere (not " the
water masses that hover over the air-strata of the
atmosphere "). DeUtzsch here mistakes the symbol-
ical element. " It must be admitted," he says, " that
in this the Old Testament is chargeable with a delect,
for a physical connection between the descending
rain-waters and the heavenly waters, which is also
indicated in the New Testament (Rev. iv. 6) cannot be
maintained." Indeed, it is with the actual physical
connection between the invisible collection of water
(the gas-formed) and the visible, that the contrast is
established ; it is the polaric tension which even the
phenomenological extension brings to vii'W. Buf,
why should the Septuagint correct the text here with
the addition, ver. 8 : And God sau\ whilst the Hebrew
text has it not? H-.id the prophetic author some
anticipation that the blue vault oi heaven was merely
an appearance, whilst the savai.s of the Septuagint
bad no .-^ueh anticipation, and, therefore, proceeded
to doctor the passage? There may, indeed, be an
exaggeration ol' this conception of the ujtper waters,
since Philoponus and the other church fathcis under-
stand by the same the ether that is beyond the earth's
atmosphere ; nevertheless, their view would seem to
be more correct than that which refers the expression
to a proper cloud-formed atmospheiic water. — And
God named the firmament heaven, CCB . See
ver. 1. Delitzsch: Here is meant the heaven of the
earth-world; ver. 1, on the contrary, refers to the
heaven and the heaven of heavens. But if the firma-
ment IS " the immeasurable far-re.aehing height," there
is a failure, or falling short, in the limiting of the
conception. A main point appears to be. that the
rakia is presented to view as the symbolic dividing
of the super-earthly heaven, a phenomenal appear-
ance of that house of God to which all who pray to
(iod look up. For the later cosmological interpreta-
tions of the upper waters, see IJelitzsch, p. lOS.
7. Vers. 9-13. TJiird Crraliir Jiai/.—Ycr.'.K Let
the waters be gathered together. — The Ifrimjin,
the enrtli into form and the creation of the ve(jetal^
world. — That the ph\ sical dividing of the earth-mass
and of the water-mass is here jiresented, is clear.
There would appear, however, to be sigidfied a pre-
ce<ling chemical separation of both elements, which
had withdrawn themselves from the inner or undoi
core of the earth. The expression C"'Hn !n;3'
CHAP. 1.— 11. 3.
1C>9
ICjOtcs properly not merely an outward assembling,
but an intensive close combining (see Gesenius, T^'^p).
ijpon the formation of tlie water proper, as it is now
introduced, is conditioned tiie firm underlying of tlie
eartli. The completing of this division, however, has
for its cousei-iueuce tiiat flowiug togetlu'r of tlie water
into its peculiar place, with wliich immediately the
self-foi-ming earth-soil now comes into risibility.
It is thereby implied that the elevations and depres-
sions of the earth's surface — the hills and vales, the
highlands and the ocean-depths — are here formed,
just as it is so precisely set forth, Ps. civ. B-8 (with
which compare Prov. viil. 24). And so, too, the crea-
tion of the hills is here only indicated, or rather pre-
sented, as a consequence of the creation of the sea
(see Ps. xc. 2; Deut. xxxiii. 15; Habak. iii. 8).
Thus much is clear ; as long as the water and the
earth-mass are not divided, there can be no mention
of any oiigination of the hills. With the sea-lite,
however, must begin also the earth-life, that is, the
working of the imier earth-fire that causes the up-
heavings. It is a wrong apprehension of the waters
of ver. 2 and ver. 6, when one takes the story of cre-
tion as favoring a one-sided Neptuuism (Wagner).
The volcanic action of the earth in the formation of
the earth, is not expressed, indeed, but it is through-
out freely unplied ; it would appear to be indicated,
Ps. civ. S. There is truly no tlitficulty in supposing
that the formation of the hills kept on through the
succeeding creative days. In respect to this, De-
litzsch expresses himself better than Hofmann:
" Generally," says he, " the works of the single crea-
tive days consist only in laying Ibundations; the
birth-process that is introduced in each, extends its
efiicacy beyond it, and, in tiiis sense we say with
Hofmann (i. p. 278) : ' Not how lorig^ but how mani/
limes, God created is the thing intended to be set
forth.' " Much more have we to distinguish between
the distinct creative acts and the creative evolutions.
Even after the creative division of the first day the
evolving of light may stiU go on, and the same
thought holds good of the efiicacy of the succeeding
&cts of each of the other days. The act itself means
the introduction of a new principle out of the word
of God, which, as such, has the form of an epoch-
creating event. — Ver. 10. And God named the
dry earth land, that is, earth-soil in the narrower
sense, and, therefore, it is that }'"IX has no article. —
And the water named he sea. — Properly seas,
"or rather ocean; for it is more intensive than a
numerical plural, and is therefore (as ui Ps. xlvi. 4)
construed in the singular." Delitzsch. On the other
nand, Knobel would make prominent the singleness
of the seas in the rendering Weltmeer^ or world-sea,
main sea, or ocean. — And G-od saw. — Xow has the
earth-formation come into visibility, though only in
its first outlines, or, according to the idea of the
naturaUst, as an insular appearing of the land-region
as it untblds itself to view. — Let the earth bring
forth (sprout, germinate). — It is agreeable to the
nature of the earth as well as of the plant that both
«re together as soon as possible. The earth has an
mclinatioii to germinate, the plant to appear. In
truth, its origination is a new creative act. In the
proper place is this creation narrated ; for the plant
denotes the transformation of the elementary mate-
rials, earth, air, water, which are now present in
organic life through the inward working of the hght.
It forms the preconditioning, as the sign or prognos
tic, of the awaiting animal creation. And though it
has need of the light too in some measure, it doea
not yet want the sunshine in its first subordinate
kinds. The question now arises, whether we must
distinguish three kinds of plants : Xtlj^ , tender green.
--" , herbs and shrubs, vegetables and grain !o
the smaller growths generally), and i"i3 y: , fruit
tree, according to the view of Knobel, embracing aL
trees inasmuch as tney all bear seed. Delitzsch, at
well as Knobel, assumes this threefold division.
Farther on, however, we see that the more general
kinds precede (lights, water-swarmings), in order
that they may become more or less specific. And
here XIU^ may present the universal conception of
all vegetable life in its first germination (although
including along with it the more particular kmds of
cryptogamic and the grasses), whilst in this way the
contrast between the herbaceous plants and the trees
becomes more prominent (Umbreit, Ewald). Thence,
too, it appears that the sign of sted-formation, of
propagation, and of particular specification, is ascril>-
ed to all plants. Closer observations in respect to
single particulars may be found in Knobel. We
must protest against the exposition of Delitzsch :
" Its origination follows in that way which is un-
avoidable to a creative beginning, and which is to it
essentially what is called a generatio equivoca ; that
is, it does this in measure as the earth, through
the word of the divine power, receives strength to
generate the vegetable germ." The sentence con-
tains a contradiction in so far as the question still
relates to the divine word of power ; but this divine
word of power creates not merely a strength, or
force, in general ; * each new and distinct creative
* [The argument from exegesis here would depend vei-y
much upon the view taken of the words 3r")T ^"'^t^ - They
are rendered by the LXX. ainlpov trirepfia. THe Vulgate,
.faciensjsemeu, and our translation, yielding seed, are better,
since the Iliphil I'orai seems to demand a causative or pro-
ducing sense. The rendering of ttie LXX. would do lor the
other form >nT "^TT , which occui-s ver. 29, representing
the plant, after it was made, as casting its seed upon the
earth. If we take It in the causative or seminative sense,
there is still the question, whether it is merely desciiptive
of the plant in general as distinguished from other created
things, or whether it sets forth something in the very crea-
tive or tirst generative process. If it were the former, it
would seem to demand the article, J^ITlsn , the plant that
bears or semmat^is seed. As it stands,* however, the whole
force of the word (as emphatic) and of the context, would
favor the latter idea : " Let the earth bring forth the plant
as seminating,*' or in its semination, that is, as growing
from a seminal power in the vei7 beginning. It may not be
easy to understand, conceptually, how tliis can be withont
a previous material seed (seed-vessel) or a previous plant
from which the seed came, but still, as a fact, it may be
clear, and clearly stated. The opposite notion is, that the
plant was outwardly and mechanically formed with its stem,
leaves, limbs, seed-vessel, etc., all perfect, and then, in somp
way, connected with the ground, which, after all, has noth-
ing to do with its first production. Or it might be thought
that merely the seed (seed-vessel) was thus mech.aiucally
made (that is, by a force acting on the outside of it), and
then this seed placed in the ground if> grow. Either of
these latter views is attended with great difficulties, increas-
ing ever the more they are contemplated, though as a nier<
conceptual view it might seem at first the easiest. It ma>
be said, too, that they are not favored by the langnagt
which assigns to the earth an iiupoit-ant part in the prooe«s,
and seems to make the very semination an original act.
We gain nothing by regarding it as the mechanical ereatioD
of the seed-vessel, since that is not, in itsell, the =eminat ns
power, any more than the entiie plant, but only the seat 01
its uearer'residence, or its more interior wrapper as it may
be called. Every plant that now grows springs Irum ar
immaterial power (and thnt not a blank force, but condition
ed by an idea) brought in certain relatious to the earth
This power is not the seed as seed-vessel, for that dies I dis*
.. 'ves> in the process (see John xii. 24), and by such disso
i70
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
»ord introduces a new and distinct principle into
the already existing sphere of nature — a principle
which hitherto had not been present in it. Along
lution sets free the immaterial life to work again, as at first,
in gathering from the flowing outward conditions iho mate-
rial for its new manifestation, and arranging tuch tiowing
material in the fixed order commanded and demanded by its
unchanging ''^^'C , species, elSos, law, or idea. In the begin-
ning the command of the Logos plaees it in immediate con-
nection with such outward conditions. There is no need of
any protophist whether in the form of plant or seed. The
tree, regarded materially, or as ^an-ofxevov, is as much a
flowing thing as a river, although it flows much more slow-
ly. It is, therefore, alike irrational to think of God's mak-
ing either of thim outwardly, or immediately, int^tead of the
causation from which they respectively proceed. In the
case of things that are intended to reproduce themselves, thie
primitive seminal power is aften^'ards deposited m a seed-
vessel from whence to come forth for all future manifesta-
tions ; but it is the same power — the same that was first
created — the tsame species (»»wm in TnuUis)it\. the myriad
manifestations outwardly existing at the same time, and in
all succeeding times as long as the power lasts, or is able to
find the conditions under which it appears. It may be re-
^rded too, with all reverence, as the same process, except
that at each intermediate beginning it st^irts with its libera-
tion from the holding seed-vessel to work anew in building
itself a new house, but in the same manner, after such lib-
eration, as when it first issued from the divine fiat. For a
moment, too, may this immaterial power be said to become
disembodied, as in the instant of passing from the old per-
ishing organization into the commencing new— each being
successivi'ly its work, deriving from it structure, foim, and
outward species. It is not made by the organization — for
then chemistrv might find it. It is before the organization,
thus making the latter a real organism produced, as at first,
by a force and a law working from within, and building
around itself, instead of an artificial semblance having its
idea outwardly or mechanically introduced into the matter
after the way of human art ^Ve may say, therefore, that it
is the same original life, the going forth of the same unspent
energy, the prolonged utterance of the same Word sounding
on m nature, and obeyed now, e^ch time, with the same
alacrity as when it first felt the pulsations of the voice that
eaid: '("^JXt^ XCTP , "Let the earth germinate," let the
earth bring forth. It is mother-earth that gives the plant
its body, its outward manifestation, so far as that alone may
be called the plant, but not its idea, its law, or even its im-
material ptiwer. And it is this which makes it something
quite ditk'rent from the generatio eqiiivoca of some natural-
ists, and Jo which Deiiizsch unfortunately compares it.
The veiy term implies a blank, blind, and doubtful force
that mitiht produce one thing as well as another. But here
there is a conditioning power bringing out the plant ^njiiDb
according to its species. It is God's word appearing (speak-
ing) through the earth ; it is *' the Lord hearing tiie heavens,
and the heavens hearing the earth, and the earth hearing
the corn, the wine, and the oil," Hosea ii. 22, 23. Hence
the exceeding significance as well as beauty of one of tlie
Hebrew names for plants. They called them PlIIX , lig/ils,
manifeslalionsi see Is. xxvi. 19, P'^mx 313, the "dew of
herbs," to which ie compared the resurrection-power (or
*• resurrection-rain " as the Jewish Rabbins call it), which
nail revive the bodies " sown "' in the earth.
Whatever difficulty there may be in such views of the
Dripinal growth, it is far less than that which attends the
tiechanical notion, if we push it to all its consequences. It
►oulfl follow that the earth did not really bring forth the
first pl:ints (as Serijiture expressly says it did), unless we
take it in some mere magical sense, or think of some sudden
starting out of the earth independent of any nexus of physi-
cal causation. We must also, in that case, give up the idea
of the species determining the construction instead of the
construction the species. But the strongest argument for
the commentator is that the exegesis will not bear it. In
Bucb an outward mechanical view the words Xttllin. -"^"ms
lone all their cauj^ative force, and thus become merely re-
dundant cyphers in the account. The language of causation
whore there i« in reality no causative process is simply
magical and unmeaning, llad 5'^^T13 hero meant nothing
more thr»n casting or sowing seed, as the LXX. interpret it,
there would only have been need of the present Kal parti-
oiple ^')^^ , aH in ver. 20, where the plant is spoken of after
tfl creation, and as carrying on its procesnes of reproduction.
fliid "yielding seed" been the sense intended, there are
»thei words that would have better expressed it. This
with the various species and seeds, along with th*
determinate propagation of plants, each afiei iti
kind, there clearly and distinctly comes in that con-
ception of nature which is already announced in
the gi'eat contrasts. The words : upon (he earthy
■}*")>fn"b5 (ver. 11), are interpreted by Knobel of
the high growth of the trees [over the earth) in con-
trast with the plants which cleave closer to the
ground, and wliich are regarded by Dclitzsch as a
present clothing of the earth. With respect to ver.
20, we may assume that Knobel is right. In the
contemplation of the young world, this majestic rising
above the earth in the case of the tall trees, as in that
of the birds, has a peculiar excitement for the imagi-
nation. With the plants there appears the tirst
thing that is distinctly symbolic of life as well as of
their individual beauty.
8. Vers. 14-19. Fourth Creathe Day. Begin-
ning of the second triad. — The preconditions of the
now expectant animal and human life, are the lighta
of heaven, the stars, or heavenly bodies, partly as
physical quickening powers, and partly as signs of
the division of time for the human culture-world. It
is theirs, in the first place, to make the distinction
between day and night, between Ught and darkness,
and to rule over the day and night — to make that
great contrast upon which the human developments,
as well as the animal nature-life, are essentially con-
(litioned, such as sleep, waking, generation, diversi-
ties in the animal world — animals of the day and
animals of the night, etc. It agrees well with the
text, that again, whilst it makes a more special men-
tion of the ordinance of the heavenly bodies, it gives
the chief prominence to their spiritual or humane
appointment : let them be for signs and for festivals,
and for days, and for years. The question arises
here, whether these appointments are to be taken as
four (Luther, Calvin, DeUtzsch, Knobel); or that
three are meant: namely, for signs of times, for
days, and for years (Rosenmiiller, Eichhorn, De
Wette, Baumgarten) ; or only two : for signs, for
times, including in the latter both days and years
(Schumann, Maurer). For the first view, indeed,
there speaks the simple series of the appointments,
but there is, too, the consideration that the spiritual
(or ecclesiastical) appointments of the heavenly
bodies are not exhausted in tlie chronological. The
sign rix has oftentimes in the Old Testament, a relig-
ions significance. Thus the rainbow is established
for the sign (nix) of the covenant between Jehovah
and Noah, together with his sous (Gen. ix. 1 2).
Later, Abraham receives in the starry heaven a sign
of the divine promise. But when it is said (Jer. x.
2): Ye must not be afraid of the signs of heaven,
there is not reprobated therein the meaning of the
signs of heaven in their right significance, but only
the heathenish misconception of them. The primi-
tive religion was throughout symbolic ; it was a con
tcmplation of the invisible deity through symbolic
signs, and the most universal of them were sun,
moon, and stars. It was thus thai th*^. primitive
symbolic religion became heathenish ; e religioui
symbolic degenerated into an irreligious mythical;
the glory of God was suffered to pass away in the
Hijihil form otcurs only in one othe- place in the Hebrew
Scrip'ures, namely Lev. xii. 2, wh s it evidently bears
exclusively the coneeptive or sominaving Benwe. Its choice
hero, therefore, shows that the writer had HomethinK else in
view than an outward construction, either of the pKiut M
a whole, or of the seed-vessel whether regarded as tpparatJ
from, or as contained in, the plant. — T. L.1
CHAP. I.— II. 3.
17\
form of transitory signs ; it became identified with
them, whilst men utterly lost the consciousness of the
difference. The true representatives of the primitive
reUgiou on its light-side held fast this consciousness,
as in the example of Melchizedek ; but they reve-
renced jod as such under the name El Kliou (God
Most High). It is an improper inference when
Knobel here would refer this to the UQUsual phenom-
ena of the heaven, such as the darkening or eclipse
of the sun aud moon, the red aspect of the latter (in
•D eclipse), the comets, the liery appearances, etc.
Moreover, we cannot find indicated here, as Delitzsch
does, an astrological importance of the heavenly
bodies, on which he remarks : " This ancient univer-
sally accepted influence is undeniable, a thing not to
be called in question in itself considered, but only in
its extent," The question refers to the signs of the
theocratic belief, such as are celebrated Ps. vhi. aud
Ps. xix., from which the culture-signs of agricultuie,
navigation, and travel, must not be excluded.
Thence, by right consequence, must be added the
festival signs, S''"15113 . Moed, it is true, denotes, in
general, an appointed time, but it comes in close
connection with the word Jehovah before the festival
seasons. The significant time-sections of the Israel-
ites were, moreover, religious sabbaths, new moons
(Ps. civ. 19), and yeaily festivals which were likewise
regulated by the moon. Upon the two religious
appointments of the heavenly bodies (signs of belief,
■signs of worship) follow the two ethical and humane :
the determination of the days and therewith of the
days-works — the determination of the years and
therewith the regulation of life and its duration.
Hereupon follows the more common determination
of the heavenly hghts for the annual hfe in general.
—To give light upon the earth. — With the light
~f the sun there is also determined its vital warmth,
ihus the text speaks first of tlie appointment of the
teavenly bodies for the earth-world (vers. 14, 1.5),
»nd then of the creation of the luminaries in their
variety and distinct appointments, in which the stars
form a special class, ver. 16. After this there is
mention of their location and their efficacy ; their
place is the firmament ; their primary operation is to
give light; next follows their government, that is,
that peculiar determination of the day and night that
is necessary for the preservation of life. The third
thing is the thvision between light and darkness, the
instituting of the vicissitude of day and night. For
here must the dividing of light from darkness denote
something quite different from that of ver. 4 ; it is
not the division of the luminous and the shadowy,
but of the day-Ught and the night-shadow them-
selves. But now arises the question : How comes it
that the first mention of the creation of the heavenly
bodies is on the fourth day ? It follows from the
fundamental cosmical laws that the earth, before the
sun, was not prepared for bringing forth thi' plants.
It is saying too httle to affirm that this place must
only be understood phenomenally, or that the earUer
created heavenly bodies make their first appearance
on the fourtl day along with the clearing-up of the
atmosphere. But, on the other hand, suiely, it is
gajiiig too much, when we assume that the formation
of the starry world, or even of our owu solar and
planetary system, had its beginning in the fourth
creative period. This representation is inorganic,
abnormal. It is just as httle supported by any sound
cosmogony as demanded by the scriptural text. As
little as the text requires that in generil tiie first
light of the universe should have its originatiot
cotemporaneous with the light out of the thohu
vahhohu of the earth, just as httle does the placi
before us demand that we should date the abso.utelj
first formation of the heavenly bodies from the fourth
creative day. This, however, agrees well «ith ou?
text, that both the appearing of the starry world,
and the development and operation of the solar sys-
tem, were first made ready for the earth on that
same day in which the earth became ready for the
sun. On the fourth creative day, therefore, there 18
completed the cosmical regulation of the world for
the earth, and of the earth for the world. See more
under the Theological and Kthical.
9. Vers. 20--.;3. Fifth Creaiive Day.— Corre-
sponding then to the second day (of the first triad)
we have here (on the second day of the second triad)
the animation of the water and the air in the marine
and winged creatures. The creation of the marine
animals begins first. It is not only because they are
the most imperfect creatures, but because the water
is a more quickening aud a more primitive condition-
ing of life than the earth. The like holds true of the
air. It is clear, moreover, that the land-animals in
their organization stand nearer to men than the birds;
nevertheless they are not, in all respects, more per-
fect than the biids ; and of these latter, as of the
trees, it is emphatically said that they hover high
over the earth. IndeetJ, as birds of the heaven, they
are assigned to the heaven, as the fish to the water,
as the land-animals to the earth, and so far correctly,
since they not merely soar above the earth, and have
their proper Ufe in the air, but also because they are
in part water-fowl aud not merely land-birds. This
graphic nature-limning is, moreover, to be noticed
here in the formation of the fishes and the birds, as
at an earlier stage in the formation of the plants.
The first animals are now more carefully denoted as
living souls, n^n fs: (soul of hfe). On this De-
litzsch remarks : " The animal does not merely hare
soul, it is soul; since the soul is its proper being,
and the body is only its appearing." That might
hold in respect to men, but it could hardly be said
of the animal (see Ps. civ. 29, 30). It is true, the
beast is animated ; it has an animal principle of sen-
sation and of motion which is the groimd of its
appearing, but as soul it is inseparably connected
with all animal soul-life,* that is, the life of nature.
Knobel translates : Let the waters swarm a swarm.
This conception is still more lively and pictorial than
that of our translation {es solleit wtmnieln die Wasser
vom Gewimmel, let the water swarm with or from a
swarm) ; nevertheless we hold the latter to be more
correct, since the causality of the swarm cannot he
in the water itself,f but in the creative word. — And
* [Thierseelenlehen. Lange evidently forms this Ger-
man word with reference to the peculiar Hebrew phrase
n*n tUE3 , nephesh hayya, or soul of life, rendered in our
English Version living 3oul. We use the word animal, in
translating, from an aversion to the English word beast,
which has feilien much below the German Thier. — T. L.)
t [This reasoning seems doubtful. There is no more
uced of such an argument to avoid naturalism here than iQ
interpreting the similar language y^XH XUJ'IFI , Let the
earth bring, ver, U. The causality here, as there, is dou-
ble, but there is certainly a secondary causality in the
earth which justifies us in giving its obvious active transitive
meaning to the denominative verb Vl'ilj : Let the waten
swarm a swarm. The verb is evidently made from the noun
1'"]Ui , reptilia, the lowest and most prolific kind c f animals.
So the Jewish- Arable translator renden it by a siinilaj
172
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
let birds fly and fly (fly about). — The strong sense
of tlie Hebrew conjugation Pilel (rsi?^) cannot be
expressed by the simple words let Jiy. The element
of the formation, the air, is not here given ; for it is
clear that they are not referred to the water in their
origin.* One might think here in some way of the
upper waters ; but the birds are under the firma-
ment. Their element is the very firmament of hea-
ven, just where the two waters are divided, tin its
underside, or that which is turned towards tlie earth
(":s"br), must the birds fly. They belong just as
much to the earth as to the water and the air ; there-
fore are they assigned to no special district, ver. 21.
The great water-animals (l"'3n , long-extended), a
word which is elsewhere used of the serpent, the
crocodile, the marine monsters, but not specially of
fishes. "These, with the insects that live in the
water, worms, etc., are all here to be understood
under n^n Ce; (soul of Ufe)." Knobel. That the
animal creation had its beginning mainly with the
water-animals we learn from natural science ; but
whether with the vertebrated animals? (Delitzsch.)
All birds of wi?iff, translates Knobel. We would
rather take ^3S as a more general designation;
winged^ which would also include the insects. De-
litzsch correctly rejects the old view, which is re-
stored by Knobel, namely that the author meant to
represent God as having always created each species
of animals in one pair; for one pair cannot swartn^
and with a swarm the animal creation begins. With
good ground, however, does Delitzsch maintain that
for the animals there were determined central points
of creation, p. 117. None the more, however, can
we approve what he says of the generatio lequhoca
of the water and air-animals out of water and earth ;
denominative verb made from ^;<v V? . a lizard, r ^,v*l ^
i,j/.AA.V? E^L4Jlt I^et the water bring forth lizards, or
Bwarai with lizards. — T. L.]
* [This is not 60 clear as Dr. Lange may think, althouj^h
he has on his side most of the modern commentators. The
Hebrew words ClE'i3?^ w)i^'1 , as they stand connected, can-
not, we think, be properly rendered in any other way tlian
as we find it in our English Version ; and birds thatjly, and
in all the ancient V'ei'sions; LXX. ; Trereira wcTo^ef a ; Vul-
gate : prnducaid aquir reptile el volatile; the Syriac is exact-
ly like the Hebrew in its construction, and can have but
one possible sense, birds Uiat Jty. So Luther : es errege sich
das tVasser mil Thieren und mil Qenoget das jliege. The
valuable translation, Arabs Erpenianus, lias it fyjL^«
A t^ s , which can only be rendered, in the connection,
birds thai fly. The idiom of the Hebrew seems fixed, requir-
ing us in such a case to regard the future as descriptive, like
participle or an adjective. In the -Arabic the coiTcspttnd-
jig usage is so established as to put any other transljition
out of the question. It occurs fiequently in the Koran with
the same subject, and in just sucti a connection as we have
tt here. The other rendering, and let birds Jiy, would re-
quire a dilf«Tent order of the words, riiyn CID^S'*'!, as just
before C^ian ^^'^^S'^ltt the waters twann. The more mod-
ern rendering lias' come from the fear of what would seem
gi'OBs natur;ilism, namely the eduction of the birds from the
water; but wo know notnii g here except as wo .'ire taught.
There is notjiiiii; more i credible in such an eduction than
tboro would be in allirming it of any other form of that
ankhown and wonderful Ihing wc call life. It may lie vci-y
fer back, this coming of the bird-nature out of the waters,
but the naturalLst finds the fish-type in the birds, all of
which may have been originally water-fowl, and this would
leero U) be in harmony with the declaration of the text,
itraiigo as it may sound to us. lir. Conant, we fintl, trans-
lates iLH I^auge does; but with all our rospect for that i-xccl-
cut llebri;w w^holar, wc arc compelled to think him wrong,
fi Bush, Jacobu*, and others. — T. L.l
I since we must throughout acquiesce in the opiniol
that the creative word establishes something new-
new life-priuciples, and here also the respective ani
mal-principles, in water and air. — Ver. "iJ. And
God blessed them, and said. — We must hold as
scholastic the quesiion started and debated bv Cha-
teaubriand and others, whether God blessed also the
animals that were buried in the hills. The special
consecration to fertility, in the ease ol the fishes and
birds, Ciirries back a fact of the natuie-life to the
divine causality ; we refer to their infinitely abundant
multiplication. Besides, it suits well the fifth day,
or the number five, that the symbols of mightiest
life-motion, the fishes and the birds, are cieated on
this day. The animals of lesser physical motion, but
of more intensive individual sensation, come after
them.
10. Vers. 24, 26. Sirth Creative Pav. First
half. — The creation of the land-animals stands in
parallelism with the creation of the firm land on the
third day. On the third day, remarks DeUtzsch,
^rsj'l (and he said) is repeated only twice, but on
the sixth day four times. " Truly is this day there-
by denoted as the crown of the others (the ciown of
all is the sabbath). The sixth day's work has its eye
on man. In advancing nearness to him are the ani-
mals created." The general creation of r\'''n aiE3
(soul of life, or living soul) divides itself here, 1. into
cattle (rrsna from V\z), the tame land-animals (not
utterly dull or stupid ; for the horse is less dull than
the sloth) to whom in their hitercourse with men
speech appeai-s wanting ; 2. into the reptile that
crawls upon the soil (whether it be the footless or
the thousand-footed) and the other anmials that
move about upon the earth as the birds Hy about in
the heaven ; 3. beasts of the earth, or the wild beasts
that roam everywhere through the earth. — Let the
earth bring forth: That is, in the formative mate-
rial of the earth, in the awakened life of the earth,
the creative word of God brings forth the land-ani-
mals. According to the older opinions (see Knobel)
it was the greater power of the sun that woke up
this new animal life ; according to Ebrard it was the
volcanic revolutions of the earth. Delitzsch disputes
this, p. 119. We must distinguish, however, be-
tween a volcanic commotion of the earth's crust and
its partial eruptions. At all events, the land-animals
presuppose a warm birth-place. And yet the Vulcan-
ism, or volcanic power, must have been already
active at a far earlier period, on the third day at
least, and as long as the water was not water (proper)
must the creative power of fire have been in the
water itself.
11. Vers. 26-.31. Sixth Creative Day. Second
half. The Creation of Man. — Wherefore does the
creation of man and of the land-animals fall on one
and the same creative day '! It is because man, as
to his bodily appearance, has his being from the
earth in common with the animals, and because the
formations of the sixth day correspond to tliat forma-
tion of the earth which took place on the third day
From this it follows that on the third day tlie fornip
tion of the earth waH the main ihiug rather than tlia
of the sea. At all events, there comes here between
tlie two creative acts a solenui pause resembling a
creative evening, (iod, as it were, stays his hand,
and holds a special counsel before he goes on with
the work ; whereiis he had always, until now, imme-
diately uttered the creative word. The idea of mar
becomes the clear decree for h.s reation. — W«
CHAP. I.— n. 3.
I7J
would (or, We will) make man. — It must not be
read as though it were ii rousing of Himself: JM us
.nake man. But why the pluralV There are various
exphmalions : 1. The plural is witiiout meaning
(Rosenmtiller, and others); 2. it is a seir-L'iudk'nj^'ing
(Tuch); 3. the three persons of tlie Trinity (church-
fathers, Faschasius, and others in the middle ages;
Oulvin, Gerhard, etc.). That the Old Testament
knows nothing of a divine tri-unity, as Knobel will
have it, is not true ; yet the trinitarian idea only un-
folds itself germinally in the Old Testament, and here
it had not yet oomo to its development. 4. God's
taking eounsel with the angels (Targum of Jonathan,
the Jewish interpreters ; * Delitzsch, with rererenee to
the Babylonian and Persian myths ; yet the jiajisage
must not be so understood that the angels t:ike part
in the creation except by way of conununication ;
God commuiucates to them his resolution., nf an-
gels, however, the text has no trace, and the i>laces
cited by DeUtzseh. Ps. viii, ; Heb. ii. 7 ; Luke sx. ye,
prove nothing. Although the angels are called
spirits and sons of God, yet the Scriptures accurately
distinguish between the angelic and the human
nature, and there seems to be an impropriety in the
minghng of the divine and the angelic image. More-
over, from this human creation it is that we have the
first disclosure of the existence of any spirit-world in
general. 5. Pluralis majestaticus^ ov pluniUs inten-
sivus (Grotius, Gesenius, Neumann, Knobel). It
omst be noted that the plural is carried into the word
• [Among the Jewish interpreters the view of Maimoni-
des is peculiar and noteworthy, though it may at first .strike
a'l &s strange and irreverent. It is God, he tljinks, speaking
to the earth, or rather, to the nature already brought into
being by the previous utterances of the word, and which, in
the commands preceding, had been addressed in the impern~
iice third person : " Let the earth bring forth," etc. Xow,
when man is to be made, there is a change to the.^rs^ person
Imperative, that is, nature is addressed more as an a-ssociate
th;xn as a servant : " Let us make man," the higher work in
Muich both co-operate— God directly and sovereignly, nature
mediately and obediently through the divine woid. Prom
the out' comes his body, his physical, trom the other his
Ji\-iuer life and image. "In regard to the lower animal
ind vegetable life," says this great critic, philosopher, and
theologian, "the language ('ITSX'Sn , the word; was J<S^n
ynxn , let the earth bring forth ; but in respect to man it
13 changed to n*i3> 3 , Uei ns make man,' that is to say, * I
and the earth,'— let the latter bring forth his body from the
earthly elements, even a.^ it did in the case of the lower
things that preceded him. For this is the meaning uf that
which is written (ch. ii. 7): 'Jehovah Elohim foimed man
'■^^E^T, see note, p. 1G4) from the dust of the earth, but he
gave him a spirit from the mouth of the Most High ; ' as it ie
written, 'He breathed into man,' etc., and said, moreover,
'in 0 if r image, according to our likeness,' meaning that he
should lie like to both, that is, in the composition of his
body a likeness of earth (or nature) from which hi; was
taken, and in his spirit like to the higher order of being in
that it is incni-poreal and immortal. And so i i what follow^,
he -;iys, in the image of God (alone or unassociated) created
tie him, to set forth the wonderful distinction (X^D, the
miracle) by which man is distinguished from the rest of the
creatures; and this is also the interpretixtion that f have
found given by Rabbi Joseph Kimchi." Maimon. Comm.
it, locum.
Of all these views the pluralis majesfalicus has the le;ist
isapport. It is foreign to the usus loquendi of the earliest
language ; it is degrading instead of honoring to Deity, and
A.ben Ezra shows that the few seeming examples brought
from the Hebrew Scriptures, such as Xum. xxii. 6; Dan. ii.
36, do not bear it out— the latter, moreover, being an Ara-
maic mode of speech. If we depart at all from the patristic
view of an allusion to a plurality of idea in the Deity, the
next best is that of Maimonides. In fact, if we regard
nature as the expression of the divine Word from which it
derives its power and life, the opinion of the Jewish Doctor
approaches the patristic, or the Christian, as near as it could
oome from the Jewish stand-point.— T. L.l
^3T33:£3 (in our image), etc. This appears to go b«
yond the pluralis majei^taticm^ and to point to tht
germinal view of a distinction in the divine personali
ty, directly in favor of which is the distinction of
Elohim and Ruah Elohim, oi that xji God and h^
Wisdom, as this distinction is made, Prov. viii., with
reference to the creation. Although D^:i and naT,
as well as the particles 3 and 3 , are used proniiscu
ously (Knobel, Delitzsch), yet still the double designa-
tion does not serve merely to give a stronger emphasis
to the thought (Knobel). In that case the strongei
expression cb:: ought to come last, cba is th*
shadow of the figure, the shadow-outlin , the copj
and therefore also the idol. miST is the resem
blance, the comparison, the example, the appearance
And whilst 3 denotes the near presence of an object,
as zn, or within^ close to or in it, into^ whether in a
friendlv or a hostile sense, near fiy, etc., 3 expresses
the relation of similarity or likeness, as a*, in some
degree^ like as, instead of, etc. The former preposi-
tion denotes the norm, the form, mass, number, and
kind of a thing; the latter its relation, similarity,
equality, proportion, in reference to some other thmg
According to this, in our image means, after the
principle, or the norm of our image ; but as our like-
ness means, so that it be our Hkeucss. The imagt
denotes the ideal, and therefore also the disposition
the being, the definition ; the likeness denotes the
actuality, the appearing. As the likeness of God,
man is set (placed, appointed) ; but the image of God
he is made to become {fit^factus est) through his most
interior assimilation, his ideal formative impulse (or
that tendenf'V that forms him to the idea).* Foi
* [We have found it difficult to express the thought of
Lange here, and especially to give the force intended in the
Geiman werden. "The image," he says, "is the ideal, di«
Anlage, das Wesen.^' So Maimonides here calls cbs tLe
specific form, n^3^73n n^'i^ , the species determining
form, or that which makes a thing inwardly what it is, in
distinction from n^3"Clxn nman , the architectural
form. The manner in which the two words are used would
warrant the interpretation that zb'S, (image) is to man what
T^T3 is to the vegetable and animal species, or rather, that
in man, as created after this higher idea, the Z.h'li (image)
is the "p^a (species). This is most important in respect to
the question : in what consists the unity of the human
race? Oneness of physical origin and physiia.1 life Q'^'Q) un-
doubtedly belongs to the idea of species, but in a much
higher sense is this unity conserved by the cbs , the highei
species, the one spiritual humanity in ;ill men. It is on
proofs of this, and not on fiicial angles ur length of hceli
that the argument should be built. Of the animals it ij
said, ^ns^^b , each one according lo his kind. This is
never said of'man, but instead of it, it is ^Di;b23 , in our
image. In the next verse it is said God created man
TobsS , "in his image"— that is, God's image, though
some of the Jewish Interpreters, as referred to by Abi-n
Ezra, woold make the pronoun in iTSbSt relate to man (Art
image, man's image), but still that which God had epeclU-
eally given as his divinely distinguishing idea. So also
in thf ^:'ob^, o«r imase, they interpret it, the imncre that
we have given, as in Gen. vi. 3, ^n^l"! , 7n{/apirit, is the
spirit or life that I have given. So in Pe. civ. 29, 30;
" Thougatherest in. cnil , (Aa'r spirit" — airain : "Thou
aendest forth, T^Jl^l, ihy spirit," the life that thou hast
given. It is the same spirit in both verses.
There is in 'J'^lD , also, the radical sense of image, as w«
see in the derivative n^^lDn' Ps. xvii. 15, joined, too, with
a Di'»nwun reftrring to God, 7ir3!l^ri, "thy imajf*." **/
174
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
the dogmatic treatment of this, see farther below.
Enobel and Delitzsch, following the Syriac Version,
we of opinion that r^n (beast) has fallen out before
V"ixn (the earth); but wherefore should the domin-
ion of man be limited merely to the animal-world '!
Through his lordship can man domesticate the wild
beast ; he may also rule over the plant-world, and
o< er the earth absolutely. This, in its widest accep-
tation, is set forth, ver. 28. In this divine viceroy-
ehip must his possession of the image first reveal
itseif ; it must be the likeness of his higher and more
intense conformity. — Ver. 27. Very explicitly is
this divine-imaged nature of man presented in a two-
fold manner along with his creation. — As man and
woman. — Properly, as male and female created he
them. Rightly does Umbreit remark ; " The lan-
guage here soars to a most concise song of tri-
umph, and we meet, for the first time, with the
paralleUsm of members." In three parallel mem-
bers, and therefore in the highest poetical form, does
the narrative celebrate the creation of man. Con-
cerning the derivation of men from one pair, see be-
Bball be satisfied when I awake, thy likeness." So in a
fearful passage directly the reverse of this, Cp^ seems to be
used for the bad image, or the stamp of the Evil One in
wicked men, as in Ps. Ixxiii. 20 : "As a dream when cue
Ewaketh, so, O Lord, in the awaking (not "thy awaking,"
for which there is no pronoun and no warrant whatever), in
the great awaking C"l^?2), in the arousing (the dies retri-
buiionis), thou wilt reject their image," HT^P D735^ ,
In what this image consists, and whether lost, or to what
extent lost, by Ihc fall, are mainly questions of theology
instead of interpretation, but that there is still in man what
in a most importani and specific, or constituting, sense, is
called " the image of God," most clearly appears from Gen.
ix. 6, where it is made the ground in the divine denoxmce-
ment of the atrocity of murder.
The reasons are strong for interpreting "man from the
earth," as we interpret, the fish and the reptile from the
waters. If the formative word ^ !£ ^ is used in the one case,
60 is X"13 , which some regard as the more directly creative,
employed in the other : " And God created the great whales,
and tile moving thing which the waters swarmed," that is,
all the marine animals fi-om the greatest to the least. The
one language is no more inconsistent with the idea of a pro-
cess than the other. There is nothing then to shock us as
anti-^criptural in the thought that man, too, as to his phys-
ical and material, is a product of nature. As such physical
being be has his "?3 {physical species), and may be said to
be ^n3''T2b , as well as the other animals. But he is also a
metaphysical, a supernatural, a spiritual being, and here it
nay be questioned whether he can be said to be Sn3^133 .
To describe him in this respect there is used the higher word
CbiC , the image, the image of God, in distinction from his
male and female confoi-mations which belong wholly to the
physical. \\"c arc expressly taught that this .atter (iocs not
belong to angels, or any purely spiritual beings. They
have no sex, and it may be doubted whether they can
properly be said to have species, unless it may be :ilSrmcd
of bad Bpirita who are greatly mingled with the phy.sical,
and whose defoiincd iviogr God despises or rejects, I's.
ixxiii. 20. That there is specific variety, or species, among
Buch may be inferred from our 3avioui-'s language. Matt,
xvii. 21 : " This kind (to yeco?) goeth not out but by prayer
and fasting."
The image of Go<t the distinguishing type of man : Hold
£a-t to this in all its ipirituality as ihe mirror of the eternal
ideas, and wc nce«i not fear naturalism. Many in the church
ftre shivering with alarm at the theories, which are con-
Itantly coming from the scientific world, about the origin
of BjarcieH, and the production of man, or rather the physical
ttit may have become mau, through the lower tvpes. The
Quieting remedy is a higher ps-ychology, such as the fair
mterjiretation of the Biiile warmnts, when it tells us that
the primus htnno bewime such through the inspiration (the
ntiruattiing) and the imago of God lifting him out of nature,
ftnd making him and all hia descendants a peculiar *p^ ,
•jiecios, by the possession of the D?^, or image of the
fupematureL— T. L.]
low. — Ver. 28. And God blessed them (crix
them, not iris , A/»i, according to the Septuagint
and said to them. — "God blesses, too, the ne«
created man but with two blessings. For beside*
the power of propagation which they have in com-
mon with tha beasts (ver. 22), they hold nioreovei
the dominion over them. The same is enlarged after
the flood." Knobel. " The striving after the rhyth
mical-poetical parallelism presents itself in thes
words ;
and Elohim blessed them.
and Elohim said unto them." Delitzsch.
Yet the blessing sounds hardly " like a summons to the
subjection of hostile powers." The relation of the soul
to the outer world, especially " the feature of self-hood
in all creature-life," was not originally adverse, as is
held by Bellarmin, or even by Zwingli. And thus
is man first pictured to us, and then his calling, to
which it belongs that he must rule his own proper
sensual nature, as he rules all living, or all that is
animal in the earth — the word being taken here in its
most universal sense. The laborer is worthy of his
reward. The ruler of the earth is himself condition-
ed. He needs nourishment, and, therefore (ver. 29),
there is pointed out to him his sustenance. — Behold,
I have given you (Lange's translation : 1 have
appointed for you). — Together with tlie nourishment
of man (ver. 29) there is appointed the nourishment
of the beasts (ver. 30). What is common to both
is the appointment of the use of vegetable food ; the
distinction is that man shall have the use of the herb
with its seed, that is in itself, and of the fruit-tree,
whilst the beast, on the other hand, has the green
of the herb. The meaning of tliis is, that for man
there is the corn (or core) of nature, tor the beast
the shell or husk. "' According to the Hebrew view,
therefore, men, at first, Uved only upon vegetables,
and at a later time there first came in the use of
flesh (ch. ix. 3). The rest of antiquity agreed with
this." Knobel. For the citations troiu Plato, Plu-
tarch, etc., that belong here, see p. 211. According
to Delitzsch, this is not a mere view of aniic|uity,
but farther, he says, "God did not originally will the
violent breaking up of the life of one living thing by
another for the purpose of enjoying its flesh, since
tliat would be utterly against his clearly exjnessed
will in their creation." Oerstedt (in his ".Spirit in
Nature") avers " that we have clear proofs that cor-
poreal evil, ruin, sickness, and deatlt, were older than
the fall." DeUtzsch characterizes tliis " as a shout
of triumph which ever becomes clearer in favoring
the grossest materializing atheism." .\nd so also he
says, with A. Warner (in his " Primitive World "),
that as the body ot' man after his fall underwent an
essential alteration in its material ground, so like-
wise there must have gone before an analogou&
change and transformation in the animal-world.
We see not how a naturaUst can think of such a
transformation of organic nature ; still less liow we
can call in iiucstion the fact of a death that had
come u]ion all species of animals before the liill ol
Adam, without taking along with it the theosophic
interpretation of tlie thohu vabhohu as a (iolgotha of
the Devil's kingdom. On this supposition, loo, it is
not easy to explain the difference of the caMle and
the wild creature in our chapter— just as little, too,
the fact that immediately after the fall the skins of
animals are at lianil lor the clothing of man ; or thai
it is the pious Abel who brings the animal sacrifice
to the altar, and not Cain. Again, it will help UJ
very little to call in aid, as Delit»ch does, the Urtn
CHAP. I.— U. S.
Hi
manic and the Buddistic laws, and the Pythagorean
doctrmes (p. 125). In truth, there is still a great
chasm between the tenable supposition that the para-
disaical man put to death no animal, or could do so,
and the arbitrary inference that even within the ani-
mal-world itself everything was so disposed that no
beast even ate another. Moreover, in this view, the
representatio'i of death itself is not wholly freed
from the tear of death. The consequence of this
same theory would be, that even an insect that had
once lived could never die. But shall a natural
death, so called, as when an old hind expires frum
want of air, or from hunger, be regarded as any
more natural than tlie death which takes place under
the jaws of the lion '? In this all too gentle repre-
sentation there lacks the heroic power — the spirit
of sacrifice. May one suppose that the first speci-
mens of the beasts had not been disorganized like
the later animal, and that they did not experience
any important transformations, still a hteral change
of a grass-eating into a flesh-eating lion must be re-
garded as a radical transformation. As for the rest,
our text denotes only the basis of the law of nourish-
ment for the animal existence, and this basis is for
man the fruit, the herb, the grain, for the cattle the
pasturage and the fodder. In indulging our idealiz-
ing view of the primitive world, that it was wholly
without death, we should not overlook the fact that
it was an ill habit of the old heathenism, in its view
of the world, to confound sin with death, or even
with the natural unfolding of life. Thus the poems
that Kuobel too makes mention of, and according to
which even the ravenous beasts originally lived upon
vegetable food. — Ver. 31. And, behold, it was
very good. — At the seventh time it is said not
merely good, but very good, because in man the key-
stone of creation is reached. The possibihties Oi" the
ruin of man and of the world are for the pure para-
disaical state cures posferi ores, jnst as the destinies
of manliood are for the thinking of the child. For
the theosophic view, the undivine lay only bound
under the new order of things. That in general the
demoniac evil was already in the world is not denied,
but the six days^ work, taken as the world in gen-
eral, or as God had made it, was very good, that is,
perfect ; koo-^uos, kolWicttoi/ (Thales).*
• [TNO 2113 : "Good exceedingly." It would seem to
be not merely a benediction, but an expression of admira-
tion, as we may say without any fear of the anthropopa-
thism —euge, bene^ prmclart! It suggests a declaration in the
Timaeus of Plato so remarkable that it is no wonder that
some should have regarded it as a traditional echo of this
old account. At the completion of the }ireat cosmical ^Hiov,
the animated universe, with its body and soul (its nature),
both of which X'lato represents as the work of God, He (God)
beholds it moving on in its beautiful constancy, an image
of the eternal puwei's,.or ideas. At the sight of this the
everlasting Father (6 diSioy n-ar^p) is filled with joy and
admir;ition, tv<^pav6t\<; ijydddr} — the strongest term to express
such au emotion ttiat ecu d be found in the Greek language,
aya-tMai, ayaoMai. There seems, too, to be implied in both
expressions, the Hebrew and the Greek, the emotion of love,
and this, as it were, reciprocal — the kosmos responding and
moving on through a principle of aitmclion rather than of
pro/ectionf or outward mechaniciil force. Kivel (us fpuj^iet-oc,
he mores it (or, )t moves it) as being loved; such arc the words
of Aristotle (Metaph. xi. (xii.) c. 7), describing the first
frinciple of motion in the heavens as it proceeds from the
'irst Mover. I his language is truly wonderful in itself,
and LiU the more so when we consider its author, the dry
and rigid Aristotle, the lumen sicciim, or pure abstract intel-
lect, as he has been called. Nature, the kosmos, moving on
through love of the First Fair and the First Good— drawn,
rather than impelled— it has a Platonic richness of concep-
lion which seems strange in the more purely logical writer.
Of both, however, it may be said that they produce less im-
pression upon us than the pure grandeur'and simplicity of
12. Ch. ii. 1-3. The Divine Sabbath. Ver. 1,
Thus the heavens and the earth vrere finished
— A solemn retrospect introducing the sabbath of
God. — And all their host. — A concrete denoting
of the imiverse from the predominant terrestrial
stAnd-point. The host has reference to the heaven,
so far. at all events, as the stars are meant. As tht
host of the earth, however, denotes its inhabitant*
(Ii. xxxiv. 2), so the thought, moreover, gives aa
intimation of the inhabitants of the heaven. "The
passage in the book of Nehemiah (ch. ix. 6) that
treats of the creation supposes correctly that in the
host of heaven (X22£) the angels are included."
Delitzsch. When he says farther: " The stars, ac-
cording to the more ancient representation (Babylo-
nian, Assyrian, Persian) are set forth as a host for
battle, or that together with the angels they are as-
signed a portion in the conflict of light with darkness
whose theatre is the earth created within the sur-
rounding sphere of the luminous heavenly bodies," —
all such remarks may be taken as Parsic rather than
purely Biblical.* — Ver. 2, And on the seventh
day God ended His work. — The difficulty that
arises from the mention here of a completion of
God's work on the seventh day, as before it seemed
to have been on the sixth, has given occasion to the
Septuagint, the Syriac, and many exegetes to put
the sixth day in place of the seventh. Others (Cal-
vin, Drusius, etc.) have read ts^" as pluperfect (had
finished) contrary to the grammar. Knobel explains
the word with Tuch and others : God let it come to
an end on that day. Delitzsch in a similar manner.
Richers wrongly places a completion of the creation
on the seventh day. Kurtz speaks of a heptaemeron.
the Bible language : *' And God beheld everything that He
had made, and, lo, it was good, exceeding good." "With all
the splendor of Plato's language in the Timseus, there ig
still lurking about it his beeettiug inconsistency --the
thought of something evil, eternal in itself, and inseparable
from matter and from nature.
It may be said, too, that this great problem of evil seems
to haunt some of our best commentators in their exegesis of
this passage. They find here an implied reference to future
evil. All is yet good, they would have it to mean, and so
they regard it as a Verwaltrunff, or defence of God against
the authorship of evil. See Delitzsch, p. 126. But tbia
mars the glory of the passage. It is sunply a burst of ad-
miration and benediction called out by the Creator's sur-
vepng His works. The anthropopathism is for us its power
and its beauty, which are lessened by any such 6Ui>posed
hint or protestation. — T. L.]
* ["We get the best order of senses in the root X3i£ and
its cognate HSIJ , by regarding, as the pi-imary, the idea
of splendor, or glory, as it remains in the noun ^3!t . See
its use, Is. iv. 2, where it seems synonymous with 1133 ,
Is. xiii. 19, and a number of other places. The secondary
sense of host, orderly military array (comp. Caniicles vl,
10), comes very easily and naturally from it. Or we may
say that along with the idea of hosts, as in the frequent
P1X3S "^^J^^ ' Jehovah of hosts, it never loses the primary
conception. " Thus the earth and the heavens were finish-
ed and all their glory," or their glorious array. Compar*
the Syriac "Li^., dtcus, ornamentum, where the servile
iau has become radical. The LXX. and Vtilpate transla»
tors seem to have had someihing of this idea : n-dy 6 Koufiot
airratv — omnis ornalus eorum. There Is a grand significance
in the Greek Koa-fio^ and Latin mundus as thus used for the
world or the array (artistic unity) of the worlds. X22£
is the Hebrew for Koafj-o^, and thus there is a most sublime
parallelism presented by its two expressions : mxSSf mn''
and D^ w5" ~5^ — Lord of the worlds in space, King of th#
worlds in time : /Sao-iAeus t^v aiutvutv, Ps. cxlv. 13 ; Is. xx^i
4; 1 Tim. i. 17. The Hebrew far transcends the Greek.-
T. L.l
176
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
It seems to us, however, that the rest of God does
not denote a remaining inactive merely, or a doing
nothing. The perfecting of the worls on the seventli
is likewise sometliing positive; namely, that God
celebrated His work (kept a holy day of solemn tri-
umph over it) and blessed the sabbath. To cele-
brate, to bless, to eoiisecrate, is the finishing sabbath-
work — a living, active, priestly doing, and not merely
a laying aside of action. "The Father worketh
hitherto," says Christ in relation to His healings on
the sabbath (Jolm v. 17). The doing of God in
respect to the completed creation is of a festive kind
(solemn, stately, holy), a directing of motion and of
an unfolding of things now governed by law, in con-
trast with that woik of God which was reflected in
the pressure of a stormy development, and in the
great revolutions and epochs of the earth's formation.
"His n:sbi3 (His work) was the completion of a
task which He had proposed." Delitzsch. God
rests * now and triumphs in that last finish of His
• I" The .Scriptures," says Delitasch in his comment on
n2C^ , p. 12y, "do not hesitate to speak anthropopathi-
cally of God's entrance into rest." As far as the word n31I3
is concerned, there is no anthropathism here except as all
human language, and all human conception, in respect to
r>eity, is necessarily such — that is, necessarily representing
him in space and time. The prunary sense of the word
P^C is simply to cease, cease doing — as the LXX. render it,
Kareiravat — not av€Trav<T€ which carries the idea of recrea-
tion or refreshment after fatigue, like ai-ai/^uxw, or the He-
brew Niphal 093^. When joined with this latter verb, as
in Exod. xxxi. 17, the whole language may be called anthro-
popathic, but the added word shows that the idea expressed
by it IS not in the first. If ceasing fi-om creation, wholly or
parUalhj, implies mutability, it is no less im]ilied in the
emanation-theory, unless we suppose an emanation, or
necessiiry creation, of every possible tinny, everywhere,
always, and of the highest degree — in other words, an
unceasiug and unvaried filling of infinite space and infi-
nite time with infinite perfeciion of manifestation. But
waiving all such inconceivable subtleties, it may be truly
said that rest, of itself, is a higher and more perfect state
than outward action — if we may speak of anything as
higher and lower in respect to God. Rest is not inertia,
llest in physics is the equilibrium of power, and so the
maximum of power ire-sto, re-sisto). Motion is the yielding,
or letting out, of power, necessary, indeed, for its manifesta-
tion or patent etlect, yet still a dispersing or spending of
that static energy which was in the quiescence. Absolute
rest in the kosmos (the bringing it into, or keeping it in,
that state) would be the highest exercise of the divine
might; but as it would preclude all sensation, and all sen-
tienty, both of which are inseparable from change or motion
of i.onte kiuii, it would lie an absence of all outward mani-
festation ; that is, it would be non-phenomenal or non-
appear iig. So also rest is the highest power (activity) of
mind or spirit, and thus its highest state. This is Aristotle's
dietuni. Ethic. Nichomacb. x. 8, 7 : 17 reAeia evSatixovia
SewpriTiKri Tis earii' evfpy^ta, •' the perfect blessedness is a
inntempi.ative energy ; " **6o that (sec. 8j that energj' of (iod
wlii»;li excels all in blessedness must be contemplative (or
tlie<jretical), and, of human things, that whicli is raost akin
to this must be most b, eased " (euSatjuociKujTdTTj). In this
way, too, may we strive to obtain a conception of the saii-
batli or **rest of ihe saints." The Sciiptuie thought of this
would seem to be as much opposed to torjjor or inertia, on
the one hand, as it is, on the other, to that busy doing
which enters so much into some modern conceptions of the
future life. They that believe have entered into re.st.
There cao be no doubt, too, that the idea of holy eimtem-
platiou, or sabbath-keeping in the festal sense of the word,
(in which I.augo so much insists, enters into the idea of p^'^
here in (iencsis, although derived, perlia])S, from its subse-
quent UHO. In this senso, there is something of a sabbath
whenever there come the worda; and God jfwuj (surveyed,
toiitemiilateci), "saw that it was pood." It is a solemn
pausing to behold the divine ideas in their outward apjiear-
mg— nf»t as a change in Ijeity, as though witli him this took
place at intervals, but as a presentation, for the time, of th.it
constant, immutable aspect of the divine character as it
oomos forth at intervals for us. This eternal rest of God is
the sun ever shining calmly above the clouds, yot now and
then revealing itself through them as they break awav over
work, the paradisaical man ; God's great festiyal ii
reflected in Adam's holy-day. In accordance with
his supposition that the creative days were not num*
heied from evening to morning, out in the contrary
order (which is opposed to the te.\t), Delitzsch holds
that not the evening of tlie sixth day, but the morn-
ing of the seventh, was the real beginning of the
sabbath (p. 127). But the evening of the sixth day
Ues back before the sixth diy, whilst of an evening
and a morning of the seventh day there is no men-
tion at all. Had we taken the creative days as peri
ods generally, or the evenings as merely remission*
of the creative activity, the question about the even
ing and the morning of the seventh day would have
had no right sense. If we truly take the evenings
as denoting creative crises, then may it be asked:
did not a crisis follow upon Ihe creation of Adam?
and this may we find intimated (ch. ii. 21) in the
deep sleep of Adam. Still must we suppose that the
completion of Adam's creation took place towards
the evening or decline of the sixth day. — Ver. 3.
And God blessed the seventh day The bless-
ing of the seventh day may of itself denote primarily
that it was appointed for rest and re-creation, " which
is a blessing for the laboring man and beast (Exod.
XX. 10; Deut. v. 14)." But the earlier blessings
say : Be ye fruitful and multiply, and to blesi means
to wish for, and to promise one infinite multiplica-
tions in the course of life, as to curse means to wish
for one an infinite multiplication of evil — that is, to
imprecate, or pray against him. The blessing of the
sabbath nmst consist In this, that it gives birth to all
the festivals (or rests) of God, and all the festivals
of men — that it endlessly propagates itself as a
heavenly nature above the self-propagating earthly
nature, until it has become an everlasting sabbath
Its most distinct birth is the New Testament Sunday
But this Sunday must mediate the heavenly Sunday.
" It makes it to be an inexhaustible fountain of
re-creation " (or new Ufe), Delitzsch. — And hal-
lowed it. — To hallow is to take an object out of its
worldly relation, and to devote it to God. There is,
indeed, nothing before us here of a worldly relation
in a profane sense, and so far can the negative force
here have no place in the hallowing. Without
doubt, however, the contrast is this : he withdraws
it from labor for the sake of the world, and estab-
lishes it as the festival for God. In six days' work
had God condescended and given Himself up to live
for the world ; on the sabbath, He onhvins that the
world must live for God. He blessed and //allowed
it, because He rested tlicrein — that is, He appointed
His own rest, as a ground and rule for the rest of
man, and of the creatures, on the seventh day (see
Exod. XX. 11; xxxi. 17). "According to the author
(iod made this apj^ointment at the creation, but He
leaves Its execuiiou to a time after Moses, when, in
the desert of Sin, He practically leads Lsrael to the
festival of the seventh day, and thereupon makea
publication of the law of the sabbath on Sinai (Exod.
xxxi. 12; XXXV. 1). There is nothing known of any
observation of tlic sabbath before the time of Moses."
(Uir changing world of nature and of time. It is such n time-
less salib.ith that is intended by Rabbi Simeon, as quoted by
Riischi in his comment, on the words seventh d^iy. Gen. il.
'J : " l''lesh and blood ha^ need to add the common to the
holy time (to reckon them bypassing intervals) but to the
Holy (Jue, blessed be He, it is as the thread that binds tta€
hail-, and all days appear as ore." Compare it with th«
C^Tin "iSI^X , " the bundle of life," or lives, 1 Sam. xxT
29, and which is so :ften referred to by th-' Rabbinical wi-i
ters.— T. L..1
'1HAP. I.— II. 3.
n
Knobel. This holds good only of the legal establish-
ment of the sal)bath, for the custom of keeping a
day of rest was not confined to the Jews only. Con-
cerning the name raSJ , which the creative account
does not contain, see Deliizsch, p. 130. Deriva-
tions: I. From ^nad, an old name of Saturn; 2.
from nsailj (ny3(l)), the seventh day (Lactantius) ;
3. contracted from rnac , the time of holy rest,
which is the most likely. — Which He had created
and made (marginal reading in English Bible:
created to make). Grammatically the infinitive
construct niiUSb is rendered by the Latin faciendo.
Still the explanation : which God being active (that is,
by doing, or by an effort) had created, would be quite
idle, were it not that one would find in the language
the recognition of an antithesis to the doctrines of
emanation, or generally, to the supposed heathenish
pathological and fatalistic modes of creation. De-
litzsch thus modifies the /acicnrfo (or nliB 55): the
creating is fundamental, whilst the making, or the
forming, is consequential. Then there would be de-
noted thereby the continuing of the divine activity
beyond the time of the creative wu.'k.* In respect
to the four verses that follow, which Delitzsch, too,
as well as Ewald and others, would make the sub-
Bcription of the previous section, not the superscrip-
tion of the one that follows (as Tuch, De Wette, and
others), compare Delitzsch, p. 133. Knobel says
(p. 7): "The Elohist has a superscription before
every principal section in Genesis, and so much the
more must he have had such a superscription placed
before his first narration. " Ilgen, Pott, and Schu-
mann have rightly found the same (ch. ii. 4) in the
words : " these are the origiiies of the heaven and
the earth." etc. The word tholedoth, then, must
have sufiered a misplacement. According to De-
litzsch it is a closing formula. We hold it to be the
superscription to what follows, because the word
tholedoth must otherwise have regularly preceded,
and because our text regards the tholedoth, or gen-
erations of the heavens and the earth, as conditioned
in its principles through the creation of the earth
and the heavens — that is, the earth, and especially
Adam as the principial f point of view for the
whole.
DOCTRINAIi AMD ETHXCAl.t
1. The contrast which is at once drawn between
Leaven and earth, and whose symbolical significance
cannot be ignored, proves, in the first place, that the
whole period before us, from ch. i.-xii., is to be con-
• [The simplest rendering of the Hebrew here would
give the easiest and the plainest sense. It is that presented
in our marginal reading, taMng n1l2)T J , not as a gerund
C/aciendo), but literally, as an infinitive of piurpose ; which
God had created to make. It suggests nearly the distinction
given by Delitzsch between tha fundamental and that which
follows — the ground-laving and the finishing, the material-
gathering and the architectural arrangement of the struc-
ture. So the Vulgate : Quod Deus creavit lU faceret, and
Onkelos: tasiob ■'■' K^3 in .— T. L.)
t [This word is not to be found in any English dictiona-
ry, but we are compelled to Latinize here, and form a word,
from principium principia, to correspond to Lange's word
prinzipielle. Our " principal '* is too vague, and used in too
many senses, to answer the purpose. — T. L.j
1 With respect to dogmatical literature on the account
of the Creation, examine BaETSCHNEinEa : "Systematical
Developmei*. of Dogmatic Ideas,'* p. 450.
1-2
sidered under the point of view of the history of pri
meval religion. Secondly, the constitution of man is
the image of God, the history of Adam, of Abel, of
the Sethites, etc. ; and, further, the contrast openly
appearing at the close of this section between th»
uniting and separating of the peoples on the one hind
and the budding theocracy on the other. Thiidly,
all periods lying in the middle between these two
extreme points. Within this section, which presents
the contrast between the primeval religion and tha
patriarchal religion of Abraham, now appear individ-
ual contrasts : 1. The contrast between the para-
dise-world and the sin-world; 2. the contrast between
the anomism of the human race before the flood, and
the heathenism of man after the flood. And to these
add the more special contrasts which are to be
brought out by the separate sections.
The primitive religion is to be distinguished from
the religion of Abraham by the following points :
1. In the primitive religion, the symbolical sign \a
first, and the word second ; in the patiiarchal religion,
the word of God is first, and the symbolical sign is
second. (See Gen. xii. 1, 7.) 2. In the primitive
religion the continuance of the living faith in God is
sporadic. This, it is true, is in comiection with
genealogical relations (Seth, Noah, Shem), as the
appearance of Melchisedek especially proves (comp.
Heb. vii. 3); and, as a gradually fading twilight, it
goes on through the times until the days of Abra-
ham, forming continually, as natural religion, the
background of all the heathenism of humanity. The
faith of Abraham, on the contrary, forms with the
patriarchal religion a genealogical and historical se
quence. The aurora of the morning in Abraham
contrasts with the twilight of the evening in Melchis-
edek. Melchisedek looks, with the faithful of the
heathen world, back to the lost Paradise ; Abraham
looks forward to tlie future city of God — his religion
is the religion of the future. 3. The symbolical prim-
itive rehgion is yet, in its exterior, overgrown with
mythological heathendom. While it forms the bright
side of the primal religious world, its dark sida
arises from the mythologizing of the symbols (Rom.
i. 19-23). With the patriarchal religion, however,
the contrast between the theocratic faith and hea-
thendom has become fixed. 4. With the historic
form of this contrast, it is at the same time conclu-
sive that heathendom maintains its relative light side
in the history of humanism, and the theocratic popu-
lar history its relative dark side, which increases to
the rejection of the Messiah and the death on the
cross. The material development of salvation among
the Jews, and the formal development of the human
form of salvation among the heathen (Greeks and
Romans), are for each other, just as the evil tendencies
of heathendom and Judaism unite with each other in
the crucifying of Christ.
2. Within our division appears the beautiful con-
trast that the creation of the world is once represent-
ed in the genetic order as an ascending development
of life, so that man seems the aim (tc'^os) of al)
things; then, from chs. ii., iii., onward, in principial
order, according to which man, as a divine idea, is
the principle with which, and for which, the world,
and especially Paradise, was created. The first view
is nniversalistic, and hence Elohistic ; the latter if /A«-
ocratic, and hence Jehovistic.
3. The form of the account of the creation : re.
ligious symboUcal chronicle ; its source : a reveaicG
word or image effected by the vision of a prophecv
looking backwards (see Introduction). The objectioji;
178
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
»f Delitzsch against the mediation of the knowledge
of creatioD to men through divine revelation in hu-
man vision (see 79 sqq.), rest on a want of apprecia-
tion of the scriptural idea of vision, as already indi-
"ated. Delitzsch, with the more ancient catholic
■iupernaturalism, explains our account from a diviue
teaching, which is defined as the interposing vvice of
the Spirit of God, and the guidance, through it, ol'
man's own spirit. To this ultra-supernaturaUstic
■jiew of Delitzsch aud Keil is opposed the rationalistic
one of Hofmann, namelj^ that the account of the cre-
ation i« the transposed ir;pression in history which the
world made on the first-created man reflecting on its
origin. To the purely historical co»ception of a
vonderfully preserved or regenerated (Delitzscli) tra-
dition of revelation or legend, is contrasted the myth-
ical conception in various forms, efl'ected tiirough
the allegorical interpretation of Fhilo ; which is fol-
lowed by many church Fathers, and by Herder in his
adoption of a parabohc hieroglyphic, a. Moral myth
as a ground for the commandment of the sabbath
(Paulus). b. Philosophical myth, especially the nat-
ural philosophical (Eichhorn and others). We have
already shown in the Introduction why we cannot
ioin in either the purely historical or the mythical
view, but must insist on the specific of a religious
symljoUcal history. The vision might be designated
as intuition, in so far as we carry back the respective
knowledge to the unfallen man.
4. In our section the world is represented accord-
ing to its four dirt'erent relations : 1. As creation ; 2,
as nature ; 3. as cosmos ; 4. as seon (see Lange's
" Dogmatics," p. 222 sqq.). The idea ofci-eation is ex-
pressed by the word S^2, as well as by the going
forth ten tunes of the Omnific Word of God. God
said, " Let there be, and there was." The ac-
count of nature, 1. through the great contrasts,
separations, and combinations : heaven and earth,
darkness and light, atmospheric waters and terres-
trial waters, firmament and terra firma, land and
water, sky and earth. 2. Through the designation
of plants, that they should bear seed, each according
to its kind. 3. Through the blessing on animals :
be fiuitful and multiply, and the distinction of vari-
ous kinds of animals, as also finally the blessing on
men. 4. Through the relation of tlie various crea-
tures to the sphere of birth or life corresponding to
them (especially water and earth), through their
coming forth from these spheres at the creating
word. Especially belong here the picturescjue ex-
pressions: Thohu, Vabhohu.—VCa'\ 7"!^ri sr-iH
S-IT S"'"1Ta 3UJS "-iS niD3> ■'■IS •)'» I'-IUJ
can iis'iiti"' — rBiy> ciiri — ^3"i5 iHe — m-^'-\n
li;B"in. 0. The six days' work itself ^The idea of
the cosmos. It appears distinctly in all the solemn
pauses of the creative work, as they are marked with
the sevenfold repetition of the words : and (Jod saw
that it was good. The celebration of the sabbath
also belongs iiere, as it points back to tiie beautiful
completion of the universe. — liut the idea of the a;on
appears with the fact that man is made the end and
aim of all days of creation, by which it is clearly pro-
aouiiced that he is the real ]irinciple in which the
iTorld and its origin is comiireliended. The history
of the eaith is thus made the lifetime of humanity.
(l8 profouidest princijile of development and meas-
ure of tiu,e is the support of man.
6. The C'realirm. — On the dogmatic doctrine of
Jie crcMiCon, Hce Hase, Hutter, jLIaiin: "Doctrine
of Faith," and Lange's " Positive Dogmatics." Hen
comes especially into consideration 1 . the relation of th«
doctrine of the creation to the Logos, John i. 1-3.
The first verse of Genesis clearly forms the ground
presupposed in that passage, God spake ; through Hi"
word He created the world, says Genesis ; His woro
is a personal divine lifi', says John, and the Ne»
Testament in general, especially f'ol. i. 15-19; ch.
ii. 3-9. According to Genesis everything is created
through the idea of man in the image of God
with a view to this man; according to the Ne*
Testament it is through the idea of Christ, who i»
the principal of humanity, with a view to Christ. A.i
Adam was the principle of the creation, so is Chrifi
the principle of humanity. Therefore it reads :
" God hath chosen us in liim before the foundation
of tlie world" (Eph. i. 4; comp. John xvii. 5). The
creation is, in its most essential point, the production
of the eternal God-Man in the eternal to-day. In
man nature has passed beyond itself, from the relative,
symboUcal independence, to the perfected and real, to
freedom ; it has in him the mediator of its redemp-
tion, of its glorification. The beautiful cosmos, this
unity of all varieties, which combines in it an endless
complex of unities, to the production of external
harmony and beauty, has, in Christ, the most beau-
tiful of the children of men, its middle point, the
centre of its ideal beauty. Finally, the first aeon,
which is fixed by the life of Adam, has for its cort
its root, and its aim, the second ffion fixed by Christ.
2. The relation to the Holy Ghost. The spirit
is the living, self-impelling unity of spiritual life, the
breath of the suul, as the wind forms the spirit of the
earth, the vital, ever-active unity of its varieties. The
Spirit of (lod hovering over the waters, is the divine,
creative, living unity, which rules over the ferment-
ing process of the Thohu Vabhohu ; hence, as the
peripheral principle of Ibrmation (at one with the
central principle of formation, the Logos), it etlectu-
ates the separations and the combinations by which
the formation of the earth is determined. In the
New Testament, however, it appears in its personal
strength, as the unity of all works of revelation of
tlie lather and the Son, and as the absolute, spiritual
principle of formation which etti'cts the glorification
of the world through the separation of the ungodly
and the godly, aud through the combination ol every-
thing godly in the church and the kingdom of God.
3. The relation of the creation to the Diviue Be-
ing. In the creation, God appears as the creator,
who calls forth things as out of nothing. But from J
the genesis out of the pure nothing, are distinguished ^
the creative things as proceeding from the life op
breath of the creator's word, with which they come
forth into existence (Ps. civ. ■i"); and finally man
stanils eomjilete "itli the features of divine allinity,
proceeding from the thought of His heart, Iroiii His
counsel, as created in His image, and inlended to be
His visible administrator on earth. In the New
Testament, however, the paternal feature of the
Divine Being has uiivailcd itself as a paiernity, from
which all paternity in heaven aud on earth proceeils,
bul which, in the most special sense, refers to Christ,
tlie image of the Divine Being. By the relation of
the work of creation to the coming Christ, the whole
creation becomes an advance representation, a sym-
bol of Christ ill a series of symuOiical degrees, of
which each represents in advance the next followiug
one. Through the relation of Christ to the Father,
the whole creation receives the mark of the Imuiaii,
especially of revelation, or of the wonderful (as de
CHAP. 1.- [I. 3.
\li
noted by the lion), of resignation, or of sacrifice
(as denoted by the ox), and of the reflection of light,
that is, the idea (as denoted by the eagle).* But the
spirit, as the unitary life of the revelation of the
Father and of the Son, is reflected as creative wis-
dom in all creative movements of the world, and,
indeed, in the fundamental forms of separation
and combination, of centrifugal and centripetal
force, of repelling and attracting operations. — The
account of the creation. Gen. ch. i., is not a dogma
of the trinity of God; the completed creation, how-
ever, as a work of God and revelation, is a mirror
of the trinity, and a prophecy of the revelation of
its future (see Lange's " Positive Dogmatics," p. 201;
ff. 4. The relation of the creation to revelation.
The most general sphere of the revelation of God,
that which forms the basis of all future revelations,
is the creation of heaven and earth as the objec-
tive revelation of God, which corresponds with the
subjective revelation of God in his image, man.
5. The relation of the doctrine of the creation to
the heathen and post-heathen view of the world.
It denies polytheism^ for the creator of all things
appears as the only one, and if his name stands in the
plural (Elohim), the element of truth in polytheism
(in contrast to Judaism) is therewith recognized,
namely, the variety of the revelation of the one God
in the variety of his strength, works, and signs, and
the variety of the impressions which he thereby pro-
duces.
It denies pantheism, for God distinguishes himself
by his creation of the world ; he creates the world
through his conscious word, consequently freely, and
stands in personal completion before his work and
over it, so that the world is neither to be regarded
as an emanation of his divine being, nor especially
as a metamorphosis of the divine being, (the second
form of it,) or, viee versa, God as the emanation of
the world. But it emphasizes also the true in pan-
theism (in contrast to deism) : the animating omni-
presence and revelation of God in the world, with his
creating word, with his spirit hovering over the form-
ation of the world, with his image in the dispositions
and destination of man. It denies dualism, for God
appears as the creator of all things directly. He is also
the originator of the Thohu Vabhohu of fermenting ele-
ments ; he finds in the creation no blame, and, at
the end of the sixth day, everything is very good.
The true in dualism is, however, also retained (against
fatalism), namely, the contrast between the materials
and the formative power, between the natural degrees
* (For this thought of Lanp:(?, which some might regard
«a pure fancy, there is an etymological ground in the He-
brew langu.^ge. The words for tight, and for the motions
of light, have a close affinity to those for fiying, compare
ri^l* , votare, CIST, vibrare, n^^V rendered tenebrse, but
which strictly means the earliest twilight or twinkling of the
morning, and that beautiful word, Hn'aJ ^SZ-'ESJ , palpebrm
aurorsf, .Toli iii 9; xli. 10— ijfiepas ^Xc^apoi/, Soph. Autig.
103, "the eye-lids,*' the opening wing "of the morning."
Compare also X2£3 , volavit, Jer. xlviii. 9, and v:J3 , splen-
duity micavit, shone, glistened, glimmered, VD , a flower, etc.
It is something more than a mere poetical 'image when we
speak of light as having wings, especially as the conception
S3 applied to the faint gleaming. glimTa&mn^, fiutlering, we
ocay say, just waving up out of the darkness. How natural
the order of the images : to fly, flutter, palpitate, vibrate,
qtliver, twinkle, glimmer, gleam, shine. Comp. Engl. : fly,
flare, flash ; Latin : volo ivotito), Jlo, fiare, flamma. So
•piritually, idea and rejUMion support the same analogy.
It may bo the piercing eye of the eagle that represents tho
idea, but the other view has the best philological grounds.
and the natural principles, between nature and spirit
But the doctrine of creation denies much more the
aiitichristian polytheism, that is, atumism, even tr
its most tnodern form of inttterialisin, as such mate
rialism rejects not only the truth of the .spirit, of
personal Ufs, of the Godhead, of the immortality of
the soul, and of liberty, consequently all clhical priu
ciples, but also the physical principia of crystal form-
ation, of the formation of plants and animals. I|
does this by making matter regai'ded as devoid of al
visibility, and in so far thoroughly hypothetical and
abstract, or rather the infinity of ieigiied abstract
substances (with which the TJiohu Vabhohu, as a
living fei-mentation of appearing elements, is not to
be contbuiided), the sole God-resembling factor of all
phenomena of life, such phenomena consisting of two
classes, of which the pliysical and abstract spiritual
is to be in accordance with the play of matter, the
ethical, on the contrary, a bare appearance, having
no conceivable or comprehensible reality. The hving
God here stands in contrast with the nmltitude of
these dark idols of a feigned deity, and he places
opposite the subordinate elements of life the super-
ordiuate vital principles, which give the elements
their cosmical form, whilst over all he places the
ruler man, with his godlike, spiritual nature.
The only thing that endures as an element of
truth in materialism is the infinite and subtle eon-
ibrmity to law that is foimd in material things, a fiict
which spiritualism nowadays far too much disre-
gards. The doctrine of creation also deifies with
increased emphasis the intensified pantheism, i. e.,
the most modern pantheism as opposed to personal-
ity— the pantheism which makes everything pi-oceed
from an impersonal thought, in order to let every-
thing again disappear through continual metamor-
phoses (morphologism) in impersonal thoughts ; for
the scriptural doctrine makes all thoughts of crea-
tion proceed from an unconditioned personality, pass
through fixed forms, and culminate in a conditioned
personality. The truth that lies in such self-deifica-
tion is recognized in this, that all works of the abso-
lute thinking are themselves thoughts. He has
spoken thoughts which have become works of crea-
tion. Finally, it denies the d)-namical dualism (or
the dualism of power), i. e., that hierarchical abso-
lutism which holds as evil not only the material
world, but still more the entire realm of spirit and
spiritual life regarded as something to be controlled
with infinite care, and with the infinite art and power
of an abstract authority ; for it testifies for the word
of God as imni,anent in the world, and thereby holds
fast the element of truth in that hierarchism, accord-
ing to which the spirit of God hovers over the waters,
and mail as the administrator of God is commanded,
with reterence to all animal life in the world : Rule
over them, and make them subject to you.
At the very first verse and word of Genesis, u
clearly steps over that impure sink of dualism beyond
which the entire heathen and philosophical view of
the world could never go. It does this, by contrast-
ing God in his eternal self-perfection to the creation
which arose with time. The doctrine of the creation
is the first act of revelation and of faith in the historj
of the kingdom of God. It would lead too far, should
we attempt to show how the three heathen errors of
religion are ever present with each other, although al
one time polytheism, at one tune pantheism, and a:
another time dualism, prevails. We make this observ
ation, however, to indicate thereby that we do not
ignore the pantheistic basis of Gnosticism, even wher
180
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
It plaT3 with polytheism, since we present it accord-
ing to its prevailing characteristic as dualism. But
not only are the coarse ground-forms of the ancient
And modern darkening of the doctrine of the creation
to be judged by the tirst chapter of Genesis, but also
the more subtle, Cliristianly modified forms, as, on
the one hand, they present themselves in Gnosticism,
(with which we also reckon ilanichaeism and its later
shoots, extending to our time : PriscUlianism, Paul-
Icianism, Bogomiles, Albigenses, dualistic theosophs
of Jacob BiJhm), and, on the other hand, in Ebion-
itism, as it has found its continuation in the later
ilonarchianism, and still more modern deism. The
Gnostics ground their opposition to the Old Testament
on a paganistic misinterpretation of the New, and
thus they may be ranged according to their more or
less hostile attitude to the Old Testament, and as
representing various heathenish views of the world
which, after the manner of old Palimpsests, placed one
upon the other, appear through the overlying Chris-
tianity. Among such Palimpsests, on which a form
of Christianity has been overwritten, may be reckoned
the Samaritan (Simon Magus), Syrian (Saturninus,
etc.), Alexandrian (Basilides), old-Egyptian (Ophiten),
Hellenic (Karpocrates), Ponto-Asiatic(Marcion), and
Persian Gnostics (Manes). Finally, in Mohammed,
the Arabian Gnosticism and Ebionitism ran together,
as the again broken forms of Subordinatianism and
ilonarchianism ran together in Arianism. Through
the manifold modifications which Christian dualism
experienced immediately, and especially in the course
of time, one must not he led astray in respect to the
unity of the genus. Just so, pure Ebionitism, whose
naked image is Jewish Talmudism (as it is to be rec-
ognized throughout by its obhque position (o the New
Testament and the New Testament elements in the
Old), has passed through various mutations whose
ground-thought remains the same : namely, a fatal-
istic, eternalized, ontological divorcement between
God and the world, through the law of religion or
nature, whether the form of the change be called
deism, naturalism, or rationahsm. And, finally, the
mixed form of gnostic Ebionitism, which was prepared
tlirough the Alexandrian system of Philo, and whose
naked image is the Jewish Kabbala, has remained
unchanged, through all mutations, in its ground-
thoughts, whether they appear as Montanism, Douat-
ism, or pseudo-Dionysian, mediaeval and modern ultra-
"upernaturalism, as inflexible baptismism, or yielding
spiritualism. Together with the true difference be-
tween God and the world, the doctrine of creation
expresses also the true combination between both,
and finds the living mediation of this contnist in the
man created in the image of God ; whereas, dualism
makes the difference a separation, while pantheism
makes the combination a mixture, and the still ob-
Bervalile, polytheistic remiidscence in Christendom
vacillaies, in its love of fables, between creature
deification and creature demonizing.
6. The relation of the temporal creation to the
eternity of God. It is quite as wrong to transfer
gnostically the origin of the real world to the eternity
of God, to fix the existence of God according to
theogony by epeaking of a becoming of God, or of an
obscure basis in God (Biilim), or of an origin of the
material contemporary with the self-afllrmation of
God (Rothe), as it is to declare, with scholastic super-
BatunUsm, that (iod indeed might have left the
world uncreated. Against the first view, tliere is the
declaration that the world had a beginning, which,
a little farther on, is fixed as the beginning of time.
Against the latter, there is the declaration that Ooc
chose believing humanity from eternity in Christ, as
it is also indicated in our text, by the decree of (lod
at the creation of man, and by tlie image of God
Jlie icorlfl rests therefore^ as an actual and tempora.
world, on an eternal ideal ground."^ Its ideal prepa-
ration is eternal, but its genesis is temporal, for it if
conditioned by the gradual growing, and the beauti'
fill rhythm of growth is time.
7. In the significant number ten, the number of
actual historical completion, the account is repeated .
God said, Let there be, and there was. The speak-
ing of God now certainly indicates the thinking of
God, and it thence follows that all works of creation
are thoughts of God (ideahsm). But it indicates also
a will, making himself externally known, an active
operation of God, and thence it follows that all th«
works of creation are deeds of God (realism). Both,
however, thinking and operating, are one in the di-
vine speaking, the primal source of all language, his
personally making himself known, although we can-
not bring up the thought of this speaking to the con-
ception (personalism). Through creating, speaking,
making, forming, the world is ever again and agair
denoted as the free deed of God.
8. Theological definitions of the creation. The
creatio is distingtushed as a single act and as a per-
manent fact. A third period is, however, at the
same time pointed out, namely, the continuance of
the doing in the deed, so that the world would not
only fall to pieces, but would pass away, if God with-
drew himself from it. The thought that he cannot
withdraw from il in his love, should not be confound-
ed with the untenable thought that he might not be
able to withdraw from it in his omnipotence. The
absolute dependence of the world on God is at all
times the same (see Ps. civ. 30; Col. i. 17; Heb.
i. 3). On the relation of the creation to the trinity,
compare Hase, Hctter, p. 149, and L.inge's "Pos-
itive Dogmatics," p. 206 ff. — The expression, crea-
tion from nothing, is borrowed from the apocryphical
word, 2 Mace. vii. 28 : H o-k Sr/TUK ; comp. Heb. xi.
3. It denies that an eternal material, or indeed that
anything, was present as a (material) substratum of
the creation. One can, however, misinterpret the
expression by making the act of creation one of ab-
stract will, absolved from any divine breath of life
(Giintherianism). On determining the creatio ex ni-
liilo we distinguish the nihil negativum, by deming
the eternity of matter as substratum of the creation,
and the nihil privativum^ by assuming that God at
first created matter as nihil privativum, then the
forma in the hexahneron. This tlie tnodtts creationis :
first, matter ; then, the form. Tliis idea of a matter
as something before form, does not correspond, how-
ever, to the idea of a quickening or life-giving ac-
tivity in creation. With the beginning of crea-
tion there Is immediately estabhshed the contrast of
heaven and earth, i. e., different spheres, which as
such are not mere matter ; and with the Thohu Va-
bhohu of the first earth-form there is immediately
established the constructive activity of the spirit of
* nVo havo placed this sentence in italics as containing
a truth of vast importance, transcending all science on thi
one hand, and all theology that places itself in onta^onijl]]
to science on the other. If it contains truth in respect to
the world, then, a/or/ion, is it tnxe in respect to man, wh«
is the final cause, or "the spiritual core of the world,'' as
Lanpo ehsewhore styles him. There is an eternal (ground
for the world; much more is there an eternal pround foi
humanity ( Adaro-ity) ; beyond all, is there an eternal ground
for the new humanity (Christ-ianity). "Chosen in Hixr
before the foundation of the world." — 1". I-l
CHAP. 1.— II. 3.
18.
i;od. The demiurgic conception presupposes an eter-
nal world-matter, wnether regarded according to the
Persian idea as evil, or according to the Greek as
blind, heterogeneous, and antagonistic, or according to
the Indian idea as magically mutable, which eternal
world-matter must, in all cases, make the demiurgic
formation a thing of mere ai'bitrary sport. The true
idea of the work of creation lies between this and the
theurgo-magical, according to which God had made
the universe, in abstract positiveness, a purs mate-
rial contrast of His divine being. This is a concep-
tion in which the creating word, the spirit of God
hovering over the waters, the image of God, or even
the omnipresence of God in the world, do not receive
their just due. As the aim of the creation finally
[Jinis creationis)^ there have been distinguished the
highest or last aim, God's glorification, and the inter-
mediate aim, the welfare of his creatures and the
happiness of man. But it must be observed that
God glorifies himself in the happiness of men, and
that the latter should find their happiness in contem-
plating the glory of God.
9. Ttte Relation of the Mosaic Account of the
Creation to the Mythological Legends of the Creation,
— The cosmogonies of the heathen are confounded
with their theogonies, as their gods with primeval
man. See Licken: "The Traditions of the Human
Race, or the Primitive Revelation of God among the
Heathen," Miinster, 1856. "These cosmogonies are
all very similar to each other. At first chaos is
placed at the head as a disordered mass (chaos
alone V). This chaos develops or forms itself into
thp world-egg. This egg, which plays a certain part
in the cosmogonies, is only a conception called forth
by the apparent form of the earth,* so that the sky
presents itself as the shell and the earth as the yolk
of this great egg. With this shaping of chaos into a
fforld-egg, or earth-sphere, arises then, according to
the representation of these cosmogonies, the first
being, the ' first-born,' or the first man. This first
man originating with (out of) the world-egg, the
father and founder of all life, is now, according to
the popular conception, a giant-like being. As the
* [This conception seems to be sanctioned by Lange, but
th re is no proof of it. Instead of being suggested by the
riuire of the mundus (which is not like an egg, or the earth
ife- its yolk, unless we make very ancient the knowledge,
0^ notion, of the earth's sphericity), this so common feature
J * the old cosmogonies came most probably from the idea
>^ a brooding, cheristdng, life-producing power, rej resented
tt» GMlesis by the rBnn'3 fl^l , the throbbing, pulsating,
OPtoving spirit — from r)n^ , primary sense in Piel, palpitare,
ipoondary sense, yet very ancient in the Syriac, to love
% irmft/, or with the strongest affection. Hence in the
3re«k cosmogony the first thing bom of this ecg was epw?,
' .e primitive love, which shows that the egg had nothing to
U* wiih the figure of the earth, either real or supposed. See
^e Birds of Aribtophanes, 697, where the poet calls it umji/e-
^ovj the egg produced without natural impregnation :
'Ef o5 )TepiT€AAo^€^ai? ttipati e^Aoo'Tei' 'Eptuy 6 irofleii-o?,
From which spning Love the all desired,—
^nly the Greeks, as usual, inverted the primitive idea, and
awde the generating cause itself the effect. Eros then pro-
■IMccd the human race, etc. In other respects the heathen
Bo^mogonies are very fairly given here by Lucken ; but what
ft wntrast. do these monstrosities present to the pure, har-
v-nious, monotheistic grandeur of the Bible account ! If
*h5 ilos-aic co-mogony was derived from the heathen, as is
'intended, how very strange it is, and counter to what takes
place in all similar derivations, that the Hebrew mind (a
Terj' gross mmd, they say) should have taken it in this im-
pure and monstrously confused state, and refined it back to
that chaste and sublime consistency which the Bible naira-
Uve, whatever may be thought of its absolute trutb, may so
lastly claim.— T. L.]
present man, according to primitive conception, is i
microcosm, so is that first being, in heathen concep-
tion, the macrocosm itself, originating all life in
nature by developing from himself the various partt
of the world-organism, heaven and earth, sim and
moon, mountains and rivers. Now by dividing or
killing this macrocosmic being, or by mingling its
generating parts with earthly things (esi)ecially fer-
tilizing water, as in the story of I hronos), the lowej
Ufe of nature begins, and things can multi|ily in sex-
ual division and separation. This is the whole
nucleus of all co.smogonies. And we would here
observe, how Irequent it is in heathen conceptiona
that all primitive generating being is imagined imder
the form of a great world-animal (as an injmense ox
or goat, for example), and as such worshipped.
Thus the first being of the Persians is the ox Abu-
dad, and the Egyptians worshipped it as a goat
under the name of Mendes." Here, however, the
following is to be observed : 1. Behind, beside, or
over the chaos, or the disordered matter, usually
stands a mysterious form of the highest divinity :
Brahma among the Indians, Fimbultyr among the
Teutons, Ormuzd among the Persians. 2. With the
Hesiodic Gaia, which proceeds from chaos (i. e.,
from boundless empty space), there is also Eros ; so in
the Chinese legend the first macrocosinic man or
giant (Panku) is formed with the earth. In like
manner Brahma with the Indians, and Ymer with
the Teutons, become, by the division of their limbs,
the foundation of the world. 3. Matter is always
fixed with the divinity, or the divinity with matter.
But matter is coherent with God in the predominant-
ly pantheistic systems of emanation. According to
the Indo-Brahmic, Platonic, and Alexandrian system
of emanation, matter emanates witli the world from
divirdty ; according to the Egyptian and mytliologi-
co-Grecian system, divinity emanates from the world,
from chaos, or the ocean. According to the pre-
dominantly duahstic systems, the world arises from a
mixture in the conflict between the emanaticjiis of
the predominantly spiritual, light, good God, and the
emanations of the predominantly material, dark,
wicked God — sometimes in a decidedly hostile posi-
tion of the two powers, as in the Persian niytliology,
sometimes in a more peaceful parallelism, as in the
Slavonian. For the various cosmologies, compare
the quoted work of Lucken, p. 33 ; Delitzscm, pp.
81, 83, and ti09 ; Hah.n : Compendium, p. 374, with
reference to Wdttke : " The Cosmogonies of the
Heathen Nations before the Time of Jesus and the
Apostles," Hague, 1850. The Chaldean myth of the
creation, as given by Berosus, is found in Eusebils:
" Chronicles," i. p. 22 ; Syncellcs, i. p. 25 ; the
Phenician myth as given by Sanchouiaton in Euse-
bils; Praparatio Evangelica, i. p. 10; the Egyptian
myth in Diodorus Siculcs, i. 7 and 10; a Grecian
myth in Hesiod's Theogoni/, ver. 116 s(iq. ; the In-
dian myths in P. von Bohlen : " Ancient India," i,
p. 158; Lassen: "Indian Antiquities," iii. p. 387
(at the begiiuiing of the code of Manu) ; the Zend
myth in Avesta, the Etrurian myth in Suidas under
Tyrrhenia (see the " Commentary " of Keil and
Delitzsch, p. 8) ; the Scandinavian myth in the
Edda, etc.
According to the older conceptions of the dayi
of creation as combined with biblical chronology,
one could speak of a date of the creation. Starke Lt
satisfied with the correctness of the date: 23d of
October, 4004 before Christ. Schroder makes thi
date the 1st or 17th of September, 4201, but adds
182
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
" The Son of Man knew not the day nor the hour when
heaven and earth should pass away, but the child of
man would know the year and the day when heaven
and earth arose." The autumn seems to have been
chosen on account of the ripe fruits, without reflecting
that on the entire earth it must ever be autumn
Bomewhere.
id. The World as Mature, a. The A ndent View
of tht World, that of the Bible and of Modern Times.
— Tlie world-view of the ancients was based on
appearance, according to whicli the earth formed a
centre reposing under the moving, rolUng starry
world ; this geocentric view received a scientific
expression in the well-known Ptolemaic system.
This system was abandoned in the time of the Refor-
mation for the helio-centric system of Copernicus.
But because the Bible, with "Kspect to astronomical
matters, speaks the language oi common life, which
is yet authorized in accordance with appearances (the
Bun rises, sets, etc.), it was supposed that the Coper-
Dican system contradicted the teaching of Holy Writ,
and not only the papal council imagined that in its
treatment of Galileo, but even Melancthon was of
the same opinion, and to the present day such pro-
tests, even on the Protestant side, have not entirely
died away (see the attacks on Dr. Franz in Sanger-
hausen in Diesterweg's "Astronomy," p. 104; also
p. 20, especially p. 326). These prove how often a
contracted Bible belief can injure more than profit
the faith. The Copernican theory was especially
supposed to be in contradiction with the passage iu
Jos. X. 12, 13. While men were torturing them-
selves with this difficulty springing from a blind
adherence to the hteral rendering, a much greater
one was gradually stepping forth out of the back-
ground. The cousequences of the Copernican system
were developed, according to the discoveries of Her-
schel, in this wise : the sun among its planets is only
a single star of heaven, and the earth is one of its
smallest planets. Since now the fixed stars of hea-
ven are nothing but suns, and these suns are all,
according to the analogy of ours, surrounded by
planetary groups, there appear to be countless num-
bers of planets, of which very many are larger than
our earth. How shall we now retain the thought,
that the earth is the sole scene of the revelation of
God, as Holy Writ declares : the scene of the incar-
nation of God, and the centre of a reconciliation,
dissolution, and glorification of the world, embracing
heaven and earth.
The Hegelian philosophy sought at first to meet
this dilBccdty in its own interest. In order to make
the earth the sole arena of the evolutions of mind,
whicli was to reacli the full glory of its self-con-
Bciousiiess in the Hegelian system, the whole starry
world was declared to be destitute (jf spirits and in
he main spiritless — mere films of light, etc. (see
Langk's " Pd.sitive Dogmatics," p. 2711). The ettbrt
was made to render this barren view agreeable to
theology with the pretence that it was in accordance
with the Bible, and favored the faith ("Land of
Glory," p. 12 ff.). Against this insinuation the
author wrote the articles which are collected in the
work: "The Land of Glory" (Meurs), Bielefeld,
1838. "ith reference to the work of 1'fafk: "Man
»nd the Stars." The results of modern a.^ironomy
(according to Struve, Miidler, Schubert, etc.), viz.,
that the other planets of our solar system have not,
in the first place, the same plastic consistency nor
the same planetary relations as our earth, and sec-
jndlf, that the stellar world is divided into a solar
planetary region like our solar system, and a solai
astral region (the world of double stars, of etema!
sunshine), were applied to the bibUcal Christian view
of the world as recognizing (in its conception of
various places of discipline and punishment) a plact
beneath the world on the one hand, and a placa
above it on the other ; consequently the contrast oi
a region of growing and a region of perfected life,
of the church militant and the church triumphant,
of the earthly and the heavenly, of the earthly-human
and the angelic hfe. Above all, it was observed that
with the doctrine of the ascension of Christ the exist-
ence of a land of glory, in contradistinction to the
earthly sphere of day and night, birth and death, or
the sphere of the creative, was settled. This work
was followed by the work of Kurtz: "Bible and
Astronomy," 1st ed. 1842. In the meanwhile there
sprung up a third representation of cosmology,
which was again to fix the geocentric stand-point in
a spiritual respect. This was mainly induced by A.
von Schaden, but diligently prosecuted by Dr. Ebrard,
recently in his work ; " The Results of Natural Sci-
ence," Kbnigsberg, 1861. With respect to our plan-
etary system, the said work endeavors to prove that
the earth is its teleological centre, and to that end,
fartlier, that the other planets could be either not at
all or only partly inhabitable ; that they are only ac
cretions to the planetary nature, having their places
there simply on account of the earth ; and that con-
sidered under any other point of view they could
only appear as caricatures of the planetary nature.
DeUtzsch (p. 614) is in general inchned to this
view. He permits, however, a natural pliilosopher
by profession (Prof Franz Pfufl'), to speak for him,
who nevertheless acknowledges (after a severe criti-
cism of the plant-family) that there may be imagined
elsewhere such beings as are organized in correspon-
dence to the prevaUing relations on other heavenly
bodies. But one cannot see how the conceptions in
question can be called " creatures of fantasyy
We consider the view of the pure unreality of the
extra-earthly planetary world as neither cosmologi-
cully grounded, nor of wholesome tendency in aid of
a biblical view of the world. As respects the first
point, one must clearly distinguish between an in-
habitability of the planets ot our solar system for
beings of our earthly organization, and a similar in-
habitability for spiritual beings in general. If the
earthly organization of man is to fix the measure for
the liabitableness of supra-terrene bodies, then must
we also apply the analogy to the most beautiful and
briUiaiit stellar-world. And what must become of
the departed human souls, separated from their
bodies ? How shall there be found a native region
for angelic spirits '/ But it would redound little to
the glorification of the living God of Holy Writ to
consider the whole planetary group of our snii, the
earth alone excepted, as spiritless wastes. Wliat-
ever in this respect is true of the llegehan system in
general, in its relation to the stellar-world, is true of
the said view m special reference to our iilauetary
system.
[Note on tmk Astronomical Oiuection tc
Rkvelation. — The (piestion of the planets' iuhabita-
bility, especially in its religious and biblical bearings,
has been very ably and scientifically discussed iu a
work entitled "The Plurality ol' Worlds" by Prof
Whewkll of Oxford. Tlie author maintains a vi(!»
similar to that of Dr. Ebrard, that the earth is the
advanced planet of the system, and that the molt
scieiitilie evidence goes to slion that the otheit
CHAP. I— II. 3.
!8i
(especially the largest, or those of least density) are
In a rudimentary or iochoate state. The same may
be true of all the visible bodies of the stellar spaces.
The only reasouiug against it is simply the question,
why not, poiirquoi non, as Montaigne employs it,
without any inductive evidence. This author employs
also the modern view in geology with great [lerti-
nence and Ibive : lumiense limex without life or witli
only th(! lowest forms of Ufe ! If tills is not ineon-
Bistent with the divine wisdom and goodness, then
immense spaces without life, or with only the lowest
forms of Ufe, for a certain time, is no more incon-
sistent.
So far, however, as this presents a difficulty to
revelation and Christianity, it is not due to modern
fcience alone, or even mainly. The inhabitaljiUty
of the planets, and the " plurality of worlds," are as
much a priori thoughts, that is, rising of themselves
to the musing meditative mind, as they are the
results of any scientific or inductive reasoning. In
both cases, imagination is the chief power of the
mind employed, tuough modem science has furnished
it with its stronger stimulants. As such a priori or
independent thought, the notion of a plurality, or
even an infinity, of worlds, was very ancient. It
was, however, larger than the modern notion, being
rather a plurality of Konnol, or mundi (that is, total
visible universes) than of worlds used, as the name
is now used, of planetary or stellar bodies. It wa."?
the old question of the soul demanding a sufficient
reason for the non-^xisieiice^ the absence of which
reason seemed to be itself a proof of the actual exist-
ence. Why not? If one world, why not two^
three — more — numberless? See Plotaech : De
J'lacilis Philosophonim, vol. v. p. 289, Leip. ed.,
where among other statements and arguments he
<^uotes the saying of Metrodorus: 6.ronov eii/at eV
^eyd\(i> irefittjj eva araxvf yffTj^ijvaty Ka't eva Kofr^iOt/
eV T(f iireifia'. " it is absurd (incredibly strange) that
there should be but one head of wheat in a great
plain, and no less so, that there should be but one
cosmos in infimte space." The other idea of the
planets' inhabitability appears also in the Greek
poetry. See especially the fragment given by Pro-
cius:
fiWijf yaiav aireipaTov ^vre aeXTjvTiv
a^dvarat K\ijCov(Tiv, einx^Oifioi Se t€ fJLTjirrjy
TJ woAA' ovpe ex*'i toAV iffrea noWa jueAadpa,
Another Ian J of vast extent.
Immortals call Seleue, men, the moon,
A land of mountains, cities, palaces.
The Bible is charged with narrowness in its space
conceptions, but how narrow is that science, or that
philosophy, which while vaunting itself, perhaps, on
its superior range of view, has no idea of any higher
being than man, and sometimes would seem to reject
any other conception of deity than that of a devel-
oped humanity, slowly becoming a god, an etre su-
preme, to the nature still below. How glorious the
Scripture doctrine appears in the contrast, as start-
ing with an all-perfect peisonal being: Jehovah
Tzebaoth, Jehovah of Hosts, with cherubim and
ueraphim, apx"', Kupi6rriTes. Uving principles, ruling
energies, angels, archangels, thrones, donunions,
principalities, and powers. If not in space concep-
tions, yet how sublimely in the higher idea of ascend-
ing ranks of being do the Scriptures surpass the low
%nd narrow views of Herbert, Comte, and Uarwiu.
*fter a past eternity of progress, nature and the
cosmos have just struggled up to man t This is thi
highest limit yet reached after a movement so im.
measurably long, yea, endless in one direetion; and
that, too, not man as the Scripture represents hini,
a primus homo, an exalted being, so constituted bv
the inspiration that gave him birth, and signed him
with the image of the eternal God, but man jus*
rising above the ape, just emerging from that last
growth of nature that preceded him in this intermina-
ble series of chance selections at last falling into
some seeming order, and of random developments
that never came from any preceding idea. Man as
he now appears on earth, and whom Scripture pro-
nounces a fallen being, the highest product of an
endless time! Such is "the positive philosophy,"
so boastful of its discoveries in width and space, but
so exceedingly low and narrow in respect to the
other and grander dimension ! It discards theology
and metaphysics as belonging to a still lower stage
of this late-born child of nature, but alas for man if
all the glory of his being, all his higher thinking, has
already thus passed away ! We may thank the Liv-
ing God for giving to us an ideal world, as in itself a
proof of something above nature, and of a higher
actual even now in nature than our sense and our
science ever have drawn, or may ever expect to
draw, from it.
The objection to revelation to which Lange here
alludes as drawn from the modern astronomy is
itself simply anthropopathic. They who make it
imagine Deity to be just such a one as themselves.
If He has two worlds to take care of, it is incredible
that His providence should he as particular, and His
interest as near, as though He had but one to govern.
Such a mode of thinking makes worth, too, and rank,
wholly ijuantitative and numerical, banishing, in fact,
all intrinsic quality, and intrinsic value, from the
world of things and ideas. The bigger the uniTerse
in space, the less the worth in each part, as a part,
and this without any distinction between the purely
physical or material to which such a quantitative
rule of inverse proportion might apply, and the
mo|al and spiritual, which can never be measured
by it.
The force of this objection comes from the fact
of the imagination overpowering the reason. The
lower though more vivid faculty impedes or silences
for a time the higher. Reason teaches intuitively,
or as derived from the very idea of God, that Uia
care and providence towards any one rational and
moral agent cannot be diminished by the number of
other rational and moral agents, or be any less than
it would be if such agent had been alone with Deity
in the universe. The Ught and heat of the smi are
the same whether the recipients are few or many.
The case, therefore, may be thus stated : If a certain
manifestation of the divine care for, and interest in,
our world and race (namely, such as is revealed in
the Bible) would not be incredible on the supposnion
of their being but one such world or lace, then such
credibility is not at all diminished by the discovery
that there are others, few or many, to any extent
conceivable. We must hold firmly to this as a pur«
rational judgment against the swaying imaginatioD
invading the reason, and even assuming to take its
l)lace. If the interest revealed by Christianity could
be pronounced credible before the discoveries of
astronomy (and this is assumed as the ground of the
argument), then such measure is equally credible
now, or we are convicted of judging God anthropo-
pathically, however we may dignil'y the feelluj
184
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
with the name of an enlarged and liberal philos-
ophy.
Besides, there is no end to the argument until it
banishes all providence, all government, all divine
interest conceivable in the cosmos — everything, in
ehort, which distinguishes the divine idea from that
of a wholly impersonal nature. On a certain scale
of the universe the Old Testament becomes incredible.
On a wider sweep Christianity, the old Christianity
ef the Church, can no longer be beUeved. The in-
carnation and the atonement must be thrown out;
God could not have cared to that extent for this
petty world. Turn the telescope, so as to enlarge
the field, or, through its inverted lenses, behold the
objects still farther off, and " liberal Christianity "
disappears. Even that has too much of divine inter-
est for the new view. Draw out the slide still
farther, and the very latest and faintest '" phase of
faith " departs. Everything resembling a providence
or care of any kind for the individual becomes incre-
dible in this time and space ratio. Prayer is gone,
and hope, and all remains of any fear or love of God.
Farther on, and races are thrown out of the scale as
well as individuals ; even a general providence of
any kind becomes an obsolete idea. Not only the
earth but solar and stellar systems become infinitesi-
mals, or quantities that may be neglected in the cal-
culus that sums the series. There is no end to this.
We have no light to limit it by the present size or
power of our telescopes. The present visible worlds
of astronomy may be no more — they probably are no
more — to the whole, than a single leaf to the forests
of the Orinoco. The false idea must be carried on
until every conception of every relation of a per.sonal
deity to tinite beings, of any rank, utterly disappears,
and a view no better than blank atheism — yea, worse
than atheism, for that does not mock us with any
pretense of theism — takes the place of aU moral fear
as well as of all religion.
And this raises the farther question : If such be
the diminishing eS'ect on the rehgion, what must it
be on the science and the philosophy? If human
Bins and human salvation become such small things
when seen through this inverted glass, what becomes
of all human knowledge, human genius, and human
boasting of it ? We do not find that the men who
make these objections, as drawn from the magnitude
of the universe, are more humble than others ; but
Burely they ought to be so, after having thus shown
their own moral and physical nothingness, and,
along with it, the utter insignificance of their
Bcience.
lix one aspect, his mere physical aspect, man is
Indeed insignificant. The Scripture does not hesitate
to call him a worm. It pronounces all nations
"vanity" — "the small dust of the balance," uuap-
preciable physically in the great cosmical scales —
" less than uotiiing and enqjtiuess." Such is its
view of man in one direction, whilst in the other his
value is to be estiiuated by the incarnation of Christ,
and the very fact th&t the Infinite One condescends
to make a revelation of Himself to such a being. —
The cosmology of the Bible is geocosndc in its
practical point of view. After it has presented to us
the creation of the heavens and the earth, it lets us
sonclude I'rom the devslopu-cnt of the earth the
development of the heavens, namely in respect to
the creatiwi of light and of nian I'Voni the spirit-
world of eai til we are to cout'u.le a spiriUworld of
h«»vrTi flut H fuperabuudauily '.n licates a develop-
ment of the earthly solar system parallel with th«
development of the earth (ch. i. H). That heaven
is an inhabited region, appears from many passages,
e. g., Gen. xxviii. 1'2; and also that this region Li
divided into a rich multitude of various departments.
And the question is not only of heaven, but also of
the heaven of heavens (1 Kings viii. 27). Chris*
teaches us too : In My father's house are many man-
sions (John xiv. 2). But finally the Holy Writ ;3-
forms us clearly, that notwithstanding the changea-
bility, and necessity for rejuvenation, of the entire
universe (Ps. cii. 27 ; Is. h, 6), there is yet a contrast
between the regions of growth on this side, and of
perfection on the other (Ezek. i. 21 ; 1 Pet. i. 4; 2
Pet. iii. 13, etc.). In this respect the newest and
purest astronomical view of the world corresponds
entirely to this biblical distinction between the
regions of growth here, and of perfection beyond.
But the Bible also promises for the form of the
world, even on this side, a new structure and perfec-
tion. Once all was night ; but in the present order
of things day and night alternate ; in the future the
new world shall be raised beyond the contrast of
day and night (Rev. xxi.). Formerly all was sea ;
the present order consists in the contrast of land and
sea ; in the new world the sea shall be no more.
b. 77ie Idea of Nature in the Bible. The Bible
and the Iiivestigation of Nature. — We have shown in
passing that the Scriptures fully recognize the idea
of nature, i. e., of the conditioned going forth of the
fixed life of nature from a fundamental piinciple
peculiarly belonging to it. Every creative word be-
comes the ideal dynamical basis of a real principle.
At first appear the principles of the separation. The
separation of heaven and earth has the more general
signification of universe on tlte one side, and of a
special world-sphere on the other as represented by
the earth, of which we now speak. At the second
separation (light and darkness) the co-operation of
the spirit of God is brought out, i. e., of the creative
formative activity of God ; at the third separation
(water and land) the co-operation of light is presup-
posed. The natinal law set up by Harvey (see
Lange's "Positive Dogmatics," p. 259): omne vivmn
ex ovo, has been again brilliantly restored in moJern
times by the exact investigation of nature in opposi-
tion to the theory of generatio wquivoca, which nat-
ural philosophy had taught (see Sobernheim: "Ele-
ments of General Physiology," Berlin, 1844). In
Delitzseh also the conception of the generatio cequi-
voca plays a part in the account of the creation (p.
Ill), because he has not sufficiently considered that
the creative word.s, in the ideal they carry, form the
fouiiilation of the actual princi|iles of nature.
From the last-quoted principle it appears as fol-
lows:
1. Every grade of nature is fixed by a correspond-
ing principle of nature, the natural principle of the
plant, etc.
2. By its unfolding, this principle brings to light
the standard of its develo]inient as the natural law
of its grade. The natural principle is the first, the
natund law is the second.
;). Hy the new princijilc of the higher gradi ot
nature, the natural law of the preceding grade L
mollified in aecorilancc with the new and higher fife.
The plant modifies the natural law of gravity, th«
animal modifies the hical attaclmient of the plant-
in man the anunal instinct is ertaced.
4. With each new life-principle God create? a
new thing. The creation of tlie new is however th«
CHAP. I.— n. 3.
18S
most general idea of the miracle, as the announce-
ment of what is new is the most general idea of
prophecy. Consequently, each new natural prmeiple
is to the preceding surpassed grade of nature as a
miracle. " The animal is a miracle for the vegetable
world " (Hegel). From this relation of the new nat-
ural principles, as they form the new degrees of
nature, it follows that all nature is a symboUcal sup-
port and prophecy of the ethical miracle of the king-
dom of God. For as the first man, Adam, miracu-
lously changes the natural law of the animal world,
that is, changes instinct into human freedom, thus
does Christ, as the new man from he.aven, as the
completed life-principle and miracle, change the
Adamic laws of life into fundamental laws of the
kingdom of God. It is in accordance with his nature
to perform miracles within the Adamic sphere (1
Cor. XV.).
6. But what is true of the laws of natm'e, is also
true of the matter of nature. Principle is the first
thing in nature, law is the second, matter, as we
know it, is the third. For through the intervention
of a new and higher natural principle in the world
by means of the creative word supporting it, the
life of the preceding grade is reduced to the grade
of matter. Thus by the appearance of the vegetable
principle, the elementary world becomes matter for
new formations ; so, too, the animal reduces the
vegetable world to the grade of material, and in like
manner does man change the grade of the animal
world. But the man from heaven makes from the
elements of the Adamic world the matter for a new
world. The materialists of our day have ridiculed
the idea of a hfe-power which should be different
from the supposed fundamental matter of the world.
Instead of the life-power, there should have been
opposed to them something more real : the Ufe-prin-
ciple. The life-principle is fundamentally distin-
guished in the contrast of plastic formative power
and material substratum. They are both mutually
estabUshed each with the other, but above them
stands the principle. I'he materialist, therefore, as
he explains everything from a force of matter, which
no man has ever yet seen (see La.nge's " Miscel-
laneous Writings," 1st vol. p. 54), does not only
deny the existeuce of the human soul and its ethical
nature and highest causality, the Godhead, but he is
also the antagonist of the genuine zoologist who be-
lieves in the reaUty of the animal principle, as he is
of the genuine botanist who does not consider the
vegetable formations a shadowy play of matter on
the wall, and of the crystallographer who connects
imponderable forces and polarity — yea, of the genuine
ihemist too, who has perceived that the relations of
elective affinity in substances extend beyond the
atomistic conceptions. May it not possibly be explain-
ed, that as the material side of the natural principle is
formed by the creating word, so is the reference of the
origin of matter to a pure thought of God something
else than the reference to the difficult enigma of a crea-
tive matter ; and experience proves that the coarser
matter everywhere, as outside or precipitate, pro-
ceeds from finer formations. It is a radical contra-
diction that matter should generate spirit, and, never-
ttieless, be everywiiere subjected to spirit, even to
the disappearance of its original nature.
6. The ascending line of natural principles is an
iscencUug Une of acts of creation, with which the
principles always the more strengthen, deepen, gen-
Iralize, and individualize themselves, and with
which, at the same time, new forms of the nat-
ural law and new combinations of substances ap
pear.
7. The finished lower sphere of nature does no
produce the newly appearing principle of the highei
sphere, but it is, however, its maternal birth-place.
And because the lower sphere prepares for th«
higher, in order to serve as its basis, it is full of indi-
cations of it, and becomes throughout a symbol
which represents in advance the coming new world*
form.
8. With respect to the development of the nature-
principles into the reaUzation of the conditioned self-
generation of nature, we must distinguish the follow-
ing kinds of development: a. The development of
the world-creation in general ; b. the development
of our solar system ; c. the spherical development of
the earth ; d. the gradual development of the indi-
vidual Ufe on earth ; e. the natural development of
the individuals themselves ; /. the development of
nature in the narrower and the bioader sense, or 1.
apart from human Ufe, and 2. in connection with it.
a. The Development of the Creation of the Worla
in general. — Through the analogy of the development
of the earth, the Scripture permits us to infer also a
development of heaven. The heavens are created
(Gen. L 1 ; 1 Chron. xvii. 26 ; Neh. ix. 6 ; Ps. xxxiii.
6; cxxxvi. 5; Prov. iii. 19); the heavens grow old
and pass away (Ps. cii. 27; Is. h. 6); the heavens
are renewed (2 Pet. iii. 13 ; Rev. xxi. 5). Astronomy
also teaches a continuous growth, and in the same
way recognizes indications of passing away in the
stellar world. But there is a difference between the
various celestial regions. The old Jewish and Ma-
hommedan tradition, and the Christian Apocryphas
know seven heavens (the Koran, the Kabbala, the
Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs). But the He-
brews admitted in general three heavens as in accord-
ance with the Scripture (Paul also 2 Cor. xii. 2-4 ;
the third heaven the paradise); 1. The heaven of the
air (the clouds, birds, changes of the atmosphere) ;
2. the heaven of the stellar world, the firmament;
3. the heaven in which God dwells with His angels,
paradise. Of the latter heaven it must be observed
that it is a sjTnboUco-rehgious idea, and by no means
excludes the stellar world (see Lange's work : " The
Land of Glory "). The Scripture recognizes also the
distinction between an earlier heavenly stellar world
and the system to which this earth belongs, as we
find it indicated in the fourth day's work. When
the earth was founded the morning-stars sang to-
gether, and all the sons of God shouted for joy (Job
xxxviii. 7). Consequently before the foundations of
the earth those morning-stars were there. Also the
" Heaven of heavens," as well as the ascension of
Christ, point to a heavenly region which Ues beyond
the cosmical sphere of the world, to a region "of
eternal sunshine." See the above quotations.
b. 77(6 Developtnent of our Solar Si/stetn. — Al-
though on the fourth day of the creation the whole
stellar world is introduced into the cucle of vision of
the earth, nevertheless the cosmical completion of
the system belonging to the earth is especially indi-
cated. Special allusion is made to this system whet
the New Testament biblical eschatology treats of th
end of the heavens and the earth, and their renewal
(Joel iii. i ; Matt. xxiv. 29 ; 2 Pet. iii. 10).
[Note o.s the Scriptural Heavens asu Earth.
— We think Dr. Lange carries too far what may be
called the cosmological view of the Mosaic account.
It either gives the writer too much seienct, or, ii
order to get a ground of interpretation ildependenl
186
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
of bis conceptions, makes him to be a mere automa-
tic medium — thus taking awaj the human, or that
subjective truthfuhiess nUch is so precious in any
view we may take of this narrative. Hence the ten-
dency to regard the Bible heavens as the astronomi-
.;al lieaveus of modern science, instead of the heavens
of the earth, nearly connected with the earth, and in
which the sun, moon, and stars appear as lig/ils,
whatever may be the near or remote causes of those
appearances. See remarks in note on the Hebrew
plural c'^aa, pp. 162, 163. The symboUc contrast of
the heavens and the earth, with which Dr. Lauge starts
in the mterpretation, has all the value he attaches to
it; but it is not at all lost in what he might regard
as the narrower view. The optical heavens, with
the appearances in it, was all the writer knew, or was
inspired to know, or describe. It was to him the
cosmos. As this enlarges, by science, or otherwise,
the conception of the heavens enlarges with it, but
only as a conception. The idea remains as in the
beginning. In keeping up this contrast, however,
we are not to regard the scientific bodies discovered
in the remoter spaces, as the heavens in distinction
from our own home, as though the heavens were
simply all that is oft', and away from, the earth.
The planet Mars is no more a heaven, or heavens, to
us than we are a heavens to it. As knowledge hfts
up the everlasting gates, the conception of the )nun-
aiis enlarges to take in other earth-like bodies in
space; but the old idea travels forth unchanged.
The great symbolic contrast yet remains. The hea-
vens, too, enlarge their scale, and the pecuhar divine
residence, once thought to be in the near sky just
above us, is carried tarther oflf, beyond the sky of
clouds, beyond the sphere of the moon, the sun, the
planets, the solai- system. Science adds the stellar
bodies ; the heavens, the great symbolic, or rather
symbolized, heavens, are still beyond, high over all,
embracmg all. " Who hast set Thy glory above the
heavens," c^"9rn bj" (compare b? as used Gen. i.
20; six. 23, ""Xfi'bi" CCUJ); "Who stoopeth
down to behold the things that are in the heavens
(the lower heavens) and the earth," Ps. cxiii. 6.
Solomon's language, " The heaven and heaven of
heavens cannot contain Thee," may, or may not, be
surpassed in its local co-ncepiion^ but no science, it
may be repeated, will ever transcend it in idea.
'Whatever the number of spheres, real or imaginary,
the D^~t" ""IC , the heaven of heavens, is still the
great heaven above them all. — T. L.]
c. The Spherical Jjmeloprnent of the Earth, or
the Six Uai/s' Work. — As was above indicated, the
six days" work have been represented in the sequence
of a twofold ternary, in which is mirrored the signiti-
canee of tlie number three. We construct these
ternaries m the Ibllowing manner: 1. higlit and the
lights; 2. water and air, and the animals of water
»nd air; A. the solid land and over it the vegetable
world ; the land-animahi and over them man. As to
the strict consistency of these days' works, tlie
most celebrated naturalists, as Cuvier, have expressly
»cknowledged it. Now we find these days' works
eonstrued in the most manifold way ; in part purely
»ccording to tlje Scriptures, in part purely according
lo natural science, and partly in distinct comi)arison,
whereby the harmony between the Bible and natural
science is contested or maintained. — Scriptural repre-
9entatiiina of the six days' work. Here the 104th
Psalm exceeds all. First d ly, vers. I, 2 ; second day,
rers. H, 4 ; third day, vera. (i-IS ; fourth day, vers.
19, 20. The fitth day and the first half of the sixlL
are freely inlaid into the picture from the fourtee-ith
verse. The sixth day also from ver. 14 ; but in vcr
23 man appears more distinctly in his rule. Hert
follows an accurate picture of the whole creation
from ver. 24. The creation of the new world, which
is the aim of the Apocalypse, passes also through i
sevenfold stage. Here an accord in the order of the
six days' work is not to be misunderstood. 1. Thj
seven congregations as the seven candlesticks of the
earth, Christ in a figure of light in their midst, with
seven stars in His hands — an allusion to the creation
of light of the first day (ch. i.-iii.). 2. The seven
seals. The council in heaven and the seven seals or
decrees of sorrow on earth — an allusion to the crea-
tion of the firmament between the waters above (ch.
iv. 6, the "sea of glass"; comp. vii. 17) and the
waters beneath (the blood of the lamb,* ch. vii. 14),
ch. iv.-vii. The seven trimipets. Decrees of judg-
ment on the earth preaching repentance (ch. viii. 7)
and on the sea (ver. 8) — allusion to the separation
of land and sea (see also ch. x. 2), ch. viii.-x. 2.
The seven thunders (voices of awaking whose speech
had been sealed). The angel who had awakened
the seven thunders, raises has hand to heaven and
swears that hereafter time shall be no more.f Epi-
sodes from the stage of the seven thunders: tha
swallowed scroll, the measuring of the temjile of God,
the two olive trees, the woman in heaven clothed
with the sun, the moon under her feet, and a crown
of twelve stars on her head — an allusion to the
lights created to mark the seasons (eh. x. 3 to ch.
xii. 2). 5. The seven heads of the dragon. The
(flying) dragon in heaven, the woman with eagles'
wings, and the beast out of the sea with seven heads,
the earthly anti-Christ representative of the seven
heads of the dragon — allusion to the birds of the
heavens and the beasts of the sea (eh. xii. 3-xiii. Iti).
6. The seven last plagues or vials of wrath. Intro-
duction: the animal out of the earth, the number
666 (with reference to the significance of the number
6; perhaps also the sixth day); the lamb on Mount
Siou, .the image of God with the 144,00(1 virgins who
bear on their foreheads the name of the lamb and
the name of the father, i. e., are images of God ; the
announcement of the judgment, of the seven last
plagues; the judgment on the earth; the whore, her
counterpart the bride and her bridegroom, heroes
and deliverers, judges of spirits and associates in the
apostasy — allusion to the animals of the earth and
to man created in the image of God, with the com-
mand : Rule over them and make them subject to
you, ch. liii. 11-xix. 21).:}
* [Dr. Lange'e fanry Here seems altogether too exuberant
The lla^alleli!^m with tiie Mosaic account in the 104th I'salci
is too striking to be nustalion. It was doulitlcss, too, in the
mind of the writer ol the Apocalypse, as it is alto evident in
the lieginning of the (iospel of .lolin, but many of the
reseml)binces here traeetl bv Dr. Lange altogollicr fail to
satisfy— T. L.)
* [Dr. Lange's renai nng nerc is that of Luther, and ia
the same with our English translation. But there can be
hardly a doubt of its l)eing erroneous. It should be, " that
there "shall be no more delay " —that is, in what is to follow,
.Set lilo.imfleld.— T. I..,
J (It may t^eem strange that Dr. Lange, while hiymp io
much stress on these remoter, if not altogether far.riful,
parallelisms with the creative account which be liuds in the
Apocalyjisf, should have overlooked the much more distinct
reference in the beginning of the (iospel of John. Whether
the priniipium there is the same with tliat in Genisis, may
adnnt of diseussinn, but there can be no doubt of tlic nnral-
lelism, and the mention of light and life inmiediately fol-
lowmg makes it unmistakable. It is a higher light, indeed,
for ' the darkness overtakes it not," is it should bv -oU'
CHAP. 1.— 11. S.
181
7. The great Sabbath of God (ch. xx. and xxi.).
It is, of course, understood that so original a crea-
tion as the A]>ocalyi)se cuuld not be an allegorical
copy of the six days' work. In the Epistle of Bar-
nabas (among the writings of the FatrfR apostolici)
we find eh. xv. the incorrect Uteral interpretation ol
the passages Ps. xc. 4 and "2 Pet. iii. 8 (according to
wiiieh a thousand years of earth should make one
day of God, consequently six thousand years of his-
tory the great spiritual week of God which is to pre-
cede the divine millennium sabbath). This became
later a standing presumption of the chiliastic com-
putations. One of the first patristic representations
of the hexaiimeron with polemical references to the
hciithen ^^ew of the world, we find in the apology of
Theophilus of Antioch: Ad Autolycum, lib. ii. cap.
1 2 sqq. Many others have followed these (see Intro-
duction). Among the modern biblio-theologieal
representations of the six days' work, that of Hkrdkr
("Oldest Record of the Human Race") occupies a
prominent place. It rejects all combinations of the
ticriptural text with natural science. It traces back
the account to the teachuig of God; but it arose by
means of human observation of the rising sun, as in
this the picture of creation is ever unrolled to the
eyes of the observer. The representation itself he
calls a hieroglyphe for the instruction of man in the
great pictures of creation, as presented to his con-
templation in the order of life, first work, then rest
(the sabbath-law), and in the numbering of days
(with reference to the week) as given to him in lan-
guage, etc. He finds in the account the symbols of
the fiisi religion, natural science, morality, politics,
clironology, writing, and language. In his poetic
diction there is much that is beautiful ; but fhe pic-
ture he gives us of the terror of the Orientals in
respect to darkness and labor is very partial and
exaggerated. The same may be said of many other
ttimgs in his book. The ignoring of the reaUty of
tue six days' work is rationalistic. The construction
is as follows :
I. Light.
II. Firmament. III. Terra firma.
IV. Lights.
Water )
\ of heaven. YI. Creatures of earth.
YII. Sabbath.
In the spirit of Herder, but independent in its
view, and determination of the individual parts, is the
representation in F. A. Krommacher's "Paragraphs
on Sacred History " (p. 22 ff). The six days, as
such, and in themselves understood, are to him divine
days. Zahn also falls back on Herder in animated
representation (" History of the Kingdom of God," p.
1 ff.). Gkube's deUneation of the six days' work is
very comprehensive and full of meaning ("Features
from Sacred History," p. 11 ff. — Scientific npreseiU-
ation of the six daya^ work. On the historical devel-
•pment of the doctrine of the cosmos, see Alex, vo.n-
Humboldt, iii. p. 3 ff. Steffens : " Polemical
Sheets for the Advancement of Speculative Physics."
Second number, on Geology, Berlin, 1835 (here arc
quoted, p. 6, the respective geological works of
Cuvier, Boue, Brogniart, EUe de Beaumont, De
la Beche, and Von Leonhard). Mekleker: "Cos-
lered. There is no night fi)llowing that new and eternal
iay, and so there are no mornings and evenings to succeed.
it is a new cieution, and a new chronology, but this idea
mly makes more clear the reference to the old ilo&aic crea-
tion and the Mosaie days. — T. L.]
V.
mography," Leipzig, 1848, p. 3. There is also the hi&
torical part of Lyell's " Principles of Geology," ani
Voot's " Compendium of Geology " (Braunschweig,
1854, 2 vols.); Reuscu: "Bible and Nature," p. 71.
— Here belong Qde.vstedt: "Then and Now." A
popular treatise : Hakting: "The Antemundane Crea
tions compared with the Present." From the Dutcli,
Leipzig, Engelmann, 1859. See, moreover, the prelim-
inary literature. We must distingnisli those treatises
which regard the Hexatmeron of Hoses, and tboso
which do not. And further, we must distinguish the
systems which assume the formation of the earth bj
radical revolutions in a steady secjuence of new crea-
tions (Cuvier), and those which assume a gradual
transformation with partial revolutions. Harting be-
longs to tlie latter. We must, however, certainly
maintain tliat a seed or germ of creation (for the
transformation) must have passed through the ca-
tastrophes out of the earlier stage into the later,
analogous to the process at the flood, but transform-
ed in a creative way during the metamorphosis of
the earth. But the doctrine of the great catastrophes
is not therewith excluded. In respect to those who
deny the existence of any harmony between the Bible
and natural science, it may be said, that a few the-
ologians in Germany, with shallow scientific acquire-
ments, have undertaken the work ; such as Ballen-
SHEDT (in the notorious book ; " The Primitive
World "), Bretschneider, and Strauss. In England
recently Goodwin (in the Essays and Reviews).
ScHLEiERMACHER has also in this respect expressed
anxieties which prove that he was not well posted
on the point ("Studies and Criticisms," 1829, p.
489). Most recently has this assumed opposition
become a special dogma of the Hegelian school of
Tiihingen, which has its njain altar in Eastern Swit-
zerland. On the side of natural science the harmony
has been mainly contested by French authors ; in
Germany, by Vogt and Burmeister. On the side of
the naturalists, who at the same time were scientific-
ally learned and Bible-believing men, stand Coperni-
cus, Kepler, Newton, Pascal, Haller, and Euler; at
a later period the Frenchmen Cuviei-, Brogniart, De-
luc, Biot, Ampere; in Germany, Steflins, H. von
.Schubert, A. Wagner, and others. (See Reusch, p.
63 ff.) To these add also the Bible-believing cos-
mologists — the Frenchmen Marcel de Serres, de Blain-
ville, the Belgian Waterkeyn, and especially many
Englishmen and North Americans (Reusch, p. 67 ;
see especially also Delitzsch, p. 609). A significant
position is taken by the already quoted work of
Buckla.sd: "Geology and Mineralogy," etc., as given
by Wfrner, in the German edition of the well-knowu
" Bridgewater Treatises," vol. v., with which com-
pare the valuable criticism of it by W. Hoffmann, in
"Tholuck's Literary Advertiser," 18.38, Number 44.
" The conditions on which the great geologist treats
with his timid brothers in the theological world are
(according to W. Hoffmann) the following: 1. Ge-
ology has evidently proved that the surface of our
planet has not been from eternity in its present con-
dition, but has passed through a series of creative
operations, which followed each other in long, fixed
periods of time. 2. There is an exposition of naturaj
phenomena which stands so little in contrast with the
Mosaic history that it even throws Ught on dark
parts of it, and thereby confirms it. 3. The authen-
ticity of the Scriptural text must remain unscathed,
but the exposition demands concessions from the
literal expositor ; the reader must make this, and
indemnify himself therefor by the accession wlucll
I8S
GENES1I3, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
geology supplies to natural theology. 4. The Bible
does not aim to give solutions of geological and other
questions of natural science. Else, (jod would have
found it necessary to endow man with omniscience,
because he was obliged, at the same time, to impart
to him all degrees and kinds of human knowleiige, if
the revelation were not to remain an insufficient one."
In several points Hotfmann has corrected the author
irith a free and large survey, namely, in the endeavor
of Buckland to transfer all the periods of the geolog-
ically determined earth-formation into the uudetinable
beginning before the first day of the creation, although
to those geological periods the long biblical day-peri-
ods are still to be added. Hoflmann, on the contrary,
alleges that then the eyes of the trilobites, for exam-
ple, must have existed before the creation of light.
The same is true of the first vegetable and animal
world throughout. The same untenable view, how-
ever, that will transfer the geological periods, with
their relation to each other, into the time of the
Thohu Vabhohn^ meets us also now in various forms.
It is represented by Andreas Wagner and Kurtz (see,
on the contrary, Delitzsch, p. 112). The more de-
fined combination of geological results and the bib-
lical account appears in a form sometimes mainly
scientific, and again mainly theological ; but the two
series c;mnot be strictly separated from each other-.
Keusch places here Marcel de Serres, Waterkcyn, An-
dreas Wagner, Wiseman, Nicolas: "Philosophical
Studies of Christendom," Sorignet [La Cosniogonie
de la Bible devant les adences perfectionees^ Paris,
1854), Pianciani, Kurtz: "Bible and Astronomy,"
Keerl and Westermeyer, whose work, in his view, is
without scientific value. So also Mutzl, Michelis,
Ebrard, and a series of Essays in the Periodicals:
"Nature and Revelation" (Minster, If 55 flu), and
"The Cutholic" (Mentz, 1858 sqq.). We also enu-
merate here, La Cosmogonie de la Rtvelalion^ par
Godefoi/, Paris, 1841, tiie previously quoted works
of 0. Reinsch, Fr. von Rougement, and Bohner (with
respect to the cosmogonal theory of K:int and La
Place). The newest commentary on Genesis, by
Keil, shows no progress. Keil insists on regarding
the account of creation as an historical record in the
strictest sense ; he opposes the division of the six
days' work according to ternaries, he sets the act of
creation in excluding contrast with the idea of the
natuial process, boldly questions the evidence of the
various jjeriods of the creation, and contends that the
days of the creation are simple earth-days. With this
continued darkening of the present view of the state
of the case, it is a small merit that the theosophic
view of the Thohu Vabhohu seems sets aside (p.
16).
The six days' works are above all things to be
comprehended as six consecutive acts of creation, in
whicli, every time, a new creation is placed as a new
appearance of the cosmos. For the world is to be
regarded throughout as being, in respect to its founda-
lion, the act of (iod, or creah'on (in the stricter sense);
according to its development, nature, whilst, accord-
ing to its appearance, cosmos, and, according to the
plastic life-principle lying at its ba,se (the future of
man and the <iod-Man), it is (xon. Tiie creation is,
In the liist jilacc, and in general, represented as cie-
ation of heaven and earth ; then the history of the
earth is specially brouglit out with reference to its
relation to heaven, and also to give an idea (jf the
COf^micid creation beyond the earth in our planetary
lystein. The chanicteriiitic traits are the following:
The Jf'irsl JJay. — The separation of darkness and
light, i. e.. of dark and light matter. We must het»
preserve the text from the terrifying pictures of tark
ness in Herder, and the conceptions of darkuesst
approaching dualism, of certain theologians of the
present day. The Scripture speaks also of a "smiting
of the sun" (Ps. cxxi. 6 ; Jonah iv. 8), and of a sa
cred obscurity, also of a beneficent shade, as Chris
tendom recognizes a holy night ; it knows also »
higher unity of day and night (Revelation xx. 21
see "TheLand of Glory," p. 150 ; Novalis: "Hymna
to the Night "). Nothing is more dangerous to life
than the commingling of physical and ethical dark-
ness (see Isaiah xlv.). God did not make physical
darkness in so far only as it is privative, mere ab-
sence of light, but he made it in so far as he made
the earth, the darkness in jencral, and the order of
life : day and night. With respect to light and it*
ett'ects, comp. Schubert : " Mirror of Nature," p. 45'?
ff. ; also F. A. KRt;MMALHER's poem : " The Light,"
and Milton's " Salutation to Light." The light is
in the Scripture as an image of the Godhead, or of
its indwelling (1 Tim. vi. 16). It is God's garment
(Ps. civ. 2), an image of the being and life of Christ
and of its efficacy. Not without reason have some
designated light as the first creature of God, and dis-
tinguished between latent light = material darkness,
and free light-matter. Comp. what HoHhiann has ob-
served, in his quoted criticism, about the visible cre-
ation proceeding from the invisible sphere of the
creative powers, the imponderable substances dynam-
ically regarded. (Comp. Heb. xi. 8.) The unity of
the contrast of centripetal and centrifugal power
(sympathy and antipathy), attraction (gravity) and
repulsion (motion), warmth and light, appears to lie
in something beyond the relative contrast of elec-
tricity, where warmth predominates, and that of
magnetism, where Ught predominates (although in
both one is set with the other) ; which remoter prin-
ciple we may designate as a breath of life, whose mate-
rial product is an inconceivably minute, fundamental
form of the luminous world-body which is to spring
from it, as the cell or the fundamental form of organic
life, in an element of growing light, that is, which
becomes light, or an ether, which as eaith-matter has
attractive power, and, as a medium of light, repul-
sive power. With resspect to the evenings and the
mornings, it is to be observed that Kurtz has also
effaced their optical reality. By the evenings is
meant the going out or departure of the separate
vi.sions. The permanent reproduction of the word,
" Let there be light," is not so much the rising of
the sun, according to Herder, as rather the electric
sjiark, the lightinng proceeding from the dark thim-
der-cloud, the northern light of the long polar niglit,
just as every meteoric revelation of the light-nature
of the earth. For this is clearly intimated, that the
earth, until its arrangement into cosmical dependence
on the sun, found itself in a condition of self-illumi-
nation, like that towards whicli it ever strives to rise
in the jjolar night. Physicid darkness is undoubtedly
made by tlie Scriptures an image of ethical darkness,
for it is the comparatively imperfect. But wc again
distinguish the black nigiit, which may lie in measure
illuminated by every spark ; the gray night of mist,
which is in positive opposition to the liglit, and the
white night, or blinding light, by which the light is
corrupted into the worst darkness, or thij most evil
night.
Second Day. — About the upper waters, see the
Exegesis. The allusion they contain to the matter
of the distant world-space, the space of heaven, ii
CHAP. I.— II. b.
18«
found also in mythology (see Delitzsch, p. 614).
But it is questionable whether, along with the upper
waters, there is also presupposed here a world-iuiit-
ter out of which the liglits are ibrmeii on the fourth
day of creation (A. Guyot, with the addition of the
mist theory of La Place ; Fr. de Rougement, trans-
lated from Fabarius, p. 61, with distinct reference to
our planetary system; Bijhner, p. 168, a clear and
Instructive representation). Bnt it is to be observed
that tlie liglits of the fourth day clearly refer to the
light of the first day, consequently not to the upper
waters of the second. The rakia, as firmament,
indicates the boundary line behind wliich water, air,
and setlier, flow together. Consequently, this firma-
ment indicates, at the same time, the boundary Hne
between the centripetal and centrifugal force of mat-
ter, between its impulse to become earth, and its
impulse to become light. But this is just what
makes the rakia a symbol of the real heaven : it is
the equator which spirits pass in their passage to the
home in light. The second day is therefore the sep-
aration of the atmosphere and the element of liquid
earth (dividing the substance of light and the sub-
stance of darkness), and probably still glowing hot.
With the firmament, between the coldness of the
sether and the warmth of the earth, as between light
and gravity, are built the first formations of the
earth as the vessel of its liquid nucleus ; neither
Plutonic nor Neptunian, because fire and water are
not yet separated. For the contest between Pluto-
nism and Neptunism, see Delitzsch, p. 609. The con-
trast of both systems does not begin till the third
day of the creation, with the separation of water and
land. The beginning of the third day of creation
(the evening) probably marks the period of the ac-
tual water-formation from the precipitates of the
recent atmosphere, with which the entire new sur-
face of the earth is overflowed. In the transition
from light days, and rain-storms, and hurricanes, is
mirrored the creation of the second day. The crys-
tals and precious stones children of nipht. " On the
second day God made nothing," says Rougemont, " he
only caused a separation." But such a separation
was a creation.
Tliird Day. — Separation between land and water.
In accordance with this, the development of fire, which
brings forth the earth, and combines with water, to
continue the formation of the earth. The first ap-
pearance of plants on points of earth in insular dis-
persion. Remains of the general flood ; deserts,
sandbanks. (Question, whether the plants through-
out were created before coal, or whether coal is not
mainly to be considered as pre-existing as a formative
Bubstance of the plants.)
Fourth Day. — The cosmical combination of the
lights of heaven and the earth. Cosmico-atmospheric
and chemical completion of the earth for the condi-
tions of a higher Ufe. Echptic. Beginning of the
relations of the zones. Continued operation : the
lones, the seasons, the periods. The metals children
of light.
Fifth Day. — Animals of the water — birds. The
conclusion of this period and the first half of the
following ; the main period of the strata-formation
and the petrifactions, although this period begins
with the end of the third day.
Sixth Day. — The catastrophe introducing this
closes, with its completion not manifest before the
tppearance of man, or the cycle of the great general
revolutions,and introduces the world which is intended
to be Adam's home. The natural law, in its central
effect as a law of necessity, is abol shed in the destina
tion and freedom of man.
Seventh Day. — God reposes aiid rests in man.
Man reposes and rests in God. God's sabbath it
reflected in the sabbath of the world. Just as the
geology of the fir.-it day represents the cosmogony
through the universality of light, so the firmament
of the second day represents the heaven above and
the earth beneath. Then the fourth day. in contrast
to the third, points up again to the cosmos. On the
fifth day of creation tlie birds ol" heaven must at
least indicate the cosmical relatiov ; on the sixth
day man, the special representative, of the spirit-
world.
d. The Gradual Development of the hidividuat
Life on Earth. — The idea of the natural life is the
idea of a relative independence communicated by God
to the world, which passes througli the stages of
symbolical independence to actual independence, or
that freedom of man in which nature is abolished
We distinguish, accordingly, the following degree*
of independence in an ascending line : 1. The ele
ment ; or dependent self-existence to be annulled
(tlirongh chemistry); 2. the chemical combination,
or the mutual relation of the one element to thf
other, i. e., to its related opposite ; 3. crystals : self
formation in forms and colors ; 4. plants : self-
production, reproduction ; 5. animals : self-motion
inwardly (self-perception), outwardly (motion in the
narrower sense) ; 6. man : self-consciousness and
power of self-control ; 7. the power denoted points to
the man from heaven, the God-man : or complete
self-control in complete self-comprehension in the
unity with Goil, nature, and humanity (see Lange'8
"Positive Dogmatics," p. 247).
Ill respect to the classification, we remark, 1.
That every lower grade reappears in all higher
grades in a continually modified form ; 2. that it is
the coming grade as a symbol and actual prophecy ;
and 3. that it takes the lower place of a serving and
supporting substance for the higher grade. In man
all grades are combined and subordinated to spirit.
As he is an image of God, so also is he an image of
the earth ; so also of the universe. Microcosm.
The idea of the lower grade is not so to be understood
as if the stamp of divine authority were wanting to
it. 5. Every grade comprises again lower and higher
formations ; with the lowest it reverts to the pre-
ceding grade, but with the highest it presents, in ita
solemn pauses of formation, a preliminary or provi-
sional completion which becomes the symbol of the
completion of life in general. Through those relaps-
ijuf or bastard-like formations arifie the poisora,
according to H. von Schubert and K. Snell (see Lan-
ce's " Dogmatics," p. 266), which are an allegory of
moral discord and relapse into sin. The completed
types of a fixed grade of nature are, on tlie contrary.,
the precious stone, the palm, the rose, the eagle,
the dove, the lamb, etc., becoming with their Iran-
sic7it completion symbols of the highest life. The
period which is peculiar to each grade, appears with
it in full power ; hence in the element, the obscure,
enigmatical, apparently isolated existence ; in chemis-
try, the whole irresistible power of physical elective
affinities ; in the crystal, the stately play of the sternest
forms and the most beautiful colors ; in the plant,
the whole power of reproduction (through root, seed,
and branch), and of growth high into space, and fat
into time ; in the animal, the motion in all kinds and
in all grades ; in man, finally, the self-consciousnes?
in that perfected intensity which makes it the mosi
liH)
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
peculiar characteristic of his being. 1. The individual
formation appears in erery grade in greater power.
Hence the elements have mostly lost theu.selves in
rhemical combinations, and these again submit to
tlie most manifold separations. Hence crystals are
piostly a'tered, arrested, or distorted through disturb-
ing infiueuces or checks, and seldom appear pure.
Hence plants are capable of greater degeneracy in
their kmds than animals, and the metamorphoses of
the subordinate animals greater than those of the
higher. This disposition to degeneracy and to
variety has lately liecome an inducement to dispute
the idea of fixed species, as we see it in the work of
the English naturalist Darwin, on the origin of species
in the animal and vegetable world Ijy natural genera-
tion, translated into German by Broim, Stuttgart,
1860. This work, doubtless, will only be able to
induce more exact formulas as to the grade of the
individuality of the species and the susceptibility of
moditicatiou in their pure ground-types through
antagonistic or favoring influences.
e. The Natural Development of the Individuals
themselves. — It passes through a regular series of
itages or metamorphoses in which the metamorphoses
of growth to maturity, of the transition from one
ground-form into another (analogous in the insect-
world to the passing through various natural grades)
are to be distinguished from a higlier state of perl'ec-
tion. It has indeed been doubted whether from the
beginning our nobler grains have not been distin-
guished from the wild species, and also tlie tame
domestic animals from the wild. Tlie Scripture
seems to speak in this tone in the distinction appear-
ing in the very beginning between cattle and wild
animals, .and farther on in the distinction of certain
plants of Paradise (see Delitzsch, p. 622 and ch. ii.).
f. The Uevetopinent of Nature at large. — 1. Apart
from man. That nature waits patiently for man
appears from the fact that left to itself it grows wild,
and in boumlless luxuriance threatens to overwhelm
and smothei- itself, as is proved by the primitive for-
ests, the marshes, and the miasmas. 2. In reference
to man. Nature is intended to develop itself in
accord with man. It therefore sympathizes in his
fall (Gen. iii. 17 If.; xix. 28; Dent, xxviii. 15 If.;
Is. xiii. 6 If. ; Kom. viii. 19 ff.), and in his resurrec-
tion (Deut. xxviii. 8 ; Ps. Ixxii. ; Is. xxxv. ; Ixv. 66 ;
Kom. viii. 21; 1 Cor. xv. 46 fl'. ; 2 Pet. iii. 13;
Rev. XX. 21). See De Rougkmo.nt, pp. 2 and 3.
Tiiereibre also has man in his individual form,
and man in his totality, his natural side; and there-
fore it is that the most sublime idea of nature (lor
the idea of iiatui'e, see the quotation I'rom Aristotle
in Lanoe's " Dogmatics," p. 258), or the idea of an
inceptive foumling, of a gradual devcloijment, and a
tiual completion of animal Ul'e, does, for that very
rea-.oii, present itself to us in the history of the king-
dom of God, an the fuiraculoua trte^ li^hick couthiucn
to grow from, the bcijiunlng to the end of tlie world^
with its crown reaching into eternitg. And esjiecially
in the history of the God-Man, does it thus appear
fcs a tree whose roots go back into the foundation of
creation, and whose boughs, branches, blossoms, and
fruits spread throughout the new humanity. The
natural sciences liave not yet attained to the great-
ceas of the sci iptural idea of natui c.
(Jf the Jiel'ition of the Accouyit of tlie Creation
»ftd of the lioig Writ in general to the Natural
Saiencen. — In tliis relation a fourfold collision may
be conceived: 1. An incorrect exegesis of the Scrip-
tare may clash with an incorrect exegesis of nature
(the investigation of nature is indeed only exegesA
and its teachings are to be distinguished" from tht
objective facts themselves). 2. An incorrect scrip-
tur.ll exegesis can contradict tlie ground-text of the
life of nature, o. A false exegesis oi' nature can
come in conflict with the text of the Scripture. The
fourth case, that the sense of the Scripture itself, or
the text of nature itself, might be in contradiction
with each other, could only be imagined on th
ground that Scripture and nature were not, both of
them, books of revelation of the same God. The
thorough, scientific, and theological investigation
confirms more and more their harmony.- — Pretended
incongruities in the account of creation itself are : 1 .
Light before the lights or illuminating bodies. This
is thoroughly removed (see Exegesis). 2. The earth
proceeding from the water in contrast to Plutonism.
This objection reposes on the misunderstanding of the
waters ver. 2 and ver. 6, and exaggeration of the
demands of Plutonism. 3. The firmament on the
fourth day. See the Exegesis and the fundamental
thoughts. 4. The days of creation: Also removed
by the correct exposition which makes them pecu-
liar days of God. When, however, naturalists fill
their mouths with millions of years as a necessity for
the formation of the earth, they fall into contradic-
tion with the spirit and the laws of nature itself. It
is a law of nature that the subordinate formations
arise more rapidly than tlie higher ones. And fur
ther, that life in the glowing, warm moments of iti-
origin, moves more rapidly than in its development.
If man continued to grow in the same proportion as
in the maternal womb, he would increase beyond the
highest trees. 5. The relation between the heliocen-
tric and the geocentric view, see above. — Pretended
colUsions between the scriptural miracles and nature.
See " Bible-Work," Matthew ; " Life of .lesus,"
ii. p. 258 ; " Philosophical Dogmatics," p. 467. On
the prophetic-symbolical parallel-miracles, see more
particularly in the " Bible-Work," Exodus.
11. The World as Cosmos. — The idea of the
cosmos, i. e., of the regulated, unitary, beautiful
appearance of the world, makes itself known, at first,
through the sevenlbhi verdict: "God saw that it
was good." In this we must bear in mind that, with
the good, the adjective 31U means also the appro-
priate, the agreeable, the beautiful. But when it is
said for the seventh time, after the creation of man,
and with enhanced emphasis: Behold everything was
very good, thei'e lies therein a reference to the fact
that the great world, the macroeosmos, has reached
in man, as the microcosmos, its living point of unity.
A variety, however, wliich with its appeaiauce rises
into an ideal unity, forms the very idea of t.he beau-
tiful. But here this idea is, at the same time, in its
completeness, the idea of the good ; for in man the
finite world has reached its unending eternal aim.
And then there is what may be called the iioctical
account of man aflirming his ajipeai'tnce in thai
parallelism ot phrases, ver. 27, of whicii it has been
observed, it is the first examiilc of religious poetry,
as the song of Lamech, ch. iv. 23, is the first exam-
ple of secular. The solemnity of the cosinieal ap
jiearauce of the world is then again specially expressed
in the dcliueaiion of the rest of God on the seventh
day. The sabbath of God is the primitive iiictine ol
the liuman days of rest and festivity, in which ilie
adorning of the world ap|iears in the leflc-ctiim of
human adornment, and human worship endeavors tc
unite in itsell all forms of the Ueautitul, of art, as il
also unites with the most beautiful peril ds et thi
CHAP. 1.—U.
1»1
life of nature in the course of the year. The Holy
Writ retains also this view of the world especially
in the appreciation of the beautiful, even of female
beauty, anil in the reverence of the sublime and
beautiful nature (Ps. riii. 19 and civ. ; Is. xl., etc.),
in the glorifying of the beautiful service of Jehovah
(who Himself is adorned with light, Ps. civ.), and in
its own festal robes of beauty. It may be observed,
Sn passing, that the Jewish Kabbinisni has discov-
ered strange reasons why, in the account of the sec-
ond day, there does >iot also stand the expression
" He saw that it was good ; " it was because, say
they, on that day the apostate angels fell, because on
it God created hell, or because the waters brought
the flood over the world. It is generally assumed
that the sentence of approbation of the firmament
on the second day is comprised with tliat pronounced
on the formation of the land on the third day, and
on the firmament on the fourth. This is jiursued
farther in the preceding exegetical illustration. — It is
known that the Grecian idea of beauty and of the
cosmos is elevated far above that of the Chinese,
satisfied as it is only with the delicately formed, the
variegated, and the cheerful, and whilst it detests
the shadows In the picture. Certain representations
respecting the darkness and night In the treatment
of the six days' work remind us of the Chinese or
Persian views ; for Instance, In Herder, Delltzsch,
RouGEMONT (p. 11), and in Christianus ("Gospel of
the Kingdom," p. 5). In one respect, again, is
there presented a similar difference between the
Grecian and the scriptural Idea of the cosmical.
The former throws the obscure into the background,
because it cannot resolve it into higher unities. For
the Hebrew, that which Is the ugly In a smaller unity
is oidy the picturesque shadow m a general higher
unity (see Ps. civ. 20; cxlvui. 7, 8). The obscurity
of the cosmos, originating with sin, is iiuite as well
to be regarded subjectively, according to which the
world meets the sinner in an uneasy threatening
form (Eccleslastes i. 8), as objectively, according to
which the creature, as suffering, must. In reality,
with fallen man, sigh for redemption (Rom. viil.
19).
12. Tlie World as jEon. — That the world also In
its truest and most inward principle of life and devel-
opment Is comprised In nmn, appears already fiom
the strong emphasis with which man is Introduced
in the first chapter of Genesis as end or aim of the
creation, but still more from his princlplal position
at the head of things, which is given to him In the
second chapter. The Idea of the aon Is a develop-
meut and a developing period of life placed with the
power of life in the principle of life. The world as
8Bon has also the principle of its life-power, its dura-
tion, form, and development m man. And thus Is It
explained that with the distinction of universal liis-
tory into the history of the first and second man, or
Adam and the Messiah, there Is also distinguished a
twofold aion. But it Is in aecoidaiice with the idea
of the Eeon, that the new aeon o' Christ can have
prlnciplaUy begun with His appearance and redemp-
tor) act, whilst the old aeon still externally continues.
The Ilfe-de-elopment of the aeon starts fiom the be-
ginning and appears, at first, gradually, but not per-
fectly, until the close. Just so It Is explained that
the world iu the course of its development depends
on the bearlug of man, and that the history of man
is the history of the earthly cosmos. The sinless man
»nd Paradise, Adam and the field burdened with the
tuise, the r ±i of the first race and the lood, JCoah's
generation and the rainbow, the people of promisi
and the promised laiul, the renewal of humanity,
through Cbilsi, and the renewal of the earth, the
judgment, and the end of the woild, these are only
the principal epochs of a chain of events which ar«
expressed in the most manifold separate pictures and
traits (see Laxge's " Life of Jesus : '' the Baptism of
Jesus, the natural events at His death and ascen-
sion).
13. That the Scriptures neither know nor will
know of pre-Adamltes (see Hahn : " Compendium of
Fiiith,'' ii. p. 24), nor of various primitive aboriginal
races, ai>pears not only from Genesis I. and 11., but
also from the consistent presumption and assertion
of the entire Holy Writ ; for example, Matt. xix. 4 ;
Acts xvli. 2ij ; 1 Cor. xv. 47. Here we can bring
out only the following points: 1. The original unity
of the human race coincides with the doctrine of the
unity of the fall of man in Adam, and the unity of
the redemption in Christ. It also accords with the
biblical and Christian Idea of the unitary destination
of the earth. 2. The autochthonic doctiine of the
ancients stands in Intimate connection with their
polytheism ; the special race of any certain laud cor-
responds with the special gods of said land, as tho
speech of Paul in Athens clearly shows (Acts xvii
26, 26). 3. The greatest naturalists have mostly de-
clared themselves against the originality of different
human races, see Lange's "Dogmatics," p. 330; the
greater part of the earlier defenders of said view
Ijelonged to the department of natural philosophy.
With the distinction of the various ground-types,
winch are formed from the one human species, the
most serious difficulties are banished, though not
solely by reference to climatic relations; and so in
regard to the alleged fruitfulness of sexual combma-
tlons among the various races, the proof of such
fruitfulness Is justly pronounced one of the strongest
proofs of unity. 5. The autochthonic theory has
never been able to harmonize Itself In relation to the
ground-forms to be presented ; and It can also, C. not
deny the fact that the origin of the various types of
men points back to a common home iu Asia,
14. As to the doctrine of the original image,
compare the dogmatic works. The following dis
tiuctlons need special attention; 1. cbs and TWS^
image and hkeness. The Greek expositors referred
the first to the dispositions of man, and the latter to
his normal development; thus also the scholastic*
referred the former to the sum-total of the natural
powers of man (reason, Uberty), and the latter to his
pious and moral nature. This distinction appears
again iu another form in the older Protestant dogma-
tics, when it distinguishes between an image that
man has not lost by sm (Gen. Ix. 6 ; James ill. 9),
and such a oue as he. In fact, has lost, although this
Protestant distinction does not refer itself back to those
words image and likeness. Image has already been
made to refer to the simlhtude to God In man (the
so-called iJ-iKpi^io-i),! likeness to man as microcosm In
so far as he unites the whole world In himself and
presents It In a reduced scale, because the world Is a
likeness of God on a grand scale (A. Feldhoff:
" Uur ImmortaUty," Kempten, 1836). We malntali,
rather that the image designates the principle In
accordance with, and with a view to which, man hai
been created — consequently, the dynamic-plastic idea
of the God-Man (which view is supported by the fac;
that man, according to Gen. ill., wished arbitrarUy
to reahze this Ideaj. We maintain, therefore, thai
the image denotes the primitive Image, as In Chrisf
102
GBXESIS, OK THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
■lone is it plainly so called,* and comes in Him to
its realized appearance. Tiierefore is it said in the
image, tiiat is, the determinable similitude of man in
proportion to tlie image of Ciirist. The likeness, on
the contrary, is the real appearance of the copied
similitude, as it was peculiar to the first man in the
condition of innocence from the beginning. The
older Protestant dogmatics distinguished, as said
(without reference to the words image and likeness),
the substantial human affinity, to trod, especially in
B]iiritual powers, reason, etc., and the image in the
narrower sense, the jaditia vriffinalis, the status
initijritaHs with its separate attributes (especially
impassibility, immortality). They laid the emphasis
on tiie fact that the image in this stricter sense
was lost. Thereby has this opinion, for its part,
represented the glory of the first man in various
ways as too much developed, whilst the Socinians,
contrary to the nature of the spirit, wotdd consider it
as a mere abstract power (see Lange's " Positive Dog-
matics," p. 304). 2. To say nothing now of the
Encratites and Severians, who denied to the female
sex a share in the similitude, there may be farther
noted the strange contrast between such as would
6nd the image merely in the bodily appearance of
man (The Audians, and lately Hofmann), or merely in
his spiritual nature (Alexandrians, Augustine, Zwin-
gli), since here the simple observation suffices, that
the body of man is above all an image of his pecu-
Udr spiritual nature. In accordance with this the
similitude can naturally be understood only of man
in his totality. Its root is the spiritual nature or
the divine affinity, its appearance is the bodily form
in which man eifects his dominion over nature, and
although this does not fulfil the idea of his simili-
tude, it certainly appears as the first and most com-
mon realization of it. Man is the administrator of
God on earth. The similitude, i. e., the disposition
and designation of man to the image, has remained
to him ; the image in its integrity (6i)|a) he haa lost.
Still, an obscure outline of it, especially of the like-
ness, has remained to him, as is proved by the re-
mains of the manifoldly evil administration of men
on e.irth. The distorted image of the divine assumes
various forms in sinful man, even to the image of
evil spirits. One must make the distinction between
the prhnUive imatie, Christ, and the copy, human
nature, but not so as if the primitive image were the
exclusive Godhead, or the copy pure creature. See
also the article "Image" in Hkrzog's Real-Lexii^on-
15. Man (c^^«) indicates here collectively human-
ity according to its origin in the first human pair, or
in the one man in general, who was certainly the
universal primitive man and the individual Adam in
one person. Adam, referring to Adamah ; the red
one, from the red earth taken. Or is it, in fact, as
Starke maintains, the beautifid, tlie brilliant? It is
true, cnx in Arabic may also mean to be beautiful,
to shine, and Gesenius remarks : soUrd Arabes duplex
genus hominum distinguere, allerum ruhrum, quod
no* album appellamus, alteriim nigrum. If the
earth liad the nanjc of Adam, Adainah, as might be
inferred from the first ap])earance of the word in ch.
ii. 7, the conception of .\dam had a good sense, as
brilliant, beautiful, analogous to the commendatory
appellations of man in other nations. But it is clear
* (Oomparo H"b. i.3, where Christ is called "the express
Image," whieh is a poor translation of the Greek xap<""JP
riff un-0(7To<rfw«, the impression, stamp, or image of the
•atistance. Compare, also, Coloss. i. 15 : fUwK toD 9c*u toij
4«^Tov— ** imAtfe of the invisible God." T. L.)
that Adam is named according to Adamnh, oh. ii. 7
and so Paul has comprehended him as the xo'tns (I
Cor. XT. 47). On the word Adam, comp. Dklitzsch,
pp. 141 and 619. The Scripture indicates by thii
name that it is in unity with the wonderful fact, that
man was created by God, though he went forth fiom
the earth in the form of a natuial growtli under an
*' inspiration of the earth," as Steffens expresses him-
self.
16. The Sabbath. The view set up by Schrodei
and Gerlach of the late origin of the sabbath in the
giving of the law, finds a contrast in the exaggerated
importance of the significance of the word sabbath
in Delitzsch (p. 131 ff.), where he says, "Sunday has
a churehly solemnization, but the sabbath remains
the blessed and hallowed day of days," etc. The
sense of these and similar words is not entirely clear,
especially when one considers that under the days
of creation Delitzsch does not understand real days
but periods. Also the beautifully expressed parallel,
in Delitzsch, of the creative Friday when everything
was finished, and the Friday of the redemption, when
Christ died with the words: " Ii is Jinished;" that
is, the sabbath of creation and the day of rest of
Christ in the grave, as bringing up with the resurrec-
tion of Christ the now prominent and deep signifi-
cance of that first Sunday, when God said : " Let
there be light.''' For historical particulars, see WiNEK,
article "Sabbath;" Hk.ngstenberg : "The Day of
the Lord." See especially the article "Sabbath"
by Oehler in Herzog's " Keal-Encyclopsedia," where
the existence of a clearly marked pre-Mosaic solem-
nization of the sabbath among the Jews, and the
analogous existence of a heathen, that is, an Egyp-
tian weekly festival, is decidedly questioned. That
the heathen nevertheless, from time immemorial,
have known certain festive periods, appears from
their mythological systems.
17. As significant figures, as signs of a future
sacred symbol of numbers already appearing in our
section, are to be observed the nimiber two, appear-
ing in the various contrasts (heaven and earth, etc.)
as the number of nature or of life ; the number three
in the contrast of the two ternaries ; the number
four as number of the world in so far, as on the
fourth day the cosmos in the whole was completed ;
the number six as the number of labor, and seven
as the sacred number of the divine labor concluded
and perfected in the solemn rest of God. The num-
ber seven appears besides in the sevenfold, solemn
expression: God saw that it was good. But the
nimiber ten also is seen in the tenfold introduction
of the creative word : " God spake : Let there be."
18. The so-called anthropomorphisms of the
present chapter; God spake, God saw, God made,
God rested, form the foundation of the whole anthro-
pomorjjhic and anthropopathic style of delineation in
Sacred Writ. We must here observe that the authro
popathic expression may not be understood as literal-
dogmatic (anthropopathists) neither as mythical
(spiritualists), but as religio-symbolical, representing
the divine ideal-doing under the figure of human
action, not, however, in the sense as if human life
action, and image weit the original that shadow!
itself in the similarities of divine action, but in the
sense that the divine speaking, working, and resting
form the foundation for the analogous, comparative
doings of man (see " Hible-Work," John) ; just u
God's day is the original image for the day of man,
but not vice-versa.
VJ. The first chajiter of Genesis clearly contain;
CHAP. I.— II. 3.
193
the germs of all fundamental doctrines of theology
in the stricter sense, as well as of anthropology ;
that is, it is the basis for the doctrine of God (the
first article of tlie apostolic Confession of Faith), of
Hi^ attributes and His personality, of the world, of
the religious and earthly-real side of the world ; fi-
nally of man. his nature, dignity, and destiny. With
the image of God, in which man is created, is also
expressed the future of Christ, as it lay in its ideal
destiuatiou in the dlrine counsel from eternity (see
Lange's "Dogmatics," p. 211). The possibiUty of
ein is, moreover, alluded to in the words ; Rule
over them and make tliem subject to thee. It ap-
pears, however, more clearly in the second chapter.
UOMILETICAl AND PRACTICAL.
(Kleist: "Hymn to God;" Gellert: "God is
my Song ; " Klopstock's " Odes to Creation ; " Fr.
Ad. Krummacher: "The Days of Creation"). —
Homily on the six days' work fiom ch. i.-ii. .S.
Point of view: The creation as a revelation of God:
1. His omnipotence (Let there be!); 2. His wisdom
(means and end, the grades of nature and the image
of God) ; 3. His goodness (the living beings and
their movement and nourishment) ; His love (mau).
— Tlie creation as a future of man (the prep3,ration
of the house of God for man and man for the house
of God). — The creation as the advent of the God-
Man: 1. The days' works of God a prophecy of man;
2. the perfected man on the sabbath of God a proph-
ecy of the God-Man. — The first creation a prefigura-
tion of the second creation or the redemption. — The
week of God: 1. God's work in nature; 2. God's rest
in man. — The sabbuh of God a prophecy of the di-
vine Sunday. — The week of God in the history of
the world. — -The appointment of the whole course of
the world as a work of God: 1. The Chiliastic error
therein : the chronological computation, etc. ; 2. the
truth therein : the expectation of the divine period
of rest (Rev. xx.), — The world according to its various
forms: 1. As creation; 2. as nature; 3. as cosmos;
4. as ieon. — The work of God and the work of man.
What is different, and what is common to both : a.
The order ; 6. the constancy ; c. the gradual progres-
sion ; (/. the aim. — The account of the creation con-
trasted with ancient and modern errors (see Doctrinal
aud Ethical). — The account of the creation in its
truth and sublimity. — The basis of all the days' works :
Heaven and earth. — The contrast of heaven and
earth running through the entire Holy Writ as a
symbol of religion. — Heaven as the home of man
whilst on the earth : 1. The sign of liis origin ; 2. the
direction of Ids prayer; 3. tie goal of his hope. —
The lirst three d.iys' work as the preparation of the
last three. — The word of God ss the word of power
in the creation. — The spirit of God as the formative
strength of all God's works. — Creation as a mirror of
the Trinity. — The creation a revelation of life from
God- 1. The foundations of life in the elementary
world ; 2. the symboUcal phenomena of life in the
animal world ; 3. the reahty and truth of Ufe in the
human world. — The glory of the Lord in the work
of creation : 1. The co-operation of all His quaUties
(omnipotence, omnipresence, omniscience, etc.); 2.
the unity of all His attributes. — Separate Sechonn
and Verses. V'er. 1 : In. the beginning. The birth
of the world also the birth of time. 1. The tact
that tlie world aud time are inseparable ; 2. the
41>p;ication • a. the operations in the world are
IS
bound to the order of time, 6. time is given fbi
labor. To-day, to-day ! — The relation of worldlj
time to the eternity of God (Ts. xc. 1). — The begin-
ning of the Scriptures goes back to the beginning
of the world, as the end of the Scriptures extends to
the end of the world. — The outline of creation : Hea-
ven and earth: 1. Heaven and earth in union; 2.
earth for heaven ; 3. heaven for earth. — The primary
form of the earth and the creation of Ught a pict'ue
of the redemption : 1. The redemption of mankind in
general, 2. of the individual man. — Waste and void
tlie first form of the world. — Laying the foundations
of the world (Eph. i. 4, aud other passages). — Tho
spirit of God the sculptor of all forms of life. — The
word of God: Let there be: 1. How the growth of
the world points back to the eternal existence of the
word; 2. how the eternal word is the foundation for
the growth of the world. — The word — let there be —
in its echo through time as the word of the creation,
of the redemption and glorification. — The first clear-
ly defined creation : the light. — -The significance of
light ; its physical and religious significance. — God's
survey of light. — Light a source of life : 1. Its good
as existing iu its ground; 2. its fiena^y as disclosed
in its appearing. — The creation of light at the same
time the creation of physical darkness (see Is. xlv.).
— How carefully we must guard against the commin-
gling of natural and spiritual darkness. — The natural
darkness as it were a picture of the spiritual. — But
also a picture of the " shadow of His wings." — Even-
ing aud morning, or the great daily pheuomenou of
the alternation of time. — The creatiim of light a
day's work of God: 1. The first day's work; 2. a
whole day's work; 3. a continuous day's work; 4. a
day's work rich iu its cousequences. — The fiist day.
Vers. 6-8 : The second day's work, or the firmament
of heaven. — The firmament in its changing phenome-
na a visible image of the invisible heaven. — Vers. 9
and 10 : Laud and sea. The beauty of the land, the
subUmity of the sea. The symbolical significance of
the land : the fi''m institutions of God; of the sea:
the wave-like hfe of nations. — The second day of
God. Vers. 9-13: The earth and the vegetable
worlil. The green earth a child of hope. — The plant
the prelude and symbol of all life (of animal, human,
and spiritual). — The providence oi" God iu the crea-
tion of the vegetable world before the creation of
animals and man. — This providence a picture of the
same providence with which he thought and com-
manded our salvation from eternity. — The store-
houses of the earth supplied before the appearance
of man, according to the Scriptures and natural sci-
ence (coal, minerals, salts, etc.). — The third day.
Vers. 14-19 : The creation of the heavenly lights foi
the earth. — The sun. The moon. Sun aud moon
(Ps. viii. 19). The stellar world. — -\ glance of faith
into the stellar world. — The oHice of the stars fo'
the earth: 1. God's sign for faith; 2. sacred signs
for the festive periods of the solemnization of the
faith ; 3. spiritual watchers and guides for the spirit-
ual life of man; 4. homes of life lor creature-lite. —
The fourth day. Vers. 20-23 : The life of the fishe.s
in the sea and the Idrds under the heaven a sign of
the po.-sibility of an endlessly diversified existence of
spiritual beings. — The blessing of God on the animal
world (in every cUniate and sea). — The fifth day.
Vers. 24 and 25 : The animals of the earth as the
forerunners of man : 1. The first signs and pictures
of human life ; 2. its most intimate assistants ; 3. ita
first conditions. — Vers. 26-31 : The creation of man:
1. A decree of God; 2. an anuouncemenl of th4
194
GEXESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
bnage of God ; 3. the last work of God. — The office
of in;>n : 1. God's image in his power and perfection ;
2. God's likeness in bis appearance. — The perfect
fullihnent of tliis destiny. — The one divine similitude
in the contrast of man and woman. — The hiessing of
God on man- 1. His future; 2. his calling; 3. his
possessions and his sustenance. — The institution of
marriage (see ch. ii.). — The calling of man, through-
out, a call to domiiuon : I. In representing God ; 2.
in ruling over the beasts : 3. in the free self-control.
— The purity of the first creation. — The verdict of
God: Very good. — Vers. 24-31. The si.xth day. —
The completion of the world, the sabbath of God. —
The significance of the rest of God on the seventh
day. — The sabbath of God, the sabbath of man: 1.
Man a sabbath of God ; 2. God the sabbath of man.
— The contrast between struggling creation and joy-
ful labor, also in the life of man. — The blessing of
God on the sabbath. — The sabbath in its significance :
1. Its source in the heart of God, like the life of man
(the bliss of God) ; 2. its signs : the solemn pauses
^God saw that it was good), like the evening-rest,
preludes of the Sunday ; 3. its fruitfulness : the festi-
vals of the Old Covenant, the Sunday of the New
Covenant, the eternal sabbath-rest, and celebration
of tlie Sunday in eternity. — The festal demeanor
according to the pattern of God: 1. Reposing; 2.
blessing ; 3. hallowing. — The first completion Of the
world a presage of its final completion.
Starke, ver. 1 : The question what God did be-
fore the creation. He chose us (Eph. i. 4), He pre-
pared for us the kingdom (Matt. xxv. 34), He gave
us giace in Christ (2 TItu. i. 9), He madi- the decree
of the creation. — Some understand by the beginning
the Son (jf God (Col. i. 16 ; Rev. i. S), at which also
the Chaldaic translation aims by rendei-ing it: in
wusJom (couip. Wisdom of Solomon ix, 4 ; Ps. civ.
24 ; Prov. viii. 22) ; but because the Son of God is
nowhere * absolutely called the beginning (see, how-
ever, Col. i., apxi), and Moses, besides, intends to
describe the origin of the world, the first explanation
18 reasonably preferred to the second (namely, from
the beginning of the creation). — Moses, witii these
words : in the beyinniny, overthrows all the reasons
of the heathen philosophers and atheists with which
they maintain the eternity of the world, or that it
perchance has arisen from numberless atoms (see
Kom. i. I'J and 20). — That the world is not eternal
may be seen from the following passages : Fs. xc. 2 ;
Prov. viii. 22, 24, 25; Is. xlv. 11, 12; corap. ver.
13; Matt, xiii. 35; xxiv. 21 ; xxv. 34; Mark x. 0;
'2. Tim. i. 9 ; 2 Pet. iii. 4 ; John xvii. 24 ; Eph. i. 4 ;
1 Pet. i. 20. — The spirit of God (Ps. xxxiii. B). —
\^cr. 3 : Of the speaking of God. Although God did
not speak as we do, nevertheless the speaking of (Jod
was a real genuine speech, in a higher but also more
appropriate .sense than speaking is said of man.
For as God really and properly, aUhougli not in a
natural uiannei generates like man, .^d also is it
with divine .speech. — Ver. 6 : God created liglit on a
Sunday, and on that day the children of Isiaul passed
tl rough the Red Sea, etc. — God is a lather of lights
" .UnlosaitlioProv. viii. 22, is^ri rr'axi ""SSp nin"
whiul - can only bo rendered " Jehovah possessed me, or
tHKiit raP-^ the ito^finninf; of hw way." This prubalily w.u-.
lh« (ground oi'tho translation m the Jerasalem Tarh'uni, aud
IhC'fe would seem to Ite something in it, it" wo would in any
way lyjQuect tho oreatiua of the world with the ot<.TUal
be^iuiiing, as Ltinge does in respect to the ereatlou of the
cllllr':h — chos<7U in Him, creatod in Him. The oxprtiti»ioa.s
1M1D pa-allel.— T. L.l
(James i. 17), of the external light, of the internal,
natural light of reason, of the spiritual light of graca
and the eternal fight in yonder world of glory. — Ver.
11 : The herbs not only a house of supply, but also
a store for heaUng. — To this third day belong also
the subterranean treasures, .a p-ecious stones, metals,
and other minerals. — Ver. 29 : We cannot say that
they had not the liberty of eating flesh. Wiiethef
they really used this or preferred to eat fruits an
herbs, we can reasonably refer to its proper place.—*
(Ver. 31 : Since God could have created everything
in a moment, no reasonable cause can be given why
He preferred six days, unless we reflect that it had
perhaps a reference to the six great changes in the
church, to which will finally succeed the sabbath of
the saints. Thus the first day is a prefiguration of
the time from Adam to Noah, etc.) — A Christian can
use the creatures, but he must not misuse them (1
Cor. vii. 31) that they groan not against him (Rom.
viii. 19). — Ch. IL 3: Discussion whether the first men
were bound to respect the sabbath. On the contra^
ry: 1. Every service of God connected with certain
times and places had a view to man after the fall ; 2.
man in a state of innocence has served God at all
times and in all places ; the sabbath was first insti-
tuted in the wilderness : God gave the sabbath only
to the Jews. Reasons for it : Appeal to the contents
of our passage, etc. — The sabbath-day a favor of
God.
Schroder to ver. 3 : Then spake God, says Chry-
sostom, "let there be light," and there was fight,
but now He has not spoken it, but Himself has be-
come our light. — From Valerius Uerberger: But it
16 much more that the Lord Jesus will finally trans-
port us, after this temporal light, into the eternal
light of heaven, where we shaU see God in His light
face to face, aud praise Hicn in the everlasting hea-
venly light and glory. — From Luther: He utters not
yranivialical words, but real and material thinys.
Thus sun, moon, heaven, earth, Peter, Paul, I and
thou are scarcely to be reckoned words of God, yea,
hardly a syllable and letter (y) in comparison to the
entire creation. — From Michaelis : Moses endeavor?
in the whole history of the creation to present God
not merely as ahnighty, but at the same time as per-
fect, wise, and good. Who considers all His works
and has created the best world. — Vers. 6-8 : The
conclusion of the first day's work was an actual
prophecy of the work of the second day of creation.
It was on the basis of the light shining into aud sep-
arating the moist chaos of the world, that God made
the division. — From Calviu: We well know that tor-
rents of rain arise in a n.itural manner, but the flood
sufficiently proves how soon we can be overwhelmed
by the violence of the clouds, if the cataracts of hea-
ven are not stayed by the hantl of (iod. — Gud named.
The subsequent naming on tlie part of man is only
the prophetic lolfilmeut of the naming of God here
and elsewhere. — Vers. 9-13 : The first (rather the
second) division (vers. 6-8) is followed by a second,
both closely and intimately cUnging to and antithet-
ically conditioning each other, lor which reason
some would even reckon vers. 9 and lu to the prty
ceding day. — Valesti.v UEiiBEituEK : Is it not
miracle':' We take a handlnl of .seeii aud strew
them on one earth and soil, where they have the
same food, sap, and care, nevertheless they do not
commingle, but each produces its kind : the one wliite,
the other yidlow, the fruit sweet and sour, brown
and black, red and green, fragraut and olfensive,
high and low. Thtis we, though, like the seeds, buriet?
CHAP. I.— II. 3.
19S
a one consecrated ground (Sirach xl. 1), will ncvei-
theless at the day of judgment not be confounded
with each other, but each will go forth in his flesh,
yet incorruptible (1 Cor. xv. 38). — Vers. 14-19.
From Luthkr: He maintains the same order as in
the three preceding days, in tliat He JirM adorns tlie
heavens with Ughts and stars, and afleniiards the
earth. Even the heathen philosopher Plato says,
that eyes are especially given to men tliat, by the
observation of the heavenly bodies and their move-
ments, they may be to them as guides to the Isnow-
ledge of God. It is by the heavenly bodies that men
judge of the weather; by their help they hnd their
way on the water and on the land. So, too, a star
led the wise men to the manger, etc. — Michaklis:
They (the stars) are the great and almost infallible
clock of the world, ever moving at the same rate. — ■
From Ldther : Hereby is developed and shown to us
the immortality of the soul, from the fact that, with
the exception of man, no creature can understand the
movement of the heavens, nor measure the heavenly
bodies. The hog, the cow, and the dog cannot mea-
sure the water that they drink, but man measures
the heavens and all their hosts. Therefore there
shows itself here a spark of eternal life. — From Cal-
vin : '' Moses paid more attention to us than to the
stars, precisely as became a theologian." — The true
morning-star is Christ (Rev. xxii. 16), tlie sun of
righteousness (Mai. iv. 2). — The aiiiuials of the water
are in marked contrast with the animals of" the air.
Water and air. The latter is as it were the embodied
liquid light, the former embodied darkness ; in its
depths there is neither summer nor winter, it is the
heavy melancholy element, whilst the air, light and
clieerful, gives hfe and breMth eveiywhere. The in-
habitants of the former are opposed to those of the
latter, the fish to the birds, as water and air, dark-
ness and light. The fish is cold, .stiff, mute ; the
bird warm, tree, and full of melody. Yet not with-
out reason were both created on one and the same
day. They have many things in commor., and are
in structure and movement closely and intimately
allied ; the variegated scaly mail of the fish pomts to
the colored feathery coat of the bird, and what the
wings are to the latter, the fins are to the former.
Water and air once lived together, and do so now ;
as the air descends into sea and earth, and vivifying-
ly penetrates the water, the latter, for its part, rises
into the air, and mingles with the atmosphere to its
remotest border. — That God blesses the animals, ex-
presses the thought, that God creatively endows ani-
mals with the power of propagating their kind, and
also points to the work of preserving the world.
" Here we see what a blessing really means, namely,
a powerful increase. When we bless we do nothing
more than to wish good ; but in God's blessing there
is a sound of increase, and it is immediately efficacious ;
BO again. His curse is a withering, and its effect in
like manner immediately consuming." Luther. —
Only the largest water-animals are introduced, be-
cause from them the greatness, omnipotence, and
glory of the creator most clearly shine foi th. The
land-animals a product of the earth — with heads
bent downwards. — Various views as to the time of
Ihe creation of the angels (p. 2o). — The Redeemer
rests also through the seventh day in the grave. —
In divinely solemn stillness lay the young world, a
mirror of the Godhead, before tlie eyes of the still
jnfalleu first human pair, as with Him they kept
loly day, representing in their divine simiUtude the
labVvatb of God in the creation, and the sabbath of
the creation in God, harmoidously joined in ona
— Of a sabbath-law, there is nothing said in the text
IsraeFs later sabbaths (as the whole law was tc
awaken a sense of sin) were reminding copies o! this
sabbath of God after the creation, and uid'ulfillec
prophecies not only of the completion of the theocra
ey of the Old in the Christocracy of the New Cove
nant, but also of the final consummation of tiie pre*
ent order of things, especially on the last great
sabbath, etc. — The ancient allegorizing of the days
of creation according to the periods of the kingdom
of God (p. 23).— "Six days," says Calvin, "the
Lord occupied in the structure of the world, not aa
if He needed these periods, before whom a moment
is a thousand years, but because He will bind us to
the observing of each one of His works. He had
the same object in His repose on the seventh day."
(Augustine had already expressed himself in the
same way. There lies at the base of this an abstract
comprehension of the divine omnipotence, and a
great ignoring of the idea of nature. Luther's con-
jecture : The fall occurred on the first day of crea-
tion, about noon.)
Lisco : Death is nothing in the creation. Every-
thing lives, but in very manifold modification. — JIau
is created in the image of God, i. e., so that all divine
glory shines forth in him in a reduced scale. He
has a nature allied to God, and therein lies the pos-
sibihty and capabihty of becoming ever more like
God. — The whole human race is one great family.
All are blood-relations. — The dominion of man ovei
n.iture obtains, in progressive development and ex
tension, by the arts and sciences, by investigation ol
nature's laws, aud by using its powers (of course
under the conditioning of life m the spirit througL
coniniunity with God).
Gerlach : The whole subsequent history is writ-
ten only for men fi. e., according to the human
stand-point) ; therefore sun, moon, and stars, the
host of heaven (ch. ii. 1), appear merely as lights in
the firmament of hea\ en, and nothing is told us of
the inhabitants of heaven, altliougli even in this book
the angels frequently appear, and the fall of some is
already in ch. iii. presupposed, etc. — All things have
had a beginning. — The world was to develop itself in
the contrast of heaven and earth, which repeats itself
on a small scale — on earth, in spirit and nature, and
in man, in spirit and flesh. — It is self-evident, theie-
fore, that God's speaking is not the production of an
audible sound, but the realization of His tlioughts
through an act of His will. — The "jtaming'^ is equi-
valent to determining something in accordance with
its nature or its appearance. There is thereby indi-
cated the power of God as ruling and thinking all
things. (The naming here is not meant as a creative
calling, but as an expression of the divine adaptation.)
— The ujiper flimament from which descend light and
warmth and fertiUzing moisture, casting blessings on
the eartli. attracting with its wonderful moving and
fixed lights the observation of the rudest man, and
drawing forth the anticipation of, and longing for,
a higher home than this earthly one, is the visible
I pledge, yes, perhaps the distant gleam, of a heavenly
I world of ligljt. It bears with it, therefore, a nami
which is the same with the kuigdom. where iu un-
I dimmed light " our Father in heaven " reveals Him-
j si'lf — As originally everything was sea, thus in th«
j glorified earth there will be no more sea. — It is ab-
: surd to suppose, because fruit-trees oidy are her*
I spoken of, that the others, as thorns and thistles, did
I not appear until after the fall of man. (Only the fac«
(U6
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
that they at a later period burdened the field, is al
luded to by Augustine as a punishment.) A very
fitting distinction of a similitude of man, which can-
Dot be lost, and of such a one as has been lost. — The
reader must carefully guard against the Jewish fables
irhich have also tbund their way among Christians,
namely, that man was at first created as man and
woman in one person, and afterwards both sexes
were separated from it. — God rested, etc. Perfect
rest and the greatest activity are one in Him (see
John v. 1*7). — Whether a fixed observance of the
seventh day was ordered with the revelation of the
history of creation, or whether this was first given to
the people of the law with the other laws, presents
an obscure question, but the latter view is the more
probable ; in Genesis, at least, there is found no trace
of the observance of the sabbath, and still less among
heathen nations; the division of weeks, as found
among some, might have been made according to
the quarters of the moon. (The knowledge of the
week, and the religious consecration of this know-
edge, forms, indeed, the patriarchal religious basis
of the sabbath-law, which no more came into the
world abruptly than any other reUgious institution.)
Calmer Bible Exposition: The number seven,
important through the whole Old Testament, reminds
one of the year of jubilee and the rest of the sabbath
which is allotted to the people of God above, whither
Jesus has gone before to prepare a place for His
own. — BuNSEN ; The days of creation go from light
to Ught, from one (outstreaming) of light to another.
Man as the real creature of light is the last progres-
sive step. — Fruits of trees " above the earth " in con-
trast with bulbous plants, which are included in the
herbs (?). — Sir/ns. Sun, moon, and stars ; especially
Bun and moon are to be signs for three important
points : for festive periods (new moons and sabbaths),
for days of the month, ami for the new year (begin-
ning of the solar and lunar year). — The week has its
natural basis in the approximate duration of the four
phases or appearances of the moon's disk, whose
unity forms the fitst measure of time, or the month,
according to the general view of all Shemites.
Astronomically the number seven has in the ancient
world, and especially among the Shemites, its repre-
fientation in the seven plitnets, or wandering stars,
accortling to the view of the senses (?): the moon,
Mercury, Venus, the sun. Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn.
Thence comes also the series of our week-days. —
Arndt (Christ m the Old Covenant) : As long as
there i.-* a world there is an advent. — The birth of
the world is the great moment of which it is declar-
ed : God said : Let there be Ught, and there was
jght.
[Note on the Cre.itiox-Sabbatii. — The question
of the sabbath in all its aspects stands wholly clear
from any difficulty as to the length of the creative
days. We ha\e already jhowii that there is not only
a bare consistency but a beautiful scriptural harmony
in the less being made a memorial of the greater.
Bee Introd. to Gen. i. pp. 135, 130. God's great rest,
or ceasing from His work of creation, commences
with the first human consciousness following the
inspiration that makes the primuK homo. Then the
heavens and the •■arth are finished. Nature and the
world are couiplcte ip this crowning work, :ind the
divine sabVjath beguis. This is blessed and liallnwcd.
Time, ds a part of nature, is now iirocci'diiig in its
regular suii-divided ord(;r, and from this time a sev-
enth returning part is also blesitcd and hallowed for
■US, nc a season in which he is to rest from his
works, and contemplate that now unceasing sabbatl
of God, which, from the very nature of the case, can
have no such shorter recurring intervals. Hence the
force of "ur Saviour's words that the sabbath, the
weekly solar sabbath, was made for miin. They who
contend that the divine sabbath is simply the first
twenty-four hours after creation is finished, make it
unmeaning, as predicated of God and His works. In
tL'S sense God no more rested on that solar day than
on every one that follows until a new creative aeon,
or a new creative day, arises in the eternal coimsels.
Such a view destroys the boautiful analogy pirvading
the Scripture, by which the less is made the type of
the greater, the earthly of the heavenly, the tempora
of the eternal. It makes the earthly human sabbath
a memorial of something just like itself, of one long-
past solar day, of one single transient event, instead
of being the constantly recurring witness of an xonian
state, an eternal rest, ever present to God, and re-
served for man in the unchanging timeless heavens.
But the question with which we are most con-
cerned is in regard to the sabbath as established foi
man. Does this seventh day, or this seventh portioL
of time, which God blessed and hallowed, have thus
an eternal and universal ground as a memorial of the
creative work with its sevenfold division, or does it
derive its sanction from a particular law made long
after for a particular and pecuUar peo]>le? The
question must be determined by exegesis, and for
this we have clear and decisive, if not extensive,
grounds. It demands the close consideration of two
short passages, and of a word or two in each. " And
God blessed the seventh day," Gen. ii. 3. Which
SL'venth day ? one might ask, the greater or the less
the divine or the human, the a?onian or the astro
nomical ? Both, is the easy answer ; both, as com
meucing at the same time, so far as the one connects
with astronomical time ; both, as the greater includ-
ing the less ; both, as being (the one as represented,
the other as typically representing) the same in
essence and idea. The attempt to make them one in
scale, or in measure, as well as in idea, does in fact
destroy that universality of aspect whicli comes from
the recurring, moving type as representing the statid-
inc/ antitype. Take away this, and all that we can
make out of the words, as they stand in Gen. ii. 3, is
that God blessed that one seventh day (be it long or
short), or, on the narrower hypothesis, that one day
of twenty-four hours whieli first followed His ceasing
to create, and left it standing, sacred and alone, away
back in the flow of time. But blessing the day
means blessing it for some purpose : it is the expres-
sion of God's love to it as a holy and beneficent
thing among the things of time, as carrying ever
with it something of God, some idea of the Blesser,
and of the love and reverence due to Him as the
fountain of all blessedness and of all blessed tilings.
So the blessing upon man looks down through all the
generations of man. No narrower idea of the bless-
ing of the sabbath can be held without taking froir
the word all me:ming. " And hallowed it, inX U5^~"'"
and made it hnlii. This also is a very plain Hebrew
word, especially in its Piel form, as any one may set
by examining it with a coneordiince. We have given
to the word nnholy (the etymological opposite) too
much the vague sense of wickedness in general, tc
allow of its fairly representing the op()Osite in idea
The hulji throughout the Old Testament is ojijiosec?
to the romtiion, however lawful in iL-^elf it may be.
To hallow is to make uncommon. To hallow a tim«
is to make it a time when thinzs which are comnioi
CHAP. 1.— II.
19',
tt other times, and peculiar to otlier times, should
lot be done, but the time so hallowed should bo de-
moted to other and uncommon uses. Of course,
things essential and necessary at all times are not
included, or excluded, iu such distinction. Neither
will it hold of days or times that mere human author-
ity thus devotes to any separate uses. Such devotion
may be as partial, or as indefinite, as the authority
chooses to make it. But when God hallows a time
it is for Himself. Not simply whatever man does,
but whatever he <loes for himself, or for his indi-
vidual worldly interest, at other times, that must he
not do on the times that God has hallowed for His
own special remembrance; but he must, on the con-
trary, do other things which are more immediately
connected with that special remembrance. Anything
less th.in this as a general principle leaves the word
to hallow or make holy, as used by God, and of God
(unless specially limited to some partial application),
an unnieauing utterance. It is the portion of time
which the Creator of time keeps for Himself, out of
the time He has given to man. It is elevating a por-
tion of the human time to the standard, or in the
direction at least, of God's own eternal sabbath.
There can be no hallowed time to God alone ;
there can be no hallowed time in itself irrespective
of any agents in time. Therefore, the expression,
He hallowed it, must be for men, for all men who
were to be on the earth, or it is a mere blank. It is
God's day in which men should live specially for
Him. It is sometimes said, we should live every day
for God. If it be meant that there should be no
special times in which we live to God as we do not,
and cannot, at all tunes (when God permits us, in
living for Him, to live also for ourselves), then is it a
hyper-piety which becomes profanity iu claiming to
be above the need of a provision instituted by the
divine wisdom and grace. Like to this is the plea,
that, if there be a sabbath at all, it should be spent,
not in religious acts, so called, but in the study and
the contemplation of nature. This cavil has a high
sound, but it would soon be abandoned, perhaps, by
many that use it, if the contemplation of nature
spoken of were what it ought to be, a contemplation
of the very sabbath of God — nature itself being that
holy pause in which God rests from His creative
energies, that ineffable repose in which, though
superintending and preserving. He provides for man
through law that he can comprehend, and an execut-
ing Word that he can devoutly study.
If we had no other passage than this of Gen. ii. 3,
there would be no difficulty in deducing from it a
precept for the universal observance of a sabbath, or
seventh day, to be devoted to God, as holy time, by
all of that race for whom the earth and its nature
were specially prepared. The fli'st men must have
known it. The words " He hallowed it," can have
no meaning otherwise. They would be a blank
unless in reference to some who were required to
ieep it holy. After the fall, the evil race of Cain,
loubtless, soon utterly lost the knowledge. In the
une of Seth it may have become greatly dimmed.
Enoch, we cannot hesitate to behev^ kept holy sab-
bath, or holy seventh day (whether the exact chrono-
logical seventh or not), until God took him to the
holy rest above. It lingered with Noah and his lam-
ily, if we may judge from the seven-day periods ob-
served in the ark. Of the other patriarchs, in this
:«spect, nothing is directly told us. They were
devout men, unworldly men, confessing themselves
pilgrims on earth, seeking a rest. Nothing is more
probable, prima facie, than that such men, as w«
lead of them in Genesis, and as the Apostle hai
desciibed them to us, should have cherished an ide»
so in harmony with their unearthly pilgrim-life, eve»
though coming to them from the faintest tradition.
To object that the Bible, in its few brief memoranda
of their lives, says nothing about their sabbath,
keeping, any more than it tells us of their forms of
prayer and modes of worship, is a worthless argu
ment. The Holy Scripture never anticipates cavils;
it never shows distrust of its own truthfulness by
providing against objections — objections we may say
that it could have avoided, and nujst certainly would
have avoided, had it been an untruthful liook made
either by earlier or later compilers. Tlie patriarchs
may have lost the tradition of the sabbath ; it may
not have come to them over the great catastrophe of
the flood ; or they may have lost the chronological
reckoning of it ; but, in either case, it would not
afl'eet the verity of the great facts and announcements
in Gen. i. and ii., however, or by whatever species of
inspiration, the first author of that account obtained
Ms knowledge. For all who believe the Old Scrip-
tures, as sanctioned by Christ and supported by the
general bibUcal evidence, there it stands unimpaired
by anything given or omitted in the subsequent
history.
But there is another passage which shows con-
clusively that, through whatever channel it may have
come, such a knowledge of the sabbath was in the
world after the time of the patriarchs. The language
of the fourth commandment (Exod. xx. 8), to say
nothing of Exod. xvi. 22-27, caniiot be interpreted
in any other way. Remember the sabbath-day,
nsBr; c'ii rs n^Dt . The force of the article is
there, though omitted, in the Hebrew syntax, because
of the specifying word that follows. It is just as
though we should say in English ; Remember sab-
bath-day. Take the precisely similar language, Mai.
iii. 22, n'^jia n'lin insl : Remember the law of
Moses, or, Remember Moses' law. As well might
one contend that this waj the first promulgation of
the Pentateuch, as that Exod. xx. 8 was the first
setting forth of the sabbatical institution. There
was no call for such language had that been the case.
It would have been in the style of the other com-
mands : ' Thou shalt have no other gods ; Thou shall
not take the name, etc. ; Thou shalt keep a sabbath,
or rest,' etc. We dwell not upon the distinct refer-
ence that follows to the creation-sabbath, and the
perfect similarity of reason and of language. The
artless intioduction is enough to show that those to
whom it was addressed are supposed to have known
something of the ancient institution, however much
its observance may have been neglected, or its reck-
oning, perhaps, been forgotten. The use of the word
lilt [remember) would seem to point to some such
danger of misreckoning, as though the Lawgiver
meant to coimect it back chronologically, by septen-
nial successions, with the first sabbath, or the first
day of the conscious human existence. Or he may
have had in view future reckonings. The old law of
a seventh day, or a seventh of time, being preserved
as an immutable principle, there might have been p
peculiar memorial reckoning for the Jewish people
as there afterwards was for the Christian church
when the resurrection of Christ was taken for the
initial day of reckoning, as being, in a most solemn
sense, to the church, what the creative finishing had
been to the world. So that, iu this respect, th«
198
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MObES
Christian seTenth day may have been no more a sub-
stitution than the Jewish.
A seventh part of time is holy for man. God
blessed it and hallowed it. Such is the deduction
from the language of Gen. ii. 3. There are other
questions relating to the sabbath, its adaptation to
the human physical constitution, and the change of
reckoning as between the Jewish and Christian dis-
pensations, but they would come more in place in
commenting on some other parts of the sacred vol-
ume, to which they may be, therefore, referred.
The rdigious aspect appears more in the universal
hallowing in Genesis than in the more national estab-
lishment among the Jews, where mere rest from
labor seems more prominent than religious worship,
or that holy contemplation of the divine which is the
living thought in the creative account, and which
comes out aiain so emphatically in the Christian
institution as more suggestive, than the Jewish, of
the eternal rest. It is a great, though very common,
mistake, that the Jewish aspect of the sabbath is the
more severely religious, as compared with the Chris-
tian, which is sometimes claimed to be more free in
this respect. Strict as the Jewish institution was, in
its prohibitions of labor, it was in fact the less reli-
gious ; it had less of holy contemplation ; it had no
worship prescribed to it ; it was, in a word, more
secular than the primitive or the Christian, as being
enjoined more for secular ends, namely bodily rest
and restoration for man and beast, and even for thii
land. These, indeed, are important ends still remain'
iiig. The connections between the sabbatli and th«
physical constitution of man form a most valuable
part of the general argument, but as they bear upon
the biblical view as collateral confirmation rathei
than as connected with its direct sanctions, we would
simply refer the reader to some of the more instruc
tive works that have been written on this branch of
the subject.
James Aug. Hesset: "Sunday, its Origin, Hia
tory, and Present Obligation" (Bampton Lectures
preached before the University of Oxford), London.
1860; James GiLFiLLAN : "The Sabbath viewed in
the Light of Reason, Revelation, and History, with
Sketches of its Literature," Edinburgh, 1862, repub-
lished by the N. Y. Sabbath Committee and the
American Tract Society, New York, 1862; PniLiF
Schaff: "The Anglo-American Sabbath (an Essay
read before the National Sabbath Convention, Sara-
toga, Aug. 11, 186;i), New York, 1863 (republished
in English and in German by the American Tract
Society); Mark Hopkins: "The Sabbath and Free
InstitutJons " (read before the same Convention),
New Y'ork, 1863; Robert Cox: "The Literature on
the Sabbath-Question," Edinburgh, 1866, 2 vols.
On the practical aspects of the sabbath-question,
comp. the Documents prepared and published by the
N. Y. Sabbath Committee from 1867 to 1867.— T. L]
SECOND SECTION.
Man — Paradue — iAe Faradisaical Pair and the Paradisaical Institutiom, — TheoeratM — Jehovittic
Chapter II. 4-25.
A. — The Earth waiting for Man.
4 These are the generations [genealogies] ' of the heavens and of the earth when thej
were created, in the day [here the six days are one day] that the Lord God [not God Jehovah, mud
lese God the Eternal. Israel's God aa God of all the world] made the earth aud the heavens [the theo-
5 cratic heavens are completed from the earth]. And every plant of the field before it was in the
earth, and every herb of the field before it grew ; for the Lord God had not caused it
to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man [^Adam] to till the ground [adamnh].
B. — The Creation of the Paradisaical Man.
6 But there went up a mist from the earth [including the sea] and watered the whole face
7 of the earth [the adamah or the land]. And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the
ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, aud man became* a living souL
C. — The Creation of Paradise.
i And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden [land of delight], and there Le
9 put the man wliom \\'^ had formed: And out of the ground made the Lord God tc
grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food ; the tree of life also in
10 the midst ol the garden, and the tree of knowledge; of good and evil. And a rivei
went out of Eden to water tVe garden; and hum theuce it was parted ind became intf
• IHAP. II. 4-26.
19t
11 four heads. The name of the first is Pison [spreading]; that is it which compassett
12 [winds through] the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold. And the gold of tliaj
i3 land is good [fine] ; there is bdelhum and the onyx stone. And the name of the seconc
river is Gihon [gushing], the same is it that compasseth the whole land of Ethiopia [cuBh]
1 1 And the nanie of the third river is Hiddekel [swift-flowing] ; that is it which gc«th towara
the East of Assyria. And the fourth river is Euphrates.
D.— The Paradise Life.
1 5 And the Lord God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden, to dress it
16 and to keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man saying, Of every tree of the
17 garden thou mayest freely eat [bsxn bDx]. But of the tree of knowledge of good and
evil, thou shalt not eat of it; for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely
die [man mo].
E. — Paradisaical Development and Institutions.
i8 And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will maice
19 him a help meet for him [n5:3 , his contrast, reflected image, his other l]. And out of the ground
the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air, and brought
them unto Adam to see' what he would call them; and whatsoever Adam called every
20 living creature, that was the name thereof. And Adam gave names to all cattle, and
to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field ; but for Adam there was not
21 found a help meet for him. And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam,
22 and he slept; and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof And
the rib which the Lord God had taken from man, made he a woman and brought her
23 unto the man. And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh
she shall be called woman, because she was taken out of man [tscAa/i, man-ess, because taken
24 from isoA, man]. Therefore .shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave
25 unto his wile ; and they shall be one flesh. And they were both naked, the man and
his wife, and were not ashamed.
[1 Ver. 4. — m?n. Rendered by Lange genealogies. More properly generations in the primary sense, and without
any reference to time, like "1^ , or yevei. Births, Greek : vevecreis, whence the name of the book in the Septuagint. -It is
directly applied to births, or suct^essions (one thing, or event, proceeding from another), in nature, and this may be
regarded as primary. For example, see Ps. xc. 2, ^12^ C^^n , before the mountains were born, generated. — T. L.)
[■J Ver. 7. — Lange renders: "tind so ward der Mensch eine lebendige Seele." Luther has alio. The Hebrew baa
simply TI"i1 , which we render : and man became, like the Vulgate and LXS. ; but the verb seems to have an emphasis,
which Lange rightly aims to give, and so man became, etc. : in this special vtanner, namely by the divine inspiration
directly ; since the animals also are called i~I^n ITSS , living soul, though their life comes mediately through the general
life of nature or the C^nbs mi , as mentioned ch. i. 2. See Ps. civ. 29.— T. L.]
[3 Ver. IG-^niXlb , to set. Lange : "um zu sehen." Some of the Jewish commentators raise the question whether
this has for its subject God or Adam. If the latter, then mX"lP has the sense oi judging, determining, which it will well
oear.— T. L.)
EXEQETICAL AND CEITTOAL.
1. The present section, ch. ii. 4-26, is coniiected
with the one that follows to the end of ch. iii., by
the peculiar divine designation of Jehovah Elohim.
It has also a still closer connection with ch. iv., inas-
much as the next toledoth, or generations, begin
with ch. V. 1. That, however, ch. ii. 25 is really a
separate portion, appears fiom the strong contrast in
which the history of the fall, ch. iii., stands to the
history of Paradise, ch. ii. Keil denotes the whole
division, even to the next toledoth (ch. v. 1 ), as the
history of the heavens and the earth. Upon the
tompleting of the creative work, ch. i., there follows
the commencing historical development of the world,
with the history of the heavens and the earth in three
sections: a. Of the primitive condition of man in
Paradise (ch. ii. 5—25) ; b. of the fall (ch. iii.) ; c. of
the breaking up of the one human race into two dis-
tinct and separately disposed races (ch. iv.). It
must be remarked, however, in the first place, that
in ch. ii. there is not yet any proper beginning of
historical development in the strict sense, and, sec-
ondly, that chs. iv. — vi. 1-7 do evidently cohere in a
definite unity presenting, as consequence of the his-
tory of the fall, 1. the unfolding of the line of Cain,
2. the unfolding of the line of Seth, and 3. the inter-
folding of both lines to their mutual corruption. So
far, therefore, does the history of the first world pro-
ceed under the reUgious pjint of view. But the
generations of the heavens and the earth go on from
the beginning of our present section to ch. v. In
respect to this, Keil rightly maintains that the phrasf
200
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
ileh tlwledoth (these the generations) must be the
superscription to what follows (ver. 33). The ques-
tion arises ; in what sense ? On good ground does
Keil insist that toledoth (a noun derived from the
Hiphil "I'b'n , in the construct plural, and denoting
properly the generations, or the posterity of any one)
means not the historical origin of the one named in
the genitive, but ever the history of the generations
and the life that proceeds from him — or his series of
descendants (we may add) as his own genesis still
going on in his race. This word, therefore, in its
relation to lieaven and earth, cannot denote the origi-
nal beginning of the heaven and the earth (Delitzsch
thiuks otherwise), but only the historical development
of heaven and earth after they are finished. For the
toledoth or " generations of Noah," for example, do
not denote his own birth and begetting, but his his-
tory and the begetting of his sons. From what has
been said it follows, therefore, that the human history,
from ch. ii. to the end of eh. iv., is not to be regarded
as a history of the earth only, but also of the hea-
fens. And in a mystical sense, truly, Paradise is
teaven and earth together. Let us now keep special-
y in view the section of Jehovah Elohim, elis. ii. and
lii. When we bear in mind that the name Jehovah
Elohim occurs twenty times in this section in place
of Elohim that had been used hitherto (the excep-
tions, ch. iii. 1, 3, 5, are very characteristic), and
that, besides this, it is found only once in the Penta-
teuch (Exod. ix. 30), the significance of this coimec-
tion becomes very clear. When once, however, the
documentary unity of the Elohim and Jehovah sec-
tions is clearly entertained, this section becomes im-
mediately a declaration that the Covenant-God of
Israel, originally the Covenant-God of Ad.am in Para-
dise, is one with Elohim the God of all the world.
Immediately, too, is there established the central
stand-point of the theocratic spirit, according to
which Jehovah is the (jod of all the world, and
Adam, with his Paradise, is the microcosmie centre
of all the world (in respect to the names Jehovah and
Elohim, see Keil, p. 33). As far as specially con-
cerns our section, ch. ii,, Knobel gives it the super-
scription: "The Creation, Narration Second." It
must be remarked, however, that here the genesis of
the earth, in contrast with the generative series that
follows, is presented according to the principle that
determines the ordering of things ; so that Adam, as
such principle, stands at the head. (It is according
to Aristotle's proposition : the posterior in appear-
ance, the prior in idea.) The representation must,
indeed, give him a basis in an already existing earth ;
yet still for the paradisaical earth is it true that the
earth is first through man. The paradisaical earili
with its institutions, uniting as they do the contrust
of heaven and earth, or rather of earth ami heaven,
lo the fundamental idea of the second chapter. For
an apprehension of this contrast, in part akin to and
partly v;iriant, see Delitzsch, p. 138. From the
very supposition of the earth as existing, it appears
that the author presu|)[io.sc3 still another representa-
tion of the creation, and that the jfresent is only
meant to give a supplement ti-om another side. It is
incorrect to say here, as Knoliel does, that the origin
of plants in general goes before the orighi of
man.
2. Ver. 4. The construction of De Wette is to
this effect: "At the time when God Jehovah made
earth and heaven, there was no shrub of the field,"
r'c. Still burgher and more difficult is the construc-
tion of Bunsen : "At the time when God the Evu
lasting made heaven and earth, and there was no
yet any shrub of the field upon the earth, and nt
herb of the field had }ct sprouted (for Jehovah Goc
had not yet made it to rain upon the earth, etc.),
then did God the Everlasting form man," etc. Both
of these are untenable and opposed to the simple ex-
pression of the text. (See also Delitzsch and Kei' j
Ver. 4 is indeed not altogether easy. Oh the day irt
which the Lord made the earth and the hearens, that
is, on the one great day, in which here the hexatjme-
ron is included (with special reference, indeed, to its
closing period), there commenced the history of the
heavens and the earth in their becoming created —
that is, in the same period in which they became
created. Out of the paradisaical history : Earth and
heaven, arose the converse history : Heaven and
earth, in a religious sense, just as in a genetic sense
there was the same order from the beginning,
3. Vers, 5 and 6. And every plant ot the
field. — The word 23 with the negative particle is
equivalent to the German ffar nichts, not at all. The
Hebrew conjunction 1 leaves it at first view unde-
cided, whether the superscription goes on so as to
take in the words, ajtd every herb, etc. And yet, on
that view, there would be a failure of any concluding
sense. The most probable view, therefore, is that
which regards the conjunction as merely a transition
particle, and passes it over in the translation. Ac-
cording to Knobel and others this narration is actual-
ly at variance with that of ch. i., as, for example, in
its view of the dryness of the earth before the intro-
duction of the plants, etc. (see ver. '22), and, there-
fore, we must conclude that it belongs to another
narrator. In regard to this assumption of dift'ereiit
documents, we may refer to the Introduction (for the
modes of representation in the Jehovistic portions,
see Knobel, p. 23 ; likewise the head Literature, p.
24). The designed uinty of both representations
appears Irom tiie manner ami way in which, even
according to Knobel, the second of these narrations,
in many of its references, presupposes the first. The
full ex|ilanation of this unity becomes obvious from
the harmonic comiast which arises when the univer-
sal creation of the world is regarded from the ideal
stand-point of the Jehovah belief (see John xvii. 5;
Eph. i. 4), The author carries us back to the time
of the hexaemeron, when no herb of the held had
yet grown. Nevertheless there is not meant by this
the beginning of the third creative day, hut the time
of the sixth. The apparent contradiction, however,
disappears, when we lay the emphasis upon the ex-
pression ^^ of the field ^^ and by the herbs and plants
of the field that are here meant, understand the nobler
species of herbs tliat are the growth of culture. In
opposition to Delitzsch, Keil correctly distinguishes
between mtr and yix . Delitzsch has not suffi-
ciently removed the dilficulty that arises when we
carry back the date of this to the time before vegeta-
ti(m existed. There would be (apjiareiit) coutradic-
tiun (he admits) between the two narratives, but not
an inexplicable one — then it is no contradiction at
all. It is the paradisaical plauUs, ihcrefore; these
did not yet exist; for they presuppose njan. See
other interpretations in Lanoe's " Positive Dogmat-
ic," p. 242. Keil connects our interpretation with
that of Haumgarten : " liy the being of the plant is
denoted its growth and genninalion." This is evci
wont to follow very soon after the planting of tlu
germ. By assuming, indeed, a certain emphasis od
(;HAP. II. 4-26.
2«»
;he verbs riTT' and riBS"' , we may get the sense:
the herbs of the fielJ were not yet rightiy grown, the
plant was not yet come to its perfection of form or
feature, because the conditions of culture were as yet
wantiug. But this thought connects itself more or
less with tliat of plants produced by cultivation,
which, as such, presuppose the existence of man. —
Had not caused it to rain. — To the human culti-
vation 01 the world belong two distinct things : first
the rain from heaven together with sunshine, and
secondly the labor and care of man. Both condi-
tions fail as yet, but now, for the first time, comes in
the first mode of nurture. The fog-vapor that arose
from the earth (ha-aretz, including the seaj waters
the earth-soil (the adamah). It is rightly inferred
from ver. 6 that the vapor which arose from the
earth indicates the first ram. If it means that the
mist then first arose from the earth, there would
seem to be indicated thereby the form of rain, or, at
all events, of some extraordinary fall of the di'W.
From this place, and from the history of the flood
(especially the appearance of the rainbow), it was
formerly inferred that until the time of the deluge
no rain had actually fallen. But from the fact that
the rainbow was first made a sign of the covenant
for Noah, it does not at all follow that it had not
actually existed before ; just as little as it follows
from the sign of the starry night which Abraham re-
ceived (Gen. XV.), that there had been no starry
night before, or from the institution of the covenant-
sign of circumcision, that circumcision had not ear-
lier existed as a popular usage (two points which
the Epistle of Barnabas has well distinguished, al-
though the critics have partially failed in understand-
ing it. Epistle of Barnabas ix.). A similar view
must be taken of the previous natural history of the
paschal lamb, of the dove, and of the eucharistic
supper ; they were ever earUer than the sacramental
appointment. In fact, there is in this place no ex-
press mention made of rain proper, and it may well
suggest here one of those heavy falls of dew that
take place in the warmer climates. Our text may
fairly mean, not that the rain was a mere elementary
phenomenon, but that it belonged to the divinely
ordered economy of human cultivation in its inter-
change with the labor of man. The most we can
say is, that the watering of the soil was a precondi-
tion to the creation of man himself Just as cultiva-
tion after this, so must also, primarily, the cultiva-
tor of the soil come into existence under tlie dew of
heaven. Moreover, the earthly organization of man
consists, in good part, of water. The words Adam
and adamah are used here, as we may well beUeve,
to denote a close relationship of kin. As Adam, how-
ever, is not simply from the earth (ha-aretz), so the
adamah is not simply the theocratic earth-soil pre-
pared by the God who created man. Adam is the
man in his relation to the earth, and so is adamah
the earth in its relation to man.
[Note on the Summ.irt of the First Creative
Account in the Second. — Knobel has to admit the
internal evidence showing that this second account
recognizea the first and is grounded upon it, thereby
disproving the probabiUty of a contrariety either in-
tended or unseen. The attempt, however, of Lange,
and of others cited, to reconcile the seeming difficul-
ties, can hardly be regarded as giving full satislac-
tion. Another method, therefore, may be proposed,
irbich we think is the one that would most obvious-
T commend itself to the ordinary reader who beUeved
in the absolute truthfulness of the account, and kue»
nothing of any documentary theory. The two narra
tives are a continuation of tlie same story. The sec
ond is by the same autlior as the first, or by one ij
perfect harmony with him, and evidently referring tc
all that had been previously said as the ground-work
of what is now to he more particularly added respett-
ing man, and which may be called the special sub-
ject of this second part. Hence the preparatory
recapitulation, just as Xenophon in each book of the
Anabasis presents a brief summary of the one pre-
ceding. This reference to the previous account thus
commences : " These are the generations of the hea-
vens and the earth " — that is, as has been already
told. That mbr refers to the creative growths,
birtlis, evolutions, or whatever else we might call
them, would be the first and most obvious thought.
When told that they mean the generations of Adam,
as subsequently given, and this because " Paradise is
heaven and earth together," or "Adam with hia
Paradise is the microcosmie centre of the world," we
admit the justness and beauty of the thoughts, but
find it diSicult to be satisfieii with the exposition.
Again, whoever will examine the uses of nbs (these)
in NoLDics' " Concordance," will find that it refers
as often, and perhaps oftener, to what precedes than
to what follows. The context alone determines, and
here it decidedly points to the first chapter. There
is, however, no difliculty in taking it both ways, as a
subscription to the first passage, or as a superscrip-
tion to the second, at the same time. That " the
generations of the heavens and the earth " means
the previous creative account, and not that which
comes after, would seem to be decided by the words
immediately added, cxnaiia , " in their being creat-
ed " — " in the day (that is, the time or period taken
as a whole) of the Lord God's making the earth and
heavens." To seek for mysteries here in the trans-
position of the words " earth and heavens," would be
lUce a similar search by the Jewish Masorites of
something occult in the little il (S"^?? 'n) of the
word cs^anz. Either the whole previous time ia
referred to, or, as is more probable, the earhest part
of it, before not only man but vegetation also. Or,
in the day, may mean, as some have thought, the
firsL day, when the material of the earth and heavens
had been created, but all was yet unformed. Now
this seems to be very much what is meant by what
follows in vers. 5 and 6. In the day when God made
the earth and heavens ; here the writer might have
stopped, so far as his main design was concerned,
and gone on immediately to give the intended more
particular account of man ; but he is led to eidarge
his recapitulating summary by an addition that may
be regarded either as parenthetical or exegetical —
*' the earth and heavens, and every shrub of the field
before it was in the earth, and every herb before it
grew," etc. He puts the greatest and the smallest
things together to denote totality. All was made
before man. And then, to make the language more
emphatic in the assertion of its being a di%'ine work,
and that it was before man, who is excluded from all
agency in its production, it is further declared tha'
this first appearance of the vegetable world was not
in its origin, an ordinary production of nature (such
as growth produced by rain), and was whoUy inde-
pendent of numan cultivation. It had not yet rained
in the ordinary way, that is, the regular productiop
and reproduction of the seasons had not yet tak «
'MU.
GENESIS, OR THE FUIST BOOK OF MOSKS
place, and there was no man to till the ground. It
was after this first supernatural vegetation that the
irrigating processes commenced, when God made " a
law for the rain ("i:;S5 pn , legem pluvm, Job
xxviii. '26), and caused the mist to go up (the evapora-
tion and condensation) that watered the whole face
of the niTS , tlie earth's soil. This assertion of
Bupernaiural growths being premised as antecedent
■ummarv, the writer immediately proceeds to the
main and direct subject of this second section : ^^'''l ,
and after this (as is demanded by the ' conversive
denoting sequence of event) the Lord God formed
man."
The language is irregular and parenthetical, but
artless and clear, at least in its general design. The
terms employed are those that a writer with those
primitive conceptions would use in impressing the
idea of the supernatural. The first plants were made
to grow without that help of rain and of human cul-
tivation which they now require. A striking dift'er-
tnce between this and the first account is that it is
ivhoUy unchronological, just as would be expected in
a summary or a recapitulation. It is an introduction
to man, as showing briefly what was done for him
before he is brought into the world, and then what
follows is wholly confined to him. Thus viewed,
there is the strongest internal evidence that the two
accounts are from one and the same author, who has
neither desire nor motive to enlarge upon what he
had previously said. It is the style of one who
understands himself, and who has no fear of being
misunderstood, or taken for another, by his reader.
Perhaps the best view of the whole case would be
gained by making a fair paraphrase, wtiich is only
putting it into a more modern style of language and
conception : ' Such were the generations of the hea-
vens and the earth in that early day when God made
not only the great earth and heavens, but even the
lowly shrub and plant — made them by His own divine
word — made them when they yet were not (as Kaschi
gives the sense of o^U , without preceding causali(y)
without the aid of rain — before the rain and before
any human cultivation. For it was alter this early
day (" in ^i<^ being grammatically both illative and
denoting sequence) that the mists began to go up
(nbr", the unconnected future form here denoting
series, habit, or continuance, see Job i. b ; Judg. xlv.
Ill; Ps. xxxii. 4), from which come the descending
rains that now water the earth. And it was after all
this that the Lord (Jod made man, his body from the
earth (from nature), his spirit from His own divine
inspiration ; and thus it was that man became a liv-
ing soul.'
Tlie TS or mist here that went up can mean
nothing but the rain itself. It is the same process,
and that the word is to be so regarded is evident
from its use, Job .\.\xvi. 27 : " For He makcth small
the drops of water, when they pour down the rain of
its vapor" nxb "i::'2 'P'^. It may be a question
whether n'tt) hz (ver. 4) is to be taken as the object
of riu)3 , ver. .'J, as it commonly is, or is to be re-
garded as connected with what follows, so as to be
the subject of the verbal force that is in z~:'J) . This
word is not well renilered hefore, as though a thing
could be before it was. unless in an ideal sense,
which we cannot suppose to be the writer's njcaning
here. The being in tlie earth was csseutial to its
being a plant ; otherwise it is but the idolon or imagt
of a plant, according to the crude and untenable view
that would represent God as outwardly or mechanV
cally making it and then putting it in the earth to be
brought forth (see Introduction to the First Chapter,
p. ). The word Cia , says Raschi, is equivalent
to sb IS , until not, or, not i/el, and contains a ver-
bal assertive force. So the Targum of Oukelos renders
it, and the Syriac by a similar idiom, }] ^..^kSf^.
It would then read : And as for the shrub, it (was)
not yet in the earth, the herb had not yet begun to
grow ; thus giving to cna the force of a negative
verb, Uke "p !< , only with the idea of time. And
then, with this negative force in C";: , the i>3 , ac-
cording to the Hebrew idiom, makes a universal nega-
tive of the strongest kind, being equivalent to gar
nichts, as Lange says — nothing at all. Thus the ex-
pression: every shrub was 7iot, etc., which with ua
would be a particular or partial negative equivalent
to not evert/, is the widest universal in the Hebrew :
In the day of God's making the earth and the hea-
vens, when (as 1 may well be rendered) there was not
the least sign of shrub or plant growing in the earth.
See LuD. de DiEtJ : CrUiea Sacra, in loc.
This is, in the main, the view of Delitzsch, though
he still seems to have some perplexities about the
time. We get clear, however, of the difficulties of
Lange and others. There is no need of bringing this
vegetation down to the sixth day, and referring it tc
the growth of cultivated plants from the adamah.
The language will not bear it. In like manner there
is disposed of the explanation of some of the Jewish
Rabbis, that the plants barely came to the surface on
the third day, but for the want of rain did not eotne
forth and reach their perfection until the sixth,
ilaimonides says justly, that this is against the posi-
tive declaiation that the " earth did bring thejn forth "
(ch. i. 12). In refuting it, however, he lays the em-
phasis on mtr , the field, in distinction fro'n the
earth generally, and so regards it as spoken of culti-
vated plants. But this seems forced, arii thert,
stands in the way of it the word H^v: , which is espi
ciaUy used of uncultivated growths, as of the desert.
Job XXX. 4, 7, or of the wild bushes in thi ^.■^derntv^a
of Beer-Sheba, Gen. xxi. 15.
See the attempts to reconcile the two accounts in
Wordsworth, Murphy, and Jacobus. The troiole
springs from the assuming of a chron'>logy, and en-
deavoring to find it, when the chief (eature of this
second narrative, or of the summary tl^at precedes it,
is its wholly unchronological characttr. There e no
time in it. The near and the remote are brought
together; In the day when God made the h avens
and the earth, from the firmament down to th' shrub
— or, when there was not a sign of a plant in the
earth — made them by His divin'j word, befo e there
was any rain (compare Prov. viii. 24, n'^S'Ja "fXa
z^V "^"tZDi , when there were no fountains full of
water), though afterwards "He made a laiv lor the
rain," and the mists went up and descend.d to fer-
tilize the earth, etc. This absence of rain wa«
soiiieir/iere in this summed-up day of creation ; it«
place, however, is nut fixed in th^ series, and it ii
alluded to not for its own sake, but in connection
with the plants as originating from a higher causality
— T. L.l
4. Ver. 7. The Lord God termed man.—
Knobel: "As the princiiial le-tio^ of the earth ih<
CHAP. II. 4-26.
203
author has him created before all his fellow-crea-
turos." This is incorrect, inasmuch as the represen-
tation evidently has in view no genealogical or chro-
nological onier. It only presents him as the chief
divine thought, at the head of the Paradise-creation.
*' In respect to the mode of origin of the divine-form-
ed man the first chapter says nothing; it only indi-
cates that man is of a higher, and, at the same time,
of an earthly nature, without being a product of the
earth. But now, on the threshold of a history rising
&nd revealing its purposes, there is need to know
something more particular in respect to his mode of
origin, so that, along with the fact of his existence,
we may understand his established relation to God,
10 the surrounding vegetable and animal world, and
to the earth in general." Dehtzsch. The spirit of
tlie Old Testament, with all correctness, represents
the nature of man, in respect to his bodily substance,
as earthly; and just so does physiology determine.
In the matter of his body man consists of earthly
elements ; in a wider sense he is out of the earth
(ch. xviii. 27 ; Ps. ciii. 14), and at his death he goes
back to his mother-earth (ch. iii. 19, 23; Job x. 9;
xxxiv. 15; Ps. cxlvi. 4; Ecclesiastes iii. 20; xii. 7).
*' According to the classical myth Prometheus formed
the first man of earthy and watery material (ApoUo-
dorus, Ovid, Juvenal), and in the same manner Vul-
can made the first woman (Pandora) out of earth
(Uesiod). In other places the ancients represent
man as generated out of the earth (Plato in the Kri-
tiaSy and others, Virgil) as well as the beasts."
Kuobel. The name Adam does not denote precisely
one taken from the earth (}^^X, yT^yecTis), but one
formed from the adamah, the soil of cultivation in its
paradisaical state; just as the Latin homo from
humus, and the Greek xoikos from x"*^^] *^lo not refer
back to the earth-matter generally, but to the earth-
soil as adapted to cultivation. This derivation from
adamah is adopted by most (Kimchi, Roseumiiller,
and others). On the contrary, others, after Josephus,
derive the word from the verb 3ix , to be red, with
reference to the ruddy color of man, or the reddish
soil of Palestine. Knobel, again, explains it, with
Ludolf, from the ^Ethiopian DIX , to be pleasant,
agreeable, according to which it would denote some-
thing of comely form.* One Jewish Doctor, and
* ("WTiy should we go to the remote ^thiopic here, and
take a secondary sense of a secondary, when the primary
derivation seems to lie right before us in the Hebrew;
CTX from niS'S , man from the earth, whether homo be
from humtis or not. The reasoning of Gesenius will not
bear close examination. "There must have been a name
for man," he says, "much earlier imuUo anliquior) than
the tradition of tlie Mosaic cosmogony.'* As far, however,
as we can. learn anything of the first history of the race,
from wh'itevcr source derived (biblical, heathen, or mytho-
logical), cosmogonies, or notions about cosmogonies, belonged
to the earliest human thinking, and might as well have fur-
nished the ground of the most popular nam^s as anything
else. The question, however, is not about " a name " for
man (any namei, but this name Adam which seems the
«stablished one in the Hebrew books. What more natural
origin than the tniditional could there have been, even with-
out deriving it from a cosmogony ? Names ever have a
•eason for them, though that reason, in many cases, may be
kist or uadiscoverable. They are given from tliat fact or
gnality which most impresses us in the thing named. Man
is ever retiLming to the earth, and this might easily suggest
the name, and the idea, too, that in. some way he also came
out of the earth: "Who am but dust and aahes," ^E"
■*B!<1 , Gen. xviii. 27 ; Job xxx. 19; Ps. ciii. 14. Homo
ind humus certainly suggest each other, and the etymology
13 not wholly impaired by the n in the genitive. Those
names are most impressive and likely to be most ancient
.hat are taken from the sorrowful aspect of humanity. Such
after him Eichhorn and Richers, would make th
word Ci (Ezek. xix. 10 = niaT) the etymologic^,
ground, and would, therefore, give it pre-eminently
the meaning of image or likeness. The two firsi
explinations are in so far one as the primitive con-
templation saw the reflection of the reddish earth in
the glow of the ruddy cheek or iu the color of the
blood. In this it must be maintained that the earth-
ly lowliness of man, as thereby expressed, become!
modified by the superior excellence of the primitive
paradisaical earth. First after the fall does it thus
properly become the lowliness of this lower earth.
As, therefore, in respect to one half, the lower de*
cent of the outward human nature is expressed h}
the name Adam, so also, on the otlier side, there ia
the hidden nobleness of the adamah, and the destiny
of man to draw the adamah along with it in ita
development to a higher life. In respect to the
Greek word for man, Siv^panros (= 6 &vw lidpaii', the
is the case with that other Hebrew appellation for man,
123"35< , weak, sick, affitcted. Compare it with Homer's
ppoTol (mnrtahs), which he seems so fond of using, and in
similar connections of thought. IIJ^X , although having the
more exalting sense when in contrast with CIS (see Ps.
xlix. 3 ; Is. ii. 9 ; v. 15;, is clearly allied to ^*3X (the n lost
or compensated by the long vowel). The plural D^IUSS,
the n in the Arabic , »Lm*Ji > ^^"^ i^ *he Arabic name for
woman -Jol ^^^ H'iJX , show this beyond a doubt. The
first name for man, or the more common one, would not be
from strength, or from a ruddy color. These do not dislin-
guish him, at least, to the emotions. They are not such as
would affect the soul, like his sorrowful return to the earth.
Afterwards, when he forgot himself in his pride, and began
to boast, he might call himself 1"5 ("[''S^), vir, avfip—hero,
strong one — but these names are not the primitive ones.
Least of all would he think of calling hiiuself anmulhig
according to Knobol's notion, that is, pleasant, agreeable,
handsome one. Certainly not, if his primitive condiiion
were that which the " higher criticism," in spite of history
as well as of revelation, is determined it shall be. The
squalid dweller in the cave, suiToundcd by wolves, and
bones, and stone-axes, and hardly distinguishable from his
beastly companions, would be the last one to be called, or
who would think of calling himself, the agrecat)le one, accoi-d-
ing to this derivation for which the rationalists go to the
^thiopic.
The same thought of depression, lowliness, and depend-
ence, may be traced, if we mistake not, in the Greek
av9p<inTo^ as contrasted with the later ac^p. The etymology
favored by Lange, 6 avut aOputv, is untenable. So we may
i^ay of the kindred one sometimes given, aco* Tpen-wi' ofLfm,
turning the eye upward, to denote the pmud commanding
look (comp. Ovid : Atefam. lib. i. 85). It is not only unphil-
ologiciil, but also too artificial tor a common name, though
it might do for a poetical epithet. It would rather seem to
come directly ti'om Tpi4no, to feed, nourish, bring up. The
alpha is probably an article, as contracted in w V^pwiro?, or
avdpttiwoi; with the rough aspirate and the nun euphonic.
'AvOpuiTTOi, man, a nui-sling, a foundling, a cbild of earth and
nature. So from the same verb is Bpififia, often used for the
feeble young of animals, and so applied, especially by the
comic poets, to a feeble, worthless man. in this way we
account for what otherwise seems stranRC, the contemptuoui
use of dvBpuiiTog as distinguished from ayrjp ; as u afdpwire.
Oh fellow. Oh poor creature !
The higher we ascend in language, the more numerous,
in all departments, as well as the more impressive, do we
find names derived from this sense of human frailty. It is
the wailing cry called out of man by a feeling of the contra^?!
between his hopes and his apparently dark earthly destiny
— between his ideal and his actual, his young vigorous lift
and the certainty of the death that awaits him. '* Who am
but dust and ashes!" Notwithstanding what Gesenixu
would mountain in respect to its improbability, this style of
naming belongs to the eLirliest patriarchal speech. Whether
it was before or after any cosmogonical traditions (a ques-
tion on which Gesenius and Knobol would seem to lay sc
much stress), it certainly points to an older idea as its origin ;
and what more likely to have been such than the Scripturi
favored derivation on which we have been dwelling ! — T. I*
20-t
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
upward lookini:), compare Dklitzsch, p. 141, and
Knobkl, p. io i>o also for the Indo-Germanic Mensch,
in the Sanscrit manu (from miui, to think, related to
maniu, spirit), see the notes in Delitzsch, p. 619.
The translations of ~E", dust, also clay, soil (Lev.
xiv. 42, 45 ; English Version, mortar), are exegeti-
cal; Vulf,'ate: Jje Unto ierrie ; Luther: Out of the
tartti-dod ; Symmachus and Theodolion: x"''' o'"^
rfis aSoMS 'jod formed him out of the dust of the
earth. The verb TS^ must certainly have its em-
phatic distinction here from sna and nos . It de-
notes the curious structure of man according to his
idea, as an act of the divine conscious wisdom (Ps.
cxxxLX. 13; Prov. viii. 31). — And breathed into
his nostrils. — " The inbreathing takes place through
the nostrils ; for this is the organ of the breath, but
the breath itselt" is the expression and sign of the
inward existing life. From the breath of God comes
the life of man (Job xxxiii. 4; Is. xlii. 5), and the
breath in the nostrils of man is the divine breathing
(Job xxvii. 3). In a similar maimer does the Chal-
jaic myth make the creature to be formed of earthy
matter and the divine blood ; the blood is taken for
the seat of life ^see ch. ix. 4)." Knobel. The ex-
pression evidently presents the formative agency of
God in an anthropomorphic form. There is the
mouth of God and the nostrils of the man as he
comes into existence; it is as though He had waked
him into life with a kiss (compare 1 Kings xvii. 21).
It evidently means the impartation of the divine Ufe,
on which depends the divine kinsmanship of man
(Acts xvii. 28, 29). niacj (from c\:;3), bn-ath, spirit,
breath of the spirit, breath of man, life of the spirit
is more specific than nn , more universal than ITBJ
but may be interchanged with botli, as sometliing
that stands between them ; yet only in relation to
man. Here it evidently denotes something which is
common both to God and man, something which
goes forth from God and enters into man — God's
*^ breath of ^(/'e," tliat is, the spirit of God in its active
self-motion, as in man it calls out the spiritual prin-
ciple, the spirit of his hfe, but none the less as the
spirit in its actual personaUty. The HBCJ , or breath
of God, has the predicate D^'Tl (life or lives) from
the adjective n^n (ch. i.), in order to distinguish
primarily the living subject, and, in the next place,
the Ufe itself. Tlie life, in its most intensive sense, is
the unity of the life in all Uving persons, and in any
living thing ; — it is the personahty. ttJSJ (from tlie: ,
to breathe), the life's breath, the soul of life, anima,
xl/vxn, the principle of the animal vitaUty, and, in
this respect, the life itself; in a wider sense it is
animus, the personal spiritual soul, the psychical
allijclion, the man idmseif. In our text it denotes
the man in liia totality as living soul. In conse(|uence
of the formation of the human figure out of dust
from the earth-soil, and the animation of this figure
ttr<x gh the impartation of the life from God, does
man become a living soul. For the psychology of
the passage, see the Fundamental Ideas.
6. Ver. 8. Planted a garden in Eden. — As
'ehovali-(Jod (farther on, vers. 15 and 10) is named
(ui the establisher of the order of life, of natural
Kiencc, or of the human knowledge of it (ver. 19),
of marriage and the law of the family (vera. 21, 21),
U) the judge and fownder of the religion of the prom-
ise and of the moral conflict on the earth, of the
earthly state of sorrow and discipline (ch. iii. 7),
and, tinally, as tlie inimediato director of human
chastity and the author of the human clothing (vei
21), so also heie, in the beginning, is He represented
as the first Planter, the Founder of human cultvre,
which is as yet identical with the human cultiis or
worship. DeUtzsch transfers this planting to tlie
time of the first vegetable creation (p. 146); but
this is not agreeable to the sense of tin: text, whicn
does not relate things chronologically, and presup-
poses the creation of man. In conse(|uence of the
previous preparation for the future of man in the
bedewing of the earth, an Eden is already originated.
The name Eden (enjoyment, pleasure, delight), as the
region of Paradise, would denote, according to De-
litzsch, a land determinate but no longer ascertainar
ble by us ; since the Assyrian Eden, he thinks,
which is vocaUzed by the doubled segol and men-
tioned Is. xxxvii. 12, and the Coelo-Syriac Eden men-
tioned Amos XV., are altogether different. But if the
garden in Eden had its name from a determinate
boundary and enclosure, and if the paradisaical
streams went forth in all the world, then it becomes
a very serious question whether the author had in
view any distinct boundary of Eden, itself, as any
determinate land. It appears, at all events, to have
been his intention to represent the whole paradisaical
adamah as an Eden in respect to its nature and laying
out, although he meant by it, primarily, the undeter-
mined wide environs that surrounded man, whilst, at
the same time, supposing a distinction between Eden
and the earth generally. There is also the passage,
ch. iv. 16, which seems to presuppose a limitation of
Eden to one determinate region ; still it must be
noticed, in the mean time, that the soil becomes
cursed for man's sake. According to the represen-
tation, it is a view that takes the form of three
spheres : the earth, the Paradise, the garden. .Vt all
events, the best supposition in regard to man is that
he was created in Eden, although by a new act of
God he is early transferred to the centre of Eden,
tliat is, of the Paradise. Besides this place, the uame
Eden occurs vers. 10 and 15 ; ch. iii. 23 ; iv. 16 ;
xlii. 10; Joel ii. 3; Ezek. xxxi. 16, 18. — A garden,
'\i . The Septuagint translates it irapa5fi<ros ; the
Vulgate : Paradinus. " Spiegel explains this word
(Ave-sta, i. p. 293) according to the Zend: Pa'iri
daeza, is a heaping roujul, an eitcloiiing, with which
the Hebrew TS (properly, something covered or shel-
tered) well agrees. It is carried out of the Indo-
Germanic into the Sheraitic, and is found in the
Hebrew, where it has the pronunciation OTIS
(Par-dhes), Cautic. iv. 13; Neh. ii. 8; Ecclcsiastes ii.
5." Knobel. An explanation, now set aside, is that
which derives it liom the Sanscrit jiaradifa (aUen,
foreign, wondrous land). The conceptions — Garden
of Eden, Eden Garden, Garden of God — by reason
of the symbolical .significance of these expressions,
jjlay into each other. By the garden, according to
Knobel, is to be understood " a garden of trees."
Thus niiieli is clear, that the garden of the paradisai-
cal nature was distinguished for its trees. The gar-
den lay in the eastern district of the Eden region
(mpB); there is probably indicated along with this
the stand-point of the reporter. The Ea,stcni laud is
the home-land of humanity.— There He put the
man. — As the creation of Eve is triinsferred to Para-
dise, it is as well not to lay stress upon the fact of
Adam's having been created outside of Pamdise;
the fundamental iilea consists in this, that Adam waf
immediately triinsferred IVorn his state of nature (oi
his universal relation to the adamah) into the sta •
CHAP. II. 4-25.
201
if culture, or his particular relation to Paradise.
**Both facts are announced before in a summary
way, but are unfolded in what follows; jusi as the
facts summarily announced in the first verse of ch.
i. receive afterwards a wider explanation." De-
litzsch.
6. Vers. 9-14. And out of the ground made
the Lord to grow. — We must not regard this act
as a chronological following of the preceding. Man
finds himself well-cared for in Paradise by moans of
its abundance. This consists in fruit-trees of every
kind. It may fairly be regarded here as an indica-
tion of the spirituality of the human enjoyment, tliat
the lovely aspect of the trees is named first, then the
good that is given along with it — that is, agreeable
and healthsome food— but this spiritual side of the
human enjoyment comes out, in its perfection, with
the mention of the two trees that form a contrast in
the midst of the garden ; for, according to ch iii. 3,
the tree of knowledge stands likewise in the midst
of the garden. The significance and efficacy of the
tree of life are more particularly given ch. iii. i> ; it
could have procured for Adam the power of living on
forever. That this efficacy is not to be regarded as
something purely physical appears from the contrast
of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, whose
efficacy, again, on its own side, is not to he regarded
as purely spiritual (see ch. iii. 22). The spiritual
side of the tree of life is also supposed Rev. ii. 7 ;
xxii. 2. It is, therefore, just a false contrast when
Knobel tells us that " the narrator supposes in Para-
dise two trees, of which the fruits of the one strengthen
the physical power of life and sustain the life itself,
Thilst that of the other arouses and advances the
spiritual power, and thereby induces a higher know-
ledge." (1) Truly, the garden appears a "region of
wonder, on account of this tree not only, but as the
place of God's personal presence, the place of the
vocal utterance of a spiritual voice by the serpent,
and on account of the cherubim. The wonderful
consists, in the first place, in this, that here is the
region of innocence, of the integtity both of the
human spirit and of the surrounding nature, and that,
consequently, here the spiritual and the natural are
embraced in pe'-fect union ; whilst therefore it is,
that outward tilings become of typical and sym-
bolical significance in their potential measure, it
belongs now to the perfection of the gardeti, not
merely that it is watered with its own Paradise rivers,
but also, that by means of the four streams that go
out from it.s one united stream it stands in close con-
nection with the whole earth, and sends forth to it
its own peculiar blessings. From the reading of the
text : a stream went out, instead of, a stream r/oes
out, Delitzsch finds proof that the author speaks of
Paradise as of a thing purely past. Much rather,
however, does he speak of Paradise after the fall, as
of a place at least still existing, but closely shut up
by means of the cherubim. That is, the representa-
tion is not now purely geographical ; it is also, at
the same time, throughout symboUc. According to
our representation, the stream originates, not in
Paradise itself, but outside of it, in the land of Eden ;
and so here, too, as in the case of Adam, must we
liistinguish between the origin in nature, and the
destiny that was to have its development in culture.
[n Paradise itself, therefore, does this one stream,
jn its going out of the garden, divide itself into four
(C'OSI) flood-heads (not " rain-streams," nor
"brooks"), which as four rivers part themselves in
all the world, the stream-heads become bead-streams.
—The name of the first is Pishon: The free,
flowing (Fiirst); the full-flowing (Gesenius). By thi
name Pishon has been understood 1. the Phasis, 2,
the Phasi-s-Araxes of Xenophon, 3. the Bisynga oi
Fiadatti (Buttmaim), 4. the Indus (Schultliess), S
the Ganges (Josephus, Etisebius, Bertheau), 6. tht
Hyphasis (Haneberg), 7. the Nile (the Midrash), 8.
the Goscliah (C. Ritter). See the Doctrinal and
Ethical. — That is it which encompasses th«
whole land of Havilah. — according to Fiirst, it ia
the same with circuit, repion. (This is what Uavilab
probably signifies ; according to Delitzsch it meani
sandy land.) The word ::d (primarily, to xtirround]
may be interpreted of a circuitous flowing round,
though it also occurs in the sense of surrounding on
one side. The verb may also denote a winding pas-
sage through (Is. xxiii. 16, ""'? "30 , "Go round
about through the city "), and here it may be better
conceived of as a winding through than as an encom
passing. We choose an expression that at the same
time calls to mind a region of streams.— Where
there is gold. — That is, especially or abundantly —
the tnother-country of gold, not only in respect to
quantity, but also in respect to quality. — The gold
of that land is good. — Besides its fine gold, Havi-
lah is also famous for its spices, such as Bdolach
(Num. xi. 7), similar to manna, or according to JosC'
phus Bdellion, and, similarly named (see Knobel),
"an odoriferous and very costly gum, which is in-
digenous in India and Arabia, in Babylonia and
Media, and especially in Bactriana. It must have
been well known to the Hebrews." To this is added,
in the third place, the precious stone oriil) , schoham.
According to most interpreters it is an onyx stone,
sardonyx, or sardius, which belong together to the
species chalcedon. The Targumists and others
would understand by schoham the sea-green beryl.
The onyx, on the contrary, has the color of the
human finger-nails, and that is denoted by the name.
With this agrees cntii as " signifying something thin,
delicate, pale" (Knobel). In respect to the geography,
see further on. — The name of the second river is
Gihon — "According to Josephus, Ant. i. 1. 3,
Kimchi, and others, also as might be inferred from
the Septuagint translation of Jer. ii. 18, Ben Lira
24, 27, there was understood by it the Nile, which
flows through all the south-lands (B^:) that fell
within the circuit of the narrator's view " (Fiirst).
Under the Gihon, moreover, according to the Shem
itic use of the word, there have been understood the
Oxus, the Pyramus, and the Ganges. B'S , the
dark-colored (?), is a proper name for the oldest son
of Ham, the ancestor of the JJthiopians. Thence
it is given to the south-land, especially Meroe, and,
thereupon, to Jithiopia and the south-region general-
ly. And yet imder the like name may be understood
a dark-colored people that dwelt in southern India,
in Upper Egypt, and in South Arabia (Ktesias and
Arrian). In like manner are there different geogra-
phical districts under this name (see Fi-rst : Lex*
con). — The name of the third river is HiddekeL
— The Tigris, the rushing, so named from its violent
flowing. Dan. x. 4, it is called the great river — so
also the Euphrates. The Zend form is tiyra, tigr,
tigira, swift, raging.* — Toward the east of As-
syria (Lange: Before ov in front of Assyria). The
• [There would seem, at first view, but a faint re&na>
bl.ince between hiddektl and Tigris. There can be but lit-
tle iljulit, however, of their etymologioiil conoection rh»
M6
GENESIS, OB THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
word r~"ip before Assyria can also mean to the
east, but as a preposition it has the more common
sense before^ frontward. The latter sense, taken
freely, is here to be preferred ; since the Tigris, in
fact, I'urms the western boundary of Assyria. Ac-
cording 10 some, Assyria is to be taken here in a
wider sense. — The fourth river is Euphrates. —
The outbreaking, the viohnt. It is the greatest river
of Western Asia, and, therefore, called the great
river^ or the river., without anything more. The
origii. of the Greek form Et/(ppai-T)s is explained either
from rr^BX = r"'E , or from the Persian Ifral, Uj'rat.
For the different derivations, see Fiirst.
7. Vers. 15-17. Took the man and put him in
the garden. — The author takes up again what is
said in the 8th verse about the transfer of Adam to
Paradise, but adds to it, at the same time, the pur-
pose for which it was done, namely, to dre»x it and
to keep it. According to Delitzsch man was created
outside of Paradise ; since he must first see the extra-
paradisaical earth, in order that he might have a
worthy estimation of the glory of Paradise, and of
his own vocation as extending thence over the whole
»orld. Such an assignment of a purpose is altogether
.00 didactic. The garden is the place of tlie human
vocation, and of the human eiijovment in its undivid-
ed unity. This enjoyment has two sides, to eat and
ttt refrain. In like manner the vocation has two
sides, to dress and to keep. The first thing is to
dress it ; for nature, which grows wild or rank with-
out the care of man, becomes ennobled under the
human hand (Delitzsch). Says the same wiitcr, this
work was as widely different from agriculture ]iio-
per, as Paradise itself diflered from the later culti-
vated laud, but it was still work ; " and work was so
far from being unparadisaical, tliat, according to ch.
ii. 1-3, eveu the creation is regarded as a work of
(lod.'' We must distiniruish, however, work in its
narrower sense, as it stands under the bunlen of
vanity (made subject to vanity, Rom. viii. 20) from
tlie paradisaical work, or activity. Even of the later
Israel is it said : There is no toil in Zion.* Accord-
ing to Dehtzsch, the whole earth, from Paradise out,
was to become a Paradise : " The garden is the most
holy (or the holy of holies), Eden is the holy place,
whilst the whole earth around is its porch and court."
The comparison is not wliolly apphcable; since
where there are no spiritual orders, there could be
no proper mention of court and sanctuary. — And to
keep it. — The garden, as such, is unincloscd and
imwalled ; still must Adam watch aud protect it.
Tliis is, in (act. a very significant addition, and seems
to give a strong indication of danger as threatening
man and Paradise from the sitle of an already exist-
ing power of evil (Delitzsch and others i, although,
even in tliat case, tlie guarding of the garden belong-
ed to man's vocation ; since against tlie misuse of Ids
freedom, he had only to take care of his own free
will, and, with it, the possession and the integrity of
•"1 in bpnn tiiay be the article hardened, or it may be part
of the 8yllal)le TH (sharp, Bwift) in composition. The re-
ma'pder 5pT and Tigris have copnate letters — DKL, T(iK.
rbe intermediate or tranijition form is seen in the Aramaic
1^1.^), Arabic SJL^A ; Diglath, DOL. The Zend TGll
IK the H.-ime word.— T. L.J
• [The rcfereno; hero would i*eem to be to Num. xxiii.
21, which the German Version (pves : '* Keirie MUlie in Jacob,
und kt.int Arbe.il in Israel; no toil iu Jacob, no labor in
Ismel," instead of our more correct Version : "no iniquity
In Jacob, no perTunfjiiesa in IfiraeL"— T. L.I
Paradise. Knobel refers the care with which Adan
was charged, to the task appointed him of guarding
Paradise against the mischief of the wdd beasts. —
Of every tree of the garden. — Says Knobel :
" The author clearly assumes that in the early period
men Uved alone fiom the fruit of trees, and at a latei
period first advanced to the use of herbs and grair
(ch. iii. 17), whilst the Elohist, in the very beginning
assigns both to men (cli. i. 2h). According to th
classical writers, such as Plato (Polit. 272), Strabo
and others, men iu the beginning ate herbs, berries,
bark, and fruit o( trees, especially acorns ; the raising
of grain came in later." That the paradisaical man
did not eat herbs is nowhere said ; but the Iruit of
the trees is prominently presented because of its
symbolic relation to the two mysterious trees in the
midst of the garden. The free enjo\Tnent of all
trees is strongly expressed by the intensive idiom,
bssnbss. So much the more precise, therefore,
is the limitation of the freedom. — But of the tree of
the knowledge of good and evil According to
Hoffmann and Richers, "ii Sia means good ana
bad simply. Delitzsch denies this, aud rightly.
"The good," says he, "is obedience with its good,
the bad is disobe dence with its evil consequences.
Here it must be remarked, that the conception of
physical evil can be, at the most, only as a conse-
quence of moral evil, and that, therefore, the ethical
contrast is the main thing, though not to the exclu-
sion of the physical side. The tree, in any case,
was a tree thtit might produce tliis knowledge ; that
is, it was the tree of probation, throngli which Adam
might come to a conscious distinction of good and
evil, and, thereby, to a moial transition from the
stale of innocent simplicity into a state of conscious,
religious virtue. Did he not sin, then lie learned, iu
a normal way, to know the distinction between good
and evil — the good as the actuality of believing obe-
dience towards God, which was, at the same time,
the maintaining of his own life in it.-; self-command
and fi eedom — the evil, as the possibility of an unbe-
lieving and disobedient behavior towards God,
which must have for its consequent, slavisli desire
and death. The opinion of Hilaiius cannot be sus-
tained {Spicilegium Solesmense, i. Iti2): .Arbor fuluri
de se tneitdacii nomen accepit. For, ' not to know
good and evil,' is the sign of the infantile childish-
ness (Dent. i. 3y) or of senile obtuseuess (2 Sam. xix.
36); the con.^cious free choice of the one or tlic
other indicates the most mature period of Ufe (or
that ot the so-named anni diJicrelio»k, Is. vii. 15;
Ueb. V. 14). So to know good and evil, and to dis-
tinguish between them, is called the charisma or gift
of a king (1 Kings iii. 9), the wisdom of the angel (2
Sam. xiv. 17), and, in its higher exercise, of God
Himself (Gen. iii. 5, 22). By the tree of knowledge
of good and evil man is to attain to a consciousness
and to a contirmation of Ids freedom of choice, and,
in fact (according to God's purpose in his determina-
tion for good), to a freedom of poW);r — that i.^^, to a
true freedom available fur the choice of good or its
opposite. It was designed to bring out the necessary
seli'-determination of a creature choosing licely, either
for or against God, either for the (iod-willed good or
the possible evil — and so to make perfect its inde-
pendence. The very idea of a free personal being
carries with it the necessity that its relation to tiod
be a relation of free love" (Diditzsch). It is an en-
tire perversion of the meaning of this probation-tree
to teach, as the Gnostic Ophites did, that, onlj
CHAP. II. 4-26.
2<y)
'.hrough the eating of this tree, is man enabled to
attain tc his self-conscious free development, or, as
Hegel and his school have taught in modern times,
that sin is a necessaiy transition-point to good. The
victory of Christ in tlie temptation shows us how it
is for man to come to the knowledge of good and
evil in a normal, and not in an abnormal, way. The
knowledge of the distinction which Adam obtained
in this way, was in him from the beginning, though
dark and confused. Along with his freedom of
choice, heretofore undeveloped, there was estabUshed,
not only his capabiUty of probation, but also his need
of such probation. This probation does, indeed,
suppose the previous eiistence of a divine i-o/xos, or
law (Delitzsch, p. 154); but we err when we con-
found this paradisaical v6fios with the law of Moses
as it was given to dinners. Moreover, the Mosaic
commands are not mere positive instructions ; they
are, to the extent of the ten commandments, moral
laws of nature precisely adapted to the human stiite,
but because of their having become foreign and ob-
jective to the consciousness of the sinner, they are,
therefore, placed before him in the way of positive
revelation. In the fiuoL, or institutions of Paradise,
however, must the abiding laws of life constitute the
ground of that revelation-form which is adapted to
the commands. Th.it is, in relation to the tree of
probation, (jod could not have made it to be a tree
af probation in the exercise merely of an arbitrary
positiveness ; there must lie in the tree itself an in-
nate efficacy ; and a natural speech, that may serve
as a warning to man against its use. The sign-word
of the tree (or the designating name) would, through
the divine interpretation, become to man a positive
paradisaical prohibition. Even granting, moreover,
that the tree was not properly a poison-tree, still the
explanation that belongs to it has been too lightly
treated, since it might have led us upon the proper
track ; but that its tendency must have been to pro-
duce a change in the human spiritual frame, is a doc-
trine to be firmly held (see Lange's " Dogmatics," p.
409). It becomes important as an elucidation of this
mysterious fact, when we are told that the sin of
Noah, the second head of our race, became manifest
through the enjoyment of wine. To say nothing of
the coarse conceptions of Bohme and others as lately
taken in a mythical sense by Sorensen, we must
decidedly protest against the theosophical dualistic
representation of the probation-tree as we find it in
Baumgarten (p. 48), and still later in Delitzsch.
"When we remember," says Delitzsch, "that the
paradisaical vocation and destiny of man had for its
aim the overcoming of evil that had intruded into
the creation, we cannot wonder at there being a tree
.n Paradise itself, created indeed by (Jod, but whose
mysterious background was a dark ground of death
and evil placed by God in ward ; which tiee, in order
that man might not fall into the participation of evil,
and thereby of death, is hedged around by the divine
prohibition, not as by an arbitrary sentence, but as
by a warning rather of holy love" (p. 15-5). We
may not resort to the myths of the Thibetans, Hin-
dus, etc. (p. 155), in support of an assertion of such
a nature that, according to it, we cannot think of
anything determinate or ordained, without setting
forth under it, in opposition both to the Scriptures
wid to the monotheistic consciousness, a material
evil (or an evil inherent in matter). According to
Delitzsch, the tree actually carried in it " the power
of death." The question arises : What is meant by
■he threatening : " In the day that thou eatest there-
of thou shalt surely die." Knobel holds the sense U
be, that he should die immediately ; because the in-
finitive absolute before the finite verb, he says, ex
presses the undoubted, the certain, the actual. Bu
notwithstanding this, Adam must have lived quite i
long time after the fall. In vain is it attempted t«
set aside this difficulty either by the rendering tt
become mortal (Targuni, Synimachus, HieronymuB,
and others), or by making it that introduction of
pain and sorrow into life which goes before death ill
our conception of it (Calvin, Gerhard, and others)
Still less, indeed, can we think of a death-penalty t«
be pos'*''pcly inflicted (Batav., Tuch, Ewald, and oth
ers). The nearest solution is overlooked, namely,
that the expression nmst have, even here, an ideal
symbolical force ; in other words, that death here,
corresponding to the biblical conception of dea*"-
must be taken primarily to mean a moral dea.
which goes out of tlie soul, or heart, and through tK
soul-life, gradually fastens itself, in every part, upon
the physical organism (Langk's " Dogmatics," p.
471). The sign of becoming suddenly dead does not
necessarily belong to the conception of death. It
allows too of a long dying in the physical depart-
ment. Hoflinann has not thought of this in that very
strange exposition of his, which it is hardly worth
while to cite. Knobel lays much stress upon it, that
man, according to ch. iii. 19, 22 (as he insists), was
not created immortal. It is true, that alter the fall
the tree of life is named as the condition of perma-
nent duration; but the possibility of falling into
death, under the supposition of transgression and
separation from the tree of life, is something quite
ditfeient from what we embrace under the conception
of mortality. Knobel, with Clericus and others,
would refer the threatening, in the first place, to the
hurtful, life-endangering power of the liuit, and sup-
poses, therefore, that the strong expression : thou
shalt immediately die, is to be understood in a peda-
gogical sense (oras a warning is given to children):
and yet it would be rightly an announcement of death,
since man, through his sin, throws from him the en-
joyment of the tree of Ufe. Let it be then a repre-
sentation of the Hebrew mode of thinking ; but the
connection of the promise of long life to the observ-
ance of the divine commands throughout the Old
Testament (Knobel, p. 33) is not a mere Hebraic
representation ; it is carried still farther in the
New Testament in the words: Whosoever believ-
eth on the Son hath everlasting life. And yet
it must be perceived that already in the Old Tes-
tami'nt, and so certainly here, the conception of
life, as also the conception of death, hath its ethical
and ideal ground ; on account of wliich the trw
of life is not to be thought of as having a
merely physical efficacy. Riglitly, too, has Keil,
who is here in special opposition to Delitzsch, de-
fended the spiritual propriety of the etliical concep-
tion.
8. To vers. 18-25. It is not good that the
man should be alone. — Keil : " As the creation of
man is introduced b_v a divine decree, so the creation
of woman is preceded by God's declaialion : It is not
good, etc." On the supposition that the second
chapter, like the first, presents the genesis of man in
a generic chronological series, as we find it in De
litzsch, there arises a difficulty in respect to the seo
ond. Then must man have existed so long a time
before the creation of the trees of Paradise that he
must have died of hunger; since he wojld have had
around him only a plant-producing district, and
S08
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSEb.
would have existed then for himself alone as the one
only coi"rl<?'ed being ; just as the body, too, of this
man would liave been something first completed, and
then the soul iiujiarted to this body from without.
Without doulit, however, this genetic chronological
conception of the second chapter is a misapprehen
sion of its autithetical and complementary relation to
the first. It is not good tliat man, etc. What can
this mean after it had been so often said in the first
chapter. He saw that it was good? The expression
does not denote a condition positively bad, but rather
an mcompleteness of being, whose continuance would
eventually pass over from the negative not iiood. or
a manifest want, into the positive not good, or a
hurtful impropriety. It must be observed that this
point of time lies between the last preceding declara-
tion respecting God on the fifth day : and He saw
that it wn« good, and the final judgment verg good,
at the close of the sixth. According to Knobel the
sense would be this : Jehovah shows that a solitary
existence is not good for man ; He determines upon
the creation of some being that may correspond to
him, and forms first the beasts for the purpose of
seeing whether they would satisfy the himi;iii want. (!)
To this conception the text is througliout opposed,
and e.-pecially in the words : I will make a help for
him ("'^533) as his opposite (his converse), not mere-
ly /(W like (Delitzsch). The exposition of Delitzsch :
He needed such a one that when he ha,d it before
him he might renognize himself, obliterates the pecu-
liar point of the expression. It allows, too, of its
application to the relation of one man to another.
Tlie opposite (or converse) here spoken of, depends
not npon any ;/', or casual condition. What is meant
by this obhteration becomes evident farther on.
The primary thing (he seems to think) is to provide
a help for man in his vocation-destiny ; but then there
comes also into view the possibility that he may
transgress the command of God, iind die the death,
in which case the aim of the creation would be ren-
dered vain. How suspicious this ! the making the
motive for the creation of the woman to be this fu-
ture jiossible cventuahty — especially since Eve herself
it is who realizes that possibility. Moreover, De-
litzsch means that Adam would then, as the second
seduced, have been rather the object of the divine
compassion (but Eve, the first seduced, what of her !),
and finally leaves us to conclude that it does not
mean : I will make one like to him that he may
propagate his race. But see ch. i. 28, where the
theosopliic deriving of the propagation of the race
from tiie eventuality of the fall is clear, and without
reserve, and forever cut off. When there is given to
^3:^ the sense to be conl'orinable, or correspondent
(see Knobel), it does not bring out the emphasis of
the word, in this place, according to the oii^^inal im-
port of the root 15!; although, on the other side,
the sensual meaning, antcriora, i. c, pttdevda (Selud-
tcns, and others), can only lie regarded as a ciun^o
exaggeration of tlie expression. — Ver. 10. And out
of the ground the Lord God formed every
boast of the field. — Ubviou,-ly iloes the represcnia-
tion that lollows serve as an introductioti to (he
representation of the creation of the woman ; that is,
the order <ib»erved in mentioning the crealing of the
beasts is deteiinined by a motive not at all chrono-
logical, but lookitig only to the fact itself. But in
what could this motive lie ? In bringing the beasts
before hinj, was there Bomcthing of a purpose in the
Creator to awaken in man a consciousness of the
need of some help of kindred birth to Mmself ? Thu
is the supposition of Michaelis and Rosenmjller.
Delitzsch and Keil have something of the eamt
thought (p. 48). On the other hanil, it is the sup
position of Jacob Bohme and other theosophists that
from looking at the beasts in p;iirs, there was awak-
ened a sinfiil desire in the as yet androgynic Adam
These wild phantasies (Mi/st. Mag. p. lli;) have yet
been able to influence the latest representations of
the paradisaical rehitions. Bohme's views of the sex-
ual relations are perfectly abominable. It has been
maintained that in the first chapter the creation of
the stars is laid on the fourth creative day for the
purpose of counteracting the heathen «tar-worship ;
since the stars, or heavenly bodies, are brought in aa
conditioned by the preceding creations, especially
that of light. In analogy with this view, and in
opposition to the animal-worship of the heathen-
world, would the passage before us represent the
beasts as creations subordinate to man : in the first
place, because man had to give them name,«, and
secondly, because among them all he found nothing
of hke birth with himself, to say nothing of imy
superiority. At all events, lor the Oriental mind, tl e
pa.ssage presents a very significant elevation of the
woman, as human, over the lower animal-world, and
her equality of birth with the man. It is no real
difference, as Knobel holds it is, that here the Crea-
tor forms the beasts out of the ground, whilst in the
first chapter they come forth (and yet in eonsetiuence
of the creative word) from the earth. Creating and
forming are just different points of view of the same
conception. The apparent difference proceeds partly
fiom this, that here we have the more definite, namely
the forming of the beasts out of the earth. Tlu
beasts of the field ; taken here in the compreliensiv
sense — the wild and tlie tame. — And every fowl
of the air (the heavens). — The fish of the sea and
the reptiles are passed over. Keil finds the ground
of it in this, that both classes, the beasts of the field
and the birds of heaven, are like men in being formed
out of the earth, and, therefore, stand to him in nearer
relation than the water-animals and the reptiles.
But the earthy matter is found also in the two last,
although it may not be without meaning that both
the classes here preferred were formed out of the
adamah. More to the purpose is the second ground
mentioned by Keil, that "God brought the beasts to
Adam to show him the creatures that had been or-
dained to his service." At all events, the domestic
animals are of these two classes. It is specially to
be considered, moreover, that in tliese beasts there
is already a more distinct pairing, which is a s)-mbol
of human marriage; especially is this the case with
the birds. Still the main purpose set forth is : to
see how he would name them. With the intuitive
knowledge of the beasts there follows the nannng of
them ; lor speech is the thought outwardly realized •
(on tlie essential connection of thinking and speaking,
see Kkh., p. 47); and with the naming coinmences
the dotninion. Conscciuently the first science to
which (!od introduces man is the science of nature;
his first sijecch, to which he is led for the mention of
zoological properties, is the naming of the animals.
That this his naming was an actual calling out, and
that the assigned domestic animals followed his call,
lies included, as matter of fact, in the very represen-
tation itself. From this centre spreads out the know-
* (For a very able and a very full discussion of thL
primitive naming — the philosophy and the theology of it—
8i'C Katji.en'8 Sprachverwirrunp, pp. 90-106.— 1'. L.I
CHAP. n. 4-26.
20S
tedge of man over all nature. — ^Ter. 20. And the
man gave names. — Here the cattle have the first
place in tlie selection, because their place, in the
future, is next to man. — But for Adam. — We do not
translate for man, since the principal thing here is
the care for the individual naan, for Adam. The new
knowledge satisfied his need but not his heart. — Ver.
21. A deep sleep to fall. — nr'n'in , a deep sleep,
in which the consciousness of the outer world, and
of his own inward life, is wholly gone. "Sleep, in
and of itself, is ordained for the divinely created
human nature, and is as necessary for man, as a
creature of earth, as the change of day and night for
the universal earthly nature. But this deep sleep is
different from natural sleep, and God causes it to fall
upon man in the day-time, in order that out of him
he might create the woman." Keil. Thereto the
remark of Ziegler: "Everything out of which some
new thing is to come, sinks down before the event
into such a deep sleep " In fact, this preparation
for a new being suggests to our minds the preceding
creative evening. In Job iv. 13. maT^n denotes a
deep sleep in which a dream-vision (a clairvoyant or
seeing dream) unfolds itself. On this account, prob-
ably, have some interpreters tliought that here also
there was intended an ecstasy or vision. — And took
one of his ribs. — According to BiJhme, man had
lost the magical propagation (of which he was capa-
ble by means of his androgynio nature), through his
longing in sleep (the forty-days' sleep of the tempta-
tion) for the sexual contrast, and that the woman
proceeded from him not in consequence of a creative
act, but by means of the divine fiat remaining in
Adam ; because God saw that now he must have the
object of his desire, since he could no more propa-
gate himself magically. The confident theosophist
here becomes Moses' tutor (p. 111). According to
Hoflmann, God must have made the wom:in not out
of parts of man's breast, but out of his abdomen,
where there might be found a portion of the body
capable of being lost. Keil strives in a manner
worthy of acknowledgment to express himself fairly
in respect to these fantasies (p. 49). As in them-
selves they wrong not only the scriptural text, her-
meneutics, and reason, but also the moral feeling, so
are they still more strange through their combination
with the consequences of the fall. On the other
hand, Delitzsch finds something of an ideal human in
the manner and way of the woman's creation (p.
160). Still as to the further formation, or restora-
tion of Adam, it is not perhaps to be undei'stood that
" he closed the cavity that was made by putting flesh
in the place of the rib that was taken away," but
rather, witli De Wette, " he closed the flesh in its
place." In respect to the literal conception, the
question must still arise. Whence could such flesh
nave been taken? But it is just this filling from
without, by which that vacuity, or that want, which
was ordained to man, is removed. Delitzsch lays
stress upon this, that Adam must have been already
complete as man before Eve was taken from him.
But thereby the symbohcal side of the representation
is marred. So far as the fact is concerned, it is sat-
isfied by recognizing that the sexual contrast is first
called into being in the way of the unfolding of the
first human form. This fact, on its physical side, is
ever reflected in the child-world. Delitzsch pre-
sents the view that the outward form of Adam was
not double-sexed. " To speak generally, it was
without sex. In its most refined nature Adam had
u
the sexual contrast in himself. With ita going fortt
from the unity of his personality, there neces»arily
connected itself that configuration which was de
manded for the then commencing sexual life." The
expression ; he built (il3S), indicates the farther ma.
ternal appointment of the woman (from n33 , to build,
comes "i^, ben, a son). In respect to the wide-S|iread
view of antiquity concerning the sexual unity of man,
see Knobel, p. 35. — Ver. 22. And brought her
unto the man. — "In the passage above we recog-
nize God as the first teacher of language ; here he
appears as the first bridesman ; speech is, in some
respects, emblematical of the divine, and so, too, ii
marriage." Delitzsch. — Ver. 23. This is now.-
Literally : this once, or (his time. In contrast with
the long missing of his help, he finds a/ lust his de*
sire realized. She it is — or this is it. The demon-
strative pronoun rKT not only expresses, by ita
threefold repetition, the joyful appropriation of
Adam, but also serves as a specific feminine indica-
tion. He immediately recognizes the fact that she
is formed out of his being, out of his solidity (hia
bone), out of his sensibility (his flesh), and yet hii
counterpart; therefore, in correspondence with the
fact of her derivation from him, and her belonging to
him, does he give her the name maness (woman, as
the old Latin has it, vira from vir). It is not exact-
ly certain that the woman was taken from iln' leart-
side: nevertheless it is a probable interproiaiion of
this symboUcally significant narration. At all events
is she taken out of his breast, and not out of the
lower part of his body. According to Knobel it is,
because she stands by his side (Ps. xlv. 10) and ia
his attendant, his companion, and his helper. The
Hebrew readily expresses the conception of attend-
ance through such phrases as at hand, by the side
(Job XV. 23 ; xviii. 12), vhy mauj , to be a compan-
ion, a friend (Jer. xx. 10). — Ver. 24. Therefore
shall a man. — The question arises whether this ia
something farther said, and to be understood as
Adam's speech, or whether it is the remark of the
narrator. In Matt. xix. 5, Christ ciies this language
as the word of God. That, however, makes no dif-
ference ; since Adam may utter the word of God de-
rived from the divine fact, as well as the narrator.
It seems to favor the idea of the narrator's speaking,
that he so often inserts his remarks with an "3-is
(wherefore; ch. x 9; see Delitzsch). On this ac-
count Keil decides that it is the language of the nar-
rator, especially since it is spoken of father and
mother. Delitzsch, however, insists that the words
must be taken as a prophetic or divining expression
of Adam himself. The word must evidently have
the significance of a moral lite-ordering for all
humanity — a meaning which results from this expres-
sion ?naness, or woman. It is, therefore, most closely
connected with what precedes, and suits better here
the mouth of Adam than that of the narrator.
With the latter it would have been merely a histori-
cal remark, with which, moreover, the future tenss
would not have been consistent. In the mouth of
Adam it is a law of life for all human time, and. in-
deed, of such a nature that it expresses, at the same
time, a feeling of self-denial in that he gives to hii
children, in the conclusion of marriage, a free depar
ture from the ancestral home. It is evident that
here all the fundamental laws of the marriage-life are
indicated. 1. The foundation of the same, the sex-
ual affinity; 2. the freedom of choice (as this avails
zio
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
also for the wife in relation to the recognition of the
man, and the free departure from father and mother) ;
M. the monogamic form of marriage and its original
indissolubihty. They become one flesh — an expres-
sion which does indeed include the sexual connection,
but, as something lying beyond all that, it expresses
the essent.al unity and higher wholeness of man in
man and wife. 4. The relativity ot tlie departure
Irom father and mother; the first relation is not
taitn away by the second, but only m:ide snViordi-
nate to it ; it .supposes the relations to be normal. —
Ver. 2o And they w^ere both naked. — "In this
view, that the tirsL men went naked, all other anti-
quity agrees with the Hebrews, e. g., Plato : Politi-
cu!s,'2~i'I\ Uioii. Sic. i. 8." Knobel. Expositions of
this condition of nakedness entirely opposed to each
other are found in Knobel and Delitzsch. "They
had, thereibre, in the beginning, no feeling of shame,
and none of that moral insight to the beginning of
which such feehng of shame belongs. After the
eutRince of the latter they made themselves aprons
to cover their shame (ch. iii. 7), and at a later period
they were furnished with clolliing from the skins of
beasts. People wholly uncultivated go perfectly
naked, those that are somewhat cultivated have par-
tial coverings, whilst those who have a complete
civilization go wholly clothed.'' Knobel. Un the
other hand, l3eliizsch : " Their bodies were the eloth-
ng of their inner gloiy, and this glory (rightly under-
stood) was the clothing of thdr naketlness." And,
finally, Keil, with a more apt conception of the case:
" Their bodies were made holy through the spirit that
animated them. Shame first came in with sin, which
took away the normal relation of the spirit to the
body, begat an inclination and a desire in conflict
with the soul, and turned the holy order of God into
Binful enticement and the lust of the flesh." In the
view of Knobel, Grecian art must be accounted a
coarser thing than many a crude mythological repre-
sentation. But as the first men must be distinguish-
ed from mere naked savages, so also are they not
to be regarded, according to a Jewish Midrash cited
by Delitzsch, as something transparent or luminous
" which the clouds of glory must have overshadow-
ed." Nakedness is here the expression of perfect
iimocence, which, in its ingenuousness, elevates the
body into the spiiilual personality as ruled by it,
whilst, on the contrary, the feeling of shame enters
with the consciousness of opposition between spirit
and sensual corporeity, whilst shame itself comes
in with the presentiment and the actual feeling of
guilt.
[Note o.n the Time-Succe.ssions of the Sixth
Dav a.ni) of the Euen-Life. — This second account,
in its latter part, appears to be an enlargement, or
magnified picture, of the sixth day. Taking it in its
intrinsic character, or apart froiii any outside diffi-
culties of science, it strongly suggests two thoughts;
First, its pictorial aspect, on whicli we have already
■■welt (Introd. to Gen. i. p. 153), and, secondly, tliat
the events liere narrated, or jminted, could not have
been regarded by the narrator liimsclf as all taking
place in their conseiiueutial nexus, witliin the time
of a Ijw solar hours, or the latter half of one solar
lay. lie could not .so have told the story had such
1 view bi>en constantly jiresent to his own mind.
The coiisisti-ncy ol impression would be utterly de-
stroyed by the rajiiility. Here is a consecution of
ereuts growing regularly out of each other, each one
preparing the way for what follows. Here are Ibrma-
tfonii, (growths, seeming natures, conditioiiB of life.
wants growing out of such condition.^, adaptations 1;
such wants, preparations for such adaptations, ft
course of disciphne for man, a development of know-
ledge and of language out of such discipline, the
means for such development, a strange state of hu
manity called a trance or deep sleep, a wondrous
change in the previous human nature arising out of
it — all most briefly sketched, but all there, in cohe-
rent continuity. Besides this, there is the prepara-
tion of a part of the earth for the new inhabitants, a
state of conscious innocence without shame, imply-
ing some course of Ufe, longer or shorter, to give the
representation any moral significance — the ordaining
a law indicating some course of Ufe according to it, a
divine intercourse and teaching, a probation, a tempt-
ation, and a fall into sin. All of this, at least down
to the making of Paradise, was on the sixth day, and
the rest in consecutive series with it. Now did thif
chain of events, or the greater part of them, take
place in the afternoon of one solar day V It is not a
sufficient answer to say that God's almighty power
might have caused such a rapid shifting of scene.
It is a question of style, of consistency, of descriptive
impres.-ion. It might have been so ; but then the
aspect given of causation, of series, of adaptation,
would be but a show, a seeming. It would be an
appearance of a causation without that consistent
nexus that makes it easily conceivable ; it would be
a seeming succession without that proportion of ante,
cedent and consequent which we find it difficult to
separate from it ; events, great events, growmg out
of each other — so treated — and yet without any real
growth, or that proportional gradualness without
which growth has no true meaning. There would
seem to be a new formation, or a re-formatitjn of the
animal races brought into the picture — or if it refers
to the old, a modification of them for the iustructiOD
and discipline of man. They are to be the means of
develojiing his powers of knowledge and of speech.
Through their unhkeness to himself and their unfit-
ness tor rational human intercourse, there is awaken-
ed in him the desire for higher society. And then
that most mysterious trance-state of being, in which
there is vaiied from him, as now from all science,
that inetJable transformation out of which comes the
duality of our human nature. The fact is told us
according to the easiest conception, but it was a
trance-vision to Adam, and we have no reason to
suppose that his narrating descendant had the know-
ledge of it in any revelation more objective than was
given to his ancestor. Adam had longed for some one
like himself, inspired from above, and lifted out ol
the surrounding anunalily, yet sharing with him the
earthly nature. The language asciibed tu him shows
the vehemence of his desire, the deferring of hie
hope, and the patience of his waiting: C"5n rST ,
dii:siital, this now, ipsa tandem — there Ls an intense
significance in this small Hebrew p:irticle — come at
laxt, bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh. Three
times does he repeat this feminine rsT (see De-
litzsch, p. 161). Bone of my bone: — can we doubt
as to the origin of the peculiar symbolism in which
the narrative is clothed ? His want was satisfied,
and the vivid picture of his dream becomes the lan-
guage, the only possilde language, jierhaps, of a di-
vine work which no merely human speech could ade-
([uately set forth — one of the deej) mysteries of God.
it,self shadowing forth the still deeper mysteries o(
the Incarnation and the Church.
Similar suggestions of time present tucmselves ii
CHAP. II. *-'io.
•21
»hat is said of tlie planting of Paradise : And the
Lord God caused to grow, etc. Did the great trees
grow in the same time with the herb and the flower ?
Confine it all to a few hours and the difference is as
nothing ; vet giowth, without proportion according
to the natures or products grown, is in itself both
conceptioniess to the sense and idealess to the reason.
We may conceive it, however, from a picture, or a
vision, and such a mode of representation, therefore.
oa appearing in the style, is one of the strongest crit-
ical arguments for llie vision-theory of the creative
revelation. It is perfectly consistent, too, for in the
subjective deUneatiou time is given in perspective.
But the grouping shows that the great things repre-
sented could not have been thus, unlfss the picture
itself be but a phantasy, or phantasmagoria, nut
supernatural or contranatural merely, but wholly un-
natural, according to any conceptions our human
faculties can form of time, succession, cause, and
effect. Great truths, great facts, incfliible truths, in-
effable facts, are doubtless set forth. We do not
abate one iota of their greatness, their wonderful n ess,
by supposmg such a mode of representation. It is
not an accommodation to a rude and early age, but
the best language for every age. How trifling the
conceit that our science coiUd have fuinished any
better ! Her field is induction, and, by this creeping
process, though she may travel far relatively, she can
never ascend to the great facts of origin that belong
to the supernatural plane. Her language will ever
be more or less incorrect ; and, therefore, a divine
revelation cannot use it, since such use would be an
endorsement of its absolute verity. The simpler and
more universal language of the Scripture may be in-
adequate, as all language must be ; it may fall short;
but it points in the right direction. Though giving
us only the great steps in the process, it secures
that essential faith in the transcendent divine work-
ing, which science — our science, or the science of
ages hence — might only be in danger, to say the
least, of darkening. It saves us from those trifling
things commonly called reconciliations of revelation
with science, and which the next science is almost
sure to imreconcile. It does so by placing the mind
on a wholly different plane, giving us simple though
grand conceptions as the vehicle of great ideas and
great facts of origin in themselves no more accessible
to the most cultivated than to the lowliest minds.
There is an awful sublimity in this Mosaic account of
the origin of the world and man, and that, too, whe-
ther we regard it as inspired Scripture or the grand-
est picture ever conceived by human genius. To
those who cannot, or who do not, thus appreciate it,
it matters little what mode of interpretation is adopt-
ed— whether it be one of the so-culled reconciliations,
or the crude dogmatism that calls itself literal because
it chooses to talie on the narrowest scale a language
so suggestive of vast times and ineffable causaUties.
— T. L.1
DOCTRINAI, ANTD ETHICAL.
1. In respect to the opposition between this sec-
tion and the preceding, see the Exegetical and Crit-
cal N otes of the former. It must be very clear that
Ji the present section the chronological order stands
in the iiackgrouud, whilst, on the contrary, the sym-
boUcal presents itself in a more signiticaut degree.
2. The present section is distinguished by the
aanii» .lehnirah-Klnhini : The meaning is, that Jehovah,
the Covenant-God of His people, is also the God ol
all worlds, the Lord of uU creatures, who made Adaa
for His Brst Covenant-chilu, and appointed him Hil
vicegerent in this dominion. Adam is the princej>s,
and so the ideal prius of the ereaturely world. This
point, of the Covenant of God with Adam, ajipears in
Cocceius as the Ibundation of the federal theology.
With Schleiermacher, again, it is modified into tha
representation of a religiousness overlying the con
trast of sin and mercy.
3. Nature presupposes man, if it would be pre-
vented from running wild. Only in man, through
him, and with him, can it find its glorious transforma-
tion. Therefore was man also, in his integrity, the
presupposing of nature in her integrity ; his religioua
and moral destiny is the condition of her higher des-
tiny, his ciillus the foundation of her culture. In
pure nature, moreover, are the nobler plants as well
as the nobler animals to be regarded as in a special
sense an appurtenance of man ; in a special measure,
tlierefore, are they conditioned in their being and
well-being, by his being and well-being. Whatever,
too, there might have been befoi-e man, it was still
as though it were not, so long as it found not in him
its cosmical destiny. It was all an enigma; the
solution was first to be found in man,
4. The moistening of the earth's soil bef'ire the
creation of man poiuts to the sh.ire of the nj,ters in
the ereaturely formations (and sustenance), especially
the human. Through the observation of this camt
Thales by Ids system.
5. The creation of man. It is rightly regarded
as an entirely new creative act,* and, indeed, as the
very highest. And yet it is a falsely literal view of
thi^ anthropomorphic and symbolical representation,
when in this act of God we are led to regard the
earthly nature as wholly passive. Rather does this
act, in its truest realization, presuppose the highest
excitation and effort of the earth — we may even say
* [This is doubtless true of that decisive act of God
(whetiier the inspir.ition, or the image, or botli) tliat in
a moment constituted the first man, and the species homo,
which, a moment before, was not. Bui this does not ex-
clude the idea that the human physical was connected with
the previous natxn-e, or natures, and was brought out of
them. That is, it was made from the earth in the widest
signification of the tei-m. That it was not a mere phistio
shaping, or outward mechanical structure, is implied in
what Lange says just below in respect to the non-passivity
of the eai-tb. 't here are immense diificulties connected with
the idea of an outward Promethean image, a dead organiza-
tion which, although having the appeaiance, is really nc
organization at all in the strict sense of the word, any more
than the marble statue or the waxen image. No one sup-
poses that the making of the human body was an immediate
cftaking dc nihiio. It was made from earth, and this earth
already had its nature according to its varieties ol carbon,
rin-ogen, etc., and these, as natures, connected with other
natures, entered into the human body. If it is not a crea-
tion de nrtiJo, which is expressly contrary to the language
of the accoimt, we must suppose a connection with nature
to a certain extent. What difficulty or danger, then, in
giving to the phrase "from the earth," the widest sense
consistent with the idea of man's having an earthly as weL
as a heavenly origin! It is this latter idea, and the higher
psychology connected with it, that liunishes to the faith itl
shield against all mere theories of development that may
proceed, with weaker or stronger evidence, from a natural-
izing science. From the one' thus first inspired, and con-
stituted hf'mo, came all humanity— (/le one humanity, As «
transmission of that one inspii-ation and that one spiritual
image (see Remarks, Introduction to the First Chapter of
Genesis, p. 156). Even on this view, however, the human
body did not precede the human soul, as Lange observes in
what follows ; since, whatever may have been the precedenl
causation, it was not a human body, any more than it was »
human soul, before that decisive man-creating, man-consti
tuting act which m.ade the species, or the specific chaiactbr
of both.-T. L.l
212
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OK MOSES
with Stoffens, its animation. The representation has
for its leading fundamental idea: Man the prime
tiling of the eaithlv creation ; not that it can or
ought to be carried out into its philosophical conse-
quences, for then man must liave been introduced
before tlie earth-soil, and the formation of his Ijody
must liave been before the creation of his sotil. On
this account we are not authorized to assign separate-
ly the formation of the bodv and of the soul to two
acts following each other in a temporal series — as
was held in some respects by the Gnostic Satumi-
nus.
6. The anthropological, physiological, and psy-
chological ideas of the passage. Compare the writings
before cited : Von Roos, Zeller, Beck, Delitzsch,
Yon Rudolf, and others. Before all things does the
passage affirm that man became an indissoluble, that
is, a creatively established, unity — a liring soul pro-
ceeding out of the contrast, or tlie duality, of the dust
of the earth, on the one side, and the divine breath of
life on the other (nis'i::), and that these were the sub-
stances out of which he was formed. He is, in his
one total appearing, a living soul ; that is, the body
too, in this human constitution, is only a special
ground-form of the whole man, as the divine breath
of life, on its side, is the ground-principle of the
whole man. Spirit and body are joined together
with the soul. These three are mutually inseparable,
and they together make the individualized unity of
man. To this extent may we deny that man consists
alone of body and soul. He is always, and at any
moment, body, soul, and spirit; though the outer
form of the body may, by death, be loosed from its
life, and the spirit, by siu, may smk into a latent
state (see 1 Cor. xv. 44 ; Lange's " Dogmatics," p.
1243). As man, in respect to his inner Ufe, is not
divided into feeling, intelligence, and will, but is
present in each of these ground-forms as the entire
man, so also is he ever the entire man in respect to
his outer or concrete life ; as body he is related to his
earthly appearing, and to the sphere of such a]jpear-
ing ; as spirit, in the relation of his principial unity
to his unitary ground, he is related to God and divine
things ; as soul, or essential form and life, he is re-
lated to the world of souls and the life of the wliole
universe. Man is a one with himself: individuality
in his singleness, personaUty in his universalness,
subjectivity in the mode and way of mediating be-
tween his singleness and his universal relation.
And so far is the passage atomic, as it represents
man as becoming a living soul (monade) through the
highest and most intensive creative act of God.
In rel'erence to the essential elements and rela-
tions of human life, however, it is predominantly
dichotomic, as other places of Holy Writ (Ecclesiastes
xii. 7 ; .Matt. x. 2>i) distinctly represent.
Concerning the relation of the corporeity of man
to the earthly nature, compare Schubekt's "History
'•f the Soul," g 10. The constituents of the animal
body : Calcareous earth (bone), nitrogen, oxygen,
hydrogen, oxygen gas, iron (in the blood), sulphur,
|)hosi)l]oru3 (in the nerves), silica (in the teeth), and,
■ondjined witli this, fluoric acid.
In respect to the spiritual nature of man as akin
l(v God, compare Gen. iii. 6 ; Matt. xxii. 32 ; Jer.
xxxi. 3 ; Luke xv. 11; John i. 49 ; Acts xvii. 28,
29; Rom. vUi. IB; 2 Pet. i. 4 ; Rev. i. 6 ; u. 17,
and other places. — Delitzsch disputes against the
supposition that theie is in man an uncreated divine
■p. 144); for the word K'^:''! , ch. i. 27, embraces,
he says, the essential being of the entire man. Oj
the man, certainly, as a whole, but is it so especially
of his spiritual nature ? Is man, moreover, as an
eternal uidividual thought of (iod, by virtue of his
election in Christ, a thought in some way created f
We cannot say that God has created the thought oi
his love. The older theology was very much afraid
of the idea of emanation. If God imparted anythine
to man from his own being, it meant either that God
must have given away some of His own being, or
that something still of His being cotild have sinned
in man. We must, by ,\U means, avoid both repre-
sentations as we must generally do in respect to
every emanation-view. But does there follow from
this the pure creatureliness of the human spirit — that
is, of its God-likeness (or that in it called divine, oi
which is supposed to have come from God)? Or i»
it only, as Delitzsch says, the itvotj of the irrtC^a (the
breathing of the Spirit) ? Still it is a iri/tG^a, a hu
man spirit. And certainly tliis needs the spirit of
God for its well-being — for its own life (see 1 Cor. ii
14; Jude 19). The mere existence of the humai
soul does not fail from the fact of its unspiritualness
(the want of the higher spirituality, or its sensuality
Delitzsch touches upon the true relation when he
says, "a creative word, although of a divine being, is
not the Logos clothed with the eternal being of thi
Father." Yet still does the decree concerning hu
manity embrace in Christ the individual elect. Be
tween the emanation-representations, on the one
side, and the pure creatureliness on the other, lies the
conception of the free impartation of life in the mys
tery of the quickening: life from Ih'e, light fron
Ught, spirit from spirit. Man may be begotten of
God by the seed of the new birth, which is the word
of God ; and when we take this as the basis of our
behef that he can receive the J/olg Spirit, we cannot
deny that original state of man which corresponds
to it.
But the passage contains already the germ of a
trichotomy-body, soul, and spirit, which impliedly
pervades the Holy Scripture, and is most expressly
set forth 1 Thess. v. 23; Hub iv. 12 (see Lance's
" Dogmatics," p. 307). A similar trichotomy, as is
well known, is found in the writings of the Platonists,
and so, too, in connection with biblical doctrines and
Platonic ideas, among the oldest church-fathers.
This continued, until through the heresy of Apolli-
naris, the trichotomy became suspected, and in the
following time of the middle ages, gave place to the
mere popular dichotomy. In modern times, again,
in connection with a deeper study of psychology,
trichotomic views presented themselves. It must
herewith be remarked that the dichotomy, when
simply held, is no more in contradiction to the
trichotomy, than those dual places of Holy Scripture
in which only God and His Logos, or the Wisdom
or the Angel of the Lord, are named, contain a con-
tradiction of the trinity. The triad just as easily
holds together for a dual (soul and spirit being taken
as one) as for a monad. Or rather, the monad re-
solves itself over all, first into a duality, then into a
triad.
That the spirit is the principle and the form of
unity in man — liis derivation from God, and his lela-
tion to God — is declared in Ecclesiastes xii. 7. It is
God who has given the spirit. In like manner does
the same text of the Preacher say that the body ii
the finishing and the form of ajtpeariiig for man,
showing his descent from the earth, and his relation
to the earthly sphere. But that the soul is the/om
CHAP. 11. 4-i!B.
'zn
of beinff in man, the configuration and the form of
life, his descent from and liis reciprooal relation to
Sie whole world, is declared in the very expression
'' living soul."
The C'^n ntt'J3 (breath of lives), as the divine
principle of all life, imparted to man an individual
divine principle of life, and in consequence thereof it
became, in tne whole, a living soul, and in the vitali-
iy, or vitalizing, a conscious self-revealing soul.
Man, as related to the eternal and the divine, is
»/)>■'■ laar, as related to the universe, is sotil ;
^ao, as related to the earth, or to any particular
world-sphere wherein he dwells, is bodi/. Concerning
the relation of the psychological system of Delitzsch
0 the conception of Von Rudloff, see " Notice of Re-
carkable Writings," in the German Periodical, edited
,y Von HoUenberg, No. 3, 1869.
For the various defective and marring statements
respecting the triune form of man's being, see
Lange's " Dogmatics," p. 307. Gnosticism refuses
to regard the corporeity as belonging to the essen-
tial being of man (so, too, the Book of Wisdom, ch.
ix. 15). Hegelianism regards the soul as oidy the
band that connects body and spirit. Later psychol-
ogists and theologians (Heinroth, Hofiftnann, and
others) have denied to man, in /limself, a spirit-being;
he has spirit, they say, only so far as the spirit of
God enlightens him. Beck speiks of a .spiritual
power, at least, as belonging to the human soul. It
must be held fa.st, however, that man could not re-
ceive the spirit of God if he was not himself a spiT-it-
ual being (" were not the eye adapted to the sun,"
etc.). It is, at all events, a supposition of the Scrip-
ture, that since the fall the spiritual nature is bound
in the natural man, and does not come to its actuali-
ty (see Jude ver. 10; Laxge's "Dogmatics," p. 311).
lu relation, however, to the body of man, we must
distinguish between his ncofia, the organism, and his
tiesh ffap^, the material merely, the filling out of his
appearance. In relation to his soul, we must distin-
guish between soul as the animal princi]>le of life,
and as conscious form of being. In relation to his
spirit, we must distinguisli between his spiritual
nature and the element of the spiritual in which the
jidividual spirit lives, and which enters into it.
7. For the doctrine of the divine image, see the
remarks on the fiist chapter. For what belongs
specially to the immortahty of man, see the title
Literature hs above given. We must distinguish,
however, a threefold conception of immortaUty: 1.
The paradisaical immortality of Adam ; 2. the onto-
logical immortality of human nature ; 3. the religious
ethical immortality which is shared by man tlu'ough
ais communion with (Jod — the life in its deeper signif-
icance, or the eternal life. As to what concerns the
immortality of Adam, the Scripture supposes that he
could avoid death under the condition of continued
QOi-mal rectitude in the strength of liis communicm
with God, or that he might fall ijiio death through
n"^normal convluct conlbrmable to his connection
with the earth. But the Scripture does not suppose
that mat> could have remained immortal without ob-
jective conditionings for the eternal rene«';il of his
life. These conditionings are embraced in the sym-
bol of the tree of life (see below). There is, too, the
further disclosure, that man, in the case of the con-
firmation of his innocence, must undergo a meta-
morphosis resembling death, and yet not death, in
order that he might pass out of his first physical
Jtate of existence, where there is yet a possibility of
his dying, into a second spiritual state of exisleiicf
which is raised above the sphere of death. Thii
appears from the translation of Enoch, in connectioi
with the long enduring of the Macrobii (tlie earl}
loug-living antediluvian patriarchs), from the trans-
lation of Elias, and, above all, from the glorified form
of Christ after his resurrection. It appears, too,
from the passage, 2 Cor. v. 2, 3 (see Langk's "Dog-
matics," p. 318), and from the doctrine of the apos-
tles respecting the transformation of Christians who
should be living at the end of the world (1 Cor. x\.).
The form of death that proceeds from sin had op-
posed itself to this tendency of man to transforma-
tion— had changed and subverted it. In respect to
the various ecclesiastical views of the original immor-
tahty, compare Winkk: "Comparative Representa-
tion," p. 4i). 2. The ontological uumortality of man.
At the bottom of the wide-spread prejudgment that the
Mosaic books, as also the Old Testament generally in
its first periods, did not teach the doctrine of a per
sonal immortality, lie the following misunderstand
inis : 1. In various ways was the ontological supposi-
tion of the imperishable continuance of man which
pervades the whole Old Testament (namely, in the
doctrines of Sheol, of the Rephaim in Sheol, of the
conscious condition, and in the expressions lor life,
in Sheol), confounded with the doctrine of the ethical
eternal life. This has also occurred to one of the
latest writers on the subject before us (H. Scucltz;
"The Presuppositions of the Chiislian Doctrine of
Immortality," Gottingen, 1S61J. As we must distin-
guish, however, between the conceptions of tlie
ph\ sical and the ethical life in the Scriptures (a fife
without God no life, but death ), and between the
conceptions of the physical and the ethical death (a
death without the sting of conscious guilt no death),
so also must we distinguish between the conceptions
of the physical and the ethical immortality. Although
the Scripture does not acknowledge the physical,
without the ethical, as the true immortality, still it
denotes it as continuous hidividual existence \\\t\\ the
two attributes of consciousness and imperishability
(Is. Ixvi. 2i ; Rev. xiv. 11). 2. The pathetic and
poetical expressions for the mimrnful condition in
Slieol have been regarded purely as dogmas, without
calling to mind that there are praises of the rest in
Sheol of a directly opposite character (as in Job iii. ),
and that, in like manner, the dogma of the perfect
nothingness of the present worldly life may lie de-
duced from many of the songs of the Church. 3.
The fact has been overlooked that the immortality
of the soul is just as distinctly a supposition of the
Old Testament as the existence of God, and that on
this account neither article is expressly taught, but
only appears in language on occasions which call it
out, ami then wholly as something thus presupposed.
4. Xo distinction has been made between the first
germ-form which is peculiar to this doctrine, as it id
to most others in the earlier books of the t)ld Testa-
ment, and its later development ; and, therefore, too.
has there been no distinction made between the rami-
fying ontological definitives (such as Sheol, Rephaiir,
appearings of the dead, awakenings of the dead,
questionings of the dead), the ethical detiiutives
(such as covenant with God, confidence in lioJ) and
the synthetic, out of which the doctrine of the resur.
rection gradually came forth (such as tlie tree of life,
the translations of Enoch and Elijah, together with
the doctrine of the resurrection that prevailed in the
prophetic period). Still less has it been considered
how gradually Sheol came to be regarded as a plac«
214
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOR OF MOSES.
if life, how gradually the shades come to form two
Jirisions, those that are enjoying the holy rest, and
those that are the subjects of penal suft'ering — how
gradually faith iu the living God becomes faith in
that eternal life whith consists in communion with
him (Ps. xvi.), and how gradually the resurrection
lomes to its most definite form (2 Mace, vii.). The
decisive word, as Christ interprets it, Matt. xxii. 32,
is the designation which God gives to Himself, Exod.
iii. 6. Its meaning is that the doctrine of covenants
made with tJie pioufi by a personal God contains in
itself the supponition of their own personal imperisha-
ble nature. For an explanation of this point it must
be observed: 1. That the abode in Sheol is to be re-
garded primarily as the continuance of the death-doom
incurred by sin. Just as death, the wages of sin ac-
cording to I'aul, or the birth of sin according to James,
begins in this world with sin (the inner death accord-
ing to John), with mortaUty and sickness, so does it
also continue on in tlie other world under the relative
ideas of nakedness, imprisonment, restlessness — in a
word, under the intensified form of a penal or disci-
plinary relation to a future redemption. Therefore
it is that even in the pious of the Old Testament, the
condition beyond the grave is reflected in this world-
consciousness, presenting itself in a form for the
most part gloomy, sad, trembling, and terrific. 2. It
must be kept iu mind that Moses had to establish
the theocratic belief of the Jews in direct contrast
with heathenism, and especially the heathenism of
the Egyptians, from the midst of whom they came,
and was therefore led to give the strongest and most
significant emphasis to the present life ; because the
Egyptian religion was most specifically a worship
having relation to the state beyond the grave — that
is, 10 death. 3. Add to tliis that it was in entire
correspondence with the disciplinary degrees by
which Israel was to be educated that Moses should
represent the retribution as being principally in this
world, and, indeed, as impending every moment, like
something that followed close upon every step of hu-
man conduct. In entire conformity to truth did he
direct the people in this first step of belief in retribu-
tion ; for, in fact, retribution is an immediate (or
evcr-imijending) thing. Everywhere, however, the
hope of a future life gleams out of his doctrine.s and
his institutions. The promise of long life was the
outward hull of the promise of eternal Ule ; tlie
symboUc deatli-ofl'ering was the emblem of hopeful
resignation to (iod in death ; and how shall piety in
death find its reward otherwise than in tlie time be-
yond the grave? Above all, it was the covenant of
God that furnished the richest guaranty (Exod. iii.
b).
[lOKA OF A FUTUKK LlFE IN THE OlD TESTAMENT.
— The doctrine of a future life is in the Old Testament
aa well as in the New, but in a different manner. In
the latter it is for all who read, d(!clared uiuleniedly,
if not dogmatically ; in the former it is for the devout
and believing. Tliere is thrown over it a vyil of iioly
reserve, making it all the more imiucssivc when the
truth is seen tlirough it. liut lor tliia the Sadducee
had no eyes He could not find texts declaring it
preceptively as he found the law laid down for mar-
rying a brother's widow. He came to our Saviour
with liis puzzle, and doubtless dei-nied it unanswera-
ble. The course taken by Christ, iMatt. xxii. 2'.l, is
very remarkable, and it is astonishing how little
weight it seems t(; have had with writers of Ihe War-
burtou school. He does not nieel. the caviller ivitli
She texlH we would have expected. He docs not
cite such passages as Ps. xvii. 16 : "I shall be wtie
fied when I awake in thy likeness;" or Ps. xvi.
" Thou wilt not leave my soul in Sheol ; " or Ps. Ixxiii
24 : " Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel and
afterward receive me to glory;" or Is. xxvi. 19
where a resurrection seems to be spoken of; or Dan
xii. 2, where it is expressly declared. The Sadduce*
would probably have been prepared with some ex-
planations of these, such as arc now offered by tht
modern rationalist. Instead of them our Saviour
quotes one of the most common passages in the Old
Testament: I am the God of Abraham, of Isaac, ani
of Jacob. The Sadducee had heard it read hundreda
of times in the .synagogue, but saw nothing in it
about a future life. It may have been to him, in ''
other respects, a favorite passage ; for though called
infidels m modern times they were the strictest of
Jews, glorying strongly in their ancient patriarchal
descent. "I am the God of Abraham, the God of
Isaac, and the God of Jacob : " this they were famil-
iar with ; but Christ's appendix was as startling to
them as it was conclusive : He is not the God of the
dead but of the living. Godlg^ covenant with man
proves His immortality. He does not deal thus with
beings of a day. He does not thus solemnly declare
Himself the God of things non-existent. Abraham,
and Isaac, and Jacob, are still present realities, not
living in their children, simply, but rather their chil-
dren hving in them. The divine care of a chosen
people thus continued from generation to generation
imphes a continued being in the individuals that
compose it, and without which the whole series
would have no more spiritual value than any linked
succession iu the animal or vegetable woild. They
still "live unto Him."
Let the reader test this by endeavoring to fix in
hL« mind the idea that the Old Testament writers all
regarded themselves as beings destined soon to de-
part into nothingness — in other words, that they were
all sheer animal materialists. Let him carry along
this impression, and keep it constantly present in
reading the Psalms, the Projihets, or even the Hook
of Proverbs. What a discord will arise between it
and many of their vivid utterances, even though
there is nothing in them, dogmatically or didactively,
about a future life. Did men who believe in no
hereafter ever talk so? "Whom have I in lieaven
but Thee, and there is none in all the earth that I de-
sire beside Thee : Flesh and heart fail, but Thou art
the strength (the rock) of my soul : Thy favor is life :
Thy loving-kindness is more than lile : My soul fiunta
for Thee, the living God : For with Thee is the foun-
tain of life, and in Thy light do we >ee light: Thou
art our dwelling-place in all generations : Doubtless
Thou art our Father even though Abraham be igno-
rant of us and Israel acknowledge us not ; Thou, Oh
Lord, art our Father and our Redeemer : Art Thou
not from eveilastmg, Jehovah, my God, my Holy
One'? we .'^hall not die." Or take that oft-repeated
Hebrew oath : A^ the Loril Uveih and a.s /Ay soul liv-
el/i ; what meaning in such a connection of terms?
How does all this lofty language immediately collapso
at the presence o( the low materializing idea I Even
the language of their despondency shows how far
they were from the satisfied animal or earthly state
of soul: Shall (lust praise Thee? Shall Thy loving
kindness be declared iu the grave, or Thy righteous-
ness in the land nf oblivion '^ it was bidding t.irewelJ
to God, not to earth, it was losing the idea of th*j
everlasting covenant and its everlasting author, flat
imparted the deepest ghjoiii to their seasons of seep
CHAP. n. 4-26.
21f
>'ci8m. It was in ju3t such travail of the spirit that
tie hope was boru withiu them. This was tlie sub
jcctive mode of its revelation; and, thus regarded,
the very texts whiuh the Sadducee, ancient or mod-
ern, would iiuote iu favor of his denial, testify to a
'.rue spirituality — to a state of soul most opposite to
his own. And this style of language is not confined
[0 tlie devotional or prophetical Sci-iptures. It
gleams out in expressions interspersed among the
historical details of tlie Jewish home-life. What a
people, says Kabbi Tanchum {citing the words of
Abigail, 1 Sam. xxv. '2'j), where even the women
epeak so sublimely, and beyond even the philosophers
of other nations, about soula bou/id up in the bundle
of life (or hves, o-'^nn m^s). See Pococke's
" Notts to Porta Mosis," p. 93. It may be very easy
for the rationalizing interpreter to put another face
on such a passage as this, but it may be only because
iu his case, as in that of the Sadducee of old, there
is a vail upon his heart in the reading of the Old
Covenant.
Such an expanding spiritual sense (in distinction
iroru the merely fanciful or the cabalistical) is for
those who have eyes to see and ears to hear ; and,
thus regarded, it may be said that tlie future life of
the Old Testament, even with tliis vail thrown over
it, has far more of moral power than the Gre, k
Uades, or any spirit-world mythology of other ancieiu
nations whom the r.itionalist would represent as sur-
passing the Jews in this respect. The latter were
doubtless far behind the Greeks in distinctness of
conception and locality ; but ihis was because God did
not mean to leave Ilis people to their fancies. He
gave them, and especially the pious among them, the
spirit of the doctrine, but so kept it in holy reserve
that they could not turn it into tables. — T. L.]
8. From the circumstance of its not being said
that the woman was inspired by the breath of God,
Delitzsch is inclined to follow, with Tertulliau, the
so-called traducian theory, or the generic propaga-
tion of the human soul. This argument, however,
de sileiitio, proves nothing; since Adam, in relation
-£o Eve, also is the type of the creation of humanity.
/(Mud so we adhere to this : The body of man proceeds
I Hrom propagation (traducianism), the soul is created
icreatiouism), the spirit is pre-existent as the idea of
• 9. Paradise. — See the article "Eden" in Winer,
and the literary catalogue there given. See also
Hekzog's " Real-Encyelopedia." Paradise (Hebrew,
"3 ; Septuagint, irajjaSticros, that is, a walUng or fenc-
ing round, a place enclosed as a garden), like all
facts in Genesis, especially of its earlier history, was,
on the one side, an actuality, on the other a s^-mijol ;
and the latter, indeed, iu a special degree. In iavor
of its actuality there is, first, the fundamental thought :
there was a home of the human race; secondly, the
territory of this home, the region in which the
Euphrates and tlie Tigris had their sources, or West-
ern'^sia as appears probable from other reasons;
thirdly, the mention of the well-known rivers Phrat
(Euphiates) and Hiddekcl (Tigris), together with other
'eatures. In favor of the clear symbolical significance
of Paradise there is the figure of the one stream that
afterwards divided itself into four diiferent streams
running out from thence into the world, as also the
inclosure of the garden, and especially the two trees
witi their wonderful significance. The theological
views respecting Paradise embrace two extremes:
vhilst some would regard it as extending over all the
earth (Ephraim the Syrian ; and a multitude of sucl
extravagant opinions as cited by L'almkt: (Jomment
litter, in Genesin, p. 81), others, on the other side
would reduce it to one common section so appropri
ated as to have a ©ommensurate influence upon thtj
first men. Between these lies the sound view of the
church, which supposes for the pure a pure sphere oi
nature, for the care-needing a motherly bosom of
nature, for the innocent a heavenly, peaceful, holj
region, for the cliild-like a garden with its fruits (see
La.sge's " Dogmatics," p. 396). The exegetical
views respecting the passage divide themselves into
the liistyiicatj-the aUegorical, aud the mythical. The
historical views, again, fill into two classes: thosa
that maintain the possibility of yet deterniiuing the
region of Paradise, and such as suppose the configu-
ration of the earth to have been so ch.anged by the
flood that the place of union of the four rivers can-
not now be pointed out. Both assume a significant
change of the earth, especially since the fall of Adam,
or the beginning of the human race. The allegorical
views divide themselves into the Gnostic or the theo-
sophic-allegorical (Philo, Jacob Bohm, and others)
and into the inystic-allegorieal (Swedenborg and
others). The mythical views may be divided into
the predominantly theological or philosophical, or
the predominantly geographical. First Class: a.
Oalvin, Huetius, Bocharl, and others: Paradise, they
say, lay in the district in which the Euphrates and
the Tigris unite (Schat al Arab) ; the Pislion and the
Gihou are the two prmcipal mouths of Schat al Arab.
b. Uopkinson : Paradise was the region of Babylon;
the two canals of the Euphrates form half of the
number of the four rivers, c. Kask : The same
region probably, oifly let there be added to the two
well-known streams the two subordinate streams of
the Schat al Arab. rf. Harduin : Gahlee. e. Hasse:
Paradise lay in East Prussia. Second Class : Change
in the course of the rivers. Cleiicus, and others:
Paradise lay in Syria (Kohlreif aud others : Damas-
cus). Third Class: 1'hilo : JJe ilundi Opificio ;
Jacob Bohm: Mi/sterium Maffnum. Fourth Class:
See the article " Swedenborg " in Hekzog's " Real-
Encyclopedia." Fifth Class: The mythieo-theologi-
cal, or strictly mythological, view, which makes it
the story of the four world-rivers that come from the
hills of heaven, and wander over the earth (Von
Bohleu and others). Sixth Class: The mythico-
geographical. Sickler, Buttmaun, Bertheau : " Geo-
graphical Views that form the Ground of the Descrip-
tion of the Situation of Paradise," Gbttingen, 1848.
Wiuer distinguishes a Uteral view (ileugstenberg,
Tiele, Baumgarten), a half-Uteral, which attempts to
separate the distribution of the streams from the
matter of fact contained (Less, Cramer, Werner, and
otliers), an allegorical (Von Gerstenberg), and a
liierogiyphical, not very distinguishable (J. G. Rosen-
muller and others), p. 2u0, wherein he protesM
against the conjectures of Hiillmann and Ballen-
stedt.
According to Verbrugge, Jahn, and others, the
one Paradise-stream may be understood of a regioD
abounding in streams. We suppose that the stream
has a mo.-t special symbolical importance, aud de-
notes, generally, the well-ground of the Paradise-
earth. With this, however, there is easUy connected
the historical view of Reland and Calmct. Accord-
ing to this, Pislion denotes the Phasis whicli rises in
the Moschian mountains, stands iu coimectioa wiifi
thegf)ld-land of Colchis so lamed in auti (uity (Colchii
^ CiiaviUil. and flows into the Black Sea Gihoii is tl»
216
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Aras jr A raxes (the Phasis of Xenophon, n'S, to
break forth — apdrTu;), which likewise rises in Arme-
nia, and flows into the Caspian Sea. But Cush is the
and of the Kossaeans, which Strabo and Diodorus
place in the neighborhood of Media and the Caspian
Sea. According to this, Armenia would have been
the terr'.'.ory of the ancient Paradise. Knobel also
had tirst presented the grounds (p. 28), wliich are
in favor of Armenia, out of which, moreover, the
postdiluvian men proceeded. On this accoimt have
Beland, Link, Vou Lengerke, Kurtz, Bunsen, and
others, supposed it to be Armenia. It is objected,
however, to this : 1. That the names Havila and
Cush, in otlier places, belong to the South. The
name Havila, it may be said generally, is not geogra-
phically determined ; but the name Cush, together
with the Cushites, can just as well be extended from
the north to the south as that of the Xormans (see
Kurtz : " History of the Old Testament," p. 69). 2.
No Armenian district can be summarily denoted as
the native land of gold, bdellium, and the onyx. In
regard to tlie gold, however, Colchis presents no diffi-
culty. Just as little are the bdellium and the onyx
to be denied of tliis district, since it evidently has
something symboUcal. Objection Bd : It is said that
the cherubim are not to be found in Armenia ; but
where on the earth was the home of these V And
then, too, must many indications point to a more
northern liigldaud. But the places commonly cited
for this purpose, Ps. xlviii. 3; Is. xlviii. 13, prove
nothing, and Ezek. xxviii. 13 is a pure ideal painting.
Moreover, the analogies of the Alburdi, the Medo-
Persian mountains of God, and the Indian mountains
Meru, appear to be merely reflexes of the Paradise-
story ; and the same may be said of the Chinese
mountain-tract Kuenlun. In other respects the
analogies and combinations collected by Knobel are
communications of great interest. KeU states a
reason why the Cyrus (now the Kur) should be put
in place of the I'hasis (p. 42) ; it is the fact that the
rising of the Phasis lies beyond Armenia. Tills rea-
son would be decisive, if we had to insist upon the
pure literalness of the origin of the Paradise rivers.
He holds, in like maimer, that the Gihon is the
Araxes : the sundering of the four streams he ex-
plaius by changes in the eartii's surface, yet not
alone through the flood (Xote, p. 44 J. Finally, ac-
cording to Delitzsch, the Pison must relate to the
Indus and its river territory to India, whilst the
Gihon is the Nile (pp. lit), tJ2U). Afterwards he
came to regard the combination of Bunsen as having
a good degree of proljability (p. 150), and tlien he
represents the mutually opposing dilUculties by the
concluding alternative : We must either acknowledge
the incomprehensibility of the narration, or aeeom-
inodate ourselves with the admission that the certain
knowledge of the four rivers has been lost in the
disappearance of Paradise itself. — T/w actual and
tyinfjotical Inip'/rtfincc of Faradme. J'lw tjardfit in
Eden. Jliitlorical. Tke lieat'eidtj carthhtumn which
surrounded the new-born man, who is to be regarded,
indeed, as lull-grown, and yet childlike and inexpe-
rienced. Tile jioint of tlie earth's coiigetiiality,
wherein the divine eartii-culture is in unity with tiie
earthly nature — wlien the fruitrtrees arc of the noblest
(jual'ty, the grain grows wild, the beasts attach them-
Belves to men in the domestic state, whilst there is
allotted to men an abundance of .simple food (Iruit
of trees, the nourishment of eliiklren) to be procured
by an easy labor of the body, and a tboughtfui care
OD the [lart of the mind. — Syinbolkai uiyiii/u-ance of
Paradise. The general correspondence between tht
pure, peaceful, serene, and blessed man, and the
pure, peaceful, serene, and blessed world of God . oi
the inward communion with God, and, corresponding
to it, the outward, sensible presence of God in the
surroundings of humanity. In its more special signif-
icance: 1. The heavenly disposition of the earth,
the ricli paradisaical soil ; 2. the objective paradisai-
cal aspects of the earth, as the subjective in the con-
templation of childi en and of men attuned to a festal
' life ; 3. the promised land, the consecration of the
earth through the salvation ; 4. the kingdom of glory
above (Luke xxiii. 43; 2 Cor. xii. 4); 5. the earth
glorifietl for its union, at some future time, with the
heavens (2 Pet. iii. 13; Rev. xx.). — The vocation in
-Paradise. Historical : The serene, free activity of
the child in contrast with the necessity and the
pains of labor proper. The true keeping of entrusted
good against a damage yet unforeseen, especially
through self-keeping in contrast with the later anxious
watching. Symbolical: The calling of tlie pious
and blessed, according to its positive and negative
sides. A holy office of labor, a holy office of defence,
and, through both, a holy ministry of instruction. —
The Paradise-rivers: 1. Historical (see above). 2.
Symbolic. The four world-streams in their high
signilicance, as the streams of lile and blessing that
flow conditionally from the paradisaical home of
man. — T/te trees in the garden. Historical : The
abundance that surrounded the first man still simple
and conformable to his childlike degree; food both
lovely to the eye and ennobling in its efficacy. Sym-
bolical: The riches of the pious and their freedom
from want (Ps. xxiii.). — The two trees in the midst of
the garden. Historical: Nature in its centre endowed
with a wonderful power of health, as also with intoxi-
cating gifts of dangerous efficacy, which, through an
enjoyment rash or immoderate (or, in general, having
ordy the form of nourishment), exert a destructive in-
tluence, and both alike represented there by a cen-
tral vegetable formation, whether it be tfee or bush.
Symbolical : The tree of life : The power of health
and life in nature, which, in connection with the
word ol God, ruses to a fountain of everlasting life in
Christ soteriologically, and to be the nourishment of
everlasting life in Christ sacramentally. — The tree of
knowUdge of good and evil. Nature as the tree of
probation every way, namely in excessive, in dan-
gerous, and in forbidden means of enjoyment. — TIte
paradisaical cominand. Historical: The warning,
inviting, and dissuading signs of Goil in the produc-
tions of nature themselves, and the transformation
of the signs into miraculous words lor the ear through
the present spirit of God. The mention ol all the
trees in the garden is in so far a command as the
arbitrary aoslinence from permitted enjoyment ha3
for its consequence the inclination to forbidden en-
joyment. There is also a reminder in it that he has
no need of the loibidden enjoyment. Symbolical:
The reveah'd will of liod, in general, not a constraint
nor an abridgiiieut, but only a healthful bariier foi
the sake of freedom and happiness.- -7'Ae beasts
brought before Adam in Paradise, Historical
Original sympathy between the animal and the humai
worlds. Symbolical: The destiny of man, to learii
to understand, through the gospel, the sigliing of the
creature, or to have, in general, a right knowledge
of the animal-world and of nature, and how rightly
to use them. — 'Jhc naming of the beus's. Historical.
First exercise of the human sjiirit — ;md especially of
speech. Symbolical: The religious and scientific
CHAP. II. 4-2S.
an
levelopment of man through nature. — Human speech.
Hinlorical : Hereditary disposition taking root in the
very life of the spirit and its plastic organization,
awakened through the most excited coulemplations
of childhood — such as that of life in the beast.
Symbolical : Man's tirst prophecy of nature, a presage
of his destiny to know and predict perfectly the law
and gospel of nature. — Tlie creation of woman.
Historical: The formation of the human pair falls in
the period of the physiological creation of the man.
Not after the manner of ready-made or at once com-
pleted being, but in the way of becoming, does the
one developing human form become perfected in tlie
contrast of one man and woman. Man, as a per-
Bouality, is not conditioned through sexual comple-
tion or integration ; and man and wife are not, some-
how, only two halves which make one whole in a
personal sense, but perhaps in a social. The wife,
however, is just as much whole man as the man
himself She proceeds not only from the substance
of the man, Ijut :ilso from his trance-vision m that
deathlike sleep into which he had been cast by God.
In respect to substance, as formed from one of man's
ribs, she comprehends less than Adam ; in respect to
form she is a creation of secondary power in the
region of paradise. God brings Eve to Adam. Mar-
riage is instituted by God, not only in respect to the
divine creation of its contrast, but also in respect to
the divine guidance of the individual choice. Man
must not anticipate the decision of God, but neither
is he to reject the destined one whom God brings
before him — the one who through a divine revela-
tion, as it were, and a divine consideration, is marked
out for him as his counterpart. — Admits salutation
and blessing. Si/mbolical : The first of all high and
sacred songs of love. Marriage the principle of the
family state, superordinate to all other domestic rela-
tions. Marriage m contrast with the sins of sodomy
and fornication — in contrast with incest (leaving
father and motiier, etc.) — in contrast with an arbitra-
ry and sinful taking and forsaking. (The paradisai-
cal indissolubility of marriage is conditioned upon its
paradisaical infallibility.) Duties to father and mo-
ther receive an emphasis from the fact that they are
measured by the law of love. The greatness and the
limit of the parental right. It extends to, but not
into, the marriage state. — The nakedness of the Jirst
human beings. Symbolical: The childlike simplicity,
the freedom, beauty, and majesty of innocence.
[ExccRSDS ON THE Paradise Rivers. — The Search
for the Gihon and the Pishon in the north is attended
with the greatest difficulties. Chief auiong them is
the necessity it involves of finding another Gush in
the same direction. The language of the writer gives
the impression of a territory of great comparative ex-
tent, and that could not easily be misunderstood by a
reader familiar with the geographical terms employed.
BIS y-X hzi a=:on sin: that is, the river that
goes round the whole land of Gush — clear round it —
4^de and notable circuit. The sense of winding or
meandering throxujh cannot be got from the verb,
tnd the references to Is. xxiii. 16, and other places
f-fl' ■'20, 1-'3 130 , Ps. xlviii. 13 : Go round about
the city — round about Zion), do not support it. Tlie
sncient view that the Gihon was the Nile, and Pishon
ihe Indus, though having difficulties of another Idnd,
.8 more near to what would seem to be the general
idea of the passage : four great rivers (waters rather)
prominent in the earth, and having their courses, in
lomc way, connected with Eden.. Even if the Nile
and the Indus are no' the rivers, it is more easy ti
see how they came to be anciently, and almost uni
versally, so regarded, than to find anything corre
spending to this graphic representation in the regioi
north of the Euphrates and the Hiddekel or Tigris
One thing is clear on the very face of the account:
the writer himself had no difficulty, and thought of
none for the reader. He is certainly not speaking
of things supposed to be obliterated by the deluge,
but of places recognized, however vaguely, in the
knowledge of the day. To tills assumed knowledge
the picture is presented, thougli with that inadequacy
of conception, and that generahty or undefinednesa
of language, which necessarily marked the tirst
geographical notions of mankind. It was very much
as an early Greek writer would have done, in a simi-
lar case, who had nothing else to go by hut the map
of Eratosthenes, or the still older one of Hecataeus.
This does not at all detract from the inspiration of
the account, whether we adopt the vision-theory, or
some more objective mode of raising the conceptiona
in the narrator's mmd. In either case such concep-
tions would be shaped by his supposed knowledge,
as this would also be the ground of presentation to
other minds. The picture which St. John had of the
Euphrates, in his apocalyptic vision, was doubtless
according to the geographical ideas, more or less
correct, which he had previously possessed of that
river. Geographical language has undergone a great
change. Everything now, and for a long time, has
been so precisely defined that we need to get out of
our modern conceptions to be m a condition to under-
stand satisfactorily the most ancient modes of divid-
ing and describing the earth. The nomenclature has
become greatly enlarged and varied. We have rivers,
lakes, seas (the Greeks in Homer's time called these
two last by one name, \<.v.vt\), oceans, friths, arms of
the sea, gults, bays, sounds, etc. In the eariiest
times they were not fixed, and we cannot be always
certain, therefore, that a general name Uke nn: , a
Jlood or flowing water, presented just that limited
conception in every case that we now invariably con-
nect with river, flumen, irorauf's, etc. For examples
of the wide sense of "ins, see such passages as Ps.
xciii. 3 : The floods Uft up their voice, min: , lift
up their dashing waves, o-'ST; Ps. Ixvi. 6, it is join-
ed with c , and most obviously used of the Red
Sea ; see also Ps. Ixxxix. 26. So Hab. iii. 8, where
D^'tns: and ca are spoken of in the same way;
comp. Is. xlviii. 18. We deduce, too, this wide
primitive sense from its employment in metaphors
where there is to be denoted width, enlargement,
fulness; Peace like a river, "in:3 , Is. Ixvi. 12, like
a flood ; so Is. lix. 19, enemy come in Uke a flood.
Beyond the floods of Gush, Is. xviii. 1 ; the same
expression, Zeph. iii. 10. See especially Jonah ii. 4:
■'Jnao^ in: , the flood went round me (the deep
sea); compare with this Homer's wKiavoi' fueipa,
streams of ocean, Iliad xiv. 245. So it seero= to be
used, not so much of a river, in the limited sense, aa
of any great water, in such passages as Job xxii. 16,
Ps. xlvi. 6. In Ps. xxiv. 2 it denotes the floods of
cliaos, the old Tehom rabbah, or " great deep," and
is put in direct parallelism with ca^ : For He hath
founded it upon the seas, and built it upon the flood*,
mn3 57 . See the same word used in the same
way, Ezek. xxxi. 15.
Thus the inj , or great water, in the passage be
ais
GENESIS, OK THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
fore us, Gen. ii. 10. In the Eden territory itself it
might have had the form of a lake — an idea, in fact,
which the whole aspect of the account greatly favors.
It was certainly rot a spring or fountain-head to four
commencing streams, but rather a reservoir in which
all were joined, whether as flowing in or flowing out.
From thence tl'.ey were parted, or began to be parted
(inS" , see remark on T^'iV and references, p. 202)
into lour C^wS^ . This is rendered heads in our ver-
sion, and so the Vulgate, in quatuor capita. But they
both mislead in their literalness; the Hebrew CSi
never having, like our word, the sense of fouutiiin-
head or spring; tlie Shemitic tongues called the re-
mote upper part of a stream a font or a finger rather
than a head. It became four principal waters or
floods, four arms (brachia) or great branches. Two
of these were rivers within the modern limits of the
term, but very great rivers ; so that one comes after-
wards to be almost constantly called 1~3 with the
article as a proper name — the great river, the sea or
flood. See Gen. xv. 18 ; xxxi. 21 ; Num. xxii. 6 ;
Deut. i. 7; xi. 24; Josh. xxiv. 2, 3, 14, 15; 2 Sam.
X. 16; Neh. ii. 7; Is. vii. 20; xi. 15; xxvii. 12 and
others. From such a use as this, perhaps, came the
more common secondary or specific appUcation of ~n3
to rivers proper. The other two, probably, presented
a different appearance. Beyond the l^ouuds of the
Eden territory they may have become friths, or arms
of the sea, or two diverging shores of a great water
80on losing sight of each other, yet each still keeping
the name in: as more applicable, in fact, to them
(if we may judge from its primary sense) than to the
streams on tiie north.
Such a view may not, at first, seem in harmony
with our preconceptions, but there are considerations
to be mentioned which, on closer examination, will
more and more divest it of any strange or forced
appearance. In the first place, two of these cnns
are determined, and we may regard them as furnish-
ing the necessary data for the determination of the
others according to some sense once clearly recog-
nized. They are waters in close and even immediate
connection with the Euphrates and the Tigris, not at
their obscure sources, or springs, where they could
not be recognized as D"'"n3 , but where they both
appear as parting from a common junction in the
Eden-laud. The two well-known branches are north
of this junction ; we must, therefore, look for the
others on the soutli, and the region first to be exam-
ined in our searcli for Eden is that in which the
Euphrates and the Tigris come together. This was
near the head of the I'ersian (iulf, where most of the
ancient authorities agreed in fixing it, anil to which
place also there points a concurrence of Arabian and
Persian tradition. Uere Calvin and Bochart find it.
But wliere, then, are the two southern a'^n: , one
of which goes round the land of Havilah, the land of
gold (India, says the Jerusalem Targum), anil the
other goes round the whole land of Cush, that is,
Southern Arabia (see Gen. x. 7 ; 1 Kings x. 1 ;
UoMKK' Odi/is. i. 20)? Tlie branches of the Schat
al Arab, which completes the juuciion of the Eu-
phrates and the Tigris, fall altogether short of this
graphic description. We might regard this delta as
the remains of the ancient confluence in Eden, but it
will not inswer for I'ishon and Gihon. The key to
the dilliculty, we think, will suggest itaelt', if the
reader will keep in mini die view here taken of
"IMS , and carry it with him in a steady conten.platios
of all the waters that meet in this region of tht
earth. An ancient map, suoh as that of Ptolemy
or Strabo, or the still eariier one of Hecatseus, would
be best for this purpose ; but the simplest delineation
could hardly fail to awake the thought that in the
general contour of the system of waters presented by
these two mighty streams as they come down from
the north, and the two diverging seas, or shores of
seas, that, parting just below their junction, sweep
round the land of India on the one side, and Arabia
on the other, we have the data that determine for ua
the location of the ancient Eden-land. It suggests,
too, the origin of the general language, and of %his
special naming. Knowledge has not yet introduced
geographical distinctions ; the internal wastes of seas
and their connections are unknown ; the pioneers or
travellers on either diverging shore simply recognize
them as two great waters, two mighty C'lns , and
they name them according to their most visible char-
acteristics and directions. Hence the earliest repre-
sentation, which is afterwards enlarged and becomes
a fixed tradition. One is the broad-sjireiuUng Pishou,
trending far away to the eastern land of gold and
diamonds, the other is the deep-fiowing Gihon (com-
pare the favorite epithet of Homer's " Ocean-River,'
Badvp^oav 'nKiavoio, Odyss. xi. 13; Jliad xiv. 311),
surging far round to the south and the west. Ob
serve, too, the contrast they present to the other
names, the fertilizing Euphrates (DIE), and the swift-
darting Hiddekel or Tigris. The inland and mari-
time features could hardly have been distinguished
by more significant epithets.*
But such an opinion should be fortified by histor-
ical argument, and this, we think, is found in a fact
of Greek archaeology, having much interest for its
own sake, but to which sufficient attention has not
been given in its bearing on the names, and the
primitive significance, of these neharim. Homer
calls Oceanus a river. It had been so called, doubt-
less, long before his time. He connects with it, in-
deed, much wild mythology, but that does not affect
the fact, nor the interest, of such a naming. Wh»uce
came it? It is not a sufficient explanation to call it
poetical. All early conceivings of nature were poeti-
cal in this sense of vastness and wonder. The great
unknown of things was full of it, and the wonderful
was ever divine. Hence Ho.mek's divine ether, divine
fire, divine sea (aidepus eV Si'tj^ — .aeiTTiiSaes itxip — ety
aKa h'lau, Jliad xvl. 31)5; xii. 177; Odt/ss. v. 261—
compare bs ""Tin , montes Dei, Ps. xxxvi. 7). But
Homer, though a poet, speaks here in the most mat-
ter-of-fact style. He believes in Oceanus as he be-
lieves in the Peneus and the Euiotas. Ulysses navi-
gates this ocean-river in a black sliip; lie sails along
its one shore until he leaves it and enters the Kv^xa
daAduir-ns. the swell of the inland sea, Odyss. X. 639;
xi. 1. Homer's poetry makes him none ilie kss a
good witness for i lie mo.-;t ancient geographical ideas,
and to this purpose does the prosaic Stralio speak in
quoting him : '• Homer," he .says, 'not only calls the
great ocean a river [-noTaf^hv Kal Trorafxoio /^oof), hut
gives the same name to a part of it ; otherwi.^'e he
would have (absurdly) represented Ulysses as goiiig
uul of the occim into the ocean." See Stuabo: \'\h.
i. 75 ; also Ub. i. 3 ; ii. 3, 5 ; ii, 18, where he .speaks
of the lour great sinuses wliicli were regarded as in-
* [The annexed figure woulii presieut the outline appear-
ance uf the sapposed Eden-region, with its four great watera
or Deharim, atj given by the modem mavK -.
CHAP. II. 4-26.
•2U
lets from the ocean-stream, the Caspian and the Pon-
tus on the north and the Persian and Arabian sinus
on the south. See, also, how he speaks in other
places of the Northern Occiinus, and its supposed
conneotious. It is worthy of note, too, how Homer's
frequent puos, and Stral)o's use of it in his remarks
upon him, corresponds to the primary sense of the
Hebrew nnj , as a full, maje.stic flowing rather than
B gliding or rapid running stream, like rtvns or
amni«. It would take up too much space to cite
other passages from the Greek poets, Herodotus, etc.,
where similar language is used. One reference, how-
ever, may be made to Pindar; Pi/lh. Carm. iv. 250,
iv t' uinfatfov Trf\dyea<Tt ttoctcd t* epu^paj,
because in it this river Oceanus is directly connected
with the Persian Gulf. Jason is represented as re
turning " by the channels of Oceanus and the Ery
thrian or Red Sea," by which name the Greeks de
nominated not the Egyptian but the Persian sinus.
JosKPHUs names it in the same vf^y,Ant. lib. i. ch. I
3, where he says " tlie Euphrates and the Tigris gc
down into the Red Sea, whilst Gihon (Geon, as h«
calls it) runs through Egypt, the (ireeks calling it the
Nile." He seems to have regarded the Egyptian
river as in some way connected with the Scripture
Gihon on the unknown South.
This usus loquendi may be explained by suppos
ing that the sons of Javan, Elisa and Tarshish, Kit-
tim and Rodanim, carried it with them from the old
N
*
LAND or NARRATOR
AFRICAN CUSH
The maps of Ptolemy and of Eratosthenes make the Persian Gulf a lake, or nearly so, which misht represent the
Eden reservoir, or the one nahar, afterwards become a marshy collection of waters of wider extent like that which now
represents the doomed cities of the plain with their ancient Eden-like fertility. The representation of the old maps miKhl
not have been wholly due to imperfect knowledge. It might be accounted for by supposing changes no greater than an
mown to have tattenplace in the old Batavian region of the Zuyder Zee and the delta of the Rhine. Strabo confirms tb«
maps on the authority of Polycletus, who says that " the Tigris, tocrether with the Euteus and the Ohoaspes (on th6 Sast),
nowarst into a lake and then into the sea "—and of Onosicritus who says that "the two rivers, the Euphrates and the
ngiTS, empty en nji. Ki.ij.n,v," which properly me.ins a salt-lake or marsh. See Stribo : Lib. xv. ch. iii. 4.
on almost any hypothesis it would seem impossible that the Eden-region could have been in the mountainons Anne-
nia. It ia expressly said to have been Dtp's . and it is not at all p.isy to suppose a place for the narrator to which Arme
Bia would have been either east or north-east.— T. I,.l
220
GEN'ESIS, OR TUE FIRST BOOK OF M(-iSES.
home-land in the east, and applied it in their pioneer-
ing among the friths and sounds of the Mediterranean.
The Egyptians, or sous of Ham, had it in the same
wav ; and this makes simple a!id natural what other-
irise might seem forced or far-fetched, in such an
Interpretation of tlie earliest geographical language.
This idea, too, of a great Oceanus river with its one
far-stretching contiuuity of shore winding round an
extensive portion of the earth, must have had its
origin in tlie east, and in that region of it where two
such vast shores met each other, and, at tlie same
time, some great inland water. It would never have
come from any aspect of things presented to tlie first
migrations in the Mediterranean with its many islands,
sinuses, friths, and sounds, ever breaking up such
continuity, and seldom affording a Tiew iu which
land does not show itself, however distantly, in some
direction. Hence it was that this part of the earth
pot the name of " the isles of the sea," so frecjuent in
Scripture. As such, it became opposed to the conti-
nent or main eastern land of Asia ; the two together
making up the world, or orbii terrarum, and thus
presented in the parallelism of Ps. xcvii. 1 :
Jehovah reigns, let the earth (the land) rejoice,
Let the many isles be glad.
If we suppose that tlie Phoenicians in their earliest
voyages carried with them this idea of the Ocean-
river, they must have had it from some more primi-
tive source, and this is the more easily understood if
we ad'ypt the tradition mentioned by Strabo, hb. i.
ch. ii. 'io, that the Phoenicians, in distinction from
the Sidonians, came to the Mediterranean from the
neighoorhood of the Indian Ucean and the Persian
Gulf.
The roving Greek imagination, as usual, carried
the thing farther than the no less vivid but more
sober Shemitic. They prolonged the course of the
Ocean-river, not only round the Arabian, but also
the Western or African Ethiopia (see HoM. : Odi/ss.
i. 23; I/ia'l i. 423; Pind.: Fi/t/i. iv. 2fi ; Herod, iv.
42), and so clear round Africa itself as they conceived
it to be. On the other hand, the eastern flood turned
north, and encompassed the boreal regions, and so
the idea became complete of a jtoth^os, or ^(ios, that
encircled the earth, according to the Orphic or Ho-
meric description :
*n«eo»'os T€ Ttfpt^ eVi vSaai •yaiai' iKiiraxp.
The idea appears in all the old representations of
the world down to the map of Ptolemy, and in this
point of view it is i^ot extravagant to regard the
Bcriptvnal account of the Paradise-streams as the seed
from which it all grew. Once loosed from its sober
scri]itural moorings and Ijccome a myth, there was
no limit to the fancy. It was trau.sferred to every
groat and unknown sea, and the legend of Jason, the
old ocean circumnavigator, arose from the de.<iri' ever
manifested by the Greeks to give to every world-idea
that came to them a national aspect. Hence it look
90 many traditional forms. I'iudar, as we have seen,
yiakes him return home by the way of the I*ersiau
Gulf anil vDtliiopia; Appollonius Khodius brings him
back h\ the Ister, or Danube, and a branch, uv lirenk-
Vfffy of the ocean-streani (aTro^pu;^ 'n'reai/yiu ; ^cc
Aryomtulica iv. 283, 037), into the Ionian, and so,
rounil ag^ n, into the dangerous Libyan Sea; whilst
the writei if the other Anjonaulicu (falsely ascribed
lo Orpheus) gets him somehow into the hori'al
regions, making him return by the Gcinian Ocean
»nd 'Ifp*?), the most ancient name for Ireland, See
also the treatise Df Mutido, falsely ascribed to Ari»
totle (Arist. : Opera, Leip. iv. sect. 3d). So again
Strabo tells us (lib. i. ch. ii. 10) that Homer trans
ferred some things from the Pontus, such as the
Symplagades and the Aa'an isle of Circe, to the voyage
of L'lysscs — that sea having been anciently regardec*
as another Oceanus. It may be said, too, that when
the primitive idea began to float aw:iy into the
boundless and unknown, Gush went with it, pass-
ing over into Eastern Africa, the land of the Habesse-
nians (Abyssinians), ^, ,,,v, a*^! i jOs\ , as the Judaico-
Araljic translator (Arabs Erpeuianus) renders tiiie
very name Ci: in the place before us. Gen. ii. 13.
^Ethiopia is afterwards carried still farther south and
west, and the name is sometimes given to what was
obscurely known of Western and Central Africa, oi
the land of the Niger and Senegal. Thus it be-
comes a word for the remote and unknown regions
of the South,* as Tarshish is used lor the distant
West. In this way, we think, it is employed Zeph.
iii. 10, and Is. xviii. 1, the land of the shadow of
wings, D"'B:3 bsbs V^X (so the Syriac renders it,
) =i^< |1V I- li>j)), terra wmbrm alarum, that is,
as Abulwalid explains it, whose wings or sides are
shaded (obscure or unknown) — the land ^"injD ^asB
U313 J beyond the floods of Cvsh. The thought gives
force and vividness to the passage Ps. Ixviii. 32 :
Even Gush shall stretch forth (y^T, cause to run
swiftly or eagerly) her hands unto God. The two
lands of Cush, '" tlie one at the rising (the Arabian
Gush) and the other at the .setting sun " (the African),
were distinguished in Homer's day, and it is not
ditticult to see how the African jithiopians came
from the Arabian, or Sabiean, Cush, by crossing the
lower narrow part of the Red Sea (one of the wind-
ings of the Gihon), instead of being derived liom the
Egyptians abo\'e, that is, from Mizraim, the younger
brother of Cush. In thus regarding the Red Sea as
a continuation of the Gdioii, as in fact it was, if our
view be correct, we may understand how the Nile
may have become connected with the name, and
afterwards been taken for the Gihon itself
The Indian Ocean in the most ancient times was
the widest extent of water known. It was, too,
nearer the primitive birth-place of man in the East,
and, therefore, known before the Mediterranean.
Even after men became acquainted with the latter,
it was, in comparison with the older water, but a
AiAti'7?, or a ^d\aaaa, an irregular broken mass oi
bays and islands instead of one long continuous flow.
Here, therefore, in this earlier region of the Indian
and Persian seas should we naturally look for the
origin of that name Okeanos which it is so difficult
to deduce from the tireek. This is what Diodorue
Siculus does, Lib. i. lit, in what he says of the ,ioiir-
ney of Osiris to Inilia. The derivation of Okeanos
from wKvs i'ot*>, as we tind it in some of our lexicoua,
is wholly untenable, since fdai denotes only the trick-
* Our English vtr.sion of Is. xviii. \ mars the ])as.'yig
by its rendering of the interjection iir " AVoc to tlic himi
etc." It should bo IIo, as in Is. h. 1, S^S hD ■'Tl
•'Ho, every one that thirsteth." Whe'.her it is a particU'
of tlircittcning, of luracntation, or of invitation, deiiends en-
tiiely on the context. Here it is ii call to the far-otT: Ho,
to the land of the shadow of wings— the land of the expand-
ed vving--i— beyond the (loods of Cash— beyond the Oihon, tha
anciout river that went round the whole land of ^'^thlopia
Ho, to the remotest Cush I~T. li.i
CHAP. II. 4-25.
22
dtp Sow of a fountain, and oikus never enters into
»n_v of the many epithets of ocean used by the poets,
which it could hardly h;ive avoided doing had it be-
longed to the radical idea of the name. 'CtH^avus is
BaS^rpf>oos. Ba^vKVLLOiv. /8adi>5irT;s, fvfi^oos^ elC, but
never iiKvpfiuos. Besides, the to lias every appearance
of a prefix, being cither a privative (turned into cu),
as Suidas holds to accommodate it to an absurd deri-
vatijn of his own, or, as is far more likely, the ar-
ticle lengthened — the kean, or keon. The etymology
which traces it to ogyges, ogen, ai77>oi (if there ever
was such a word in Greek) has as little support in
any traceable signiticance, as in any tenable phonetic
ground. A word meaning ancient could never have
been a primitive name, although, inversely, such a
name as Okeanos, when its primitive significance
had been lost, might be used for the old and the un-
known. We may disregard, in the same way, what
is said of the Coptic oukarne and the Arabic ka7nus.
The true explanation of this name will, we think,
suggest itself in a careful consideration of tour
things: 1. The obvious fact that the <u is a prefix, as
Suidas regards it, and that it must, therefore, be the
article ; 2. what Josephus says when he calls Gihon
•yfiDv, Geon, as mentioned in the scriptural descrip-
tion of this great encompassing water ; 3. the graphic
nature of the Scripture language as suggesting an
idea held and emotionally conceived by the writer
and his first readers ; 4. the part of the world in
which, even according to Greek historians, the name
Okeanos had its origin. In the hght of these con-
jiderations there is no extravagance in saving that
Q-fcar-os is 0 Vi-^f — fi Viuiv — 6 Kittiv — 6 Keai/.* In
'.ther words, it is the o\i\ full-flowing Gihon that was
connected with the Eden-territory, and whose long
winding shore went round that land of Gush in the
neighborhood of which the name was first found.
This is in perfect accordance with the usage of the
oot rfj , or n'; , wherever it occurs. It does not
denote turbulence (an angi'y river). That notion has
come from the effort to connect the Gihon with the
Araxes (Greek : aoarju). It denotes, rather, force
and fulness (see Job xxxvii. 8), like the Sadiippoo^,
which is such a favorite epithet for 'nKeat'os, and
hence stateliness, as in the Aramaic, where it is used
of a soldier or an army issuing forth to battle. So
Pishon, the spreading (redundant), the wide-flowing,
(upuTropo%, from T^^S , dispergere — a fluvio redun-
dante, Ges. ; comp. Hab. i. 8 ; MaL iii. 20 or iv. 2 ;
Jer. I. 11. The image is wholly lost in the Phasis,
or any other stream in the mountains of Armenia,
where some have so earnestly sought to find it.
The difliculty of finding any other place for Eden
out the neighborhood of the Persian Gulf is shown
in the labored effort to transfer the famed Cush of
the Scriptures, or the "land beyond the floods of
Cush " (the terra obuiiibrata^ or " land of the shadow
of wings," Is. xviii. 1, with its expanduig bounds), to
■ ^* [The Greeks never allow the ft, either as aspirate or as
gTmural, to st-and in the middle or at the end of a word,
either native or derived. Such a word, therefore, as Gihon,
Kihoa, or Kehan, would necessarily become Geon, as we
have it in Josephus, kcwc, or iceai'. Just so the Hebrew
C^-n •'3 , Ge-hinncm, Gehenna, becomes ye'ewa; '3ni"' ,
Johacan, lohan, becomes luaf, 'luai^c. In roots, too,
allied to the Shemitic, they have k for y, as Hebrew ; b'33
■Greek : kvK — kvAi'ui, kvAiVSo) ; Hebrew : 5353 — Greek :
cvkAos. The article having become constant as a prefix in
k'Kcafos, and lengthened because of its em| basis, shows the
former particularity of the name, and at the same time its
celebrity^: The Gibon, the Kehan, the (tea*', the Ocean-
•ivor.- T. L.)
the Caucasian tribe of the Cossaeans {KuaaaToi) bare
ly mentioned by Diodorus and Strabo along with th«
.Mardi, the Uxii, the Elymaei, and other predatorj
hordes of like insignificance who inhabited the sterile
plains near the Caspian lake. If we studiously com
pare Is. xviii. 1 and Zeph. iii. 10 with Gen. ii. 13, thf
inference can hardly be avoided that "innsb 13S13
'a'3 , "bei/ond the floods of Cush," can mean noth.
ing more nor less than beyond the enconipassing
Gihon, ai3 yiH is ns 33ion nnjn , " the flood
or water that goes round the whole land of Cush."
In truth, what other floods or water can it mean!
Such a description would never have been lost, and
must be supposed to have been in the mind of every
subsequent writer, prophet, or historian, that refero
to a land so surrounded. A like studious contempla
tion will convince us that Ps. Ixviii. .32 ; Is. xviii. 1,
and Zeph. iii. 10, are all one prophecy, the gathering
of God's chosen, His suppliant people, na ■'ins
■'SIB, as Zephaniah calls them, dispersed to the re-
motest regions of the earth^beyond the floods of
Cush, beyond the Gihon, even from the remoter
^Ethiopia, just as " Tarshish and the isles," Ps. Ixxil
10, are used to indicate remoteness in the other
direction.
It only remains to fortify what has been said by
adverting to the fact that this mode of speech (that
is, calling the sea a river, or a stream, and, inversely,
a great river a sea) remained in the Hebrew down to
its latest use as a living language. We may refer to
Is. xix. 5, where the Nile is called both C"' and inj
in the same verse ; Is. xxvii. 1, the leviathan or croc-
odile, c:, in the se»- Is. xxi. 1, the burthen o(
the desert of the sea, srtpposed to mean Babylon oi
the Euphrates ; Job xli. 23, where the Xile is indi-
cated ; Nah- iii- 8, the same ; see also Ezek. xxxu. 2,
Zech. X. 11, and others, and compare Koran Surat
XX. 39, where, in the same manner, the Arabic iHr '
(c^n) is given as a name to the river, when it is said
that Moses was cast into the sea, and the sea cast
him, with the ark, upon the shore. See also LuD. de
DiEU: Critica Sacra, 555, and Bochart: Bierozoi-
can, vol. ii. 789, where he cites Pliny as calling the
shore of the Nile not ripam, but lit-us, a name usual-
ly given to the shore of the sea. Compare, more-
over, the long note on the oceanic streams of West-
ern Asia in Rawlinson's Herodotus, Appendix, vol.
i. p. 446. The usage still exists in the Oriental lan-
guages. To this day •<\ 1 1| , the sea, is applied in
Arabic not only to the Xile, but to any great _;?«mCT!,
or wide-flowing water ; and they speak of the shore
of such a river as they would of the shore of the
sea. If the account in Genesis had been originally
given in the Arabic language, whether in its oldest
or latest forms, there can hardly be a doubt that it
would have been expressed in similar terms. The
word -So would have been alike applicable to the
great inland rivers and the two long winding oceanic
shores.
Nor is such usage so strange as it might at first
seem to our stricter occidental logic. Rigorously
defined as inland streams, our greatest and oul
smallest rivers have the same specific appellation.
To the eye, too, that views them merely as traced
upon the map, they all appear as single lines. To
the actual sight, however, and to the emotion, thi
222
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
case ia quite different. These refuse the logic that
would place the Amazon and the Tweed in the same
category. Such mighty sea-like Sowings as the St.
Lawrence and the Mississippi claim more affinity to
the Atlantic and the oceanic Gulf-streain than to the
canal-like Mohawk, or to the mountain-torrent of the
Housatonic. From the actual and the emotional,
thu9 regarded, arose this early language which is still
etjntinueu, in the East, in its apphcation to such
rivers as the Euphrates, the Indus, and the Nile. In
the same manner, iu our North-Ameiican Indian
tongues, is the term '' great water," like the Hebrew
bnjn Tnjn , used not only of an arm of the sea, or
of the great lakes, but even of such rivers as the
Ohio and the Missouri. Such a mode of speech is,
in iact, one of the striking evidences of the subjec-
tive truthfulness of this early scriptural account. It
represents an actual, though perhaps indefinite,
knowledge, and the emotional naming that grows
naturally out of it. It shows that it is not itself a
myth, though, doubtless, the seed of myths that
afterwards came out of it. Legends, historical or
geographical, are the result of a later process. They
do not belong to the most primitive ages, occupied,
as they must be, with the greatness and novelty of
the real as it lies before the sense. The mythical
succeeds. It betrays a semipnilosophizing spirit, a
disposition to create an ideal by carrying the actual
beyond its ascertained or supposed bounds, or to
make some primitive knowledge, or event, the repre-
sentative of a wide unknown. In this early story of
the Eden-streams there is the seed of the Egyptian
and the Greek oceanic legends. Its sober truthful
character, Uke that of the modest Hebrew chronology,
is shown by its matter-of-fact limitation, and its evi-
dent appeal to existing observation. The mythical
spirit would have carried the Pishon and the Gihon
not only round Havilah and the whole land of Cush,
but, as it afterwards did, round the whole earth
known or unknown. This Eden account, too, may
be regarded as the beginning of geography. We
need only trace the successive delmeations of the
earth, from the earliest map of Hecatasus down to
that of Ptolemy and the modem charts of the world,
to have the thought suggested that their ever-widen-
ing scales were simply expansions from this primitive
central sketch. — T. L.]
HOMILETICAL AND PRAOTICAi.
In relation to the whole section. — • God's govern-
ment of men in the beginning. — His covenant vnth
Adam. 1. His gift and blessings: a. The soil of the
earth prepared for man ; b. the hand of God the in-
strument of his formation ; c. the breath of (lod, his
Innermost life ; d. Paradise his home, the wide earth
his country; e. the abundance of Paradise his food ;
/. tlie beasts his school for the study of form, aud his
attendant service; g. the wife his lielper. 2. The com-
mands laid upon him in Paradise : a. To dress the gar-
den and to keep it ; b. to beware of the tree of know-
ledge of good and evil ; c. to give names to the
bcasi* (that is, contemplate, recognize,* and distin-
gu-sl 'he nature of things) ; d, to keep holy the soci-
•lOcn. ii. 19: To tct what he weald coll them, PIS^^
K^P^ nifl . As ttia ia commonJy read and understood,
f'^Ji^b , to see, is referred to Ood. It corresponds, how-
ever, >iett *r with the eflntoxt, and the view that Lun^e takep
of it, Ui refer it to A tim in the Hcnso of judging— iUii ni^iht
of tbe mil. i— an oasi y derived secondary sense, appearing in
ety { marriage. — The glory of God as displayed ii
the first paradisaical world (His power, wisdom, good
ness, love). — The creation of man : 1. So grand th«
preparation made for him (vers. 4-B) ; 2. so wonder
fully and richly grounded (ver. 1), so carefully es-
tablished (vers. 8-18), and so gloriously completed
(vers. 19-25). — The appearing of man upon the
earth as the revelation of its destiny : 1. The presen-
tation of its fundamental idea, of its purport, its
aim ; 2. the perfection of its structure ; 3. the solving
of its enigma; 4. the consecration of its being;
5. the bond of its connection with heaven ; 6. the
beginning of its transformation from a state of pure
nature to a paradisaical spirit-world. — Man and
nature. Man: 1. The elevation of nature; 2. the
exaltation of nature, and at the same time, 3. the
pupil of nature. — The first transformation of nature
through the entrance of the first man a prognostic
of its second transformation through the second
man, the one from heav.n (1 Cor. xv.). — The history
of Adam a history of the heaven and the earth. —
The reflected splendor of the glory of the first hu-
manity in the glory of Paradise.— The inward connec-
tion and reciprocity between man and nature : 1. His
innocence, its beauty and its peace ; 2. his fall, its
ruin or subjection to the " law of vanity ; " 3. his
resurrection, its hope of renewed glory. — The man
and his wife as the crowning work of creation. —
The bridal of Adam a presignal of the marriage
supper of the Lamb (Rev. xix. 7). — The old as well
as the new world prepared for a marriage chamber.
The First Section (vers. 4-6). — The earth waiting
for man, a figure of the humanity waiting for the
God-Man.
I'he Seco7id Seclimi (ver. 7). — The creation of man.
1. The formation of man the work of God's master-
hand ; 2. the nature of man : akin to tlie earth and
akin to God, or at the same time earthly and divine ;
3. the character of man as a tmit, a Uving soul. —
Man in his unity, in his duality, — in his threefold
nature. — The original human dust of the earth in the
splendor of heaven.
77ie Third Section (vers. 8-14). — Paradise. —
Paradise: 1. As a fact in the e«rth, the bloom of the
earth, the home of the first man; 2. as an emblem,
of the paradisaical disposition of the earth, of its
paradisaical power, namely for children and iu festal
contemplation, of its paradisaical prefiguration, as of
the new paradise in the other world and in this.
The Fourth Section (vers. 15-18). — The first man in
Paradise. His relation to the earth-world, to Paradise,
to the vegetable world, to the animal world, to Eve.
— -The Paradise-life, moreover, not an unrestricted
state: 1. Limitation of action: the calling (to dress
and keep); 2. limitation of enjoyment (not to eat of
the tree of knowledge of good and evil) ; 3. hmitations
in the treatment of nature and especially of the
beasts (no enclosing); 4. limitations on human
society (regulation of marriage aud domestic life). —
The restrictions upon life the measure and the de-
other places in the use of this common verb, and beeoming,
in fact, predominant in the Rabbinical Hebrew. It is sim-
ply the tran-sfi-r that takes place in the Greek ei5-oi5 (tc
.s'gff, to knoiv), and ptabaps in most lantniagcs : that Adam
uiipht »« ( judee), wliat lie would call them. It denotes nn
intuirion or an intuitive judgment — the fiist callinc out of
his faculties in the ub..^ervation oi thinu's. It is no olijei.tinr
to the other sense tl.at it is nntbroiH)j)atliJc, nlthoucb it
would seem to re]iresout sometliint: like einausif y on the part
of Deity. The view taken, however, wbieli is equally cor-
rect, lo.vically and Kraiiuuaticaily, makes it the betriniiina
of the first develojiment of lantniai'C in the perception ol
some intuitive fitness between nrrooi and tb'nps named.
T. L.1
(;UAF. 11. 4-26.
22S
relopment of freedom. The ground features of the
paradisaical life : heavenly innocence, festal work,
pure enjoyment, clear knowledge, quiet waiting (the
deep sleep), inward love and greeting, unconstrained
and childlike being. — Single verses and themes.
Ver. 4. The history of the heaven and the earth in
the history of man. — Tlie rich significance of the
Dame Jehovah-Elohim : 1 . Jehovah is Elohim ; 2.
Elohim is Jehovah (analogous to the New Testament
In respect to the name Jesus Christ, that is, Jesus is
Christ, Christ is Jesus). — Ver. 6. The world witliout
Qian a desert ; the world everywhere incomplete until
man comes (the child of the election). The first
dewy rain and its blessing a presignal for all times
(children yet believe that they grow from tlie rain). —
Ver. 7. The creation of man as, 1. a divine formmg ;
2. a divine inbreathing (so goes the ideal before the
life, art before the realization, the sliadow or the
type before the truth). — The descent of man, his
earthly descent (A Jam from adamah); his divine
iescent (a soul from God's breath of life). — The ori-
ginal harmony and unity of the earthly and heavenly
nature of uiiin. How we ought to be on our guard
against those suspicions of matter, of the body, and
of the sense-nature, which claim to be profound, and
yet are not taught in the Scriptures. — Why tlie
church has always held dualism to be spiritually
dangerous. Man, in his being an exaltation of the
dust, a humility of the spirit. The nature of man a
type of his destiny : 1. To build the dust inl,o form ;
2. to reveal the inspiration of God in his hfe. The
lowliness and the sublimity of the first man Adam
without father and mother, a foreshowing of the
wonderful descent of Christ. — Paradise (vers. 8-14,
see number 9 of the Doctrinal, etc.). Paradise at the
beginning of the world, and Paradise at the end (the
tree of life in the beginning and the tree of life at
the end, Rev. xxii.). — The rivers of Paradise, figures
of the spiritual life that, proceeding from Paradise,
spreads through the world. Gold, spices, and precious
stones according to their higher paradisaical appoint-
ment, or the riches of the earth an emblem of
the higher heavenly riches. — The calling of Adam
(ver. I.t): In the first chapter he is appointed ruler
of the earth. This divides itself here into two as-
pects, 1. to dress, 2. to keep. The calling of Adam
a type of our calling. The entrusted goods (spiritual
talents, outward goods of culture, spiritual goods) :
First to dress it, that is, to increase, ennoble ; second
to keep it, that is, to guard it against injury and loss.
— Ver. 16. In Adam's life, calling and enjoyment are
united ; therefore are they both paradisaical ; so in
a still higher degree are calling and enjoyment
united in the life of Jesus (John iv. 34). — Ver. 17.
The paradisaical freedom not without limitation.
Outward restraint educates to a free self-restraint.
As God binds Himself in His love to man, so also
sliould man bind himself in love to God and to obe-
dience. "For it is the self -limitation that first shows
the master." Freedom and limitation, right and duty,
Ujseparably united. The tree of probation, 1. a fact
(a hurtful enjoyment of nature, as explained from
God's spirit and word) ; 2. an emblem of all natural
enjoyment that is hurtful and destructive. Ac-
cording to God's will, the tree was primarily only a
•ree of probation ; it first became a tree of tempt-
ition by the coming of the serpent. The threaten-
ag of death is indirectly a promise of imperishable
il'e. Death is the wages of sin. — Tlie animal world.
€ow the right treatment of these rests upon the
ight kno ffledge and naming of them. Peace in the
paradisf.ical nature (all the animals are brought be
fore Adam). — Ver. IS, etc. It is not good that mar
should be alone. God's ji.iignient respecting thf
unmarried state, 1. as universal, 2. as conditional.—
How all the riches of nature leave man still alone
in the failure of kmdred society. Man alone, in the
midst of all the beasts, with all his knowledge. Tha
true helper of man, 1. As his image; 2. as hia coun-
terpart (his antithetical complement). — The marriage
of man, how grounded, 1. on the judgment of (iod;
2. on the solitary state of man ; 3. on his deep sleep
(trance-vision, see Job iv. 13) ; 4. on the divine
creating of the woman out of the side of the man
5. on God's bringing Eve to him ; 6. on the love-greei
ing of Adam ; 7. on its rich and noble destiny.—
Ver. 25. The clothing of innocence : 1. The purest
2. the fairest, 3. the most substantial. The infinite
contrast between innocence and coarseness. The
nobiUty of marriage : communion of the spirit, the
consecration of the sexual association.
Starke (Tcr. 7): Out of the dust of the earth,
which by moistening with water is capable of an easy
moulding. How thoughtless the conduct of men, who
adorn their body made from earth and to eaith again
returning, whilst losing all care of their immorta'.
souls ! — Ver. 15. Even in a state of innocence man
must work, and not go idle. 1. He must be ever ac-
tive like God ; 2. he must have joy in the work of his
hands, as God has (Gen. i. 31); S. he must have op-
portunity to show, as (iod does, wisdom, power, and
goodness to the creatures committed to him. — Ver.
17. This is the covenant which God estabUshed with
Adam. On the one side was God, and on the other
side Adam, who in his own person represented the
whole human race. — See that thou dost immediately
choose the best way, and hold fast to the tree of life
which is Christ. 'Taste this fruit, so shaft thou be-
come well. — God the first lawgiver. — Ver. 20. Is the
question asked what language did Adam employ in
this transaction ? the most probable answer is that it
was the Hebrew. — Ver. 21. Since at the present day
a man has twelve ribs on each side, some have sup-
posed that Adam must originally have had thirteen
ribs on one side. It is, however, more probable that
God must have given him another in place of the
one he took away.
Ver. 22. Lcthbr : Therefore stands fast this con-
solation against aU the teaching of the devil, namely,
that the marriage state is a divine state, that is, or-
dained of God Himself. As Adam gave names to the
beasts, so also did he name his wife, and that, too, af-
ter himself : "wjaMes.'i" (woman); on this ground ia
the custom to be defended whereby a wife lays aside
the paternal name, and takes that of the husband. —
Ver. 24. Some would deduce from this merely a pro-
hibition of incest with father and mother. (!) Others
would derive from it a proof that in contracting mar-
riage children need not trouble themselves about the
approbation of their parents. As this, however, is
clearly opposed both to divine and liuman commands (it
is still more opposed to the divine command, we may
add, when parents force their children to a marriage)
so is it, on this account, the more strongly indicated
that the man as well as the wife, go forth from the fa-
ther's house and commence a family of their own. To
this we may add that with the vocation of marriagr,
the childlike dependence must also cease, though the
filial obligations of love, reverence, and care, do still
remain. Col. iii. 19; Eph. v. 25 ; Matt. xix. 4 ; 1
Cor. vii. 2.
BuRMANN : The rest of God in the week is a typt
■224
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
of the heavy week and lubor of our Mediator Jesus
Christ, who in the hard toil of His soul was wearied
even unto dejith for our salvation, and, finally, on
this seventh day, entered into his rest (Isaiah liii.
11). So are then here also created a new heaven
and earth, and creatures, namely, new men ; a new
light of the Gospel, new fruits of righteousness, new
water welling up to everlasting life. — Wherein does
Paradise agree with lieaven ? — And, therefore, is the
family state established as the fountain-head and
origin of all human society.
ScHRdDER; Moses makcs the primeval history
of the microcosm follow the history of the macro-
cosm.— The hints already obscurely given here and
there in the first section (comp. ch. xxii. 21) in re-
lation to the fall, assume a more distinct form in
the second, as though it were designed as a prologue
to that world-historical tragedy which begins with
chapter iii. — The hypothesis of the so-called Pre-
Adaniites, that is, of men who lived before Adam, is
clearly and distinctly excluded by the remark at the
end of ver. 5, that before Adam there was no man
to till the ground. As a proof to the contrary there
is also 1 Cor. xv. 45, and Acts xvii. 26. — The body
of man appears, therefore, as a fine artistic structure
of God. — " Stand in awe, oh man ! for upon each of
thy consecrated members was the finger of God ! "
Herder. — -As Isaiah says : Thou art our father.
Thou art our potter, and we are Thy clay (Is. Ixiv.).
Luther. — The spirit of Ufe comes to the human
soul as a gift from God immediately received into
the human frame (ch. i. 26, 27). The soul of the
beast, at God's command, has its origin in that
breath of God which pervades the elements of nature
(ch. i. 2, 20, 24). — Only as inspired by God does
the soul live its true life, its human life ; only by
means of a vitalizing communion with the divine
spirit has it true independence, and a blessed con-
tinuance.— Vers. 8-16. The whole earth as " veri/
govd" was created to be a garden of God. But the
Father, out of His abundant goodness to His human
child, plants in this garden a little garden more pecu-
liarly His own — a little Paradise in the greater. — God
planted : The image is grounded on that of a human
gardener (John xv. 1 ; Isaiah v.). — Elsewhere the
Scripture gives the name Paradise to the abode of the
blest, when we, perhaps, would say " to be in heaven "
(Luke xxiii. 43 ; 2 Cor. xii. 4 ; Rev. ii. 7) — A
garden ; And what could have been a fairer place
for the planting of our nice? " The schools of wis-
dom in the East are usually gardens, blooming places
by the side of rivers." Herder. " Moses expressly tells
us, how this garden was gloriously filled by the
Lord with fruit-trees of every kind, that the appetite
of man might have no excuse." Calvin. — "Thede-
Bcripiion of the fruit of the trees: Captivating to the
sight and good for food, is not without its purpose ;
it shows that inclination and the j)roof of sense in
respect to food and drink aliould be guides to men."
Herder. — Among the trees of Paradise two enigmat-
ical names strike us. liuth belong to the same place ;
both are found in the middle of llie garden. — Ver. 17.
The God of the covenant is called Jehovah-Elohim.
A covenant re<iuires two sides. — Dying, death, the
lense of the.'ie words he can only anticipate, accord-
ing as their contrast with the sense of the tree of
Ufe grows more clear. At the mor; ent of the fall be-
gan the death of man. Death waxes stronger with
us until it outgrows life, and conquers it. — Ver. 2(i.
In his wedded wife man receives what no help or
friendship, however lair it might be, could otherwise
have given him. — One heart and one soul. — M >r
gives names to the beasts. — As the son ->{ God ht
discerns his father's footsteps, that 's, 'he divin*
ideas in the things created. — Vers. 21-25. The be-
coming many out of one. This is the way of God.
Rons ; The sleep of Adam.
Rambach : God acts like a painter or a sculitoi
who draws a curtain before him when he is working
upon an e.\cellent picture or an artistic statue.—
Adam's eyes are veiled that God's love may un^
veil itself. The old writers noted six examples in
the Scriptures where a miraculous work follows
sleep : 1. The case of Adam, 2. of Ellas (1 Kings xix.),
3. of Jonah (ch. i.), 4. of Christ (Matt, viii.), 5. of
Peter (Acts xii.), 6. of Eutyches (Acts xx.). " More-
over, the Son of God is become weak that He might
have His members strong." Calvin. (Eph. v. 25 ;
Col. iii. 19). — The wife is from a rib; she is taken
from near man's heart. As in man there appears an
image of the Creator, so does the wife present an im-
age of His providence. The man was created wit/i-
out ; the wife was created ht Paradise. Her place ia
by the fireside and in the nursery, but nevertheless
most true it is that the world is ruled, in a most
peculiar manner, from the mother's bosom.
God builded. (Ver. 22.) " Designedly does
Moses use the expression to build, that he may teach
lis how in the person of the wife the human race
finally becomes perfected ; whereas before it was
like to a building only begun. Others refer it to the
domestic economy, as though Moses meant to say,
that at that time the right ordering of the family
state became complete — a view which does not de-
viate much from tlie first interpretation." Calvin. —
" It is worthy of note that what Moses adds : and
brought her to him, is an elegant description i'
the espousal, or the marriage presentation. For
Adam does not rashly follow his liliiug, but waits for
God, who brings her to him ; as Christ also says :
what God hath joined let not man put asunder."
Luther. — Ver. 23. "Love here makes the first
poet, lawgiver, and prophet. It is the song of songs
proceeding from the mouth of Adam." Herder. —
Adam makes himself known to his wife, in that he
gives her a name in the very act of declaring her
origin. With their name the beasts become the
property of Adam ; with her name does the wife be
come his own (Is. xliii. 1 ; Ps. cxlvii. 4). He names
himself man ; the relation to woman causes man now
to become a man, in a peculiar sense. Through
marriage the circuits of human love are made wider
(Eph. V. 25 ; 1 Cor. vii. 3, 39 ; Matt. xix. 6, 9).—
In the Scriptures, idolatry and the denial of God are
called fornication and adultery. The hieroglyphs of
the anti-Mosaic law of marriage have been renewed
by Christ in their- full splendoi'. To the Gospel docs
humanity owe tlie restoration of its original worth.
In our old German speech tire word marriage is the
stem-word of all law, fidelity, order, I'eligion, cov-
enant ; not so in the new. — Naked. In the nobler
class of men the bodily formation still reveals itself
through its spirituality.
Lisco ; The development of individuals, and of
the wlrole race, is grounded on society. The mo-
nastic solitariness is not the will of God (Eccl. iv. 9).
If man would reach his destiny, he needs help in the
sphere of the liodily as well as that of the spiritu»L
The root of all other society is that marriage state,
establislrcd by God, out of which are evolved tin
three relations of the family, the church, and the
state ; in like manner', on account of their root (is it
UUAP. II 4-26.
^'2l
merely on this account?) are they divine institutions.
All determinations of God have for their aim the
nighest good of man ; but how greatly, through sin,
are tl\e blessings of communion, the advantages of
society, perverted into mischief ! This peace between
man and beast belongs also to the prophetic Para-
dise (Is. xi. 6). Before the fall nakedness was moral,
modest, chaste ; after the fall it becomes indecorous,
remembrance of the fall, an eniiindling of sin,
Gerlach : In the Hebrew writings, the fiist man
^ called simply Adam, that Is, man ; for man is just
as much the designation of the human race as it is
ine proper name of the first man. In the first man
there was contained the whole human race, which on
that account is called children of Adam (sons of
man, or Adam (man) simply (just as it is with the
names Israel, Edom, Moab, Ammon). — Adam from
adamah. Nature must be ruled by one like herself, but
who, nevertheless, belongs to a higher order, even as
humanity has for its lord a God-Man. — The breath,
the condition of the bodily life, is an emblem of the
divine life which is breathed into man.^Just as
heaven and earth were originally created as a con-
trast whose two sides must more and more interpen-
etrate each other, so also in man is there the body
from the dust, and the spirit from God. — Man must
not be simply a living soul ; he must also have a life-
making spirit, even as the second Adam possessed
it, and all beUevers receive it from Christ (1 Cor. xv.
47). — As being from the dust, man belongs to the
earth, and, therefore, to corruptibility ; like the other
animals which die in respect to tlieir individual being
and only live on as creations, he has a natural Ufe ;
as far as that was concerned he could die, but
through the spirit derived from God was he related to
Him as an imperishable personality, and, therctbre,
also could he keep from dying (there was given to
him the possibility not to die) ; for even the dust in
its relation to him, as also the earth itself, was cre-
ated for a higher life of glory. — -Garden-work in a
mild climate is the easiest and the most appropriate
for the childhood of humanity. In this may the act-
ive powers exercise themselves for the more severe
employments of agricultural labor. The oldest known
fruit-trees, the domestic animals, and the grain, were
the portion that remained to him out of this original
time. — For the tree of knouiedge, etc. To know good
and evil is tlie conscious freedom of the will (Is. vii.
16 ; 1 Cor. viii. 3). — No want (for he lived in abun-
dance), no enticement of the sense merely (for that
arose first after the fall (ch. iii. jj), could mislead
him to transgress the command, but only his self-ex-
altation, his striving after a false self-sufficiency and
inaepi.-ndence. — In a way of childlike feeling does
Lather regard the tree of knowledge (standing as it
15
did in the midst of the garden) as the church of the
yet innocent man. — " This tree of the knowledge of
good and evil has become Adam's altar and pulpit,
in which he ought to have learned the obedience he
owed to God, to have known God's word and will,
and to have thanked Him for it ; and so, if Adam
had not fallen, this tree would have become like ti) a
common temple and cathedral." Therefore must we
be on our guard against every view that would rt
present the tree as proceeding from the devil's ki;ig
dom, or as being hurtful in itself.
Calwer Manual : The body from the dust of iht
earth, the spirit inbreathed by God ; Thus man be-
longs to two worlds, the earth and heaven ; he is
akin to the least of all created things and to the
highest, the uncreated, from whose efflux is his spirit.
— The work in Paiadise : There for them was their
desire and joy, which afterwards becomes a burden,
care, and toil. — The forbidden fruit. God only for-
bids us that which brings to us danger and hurt, and
that is often in the proportion of one to many things
allowed and right, and which is useful and healthful
to us. — The threatening of death. Not a sudden dy-
ing like an immediately accomplished fact, but, thou
wilt become subject to death ; it means, to become
mortal. With us, too, is death only the e/id of dying^
which last begins often long before. That the man
was created before the woman, and that, therefore, a
precedence is adjudged to iiim, is clear from 1 Tim.
ii. 13. — Ver. 19 : God the Creator is also man's first
schoolmaster. It is also indicated in this place that
before the fall the animal world had been more con-
fiding and dependent on man than it is now, and
that it gladly yielded itself to his dominion ; whilst
now, in part, it stands to him in a hostile attitude
(Rom. viii. 19, 2ii). — Not all marriages are from God,
decided in heaven, but all can become sharers in its
blessings if they seek it.
BtJNSEN : There follows now the representation
of the thought of creation, in connection with Para-
dise and the fall, in contrast with what precedes as
the work of creation in its chronological progress.
There m.an was necessarily the last thing, here he is
necessarily the first. For God as eternal reason can
only think Hiniself (or He must ever be essentially
His own thought), and, therefore, in creation He can
oidy think His image, the conscious finite spirit.
What lies between is the mediation of the eternal
with the finite. This second history of creation ia
neither addition nor complement to the one preced-
ing ; it is not, to say the least, its repetition. It is
the figurative representation of creation as proceeding
outward from the central point of the everlastiug
idea (the doctrine of the fall that follows "his [in
Bunsen] is Platonising and Gnostical).
426 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
SECOND PAET.
THE GENESIS OF THE WORLD-HISTORY, OF THE TRIAL, OF THE SIN OF MAN, OF THE
JUDGMENT, OF DEATH, OF THE SALVATION-TRIUMPH, OF THE CONTRAST BETWEEN
A DIVINE AND A WORLDLY TENDENCY IN HUMANITY, LASTLY OF THB UNIVKH-
8AL CORRUPTION.
S RST SECTION.
Til Lost Paradiu.
Chapter m. 1-24.
A. — The Temptation.
Ch. ill. 1 Now the serpent' was more subtle [properly: alone subtle among all beasts] than all th«
beasts of the field which the Lord God had made ; and he said unto the woman, Yea,
2 hath God said. Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden. And the woman said unto
3 the serpent, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden. But of the fruit of the
tree rN'hich is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither
4 shall ye touch it, lest ye die. And the serpent said unto the woman. Ye shall not sure-
5 ly die. For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be
ooened and ye shall be as Gods knowing good and evil.
B.— The Sin.
6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good' for food, and that it was pleasant
to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof
and did eat, and gave also to her husband [to partake with her] and he did eat.
C— The Guilt.
7 And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew ' that they were naked, and
8 they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons. And they heard the
voice of the Lord God walking'' in the garden in the cooi of the day [the evening breere] :
and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the jiresence of the Lord God among the
trees of the garden.
D. — The Jndemeni ara the Fromiae
9 And the Lord God caiied unto Adam, anu said unto h^.H, "*"jere an Aou ?
10 And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because i was naked,
11 and I hid myself. And he said, Who told thee that thou wast naked? Hast thou
12 eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat? And the
man said. The woman whom thou gavest unto me, she gave me of the tree and I did
13 eat. And the Lord God said unto the woman, What is this that thou iiast done?
1 1 And the woman said. The serpent beguiled me and 1 did eat. And the Lord God said
unto the serpent. Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle,' and
above every beast of the field: upon thy belly shalt thou go and dust shall thou eat all
16 the days of thy life; And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between
thy seed and her seed : it [vuigate: ipm u, etc.] shall bruise' thy head, and thou shalt bruise
1 6 his heel. Unto the woman he said, I will greatly nndtiply thy sorrow and thy concep
tion; in sorrow slmlt thou bring forth children : and thy desire' shall be to thy hasband
CHAP. III. 1-24. 221
"JT and he shall rule over thee. And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast liearkened unt<
the voice cf thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree of which I commanded theej saying
Thou shalt not eat of it, cursed is tiie ground *cr thy sake [from its connection with ti eej ; ir
18 sorrow shalt thou eat of it [get food from it] all the days of thy life.^ Thorns also and
thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field [instead of thi
19 garden]. In the sweat of th}^ face shalt thou eat bread until thou return unto the ground
for out of it wast thou taken, for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return,
E. — The Hope and the Compassion.
20 And Adam [man from the earth] called liis wife's name Eve" [life, life-giving] because she
21 was the mother of all living. Unto Adam also, and to his wife did the Lord God make
22 coats of skins and clothed them. And the Lord God said, Behold, the man has 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 forever [as the everlasting man, according to the idea of the ever-
lasting Jew].
F. — The Merciful Decree of Punishment and Discipline.
23 Therefore the Lord God sent him forth " [the intensive Piei form of the verb] from the garden
24 of Eden [the blissful garden] to till the ground from whence he was taken. So he drove
out the man: and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden cherubims [cherubs] and
a flaming sword which turned every way [yet ever maintaining its place] to keep the way of
the tree of life [Seraphlm ; comp. Ps. civ. 4 ; xviii. 10-15 ; Is. vi. 2l.
[' Ver. 1. — wJna . Primary sense : keen sight (secondary : intuilion^ divining^. Greek : SpoKcov (SepKuj) o(^is (oi^ojitai).
''D rtX ; expressing great surprise : yea truli/y can it be possible? Comp. Greek jitrj on with its simplicity and abrupt-
ness.—T. L.]
[* Ver. 6.— niXP rendered desirable: strictly a noun: a desire, a beauty, a lovely thing.— T. L.)
[3 Ver. 7.— lyT^I , and tbey knew. Before it was the verb nxi , to see; a higher knowledge than that of sense—
ctm'Science. — T. L.]
[* Ver. 8. — ^bnp^ may refer to blp — the voice going. It would suit very well the interpretation which would make
nin^ b'.p here a name for the thunder, as in Ps. xxis. 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9 ; xlvi. 7; Ixviii. 34; Job xxxvii. 2. This i? the
view oj Aben Ezra, who cites Jer. xlvi. 22 ; Exod. xix. 19 (voice of the trumpet, going and waxing) as examples of "^bn
joined with bip . It is thus expressly applied to inanimate things, Gen. viii. 3 (the waters going, etc.), in other places to
the light, as Prov. iv. 18. Even in the Hithpael form it would suit the description of a long roll of thunder, which seema
to go all round the horizon, comp. Job xsivii. 3. What follows can only be interpreted of an actual speaking, but ihis
may have been the first thunder they ever heard, coming in black clouds, pf!rhax-»s, towards the evening of their sinning
day, and it would have been very startling, even as it has been ever since to guilty consciences. Some of the Rabbis (see
Aben Ezra) would connect ^^nriO with Adam : He heard the voice as he was walking in the cool of the day ; but the
grammar is directly against this.— T. L.]
[* Ver. 14. — n^riwH bzV ; Lange rightly renders it : among all cattle. — T. L.)
l" Ver. 15. — ~E"*iJ^ ; for a discussion of this rare and difficult word, see the Exegetical and Critical, p. — . — T. L.)
[' Ver. 16.— ^rp'wT . The sense of this word is not libido, or sensual desire, like nij<r , but want, dependence,
and, in this sense, a looking to or running after one (see the uses of the root piTU). Comp. Gen. iv. 7, where it cannot
nave the sense of libido. So in Cant. vii. 11 it does not mean carnal desire as Gesenius would render, but the willing con-
jugal dependence, or submission to the conjugal rule ; irpHUn ^bs' , LXS. well renders it : ajroorpo^q ; Vulgate : tub
viri potestate eris. — T. L.J
[*> Ver. 17. — ~^^n ; for remarks on the plural form of the word for life in Hebrew, see Note, p. 163. — T. L.]
[» Ver. 21.— n^n ) ^Shvvah. LXX. have translated the word by the Greek Za>^ : He called her Zoe, life ; Vulgate '-
Heva.—T. L.]
[10 Vqy. 22. — "Q , test— only the particle without any verb. This silence, or aposiopesis, is very expressive ; compan
the sim^llar Greek use "i tx'rj lor an imperative of caution. — T. L.]
[11 Ver. 23. — innr^i;^! . Lange regards the Piel form as intensive, to denote a violent sending forth, a thrusting out;
but there is no need of that, the Piel diffexing but little, if any, from the Kal, and being used for an ordinary sending.
The word following, Ui"13^^ , may have that sense, but there is nothing in the context of harshness, ^r anything to carrj
t bcf :nd the general idea' ol disrais.*tl. — T. 1,.]
I continues here also in tlie third ; -ince the subject if
EXEGETICAL AND CEITICAL. the primeval history of Adam, iiS it is, at the same
time, the primitive history of man, or of humanity.
1. The comparatively stronger symbolical that i The fact of the first temptation is the symbol of tverj
appeared in the representation of the primeval facts, | human temptation ; the fact of the firs fall is th<
fcnd which we have noted in the second chapter, j sjTnbol of every human transtrression , thr f^ea*
228
GENESIS, OR THE FIRS! BOOK OF MOSES.
mistake that lav in the first human sin is the symbol
of every eft'ect of sin.
2. Ver. 1. Now the serpent. — The tree of
knowledge, a part of the vegetable world, was made
by God the medium of probation ; from the animal
world proceeds the serpent as the instrument of the
tfttptation which God did not make. True it is,
that tlie serpent appears as the probable author of
this temptation, but such probabiUty is weakened by
what is said eh. i. 25 and ii. 20. " It was (though
Richers denies it) a good creation of God, though
iifferent, as originally created, from what it after-
ward" became" (Dehtzsch). Through this supposi-
tion, however, of another created quality, he is
brought nearer to t4ie view of Richers. Does it ap-
pear as the mere instrument of a tempting spirit be-
longing to the other world, then must tlie decree of
judgment, as pronounced, have regard not so much
to it as to the spirit of sin, whose instrument and
allegorical symbol it had become. How it could be
such an instrument may be briefly explained by
its craftiness ; how it becomes an allegorical repre-
sentation of the Evil One is taught us afterwards in
the orraity that is proclaimed between the woman
and l^o. serpent. According to Noek (Etym.-Symb.-
Mylh Jieal-WorterbiKh), "the serpent is just as
well the figure of health and renovation, as of death ;
since it every year changes its skin, and ejects, more-
over, its venom. This double peculiarity, and double
character, as aya^oBaifjLaji' and KaKoSa'iuitfv, is indi-
cated not only in language, but also in mytlis, in
sculpture, and in modes of worship." In this rela-
tion, however, we must distinguish two diverging
views of the ancient peoples. To the Egyptian reve-
rence for the serpent stands in opposition the abhor-
rence for it among the Israelites (see the article
"Serpent" in the "Biblical Dictionary for Christian
People"), Greeks, Persians, and Germans. Among
the Slavonians, too, does the serpent appear to have
been an object of religious fear ; and from them may
there have come moditied view^s to the Germans, as from
the Egyptians to the Greeks. Concerning the species
of serpents mentioned in the Bible, see Winer. It
may not be without significance that Genesis (ch. iii.)
is in such distinct contrast with the Egyptian views,
not only in respect to the serpent, but also in respect
to the Egyptian cultus of death and the other world.
Delitzsch thinks that the serpent could hardly, at
that time, have had such a name as cn3, since this
(from lUnj, to hiss*) is derived from its present
constitution. In this way the original constitution
of the seductive serpent is regarded by him in a more
favorable liglit than the nature of the tree of proba-
tion. Knobel, on the contrary, is of opinion that
" the choice of the serpent was occasioned by the
Persian myth, then known to the Hebrews, which
• (So Gcsenius — a sihilando. It is far more likely, how-
ever, 10 have had for its primary sense that from which
«)men tho SfcontLirj* meaning of hra.ss, or rather of tironze—
thininff melal. 'I'tiiM pives, as the primary, the idea of
splendor, /7/is/^ni»(7. The name may have bei-n ^iven t" the
nerijent from its Klossy, shining appeanince, or more liki-ly
from the bright glistening of the eye. This would bring it
Into analogy with the (ireek &p6.Koiv from 5ep»c — ^ipKo^t-ai. —
■haxu piercing sight. There is the same derivation from the
•ye in the (ireek oifrit, or from the general shining appear-
•nce (t'l/iK) as a striking an<l beimtiful though terrible object.
And to this corresjioi d well the epithets which in the Ureek
poptH are so c^m-slantly Joined mth it, such as aioKoi^ Trouct-
k6vitnovt apyijcTT^C. 'I'lio I^atin serpens is sunply a generic
name — r«/»'i/<. The first imprc'ssions of mankind in regard
to tlie wrpent wore of the splendid and terrible kind — boau-
ky and awe.— T. i.. I
ist
da I
of
In /
makes the evil being Ahriman to be the tempter oj
the first man (giving to him the form and designation
of the serpent), and represents him as the introducei
of monstrous serpent forms." Nevertlieless, since ill
his time (according to Knobel), the belief in a devil
was still foreign to the Hebrews, the author, h«
maintains, meant a real serpent, " aj Josephus ajw
rightly supposes [Antiq. i. 1, 4), as well as Abec
Ezra, Jarchi, Kimchi, and most of the later commeL
tators." I'here is, however, not the slightest reasos
for deriving the primitive tradition, here given in it*
original Hebrew form, from any Persian myth, nor
in the second place, for ascribing to the Hebrews
not only a dependence on such Persian myth, but
also an acknowledgment of its symbolical charactei
or demoniacal background without any reasons foi
S''ch anticipation ; and, thirdly, is the alternative of
its being either an actual serpent, or the devil hii" •
self, wholly untenable. — Xow the strptiit wax mart
•ubtle. The question arises whether the adjective
CIlS here stands in connection with '(0 as express-
ing the comparative degree. At all events, the
wholly analogous passage, ver. 14 (reminding us of
this even by similarity of sound, bsB lins — DIIS
bSTS) cannot mean: cursed more than every beast
of the field. Among the beasts, the serpent was juat
a single example of cunning ; and so is it afterwards
said of the curse. " Wisdom is a native property
the serpent (Matt. x. 16), on account of which th«
Evil One chose it his instrument. Nevertheless,
tlie predicate C^IIS is not given to it here in the good
sense of (ppovii^o^ (Sept.), prudent, but in the bad
sense ^i^ Trat'oipyos, callidus, crafty. For its wisdom
presents itself as the craft of the tempter in this re-
spect, that it applies itself to the weaker woman."
Keil. — And he said unto the woman The idea
that the wife had a wish to be independent, and, for
the sake of release, had withdrawn herself out of the
man's sight, as we find it iu Milton, is originalHndeed,
but sets up, when closely examined, a beginning of
the fall before the fall itself. — Yea, hath Qod said.
— The deluding ambiguity of his utterance is admira-
bly expressed by the particles "'3 CJX . The word in
question denotes a questioning surprise, which may
have in view now a yes, and now a no, aceorduig to
the connection. This is the first striking feature in
the beginning of the temptation. In the most cau-
tious manner there is shown the tendency to excite
doubt. Then the expression aims, at the same time,
to a.vakeii mistrust, and to weaken the force of the
prohihition: Not eat of every tree of the gar-
den! But, finally, there is also intended the lower-
ing of belief tliiough the bare use of the single name
Klohim. The demon that has taken possession of
the seipent cannot naturally recognize fiod as Jeho-
vah, the Covenant-God for men. Knobel thiuks,
that the author left out the name Jehovah to avoid
profaning it. Keil interprets: In order to reach hia
aim must the tempter seek to transtbrm the personal
living God into a universal nuuten divintun. But
would, then, the Elohim of ch. i. be merely an uni-
versal nmncn divlniiin ? The assault ia direct*'^
against the paradisaical covenant of God with men;
therelore it is that the serpent cannot utter the name
Jehovah.
3. Vers. 2, 3. And the i7oman said unto the
serpent. — That the seipent sliould address the
woman, and not the man, is explained from the cir-
(*nniHt,irn'e that the wouian is the weaki-r and the
CHAP. in. 1-24.
221'
reducible (1 Pet. iii. 7). The text, however, sup-
po.'ies that the woman knew the prohibition of God,
and in some way, indeed, through tlie man. Still,
jhe woman does not offer, in her defence, this medi-
itcness of her knowledge, as neither does Adam pre-
sent as an excuse that he saw that Eve did not die
from the eating of the fruit. The answer of both
appears to be wholly right, and to correct the serpent
ghe would seem to make ilie prohibition still stronger
by the addition : Neither shall ye touch it. And
yet by this very addition does lier first wavering dis-
guise itself under the form of an overdoing obe-
dience. The first failure is her not observing the
point of the temptation, and the allowing herself to
to be drawn into an argument with the tempter ; the
second, that she makes the prohibition stronger than
I it really is, and thus lels it appear that to her, too,
I "the prohibition seems too strict" (Keil); the third
■ is, that .she weakens the prohibition by reducing it
to the lesser caution : lest ye dh, thus making the
motive to obedience to be predominantly the fear of
deatli. Or simply thus : She begins herself to doubt,
and to explain away the simple clear prohibition of
God, instead of turning away from the author of the
doubt. There is something, too, in the thought that
the woman does not denote God as her Covenant-
God. And yet many have regarded her first answer
as a sign of steadfastness in the beginning.
4. Vers. 4, 5. Ye shall not surely die This
bold step in the temptation seems to suppose a wav-
ering already observable in the woman ; although,
in truth, it may be noted, that, in spite of the perfect
readiness of answer, the temptation of our Lord,
Matt, iv., even advances in increasingly bolder forms.
Still those forms are properly co-ordinate, whilst here
the gradation is very strongly marked. Moreover,
Christ, as the perfect man, could allow Satan to come
out in all his boldness, whilst here the unprotected
woman can only find safety in an immediate turning
away.
5. And the serpent said. — The temptation
steps out from the area of cautious craft into that
of a reckless denial of the truth of God's prohibi-
tion, and a malicious suspicion of its object. Ye
shall not die at all ; • thus is the truth of the threat-
ening stoutly denied ; that is, the doubt becomes un-
belief. The way, however, is not prepared for the
unbelief without first arousing a feeling of distrust
in respect to God's love. His righteousness, and even
His power. Along with this, and entering with it,
there must be also a proud self-confidence; and a
wilful striving after a false independence. For the
transition from doubt to unbelief the way is spe-
cially openeu through a false security. The serpent
denies all evil consequences as arising from the for-
bidden enjoyment, wbilft he promises, on the contra-
ry, the best and most glorious results from the same.
—For God doth know that in the day, etc. —
The imitation of the divme language contains a spe-
cies of mockery. Your eyes, says the voice of tlie
tempter, instead of closing in death, will be, for the
• t flange's German translation of the pass.age is stronger,
IT rather more peremptory, than our own : Mit nickten wer-
dit i\r des Todes sterben. Our Version, Te shall not. surely.
iir, makes the rendering the same as it is in the prohibition,
and seems to have reference to the fulness or completeness
of the dying rather than to the certainty of it. The womitn
Itad not repeated the waids of the proliibition, and of the
( enalty, in its doubled or intensive Hebrew form, but Satan
cei)eats it in blasphemotis mockery, as thout^h he had heard
it in some other way. The German does not seem to ffive
ttis. T.L.I
first time, truly opened. Here it is to be remarked '
that the hour when unbelief is born is immediatelj
the birth-hour of superstition. The serpent would
have the woman believe, that on eating of that fn\il
she would become wonderfully enlightened, and, at
the same time, raised to a divine glory. And so, ill |
like m.mner, is every sin a senseless and superstitioua '
belief in the salutary effects of sin. The promise of
the tempter's voice is first regarded for its own sake
and then as a complaint against God. Against th
immediate deadly effect it sets the immediate plea-
surable eti'eot, whilst, at the same time, it represents
the condition of men hitherto as a lamentable one —
as an existence with closed eyes. Agamst the fear-
ful threatening : to die the death, it sets the opened
eyes, and the being like God, as a caricaturing, as it
were, of that promise which had appointed men tc
the image of God. 7'/w ei/ex were opened — a biblical
expression whicli in the Old Testament frequently
denotes a high spiritual seeing, either as an enlight-
enment in respect to truth, or as the seeing of some
theophauic manifestation in prophetic vision (ch. ixi.
29; Num. xxii. 21). The knowledge, however, of
good and evil, as the words are employed by Satan,
must here denote not merely a condition of higher
intelUgence, but rather a state of perfect independ-
ence of God. They would then know of themselves
what was good and what was evil, and would no
longer need the divine direction. To the same effect
the assurance : for God doth know, etc. This must
mean : He enviously seeks to keep back your happi-
ness ; and He is envious because He is weak in oppo-
sition to nature, because the fruit of the foibidden
tree will make you independent of Him, and because
He is tyrannical and without love in His dealings
with you. In this distorting of the divine image,
there is reflected the darkening of the divine con-
sciousness which the temptation tends to call out in
the woman, and actually does call out. In all this
it must be noted, that the temptation here is already
at work with those crafty Ues (see 2 Thess. ii. 9)
which it has employed through the whole course of
the world's history — that is, with lies containing ele-
ments of the truth, but misplaced and distorted.
Already that first question of the serpent contains a
truth, so tar as man ought to become conscious in
himself of the certainty and divine suitableness of
God's commands. The doubt, however, which tends
to life, is to be distinguished from that which tends
to death, by its design and direction. The tendency
of the devil is to scepticism. But in this bold assu-
rance of the serpent which immediately follows,
namely, that no evil effects, but only good, wotUd
result from the eating, there lies the truth that the
outward death would not immediately succeed the
enjoyment of the forbidden fruit ; that with tljc con-
sciousness of guilt there comes in a conscious though
a disturbed distinction between good and evil, and
that the sinner has placed himself in a false inde-
pendence through his own self-wilfulness (comp. ch.
iii. 22). When we take it all together, however, it is
the appointment to the divine image which the spirit
of the tempter perverts into a caricature ; Ye shall
be as gods, and into an anticipation of immediately
reaching their aim : " A satanic amphiboly, m which
truth and falsehood are united to a certain degree of
coincidence." Ziegler. Comp. Job viii. 44. Vary
dark is Knobel's comprehension of this passage-
" In the accoimt of the Jehovist," he says, " God
appears to be jealous of ambitious men (ver. 22 ; ch.
vi. 3 ; xi. IB). This same view of the jealousy of tbi
'iSO
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
gods appears also among the Grecian writers, e. g.,
Herod, i. 32; iii. 40; vii. 10, 46; Padsan. ii. 33;
ui. ; comp. Nagelsbach : ' Homeric Theology,' p.
83." •
6. Ter. 6. And 'when the woman saw. — There
is truly indicated by the words, according to Luther's
translation, the lustful looking of the woman ; but
the expression presents, besides, the spiritual dis-
turbance that attended it. She beheld it now with
a glance made false by the germinating unbelief, or,
BO to speak, enchanted by it. " The satauic promise
droTe the divine threatening out of her thought.
Now she beholds the tree with other eyes (ver. 6).
Three times is it said how charming the tree appeared
to her." "The words b^^DCns ysr\ Tan:l (to be
desired, to make one wise) are taken by Hofmann
for a remark of the narrator." Delitzsch rightly re-
jects tliis view. First, there is painted, in general,
the overpowering charm of the tree. It appears to
her as something from which it would be good to
eat ; that is, good for food. The charm has now,
too, its sensual side : The tree is, moreover, pleasant
to the eye. It appears also to have a special worth
in supplying a want ; it is to be desired to make one
wise. The sensual desire and the demoniacal spirit-
ual interest (especially curiosity and pride) unite in
leading her to the fall. Tuch, Beck, Baumgarten,
and others, give to b^B'anb the sense of making
wise : it appeared to her as a means for spiritual ad-
vancement. Delitzsch (as also Knobel) disputes this,
with the remark that it does not agree with the word
nanj (a thing to be desired). But why should there
not be supposed a charm in this property of making
wise ? Herein Ls indicated not only the common
power which the charm of novelty has for our human
nature in general, but also its special influence on the
female nature. — She took of the fruit thereof
and did eat. — The decisive act of sm (James i. 15).
Knobel: The heart follows the eyes (Job xxxi. 7;
Ecclesiastes xi. 9). — And gave also unto her hus-
band,— The addition njSJ' is interpreted by Delitzsch
as denoting " an actual presence, instead of mere
association." We hold both suppositions to be
wrong. An actual presence of the husband standing
mute in the very scene of the temptation presents
great difficulty ; whilst the second view amounts to
nothing If it is taken, however, as the representa-
tion of an eating together, then the language is an
• [Another example of the way in which this class of
oommentators love to pervert tbinfjs — making a iiyslercm
proteroiit or a putting the later tirst, in their endeavor to
educe Bible ideas from Egyptians, Gret-ks, and Persians.
No one can carefully study this Greek maxim tt)Oovep'oy to
Btiov (l/ie divine is envious), which so frequently meets us in
the Greek i)oets and in Herodotus, without seeing in it a fall
from a higher and holier i<Iea. The marks of human degen-
era*:y are upon it. It has become a superstitious or fatalistic
fear of tijc gods as jealous of mere human prosperity 7>cr se.
JJigh state, in their view, was danperous, not because of
ita leading to *' pride which God resi.stcth" for man's good,
bat simplv as threatening a rever.se destiny (see Uerodotos'
*'8tory 01 Polycrates of Samoa and King Amasis," Herod,
iii. 40). It was un/jtcAry, and foreboded evil. There was in
it a consciousness of something very wrong in man, but how
ditiorent this mere jealousy of human prosi>erity from the
holy attribute of jealousy against human pride and sin
aacribed to God in the Bible 1 Herodotus, as he was more
oriental in his style and feeling than the fatalistic dramatic
poets, oomcH nearer the .Scripture representation, or the
Doripture original, we may say, of the great truth thus dis-
torted. Kspeciallv is this the ca.;c In the spis'cbes of Arta-
banus dissuading Xerxes from his expedition against Greece,
Lib. vii. IIJ, .'). He talk.^ there of the jealous God (o ©eb«
^ovnaof), and his briuging down of human pridu, almost in
'Jus i^yle of iHuiuh.— T. L.I
abridgment ; after that she had eaten she gavf it !•
her husband to eat thereof after her, jr to eat will
her. In the very moments of temptation, as we mut<
take the account, there comes in the perception oi
the fact, that she does not die from the eating ; and
so it is that the wife's power of persuasion, and
Adam's sympathy with her, are net made specially
prominent.
1. Vers. 7, 8. And the eyes of them both
were opened, and they knew that they wera
naked. — In the relation between the antecedent here
and what follows there evidently lies a terrible irony.
The promise of Satan becomes half fulfilled, though,
indeed, in a different sense from what they had sup-
posed : Their eyes were opened ; they had attained
to a developed self-eonsciousness. But all that they
had reached in the first place was to become con-
scious of their nakedness as now an indecent expo-
sure. It is here in this first irony, as appearing in
the divine treatment of the consequences of sin, that
we get a clear view of that ironical aspect in the
divine penal righteousness which shows itself in the
Scripture, and in the whole history of the world (see
Ps. ii. 4 ; Acts iv. 24 ; Lange's " Dogmatics," p. 469).
Knobel would really regard the new knowledge as a
pure step of progress. " As a consequence of the
enjoyment they knew their nakedness, whereas be-
fore, like unconscious, unembarrassed children, they
had no thought of their nakedness, or of their per-
sonal contrasts. At once did they perceive that to
go naked was no longer proper for them. They had
attained, in consequence, to a moral insight. Shame
entered into men in near cotemporaneity with their
knowledge of right and wrong, good and evil ; it be-
longs to the very beginning of moral cognition and
development. This shame, in its lowest degree,
limits itself to the covering of the sexual nakedness."
The question here, however, is not respecting a moral
reform, but a religious deterioration. The reflection
upon their nakedness and its unseemliness becomes,
in the light of the symbolical representation, neces-
sarily known as the tirst form of the entering con-
sciousness of guilt. They have lost the unconscious
dominion of the spirit over the bodily and sensuous
appearance, and henceforth there enters into the
conscience the world-historical strife between the
spirit and the flesh — a strife whose prime cause lies
in tlie fact that the spirit came out of the comnmnion
of the spirit of (Jod, whose form consists in the fact
that the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and whose
ejfect (the feeling of hateful nakedness) is, indeed,
attended by a reaction of the shame-feeling, but
which can only manifest itself in the eflbrt to cover,
in the most scanty way, the nakedness revealed. In
this part of the body the feeling of nakedness mani-
fests itself as a sense of exposure that needs covering,
not because that fruit poisoned the fountain of
human life, or, by means of an innate property,
immediately eB'ected a corruption of the body, so far
as propagation is concerned (Von ilotJhiann, liaum-
garten), nor because, in consequence of the fall, a
physical change bad taken place ; but simply because,
ill the taking away by sin of the normal relation
between the soul and the body, the body ceasee 'o be
any longer a pure instrument of the spirit wbiiL it
united to God. "This part of the body is called
ni"!? (e. g., ch. ix. 22) and niaa (e. g , Lev. xv. 2;
comp. Exod. xxviii. 42), because nakeibusa and_/f«A,
which shame bids nien cover, culminate in them."
Delitzsch. In what tbllows, wheiein he says thai
liere the contrast between the suiritual and the uat
CHAP. m. 1-24.
!i3.
.ral, hariug lost its point of unity, 13 of the sharpest
kind, :inci that the beastlikc in the human appearance
appears here most bestial, Delitzsch is approacliing
ag:'.in the tlieosophic mode of view ; although it is
true that man, from his demoniacal striving after
something too great for him, falls back into a beastly
laxity of behavior, which, however, even here shame ,
contends against, and seeks to veil. As the death of
man. in its historical aspect, stand." in counter-rela- 1
tion to the human generations in their historical |
aspect, so it would seem that whilst the first presenti-
ment of death, in the first human consciousness of
guilt, must give a shock to men, there would also be,
in connection with this foreboding of death, another
presentiment of a call to sexual propagation; but
along with this, and in order to this, there would be
a feeling which would seek to veil it, with its acts
and organs, as by a sacred law. This modesty, or
bashfulness, of man, however, relates not merely to
natural generation, but also to the spiritual and the
churchly ; as though all origin demanded its covering
— its creative night. The commendation of the first
growths of intelligence in a man's soul produces a
feeling of blushing diffidence, and so. too, the church-
ly birth hath its reverent and modest veiling. When,
therefore, along with the presentiment of death, and
of the generic or sexual destiny (whicli, nevertheless,
we cannot njake independent of man's historical
death), there comes in the feeling of shame in the
first men, so also, as a symbolic expression therefor,
there enters into them, along with the guilt, an inner
death, and the sense of the want of renovation. For
the refutation of Knobel's view, that by the tig-tree
here is not meant the usual fig-tree, but the plant
named pisang, or banana, see Pklitzsch and Keil.
See also more particularly, respecting the tree in
question, Knobkl and Delitzsch. — And they
hejird the voice. — Knobei, Keil, and DeUtzsch ex-
plain il^e word b"p here, not of the voice of the Lord,
but of the sound or rustling noise made by the Deity
as he walked ; and they compare it with Lev. xxvi.
33 ; N'um. xvi. .34 ; 2 Sam. v. 24, By such an inter-
pretation is the symbolical element left entirely out
of view". For beings in their condition, this sound
of God walking must evidently have become a voice;
but besides this it is said, farther on, that God called
to Adam. At all events, the voice here becomes
first a call. " In the cool of the day, that is, towards
evening, when a cooling breeze is wont to arise."
Keil. To this we may add: and when also there
comes to man a more quiet and contemplative frame
of soul. So Delitzsch remarks very aptly : " God
appears, because at that time men are in a state most
susceptible of serious impressions.* Every one ex-
periences, even to this day, the truth of what is nar-
rated. In the evening the dissipating impressions of
the day become weaker, there is stillness in tlie soul ;
more than at other times do we feel left to ourselves,
and then, too, there awake in us the sentimeiits of
sadniiss, of longing, of insulation, and of the love of
hotni-'. Thus with our first parents ; when evening
comes, the first intoxication of the satanic delusion
subsides, stillness reigns within ; they feel themselves
isolated from the communion of God, parted from
their original home, whilst the darkness, as it comes
rushing in upon them, makes them feel that their
imer light has gone out." Farther on Delitzsch
• [Compare P- dv. 34 : *' My meditation of Him shall be
<weet, 3^?^" — ^literally, like the calm evening hour. So
the Greek poet,s called the night evi^pot^— the time of calm
•ober thouglit.--T. L.)
maintains that God appeared to man as ote man ap
pears to another, though this had not been the ori
ginal mode of the divine convei-se with him. The
theophanies had their beginning first at\er the fe-U ;
antl according to his explanation, " God now for the
first time holds converse with men in an outward
maimer, corresponding to their materialization and
alienated state." On the other hand, Keil maintains,
" that God held converse with the first men in a visi.
ble form, as a father and educator of his children,
and that this was the original mode of the divina
revelation, not coming in for the first time after the
fall." In neither can we suppose that there is taught
a twofold incarnation of God, first in Paradise, and
then in Christ. In like manner, too, must we regard
the question here as unanswered, in what respect the
theophanies (which were mediated in all cases through
vision-seeing states of soul) are to be distinguished
from real outward appearances in human form.
Hofmann would complete the knowledge of Paradise,
by taking as the appointed mode of revelation God's
appearance to them as soaring on the cherubim.
Delitzsch, moreover, informs us (after Hofmaim, per-
haps) that God, at this time, did not come down from
heaven, since he yet dwelt upon the earth. Mora
worthy of our confidence is the language of Keil :
" Men have separated themselves from God, but God
cannot .and will not give them up." — And Adam
and his wife hid themselves. — Clearly an expres-
sion of guilt-consciousness, as also, an indication, at
the same tune, of the fall into sin, and of the decline
into a state of corruption. The particular character-
istics are these : consciousness of their transgression,
of its eftect, of their spiritual and bodily nakedness,
of their separation from God — of a feeling of dis-
trustful, selfish, and servile fear, in the presence of
God, and of the loss of their spiritual purity, as ori-
ginating in their guilt, together with the false notion
that they can hide themselves from God. Moreover,
the regular consistency which appears in this prog-
ress of sin must not be overlooked. Through this
xtattis corruptionis, the first common act of sin passes
over into a second. Taken symbolically, this is the
history of every individual fall into sin. " They hid
themselves through modesty," says Knobei. With
all this, there is presented in the flight of the sinner
from God a feeling of exculpation ; yet stiU, again, it
is attainted with self-deception, with a want of truth
and humihty. — Amongst the trees In the deep-
est density and darkness of the garden, which now
becomes an emblem of the world, and of that worldly
enjoyment in which the sinner seeks to hide himself.
8. Vers. 9-19. Where art thou 7 — Knobei :
"Jehovah must now call for man, who, at other
times, was ever there." Delitzsch : " It is clear, that
not for his own sake does God direct this inquiring
call to man, but only for man's sake. God does in
truth seek them, not because they are gone from his
knowledge, but because they are lost from his com-
munion." It is a consequence of the very being of
God as a person, if he would not violently surprise
man with his omrupreseuce and his omniscience, that
he should freely assume the form of seeking him,
that is, of drawing nigh unto him gradually, in a way
of mercy ; since man must seek aud find Him. The
Good Shepherd seeks and finds the lost sheep ; the
.•-inner must seek and find God ; the relation must
be an ethical covenant relation. Delitzsch says far-
ther: "This word, ns^s (where art thoi?) echoei
through the whole human world, and in each indi-
vidual man." That is, in a symbohcal sense, tin
232
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
passage denotes every case of a, sinner seeking his
divine home. Delitzsch: "The heathen world feel-
ing after (iod (i//i)Aa<f>av, Acts -xvii. 27) is the conse-
quence of this evening call, n3^S, and of the long-
mg for home that is thereby evoked. — I heard thy
voice-in the garden. — Knobel : " His slight cover-
ing is sufficient as against the familiar wife, but not
as against the high and far-seeing Lord of the Gar-
den." (! ) The question may be asked, nliy God
called to Adam, though Eve had been first in sin ?
Without doubt is Eve included in the more universal
gigniticance of the word Adam (man), yet still the
call is directed to the individual Adam. In a certain
sense, however, is this Adam, as the household lord
of the wife, answerable for her step, notwithstanding
that he himself is ensnared with her. The ethical
arraignment for the complaint against the wife pro-
ceeds through .-idam. But thus appears also here
the additional indication that Adam is denoted as the
first author of the hiding, as Eve was first in the sin
itself. According to the mere laws of modesty
(Knobel) the wife should rather have appeared in the
foreground here. According to Keil, " when Adam
says that he hid himself for fear, on account of his
nakedness (thereby seeking to hide his sin behind its
consequences, and his disobedience behind his feeling
of shame), it is not a sign of special obduracy, but
may easily be taken psychologically ; as that, in fact,
the feeling of nakedness and shame were sooner pres-
ent to his consciousness than the transgression of the
divine command, and that he felt the consequences of
sin more than he recognized the sin itself" Delitzsch
would amend this by adding : " although all that he
says is purely involuntary self-accusation." It is to
be observed that here appeal's t/ie Jtrai mingling and
confusion of •■<in. and of evil^ that 2.s, that puitishmerU
of sin ordained of Gnd^ arid which is the peculiar
characteristic of nur redemptioiir-necding hitmaniti/. —
Ver. 11. Who told thee that thou wast naked?
— Knobel: **From this behavior Jeliovah recognised
at once what hail happened." Hardly can any such
anthropomorphism be found in the sense of the te.xt.
Keil says better; " It is for the sake of awaking tins
recognitiou of sin that God speaks." The question,
however, concerns not merely the means by which
the recognitiim of sin may Ije brought out, but in a
special manner the methods througli which its con-
fession may be educed. So also Delitzsch. " His ex-
planation, however, of the interrogative '•'Q as indi-
cating that a personal power was the final original
cause of the change that had passed upon man," is
far beyond the mark. For it is not the occasion of
sin that is rrferreil to here, but the occasion of the
consciousness of nakedness. Tliis, however, comes
not froni without, but from within. There lies, more-
over, in the question that immediately foUuws : Hast
thou eaten of the tree? tlie c.\]iluualion uf Ihi'
me;ini)ig of the first. — Ver. \'l. And the man sedd,
the Tvoman wrhom thou gavest. — An acknowl
cdgment ol' sin Ity Adam, but not true and sincere.
The guilt proper is rolled upon the woman, and indi-
rectly U[)on God himself; in which, however, there is
naturally expressed a general exculpation, only God
ii! put forward as the occasion of the calamity that
bis arisen. The loss of love that comes out in this
interposing of the wife is, moreover, particularly de-
noted in this, that he grudges to call lier Eva, or my
irife (aee this form of grudging. Gen. xxxvii. 32 ; Job
ii. 20, where he says he ♦ instead ol' (rod: Luke xv.
* [This do08 not ttppoar in our translation, which, liko i (lou
3(1; this tht/ son, John ix. 12; where is k(f namtiy
Jesus, etc.). " That woman by my side, she wh«
was given to nie by God as a trusty counsellor. sh4
gave me the fruit;" in this form, again, is Eve ic
(lart excused by m imi)Utation to God. — Ver. 13.
And the Iiord God said unto the woman,
what is this that thou hast done? * — (iDd fol
lows up the transgression, even to the root — not the
psychological merely, but the historical root. — Th«
serpent beguiled me. — Although temptation is a
beguiling, yet here, in the gross delusions of the ser-
pent, and the wife's inclination to excuse herself, the
latter conception i< the more obvious one. — Ver. 14
To the serpent he said, because thou hast done
this. — It is no more said here, wherefore hast thou
done this ^ although the serpent is previously intro-
duced as speaking, and, therefore, as capable of
mauitaining conversation. Therein lies the supposi-
tion, that the trial has now reached tlie t'ountaiu-head
of sin, the purely evil purpose (the demoniacal) hav-
ing no deeper ground, and requiring no further inves-
tigation. Accordingly, there follow now the fatal
dooms, according to the consequences of each par-
ticular evil act. The serpent receives his sentence
first : thou art cursed. — The sense of "I'D (rendered
in the English translation above, or compa.itively) ia
cleai'ly that of selection : among all cattle, oi "ut of
all cattle (Clericus, Tuch, Knobel). It does not
mean, therefore, cursed, that is, abhorred, by all cat-
tle (Gesenius, De Wette, et al.) or above all cattle,
that is, comparatively more cursed (Roseumiiller et
al.). The sentence pronounced upon the serpent
proceeds in a threefold gradation. Its ex|ilanation
brings up, of itself, the question, whether the whole
sentence bears upon the serpent alone, or in connec-
tion with something else, or only in a symbolical
sense. Surely the general doom, cursed be thou
(singular) among al! cattle, and among all beasts
(c(irrcs])Onding witli the causality : siditle among all
lieusts, I prominently), indicates a symbcdical back-
ground of the whole judgment. I. Qiddam statuunt
maledictionem hitani in sevpentem solum [tjuia hie
confertur cum aliis bestiis) non in diaboium, quia is
aniea malcdictus erat. 2. Alii in diabolum solum,
quiabrutus serpens non potcrat juste puniri. 3. Alii
applicant V. 14 ad scrpentem, ZJ. 16 in diabolum. At
vera tu et te idem sunt in uiroque versa. 4. Alii
exisiimant cam in ntrunigue latain. Quant senten-
tiam verissimam Judieo. Medus ijiPoli Vommentar
ad h. I. The inconsistency that arises when we
would understand v. 14 of the serpent only, and
V. 15, on the contrary, of Satan, is very apparent
most other versions, ancient or modern, renders it in the
jjassive. It has arisen fi-om a desire to avoid the apparent
liarshness; but it is strictly in the Hebrew of .lob iii. 20 aa
Lunne trives it, and it shows his careful observance of every
thing in the biblical test. It is eh.iiactoristic of the temper
uf mind in which Job is represented, lie grmlffi'^ to name
God, though there is no other subicct for the verb "P^ —
"why docs he grivc Kfint to the wTetched ! " It is the lan-
ffuago of sullen compbaint, afraid or ashamed to name the
one complained of. So Adam h^-ro says ; She gave it to me,
the woman gave it to me. The other examples correspond
-T. L.1
♦ [Lanpe's translation here is: ''Wherefore hast tho
done this!" Oiu: version, "What hastthou done?" wou]
seem, at first view, to be a more literal rendor.ng of the lie-
brew n'O , but that given in the Vulgate (qiwre hoc J'ccistCi
and by Luther, as well as by Lange, is more in accoi lane*
with the spirit of the question, since HTa njjiv ^f fcik«>il
08 a general as well as a particular iuterrngatui v. (.)r it
;ay be rog.u-ded as exclamatory : What o ''ling ha* j yo*
juf ! llow could you do it 1— T L.i
CHAF. 111. 1-24.
iWS
rhe various diversities of interpretation are a conse-
:iuence of a want of clearness in respect to the fun-
damental exegetical law, that here an historical fore-
ground is everywhere connected with a symbolical
background. Accordingly, both the historiciil and
the symbolical go together through all the three
dooms imposed upon the serpent ; it is in the third
act, however (the protevangel, as it is called), that
the symbolical becomes especially prominent, and
casts its light over the whole passage. — First judg-
ment doom : Upon thy belly shalt thou go ; that
is, as the worm steals over the earth with its length
of body, "as a mean and despised crawler in the
dust (Deut. xsxii. 24; Micah vii, 17)."' It is a fact
that the serpent did not originally have this inferior
mode of motion Uke the worm, and it is this circum-
stance partly, and partly the consideration that along
with his speaking the serpent presented to Eve the ap-
pearance of a trusty domestic animal, tliat appears to
have given occasion to the expression : ainoiitj all
cattle, as a complement to whicli there is added :
among all the beasts of the field. And to this effect
is the remark of Knobel, that " for the time before
the curse, the author must have ascribed to the ser-
pent another kind of movement, and perhaps another
form. It is reckoned here with the njjn; (cattle),
V. 1 with the nTi'n rm (or beasts of the field) "
In respect to this, it must be noticed, that there has
also been maintained the supposition of his having
before gone erect (Luther, MUnster, Fag. Gerhard,
Osiandei) and licen possessed of bone (Joseph., Ant.
i. 1, 4 ; Ephraim, Jarchi, Merc). Delitzsch and Keil,
moreover, favor the view, that the serpent's form
and manner of motion were wholly transformed
(Delitzsch) or changed (Keil). Delitzsch : " As its
speaking was the first demoniacal miracle, so is this
transformation the first divine." Instead of that, we
hold that this exposition only works in favor of the
mythical interpretation (Knobel), since it mistakes
the symbolical of the expression; on which, beside,
it can only touch in the phrase to " eat the earth."
According to Delitzsch, " the eating of dust does not
denote the exclusive food of the serpent, but only the
involuntary consequence of its winding in the dust."
So, moreover, the expression, "On thy belly shalt
thou go," cannot denote that he was deprived of bone
and wing, but only the involuntary consequence of
the manifestation of the serpent's hostile attitude to
men, namely, that it should now wind about timor-
ously upon its belly, or go stealing about in the most
secret manner; whereas, before this, it could, with
impunity, perform its meanderiugs before their eyes,
yea, even stand upright in some respects, and twine
itself round the trees. The older exegesis had some
excuse, since it did not always know how to separate
the conception of a biblical nUracle wrought for
judgment, or deliverance, from a magical metamor-
phosis. The assumption, however, at the present
day, of such a metamorphosis, has to answer the
luestion, whether through it the conception of a nnr-
acl»is not ch.anged, as well as that of nature itself
That, in fact, in consequence of the fall, and of their
c'langed attitude towards men, the forms of animals
can undergo monstrous changes, and have often been
ius changed, though still remaining on the basis of
their generic organization, is shown in the case of
iogs who run wild ; but the exposition above men-
tior.Nl exten'ls itself inimitably beyond any concep-
tion o" detenoiation. As tar as concerns the sym-
bolical sidr of I'le first sentence, it is clear that
before any wider relation (to Satan), we must hold tc
the specific appointment, that the tempting evil shal
no longer meander about the world, bold and free,
but, in correspondence with its earthly meanness, ant
bestial association, shall wind along the ground ir
the most sly, and sneaking, and secret manner, eat-
ing the dust of the earth, and feeding itself upon the
coarsest elements of life, or the very mould of death.
This sentence, then, in the next pluce, avails not only
ag-Vmst evil in general, but the Evil One himself And
therewith is denoted, at the same time, The secona
doom. Knobel: " According to the older represen-
tations, serpents licked the dust, and enjoyed it as
their food. (Compare Micah vii. IT ; Isaiah ixv. 25 ;
Bochart: Hieroz. iii. p. 245)." Here it is supposed
that Mieah and Isaiah have merely taken Genesis too
litenilly ; whereas Knobel interprets: " it is com-
pelled to swallow down the dust as it moves here an(^
there witii its mouth upon the ground." As the sei
pent, the allegorical type of the temptation, is sen
tenced to have its mouth in the dust, so is the genius
of the serpent condemned to feed on elements which
are a coarse prelude, or a nauseous after-game, ol life.
— Third doom of the serpent ; tlte Proteva7igel. The
rationalistic interpretation, which is last defended by
Knobel, finds here denoted only the relation between
the se.pent-nature and the human race. That is,
Genesis here, in one of its most ethically significant
passages, flattens down into a mere physical anthro-
pological observation. It is true that the physical
liere forms the point of departure. " Enmity shall
exist between the serpent and the woman, and be-
tween the descendants of both. Man hates the se^
pent as a creature in direct contrariety to himself^
persecutes and destroys it." (To this point the words
of Plautcs : Mercat. iv. 4, 21, aliqvem odisAe aquf
atque angues.) It is also hostile to man, and bites
him when uncharmed. In Pliny : JS'at. Hist. x. y6,
it is called immitvisimum aitimalium genus. Com
pare also Ovid, Mcia^i.orph. xii. S04 : calcato immi
tior hydro. It appears, as matter of fact, to havt
been the creature of the primitive world that was the
most absolutely opposed to culture, and which, pro-
ceeding from the dragons of the earlier earth-periods,
found its way through the last catastrophes into the
newly prepared world, or had been organically meta-
morphosed— Hke "the den-inliabiting brood of the
old dragons," which, in a worse sense than any other
beast could have done it, render the earth uncom-
fortable, destined as it was to culture ; and therefort
is it devoted to destruction in the world into which
it had passed over. In connection with this fact, the
thought rciidily occurs, how very appropriate that the
natural relation between the serpent-brood and the
human race, destined ever, and here anew, to the
kingdom of God, should become a symbol of the re-
hgious ethical conflict between the evil and the good,
upon earth. In opposition to the rationahstic stands
the orthodox interpretation of our passage, which re-
fers it to Satan on the one side, and to Christ, the
personal Messiah, on the other. According to most
of the older interpreters, the seed of the woman de-
notes directly the Messiah. (See He.ngstknbekg:
"Christology of the Old Testament," i. p. 21.) In
respect to it, however, the Romish interpreters m:ikc
a very bold variation. They do this in coiTespond-
ence with the translation of the Vulgate: ipm (m-
stead of ipse) conteret eapiU tuum^ which is condemn
ed, not only by the Hebrew text, and the Sepiuagiut,
but in the "Quest. Heb." of Hiekostmus. who wai
himself the author of the Vulgate, as also bv Petruf
834
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF HOSES.
Chrysologus nnd Pope Leo the Great (see Calmet's
Comm. p. 120); whilst Augustine, Ambrose, Gregory
the (Jreat, and others, have ranged themselves on the
fide of the Vulgate. Calmet interprets : in eundem
teiisum namely, the right sense of the Hebrew text)
re(ldipote.t vulgata; nequealiter B. Virgo conterere vu-
hiii serpoitem quain perjilium suuin Jesum Christum.
So alio says Von Schrank iu his " Commentary :" in
Uebrjio guidem habelur, ille (S'n) conterei caput
Ilium : ergo semen mulieris, i. e. Jesus ChriMus conte-
ret, sed res eodem redii : nam neque sanctissima Virgo
aliter yuam partu suo, i. e. in virtute Jesu Ckrisli
fjii mii, caput serpentis contrivisse credenda est. Both
authors, indeed, gave these wrested interpretations
before the latest Papistical glorification of Mary. In
modern times has the interpretation which refers the
seed of tlie woman to the personal Messiah been de-
fended by Philippi. In the primary sense, says De-
litzsch, it is only promised that humanity shall win
this victory, for Xin (he) relates back to nfs "^J.
(seed of the woman); as. however, the seed of the
serpent has its unity in Satan, so it may be fairly
conjectured that the conquering party, the seed of
the woman, has also a person for its unity — a con-
jecture which, as we readily concede to Philippi
("Treatise concerning the Protevangel in Kiiefoth-
Meier's Church Periodical," 1855, pp. 519-548), is
the more obvious; since in this second sentence the
pronoun Xin has for its object not the seed of the
serpent, but the serpent, and in it Satan himself. It
is, however, an incorrect opinion, that S^n has im-
mediately, and exclusively, a personal sense, and
that the organic process of the annunciation of re-
demption demands this. The conception of Xin is
that of a circle, and Jesus Christ, or, as the Targuiu
uavs. King Jlessiaii, is evermore in the course of tlie
redemptive history the prominent centre of this cir-
cle. So Delitzseli says, too, that Christ is essentially
meant as the centre of humamty, or as the head of
humanity, especially of the redeemed, as Keil says.
We miss here the distmct exposition, whether the
prophecy directly applies to Christ as a conscious an-
nouncement, or only impliedly, in as far as Christ is the
kernel and the star of the woman's seed. Hengsten-
berg regards the place as more decidedly relating to
the collective posterity of the woman ('■ Christoloj;y,"
i. p. 22) "Truly hast thou inflicted a sore wound upon
the woman (such would be the import of the words
addressed to the sei-pent), and thou, Hith thy fellow-
serpents, wilt continue to lie in ambush for her de-
scendants. Nevertlieless, with all thy desire to hurt,
wilt thou be only able to inflict curable wounds upon
the human race, whilst, on the other hand, tln^ pos-
terity of the woman shall at last triumph over tliee,
and "make thee feel thine utter impoteuey. This in-
terpi Ltaiion is found, indeed, in the Targum of Jona-
tlian, and in the Jerusalem Targum, which, by the
seed of the woman, understand the Jews who in the
days of the .Messiah shall vamiuish Sammael.* Paul
seems to proceed on tliis view, Romans xvi. 20,
where the promise is collectively ixd'erred to Christ.
More latrly has it found an iicutc ailvoeate in Calvin,
and then in Heider." As the interpretation of the
whole Protevangel is specially conditioned on the
• [In the Tartfum, ancl by Maimonidf.8 in hia Mort Ut^
woehim. Lib. ii. chap, jtuc., Samiiiiiel is called the angel of
death, nniSI -[nh-c . Says -MaimonidoB : " Ho took the
ancient Kcri)ent for his vehicle, and seduced Eve." Else-
where he hiiys, that he Id no other thiin Satan, who caused
ieath to the world.— T. L.l
choice of expressions in detail, wo apjily ourselves tc
the analysis of the passage. .\s it is the third and
most important part of the doom, taken collectively,
so does it also divide itself again into three parts,
whose point of gravity may also be said to be in three
divisions. 1. Enmity between thee and the
woman. — In place ot the false, ungodly, and man-
destroying peace between the serpent and the woman,
must there come in, between them, a good and salu
tary enmity, established by God. That the woman
may have a special abhorrence of the serpent, aftei
her experience of the deception which she charge*
back upon him, and that the falsehood of the ser
pent, which had all along before been enmity, should
now l)e unmasked, — this is the point of departure.
But, since this enmity, as occasioned by an ethical
event, must be itself substantially ethical — since the
serpent is denoted as permanently present in his sei
pent-seed — since, finally, there is mention, at the end,
of one head of the same — so does the whole passage
have for its aim the ethical power of tem[)tation,
which must have worked in some way through the
physical serpent, notwithstanding that a being mor-
ally evil is characterized, chap. iii. 1, and throughoul
the whole process of the temptation. The woman,
however, is set in opposition to the serpent, in the
first place, because she has been seduced by him,
but then, too, in order to set forth more prominently
the ethical character of the human enmity against
the serpent. We must take into view here the pre
dominant susceptibility of the woman, which, in its
curiosity, had become a special susceptibility tc
temptation, but which now must become a predomi
naiit susceptibility for the divine appointment of en-
mity between them ; add to which that, in general,
man becomes master of evil only through a feminiin
susceptibility for the assistance of God. 2. Be-
tween thy seed and her seed. — That is, tlie ap
pointment of this enmity shall work on permanentlj
through the generations that are to come ; the strife
shall never cease. And truly, it thus continues as a
war between the serpent-seed in its one totality, anil
the woman's seed in its one totality. And now here
the symbohcal sense presents itself much stronger ;
for In all the occasional confiicts between men and
serpents there is no universal and generic war be-
tween both. But this indicates a working of the
power of temptation as a unit against the unitary
moral power of the woman's seed in the conflict. Id
general, it is a contrast between the mysterious pow-
er of evil from the other world, and the human race
altogether in this. Since, however, men alone can
belong to the genuine seed of the woman, as it car-
ries on the enmity of the woman against the serpent,
so it is clear, that fi-om the opposite direction it must
be men that fall in with the society of the serpent's
seed (that is, the demons and their powers), or in
other words, become ethically children of the power
of temptation, 'i. It shall bruise. — Here now the
<|uestion arises : what is the meaning of that enigmat-
ic verb r]i|B ? The .Septuagint translates : cii'T<is aou
TTjpTirrei He(t>a\iii' Ka'i -rv TTjpr/freis aiirov trTfpvav; the
Vulgate; ipsa conteret cajnit tuum et tu insidiaberit
caleuneo ejus. The Septuagint is consistent in having
the same expression {-nip-ii^d-s) in both cases, but i";
is the one which, in view of the Alexandrian spirit-
ualism, is the weakest of them all. The Vulgate
chooses for both members of the sentence interpre-
tations of the same word that lie too far apart. This
is evidently done in order tha'. on '.he one side, the
ipsa (the »Ae, or the Virgin in that translation) mai
•"IHAP. ni. 1-24.
23S
exhibit the highust possible degree of heroism, wliilst
on the other side, under the protecting veneration
of the monastic theology, she does not sutler the
least injury to her heel. The word Tfl'^ is interpret-
ed in various ways: 1. terere, conierere. So the Syr-
iac, the Samaritan, and others (such as our (lermau
and English versions). So also Clericus, Tuch, Baum-
garten, Rodiger ; also, with special reference to Rom.
xvi. 20, Hengstenberg, Delitzsch, Keil. In any case,
it would be an epexegetical translation, if we would
find the e.'cpressions, to tread with the foot, and to
pierce^ in one common conception, lying at the
ground of both. Moreover, this same word, as used
Psalm cxxxlx. 11, and Job ix. 17, raimot denote
either to tread, or to pierce. Just as little, on the
other side, can it mean insidian., or itihiare, to assail
or pursue in a hostile manner — as Umbreit, Gese-
nius, and Knobel explain the word with reference to
its supposed affinity with r)S\a . The middle con-
ception, which suits both places here, and which
commends itself as suitable to the two parallel pas-
sages, Job is. and Psalm cxxxix., is to lay hold of',
seize, hit. Keil : " The same word is used in rela-
tion to the head and the heel, to indicate that the
enmity on both sides is aimed at the destruction of
the opponent — for which purpose by head and lieel
are expressed majiix and jnimt.i, or, as Calvin says,
superius and iicferins.* Ttds contrast arises, indeed,
out of the very nature of the foes. The serpent who
crawls in the dust, if he would destroy man walking
in his uprightness, can only seize him by the heel ;
whereas, man can crush his head. But tuis differ-
ence itself is already a consequence of the curse pro-
nounced upon the serpent, and its crawling in the
dust is a premonition that in the strife with man it
must, at last, succumb. Be it even that the bite of
the serpent in the heel is even deadly when its poi-
son penetrates throughout the whole body (Gen.
xlix. 17), yet it is not immediately mortal, nor incur-
able, like the crushing of the serpent's head. There
* [The general sense in this passage is plain, but there is
great difficulty in fLsing on the precise action intended by
the word TT— \ in consequence of its occurring but three
Cimes in the Hebrew Bible ; and one of these places, Ps.
cxxxix. 11, is most probably a wrong reading for '^]37w'^
(from "73'^;), differing from it very slightly, and exactly
suiting the context. The sense of braising will do, as used
of the storm, -Job ix. 17, but is quite alien to any effect of
darkness, as used Ps. csxsix. The difficulty is shown by
the variety of special interpretations, though all agreeing in
the general thought. Onkelos has two different words for it :
"He shall be mindful ( ^^2T ) of what thou hast done to
llimof old (taking '.IJX* paraphi-astically for beginning), but
ihou Shalt be walclt/ul (T'ISD) for him in the end." From
;his probably, or from some older Ta^ura, came the LXX.
i-endering. The Arabic translation, c^unonlv called Arabs
Erpenianus, made by an ancient and learned Jew, and ;;en-
drally very accurate, also uses two words ; " He shall hrpMk
ttty head, and thou shalt sdng liini on the heel," — as though
in the 2d clause he had read 122'U;r Gong vowel) from "T 3
to bite ; and such also is the conjectiu-e of Jarchi, who thinks
that the variation was made originally to render the expres-
sion memorable from such a suggested paronomasia, or re-
semblance in sound. Head and lieel are evidently uced to
denote a strong contrast, but not the one, we think, pointed
out by Calvin and Lange. M,ay it not rather denote that
the fight against sin and the perpent is to be a bold and
manly one ? " He shall strike thee on the head." So Paul
Bays i-jrwjTui^tu, " I strike under the eye," I knock my body
dowi. I fight face to face. Thn fcly^■o(7 the heel, on the other
hand, denotes the mean, insidious character of the devil's
warfare, not only as carried on by the equivocating appe-
jtes, but also as waged by infidels, and self-styled rational-
"sts in all ages, who never meet Cbrifltianity in a frank and
manly wav. — T. Ij.l
comes also into consideration : 1. Tho contrast • heaii
and heel. The life, like the poison, of the serpeot,
is in its head, and is destroyed with it. The hetl of
man is the least vulnerable, whilst it is that part of
the body which is the most easily healed. 2. Th«
conscious, adaptive aiming of the woman's seed, tha
blind, brutal, tmd ill-directed assault of the serpent.
The seed of the woman seizes the power of enl io
its central life, in its principle ; the seed of tha
serpent attacks the power of good in its most out-
i ward iiud assailable appearance. 3. The very mo-
I nient in which the serpent bites at the heel of tha
I man, is the one m which the latter brings down the
crushing foot upon its head. It is, indeed, not with,
out sigiuficance, that the seed of the woman is pre
sented in the singular, and in fact, in the last deci
sive moment, set in opposition, not to the seed of the
serpent, but to the serpent himself — as is pointed
out by Hengstenborg and others. Here now must
we distinguish between the prophetical and the typi-
cal elements of prophecy — as also the prophecies
that are strictly verbal. The prophetic element is
present in the prophet's consciousness ; the typical
element is not, although it may be consciously pres-
ent to the spirit of revelation that guides him. Our
text appears primarily, indeed, as the immediate
speech of God, the all-knowing, who sees beforehand
every thmg in the future ; but still, the measure of
consciousness in our prophecy can become determin-
ate to us only according to the presumable degree of
consciousness in the author of Genesis, or, still fur-
ther, in those who actually brought down the tra-
dition contained in chapter iii. In relation, there-
fore, to this human prophetical consciousness, and its
germinal state of development, must we distinguish
lietween the conscious prophecy of the word and the
unconscious prophecy of the typical expression. So
in Psalm xvi. the conscious prophecy says, through
my commuiuon with God I shall possess immeasura-
ble joys of life ; the typical expression, however, ia
fulfilled m the resurrection of Christ (Acts ii.). So
also says the prophet, Isaiah vii. : the young prophet
wife shall, 1. conceive; 2. bear a son, whose name,
3. with joyful hope they shall call Immanuel. The
typical expression, however, is a prediction of Christ,
the son of the virgin. In this sense, also, does Paul
allow himself to interpret the singular, ;'« thi/ seed,
as a typical prophecy of Christ. And we doubt not,
that here, too, the spirit of the type chose this ex-
pression, the seed of the woman, with an Eeonian con-
sciousness of its rich significance. If we go back,
however, to the conscious prophecy, so it may be safe
to say, that with the humanity in general, on its light
side, there is also placed its core * — as it is with Jii-
dah (Gen. xUx. 10), and Israel (Hos. xi. 1). In trutli,
the core, or heart, is ever etnbraced in concrete unity
with the hull, but to the biblical view is tins gravi-
tation to the unity pecuhar from the very beginning.
On the other side, however, according to the New
Testament, and the patristic unveiling of its signifi-
cance, is the seed of the woman not exclusively to be
referred to the individuality of Christ. Christ, as the
Christ in the universal humanity, is here to be under^
stood ; especially in the second clause, at least, aa
also, therefore, in the third according to Paul (Kcm.
xvi. 20).
There remains, finally, the question how the tempt
* [This is an expression that Dr. Lange is fond of. H«
seems to mean by it something representing humanity con«
cretely and centrally — or some aspect of humanity ; as J jdat
in the prophecy, Gen. xlix. 10. — T Ii.1
W6
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
ttion of the first pair by the serpent ip to be under-
stood. According to Knobel there is found in our
passage just as little reference to the devil as to the
Messiah (p. 48). Consequently would the whole pas-
page become a mere physical myth. Von Bohlen
goes back to the kindred traditions of the ancients,
tnd finds it of the deepest significance that in the
printed Samaritan text there is 'iir\2, har, instead of
BHJ , serpent. According to one of the Indian myths,
Krishna, in the form of the sun, contends with the
Evil One, in the form of serpent. In like manner in
Egypt, Typhou, whose name is interpreted by Ser-
pent, persecutes his brother Osiris, or the sun. Her-
cules possesses himself of the golden apple of the
llesperides, which the Serpent guarded. According
to Bohlen, however, the nearest source of our nar-
rative, as of Paradise hi general, Ues in Iran.
Ahriman, according to the Zendavesta, in the form
of a serpent brought of his fruits to men, who were
of the pure creation of Ormuzd. And so, according
to him, as also according to Rosenmiiller, must the
author of our account have had that as a model be-
fore his eyes. And yet, somehow, we know not
how he distinguishes from it the simple sense of the
IsraeUtish narrator. The reference of Bohlen only
shows how our primitive tradition spreads itself in
the manifold adumbrations and transformations of
the most varied mythological systems, even as the
like holds true in respect to the cosmogony, the first
human pair. Paradise, and stiU further on in respect
to the flood. In opposition to all this stands the
traditional view of the Church, that under the ser-
pent as instrument and symbol our passage conscious-
ly intends the devil (see Hesgstenbekg : "Chris-
tology," p. 5; Dki.itzsch, p. 168; Keil, p. 51). In
respect to this, there is no doubt that in the Holy
Scripture there lies before us a connected line of tes-
timonies whose object is ever the same demoniac
tempting spirit — a line which, going out from tlie
serpent in the passage before us, reaches even to the
close of the New Testament in the Apocalypse, ch.
xii. 3, 9, 13; ch. xx. 2, 10. The identity is estab-
lished by the cited places of the Apocalypse, by 2
Cor. xi. 3 (compare ver. 14) by the Book of Wis-
dom ii. 23 ; with which again in connection stands
John viii. 44 ; though to this have been oljjected
certain weakening interpretations (Liicke, and others).
It is so also in Kom. xvi. 20. Here is every where
evident the relation of the fall to the serpent ac-
cording to its symbolical signiticance. In many
more ways, as in the Book of Wisdom ii. 24; John
viii. 44; 2 Cor. xi. 3 ; Rom. xvi. 20, there appears
the identity of the tempting Spirit, which workeil
through tliC serpent, with the figure of the devil as
he appears later in the Sciipture. That, indeed, the
physical serpent could not have been meant, as the
tempter in our passage, shows itself from the dis-
tinct ajipearance of consctousness in resjject to the
great sejjaration between man and the animal world
(ch. ii. 19, 20), as it is rightly presented by Ileng.sten-
berg; it also a[)pears fiom the collective declaration
that every ereati<m of Cod was good (ch. i), and
from the ethical features which in the third clia]>ter
the serpent assumes as a maliciously subtle creature,
EB well as from the symbolical background which
ever shows itself stronger and stronger in the prim-
itive condemnati.x Next to the identity of the
tempting spirit behind the scrjient and Satan, comes
Dow ius continuity. Before all, in the Old Testament.
firtl fkar/e of the idea : IndicatioD of evil spirits,
and of one especially as an apostate, pre-eminently u
Azazel, Levit. xvi. 8 ; in symbols of the Evil One
Deut. xxxii. 17 ; in the Schedim (Septuagint, Sa.ud'
fia. properly, master-gods), and the Seirim, U. xiii
21. Second Sta(;e : The appearance of Satan as th»
foe of man, as the tempter and accuser. Job i. and ii
1 Chron. xxi. 1. llind Stage: The designation oi
Satan as the enemy of God, as the fallen founder of
an evil dominion in opposition to the establishment
of the divine kingdom, Zech. iii. 1 ; Is. xxvii. 1 ; ser-
pents and dragon-forms as symliols of the reign of
Antichrist; Dan. vii., the beasts out of the sea. The
New Testament clearly introduces the doctrine of Sa
tan with a counterpart of the temptation of Adam ii;
Paradise, when it represents the temptation of Christ
in the wilderness. Matt. iv. After this, in the per-
fecting the doctrine of Satan, there is, first, the men-
tion, Matt. xii. 43, of his connection as chief with
the individual evil spirits in the demoniacs. Then,
in the second stage, Satan is especially designated as
the foe of man (John viii. 44 ; Matt. xii. 29 ; xiii. 39;
Acts X. 38). In the third stage comes forth the fin-
ished form of the doctrine, when Satan is represented
as the enemy of (Jod and Christ, and the prince of
the kingdom of darkness, making complete his reve-
lation, first in secret influences, then in pseudo-
Christian organs, and finally in one Antichristian
organ (John xii. 31 ; 2 Cor. iv. 4 ; Eph. vi. 12 ;
2 Thess. ii. 9, and the Revelation).
A chief question here, however, is this : whether
we are to suppose that in the passage before us there
is already indicated a developed consciousness in re-
spect to the nature of the devil. Since in the Old
Testament, the New Testament doctrines have not
yet come to their full development, and since the be-
ginnings of them on the first pages of Genesis meet
us tln-oughout in a very dark, veiled, and germinal
form, so would it be a gross inorganic anomaly, if a
developed knowledge of the devil lias to be supposed
in this place. Just such an anom:dy, however, ap-
pears to be assumed by Dei.itzsch, along with otliers,
when he says (p. 168): "The narrator keeps his po-
sition on the outer appearance of the event without
lifting the veil from the substance that lies behind
He may well do tliis, since even the heathen sages
present an express though deformed notice of the
truth ; but the author throws a veil over it, because
the unfolding would not have been suitable for those
people of his time who were inclined to a heathenish
superstition, and to a heathenish intercourse with the
demon-world (still would there h.ive arisen a super-
stition from it, even if the narrator had had the pur-
pose to stand ])urely by the literal serpent). It is f
didactic aim that determines the narrator to rest sat
isfied with the objectivity of the outward event as ii
becomes perceivable, and to be silent in regard to its
remoter ground." In maintaining this view, De-
litzsch himself refers (p. 625) to the ('hnrcli fathers.
Keil presents a more striking ground for this " didac-
tic aim " of silence in respect to Satan, both, here and
further on in the Old Testament ; "it had respect,"
he savs, "to the inclination which men have to roll
the giiilt from themselves upon the tempting spirit;
it was to allow them no pretext." We may, how-
ever, just as well trust the spirit of the divine revela-
tion with a didactic aim in relation lo the narrator,
as the narrator himself in relation to his readers ; and
it is in accordance with the divine mode ol' instruc-
tion, that revelation should unfold itself in exact cor-
rcspcmdencc with the human state of development
The assumption of an objective ieveloiimeut of e\i'
CHAPTER ni. 1-24.
23^
In the spiri rworld has in it nothing irrational ; yet
riengstenberg rightly remarks : " moreover, the posi-
tion held by most of those who deem themselves
compelled to regard the book of Job as origin;iting
before the captivity, namely, that the Satan of that
book is not the Satan of the later Old Testament
bonks, hilt rather a good ang>d, only clothed witli a
hateful office, is becoming more and more acknowl-
edged as correct ; so that we may wonder how Bkck
(Leln-wissenschafl, I, p. 2ifl) can be impressed with
the su|iposed fact, and seek to adapt himself to it,
through the assumption that the alienation of a part
of the angels from (lod, an i their kingdom of dark-
ness, develops itself in a progressive unfolding."
Yet clearly is the commencement of the tempting
epirit, Gen. iii. 1, devilish enough. Moreover, must
we distinguish the conception of the development of
the demoniacal kingdom, from that ot" the develop-
ment of the demoniacal character. The measure of
the knowledge of demons, or deinonology, which dis-
tinctly presents itself in our text, is the recognition
of an evil that stands back of the serpent, and of a
malicious spirit of temptation which hencefoith ever,
more and more, shall become acknowledged as the
crafty, lying foe of man (" and I will put enmity "),
but who betrays himself already as the foe of God
and the adversary of his counsels, as connected with
the human race. The more definite unveiling of this
last point, and its wider consequences, such as a
fallen angel-prince of a fallen angel-host, and of a
kingdom of darkness, belong to the later develop-
ment of the doctrine.
When, finally, the question is asked, in what man-
ner must we think of the working of this foe of man
as taking place through the serpent, we encounter
again the abstract opposition of the pure actuality as
against the supposition of a fact under the relations
of a vision. Next to such views as these : the devil
epoke in the phantom shape of a serpent (Cyril of
Alexandria) ; the devil spoke tlirough the serpent,
or made it speak by a diabolical agency (DKLtTZ.-»in's
" First Demoniac Miracle ") ; the serpent is only an
allegory (Grotius: the representation of an old poem);
or, an outward eating by the serpent of the fruit of
the tree of knowledge, and a simultaneous whispering
by Satan to the soul of Eve, h.appened together (Cler-
icus, Hetzel) — next to such as these we place the
view that Satan worked through a sympathetic influ-
ence upon the mind of Eve, and thereby made the in-
determinate ai^tj of the serpent to become speaking
signs, to such a degree, that, in the excited visionary
temperament of the woman, tliey became translbrmed
into a dialectical process of speech and reply.
To conclude, it is especially to be borne in mind,
against the assertions of DeUtzsch in respect to the
imposition of punishment upon the serpent (p. 179),
that every application of the idea oi^ punishment to
beasts takes away its peculiar conception ; so much
90, that, even on the ground of the Old Testament
consciousness, can we boldly affirm that, from the
very fact of Jehovah's pronouncing a doom upon the
eerpent, the meaning must beiif something more than
a serpent. Rather, may we say, that the future of
the serpent-brood is announced in a way which un-
mistakably expresses the sentence of the man-hating
spiiit in a symbolical form. Indeed, Delitzscli him-
eelf says; Not as though beasts were capable of
the imputation ; but none the less is there repeated
the mention of the infliction of punishment upon the
•erpent, and we can, therefore, read : the beast that
gkve itself for this purpose, to lead astray to an un-
godly deed him who is called to be lord of the anl
mal world, and his helpmeet, is also to bt punished
though in a different way. Delitzseh refers to Lev,
XX. 15: "It is truly an Old Testiiment law, thai
contra-natural lust must be punished, not only in
man, but also in the beast with which it is practised;
and, in general, the beast is to he punished through
which a man has suftered any harm whatever in bodj
or soul (ch. ix. 6; Ex. xxi. 28; Deut. xiii. 15;
1 Sam. XV. 3)." In the passage from Leviticus, thj
killing of the abused beast is denoted by 5"n . Tha
notion that in this and the other places cited the de-
struction of the beast is ordered for the sake of the
man, or in company with the man, rests upon tha
idea of the personal elevation of man above the beast
in accordance with which it is that, in the symboli
cal expression, a beast that has killed a man is like
wise put to death, and the beasts of multitudes of
men devoted to death are put to death with them.
It is, moreover, as a symbolical expression of anger
and abhorrence, as " when a father breaks in pieces
the sword with which his son has been slain." The
svmbolical in those acts arises out of the contrast be-
tween the New Testament and the Old. The I'etro-
brusians treated even the sign of the cross as a sign
of ignominy, because Christ had been put to death
on the cross. The Christian church, however, ha8
never acknowledged this view. Moses also, at ona
lime, established a type in the New Testament sense,
in the lifting up of the brazen serpent.
Ver. IB. Unto the tiroman he said. — -The
sentence pronounced upon the woman contains a
painful modification and transformation of the
womanly calling, as farther on the sentence pro-
nounced upon Adam is a similar modification of the
manly, or, we may say generally, of the human
calling [since Adam embraces at once the common
human nature] ; and so, accordingly, is the earlier
mode of life of the serpent made to become a modifi-
cation of the sentence pronounced upon it. What
they do according to their nature, that must now
bring upon them the punishments that are in corre-
spondence with theirnatures. Delitzseh distinguishes
a threefold reti-ibutian in the sentence upon the wo-
man. We follow him therein, only taking the mem-
bers in a different way. The punishment falls ; 1.
Upon the relation of the womanly organism in and for
itself; 2. on the relation to her chddren ; and 3. on
the relation to her husband. 1. I will greatly
multiply thy sorrow. The expression -Jj'ass
^I'^^rf is generally taken as a hendyadis. "The
frequency of pregnancy can be no punishment."
The Samaritan translates : The burden that is con-
nected with pregnancy. And yet we are not
justified here in limiting the whole doom of the
womanly distress and sorrow directly to the state
of pregnancy. Still it may be more safe to say
with DeUtzsch : Thy burden, and especially thy
pregnancy with its burden. The womanly calling
is an endless multiplicity of little '.roubles, and the
womanly destiny is loaded with the most manifold
sexual pains. The pains of a woman with child,
Jer. xxxi. 8. — 2. With sorrow^. [Lange translate!
it, ivilh di^cuUi/^ iioth.] We maintain thst thfl
translation of ZS" by trouble or pam is toe weak.
It is the state of birth-travail, which is, all at the
same time, labor, pain, difficulty, and danger (se«
Is. xiii. 8 ; xxi. 3 ; Hos. xiii. 13 ; Micah iv. 9 ; John
xvi. 21). " Gravida et paricns,'"' says an old proverb.
^^ fsf .\irut tearnta et nioriens.'''' Delitzseh. The con
238
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
trast between the lightest fExod. i. 19) and the
most difficult births, may help to give us nn idea of
the contrast between the normal paradisaical way
of birth, and the birth-sorrows that have prevailed
in human historv ; and this too without our having
to suppose, with Delitz.-cli, a cliaiigf in " the
physiohigiciil constitution of the womaii." Hence-
forth must the woman purchase the gain of children
with the danger of her life, — in a certain degree,
witli spiritual readiness for death, and the sacrifice
of her life for that end.— 3. And thy desire shall
be to thy husband. This sentence obtains its
full significance in its embracing that which follows,
and in its contrast to it. It is, emphatically, that
her desire should be to the man as though she were
magically bound to him. npllljn may denote the
longing of the woman's dependence upon man.
npiun comes from p^Ui , to run, run after, pursue,
want.* It is further emphatic that the man shall
rule over her in a strong way ; and finally that she,
in her bound and destined adherence to man, shall
find in him a strong and severe master. The
■voman had specifically sinned, " not for the sake
of earthly enjoyment merely " (Deliizsch), but in
high-fiuwn aspiring, as though she would emancipate
herself from man, get before him, and take him
under her guardianship. Her punishment, therefore,
must consist in this, that she must become subject
in the normal line of her sexual being, her con-
sciousness, adhesiveness, and dependence. "The
man can command in a lordly way, and the wife is
inwardly and outwardly compelleii to obedience.
In consequence of sin thus arises that subjection of
the wife to the husband, bordering on slavery, that
was customary in the old world, as it still is in the
East, and which through the religion of revelation
becomes gradually more tolerable, until, at last, in
the increasing worth of the woman, it becomes
entirely evened " (fielitzsch). " Among the Hebrews
a wife was bought by the husband (? cli. xsxiv. 12;
Exod. xxii. 16 ; Hos. iii. 3, 2). and was his possession
(female slave, ? ch. xx. 3; Deut. xxii. 22). He is
called her lord (ch. xviii. 12 ; Exod. xxi. H), and he
can divorce her without much ceremony (Dent. xxiv.
1). This subordinate and depressed condition of
the wife the author (!) regards as the punishment of
Bin." Knobel. — Ver. 17. And unto Adam he
said. — Sentence against Adam. In the case of
Adam (whose name here first appears as a proper
name) there is an indictment or declaration of his
guilt going before the sentence of condemnation.
His guilt culminates in this, that he had listened to
the voice of hia wife who was placed under him,
and Ihi.s, too, in direct opposition to that obedience
which he owed to the voice and the command of his
God. Instead of the protector and guide of his
wile, to guard her from the fall, or, after her fall, to
bring her liack to God, he liecomes, in his cowardly
reimnciation of his dignity, subject with her to evil.
Mediately is this also a rebuke of his self-exculpa-
tion : " the wife whom thou gave<t umo me," as it
is also of the seductive voice of his wife, and her
obedience to the voice of the serpent. As, how-
ever, the winriaii is puni-hed through the derange-
ment of the smaller subjective world (jf her womaidy
calling, so is Adam puidshed through the disorder
of the greater objective world of his masculine
*(Kiiobol hftfl a i^mm sertHual view in respect to toitt
word, which its ctymolnpy and use do not warrant. Si-e
Ktjm( lon'aU Not**, p. ?i7.— T. L. I
calling. The adamah (the soil of Eden) which,
with his wife, he was to carry forward, in » norma,
unlbldiug, to imperishable life and spiritual glory, ii
now cursed for his sake, and therewith changed tt
a position of hostility to him, and of power over
him. Like a sick, disordered woman, it becomes t»
liini a capricious and hard stepmotherlike tutoress,
swinging the rod over him with thoins and thistles.
Here, too, may we distinguish a threefold act in th«
one sentence. 1. The curse-state of the adamah,
and the harm endured by it lor Adam's sake, out-
wardly, on its surface, and in its peculiar adamitic
nature, even to its very life, — especially as the
endurance of uufruitfulness, decay, and imiioverish-
ment, to such a degree that it can only afford to him
its food in a scanty manner. 2. The positive strife
which the curse-loaded adamah, with its thorns and
thistles, opposes to Adam's labor, and the resulting
failure and deterioration of its nourishing pi oduct :
the herb of the field. 3. The fruitless efforts o
man, in the sweat of his brow, to sustain his life ii
perpetuity through his daily bread; since it has
become subject to the power of death, which now
impends as doom upon the very substance of the
adamah. — 1. Cursed be the ground. Knobel:
" Agriculture among the Hebrews was a divine
institution (Is. xxviii. 2B), but at the same time a
heavy burden (Sirach vi. 19 ; vii. lo). that pressed
especially on servants (1 Sam. viii. 12; Is. Ixi. 5;
Zach. xiii 15), and presented the idea of punishmen'
when compared with the primitive golilen age
Classic antiquity, too, assumed that in the goldep
age the earth brought forth spontaneously everj
thing necessary for man, and that agriculture proper
came in first at a later jjcriod (e. g. HESion, Op. et
Dies, p. lis f; Plato, Pditicns, p. 274 f; Viitn.,
Georr/. i. 27 ; Ovid, Atrl. i. 11.2; Machoh., .S'o„(. S'cip.
ii. 1(1). — 2. Cursed the earth for thy sake.
That is, in order to ptmish thy transgression through
it, shall she no more be blessed with fruitfulness,
but shall be unfruitful. .lust so do the Prophets
derive the desolation and oarrenness of the land
from a divine curse (Is. ' xiv. (i ; ,Ier. xxiii. In). —
3. In sorrotsr shalt thou eat of it. With pain-
ful labor shalt thou herealter derive thy fooil from
it (comp. Is. i. 7 ; v. 17; xxxvi. 16; Jer. xxiii. 111)."
Delitzsch takes it in a deejier sense : " Man had for
his grand vocation to guard the creation of t^od,
all good from Paradise down, against the entrance
of evil, and to be the medium of its gradual trans-
figuration. .\s a spirito-ctu'poreal lieing, he was to
the material world as c"ix to rrns, being placed
in a relation of essentiallv mutual adaptiveucss and
casual reciprocity. f>en from this it becomes clear,
how, in consequence of the fall, the material in
man, the direct opposite of this transforming power,
takes possession first of his corporeity, aiul then
propagates itself upon the surrounding material,
that i.s, the universal nature." It is, however, not
wholly correct to say that the doom of the curse is
represented as going out from the nature of nisn
against the outei' nature ; much rather, according to
the representation, does the curse of the adaniah
come nigh to man, as a new divine ordering of
nature (I'onjp. also Rom. viii 20). We must, there-
fore, distinguish those special deti^riorations of
naiure which in their ethical causality proceed
imniediaiely from man, from that doom of (ind
which was pronounced ciillectively upon the ailamitK
cosnio.s. In correspondence Whh the above idea
Dtilitzsch continues: "This curse of sin consist*
CHAP. III. 1-24.
23L
firstly in this, that the soil of the earth, now far
from pioducing what man needs with its original
ease and abundance, demands painl'nl exertion, and
this often in vain." Keil makes the point still
sharper when he says that "Adam, in the act of lis-
tening to the voice of liis sor|)ent-befooled wife, liad
renounced his superiority to the creature. On this
account shall nature hencelorth array herself against
him for his punishment. Through his transgression
of the divine command hath he set himself against
God ; tlierefore shall he, by falling under the power
of death, become conscious of the vanity of his
being." Since we have recognized the conception
of blessing (chap, i.) as the conception of an endless
fertility and multiplication, as an unceasing and
wonderful reproduction, so must we here regard the
curse that comes in as the opposite, — even as it
appears from the divine explication itself The
doom of unthriftiness, or of mysterious self-genera-
ting unfruitfulness, as pronounced upon the adauiah,
unfolds itself unitedly in the ground-forms of detet-i-
oratioiiy sickliness^ perishability ; negatively in the
ground-forms of impoverishment, disorder, malform-
ation, and decay ; positively in the forms of crudity,
coarseness^ deformity, and self-destruction. This
curse is the adjustment of a causal nexus between
sin and evil in its objective, physical, cosmical
appearance. As on the one side it is a mysterious
fatality, so, on the other side, as matter of contem-
plation and conception, is it an ethical consequence.
The first ground : the negative side, the spoiling
or disordering, presents itself in the first act. — 1.
With sorrow shalt thou eat, that is, derive thy
food (see Is. i. 7). — 2. Thorns and thistles.
I^ITI I'lp terms that occur in connection only here
and in Hosea x. 8, where they are repeated from
this place ; the ancient ~\'\'\'\ became obsolete, being
of like significance with P^C^ n^^'lj as used in
Isaiah." Keil. In their ground type, doubtless,
thorns and thistles must have already existed be-
fore ; but it is now the tendency of nature to favor
the ignoble forms rather than the noble, the lower
rather th.on the higher, the weed rather than the
herb. In place of the ennobling tendency which
would produce a fruit-tree or a rose-bush out of a
thorn-shrub, or that wonderful flower of the cactus
out of the thistle, there comes in a tendency to
wildiiess or degeneracy whii-'h transforms the herb
into a weed. The sickliness of nature : a falling
back upon its subordinate stages, as a punisliment
of man for his contra-natural falling back into a
demoniacal, bestial behavior. Here now, along with
the thorns and thistles, there is, at the same timi',
the positive opposition of nature to man. In place
of the garden-culture, there is introduced not agri-
culture simply, but an agriculture* which is, at the
Bame time, a strife with a resisting nature, and in
place of the fruit of Paradise, is man now directed
to the fruit of the field. There stands, besides, the
biffden cast upon the field as an expression for the
more universal deterioration of nature, — namely, in
the animal world (see the note from Calvin cited by
Keil, p. 61). In like manner the burden cast upon
file human agriculture stands for that which is im-
posed upon every branch of the human vocation.
—3. In the sweat of thy face. An emblematical
■lenoting of the daily toil ami burden of labor, even
for the necessary daily bread. It shall not merely
be e.irned by the sweat of the face ; the sweat shall
etind vpon his brow even in his meal; that is, he
shall have only a brief respite for recreation. The
face is the most peculiar representative of the
human dignity. It may reflect the light of a holj
spiritual life; on the contrary, like the dark, gloam
ing shadow of distress and care, must now the sweat
veil the countenance and moisten the bread of toil
Therefore is it well said, the sweat of the face. The
eating of broad denotes here, as throughout the
Scripture, the sustaining of life generally, or the
assuaging its wants (Eccles. v. 16 ; Amos vii. 12).
— Till thou return unto the ground. That man
must return unto the earth, that is, must die, is cow
taken for granted, and therewith it is, at the same
time, expressed, that now from the power and rule
of immortality, he has fallen under the law and rule
of death. The appointment of the time: till thou
return unto the earth, says not merely that even
to the grave his life should be pain and labor (Pg.
xc. 10), but this moreover, that it shall be a fruitless
effort for the maintaining of his existence, until at
last he shall be wholly subdued by the overpowering
might of death. — For dust thou art. This is the
culminating point iti the penal sentence, expressed
nevertheless in the form of a confirmation of what
precedes; not as a new or repeated doom; since
after the threatening (ch. ii. 17), it is understood of
course. The declaration here especially makes clear
the fact that death had already secretly couimenced
in life. Knobel affirms that *' neither this passage,
nor the Old Testament in general, teaches that
death belongs solely to the punishment of sin."
What else is .said in Psalm xc. ? The possibility,
indeed, that Adam might become dust again, that
is, that he miylit die, is made clear from this, that
he was taken from the earth ; but it does not there-
fore follow that before this time the necesxity of
dying must have been imposed upon him. Moreover,
the terminus in death which is here a|)pointed, must
clearly be regarded, not as primarily the limit of
misery, but as the culminating point of the neces-
sity ; notwithstanding a glimpse of promise presents
itself, as well in this place as throughout the differ-
ent sentences. Knobel thus explains himsell' further
on : " He might have gained immortality through
the tree of life (eh. ii. 9), but only as something
lying above the plane of his nature, only as some
superior excellence of the heavenly powers, just a"
it was imparted to Enoch and Elijah." So that, evi
according to Knobel, when through his guilt ma>.
lost the tree of life, he thereby fid! into death.
This is just the way the text presents it, as the nor-
mal destiny of man, that he should eat of the tree
of life, ami not of the tree of death. It is a per-
version of relations, when out of the conditional
posse mori we would make a conditional posse vivere.
Keil. "The fact of man's not immediately coming
to an end after eating the forbidden fruit has not its
ground in this, that through the creation of the
woman, coming between the death-threatening and
the fall, the fountain of human lite was parted, and
that the life which in the beginning had been shut
up in the one Adam became divided, and thereliy the
deadly effect of the fruit in them was weakened and
rendered more mild (Hofmank, ' Prophecy and Ful-
filment,' I. p. B7; 'Scripture Proof,' I. p. .519). De
litzsch seeks some rational support for this poetical
fancy, but finds the true reason in the divine long-
suffering and grace, which gives space for repent-
ance, and so rules and orders even the sins of men
and their punishment as may best serve the realiza-
tion of his counsels in creating, and the glorv ol hie
uo
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
name."' It must, nevertheless, before all things, be
maintained, that the text would have us recognize
the beginning of death, the root of death, the inward
ethical beginning of the same, as the matter of chief
moment.
9. Vers. 20-22. The hope and the compnssion.
And Adam called his wife's name Eve. —
Throughout the pronunciation of doom, Adam had
kept liis eye fixed upon the brightest spot, the word
of promise in respect to the seed of the woman, and
•"ith tliis he consoles himself now against tlie per-
ceived announcement of death, in that he names his
wife havah. Just as his own generic name had
become a proper name (v. 17) in the declaration of
pimishment, so now does he give his wife a proper
name after the promise as received not only m its
generic sense but also in its deeper significance.
"According to this, n.|n=n^n is either life, ftuij
(Sept.) = life-spring, or it is to be taken as abbre-
viated participle : the sustenance, that is, propagation
of life [for nina from n5n=n;n (ch. xix. :-i2, :;4),
which I prefer as being more significant than yvvj]
from yn'ia aud feinina from feo, altliougli essen-
tially of like significance. Symm. i'a!o7o^.is." Du-
litzsch. Keil declares himself for the former accep-
tation, and against the latter. Knobel hints at an
expression for the wife: Sil n_'n, to yiiie/cen the
seed, that is, to propagate the race, and derides for
taking it as an adjective : quiekener, lifc-givei',
propagalist, which also is nearer the truth than tlie
indeterminate and too extensive ^ojii. In the ex-
planatory addition of the narrator, there appears to
be indicated, along with the extensive promise of tlie
nami' : mother ■;/' all lining, also the intensive :
mother of life, as mediatrix of life in tlie higlier
sense. With great pertinency remarks DeUtzsch :
■' The promise purports truly a seed of the woman.
In the \ery face, therefore, of the death with wliicli
he is threatened, the wife is for Adam the security
of both, as well for the continuance, as for the
victory, of his race; and it is, tlieretbre, a laying
hold ()f the promise and of the grace in tlie midst
of wrath, and with a consciousness of death incurred ;
in a word, it is an act of faith that Adam names his
wife r^n, havali — Eve." In distinction from niES
(woman) this is a proper name which as a memorial
of promised grace, as Melanchthon calls it, expresses
the peculiar significance of this first of wives for
humaiiily and its history. — For Adam and his
wife made coats of skins — Knoliel; •' Clothes
of skins, that is, clothes from the skins of beasts,
which elsewhere, throughout antiquity, were used as
the earliest human clothing (DiOD. Sic. I. p. 43 ; ii.
;i8 ; AiiiiiAN Ini). vii. 2 ; Ldcian. Amok. 34 ; Bundkii
16 in Kl.VAK. Ill, p. 85). In this the clothing makes
an advance corresponding to the incieasing moral
knowledge." In the connection of events our pa,s-
sage is explained by the fact that along with the
word of death there is introduced the immolation of
the animal for the need of man. They are on the
point of being compelled to leave I'aradise ; they
lecd now a stronger clothing for their entrance upon
>,.,t clitnatc of the outer land. And finally, in place
cl the insullicient, easily lading, and easily destroyed
co'eiing of their nakedness, as practised in their
self-willed, servile shame, there must now be intro-
duced, under the divine direction, a sullicient cover-
ing, adapted to a freer ami more ingenuous modesty.
lu this sense it is (iod who makes their clothing,
iltboui^b it is done bv means of th(>ir own hand'
It Is an act of inspiration, of divine revelation ani3
guidance, out of which proceeds their becoming
clothed as though from themselves. According to
Hofinann, Drechsler, Dclitzsoh, this clothing would
appear to be a sacramental sign of grace, a type of
the death of Christ, and of the being clothed with '
the holy righteousness of the fiod-man (Dkliizsch,
p. 192). Keil disputes this, although firmly main-
taining that in this act of God there was laid \kt
ground of the sacrificial offering of beasts. The
idea of the sacrificial offering of animals points
indeed to a vast remote ; here, at least, it is an I
obvious expression to the effect that the i-estoratiot
of the human dignity, purity, and divine acceptable
ness, is not too dearly bought even by the shedding
of blood, and that it presupposes a suffering of
death. It becomes necessary, moreover, that, even
before his departure from Paradise, man should see,
in the spectacle of the bleeding beasts, how serious
his history has become. — Behold the man hai
become like one of us. — " That is, a being pos-
sessed of a similar attribute, therefore like nie, so
far as I belong to the class of higher spiritual
beings." (!) Knobel. — As one of us. — According
to Delitzsch the language is communicative in rela-
tion to the included angels. We are inclined here
to be satisfied with the conception of the anthropo-
tnorphising pluralis mnjedatis. But in how far has
he so become ? Only in relation to the knowledge
of good and evil, says Keil. Again, says Knobel,
" it is the commencing moral recognition, which,
therefore, makes him like God." Says Chrysostom,
he speaks this, bv^ihi^wv aiirw koL t^v 6.voio.v ainuv
Kw^JLwhu>v (reproaching him and mocking his folly).
Delitzsch might find something strange in such an
irony. Riehers says strongly : " Irony against an
unfortunate, seduced soul ! Satan might cherish such
a disposition, not the Lord." The opinion jiroceeds,
in the first place, from a misunderstanding of the
irony, as also, in the second jilace, of the " poor
seduced " soul. Accoriling to (JoscbeH's more cor-
rect and protbunder representation, a divine irony is
everywliere the second stage in all divine acts of
punishment {Zerxtretite Blatter, vol. i. p. 4C8).
As the serpent had lyingly promised : ye shall be as
gods, so is it clear that (iod cannot siinjily confirm
this by saying, his promise is established. When he
serves himself, therefore, with the same words, it
must be meant ironically. That, however, irony and
malicious sarcasm are two quite distinct things, we
may learn everywhere, and out of the Scriptures
themselves. In this way the expression bi'comea
more distinctly clear : he has tieconie one like us,
that is, as we become represented in ditlcrent forms
and transformations. He is become like Goil ; true,
alas ! God pity him, he knows now in his guilt-
consciou.sness the difference between good and evil.
None tlic less, too, in this ironic word lies the recog
nition that he has bioken through the limits of his
proper development, and prematurely obtruded iqinn
the consciousness of the spiritual realm. — And now
lest he put forth. — We do not, with Delitzsch,
regard "|B as deiiuling an auakolouthiin, since this
is not necet..'ary according to Isaiah xxxviii. IS ; Job
xxxii. 13 ; and "ince the assumption of anakoloutha
is only allowablo in cases of neccs.sity, — a view
wdiicli is specially applicable to the simple diction ol
Genesis.* Knobel: "Jehovah is coucerned, leat
•[AnaUolouthii r,n(l other idiomatic exprcssious fielocg
to tlu; niiniile as welj as to tho rh, *oriciil ur anima'.i 1 Ok-
tion. 'I'htsy may thorefore occur in 'innosip ns wt. is uf
CHAP. 111. 1-24.
^4
they may be able to enjoy alao the tree of life, and
thereby get to themselves the farther advantage of
a higlier being (iinmortahty)/' — a wholly paganish
representation of Jehovah which we have no right
to lay as a burden upon the text. Keil says better:
** Afler he nad become the property of death through
sin, the fruit that produces immortality could only
redound to his destruction. For, in a state of siv,
ttndyingness* is not the (^cch alwi'itis (the eternal life
of the soul) which God has designed for men, but
endless pain, riever-ceasing destruction (everlasting
destruction), which the Scripture calls the second
death (Rev. ii. 11 ; xx. 6, 14; xxi. 8). The banish-
ment from Paradise was, therefore, a punishment
having for its aim the salvation of man, — a banish-
ment which, indeed, exposes him to temporal death,
but shall be a protectionf to him against the ever-
lasting death." Nevertheless there is overlooked by
Keil the ditficulty, that there appears to be meant
such a mere physical eating from the tree of life as
would produce a physical undyingness in contradic-
tion with the spiritual state. Clearly, though sym-
bolically, is there here expressed the possibility that
even sinners, through a mysterious power of health,
may attain to a marvellous longevity. In the full
sense of the word, the paradisaical tree of life was
lost for man. " But the tree of hfe," says Delitzsch,
"which takes away the death-power of the tree of
knowledge, is already sown in, and with, the pro-
claiming of the prot-evangel."
10. Vers. 23, 24. Therefore the Lord God
sent him forth, — His new state has also a mission,
and before there is mention made of his being driven
out of Paradise, is his new t;isk laid before him. He
is sent tbrth quickly to cultivate the ground from
which he was taken, and as the earth had borne him,
80 must it now nourish him, and as he had his origin
his physical origin) from her, so must he now serve
ner, and, in the dust of the ground which he culti-
vates, have his birth and his future home ever before
tis eyes. -Per crucem ad luceia is now the watch-
word.— And he drove out the man. — Eastward
of Eden God places the cherubim ; on the east,
Isaiah or Job. The objection of anthrapomorphism is to
be disregarded. It is in just such forms of speech that the
strength of language is brought out. The ellipsis shows
that the thought is too great, or too strong, for the words.
There is more force in the simple particle 'S ilest^beware
.esO than in the fullest or most correctly guiirdei I diction.
The cases cited, Isaiah Kxxvi. 18, and Job xxxii. 13, are of
the same kind, and instead of being opposed to, confirm the
propriety of calling it an anakolouthon, or rather, an aposi-
cpesis, or expressive silence, here.— T. L.]
* rWe prefer this apparently uncouth Anglo-Saxon coin-
ing, for Lange's unsterhlichkeit, instead of the word fmmor-
lality, which, although etymological ly the same, has, in
^neral, obtained too high and spiritiSa^ a sense to suit the
Idea intended. Tliis is especially the case in our English
ersion of such passages as 1 Cor. sv. 53, 54 ; 1 Tim. vi. 16 ;
Where it is used for the Greek adavturia.—i: . L.]
t[In view of this position of Lange and Keil, the an-
hropomorphic expression of the divine solicitude by the
elliptical particle ^Q becomes perfectly startling. It is as
though the thought of the awful consequences of one in
TOoh a state of de;ith eating of the tree of life, and thereby
Boaking his ruin irreparable, or his death incurable, was so
•verpowering as to hide for a moment from the divine mind
the consciousness of his perfect foreknowIedLre. As though
the thought had suddenly occurred, and with it a sense of
be awful danger— What if he should put forth his hand!
And now lest he put forth his hand in some rash moment
as he put it forth to the tree of knowledge I And then the
remedy promptly follows, that there may be no delay in
preventing a catastrophe that would have been greater than
the other, even as making it remediless. Take away the
onthropomorjjhisms from the Bible, and a large share of
ta pv>wiT is dutioyed,— T. L.)
16
therefore, we must hold to have been the c rpiirtdie
of man from Paradise. Nevertheless, they did not
leave the district Eden ; " Cain was the first who did
that (eh. iv. 16)." Knobel. First of all, then, is to
be noted here, the distinction of a twolohi guard of
Paradise : the cherubim arid the flannng sword ; also,
that the meaning is not tlie cherubLu wUh the flam
ing sword in hand (Knobel), although there are places,
sometimes, in which the Hebrews use the comieotiva
Vau (a7id) where we would expect the preposition
with. In the interpretation of the cherubim, there ii
to be first kept in view the Bible analogies, before
tailing into account the mythological analogies.
When now the cherubim make their appearance,
further on, in the two golden cherub-forms which
hovered over the ark of the covenant (Ex. xxv. 18;
xxxvii. 7), and which also appear in the temple of
Solomon, only in greater proportions (1 Kings vi.
23 ; viii. 6 ), though not fourfold (as is maintained bj
Biblical Dictionary for Christian People) — we must
cidl to mind the command of God, Ex. xx. 4, so as
not to be led away by the idea that they are images
of some peculiar kind of heavenly angels, as Hof-
mann, Delitzsch, Naglesbach, and Kurtz have sup-
posed, in opposition to Biihr, llengstenberg, Haver-
nik, and others. How would the images of heavenly
angels figure here as guardians of the command :
" Thou shall not make to thyself any likeness of any-
thing that is in heaven above." These two ceremo-
nial cherub-forms were winged ; their wings hovered
over the ark of the covenant, and tlieir faces, as they
stood opposite to each other, looked down upon the
covering of the ark, Ex. xxv. 20, or the mercy-seat,
whilst between them appeared the shekinah of Jeho-
vah's presence (Lev. xvi. 2 ; Num. vii. 89). Their
form is not more particularly described ; like the
most holy place itself, they appear to have previously
belonged to the mysteries of the people. We have
here presented to us in worship the first unfolding
of the paradisaical form. Just as these cherubim
guarded Paradise, with the tree of life that was there-
in, and protected them from the approach of sinners,
so do the cherubim watch and guard the holy place
of God's personal presence, or of the appearing of
Jehovah, especially the mercy-seat, and the essential
unity of the law that was comprehended in it. The
sinner is parted from the tree of life. There is the
same meaning here ; he is separated from the behold-
ing of God, from the full enjoyment of his mercy, and
from the possession of the essential life of the law,
that is, the righteousness that .avails with God. Id
this sense are they called, Heb. ix. 5, cherubim of
glory, 5o{i)s. The poetical and didactic references to
the cherubim, Ps. xviii. 11 ; Ixxx. 2 ; xcix. 1 ; civ. 4 ;
Is. xxxvii. 16, form the transition to the fully devel-
oped prophetic, apocalyptic symboUcal of the cheru-
bim, as we find it in Ezek. i. 10 ; x. 4 ; xli. 18 ; and
in Eev. iv. 6; v. 6-14; vi. 1-7; vii. 11; xiv. 3;
XV. 7 ; xix. 4. The passage, Ps. xviii. 10, 11, appears
to have the highest significance in respect to the sym-
bolical of the cherubim. Jehovah comes down the
heavens, it says — the dark cloud beneath his 'eet.
Next, :;^-3J-b? ^BT^i, he rode upon a cherub. God
rides, therefore, upon the storm-driven thunder-c)oud,
as upon his chariot. On this account, we hold that
that derivation of the word is the right one which
brings 3'^X in closest connection with ZZ~ to ride,
and regards the word as formed by a metathesis of
letters* from ;53n = a3"i chariot, team, and not
* [ As far as stjTnology Ib concerned. Dr. Lan^e, wt, tlimk.
242
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
from -l^p ?!« -Oso propinguun eat, ei adstat, nor as
the same with the -ypvipet of the Persians, as very
generally held (see Gesenius' Lexicon). Since here,
at all events, the swift-moving thunder-clouds appear
as ttie chariot of God, and very significantly, too, in
the singular, so also, the fact must not be over-
looked, that, in connection with this cherub, there is
mention of the wrath of God, of the consuming fire
that goeth out of his mouth, of the glowing flames
that burn before him, of the fire-flash, of the burning
coals, God's arrows, and finally, of the lightning. To
this we may add the passage, Ps. civ. 4, where it is
said, and in fact with special reference to the creative
history; Who malieth the winds his messengers, the
flames of fire his servants. Keeping this in view,
that the cherubim have their nature = symbols in
wind and cloud, and present themselves in coimec-
tion with the flames of the lightning, we get light
upon the dark passage respecting the cherubun. Is.
vi. 1, as seen in the analogies of Scripture. That the
seraphim, which appear here in the train of Jehovah,
are likewise symbolical angel-forms, is evident from
their configuration itself, wherein they appear as en-
dowed with six wings, an arrangement which evi-
dently has a symboUcal significance. That, niore-
ever, they are not to be regarded in connection witli
the serpents mentioned Numb. xxi. 6, appears Irom
the fact, that these have their name simply from the
burning poison. Neither can they (to say nothing
of tlie gioundless identification of the name with
c^T\U pri/ifipes, nobiUs) mean the burning, the shiu-
■>!(/, according to Kinchi and others ; for »l^iU does
not mean to bum, to shine, but to scorch, to burn up,
cremare. comburere. When we consider tijat in ch. vi.
Isaiah does not set forth his general proplietic inau-
guration, but his special calling to ienounce the ob-
duracy of the people, and to set before them the
judgments that must follow, we understand how it is
that he sees the appearance of Jehovah in the tem-
ple, and in the midst of the seraphim or burning an-
gels, whilst he feels the door-sills of the temple trem-
ble at their call, and beholds the house tilled with
smoke. The meaning is, that in spirit he anticipates
the future burning of the temple as the infliction of
Jehovah's judgment. In Ps. Ixxx. 2, it is said ; O
8hei)herd of Israel, appeal-, thou that sittes^ above
toe chei'ubim, awake thy power. The cherubim,
therefore, are symbols of the actual putting forth of
the divine authority. To this corresponds, too, tlie
expression, Ps. xcix. 1 : He sitteth above the cheru
bim, therefore does the world tremble. Wholly in a
simdar sense does Hezekiah, in his extreme neces-
sity, call upon Jehovah as the one who rules over all
kingdoms, when he addresses him as Jehovah Saba-
ia wrong here. Such a metathesis, although it eeems simple,
would bo cohtrary to clear phonetic pricriples. Had the (gut-
tural come first, it would have been more plausible, but such
■i syllable as HI (riif.-) would hardly pass into ^3 (knr) Be-
sides, the piimary sense of Z2~^ is not riding nor molion at
&11, \>\i\pmiti(m — superposition, from whence comes I ho oilier
idea, as secondary or implied. This is moet clearly sliown
IB the same word in the Arabic and Syriac, although it quite
plainly appears also in the Hebrew. It is liirmore easy and
oatiirat Ut derive the name 3113 , not from anything in the
lorm or ofllco of the cbcrubim, but from their being reniiirk-
sbleengravedfiguruw, hence called pre-eminently 1 be ei/£;r(/t)-
inffi. See the m«ouut of these rcpresenljitions in the tem-
ple of Solomon. This would bring them very naturally flora
HIS , the sense of which in the Syriac is, to plough, cut, cn-
fravt. It is then, clearly, the same root with the Greek
ypa*t -r/r«u«— <' RI', Lai. 8(CUiBo). They are the re-
markable foims, figures, soulptores — engravings. — T. LI
0th, the God of Israel, who sitteth above the cheni
bim. In Ezekiel, the cheruoim are denoted in strong
synnbolical, allegorical forms, no huigcr as augels.
but as r.i'n , ^"na, living things (Luther; beasts;
Moreover, in Ezekiel x. there are again set forth in
connection with the cherubim, the coals of ti'C that
are to be cast over the city. And, finally, in the tem-
ple of Ezekiel, do we find the cherubim again as the
key-note for tlie symbolical destruction of thu tem
pie (ch. xli. IS). We have in Ezekiel the cheiubiia
figures especially set forth m their full development
(man, the lion, the ox or bullock for sacrifice, ani
the eagle), whilst in the Revelation they are recog-
nized as the ground-forms of the divine ruling in the
world, as symbolized in the four gronnd-fornn of the
ereaturely life (see " Life of Jesus," i. p. 234, Dor/ma-
tik, p. tJ03). If any one is disposed to reaird these
as the ground- orms of the spiritual life iu the world,
because the beasts bear up the throne of the divine
rule in the world, or because, according to the anal-
ogy of the Apocalypse, they pray unto God, there is
no objection to be made to it. But they are not thus
denoted as containing the idea of the highest erea-
turely life. Thus also here, in accordance with all
the related phices of Scripture, must we firmly hold
fast the view that the cherubim are only symbolical
angel-forms ; as we must also distinguish the sera
phim everywhere from personal angels ; although in
the manifestation of the cherubim, there was disclosed
to the first men a ghmpse of the angel-world. As
symbolical forms, they must be here regarded as ap-
pointed to form a permanent post of watching, in
01 der to keep men from approaching Paradise, and
especially the tree of life. When we perceive the
fact that the cherubim everywhere form the accom-
panying guard and watch of the divine throne, we
are under the necessity of bringing Paradise also, and
especially the tree of Ufe, which they are appointed
to guard, in special relation to this throne Thereby
m;iy it be explained how Jacob says; " 1 have seen
God face to face, and my life is preserved (Gen. xxxii.
;;ii), — also how the beholding of God especially brmgs
death, because it is through death that the highest
lileisattMined (E.X. xxxiii. 2ll; Ps xvi. II; xvii. 15;
1 John ill. 2 ; and the history of the visions, Is. vi. 5 ;
Dan. vii. 13; viii. 17; Kev. i. 17). The cloud and
pillar of fire which led the children of Israel through
the desert was also a sign of the presence of (iod, as
well as a dividing between the glory of God and sin-
ful men ; in other words, it was the guard that kept
off from the divine glory the profane entrance .and
the profane look. For that reason, it seems to stand
in connection with the cherubim of the ritual sym-
bolic, as it is connected with the cherubim and sera^
[jhiiii of the religious symbolic, view.
The mythological analogies of the cherubim fig-
ures are, in fact, most striking. " On the mountains
north of India," says Knobel, '' or, in general, in the
region of the mountain and Eden of (Sod, do the
ancients (e. g. Ktesias, Jndea, xii ; Arrian, Uitt.
Aniin.\v.'l''i; compare also Piiilostrat., Vit. Apoll.
iii. -48) place thi; fabulous griffins, which they describe
as feathered beings with lions' claws, the wings and
beaks of eagles, Haining eye?, &c.,— making them
the guardians of the gold that thei e abounds. Oth-
ers refer them to the higher North, to the Arimas-
piau country, describing them partly in a similar
manner, and setting them forth as watchers of the
gold, e. g. Hkkoii., iv. 13, 27; yEscii., iVow. 8n4
Pausa.v., &c. — Of these stories the author probabli
had some knowledge, as ahso of tlie ^old land ol
l.UAP. III. 1-2J
2«
Elavilab, which he mentions." Delitzsch cites hesiJcs
tlie Persian stories, according to which 99,999 Fer-
vers (that is, a countless number) keep watch over the
tree horn, which contain- in itself the power of the
-esurrection. In regard to the connection between
the Bible tradition and this legend, Delitz.<ch regards
»3 significant the comparison (Ezek. xsviii. 14) of the
king of Tyre to the protecting cherub with its out-
spread wings. This comparison, however, has its
ground simply in the fact thiit the history of the
king ol Tyie is presented in analogy with the history
of the fall iu Eden. Delitzsch supposes that the :ip-
pearance of the analogous legends which have conie
down to us, has its origin in this, that humanity, as
It went forth in tribes, ever spreading farther and
farther asunder, took along the representation of the
cherubs froD' the ancestral home, and continually
made mythological additions to it. It appears to u?,
nevertheless, th:U the analogies of the grilEn legends
are only apparent, since there is a great diflerence
between the idea of a lost tree of life, and that of
gold mines which may yet become the booty of man-
kind The story of the tree horn may be very easily
connected with the later Persian legends, which may
be referred back to the Hebrew traditions rather
than to any early and universal tradition of Paradise
— to say nothing of Knobel's opinion, that the He-
brew idea of the cherubim, so consistently maintained,
should be explained from the very indefinite form of
the Greek legend of the griffins. In our opinion, the
story of Prometheus has much more of an inner re-
lationship to the Paradise history. To conclude, as
Keil remarks on the chapter before us : " With the
banishment from the Garden of Eden, Paradise, as
far as men were concerned, disappeared from the
earth. God did not withdraw from the tree of life
its supernatural power, neither did he lay waste the
garden before their eyes, but he guarded it against
their return, to indicate that it must be preserved and
permanently guarded to the time of the consumma-
tion, when sin should be destroyed through judg-
ment, death talcen away by the conqueror of the ser-
pent (1 Cor. XV. 2B), and the tree of life grow again
and bear fruit upon the new earth of the heavenly
Jerusalem (Rev. xx. 21)." This is clearly a right
Bvmbolical imderstanding. And yet we must not
lose sight of the historical fact, that for sinful man
the central and collective power of health in nature,
as in a still higher sense the beholding of God, is.
through sin, and through the divine judgment, hid-
den and vanished, though not absolutely lost. The
individual man, hke the collective humanity, may in
many ways draw nigh to Paradise ; but he is ever
driven back as by a divine tempest and nkry judg-
ment to the outer field of labor, of conflict, and of
death. Not backwards must he look, but ever
onwards.
DOCTBINAL AlTD ETHICAL.
1. The meaning of Ihe narrative of the lost
Paradise. Like the biblical histories everywhere,
and especially the primitive traditions of Genesis, it
is an histot.oal fact to be taken in a religious ideal,
that is, a symbohcal form. It is just as httle a mere
allegory as the human race itself is a mere allegory.
I', is just as little a pure, naked fact, as the speaking
ot the serpent is a literal speaking, or as the tree
of life, in itself regarded, is a plant whose eaiing
imparted imperishable Id'e. That sin began with the
beginning of the race, that the first sin had its origin
in a foi bidden enjoyment of nature, and not in tli»
Caiiiitic fratricide or sinjilar crime? 'bat the origit
of human sin points back to the b>gii.a^g of th(
human race, that the vvoman was ever more se
ducible than the man, that along with .sin came ii,
the tendency to sin, consciou.sness of gnilt, aliena-
tion from God, and evil in general,— all these are
affirmations of the reUgious historical consciousuest
which demand the historiealness of our tradition
and would point back to some such fact, even tliough
it were not written in Genesis. It is then the actual
historical influences of our narration, in their world-
historical significance, which wholly distinguish it
from a myth. The symbolical understitnding of the
history appears in this, that the universal existence
of sin, of the fall, and of the fall of every individual,
are reflected in it. Here come esiiecially into eon
sideration : 1. The various mythological analogies
of the biblical tradition of the fall. 2. The various
exegetical understandings of the Jewish and the
Christian theology. 3. Modern interpretations.
I. In respect to ihe mythological ajinlogies, com
pare Lucken, "The Traditions of the Human Raee,"
p, 74 n., h.aving the superscription : La chute (U
Vhomme degeneri: est le fortdemeitt de la theologie de
presgue toutes les ancien?>rs nations Voltairk.
Philos. de Vhist. In the first place, Liicken shows
why it is that the heathen legends respecting these
facts must present themsehes as transformations.
Then follow, first the legends of the old Persians.
" According to the Zendavesta, or the sacred writ-
ings of the old Persians, the peo])les of this race,
namely the old Modes, Persians, and Bactiians, as
well as all the Indogermanic peoples, had primarily
the doctrine of four ages of tlie world. In the first,
which lasted 3,000 years, the world was without evil,
and Ormuzd, the good principle, reigned alone; in
tile second, Ahriman began the conflict with Or-
muzd ; in the third he divides with him the domin-
ion ; in the fourth he is apparently to gain the
victory, then to be subdued, after which is to follow
the burning of the world. To the universal legend,
how Ahriman brings death to Rajomord, the first
man, there is attached the special story of the fall
of the Mescliia and the Meschiane (p. 81). So the
Indian legends also number four ages. The myth-
ical Indian tendency has presented the fall in mani
fold myths, as well Brahminic as Buddhistic. Here-
upon tollow the Chinese legends, the Grecian legends
(the Hesiodie ages of the world: the golden, the
silver, the brazen, the iron, the Titan legend, the
Prometheus legend, the Tantalus legend), then the
Romish legends (the ancient time of Satuin), the
Germanic legends (the gold thirst, the fall of Asen,
to which may be added the admittance of Lock into
the Asenbund, death of Baldur, and other similar
things), then JSgyptian legends, as also those of th«
Xegroes^ of the polar nations, of the Iroquois, of
the Mexicans, &c,, &c." In conclusion, there is a
treatise on the dominion of the demons, the origin
of sorcery and idolatry, concerning woman and her
place in heathendom, the restoration to pardon if
the first men. In a shorter method, Delitzsch gives
an account of the myths in relation to the fall, p.
169, KsoBF.L, p. 40. — 2. Exegetical understanding
of the Jewish and the Christian theology. " It was
a universally prevaiUng opinion among the Jews
that Satan was active in the temptation of the first
men. This is found in Philo, and in the ' Book of
Wisdom,' ch. ii. 24 : ' through envy of the devi;
came sin mto the world.' In later Jewish writin(!<
244
QENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSKS
Pararaael, the head of the evil spirit-", is called
^;"1Sl~n fn:n , the old serpent, because he tempted
Eto in the form of a serpent, or IL'n: (the serpent)
alone (compare the places in Eisknmenger, ' Reve-
ation of Judaism,' i. p. 822)." Hesgstexberg,
'■ Christology," i. p. 7. It must nevertheless be ob-
derved, that even among the Jews there had alre;idy
come m a iwofnld conception of this history of the
temptation. Philo {De Mundi Opijicio) saw in the
serpent an allegory of the evil lust (^Soi-ri). In the
same manner does Maimonides interpret the place
allegorically ; whilst Josephus understands the
speaking of the serpent as a proper speaking, and
other Jews :igain are inclined to see in the serpent
an apparent form merely of Satan himself Abar-
banel and others connect a directly seductive ad-
dress of Satan to the woman with the fact of his
winding himself about the tree, and tasting of its
fruit. Cyril of Alexandria supposes the serpent to
have been only an assumed outward appearance of
Satan, whilst Basil, Chrysostom, Augustine, and, in
general, the later fathers, regard Satan as having
served himself" of the serpent, and spoken througli
him. The inclination of the Alexandrians to an
allegorizing interpretation continues in a progressive
measure, in the school of the Gnostics, namely,
among the Ophites (see Muller, " History of Cos-
mology," p. 190), and in like manner in the inter-
pretations of the later mystics and theosophists.
According to Grotius, Moses Ibund the narration
before us in the form of an ancient pc«m. Clericus
is inclined to agrt-e with those who hold that the
serpent di>l not actually speak, bvit only eat of the
fruit before the eyes of Eve, and that with this was
connected the temptation of Satan (as Abarbanel
maintains) ; but it appears to him that in re obscura
tutissima ingenun i(f7ioranti(e confessio. Concerning
the modern views, an account is given by the author
of the article " Sin," in Herzog's " Real Encyclope-
die," as follows: The tempter is the devil (John
viii. 44 ; Rev. xii. 9 ; Book of Wisdom, ii. 24), who
used the serpent as his instrument (2 Cor. xi S) ;
the serpent is, therefore, neither alone active as
such (T. Miiller, Schenkel), nor is he an incorpora-
tion of Satan (Gerhardt, Philippi), nor the mere
emblem of the cosmical principle (Martenseu). The
influence of Satan upon men was by way of dialogue,
wheieiu the peculiar nature of the serpent was taken
advantage of and with which his alluring motions
may have cooperated (Hengstcnberg, Thomasius,
Deiitzsch, Ebrard), not a mere physical influence in
that the unrecognized voice of Satan like a vision-
reflection passed over upon the serpent (in which
case 'he speaking serpent would have been merely a
syjnbolical figure), nor something at the time unob-
served by the first formed men, but afterwards, in
the later recollections ol the tradition, taken for
Satanic influence (liofmann). The tree of knowledge
of good and evil is neither a poison-tree (Reinhard,
Doderlein, Morns) nor otherwise a tree of knowledge
of good and evil in such special sense that the
cousequences of the enjoyment must have been an
intoxication, a disturbance of the pure c(|uilibrium
in the harmony of the first man (Lange), nor a
mystical tree whose fruit, for the one who enjoys it,
bi the reception of evil into his being, and therewith
the knowledf,'e of good and evil (Martcnaen), nor an
emblem of the wtnld darkened to the perdition of
death, in its false influence upon man (Schenkel),
but — an ordinary tree, which had 't« significance
only through the command of God." In this dry
idealless positivism must such an undersfandina
come to its stop. We niust, however, distiiiguieh
at present three or four principal views: 1. Tha
traditional, orthodox, pojiular representation, an
cording to which the serpent, under the influence of
Satan, Uterally spoke, or Satan, in fact, in the
appearance of the serpent-form. 2. The Gnoetie
allegorii.-al, farlher developed into the mythical
allegoric, and, in fact, at one time in a sense akir A
Ophitism (the view of Hegel, according to DEitTiSCH,
p. 171), and again, in a more cburehly and ethiial
sense. 3. The connection of the definite dialectical
speaking of Satan with corresponding motions of the
serpent, such as its eating the fruit. 4. An influence
of Satan, exemplified in acts of the serpent, inca-
pable of being farther defined, and thus becoming
a dialogue tlirough the visionary or ecstatic condi-
tion of the woman. This is our view (Dogmatic, p
439), for the understanding of which there must b*
previously an insight into the essential nature of thii
visionary state of soul. In respect to the desigl
of our narration, there are, in like manner, various
vie"s presented. According to Berger (" PraC'
tical introduetion to the Old Testament, continued
from Augusti "), who is disposed to see here, nol
the history of the first men generally, but only thai
of an ancestor of the Abrahamitic race (a hereditary
legend, in fact, of the family of Abraham, which pre-
supposes an already previous longer existence of
humanity ; Kains, Ackerbau, Stadtbau), the most
usual decision in respect to the aim of our narration
is that which regards it as containing a doctiint of
the origin of evil. As a modification of this view,
however. Pott, sets forth the proposition that its ami
is to represent the transition from the golden to the
silver age. For the old narrator this is much too
general a view. If he intended, which is the most
likely, something more than narrating merely for the
sake of the story, — in other words, if he meant also
to teach us something along with it, then his purpose
could have been nothing else than to show how man
may have been led into transgression, und what
consequences it must have had (i. p. 55). According
to the Jerusalem Targum, Eichborn, and Paulus
the design of our narration was to paint the loss of
the golden age, whilst Von Bolden, Hegel, Knobel
and others, in exact accordance with the Gnostic
Ophites, would represent it as an advance (an ad-
vance, indeed, attended by calamities) from the siata
of savage beastUness. The representation clearly
presents itself as the religious symbolical primeval
history of humanity, holding the key of all history
that follows it, according to the contrast of the
fall and the resurrection, or of sin and death, aa
also redemption and renovation, whilst it gives the
ground for the unveiling of the demon and angel-
world, as the appointed means for introducing the
deepest understanding of the history of the kingdom
of God. According to its most peculiar key-note,
it is a representation of the beginning of the king-
dom of grace. For a catalogue ot the modem
literature in respect to the different interpretation!
of the fall, see Bretschneider, " Systematic Devel
opment," n. p. 620.
2. 77(« Probation-Tree, the Probation a - (A*
Temptation. " The Rabbins and Mohammedans un
derstood by the probation-tree, the vine ; the Gre
cian church fathers understood it of the fig-tree;
the Latins, in the first place, ol' the apple. The tre<
horn plays the same part in the Zendavesta. Tlw
CHAP. III. 1-24.
241
I
Hindoos ppcak of a knowledge and creation tree,
the Tibetans of a sweet, wliiti^li herb, or marrow,
from the enjoyment of which originated the feeling
of shame, and the custom of wearing clothes." Von
Bohlen. We have elsewhere alluded to tlie analogy
between the falling into sin of the second ancestor
Noah, "ho bec;ime intoxicated by the fruit of the
Tine, and in consequence thereof lay in ids naked-
ness, and the falling into .sin of the priiEiitive ances-
tor who became aware of his nakedness after eating
of the forbidden fruit. This analogy does not justify
us in concluding that it was the vine, but some other
fruit, perhaps, whose effect, for tl>e first men, was
too strong, being of an intoxicating or disturldng
nature. If we do not find in that unknown fruit
some immanent ground of the divine command, it is
clear that we must adopt the idea of a purely arbi-
trary ordinance. Nature itself is, indeed, and in the
most general sense, a tree of probation for man ;
this pecuharity of it has always had its special types,
and there are vet various probation trees for different
nations—such as opium, hashiseh, the coco plant,
etc. So Beyer, in his sermon on the History of the
Primitive World (p. 90), takes tlie contrast between
the tree of life and the tree of probation to consist
in this, that the first, although it had not the power
to make men ever healthy and young, possessed,
nevertheless, a heiling and strengthening efficiency
( inalogous to similar medicine trees), whilst the pro-
bation-tree was, in these respects, the opposite. He
supposes it, indeed, without any ground, to have
been a poison-tree ; — without any ground, we say,
for the human race is not poisoned corporeally, but
distempered and disordered physically through an
ethical consequence of its effects. Besides this, the
probation- tree is distinguished from the serpent, as
the probation from the temptation. The probation
is from God, as the temptation is from the evil
one. Tlie prol:>ation, along with the demand for
watchfulness, presents an alternative for the good.
The temptation increases the danger of the alterna-
tive with an instigation to the evil. The probation
has in view that man should be on his guard ; it is
intended to lay the ground of his normal develop-
ment. The temptation has in view the fall of man ;
its purpose is to entice him into an abnormal devel-
opment, or rather, entanglement. Since the time
that sin is in the world, has each probation also in
itself the force of a temptation, because there is
added to it the enticement to sin on the part of the
devil, the world, and one's own peculiar evil lusts. In
this sense of probation can it be said God tempted
Abraham. And just on this account is it that the sins
of a man already perpetrated become for him a tempt-
ation to future crimes ; therefore do we pray : Lead
us not into temptation. Moreover, the liereditary
*sm is itself one great universal temptation, which
lies as a load upon the human race. From all this
it follows that the temptation which was added to
the first probation of man came not from God, nei-
ther from any physical creature, and just as Uttle
from anything withiu the soul of innocent man, but
solely from a malignant spirit. In this fact, how-
ever, lie two consequential inferences : the first that
{here are apiriis besides men endowed with reason (the
Kigel world), the second that in this spirit-world there
must have been already a fall preceding that of man.
3. The Serpfnt and Satan. The former has
bjen thus described : '■ The serpent, a beast like to
an embodied thunderbolt that has had its origin in
the deepest night, parti-colored, painted like fire, as
black tind dark as n j^ht, its eyes like glowing sparky
its tongue bhick. yet cloven like a flame, its jaws t
cliasm of the unknown, its teeth fountains of \ enoni
the sound of its mouth a hiss. Add to this th«
strange and wonderful motion, ever striving like a
flash to quiver, and like an arrow to flee, were it not
hindered by its bodily organizati(jn. It appears
among the beasts like a condemned and fallen angel ,
in the heathen world of false gods, it hath lound
and still finds, ever, awe and adoration ; its subtlety
has become a byword, its n.ime a naming of Satan,
whilst the popular feeling, even now, as in all times
past, connects a ctirse and an exorcism with its ap-
pearance." F. A. KRU.MMACHKR, " Paragra])hs for the
Holy Histtiry " (p. 65). In this splendid painting there
is left out the brutal clumsiness and obtuseness of the
serpent which stand in such remarkable contrast
witli its mobility and its guile. (See R. S-vell, " Phi-
losophiciU Observations of Nature," Dresden, 1839.)
ReSfiecting the presence and the siejniiicatice of poi.ton
in nature. "There are, in inorganic n^iture, a class
of substances which destroy life, not through any
mechanical injury and rending, but rather by insinu-
ating themselves smoothly and gently into the or-
gans of the living thing ; — thus forcing their way in
with a subtle atid malignant power, they invade the
life in its most interior and invisible laboratories,
throwing into disorder all their functions, and there-
by bringing in sickness and most painful death.
And so, too, are there beasts that iiefer attack theii
foe with plain and open weapcuis, killiug the organs
by mechatdcally breaking them up ; but, on the other
hand, with weapons concealed, underhaml, sly-ilart-
ing, and apparently weak, seem to inflict oidy a
slight injury upon their foe, and, in fact, to be only
playing with him, whilst, at the same time, through
this insignificant hurt introducmg a horrible |)o\ver
of destruction, ever inwardly growing, until finally
it breaks out in tormenting sickness, and ends in r
wretched death. These beings and products of na
ture which thus destroy life, not mediately throug-i
an outer breaking of its parts and organs, but by a
hostile effect upon the very life functions, and
which, consequently, must po.ssess an enmity directly
aiming at the life itself, — we denote by the name of
jDO«o7io««." — " Schubert has well remarked, that
the poisonous beasts are beings that appear to be
placed ambiguously and doubtfully between two
•otherwise quite distinct classes, each of which, in
their own sphere, present a distinct, perfect, and free
individuality. In such middle beings there neces-
sarily lies a striving for a higher form, though ever
cleaving to the lower. Thus shows itself in them,
often, an aberration from an otherwise soimd natu-
ral tendency, whilst their very enjoyment is, for the
most part, attended with pain and disgust. On their
bodily side they exhibit a nature, ever, in some re-
spects, infirm and sickly, and never rightly attaining
to repose." — " It is not to be wondered at, there-
fore, that in the collected organism of nature, as well
as in individual creatures, there comes in, at tiie tran-
sition point, an infirm, ambiguous organization, inter-
penetrated by evil fluids, which are able to inocu-
late other creatures with the malady of theii- own
confusion and disorder. And this i« nothing else,
than poison. Since each poison is a sensible sub-
stance, or so presented, which has become an origi'
nal cause of disease." Under this point of view th<
author now treats of arsenic, of meicury, of prussit
acid, of spiders, and of snakes. "All poisonous ani
nials carry with them a sluggish, and appsrcntli
^46
GEN'ESIS, OR THE FIRST BOCK OV MOSES.
loathing life. The most of them seldom or never
jet themselves in motion towards the object of their
passion, although there is no failure in them, either
of strength or swiftness, when they let out upon
Jieir prey. This strong contrast of sluggish rest and
angry vehemence, produces upon us tlie impression
of some irreconcilable bitbrmity in their nature.
They are lurking beasts, lying in the darkest and
most unclean recess. Along with this they seem
lispeeially to love the damp and nioukly place where
ieath riots. Tims, for example, do the rattlesnakes
love to lay themselves Ijehind some foul stump,
whilst others seek the old mouldy wall, or the pile
of ruins, or the foul dusty comer. It is worth re-
marking that almost all of them have for the lower
organization of the belly a greatly disproportioned
extension, whilst, on the other hand, the breast and
heart, or the organs that correspoud to these, are
shrivelled and contracted. In the most dangerous
and most poisonous among them, the last trace of
any interior breast formation has disappeared, whilst
they show not the least rudiments of any shoulder
bones. We see them dart with fury upon their
prey, then laboring under it with infinite pain and
distress, whilst for each gorging they pay with fee-
bleness and torpidity. In this condition they gaze
around them stupid and blear-eyed, whilst they suffer
themselves to be killed with sticks without making
any defence." — " These giant serpents, the crocodiles
and the alligators, have generally, and in an extraor-
dinary degree, the look of a former world. They are
the Titans that, under the dominion of the new cre-
ated race of gods, are thrust down into the deep,
and into darkness, whence many a lin)e still there
spits forth the fire of their rage. The croaking of
the frogs, the grunting of the toads, the shrill sharp
piping of the lizard, the hiss of the seipent, give
none of them any special conception of the emotions
of which they are tlie expression. The serpents are
without doubt the most wonderful, and, so to speak,
the most like fable, of any beings of the present cre-
ation." Next follows the depicting of the singular
contrasts in the nature of the serpent : its rude ele
mentary form and its fine, spiritual expression, its
subtle look, which never carrifs itself out in action,
its enchantment or fascination of its prey, and its
capability of becoming transported whilst itself in a
state of fascination and torpidity (p. 67, etc.). (See
the above remarks and the article '• Serpent," by'
Winer, Wdrterbuch fur dax ChrisUiche Volk. —
Satan. Between the two contradictory suppositions,
one of which is that our text recognizes otdy a tempt-
ation of the serpent, but not. at all, of any evil
spirit expressing itself through it, and the other, rep-
resenting it to contain a full Knowledge of Satan,
lies the hypotla'Sts that corresponds to the idea of
an organic unfolding of biblical doctrine ; it is, that
we have here the first germ of the doctrine of Satan,
as we also have before us the first germ of a soteri-
ological Chrisiology — that is, of a Christ of salva-
tion. Both germs are throughout placed in u re-
markable relation to each other ; the destroyer of
the serpent is announced in the seed of woman.
But the actual cons-ious knowledge, wlii(;h is here
expressed in a symbolical form, consists in this, that
it represents the serpent as a malignant spirit, ciafiy,
Ivin,.^, and rejoicing in miscliief, who shows himself,
and will continue to show himself the foe of man
and the foe of (ioil. Concerning the farther devel-
opment of the doctrine of Satan, see the cxcgetical
anuotationB.
i. The Temptation of Christ in the Wildemcsi u
antetype of the temptation of Adam in Para iise.
5. The Orhjin of Sin. Our text gives us (ht
ground of supposing, in the first place, a distinct or*
gin of sin, in opposition to the system which would
make the oiigin of sin to happen concurrently with
the initial constitution of human nature itself. It
gives IIS occasion to distinguish a threefold oiigin of
sin: 1. The cosmical-demonic : 2. the physiological
genesis of sin ; S. the Adaniic-historical. 1. Evident
ly is the first human sin to be referred back to a pre-
ceding demoniacal temptation ; therefore, also, to i
preceding demoniacal sin, and accordingly, too, to an
earlier fall in the spirit-world. Nevertheless, the
essential origin of sin is not thereby explained, for
there comes up the further question : how sin origin-
ated in the spirit-world ? According to the Apocry. '
phal book.s, the essential root of sin is mainly pride, "
yTTfpTjtf'ai'ia, which is always an assuming of a false
god, that is, of idolatry. (This is expressed some-
what obscurely. Wisdom of Sirach, x. 15 : i-pxh imep-
Tjaioi/ms afxapria. Book of Wi.=dom, xiv. 12; v. 27 :
^PXV TTopfflui eiTii/uta fl5w\wv.'~-Tj yap TUiv avi^ivy.<Ai»
flhojKttiv hp'qUKiio. iracTo? ap\7] KaKov Kat aiTia. Ka'i
TTfpat fo-Tii'), According to this the first motive to
the leading astray, through temptation or seduction,
was envy (Book of Wisdom, ii. 24). With this agrees
also, 2. the psychological origin of sin as our text
brings it before us. It certainly does not commit
itself to the crude, elementary representation, that the
beginning of sin is to be explained from any over
balance of sensuality or materiality. The process of
sin's development proceeds from a spiritiud self
disordering, wherein doubt, together with self-exalta-
tion, constitutes the ground-form which devtlopi
itself into an enviously malignant pride, and unbe
lief, that it may become complete in superstition and
sensual concupiscence, in lawlessness and seduction.
Concerning the ground-form of sin, how it degener-
ates from the demoniacal into the bestial, from thu
spiritual self-exaltation to the sensual self-degrada-
tion, see Langk's Vor/malik, p. 437. But our text,
moreover, 3. would recognize the psycholoizical com-
pletion of sin, regarded as the historical beginning-
of the same in the human world. This is proved by'
the continuation of the first sin in the guilt-eon-
scionsness of the first man, by his self-deception and
self-hardening, by his exculpations and liis crimina-
tions. Most fully is it shown in the announcement
of the conflict between the seed of the serpent and
the seed of the woman, in the banishment of man
from Paradise, and in the fratricidal mm der of Cain,
that follow so soon alter. Confronted by the sim.
pie greatness and clearness of our tradition of the
genesis of sin, stand tlie most diversely varying
views, such as the doctrine of the pre-existent ghost-
ly fall into sin (Plato, Origen, Schelling, Stetfens,
J. Miilh-r), of the pre-existent corporeal sinfulness
(Rationalism, R. Rothe), of the idealistic origin of
the conce])tion of sin in the element of repentance
(Schleiermacher), or in the element of the advancing
consciousness (Hegel), or of iis monstrous eosnii:ai
ground iu nature (Marlensen), — and others of a rtmi-
lar kind.
(i. Sill. SinfubieKS — Original Sin. Our histjry
tells us plainly that sin in its formal relation is, bfr
fore all things, a ti ansgression of the divine com-
mand ; whilst in its material relation it is a woimdiue
of the proper personal life, even unto death, and, it
consci|Ucnce thereof, a hostile tun' tig away froir
(lod, a silf-eiitanglcment in the love if self and o/
CHAPTER III. 1-24.
24'.
•he ytorld, as flowing from '.he abuse of tlie freedom
of the will to an apparent freedom which degeneiatea
Into bondage. That sin, after it becomes fixed, is
especially to be regarded as selfishness, is proiniiieiit-
ly taught byZwingli; see Farrago, "Animlaiionnm
in GeiiKsin ex ore Zimir/li,"' p. 56 : habemux jiiiiic
pr^evaricaiionis fmiiem^ (piKavriav videlicet^ hoc estnui
fpniux amorem. The signs of the siiifuhiess {status
eorruptionis) that come in with sin ai'e clearly pre-
sented in our account. At its proper focus appears
the consciousness of guilt, in whicli, at the same
time wiih alienation from God, there becomes fixed
the dependence on the sinful appetite. The essenliiil
cause is the vacuum that comes into the soul, the
failing of life in the spirit, the physically unbridled
and ungoverned behavior whereby the predominance
is given to the flesh over the power of tlie sjiirit.
Out of the permanence of a sinfulness which contra-
dicts the idea as well as the original nature of man,
there comes the necessary consequence of the doe-
trine of original sin, whose point of gravity, misap-
prehended by Pelagius, lies in the organic unity of
humanity, but whose limitation, moreover, misappre-
hended by Augustine, lies in the personal, voluntary,
human individuahty. On the one side, humanity is
no more an atomistic pile of spirit, than it is capable
of being disintegrated atomistieally into its isolated
sinnijigs. And so, again, on tlie other side, it is no
more a tiiassa in the general, than it can be a iinissn
pcrditiunis. The whole weight of the organic con-
nection, as it appears to have overwhelmed the born
Cretin (and yet not wholly so, since he is irrespon-
sible according to the measure of his imbecility), hath
revealed itself in the tact, that the burden of human
guilt has fallen on the sinless Jesus. The whole im-
portance of the individual freedom of choice is, in
like manner, to be recognized in the personal posi-
tion of the man in its various degrees of advance-
ment from the lowest step of the human gradation
even to the highest, that is, the holiness of Christ.
Within the organic connection, which, witli its his-
torical curse, winds round all, there still remains
room for the contrast between good and evil (Book
of Wisdom, eh. x. 1), and for genealogies of blessing
as well as for repeated falls, or special genealogies
of the curse. This contrast connects itself with the
contrast of human conduct in guilt consciousness and
in shame. Shame and the consciousness of sin draw
men towards God, just as they also draw them from
liim. On this it depends wliether the man, through
the aid of the gratia prcevemens^ should encourage
himself to follow the drawings of God, or in cowardly
Bight from the divine penal righteousness should give
himself up to an unholy repulsion.
7. The First Jwlgnient^ and^ in the same time^ the
First Promise of Salvation. It must be observed,
that the first presented judgment of (Jod remains
the type for all Ibllowmg judgments. The holy
Scripture does not separate in an abstract, dogmati-
cal m;umer, between the rule of the divine righteous-
ness and that of the divine love and mercy. The
judgments of God which avail for the separation of
the lost, are ever the purifying and the deliverance
of iht elect. For tlie judgments of God are separa-
tions. Thus here, they separate between the seed
of the serpent and the seed of the woman. Farther
»n, there is a separation between the house of Noah
and the first lost race. Still farther, and another
takes place between the heathen at the Babylonian
tower-building, and Abraham with his r.ace, the heirs
■)f tne Messing. Next it was between the imbeliev-
ing Israelites who fell in the desert, and the preserve*
remnant which came into the possession of Canaan
\ similar crisis is made by the Assyri;in and Baby
Ionian captiviiies. The highest and :e deepest crisii
is ju'eseuled by the cross of Christ ; .. Is the division
that takes phice between the believing and the unbe-
lieving. The last is that wliieli takes |)lace at tin
end of the world ; it is the judgment that divides be-
tween the blessed and the damned. This, then, il
the ground-reason why the divine pi-oniises, .ind the
beginnings of salvation, break Ibrth from the sen-
tences of judgment. Such is the case here in the
sentences pronounced on the guilt in Paradise. In
the very front stands the obscure yet ndghty prom-
ise of the so-called protevangel. Moreover, the pro*
nunciation of judgment against the woman has like-
wise its blessing and its promise. With pain shalt
thou — bear children ; this curse has the New Testa-
ment changed into a blessing (1 Tim. ii. 15); and so
it is with her dependence upon man (F,ph. v. 22).
The judgment pronounced on Adam burdened the
field with the curse of thorns and thistles ; but thorns
and thistles are the progenitors of the rose and of the
wonderful cactus-flower. The primitive sentence of
Adam to the hard labor of his life's calling is become
a blessing to the human race. The calling and the
labor become the ground-lbrms for the education of
man (Fs. xc. 10). And, finally, the return to earth
through death contains not only a juilgment, but
also, in the judgment, the prospect of deliverance
from the sufferings of the earthly sojourn (2 Cor. v.
8 ; Philip, i. 23). The separation of man from the
tree of Ufe, by means of the cherubim, prevented him
from looking backwards to the lost paradise; it im-
pels him to look forward, and to aspire to the new
paradise and its trees of life (Rev. xxii. 2). The ban-
ishment from Paradise lays the foundation for the
religion of the future, or, as it has been called, the
theocratic faith in God of pious Jews (Ileb. xi. 8).
The protevangel, moreover (see the Exegetical an-
notations), contains the germ of all later Messianic
prophecies ; therefore is it so universal, so compre-
hensive, so dark, and yet so striking and distinct in
its fundamental features. As the ground outline ot
the future of salvation, it denotes: 1. The religious
ethical strife between good and evil in the world,
and the sensible presentation of this strife through
natural contrasts — the serpent, the woman. 2. The
concrete form of this strife and its gradual gene-
alogical unfoldings : the seed of the serpent, the '
seed of the evil one, and the children of evU ; the
seed of the good and the children of salvation. 3.
The decision to be expected : the wounding of the
woman's seed in the heel, that is, in his human
capability of suffering, and its connection with the
earth, the treading down, or the destruction, not of
the serpent's seed merely, but of the serpent him
self, and that too in his head, the very centre of hia
life. The whole is, therefore, the prediction of an
universal conflict for salvation, with the prospect of
victory. From this basis the promise proceeds in
ever-narrowing circles, until it passes over frotn the
general seed of the woman to the ideal seed, and
from that again draws out in ever-widening circles,
together with the self-untblding promi'^e of the king-
dom of God. Thereby, too, does the conception
of the promise assume an ever deeper and richef
form.
1. General promise of salvation.
n. The posterity of the woman : battle 9i:l
vietorv. ch. iii. 15.
248
GENESIS, Oli THE FIRST BOOK OK MOSES.
4. Noah and his race : rest and Sabbath, '
ch. T. 29.
e. Shem and his tabernacle, Japliet and his
enlargement: the name of God and the
conquest of tlie world, ch. ix. 26, 27.
d Abraham and his race : the race of bless-
ing, the promised land, the blessing of the
nations, ch. xii. 2, 7; siii. 15, 16; xv. 4 ;
xvii. 2-5; xviii. 10; xxii. 15.
«. Isaac and his descendants, ch. xv. 4 ; xtU.
19 ; xxri. 3, 4.
f. Jacob. His blessing and his dominion
over his brother, ch. xxv. 23 ; xxvii. 29.
g Judah and his sceptre : prince in war,
prince of peace, ch. xUx. 8.
S Typical promise of the Messiah : Israel and
the sacerdotal kingdom, Exod. xix. 6. The
star out of Jacob, Numb. xxiv. 17.
a. The typical prophet, Deut. xviii. 6.
4. The typical Levite, Deut. xxxiii. 9-11.
c. The typical king, 2 Sam. vii. 12.
8. The transition from the typical to the ideal
promise of the Messiah in the Psalms.
4. Ideal promise of the Messiah.
The glorious appealing.
a. The ideal Messiah. Hosea, Joel, Amos.
b. The ideal Messiah as prophet, priest, and
king. Isaiah, Micah.
e. The ideal Messianic prophecy and the ideal
prophet. Jeremiah.
d. The ideal high priest. Ezekiel.
e. The ideal king. Daniel.
The conflict. The Christ and the Antichrist.
Apocalyptic forms in Obadiah, Nahum, Habakkuk,
Zephaniah, with isolated examples in all the proph-
ets, especially Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel.
The suffering and the triumphant Messiah, Isaiah
liii. ; Dan. ii. ; ch. vii. 9, 25, 26; Zaeh. ix.-xiv.
8. The earthly calling of the woman, and its sub-
jective form (see Exegetical annotations).
9. The earthly calling of the man, and its objec-
tive form (see Exegetical annotations).
10. The nature of the vanity to which the crea-
tion was made subject in hope lor man's sake (Rom.
Tiii. 18 ; Langk's Miscellaneous Writings, i, p. 217 :
Pelagianism ; Delitzsch, p. 18ti). Here, however,
we must disregard the theosopliic extravagances,
&187, for example, such sayings as that of Jacob
iihme : " rage hath got the u|ipei- liand and made
war upon the government above." Here it may be
remarked, that we cannot, in a purely inUward way,
as Delitzsch and Hofmanii have done, make a distinc-
tion between (iod's dwelling in heaven and on earth
(Delitzsch, p. 177).
11. Death, in the light of Paradise, the end of
pnnishnicnt ; in the light of the Gospel, the begin-
ning of redemption (I Cor. xv. 55j. It must be
remarked tliat the separate jmlgments upon the
wonjiin and the njan are, at the same time, a com-
mon judgment upon both. Delitzsch finds it worthy
of note that the divine sentence says nothing about
the immortality of tlie soul. '* IJtit tlie whole Scrip-
ture,' he says, " knows nothing of any immortality
eroun led in the nature of the soul " (p. 190), there-
fore their dona s>iperadditn, gifts superadded il
Paradise ! See to the contrary. Acts xvii. 28.
12. The banishraeiit from Paradise was in i
special sense a sending foith to the cultivation of
the field (see the Exegetical explanations). Th<
divine clothing of the first man. The doctrine of
Gratia, prmreniens (see Lange's " Dogmatics "),
The clothing of man referred back to the divine
revelation and regulation. And yet we cannot, on
this account, say with Dehtzsch, that "a pure deligh
in the beauty of the divine-formed human figure is
now no more possible ; that nakedness is full of sin
and tetiipting to sin." If this is so then all pure
interest in the human beauty has become impos-
sible.
1 3. The cherubim. See the Exegetical explana-
tions.
14. The disclosure of a spirit-world. With the
consciousness of guilt there is also disclosed to the
human consciousness the demoniac deep of its being
Man has entered the spirit-world, he has partaken of
its knowledge, and has now the first foreboding look
into the angel-world, and the world of fallen spirits
("Dogmatics," p. 550). In this place, too, the Scrip-
ture opens up to us a glimpse of a spirit-world
created before man. Especially is there introduced
the doctrine of the angels, although we must not
regard the cherubim as personal primarily, but only
as symbolical angel-l'orms.
1 5. That with the judgment of God upon man,
that is, with the ceasing of the paradisaical covenant,
God's covenant of grace begins, is perceived with
especial clearness by Coeceius : Summa doctrhur tie
ftederc et textamento dei^ 1648. Correctly has Zwin-
gli laid stress upon the idea, that the promise of
salvation, as given to Adam and Eve, carries tis back
to the conclusion that even up to them there extend
ed a retroacting power of redemption.
16. The divine appearings in Paradise form the
point of commencement for all theophauies before
Christ, and, as such, are not to be identified with the
actual incarnation (or man-becoming) of God in
Christ. They are, however, to be regarded, perhaps,
as typical pre-reprcsentations of the same, and as
having had, therefore, in the idea of Christ, their
principle. Compare Kefl, p. 56, where, however,
the vi-:ion-side of the theophanies does not appear
to be properly appreciated.
HOMILETICAIi AND PEACTICAL.
See the literature of which a catalogue is before
given, and the remarks, Doctrinal and Ethical.
Homilies on the whole section under the general
point of view : Paradise lost, or tiie fall, or the
origin of .sin and evi!, or the solenm begiiming of
human history, or the origin of tlie earthly order of
things, or the first disclosure of a spirit-world and
the connection between the spirit-world and the
Inmian, or, finally, the beginning of tlie kingdom of
grace, that is, the gospel — The end of the paradisa
ieal covenant, the beginning of the covenant of
redemption.— The beginning of the revelation 01
preventing grace, or tlie iinitia ]>r<ri'muvs. — Tht
first history of sin and juilgmcnt, .md, at the sama
time, the first history of punishment and of com-
passion.— The call to humanity: onwards. 1. The
ideal progress (directed towards tlie image of God
in the obedience of life). 2. The false progress (vf
shall become as gods). 3. The health-bringing
CHAPTER III. 1-24.
'ZM-
progress (on the field and in death, yet still towards
the redemption). — Religion in it-s relations to the
world-time : 1. A very ancient reminiscence (knowl-
edge of th<! original destiny, and a knowledge of
sin back to the fall and beyond), 2. A religion of
the present as made clear in our history through
God's word. 8. A religion of the future in a special
sense, as consisting in the prospect of the future
salvation. — Particular sections and verxes. Vers.
1-13 : The sm and the guilt. Vers. 1-fi ; The i'all :
a. the temptation of the serpent ; b the sinful look-
ing of the wife ; c. the seduction of the man. — The
threefold origin of sin. — The serpent the instrument
and the form of the devil's temptation : 1. The
demoniac subtlety of the evil one in its beastly
grounding. 2. The tempting words ; lying perver-
sions of the truth. — The probation and the tempta-
tion.— The murderer from the beginning (John viii.
44). — The elements of the temptation : lies, hate,
death, in contrast to truth, love, and Ufe. — The
progress of sin's development from the first evil
doubt to the completed evil act. — The mongrel du-
plicity of sin as it perverts truth into lies: 1. The
question pious in form, yet so evil in the doubt
implied. 2. The element of truth and the lies in
the promise : ye shall be as gods. — How sin perverts
the human relations : It makes out of tlie obedient
wile a directress of the husband, out of the lielper a
temptress, out of marriage a fountain of miscliief,
out of the man's call to watchfulness an easy cor-
ruptibility, out of Paradise itself a state of guilt. —
Sin as seen in the fall, or the mournful effects of
the first sin: 1. The guilt and the guilt-eonscious-
ness. 2. The divine judgment suspended over them
and the punishment inflicted. — The features of the
sinful tendency in the conduct of the first man after
the fill! : evil terror, blinding loss of love, &c. — The
evil conscience and its feai'S. — The ground-fVature
in the calamity of human sin : tlie mingling and
confusion of sin and evil, in that, 1. evil is made
to become sin, 2. sin becomes naked evil ; therefore
the redemption, that is, the separation between sin
and evil (cross). — The imperfect confession, which
is, nevertheless, through the gi-ace of God, a turning
back towards spiritual health. How God's compas-
sion brings the first man to the knowledge and the
confession. — God's righteousness in his first judg-
ment : 1 . The arraignment ; 2. the consequences
of the judgment-deed ; 3. the appointment of pun-
ishment according to the guilt ; 4. the division of
the one common judgment into its separate sen-
tences.— The revelation of God's grace in his judg-
ment.— The first gospel: 1. Tlie root of all the Old
Testament promises of salvation ; 2. of the New
Testament gospel itself; 3. of the history of the
kingdom of God, and of the announcements of the
end of the world. — The sorrows of the woman in
their connection with sin and sinfulness of the
woman. — The sorrows of the man in their connec-
tion with the sin and sinfulness of the man. — The
suffering of one party, a suffering also of the other.
— How every human caUing has its own suecial
burden, or its conflict with its own special curse. —
The blessing in the curse. — The Immiliation of the
hmnan race the pre-condition of its exaltation. —
The loss of Paradise a sending forth into the world.
— The divine preparation of man for his stale of
exile. — The looking back of man to Paradise, a
aeholdiug of the cherubim and i>f the flaming sword
of an indignant righteousness. — With the separation
from the outer tree of life the protevangel becomes
the germ of a new tree of life for them aid thei
race. — The prospect of the first man in tlu futurt
according to its signification for m : 1. A piospeol
of immeasurable sorro", and yet, 2. a prospect ot
an endless hope.
Starke : — Ver. 1. Luther : So did the devil draw
and tear them from the word of God. As long as
the word stood in tlirir heart, so long was the life
and the prospect of its continiiance. — Ver. 3. Vul-
gate : Ne forte moriamini. Were this the true
sense of the words, Eve must have already trcateo
the sentence of death as something most uncertain.
— Ver. 4. It was a great sin that Eve turned away
from God and his word, and listened to the devil ;
but it was a nmch greater that slie fell in with the
devil, who gave God the lie, and as it were struck
at him with his fists. — Ver. 5. Satm tl e first author
and predecessor of Antichrist, who is a disputing
adversary and exalieih himself above all that is
called God or worshipped (2 Tlie.-s. ii. 4 ; Dan. xi.
3ii). — -Behold now, in the midst of the fair Paradise
there appears a crafty and poisonous serpent ! It
is here, it may be even by thy side. Be on thy
guard against it (Sirach xxi. 2). Unbelief and
doubt of God's word are the sins by which llie devil
at first sought to cast men down (Matt. iv. 3) Hast
thou already obtaitied the victory over the devil ?
be not too secure. — The word of the Lord is truth,
but that of the devil is lies. — Lange : The conceits
of " opened eyes," and of some strange wisdom, are
the snares wheieby Satan especially sc'-ks to stum-
ble the learned. — Ver 6. Lust of the flesli, lust of
the eye, piidc. The garment of righteousness and
hoUness was put off. — The fig-leaves. It is not yet
proved that they were fig-leavts tli.t Eve gave to
her husband. The Hebrew word denotes twigs as
well as leaves. — Untimely curiosity brings commonly
great sorrow of heart. — God is not the cause of
man's fall. — The guile and cozening of woman can
often entice the strongest men (Jud. -xvi. 15). — Man
is ever se 'king fig-leaves to hide his shame and
cover his sins, but they are ever visible to the all-
seeing eyes of God (1 Sim. xv. 15). — Ver. 8. The
interpreting " the voice of God," of the thunder. —
Parallel of the Garden of Adam and the Garden of
Christ: 1. Adam's shep in P.iradise and his gain,
the wife; Christ'» diath-sleip in tlie gaiden of
Joseph, and its fruit in the resurnction, his bride
the church. 2. In Paradise' Adam was bound with
the cords of the devil ; in Gethseinane Christ was
bound, to free the human race frnm their imprison-
ment. 3. In the garden of Eden sin began ; in
another garden was it buried in Christ's grave. —
Ver. 9. Lctiier: Adam and Eve are ruined in them-
selves, they can no longer help themselves, they are
forsaken of all creatures ; the reason can form no
other judgment than that there is no help for them
in heaven and earth. Yet here, from this very ei-
ample, may we learn that God will help though we
may be forsaken of all creatures. And yet He give*
such help only for his Son's sake, whom even here
He has promised to send to the human race,— (?od
called to Adam. Laxge : A proof of the prc-emi-
nency of the male sex, and, therefore, also, of the
higher obligation which Adam had laid upon him,
not to follow his wife into evil, but rather to hold
her back, — Though God a long time winks at the
sinner, and keeps silence in respect to his sins, yet
at the right time does He let him hear his voice, and
seeks to awaken him out of his sleep. — Ver. J 3. Sf
it ever goes ; disobedience follows unbelief it al
•^50
GENESIS, OR THE i'lRST BOOK OF MOSES.
the faculties and members of men ; after this comes
concealment, exculpation, and, perh;ips, apology for
sm; filially, man complains of (iod and would make
him the cause of his sins, A frightened conscience
tveT mistakes itself the worst (Wisdom of Solomon
xvii. 12). Man never, God always, has the blame
(Jer. ii. 3.5). — Ver. 15. Luther: Christ crushes the
serpeni's head, that is, his kingdom of death, sin, and
hell ; tlie devil bites him in the heel, that is, he slays
and tortures him and his in the bodv (Rom. viii. 7).
Since the woman sinned fir-t (1 Tim. ii. 14), so is
she also here named first, and first assured ol' the
gospel. Therefore here, also, to this proud aud
mighty foe, and for his greatest ignominy and
shame, there is opposed, not Adam specially, al-
though he is not excluded, but, iu preference, the
weaker vessel. Such a piercing of the heel i.s more
largely described Psalm xxii. ; Isaiah liii. Among
other places this first gospel is described in the ex.
Psalm ; also in Is. xxvii. 1 ; John xiv. 30 ; Col. i.
13, 14; 1 Tim. ii. 6 ; 1 John iii. 8 ; Rev. xii. 4, 5. —
Ver. 16. The experience here described was that of
Rachel, Thamar, the daughter-in-law of Eli, and the
wife of PIdnehas (1 Sam. iv. Ill, 20). [The question
whether Mary was born without pain is one ihat does
not pertain to our salvation ; individuals may affirm
whilst otheis deny it.] — Ver. 19. Since human
nature, through sin, is so frail and pei ishable, it is
a good and wise act of God, that he lets the separa-
tion of soul and hody continue for so long a time,
even to the reunion and resurrection that is to
endure. — It is a great consolation for women in
child-' 'earing that their pains before, and during,
and alter the birth, are laid upon thera by God. He
who smites can also heal again (Col. iii. 18 ; 1 Pet.
iii. 1). Man, fear not death, but keep the thought,
rather, that it is ordained by the Lord of all licsh
(Sirach xli. 4). — Ver. 20. In view of the death in-
curred, the woman might rather have been called
the dead, and the mother of the dead. Ilcr hiiving
been called by Adam havah (Efe), the Ihunff and the
mother of the living, is grounded on the foregoing
promise of the Messiah (Mark iii. S.")). — It is a con-
solation for the poor and the low, that God clothed
our first parents with skins. — As often as thou
puttest off thy garments, think on Jesus Christ's coat
of righteousness, and aspire that thou mayest be
clothed therewith (Is. Ixi. lo ; Rev. iii. 17, 18; Ii(mi.
xiii. 14). — [.Vdam is become like one of us ; here is
indicated his justification, the jnatUia imputaia.'\ —
Ver. 23. The puiushmeut here declared was also
bencvolenily intended ; for though it is bittcT' to
man to obtain his food from the labor of the field,
Btill docs this labor, while it supports him, contribute
.to the promiition of his health, and to his avoidance
of many sins, such as those that proce<*d fi-oni idle-
ness.— Ver. 24. Paradise was an ini-ige : 1. Of tlu'
kingdom of grace ; 2. of the kingdom of glory.
The tree of life pre-eminently lypifies Christ. — Com-
parisons betwcet: Adam and Christ. — Agriculture
is holy. — O miin, wliat art thou V Earth, and again
to become earth. lii^thiiik thee oft and diligently
of thi.s : so shall every proud thought be gime.
The earthly joy has ceased, yet still we have a heav-
enly.
Valku. llKKiiKKiiKii : AliKjnalia Dii: Ye shall
not die at all ; that was tlnr first lie in the world ;
the devil told it; therclbrc Christ rightly calls him
« liar -iiid a iimrderer from the beginning (Jolni viii.
44). — " I was afraid." That wax the first lanunila-
tlOD in tbo world, and came from sin. — 0 how often
must xe, poor men, now say with Eve, the serpen
beguiled me !
ScnRooEa; Every creature created for endlesfi
perfectibility is also exposed to corruption (Job iv
18 ; XV. 14). Some would place the fall of angels in
ch. i., between ver 1 and ver. 2, since they suppose
an original creation in ver. 1, and, as a consequence
of the fall of the spirits in the same, would read in-
steail of the words, " the earth mix waste," etc., ver
2, ^* the earth became waste." tfthcrs look for the
angel-fall in the intimation supposed to be conveyed
in the account of the second day's work by the omis-
sion of the words, " And God saw that it was good."
To others again, by reason of ch. i. 31, the time im-
mediately after the completed world-creation seema
more suitable for this. And some fathers, again,
bring the fall of the evil angels into connection with
the temptation of man, meainng that the former hap-
pened by means of the latter (eh. iii. 14). God bears,
with inexpressible long-suS'eriiig, the devil and hia
kingdom, because to him the good and right of the
development, even in its per»ersion, is a holy thing
The good is not to be forced. God's power and lovt
bears now the unfolding of the creatmcly life, edu-
cates it freely and gradually. — Vers. l-tl. Hirhek:
Eve knew not yet that the subtlety of the serpent
was an evil subtlety ; it was to her only slire«dnes9
and cunning. She took the seipent for her tutor.
The serpent turns it all round, makes the piiohibitiou
greater than the gifts, tir allows her oidy to hear the
former. The sly attack of Satan is directed against
the spiritual citadel of the soul, against faith in God;
since %vith faith obedience stands or falls, JIatt. iv.
3 (Ps. Ixxviii. 19), The lusts follow after of them,
selves. — Vers. 6, 7. Lutmer: Unbelief is the primi-
tive cause and source of all sin, and whenever tha
devil can succeed, either in getting away the word
from the heart, or in falsifying it, and thus bringing
the soul to unbelief, he can easily do in the end what
he jileases. Such subtlety and wickedness follow aU
false teachers, who, under the appearance of good,
would pluck out the eyes of the people of God, blind-
ing them to his word, or painting before them another
god who has no existence. Whenever, thcrclbre,
God's word is changed or falsified, then, as Moses
says in his song, do there come in new gods, which
our tiitheis never reverenced. He would have man
regard his service to God as servile bondage, in or-
der, by deluding him with the phantom of his own
proper sovereignty, to make him the slave of shi, and,
iu this way, like himsell. This gives us a glimpse,
perhaps, of the cause of Satan's ruin. Through the
desire of sovereignty it may be that he himself be-
came a fallen being. — Hambach: The learned snap
at such doubts of (iod's word as the cat snajis at the
mouse, regarding tlicm iis mo.st excellent dainties,
wlicn, in fiict, it is a feeding on death. Out of envy
must the |)rohibition have flowed ; thus would he
make <;od to be Satan (Wisilom of Solomon ii. 24),
aud himself to be God, Satan's [uomise begins like
God's llneatening: "in the day ye eat therciif," etc.
— Haco: Man alloweil himself to fmcy that the com-
man 1 aiul prohibition of (iiid wcie nut the rules of
good ami evil, but that good and evil njust ha\c thcil
own [irinciplcs anil licginniiigs, and so he lu'ts aftei
a knowledge of these laiicicd principles, that he may
be no more dependent on God's revealed will, but
only on himself and his own pro[ier light rather than
on (iod. Pride has overthrown itself (tliat is, Satan).
Uis words invite to a liilse self-sufficiency, and to a
liold independence; lie preaches rebellion, his mos
CHAP. III. 1-24.
251
interior being. — Herder: Thoug'i here an apple l^iv,
and tut. ^ the death, whilst in God's hands the bal-
ance hung suspi'nded, as soon as it came to subtle,
casuisdeal reasoaintr, dowu weigliod the apjile ; the
light word die flew up, and in the apple ICve saw
uothiug less than divinitv. Xo tree in all tlie garden
round had a lool; so lair or so desirable to the woman
as the one forbidden. Now is hei unlieliei decided.
— The same: 7'o lust nfler. To have the soul over-
powered b» the senses, to be allured or lascinated, to
bo in a state of fluttering or throbbing agitation. No
longer in thy control ; they are beyond ; the soul is
off to the other side; thou w'llt. thou ninxt awny to
thy parted self, which dwells theie in the beloved
fruit. Wherefore, at first, an inward selfish turning
away of the soul from that divine coulbrmity which
sustains its destination to a higher godlikene.ss.
Pride and xelfsii^cletici/. Of this inner state the
origin appears as unbehef in God's word, and. there-
by, as an erroneous or superstitious belief in an un-
known being. Desire follows the tickling of the
sense. The first female siimer becomes, after Sa-
tan's fashion, the first temptress. — Krummaciier: In
the first sin lie concealed the three cardinal sins, lust
of the flesh, lust of the eye, and pride (that is, of un-
righteous coveting of possession, enjoyment, and
power. — (Concerning the time when tlie fall took
place, see p. 47). — Ver. 7. By experience, alas ! did
they become aware that what they had lost was the
good, that that into wljieh they had fallen was the
€vil. — They would have become lords, like God, and
now they are no longer masters even of tlieir own
bodies. Man fell towards evening. At this season,
in later times, the paschal lambs were slain as types
of Christ (Exod. xii. 16). Their hiding under the trees
m the g.irden stands parallel to their making them-
selves aprons. What the one was in tlie small, the
same was the other in the greater, account. The one
betrays their ignorance of the great power and depth
of sin, tlie other their lost knowledge of the omnipo-
tence and omniscience of God (Ps. cxxxix. ; Sirach
xiT. 2; Book of Wisdom xvii. 10-13). Both are a
symbol and a sign of their falling away, and, there-
with, of tlieir shame. Both, moreover, are a svmbol
and a sign of their divine original, and, therewith,
of a glimmering hope of redemption from the body
of death. Satan is not at all ashamed of himself;
Satan does not bide himself before God. — Vers. 9-13.
The voice of God still reaches the sinner (Ps. cxxxix.
7-13). Adam and Eve show themselves in tlieir
pure sin-nakedness. Dissatisfied with and unjust
towards his nearest friend and towards his God, —
they who before had been his joy and his desire, ^so
does sinner complain of sinner, yea, of God himself,
on account of his free ordaining and his very kind-
ness (Lam. iii. 3y ; Ps. xviii. 27). — Luther : (Jod
fiails to Adam, since to him alone had come the word
of God, on the sixth day, not to eat of the forbidden
fruit. As, therefore, he alone had heard the com-
mand of God, so is he the first summoned to judg-
ment. The most loving gifts of God (ch. ii. 18, 20)
become an occasion to the sinner, and are used as
weapons against the giver. Sin loosens all bands,
even the most excellent and the most holy. He calls
her no longer, my wife. — Vers. 14, 1.5. Luther: He
calls not ujion the serpent; he asks him no questions
respecting sins that are past ; there is nothing of this
kind to bring him to repentance ; but he is condemned
on the spot. (It would appear from this, that a pre-
vious fall of Satan is already here supposed.) —
KanMHACHER: Ai'ter its work is finished, then is lust
divested of its garment of light, then does it appeM
in its true form of a sneaking, earth-eating worm,
ever crawling upon its belly. He shall be given up
(for that is the force of the language as applied tc
Satan) to the most extreme conteiufit, to the deepest
shatiic ^md degradation, and shall become, in all re-
spects, like a serpent, etc., until, at last, lie is cas^
into the fiery lake There is a ditlerenee between the
fallen man and the fallen angel ; the former is lyuigly
seduced, tt e latter is the lying seducer ; the one be-
comes evil from without; the other is tlie author of
evil from himself. The fiend has struck us only on
the heel ; therefore shall his head be crushed: the
woimds which he infiicis are curable ; the wounds in-
flicted on him must bring him unto death. — Vers.
16-19. The desire becomes a burden. Through
pain does lust revenge itself upon the senses; and
yet. too, immediately on these pains there fillowa
great joy (John xvi. 21). With gentle force would
the wife rule and mislead the man to sin. There-
fore is she cast into subjection, into a state of con-
stant dependence upon the man. The field upon the
small scale is a speaking symbol of man's earthly
condition on the greater. Adam's transgression was
a breaking of the whole ten commandments taken
together (then follows the maimer in which this is
deduced, p. 63). — Ver. 20. Here, as earlier, the wife
has her name from the man. In a similar maimer
does the wife, at the present day, exchange the pater-
nal name for that of the man. — Luthek : It is the
world, moreover, that in these signs of wretchedness
becomes mad and foolish ; for who can easily tell
how much of care and expense people incur on ac-
count of clothing ? Were the self-made and fig-leaf
aprons a figure of our own righteousness, which ex-
poses more than it covers onr nakedness, so are the
clothings made o( skins the svmbols of the right-
eousness which comes through the hfe, at;d suffer
ings, and death of the Redeemer and Mediator I Is
Ixi. 10 ; Rev. iii. 17, 18). A sharp contrast that be
tween the first Adam who would, robber like, demaml
of God, and the second Adam, who tliought it no
robbery to be like God (Phil. ii. 6). God now un-
dertakes the charge of the garden. Earlier it was
to be guarded i// men ; now it is to be guarded
af/ainst them, — 'There came the day of salvation. 1 1
opened again the door to the fair Paradise.
Gerl.ich ; The immediate cousi-quence of the
fall is the awaking the feeling of shame, that is, the
consciousness that now the spirit, torn away from
God, can no more have power over the flesh. In
this feeling of shame the awakened conscience now
clothes itself; it is the fear that would hide from God,
who now appears as an adversary. The devil, whose
corporeal appearance is not mentioned in the Script-
ure (and which, therefore, m.ay be generally said to
be impossible), — what constrained liim to speak
through the beast'? It (that is, the serpent) took
advantage of man's divinely imparted consciousness,
that he was destined to a higher godlikeness, in
which he should attain to perfect security against
every temptation ; this was for the purpose of blind-
ing him by a deceptive appearance, giving him a
false glimpse of the glory of this godlikeness in the
freedom of choice (that is, an apparent freedom).
The origin of sin lies, therefore, not in the sensitiv
ity, as this history shows, but in the spiritual aspi
ration after a false self-sufficiency, independent of
God.
AcijcsTiNE : After they were fallen out of the'j
lordlv state, and the body bad now received 'nu<
2b2
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OK MOSES.
itsi;lf a sickly and death-b<^avin^ coDCupiscence. even
then, ill ttie midst of the _ lishment, tlie rational
Boul gave witness to its noble oniiin, and was ashamed
of its beastly ineliniition. Still, behind this feeling
of shame, it evidently seeks to hide the guilt of dis-
obedience. The first sin shows itself immediately as
the mother of a new one. Instead of acknowledging
hie guilt, Adam puts it upon the woman, yea, even
npon God himself, when he adds the words, " whom
th.r:i gavest to me for a companion." The woman
carries it on in the same way of sinful exculpation.
At that lime, the labor of the field afforded the sin-
gle example of man's outward calling upon the earth ;
on every condition, nevertheless, on every calling, on
every occupation of earth, is laid the curse, that is,
great necessity and tribulation, great vanity and dis-
appointment in the most painful toil. Since that
time, moreover, a great change has passed upon na-
ture. The death of the body is the visible emblem
and type of the everlwting destruction. It is the
dark curtain hung before the world beyond, and
which, to the unconverted sinner, covers nothing else
than iiopeless misery.
Lisco, B. 1 : It is no less Satanic when Satan uses
language respecting God's word and revelation simi-
lar to that which is found in the Holy Scriptures. —
Sin from sin. — In place of wretched lies, man ought
to confess ; in place of sinful exculpation he ought the
more to seek forgiveness. — Calwer, Handbook :
Christ the serpent-crusher. Ver. 19 : Here, too,
again, are punishment and redemption. Ver. 20 :
Man clothed in the skins of slain beasts ; how solemn
now to him is death thus contemplated ! — As in ver.
6, the beginning of prophecy, so in ver. 21, the be-
ginning of sacrifice. — Comparison of the three first
chapters in the Bible with the last. — Bonsen : [The
true tree of life is the knowledge of liniitr, lions, thai
is, in t)ie moral government of the natural world, eic.
And this tree would grow ever more in ParaLlise fV).
The linulation of the law (positive lawi lay rather in
the tree of knowledge.] The nature-side of the
figure is the great historical event that laid waste
eveiy territory of the e^irth, «hich liad been pre-
viously blessed, and drove out the inhabitants to
wander forth to other lands. Every word must b'
taken as the Indication of a great igneous phenome-
non in nature. Natural science lias recognized in
those regions the effects of such an old volcanic
power, though falling in the historical time. The old
traditions of tlie Bactains, too, seem to speak of the
upheaving of the mountains, when they tell us that
the evil spirit of their fathers made tlie lovely cli-
mate almost if not wholly uninhabitable by reason
of the shuddering cold. — MiCHow("The Pihiiitive
History of the Human Race," 1S58) : The lall.
We distinguish three degrees ■ 1. The preparation ;
2. the carrying out ; 3. the nearest effects. — Tadbk
(" Sermon on Genesis," 185.5): Marriage. 1. How it
was establislied in a stale of innocence ; 2. what
changes it underwent in consequence oi (he fall ; 3.
how it is again resiored by Christ. — How Adam is
the type and an antitype of Christ : 1. Wherein we
see the type ; :i. wherein the antiiype. — The history
of the fall : 1. How exactly it re|ireseiils the way sin
takes in all men ; 2. how it predicts, moreover, the
way thai grace takes in us. — W. Hoffmann (" Voices
of the Watchmen in the Old Testament," lS5<i) :
The primitive word of the divine promise (ver. 15).
It brings us, 1. curse in the blessing: 2. blessing in
the curse. [Curse in the blessing : it goes through-
out the outward and the inner strife. Blessing in
the curse : the restoration of Paradise.]
SECOND SECTION.
Cain and Abel. — IJie Cainiies. — The ungodly Worldtiness of the First Civilization.
Chapter IT. 1-26.
1 And Adam knew 'Eve his wife, and she conceived, and bare ' Cain [the gotten, or po»-
•eaeion], and said, I have gotten a man from the Lord [from, or with the God of the future, oi
2 Jehovah]. And again ^she bare his brother Abel [Habel, the perishable ; b::ri , vanishing breath
3 of life]. And Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground. And
in process of time it came to pass that Cain brouglit [offered] from the fruit of tlie ground
4 an offering [mjo] unto the Lord. And Abel, he also brouglit of the firstlings of hia
flock, and of the fat thereof And the Lord had respect' [looked in mercy] unto Abel and
5 to his offering. But unto Cain and to his olleriug he had not respect. And Cain was
6 very wroth, and his countenance fell. And the Lord said unto Cain, Why art thou
7 wrotli? and why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well slialt thou not be
accepted?* [Langc translates more correctly, lifting up of the countenance.] and if tliou doe St not
well, sin lieth at the door [likearavenousbeast forprey]. And uuto thcc shall be his desire
8 [dn'B desire— sin personiflcd J, and tllOU slialt rulc [(/u( thou sbalt rule ] over llilll. And Cain
talked ' with Abel his brother [repeating God''s words hypocritically or mockingly to him. 't'his is adapted
to Lango's translation, Cain told it to his brother. See Exegctical notes] ; And it came tr) paSS that
9 when they were in the field, Ca'n rose up against his brother, and slew him. And
the Lord said unto Cain, Wliere is Abel lliy brother? And he said, 1 know not
CHAP. IV. 1-26. "iSSi
10 am I my brother's keeper? And he said, What hast thou done? The voice of thy
11 brother's blood' [properly, blood-drops, plm-ai] crieth unto me from the grouud. And now thou
art cursed from the earth [which had before been cursed, ch. iii. 17 ; Bunsen : away from this ground],
2 which hath opened her mouth to receive th_y brother's blood from thy hand. When
thou tillest the ground it shall not henceforth yield to tiiee her strength ; a fugitive and
a vagabond [tjT rj , frighlcned and driven on, shunned and abhorred] shall thou be in tlie earth.
S And Cain said unto the Lord, My punishment [Lange renders it guilt, which is certainly nearer th«
ti Hebrew ^3"jJ is greater than I can bear. Behold thou hast driven me out this day from
llie face of llie earth [from the open, cleared, inhabited distiict of the earth] j and from thv faC6
shall I be hid; and I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth ; and it shall come
15 to pass that every one that findeth me shall slay me. And the Lord said unto him, Tliere-
fore whosoever sla3'eth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him seven-fold. And the
16 Lord set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him. And Cain went out
from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod [exile] on the east of Eden.
17 And Cain knew his wife, and she conceived, and bare Enoch [Hanoch, the devoted, initiated],
and he builded a city, and called the name of the city after the name of his son Enoch.
18 And unto Enoch was born Irad [city, I^S, Tl^S, townsman, or, with elision of one 5, prince of a city] ;
and Irad begat Mehujael [Filrst and Gesenius : nm:> smitten of God; questionable whether it is not
rather, purified, formed by God] : and Mahujael [Hebrew, ilahujiel] begat Methusael [man of God, great
man of God, tlB, \B for ntUS, and bs] : and MetllUSael begat Lamech [strong young man;
19 Gesenius]. And Lamech took unto him two wives: the name of the one was Adah
[ornament, decoration, elegant], and the name of the Other was Zlllah [Gesenius; shadow; Fuerst:
20 sounding, song, from bbs ; or player]. And Adah bare Jabal [Fuerst : rambler, wanderer, nomade, from
21 hz'] : he was the father of such as dwell in tents and of such as have cattle. And hia
brother's name was Jubal [Fuerst: one triumphing, harper, from b^^]. He was the father of
22 all such as handle the harp and the organ. And Zillah, she also bare Tubal-Cain
[Gesenius : smith, mason, or lance-maker ; literally, brass of kain, that is, brass weapons], an instructor of
every artificer ' [Lange more correctly : hammerer or polisher of all cutting instruments] in brass and
23 iron ; and the sister of Tubal-Cain was Naamah [loveliness, the lovely]. And Lamech said
unto his wives :
Adah and Zillah hear my voice,
Ye wives of Lamech hearken unto my speech ;
For I have slain a man to my wounding ;
And a young man, to my hurt.
24 If Cain shall be avenged seven-fold,
Truly Lamech seventy and seven-fold [Bunsen : seven times seventy],
25 And Adam knew his wife again, and she bare a son, and called his name Seth [flxeil,
compensation, settled], for God (Elohim), said she, hath appointed me another seed instead
26 of Abel whom Cain slew. And to Seth also was there born a son, and he called hia
name Enos [man, weak man, son of man]. Then began men to call upon [call out, proclaim] the
name of the Lord [the name Jehovah, in distinction frouL Elohim, though not accordingto the full couceptioD
of the name. See Exod. vi.].
[> Ver. 1. — For remarks on '^p H3p and rS , see the Exegetical, and marginal note. — T. L.]
[* Ver. 2. — nbb CjOm can only mean a second bearing, and not the birth of a twin. — T. L.]
[* Ver. 4,— mj^l would have been better rendered looked af, with bx ; with '(12 or b^TS, it has just the contrary
■ense, looked away from. Job vii. 19 ei al. — T. L.]
I* Ver. 7.— nxtj ; the context and the contrast will hardly allow any other sense to this than that of acceptance, aa
denoted by the ?i/finsr wp the countenance ; see the Esegetical. Vulgate, recipies. 1rp"UJn must, refer to sin personified
u masculine by the participle "::"1. Comp. Gen. iii. 16, where the same word denotes subordination, that which is
ruled over ; only there it is applied to persons, whilst here it means the appetite or passion, represented as awild beast, in
■ubjectiou to the righteous will. — T. L.J
[» Ver. 8. — H^^X"^"!. See the Esegetical. The best interpretation is that of Delitzsch and of som^ Jewish commenta-
tors, which makes the elliptical subject (or thinff said)thr very action that follows, and which the LXX. and Vulgate hflv«
supplied in words. It is not at all probable that they read auy different text.— T. L.]
[* Ver. 10.— i7St(, plural intensive; comp. Ps. v. 7, C^BT ^^^S , man of 6?oo(f5, very bloody man, Fs. xxvi. 3 ; Iv. 2^
C^prjl agrees grammatically with C^IOT , and not with b*p, voice, as would seem from our Eng:lish Version. The most
dteral, and, at the same time, the most impressive, rendering, would be obtained by taking >1p as the nominative inde-
Mudent, or exclamatory : The voice of thy brother's bloods! they cry; or. Hark ! it is the voice of thy brother's blood-
drops, — tltey are crying unto me. The separation of the participle frorn the remoter subject gives it such a force, and makes
•Ms, though seemingly free, the most truly literal or emoti mat sense. Rashi and Aben Ezra say the woril is plural because
it denotes all Abel's possible posterity, thus murdered with him. Other Jewish writers have drawn a still more rir^gulal
254
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
inference. Thus it is said in the Talmud, Sanhedrin fol. 37: ** The plural here is to teach us that every one who destroyi
B ginerle lire rrom Israel, there is a wxitine agaiust him as thouirli he hud destroyed a world full of lives." Another Jewish
Interpretation (see It^ishi) says that the pluntl form represents the many woun^ls that Cain had given him, be:ai.se he did
not know from what part of the hody the soul or lile tthe blood) would go out ; all these bloody mouths crying i)Ut to God
•* a tongue in every one." Corap. Shakespeare, Antony's speech over the dead body of Csesar. See also the lixegetical.
and marginal note. — T. L.]
[' Ver. 22.— IT^H means the smith himself; but this cannot make sense tanless we adopt a different pointing from
the Masoretic, wb- n it may read ; a sharpener of everything ( bb), a smith, or worker of brass, etc.— T. I..1
(* Ver. 26. — C'iT^ ; see the Exegetical. They first begao, or there was then a beginning of the invocation or formula
n'^n'^"3iIJ3 , 6e«/iemycAoiijaA. Comp. it with the Arabic invocation or formula &AJ 1 ^^j^*^ (bismiltali), A correspond*
tag abbreviation in Hebrew would have been rr'^bN'^'CJ- (with X elided n3?3 '^3 ), bishmeloalu or i\ith the other divius
name, bishmetjahvch. Il eviaently refers to some solemn form of address, which perhaps came to be denoted by a single
abbreviated word, like this and other similar forms in the ancient sister language.— T. L.l
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAIi.
1. The propagation of the human race through
the formation of the family, is, in its beginning, laid
outside of Paradise, not because it was hi contradic-
tion with the paradisaical destiny, but bec.iuse it
had, from the beginning, an unparadisaical char-
acter (that is, not in harmony with tlie first life as
led in Paradise. — T. L.). Immediately, however,
even iti tlie first Adamic generation, the human race
presents itself in the contrast of a godless and a
pious line, in proof that the sinful tendency propa-
gaie.s itself along witli the sin, whilst it shows at the
same time that not as an absolute corruption, or
fatalistic necessity, does it lay its burden upon the
race. This contrast, whicli seems broken up by the
fratricide of Cain, is restored again at the close of
our chapter, by the birth and destination of Seth.
In regard lo its chief content, however, the section
before us is a characteriziug of the line of Cain. It
is marked by a very rapid unfolding of primitive
culture, but throughout in a direction worldly and
ungodly, just as we find it afterwards among the
Hamites. The ideaiitii of art, to which the Cainites
in their formative tendency liave already advanced,
appears as a substitute for the ■reality of a religious-
ideal course of life, and becomes ministerial to sin
and to a malignant pride. Not without ground are
the decorative dre.ss (the name Adah), the musical
skill (the name Ziliah) and beauty of the daughters
of Cain brought into view. For after the contrast
presented in chapter v. between the Sethites, who
advance in the pure direction of a godly life, and
the Cainites, who ate ever sinking lower and lower
in an ungodly existence, there is shown, chapter vi.,
how an intercourse arises between them, and how
the Sethites, infatUiiteil by the charms of the Cain-
itish women, introduce a mingling of both line.s,
and, thereby, a universal corruption. According to
Knobel the chapter must be regarded as the genea-
logical register of Adam, though this docs not agree,
he says, with the genealogical register of the Elohist
(ch. v.), which names Seth as the first-boin (!) of
Adara. The ethnological table (ch. x.), he tells us,
can only embrace the Caucasian race, whilst the
Cainites can oidy be a legendary representation of
the East Asian tribes (p. O!!), the author of which
thereby places himself in 0[i|Kisitiori to the later ac-
eounl, that repre.-ents all the descendants of Cain as
perishing in the flood. The traits of the Cainitic
face, as presented by Knobel, belong not alone to
the East AsiiLlic people. They are ground-forms of
primitive worldline.ss in the human race. In respect
to the genealogical t.able of ch. iv. and v., Knobel
remarks "that the I'aiiiitic table agrees tolerably
well with the Sethic " (p. nl). For the siinilaritiea
•ud differcncei of both tables, cump. Kkil, p. 71.
These relations will be more distinctly shown in the
interpretation of the names. Concerning the Jeho-
vistic peculiarities of language in this section, see
Knobel, p. 56.
2. Vers. 1 and 2. " Men are yet in Eden, but no
longer in the garden of Eden.'' Delitzsch. Pro-
creation a knowing. The moral character of sexual
intercourse. Love a personal knowing. The love
of marriage, in its consummation, a spiritual corpo-
real knowing. The expression is euphemistic. In
the Pentateuch only, in the supplemeutiiry correc-
tions of the original writing. The like in other
ancient languages. The name Cain is explained
directly from ■'n"3|3 , the gotten* The word m^
* [Ver. 1. ^r^ap. The sense of bearing {purims),
pro-creating, heijeUing, seems to be older in this word than
that of t/eliuii/t'ov \ ossessing, and if so, it should guide ua
in interpreting the language of this very ancient docu-
ment It is a case in which, if ever, woi ds A'ould be used
in their archaic signiricance. It is, moreo ler, much more
easy to see how the latter senses came from the former than
to trace them in the opposite duertion. There is the same
order in the Latin pan'o, Greek ti'ktw. tcko9, tokos, birflif
ojfspriiiff, (jniii {primuni parit. ma(e}\filiuir)—pt'pi'rif da'i-
tias). For decided examples of the elder generative sense
in the Hebrew word, see I)eut. sxxii. (J. ~:p "j^^S J<'~,
thy father that begat thee, where it is used in parallelism
with "IC? and TDSI^^, and in precisely the same con-
nection as nib"^ and ^bbrf'S in ver. 18 of the same chap-
ter. Compare also Gen. siv. 10, 22, where it is used both
by Melchizedek and by Al'raham, as an antiiiue designation
of the Creator, more solemn and impiessive than X*i3,
"El Etinn, God most high, ysl C^ISD rtTp , Gen-
erator (Creator, ancient founder) of the heavens and the
earth.'* TheLXX. there renders it exTiffc, and the Vulgate
creavit ; so interpreted also by Ilashi and Maimonides. In
Ps. cxsxix. 13, "^nT^bD n^3p (rendered, thou hast pot-
sesstd my reins), the context shows that it must have this
older arid deeper sense; .since the reins denote the most
interior or fundamental being, and the words following
express, iis far as language ain, the fupematural aeative
action, esdupively divine, and that supervenes in every
human quickening ; 'IIDP , thnu didst ovcrslwdow me,
infffKiava^ ptot ; compare Liike i. 35. This is also the best
sense Prov. viii. 22, "'SSp irn^ , rendered, the Lord pot.
sessed me,— rather, hetjat nic, as the wpcdtotokos, Col. i. 15.
To these passages we are justified in addi g the i^t- belore
us, Gen. IV. 1. The idea of possession or ac«iui>ilii>n, as
outward gain or property, does not suit. Eve liad her mind
upon the seed of the woman, Gen. iii. 15. and nothing could
be more natural than that she should have uiid this kind
of language. She cries out in her joy, I'^p ^n"'3p, Kanllht
Kain, TiTOKa t6kov, or Te'«off, tjeMui fjeuilnm, or (jeacratin/iem,
I lia\e borne the .sr,(/, a man, the Lord. She calls him a
man, B^S ; for the child as a dislinctivo name was as yet
unknown, and she saw only the imago of the humanity
without regard to size or growth Nothing could I'C inoie
subjectively trntlitul. It was a new mint, and she connects
with it, as with her own laing, a ueative or gcncrntivt
process. So Rashi, regarding rX as equivalent to :J' , para-
phi'ases the words: "When God created mo and mv man
CHAP. IV. l-2ti.
-^»
may mean, to create^ to bring out^ also to gain, to
atiaih . which we prefer. — I have gotten a man I
from the Lord.- — The mterpietatioD of Luther and I
oiners, including Pliilippi, uamelv, " the man. t/ic
Lordy not only anticipates the unfolding of tlie
Messianic idea, but goes beyond it; for the Messiali
IS not Jehovah absolutely. And yet the explana-
tion : with the help of Jehovah (with his lielpful
presence, K^iobel), is too weak. So too the Vidgate
is incorrect : per Dcmu^ or the interpretation of
Clericus ; nX'O , from Jehovah, that is, in associa-
tion, in connection with Jehovah, I have gotten a
man. In this it remains remarkable, that in the
name itself, the more particular denotation is want-
ing. We may be allowed, therefore, to read : a man
(^ttJ'^X) he created us alone, or by himself, "t^S, but in
this we are sharers with him ; that is, we are iTO-creators,"
Eind so she says ^r^3p. The new ofiFspring carries the
■^'3,the imagre or species which had been created in the
becinning ; and so Aben Ezra says that '• Adam, when he
saw that he must die, felt the need of keeping aiive the
■j^lQ , and therefore Eve u?es this lana;uage." Maimonides,
without denying this, somewhat modifies it by rendering
PX , as Onkelos does, by niH^ -"^Pi "before the Lord :
for when we die he shall stand in our pbice to worehip his
creator,^^ 'X"!"!-, regarding Cain's birth as a creation,
though in a qualified sense. If n]p , then, is tctokc, genuH,
peperit, "pp is tokos, Te»cos, s'^uiliis, jtarfwi The derivation
which Gesenius seems to favor ( ■"'p, /injcea, 2 Sam. X3d.
16), is utterly absurd. What would maku Eve think of
lances, or weapons of war, before there had been a human
birth on eai'th ! besides, as thus used, it is evidently a much
later word, from whatever source it may have eomp. Oe-
senius himself regards T^ip as cognate with "pS, "DH ;
hence there is no difficulty in connecting it, not only with
the Arabic ,.tO , but also the Greek and Latin ytVt gen.
If so, then Kain (Kin, Ken), is equal to yevo^ etymologieally
as well ti^ lexically. The particle PX is generally taken by
the Jewish grammarians as a preposition = witk ( ZS' ), or
as denoting the closest union between the verb and its ob-
ject, and in certain cases its subject ; though sometimes they
say it is equivalent to Q^? , substance. This is the view of
Gesenius. It has the force of a reflex pronoun express-
ing ipseity, or selfhood, as individuality, — ^"^Tlwn PX ,
the very heavens themselves. A close examination always
shows some kind of emphasis, or some contrast, strontrer
or weaker. Or at least it may be said it calls attention
to a thing in some way. The cases where it seems to be
used as a preposition, or where it is used to make the sepa-
rate objective pronouns, can be easily explained from this.
"■^p PX n-n^ PX— itis placed here before both in
precisely the same way. This makes it harsh and diffi-
cult to give it the rendering with in the latter case, and
seems to shut us up to the rendering : I have borne a man,
the very Jehovah, or, I have borne a man, the very God,
the very -Jehovah. The supposition would not be extrava- !
gant that in this earliest use of the name (earliest as |
spoken) there is an emphasis in its futm-e form, H^H^ or |
^^^n'^ (yah-yeh or yah-vah), the one who shall be^ as in !
Exodus iii. 14 ; except that in the latter passage it is in j
the first person, P-'nx "l^rx rtinx. The greatness of 1
Eve's mistake in applying the expression to one who was I
the type of Antichrist rather than of the Redeemer, should j
not so shock us as to affect the interpretation of the pas- .
eage, now that the covenant God is revealed to us as a being '
■o transceudiniily difi"erent The limitation of Eve's knowl- j
edge, and perhaps her want of due distinction between the ;
divine and the human, only sets in a stronzei- liuht the
intensity- of her hope, and the subjective truthfulness of her I
language. Had her reported words, at sueh a time, con- ]
Gained no reference to the promised seed of the woman, the
.-ationaliit would doubtless have used it as a prot)f that she i
could have known nothing of any such pr'-diction, and |
that, therefnil?. Gen. iii. 15 and Gen. iv. 1 must have been
written by difierent authors, ignoring or contradicting each
>ther - T. L.) I
witk Jehovahy that is, one who stwide in conuection
with Jehovali ; yet it may be that the mode of gaia
iug: gotten with Jehovah, characterizes the uami
itself. The choice of the name Jehov.ih denoieft
here the (iod of the covenant. In the blessed con-
hdi'nee of female hope, slie wonKl seeni, witli ^^vi~
dt'Mt eagi-rness, to greet, in the new-born, the prom-
ised woman's seed (eh. iii. 15), according to hei
understanding of the word. Lanieeh. too, although
on better grounds, expected something immensely
great from his son Noah. We must ol)serve here
that the mother is indicated as the name-giver. Id
the case of the second name, Abel ( llabel), which
denotes a swiftly-dis:ippe;iring breatli of life, ot
vanity, or nothingness, nothing of the kind is said.
Yet in place of the great and hasty joy of hope,
there seems to have come a feaifnl motherly pre-
sentiment (Delitzsch, p. 199). That they were
twins, as Kimchi liolds, is a sense tlie text does not
favor. Abel as shepherd, especially of the smaller
cattle ("XIJ), is the type of the Isnielitish patriarchs.
Cain, as the first-born, takes the agricultural occupa-
tion to which his father was first appointed. Th*'
oldest ground-forms, therefore, of the human calling,
which Adam united in himself, are divided between
his two sons in a normal way (Cain was, in a certain
sense, the heir by birth, and the ground-proprietor).
It must be remarked, too, that agriculture, as the
older form, does not appear as the ynun^.,'er in itt
relation to cattle-breeding. *' Both modes of living
belong to the earliest times of hum;inity, and, ac
cording to Varro and Dictearchus in Porphyry, follow
directly after the limes when men Uved upon the
self-growing fruits of the earth." Knobel. " In the
choice of diflfereut calliufrs by the two brothers, we
seek in vain for any indication of a diflerenee uv
moral disposition." So Keil maintains, against Hof-
mann, that agriculture was a consequence of the
cursing of the ground. Delitzsch, however, together
with Hofmaun, is inclined to the opinion that in the
brothers' choice of different callings there was al-
ready expressed the different directions of their
minds, — that Abel's calling was directed to the
covering of the sinful nakedness by the skins of
beasts (Hofmann), and therefore Abel was a shep-
herd (!). Delitzsch, too, would have it that Abel
took the small domestic cattle, only for the sake of
their skins, and, to some extent, for their milk,
thoush this was a kind of food which had not been
used in Piiradise. It would follow, then, that if Abol
slew the beasts for the sake of their skins, and,
moreover, oilered to God in sacrifice only the fat
parts of the firstlings, it must have been that ht
suffered the flesh in general of the slaughtercfl
animals to become otiensive and go to corruption.
It would follow, too, that the human sacerdotal par-
taking of the sacrificial offering, which later became
the custom in most eases, liad not yet taken place ;
not to say that the supposition of the enjoyment of
animal food having been first granted, Gen. is. 8, is
wholly incorrect.
3. Vers, 3-8. The first offerings. The difler
enee between the offering pleasing to God, ami tha
to which he has not respect. The envy cf a brother
the divine warning, and the brottier's nnirder. The
fratricide in its connection with the offering, a type
of all religious wars. The expression C"12" yp^
denotes the passing of a definite and eonsiderabU
thne (Knobel : after the beginning of their respective
occupations), and indicates also a harvest-season
256
iJKSESlS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
yet to take '*. for the end of the year, as is done by |
De Wettp, Van Bohlen, and others, is giving it too '■
definite a sense. — It came to pass that Cain
brought of the fruits of the ground, nn:': (from
mv ; Arabic : to make a present, " the most general
name of the ofl'eriiig, as also "3^;?." D<litz-ch).
Fruits belonged to the oldest offerings. Though no
iltar is mentioned, as also in eh. viii. 20, it is never-
theless to be supposed. In the oftering of Aliel it
is prominently stated that he brought of tlie first-
born of his herds (ri-i:S), but it is not said of
Cain that his offerings were first fruits — D'"i'32.
There is added, moreover, in respect to .4bel, the
word : inabm;!! (and of the fat thereof). Knobel
explains this as meaning, from their fat; Keil, on
the contrary, understands it of the fat pieces, that
is, of the fattest of the firstlings. The ground taken
by some, that it was because no sacrificiiil feasts had
been instituted, or because men had not yet eaten
of flesh, is pure hypothesis. It shows rather that
we must not think here of the animal offerings of
Leviticus. Here arise two questions: 1. By what
was it made known that God looked to the offering
of Abel, — that is, with gracious complacency ? Many
commemators say th.it Jehovah ^Bt on fire the offer-
ing of Abel by fire from heaven, according to
Leviticus ix. 24 ; Jud. vi. 21 (Theodotion, Hierony-
mus, &c.). Delitzsch ; the look of .Jehovah was a
fire-glance that set on fire the oftering. Keil, how-
ever, reminds us how it is said, that to .\bel him.self,
as well as to his offering, the look of Jehovah was
directed. Knobel assumes, witli t«chumann, that it
suits better to tliink of a personal appearance of
Jehovah at the lime of the offering, with whicli, too,
corresponds bettei the dealing with Cain that fol-
lows. The safest way is to siaud by the fact simply,
that God graciously accepted the offering of Abel ;
but as in later times the acceptance was outwardly
actualized by the miraculous saciificial flame, so
here, it suits best to think on some such mode of
acceptance, though not on the " fiery glance " alone.
2. Wherein lay the ground of this distinction?
Knobel : " The gift of Abel was of more value than
the small offering of Cain. In all sacrificial laws
the offerings of aiumals have the chief place." So
also the Emperor Jidian, according to Cyril of Alex-
andria (Delitzsch, p. 20U). According to Hofmann
(" Scripture Proof," i. p. 584), Cain, when he brought
bis offering of the fruits of his agriculture, thanked
God only " for the prolongation of this present life,
for the support of which he had been so laboriously
Btriving : whereas Abel in offering the best animals
of his herd, thanked God for the forgiveness of his
fsins, of if}hich thf rontinued ^uin wan the. dothinrj that
had licen r/iven of OmV For this too advanced
symbolic of the clothing skins, there is no Scripture
ground, and rightly .^^ays Pelitzsch : the thought of
expiation connecUs itself not with the skins, but with
the blood (see also Keil's Polemic, — against Hok-
UANN, p. 06). Yet Delitzsch contradicts himself
when lie says, with Gregory the (ireat: omiie quod
datur Dm ey dniilh riiente pematur, and then adds:
" the unbloody offering of Cain, as such, was only
the expression of a grateful pre.>ient, or, taken in its
deepi'St significance, a consecrated offering of self ;
but man n<'eds, before all things, the expiation of
his death-deserving sins, and for tiiis the blood ob-
tained through the slaying of the victims serves as
a svmbol." it is, however, just as much anticipating
to identifj the blood-ollerini; with *lie specific expia-
tion offering, as it is to give d'reetly to t' e Uving
faith in God's pure promise the identical characiei
of faith in the specific mode of atonement. Tin
Epistle to the Hebrews lays the whole weight of thj
satisfaction expressed in Abel's offering upon hig
faith (ch. xi. 4). Abel appears here as the proper
mediator of the institution of the faith-offering for
the world. As the docti-ine of creation is introduced
to the world through the faith of the primitiva
humanity, so in a similar manner did Abel bring
into the world the belief in the symbolical propitia-
tory offering in its universal form ; as after him
Enoch was the occasion of introilucing the belief of
the immortal life, and so on. Keil, too, contends
against the view that through the slaying of an ani-
mal Abel already made known the avowal that his
sins deserved death. And yet it is a fact that a dif-
ference in the state of heart of the two brothers is
indicated in the appearance of their offerings. Keil
finds, as a sign of this difference, that Abel's thanks
come from the depths of his heart, whilst Cain's
offering is only to make terms with God in the
choice of his gifts. Delitzsch regards it as emphatic
that Abel offered the firstlings of his herds, and,
moreover, the fattest parts of them, whilst Cain's
offering was no offering of first fruits. This ditt'er-
ence appears to be indicated, in fact, as a difference
in relation to the earliness, the joyfuliies.<, and fresh-
ness of the offerings. After the course of some
time, it means, Cain offered something from the
fruits of the ground. But immediately afterwards it
is said expressly: Abel had offered (H^'yn, preterite,
Sin'DS) ; and farther it is made prominent that he
brought of the firstlings, the fattest and best. These
outward differences in regard to the time of the
offerings, and the offerings themselves, have indeed
no siguifieance in themselves considered, but oidy aa
expressing the difference between a free and joyful
faith in the offering, and a legal, reluctant state of
heart. It has too the look as though Cain had
brought his offering in a self-willed way, and for
himself alone, — that is, he brought it to his own
altar, separated, in an unbrotherly s|iirit, from that
of Abel. — And Cain was very wroth. — Liteially,
he was greatly incensed (inflamed). (".SX denotes the
distended nostril. — T. L.). The wrath was a fire in
his soul (Jer. xv. 14 ; xvii. 4).— And his counte.
nance fell. — "Cain hung down his head, and looked
upon the earth. This is the posture of one darkly
brooding (Jer. iii. 12 ; Job xxix. 24), and prevails to
this day in the East as a sign of evil plottings " (BfRK-
HAROT, ".\rabian Proverbs," p. 248). — And the
liOrd said unto Cain. — This presupposes a certain
measure of susceptibility for divine rev^ation ; as
does also his previous offering, though done in his
own way. Jehovah, in a warning m.aimer, calls his
attention to the symptom of his wicked thoughts, —
his brooding posture. — If thou doest well, &c.—
The explanation of Arnheim and Bunscn : Whether
thou bringesi fair gifts or not, sin lurks at the door,
&c., does not take the word PXSJ in its nearest con-
nection, namely, in contrast with the falling of the
countenance, as the lifting it up in freedom and
serenity. Should we take nsi for the lifting up
(the acceptance) of the oftering, still would its bet|er
and nearer sense lie in the idea that good behavior
is the right offering. And yet on account of the
contrast, the lifting up of the countenance would
seem to be the meaning most obviously suggestca.
We need not to be reminded tliat along with goivj
CHAP. IV. 1-26.
267
behavior there is also meant an inward state, yet the
eipresBion tells us that tliat inward state will also
actualize itself in the right way. — Ver. S. And
Cain talked with Abel. — Knobel re(iieseiits tliese
words as a crux interpretian. RoseniuiiUcT and
others interpret it; he talked with Abel, that is, lie
had a paroxysm or fit of goodness and spoke again
peaceably with his brother. It is against this that
the use of iTjX for ~y![ cannot be authenticati'd by
iure examples. Therefore Hieronymus, Aben Ezra,
and others, interpret it : he told it (namely, what
Jehovah had said to him) to his brother. On the
contrary, Knobel remarks : it does not seem exactly
consistent that the still euvious Cain should thus
relate his own admonition. Here, however, the
question arises whether we are required to take
^ax^l iu that manner. The sense of this may be
that Cain simply preached to his brother in a mock-
ing manner the added apothegm, sin lieth at the
door. In a similar manner, to say the least, did
Ahab preach to Elias, Caiaphas to our Lord Christ,
Cajetan to Luther, &c. The Samaritan text has the
addition : m'i'n nsb: (let us go into the field). It
has been acknowledged by the Septuagiut, the Vul-
gate, and certain individual critics. But even an-
cient testimonies show it to have been an interpola-
tion.* Knobel, together with Bottcher, has recourse
to a conjecture that the reading should be "TSUJ
(he watched), instead of TBS. Delitzsch, again,
supposes that the narration hastens beyond the
oratio directa, or the direct address, and gives im-
mediately its carrying out in place of the thing said,
that is, he regards the invitation, " let us go into the
field," as implied or understood in the act. In a
similar way, Keil. We turn back to the above
Jiterpretation with the remark that tlie narrator had
00 need to state precisely that Gain preserved the
penal words of God as solely for himself, if he meant
to tell us that out of this warning admonition Cain
had made a hypocritical address to his brother.—
Cain rose up against Abol hia brother. — The
words " his brother," how many times repeated !
The sin of the fall has advanced quickly to that of
fratricide. The divinely charged envy in tue sin of
Eve, wherein there is reflected an analogue of ihe
envy of man against God, is here again advanced
from envy of a brother to hatred, then from hatred
to a vile obduracy against the warning words of God,
and so on, even to fratricide. Therein, too, it is
evident that the tempter of man is a murderer of
man. Yet still this is not in the sense as though
John viii. 44 had reference only to this fact. In the
sense of this latter passage, Satan was the murderer
of Cain, — a thing, however, which manifests itself in
"the murder of Abel. The fact here narrated will
form a connected unity with that of Gen. iii. The
working of Satan in Gen. iii. comes fully out in the
fact narrated in Gen. iv. " Cain is the first man who
lets sin rule over him ; he is eV tuO Trofripaii (of the
evil onei, 1 John iii. 12." Delitzsch.
4. Vers. 9-16. The Judgment of Cain. Where
r* It is not in the Syriac, which closely follows the
Heorew, and there is no reference to it in the Targums.
It looks more like something added (supposed to be neces-
lary to explain ^ -X^) than like something left out. The
feet of its being in the Samaritan Pentateuch, therefore,
Instead of showing the superior antiquitv and correctness
of that as compared with the Hebrew letter, only proves
'ts later date as copying the interpolatinns of the .Septua-
£int. See the conclusive argument of Gesenius as against
tike claims of thia Samaritan Pentateuch. — T. L.]
17
IB Abel thy brother? — The divine arrai^nenl
analogous to the arraignment of .\dam and Eve Bu*
Cain evades every acknowledgment, lie lies, and
denies in an impudent manner; then co'iies boldly
out with the scornrul expression : Am I iny bro
ther's keeper ? " What a fearful advance from th«
resort and exculpation of our first parents after the
fall, so full of shame and anguish, to this sliamclesa
lying; this brutality, so void of love and feeling I*
Delitzsch. Irreligioiisness, together with an iuhumaa
want of feeling, stand out in continually increasing,
reciprocal action. Upon this impudent denial fol-
lows the accusation and the judgmeut. The stream*
of his brother's blood are represented as his accusers,
and the earth itself must bear witness against him.
— What hast thou done ? — So we read, since we
take the sense of that which follows to be : A voice
hast thou made, etc. " The deed belongs to those
crimes that cry to Heaven (ch. xviii. 20; six. 13;
Exod. iii. 9). Therefore does Abel's blood cry up to
Heaven that God, the lord and judge, may punish
the murderer. All blood shed unrighteously must
be avenged (ch. ix. 5); according to the ancient view
it cries to God continually, until vengeance take*
place. Hence the jirayer, that the earth may not
drink in the blood shed upon it, in order that it may
not thereby be made invisible and inaudible (Is. xxvi.
21; Ezek. xxiv. 7; Job xvi. 18)." Knobel. Com
pare Ps. cxvi. 15 ; Heb. xi. 4 ; Rev. vi. 9. Calvin :
Oste7idit Dens^ se de factis liomlnum cognoscere uf'
cungue nuUus queratur vel accuset ; demdesibi niagit
earam esse homhium viiani^ quam ut sanguinem in-
noxiuni impU7ie effwidi sinat ; tertio^ curam sibt
piorwni esse 71071 solum quamditt vivufit, sed etiam
post mortem. The blood as the living flow of the
Ufe, and the phenomenal basis of the soul (primarily
as basis of the nerve-life) has a voice which is as the
living echo of the blood-clad soul itself It is the
symbol of the soul crying for its right (to live), and
in this way affects immediately the human feeling.* —
* ['* Crying fnr its right to live.^' The feeling here earliest
manifested, and the idea of demanded retiibution that growi
out of it, pervades antiquity ; but as eshibitiid in the Greek
tragic poetry it becomes almost ten ific. C' >mpare numerool
pasfiages in the Eumenides of J^schtlus ; also the Cttaptiom,
398:
oAAd voiio? fj.€v i^ofiaf arayova^
XV^eVaj £9 TreSor dAAo TTpoaanfiv
al^a. BOA' yip Aoiyoi- EPINNY2
napa Tdv Trporepov titdLfi€V(jiv aTTjP"
eTepaf €1Tdyovaa.v en' aTj}.
There is a law that blood once poured on earth
By murderous hands demands that other blood
Be shed in retribution. Prom tne slaia
Erynnys calls aloud for vengeance still.
Till death in justice meet be paid for death.
In another passage there is a similar reference to a very an-
cient law, or mythus, which the poet styles TpiyeptitVj &om
its exceeding antiquity. /&, 31U :
'AvtI 5e 7rATj-y^5 <f)Oi't'a? ifioviav
TrXriyriv Ttvero) ■ Spaaavri naBetv
TPirEPtJN MYfcJOS riSe ^luyel.
For blood must blood be shed. A law by age
TTirice holy on the murderer's guilty head
This righteous doom demands.
Here again, as has been before remarked, it is not dij&-
cult t<i decide which is the original and which is the copy,
.^schylus drew from the pt imitive feeling and the primitive
idea, bnt how greatly had it become deformed. How pure,
how hoiy, how merciful evan, is this scriptural presentation
of the first murderer and his doom, as compared with the
fierce revenge (as distinguished from vrngeance, or pure rtitri.
button) together with the fatalism that appears ia the Gre-
cian lirama, and in the still harsher pictures of othei
mythologies.
The allusion to the blood of Abel, Heb. xii. 24, has bee»
6upp< 'sed to intimate the blood of Abel's sacnfice (see Ja
COBVS, p. 138), but the more direct parallelism is with tb>
»os
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOCK Oi MOSES.
And now art thou cursed, etc. — The words follow-
ing (nan.NH •'C) are explained in different ways:
1. My curse sliall smite tliee from tliis hmd; that
is, here shall be its execution (Aben Ezra, Kimchi,
k2d others ; Knobel, Keil, more or less definitely).
2. Cursed aica;/ from the district ; that is, driven forth
by the curse (Rosenmiiller, Tuch, Gerlach, Dehtzseh).
8. As in the history of the first judgment there
appear two cursings, it is proper to look back to
tbem. There is the serpent cursed directly as Cain
is here. But the earth, too, is cursed foi- Adam's
lake. Since now here, in the curse of Cain, the
earth is again mentioned, the obvious interpretation
becomes : thou thyself shalt be cursed in a much
severer degree than the earth. The earth, which
through Adam's natural sin has become to a certain
extent partaker of his gnilt, shall appear innocent in
presence of thine unnatural crime ; yea, it becomes
thy judge. — Which hath opened her mouth. —
This is tlie moving reason for the form of the pre-
ceding penal sentence. So Delitzsch interprets :
the ground has drunk innocent blood, and so is
made a participant in the sin of murder (Is. xxvi.
21; Numb. xxxv. 31). Keil disputes this, and on
good grounds. "It is because the earth has been
compelled to drink the innocent blood which has
been shed that, therefore, it opposes itself to the
murderer, and refuses to yield its strength (n3 its
fruits or crops. Job xxxi. 40) to his cultivation ; so
that it returns him no produce, just as the land of
Canaan is said to have spit out the Canaanites, on
account of the abominable crimes with wliich they
had utterly defiled it (Levit. xviii. '28)." It is clear
voice here spoken of as crvinff from the earth. The words
KpetTTofa AoAout^t (Heb. sii. 24) are best rendered speaketh
stronger, Inuden, taking Kpeirroi-a. adverbially with its pij-
mary sense of sfrcH<7//(, superiority (from (cpdros); and ibis
is confirmed by the Hebraism in n-apd, for ""Z , or w com-
parative. The blood of Chiist cries louder for mercy than
A.bel's did for venpe-ance.
The Scripture calls tb.' blood the life, and so it comes to
be used for TrS3 or lirvjc'/. Had it meant (as it is no extrav-
agance to suppose it diiT pean) that Abel's soul was crying,
this would have been t^e most ancient mode of saying it ;
aa there is no evidence that in that earliest experience of
mankind, death, though an awfully strange and fearful
event, was regarded as a cessation or discontinuiinco of
being. They could not have had anything like our modem
notion of death either in its hyper-siJiritu \lism or in its ma-
terialism. There was still a personality, j. so f hood, in the
body and in the blood. Abel was not wholV ^one ; he still
lived in his blood, lived, at least, unto God, ^ho is not the
God ol the dead hut of the living (Matt. xxii. 32).
The use of the blood for the life or soul (as life) may help
U8 to understand better Kev vi. 9, as ba\'ing some connec-
tion with this passage. John saw under the altar (Ou(na<TTT7-
ptou) the souls (rdy ^Inixo-i) of those that had Iteen slain
(_ia4tayti.iviiiv); and tiiey were crying out for n-tribution :
How long, O Lord, holy and true ! It is dilEcult to take t/zux**
in this vision as denoting spirits redeemed who have entered
ijil> rest. If, however, it iji something more than a personi-
fication, that is, if we are to regard the J/wx^i ''^*re as real
'orsomU beings, then it is not irrational to take the same
Jew of the blood, life, >fy)Ol "^f Abel, as a true personal e3s-
Istenoe for whom God stUlcared, and to suppose that such
was the view taken by the .ancient author. A mere personi-
fication is ineon.--istent with the simplicity of this earliest
thinking and feeling, however this kind of language may
fall to that in a later time, when poetry (if we will call it
poetry) bcronn-s predominantly rheloriciil. If such an idea
[b forbidden in the Apocalyptic pi'ture, much more is it alien
to the first; and there cjin hardly be a doubt that the two
paiwages are connected and mutually suggestive. WasAbe^s
Mol amont; tho.^e that were under the altir! The idea is
wen in tk.r imagery that follows : "tbere were given unto
them »>/.'£< r((b(rs." 'i'hin luhHr. robe is in f^triking conlrast
to thd trfi (^irraent of blood, and its being " niade vihifr in
the k.'jy*) of tlie Lamb " (lUv. vii. 14) addi to the vividness
•J t)j» .<'.«' .-T.L.1
that ill this case there is transferred to the earth ■
miuistrafioii of punishment against Cain. SinceCain
has done violence to nature itself, even to the ground,
in that it has been conipelleu to drink his brother's
blood, therefore must it take vengeance on him io
refusing to him its strength. The curse proper, how-
ever, of Cain must be, that through tlie power of his
guilt-consciousness he must become a fugitive and a
vagabond upon the earth. 13" 1*3 , a paranomasia
as in ch. i. 2. The first word (participle from J'3)
detiotes the inward quaking, trembling, and unrest,
the second (from 113) the outward fleeing, roving,
restlessness. The interpretation, therefore, of De-
litzsch is incorrect, " that the earth in denying to
Cain the expected fruits of his labor, drives him ever
on from one land to another." The proper middle
point of his curse is his inner restlessness. More
correctly says DeUtzsch : " ban of banning, wander
ing of exile, is the history of Cain's curse ; how di-
rectly opposite to that which is proclaimed by the
blood of the other Abel, the Holy and Righteous
one (.\cts iii. 14)." Knobel, according to tlie view
•bove noticed, interprets the words " fugitive and
vagabond," as indicsiting in the author a knowledge
of the roaming races of the East. — My punishment
is greater than I can bear [Lange tenders it my
guilt, ■'31?]. — The question arises whetlier this ex-
pression means my sin, or my punishment. The old
interpretations (Septuagint, Yulgate) render it my
sin, and accordingly give Sir3 tlie sense of forgive-
ness. My sin is too great to lie ever forgiven. Thia
expression of despair into which his earlier confi-
dence sinks down, has been interpreted by some as
denoting Cain's repentance, which, analogous to '.be
repentance of Judas, fails of salvation through self-
will and want of faith, or rather, bears him on more
fully to destruction. But since "i"? may denote also
the punishment of sin (ch. xix. 15; Is. v. 18), and
since Cain further on laments the greatness of hia
punishment, Delitzsch, Keil, and others, with Aben
Ezra, Kinichi, Calvin, etc., take the sense to be: my
punishment is too great, that is, greater than I cao
bear. But now the question arises, whether there is
not here in view a double sense, as mdicated by the
very choice of the expression ; and this the more,
smce, in fact, there Ues also in Cain's repentance a
similar doulJe sense. The sin is evitlcntly acknowl-
edged, but only in the reflex view of the pimishmeiit,
and because of the punishment [a^tritio in contrast
with contriiio). The selt-accusatiou, therefore, that
the sin is held unpardonable, is, at tlie same time, an
accusation of the judge for having laiil upon him au
uuenilurable liurden. The reservation of the heart
still unbroken in its selfishness and pride, makes the
self-accusation, in this kind of repentance, an accusa-
tion of the doom itself ; it is "the sorrow of the
world that worketh death." It is, however, the lies
bound up with tlie pride that gives the imjKissioned
utterance its curiously varied coloring. — Behold
thou hast driven me out. — Out of the sentence
of his own conscience, through whii'h (iod lets him
become a fugitive and a vagabond, Cain makes a
clear, positive, divini decree of banislinieni. There-
by does it appear to him a heavier doom that he
niust go ibrfh from the presence of the adamah in
Edi-n, than his departure from the presence of (iod
f though before he had put the latter fir.si; . iiid,
finally, they are both to him the harder punishment,
since now " every one that finds shall slay liim." I»
CHAP. rv. 1 ^ti.
U59
]ft the full, unbroken, selfish fear of death, thiit falls
upon him like a giant, rather than the wisli tliat he
muT *>H ylain by the avenger of blood, whoever he
may t)o. But therein does his outer umk-rsianding
of it give notiee ol" the sentence: thou shall lie a
fugitive and a vagabond. It has changed, for him,
into the threatening: avengers of blood will every-
where hunt and slay thee (I'rov. xxviii. 1). — Behold
thou drivest me forth this day from the face of the
Adainali, that is, out of Eden. *' In Eden dwelt Je-
hovah, whose presence guaranteed protection and
Becurity." Knobel. But would Cain take comfort in
the idea of the divine protection ? It is suflering and
punishment, in itself, that, as he says, he is directly
driven forth (^"^3} from that home still so rich and
charming, where, moreover, through his tilling of the
grounil lie meant to become a permanent possessor.
— And from thy face shall I be hid. — Knobel :
"Outside of Eden, withdrawn from thy look. In a
similar manner Jonah believed that by his withdrawal
from Canaan, the land of Jehovah's habitation, he
should escape from his territorial jurisdiction." On
the contrary, Delitzsch and Keil : '* from the place
where Jehovah revealed his presence." It must be
observed that he mentions this sutfering as of second
moment. It sounds partly as a complaint, and partly
as a threatening; for it is the specitic expression of
the morose self-consciousness that it flees from the
presence of God, whilst it maintains, in order to have
some plea of right, that it has been forced to do so.
When I lose the face of my home, then also am I
compelled to flee from the face of God. Though in
every place he would fain hide from the face of God,
yet the obvious sense here is neither the unbiblical
thought that God dwelt only in Eden (or in Canaan),
nor the loss of the beholding of the cherubim. The
idea that man c-in hide himself from God the Scrip-
ture everywhere treats as a mere false representa-
tion of the evil conscience. It is clearly growling
despair that will no more seek the presence of Jeho-
vah through prayer and sacrifice, undei" the pretence
that it is no more allowed to do so. Cain, however,
has still religious insight enough to know, that the
further from Gud, the deeper does he fall into the dan-
ger of death. — Every one that findeth me. — How
could Cain fear lest the Mood avenger should slay him,
when the earth was iminhabited? Josephus, Kimchi,
Michaelis, have referred the declaration to the rav-
enous beasts. Clericus, Dathe, Delitzsch, Keil, and
otliers, have referred it to the fiimily of Adam.
Schumann and Tuch find in it an oversight of the
narrator.* Knobel takes it as embracing the repre-
[• If there is a difficulty here, it is one that the writers
of thi- account mu.st have seen as clearly as the most acute
of modem critics. The Tiarr;itive excludes the idea of any
other historic human r.ce tiian that derivoi from Adam.
If there had been before this any other cn-ation, or crea-
tures bearing a resemblanc<-- to man, either physical or psy-
choloirical, or if there were nny such in other and remote
parts of the earth, they had no f?eneric connection with the
epecies homo, or that Adimic family, afterwards r.-present-
ed b\ the three sons of Noah, and from which has come all
whom history has rerognized, and now recog:nizes, as prop-
erly man, 2TX ''^'2, Sons of Adam, according to the Scrip-
tural de'^r^tiation, or Sons of Man. But what reason have
we to sui'].o;c that Cain knew all this? The inconsistency
of some rniQincut itors here is very strilcing. Thoy hr»hl a?
absurd that notion of some of the older theoio-ians, according
to wh'ch Adam w;vs a being of surpassiiiL' knowlc^lg.', and
yet here, in'order to make an objection to the Scriptuies, they
ascribe to Cain a knowledge he could only have had fii»m
iome transcendent experience or some direct divine rovc;ii-
tion. To establish such a coniradiction, they suppose him
to have known, or that he ought to have known, that there
were no other beings iik« himgelf anywhere in existence.
sentation of their having been primitive iidiabitanti
of Eastern Asia (Chinese inimii:rauts, perhaps) witk
whom Cain had fought. Dklitzsch says : " It ifl
Now, as far as tha account goes, notLmg of this kmJ ha4
ever been revealed to him, and he had no means of leamiai
it. There U nutbiug to show that even Adam him^c f had
any such know itiii;eof his own eai'thly solitariness. Bf jond
hi", own Kdcu iie knew nothing of the earth's vast extent or
of what (jod may have done in other paits of it. We are
carryin;:: into the narrative our own definite knowledge of
the figure, geography, and history of our globe, ami thii
some would aid interpreting rationally. We may, iDdeuiL
have a high view of Adam's po-ition in its moral aspect and
in its spiritual grandeur, but this does not demand fur him
a pa-st linowlodge, which could only have been supematur-
ally acQuireil, and of which the account gives not tbe slight-
est intimation. Awaking to a human consciousness imder
the divine inspiration that fii-st made him man, he finds
himself the object of a tender care and a guiuing law, pro-
ceeding from a being higher tlian himself. His nest esp.'xi-
ence is that of a companion mysteriously introduced lo him
as one derived from himself. He is conscious of a sereie
happiness and a blissful home. Then comes his later
knowledge. He remembers the beautiful Eden, his sad
transgi-essiou, his fall from that blessed state, and iiis ban-
ishment into the wide wilderness world He carrii-s with
hjm the thought of some dark malignant power from whom
he had received deadly injury, and is consoled by the
promise that one of his descendants shall finally triumph
over him; but beyond this, nature and history arc all un«
known. The vast waste may have other inhabitants.
Nothing to the contrary has as yet been revealed to h m or
to his children. His geography is limited to the lost Eden
and the adamah that lies around it ; hi- ethnology takes in
only himself, his companion the motlicr of life, and the chil-
dren that have been born to him. To Adam himself there
may have been the thought that he was alone with God
upnn the earth, but it would not be experience or revelation,
—only an inference from the care and government of which
he found himself the object. To the lawless, vindictive
Cain, on the nther hand, nothing would be more natural
than the thought that, somewhere in the imkno^^Ti vvaste,
there tnigbt be beings like himself, and who might be as
malignant to lumself as he had been to his slain brother.
Thus regarded, Cain's language, instead of invohnjig a con-
tradiction, or an oversight on the juirt of the nairat'ir, pre-
sents one of those inimitable feat ur is of truthfulness that
characterise the account the moment we get in the right
position for viewing it. Had not the author been writing
artlessly and imthfully (that is, in his subjective cons^ ious-
ness, whether coming from inspiration or otherwise;, he
would have provided against the cavil ; for he could not
have failed to see the dilficulty if his stand-point had been
the same with that of the modem objector. Had it bocTi
a mere fancy, he would have supplied the required knowl-
edge, as Milton lias done by the conversation of the angel.
We may say, too, as Lange intimates, that Cain's awful
guilt gave a preternatural power to his imagination, and
peopled the world with avengers. This is perlectly credible
and in accordance ^^dth human experience;. The supposition,
too, that by "iXSli^ ?r, whosoever or whatsoever finds me,
he may have had in mind imagined demonic beings, is not
to be rashly rejected. To say nothing now of any outward
demonic realm, such as the Bible elsewhere clearly reveals,
a subjective world of devils is created by the guilty human
ci>ns(.ieuce, which must find an avenger, an dAaaruip, some-
where ; and we thus regard Cain as the first human me-
dium of this awful revelation, just as other doctrines of a
dilferent kind have been brought out, tii-st as emotional
consciousness and afterwards as expressed dogma, tlu-ough
the action of the human soul itself in its holy experience.
This has been the method of their inspiration, or the genn
of their first introduction to the minds of men. Thus the
doctrine of a hell originated in the human soul itself,
just as the hope of some final rest, in holy snuls like Enoch,
or of some ■' city that had fuundations," as in the longings
of the pilgrim patriarchs (lleb. xi. 10), became (jod's morn-
ing star of revelation to the whole uoctiine of a future life,
growing brighter and brighter until, in the New Testament,
it leaches the ''perfect day."
When, in the Eumenides of JEschylus, Orestes sens the
"EpifFues everywhere puisuiug him, we recognize it as dra-
m itically true to nature. It is indeed a strnnge aspect ol
the human soul that the poet presents, but it has its ground
in its deeper consciousness, and we cannot ht-lp leeling that
there must bo something objective correspondini,' to it. 11
we ack .owledge t!iis fatness in the representations of thu
Greek ti-ageilian, tbunded. doubtless, on some nast tradition,
why may we not regard it as a ti'Uthful interpretation of thj
same human conscience in this account of '.':£ first mnrv
dererl— T. L.]
260
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
elear that the blood avengers whom Cain feared,
must be those who sl\ould exist in the future, when
his father's family had become enlarged and spread
abroad ; for that tlie murderer should be punished
with death (we might even say that the taking ven-
geance for hlood is the fountain of regulated law and
Dsht respecting nmrder) is a righteous sentence
written in any man's breast ; and that Cain already
Bees the earth full of avengers, is just the way of the
murderer who sees himself on all sides suirounded
by avenging spirits ('Epifvvfi), and feels himself sub-
jected to their tormetitings." Kkil adds : " Though
Adam, a', that time, had not many grandchildren,
great-grandchildren, and great^great-grandehildren,
yet, according to rer. 17, ch. v. 4, he must, at that
time, doubtless, have had already other children,
who might multiply, and, earlier or later, avenge
Abel's death." In aid of this supposition we must
take the representation that would give to Cain an
immensely long life. Cain's complaint was an indi-
rect prayer for the mitigation of the punishment.
Jehovah consents to the prayer in his sense, that is,
he knows that the fear of Cain is, in great part, a
reflection from his evil conscience, and, consequent-
ly, the destiny which is appointed to him appears
to serve more for the silencing (not giving rest to)
his frantic excitement, than as designed to protect
him outwardly from any danger. For not absolutely
Bhall he know himself protected, but only through
the threatening of a seven-fold blood-vengeance
against his pursuer, whoever he might be, and
through the warning of the same as given by a sign.
There appears to Knobel a difficulty in the question,
Who then would undertake the blood-vengeance on
behalf of Cain, seeing he had no companions?
Seven-fold shall he be punished, or shall he (Cain)
become avenged. — Set a mark upon Cain. — Ac-
cording to the traditional interpretation, God put a
sign on Cain himself which would make him known ;
and hence the proverbial expression : the mark of
Cain, On the contrary, the literal language has the
preposition b (to or for) Another old interpretation
(Aben Ezra, Baumgarten, DeUtzsch) will have it that
God gave him a token for his security, in order that
he might not be slain. The language, however, does
not denote a sign of security for Cain that would
make him absolutely safe, but only a sign of warn-
ing, and threatening, for some possible pursuer, and
which ndght possibly remain unnoticed, though
Berving to Cain himself as a conscious sign for the
quieting of his fears. According to Knobel, the
author had in mind, perhaps, some celestial phenom-
enon, which should every time make its appearance
and warn away the assailant. Such a divine inter-
vention, however, would be a placing the murderer
in absolute security, and besides a thing simply in-
coitceivable. The warning sign for the pursuer of
Lamech, whoever he might be, was the newly in-
vented weapons of his son Tubal-Cain. The warn-
ing sign that should serve for the protection of (!ain,
must disclose to the jjursuers the threatening pros-
pect of a seven-fold blood-vengeance. Such a sign,
jlthoiigh for Cain, may be, notwithstanding, repre-
sented as on Cain in some kiml of threatening de-
fence, perhaps, or in the attendance of his wife; it
is enniigli that the history is silent, or simply means
to tell us that IJod already, ininjediately after the
brat deed of murder, had established a modilieation
of the natural, im[iul-i\X', and inqjassioned, taking
Ot vengeance for blood ; — a warning sign, in fact,
(hat the carrying out of the blood- vengeance woulii
have for its consequence the extirpation "f the whoU
human race. But why this exemption of Cain f
To this question every kind of answer has been giveD
(comp. Deliizsch and Keil). The chief thing was.
that this banishment had in itself the significance oi
a social human death. It was a member cut ofl
from the human community, as in the \ew Test»
ment history of Judas. Besides, -.he unfolding of the
Cainitish existence was to reveal an unfolding of
death in a higher degree, and, at the same time, to
do service to human culture in the dissemination of
the Cainitish talent. Finally, there comes into con.
sideration, in relation to Cain, what is said by
DeUtzsch ; " He was gracious to him in the pro-
longation of his time of grace, because he recognized
the sin as sin." But at the same time, God himself
gives here the first example for the significance of
the law of pardon in the later society. To demanp
the death of tain was properly the right only ol
Abel's parents. But these were also Cain's pai ents
The right of pardoning is the right of modifying or
mitigating the puidshment in view of special mitigat-
ing circumstances. — And Cain tvent out. — " The
name nu denotes a land of escape and banishment,
and is therefore the contrast to the happy land of
Eden, where Jehovah walks and communes with
mem" Keil. The land lay eastward of Eden. In
other respects it cannot be definitely determined ;
for Cain carried everywhere the land of Nod with
him in his heart. Knobel thinks here again of
China.
5. Vers. 17-23. Cain and the Cainites. — And
Cain knew his wife. — Here comes in the suppcjsi-
tion that Adam must have already had danghiera
too. Cain's wife could only have been a daughter
of Adam, consequently his sister, and Abel's sister.
She still adheres, nevertheless, to the fearful man,
and follows him in his misery, which is also a testi-
mony to a humane side in his life. The marriage of
sisters was, in the beginning, a condition for the
propagation of the human race. At the commence-
ment of the race, the contrasts in the members of the
family must have been so strongly regarded, that
thereby the conditions for a true marriage ".ould be
present in the same family ; whilst the most significant
motive for the later prohibition of sister marriages,
such as the establishment of a new band of love,
and the consequent separation of the sisterly and
marriage relations, could not yet have become eifec-
tual. Keil, moreover, remarks that the sons and
daughters of Adam represent not merely the family,
but the race ; this is indeed tlie case, even in single
families, though on a reduced scale. Some have
thought it strange that Cain should have built, a city
lor his son. But in this objection it is oveilooked
that the main conception of a primitive city is simply
that of a walled fortification. The city must have
been a very small one. Cain might have built it for
an entire patriiirchal race. Moreover, it reads, aa
Keil calls attention to it, nsi T''J-"i ^^ '^^ build,
ing. It was the thought and the work of his Ufe, in
jiroof that immediately after the protection offered
to him by God, he longed lor something to fortify
himself against the tear of his conscience, and had
neeil to fix for himself an outward .station, in oppo-
sition to his iniuT misettled cimdititm. • "Even if
we do not, with Delitzseh, regard this city as the
foundation-st(me of the worldly rule in which the
Bpiiil of tlie beast predominates, yet we must not
niisapprelmid tbuici:. t le ell'ort to remove the curs*
CHAP. IT. 1-26.
861
n banishment, and to create for his race a point of
unity as a compensation for the lost unity in society
with God ; neitlier must we lose sight of the contin-
ual tendency of the Cainitish hfe to the earthly.
The mighty development of the world-feeling, and
of ungodliness, among the Cainites, becomes conspic-
uous with Laraech in the sixth generation." Keil.
This comes to be, indeed, the ground idea of the
Cainite development, that iu the symbolic ideality of
culture, it seeks an offset to the real ideality of the
living cultas (or worship), even as this is generally
the cbaracter of the secularized worldliness ; that is,
St makes a development of culture, in itself legiti-
mate, to be its one and all. If after this we take
into view the names of the Cainitish line, it will serve
for a confirmation of what has been said.
1. Henoch, initiation, the initiated and his city.
2. Irad, townsman, citizen, urbamis, civilU.
5. Mahujael, or Mahijael, the purified, or the
formed of God (nnn).
4. Metbusael, the (strengthened) man of God.
6. Lamech, strong youth. His two wives : Adah,
the decorated, Zillah, the musical player (ac-
cording to Schroder, the dark brunette).
[Schroder is all wrong. — T. L.]
6. The sons of Lamech, by Adah : Jabal, the
traveller (nomade), and Jubal, the jubilant,
the musician. By ZiUah : Tubal Cain, work-
er in brass or iron (according to the I'ersian,
Thubal ; Gesenius), the lance-forger (accord-
ing to the Shemetic, mason) — if not more
probably : brass (or iron) of Cain, that is, the
forger of the weapons in wliich the Cainites
trusted. His sister Naamah, the lovely.
Cain and Adam included, this is eight genera-
tions ; whereas the line of Seth that follows (ch. 6)
embraces ten generations. On account of the like
names, Henoch and Lamech, Irad and Jared, Kain
and Kenan, Mahujael and Mahalael, Metbusael and
Methuselah, Knobel supposes a niinghng of both
genealogies, or one common primitive legend in two
forms ; Keil contends against this by laying empha-
sis on the difference of the names that appear to be
similar, and the different position of those that are
alike. For the sake of comparison we let the line
of Seth immediately follow; 1. Adam (eartli-man).
2. Seth (compensation, or the estabhshed). 3. Enoch
(weak man). 4. Cainan (profit, a mere like-sounding
of Cain). 5. Mahalaleel, praise of God (only an
echo of Mahujael). 6. Jared, descending, the de-
scender (only a resemblance in sound to Irad). 7.
Enoch or Henoch, the consecrated. Here the devo-
ted, or consecrated, follows the desceiuling ; in the
Cainitish line he follows Cain. The one was the
occupier of a city in the world, the other was trans-
lated to God ; both consecrations, or devotions,
stand, therefore, in full contrast. 8. Methuselah.
According to the usual interpretation ; man of the
arrow, of the weapons of war. As he forms a chro-
nological parallel with the Cainitic Lamech, so may
we regard this name as indicating that he introduced
these uewly invented weapons of the Cainites into
the line of Seth, in order to be a defence against the
hostile insolence of the Cainites. It consists with
this interpretation, that with him there came into the
line of Seth a tendency to the worldly, after which
h goes down with it, and with the age. Even the
Imposing upon his son the name Lamech, the strong
youth, may be regarded as a warlike demonstration
igainst the Cainitic Lamech. Therefore, 9. Lemech
•r Lamech. 10. Noah, the rest, the quieter, or
I peacemaker. With Lamech, who greeted in his soj
the future pacificator, tliere appears lo be indicated
in the line of Seth, a direction, |ieacet'ul, yet tmublea
with toil and strife. It was just such an .-ige, how-
ever, as might have for its consequence the alli;ince#
and mingliogs with the Cainites that are now intro-
duced, and which have so often followed the exigeu*
cies of war. This Setliian Lamech, howev<^r, forma
a signilicant contrast with the Cainitic. The one
consoles himself with the newly invented weapons
of his son Tubal Cain, as his security against the
fearful blood-vengeance. The other comforts him-
self with the hope that with his son there sliall
come a season of holy rest from the labor and pains
that are burdened with the curse of God. In regard
to both lines in common, the following is to be re-
marked ; 1. The names in the Caiidtic line are, for
the most part, expressive of pride, those of the
Sethic, of humdity. 2. The Cainitic line is carried
no farther than to the point of its open corruption
in polygamy, quarrelsomeness, and consecration of
art to the service of sin. Tiie Sethic line f'urms in
its tenth period the full running out of a temporal
world-development, in which Enoch, the seventh,
properly appears as the highest point. 3. Against
the mention of the Cainitic wives, their charms, and
their art, appears in the Sethic line only the mention
of sons and daughters. It serves for an introduction
to the sixth chapter.
Concerning the repeated appearance of like
names, compare what is said by Keil, p. 71. Zillah
can just as well mean the shadowy as the sounding,
yet the latter interpretation is commended by the
context. By the invention of Jubal a distinction is
made between stringed and wind instruments. Iii
its relation to Tubal Cain the word ttJ-ih must be
taken as neuter ; since otherwise Tubal Cain would
appear as the smith that forged the smiths. The
song of Lamech is the first decidedly poetic form in
the Scriptures, more distinct than ch. i. 27 and ch.
ii. 23, as is shown by the marked parallelism of the
members. It is the consecration of poetry to the
glorification of a Titanic insolence, and, sung as it
was in the ears of both his wives, stands as a proof
that lust and murder are near akin to each other.
Rightly may we suppose (with Hamann and Herder),
that the invention of his son Tubal Cain, that i--, the
invention of weapons, made him so excessively
haughty, whilst the invention of his son Jubal put
him in a position to sing to his wives his song of
hate and vengeance. This indicates, at the same
time, an immeasurable pride in his talented sons.
He promises himself the taking of a blood-ven-
geance, vastly enhanced in degree, but shows, at the.
same time, by the citation of the case of his ances-[
tor Cain, that the dark history of that bad man had
become transformed into a proud remembrance for
his race. The meaning of the song, however, is not,
I have slam a man (Septuagint, Vulgate, &c.). He
supposes the case that he were now wounded, or
now slain ; that is, it looks to the future (Aben Ezra,
Calvin, &c.). We may take the "S with which tht
song begins as an expression of assurance, and the
preterite of the verb as denoting \he certainty of th«
declaration (see Delitzsch, p. 214). We think it
better, however, to take it liypothetically, as Nagels-
bach and others have done, and tins too as corre-
sponding to the sense as well as to the grammatical
expression. In respect to the inventions of tlie
Chonese, and the discovery of music as coming ou(
262
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES
•f the shepherd-life, compare Knobel, p. 66. In
regard to tbe conjectuies couceriiiiig these genealo-
gies, see the Catalogue of Literature, p. 66. Thus,
for example, Jubal is connected with Apollo, and
Tulial Cain with Vulcan. The siniilaritj of particu-
lai forms in popular traditions cannot ju^tii'y us in
tonl'ounding them. Knobel refers here, in the view
he takes, to the bloodthiisty cruelty of the Mongo-
lian tribes. Ewald finds in the three sons of Laniech
(Noah y) thf representatives of three prinoiijal states
according to the Judiean conceptions (see Delitzsch,
p. 212; also similar interpretations of Ewald, p.
211).
6. Vers. 24-26. Seth. — And called his name
Seth. — Seth may denote compensation for Abel
(Knobel, Keil), — one who comes in the place of Abel
who has been slain and taken away ; and in this way
he is said to be fixed, established. Eve called the
giver Elohim, according to Knobel, because the Seth-
ites were elohists ; acooi dii.g to Keil it was because
the divine power had compensated her for what hu-
man wickedness had taken away. The fact that the
name Jehovah, as mentioned further on, came to be
adopted in connection with Enoch (weak man), may
lead to the thought, indeed, of a lowering of hopes,
and yet there lies an expression of hope in this, that
Bhe regards Seth as a permanent compensation for
Abi 1. — And to Seth, — to him also was born a
■on. — Enoch, — a designation of weakness, frailty ;
probably a sorrowful remembrance of Abel (Ps. viii.
6; xc. 3). — Then began men to call. — 3 i*^P,
primarily, to call on the name of Jehovah, and then
to proclaim him, to announce. Men had before this
prayed and called upon God, but now they begin to
reverence God as Jehovah. But why not before, in
the time of Seth ? God as Jehovah is the covenant
God of a pious race, of a future full of promise.
First with Enoch does there appear the .'ure |iros-
pect of a new line of promise, after the line of Cain
had lost it. With a new divine race, and a new be-
lieving generation, there ever presents itself the
name Jehovah, and ever with a higher glory. Now
it is for the first time after Eve's first theocratic
jubdee-cry of hope. Delitzsch is inclined to think
that men now called upon Jehovah in the direction
of the Ea^t (where the Cainites made their settle-
ment). .Moreover, it must be that here is narrated
the beginning of a formal divine worship. In re-
spect to this, as also in respect to the two pillars of
Seth's descendant* of wliich Jose|)hus speaks, com-
pare Delitzsch, p. 218. The langu;ige undoubtedly
refers to a general honoring of the name Jehovah
among the pious Sethites. Concerning the name of
God, compare the Kibelwerk, Matt., p. 125 (Am. ed.).
In relation to Jehovah is the name of special signifi-
cance, because Jehovah is tlie God of the covenant,
or of the revelation of salvation, and because the
name of God, whilst on the one side it denotes his
revelation, does, on the other, present the reflex of
his revelation in the human religious recognition,
that is, m relir/ion itself. In respect to the supposi-
tion that the primitive religion was the true religion,
as wc find it in Uom. i. 19-21, Knobel gives an ac-
count in its historical relation (p. 67). According to
a Hebrew interpretation of the word "H^n, as
though from the word bbn,to profane, and which
HiiTonymus mentions, though ho rejects it, there
must have begun, in the days ol' Enoeli, a species of
image-worship, us a profanation of the name of Je-
hovah (sec RAUiiiia, " The Hebrew Traditions in the
Works of HIeronymus," p. 20). It is a Ribbinical
figment, resting upon the misinterpretation of ■
word, and of the whole text.
DOCTRINAl AND ETHICAI.
1. The propagation of the human race is ont
side of Paradise, not because it is first occasioned
by sin, but rather because it sujjposes a distinct
development of mankind, and is tainted witli its
sin.
2. The human pairing is not an act of natural
necessity, but a free ethical love, a knowing, as its
fruit is a begetting, a witnessing.
3. The first mother's-joy after the first mother'*
anguish, is a spirit of high enthusiasm, and, there-
fore, an expression of believing hope in the coming
salvation. It takes the form of womanly precipi-
tancy, and may mean that now she has bome the
serpent-crusher (gotten him, or brought him forth).
This is the first misieckoning in respect to the times
and hours of God, and the person who is to bring
salvation, but the Ijelieving hope itself is not a vain
thing. Upon this high soaring, as it appears in the
mother's naming of Cain (tiifniKa, see John i. 42),
there follows, after the human fashion, a great lower-
ing of hope, as shown in the naming of the second
son, wherein there appears to be indicated a fearful
motheily foreboding, which may have been already
occasioned by the conduct of the young Cain.
4. The formation of the family : the fundamental
law of human relations ("next to the conjugal the
parental, the sisterly and brotherly, the general rela-
tion of kindred," Delitz.-ch) and of all human ordi-
nances. Church and state, with their binding ce-
ment, the school, all in the embryo form. The
offering. The sentence upon Cain for his brother's
murder. The first moral lesson, an admonition or
wai'ning to Cain.
6. In the bosom of the first family there appears
the first contrast between the two ground-forms of
the human calling, — between worldly power and a
divine endurance, between an ungodly and a godly
direction, between one who was godless and one who
was pious, between one who was loaded in life with
the curse of God and one who was slain for his
piety, yet whose death, blood, and right, had still an
abiding value in the eyes of God.
6. The religious oll'ering is indicated and intro-
duced as early as humanity in the state of sin, ch.
iii. 21. It has its origin in thankfulness for God's
gifts, and the acknowledgment that all belongs to
him and must be presented or consecrated to him.
It is, moreover, an expression of the feeling that the
failure to present a real and perfect obedience of the
heart and will, and of a perfectly holy hfe with
prayer, is attested by the symbolical offering, which,
as such, denotes a longing for, and a craving need
of restoration to, that perfect condition wherein life
and oll'ering unite in one. Concerning the offering,
see Exodus and Leviticus.
1. God's pleasure in the one offering, Ids displeas-
ure at the other. See the Exegetical notes.
8. God's wannng to Cain. Sin evidently appear*
in Cain in an advanced stage of pmgress, and this
Uulieates hereditary sinfulness. The divine warning,
moreover, cliaracterizes litis hereditary tenilency to
sin, in its most peculiar being, not as a f'al>iiisu<
force, but as a seducing inclination to evil, a^ i
CHAP. rV. 1-26.
263
tempting power which already, like a ravenous wild
beast, was crouching at his door, and ready to spring
upoL liim. Therefore does God ascribe to him a
cupaorty to rule over sin by the aid of the warning
word of God standing as security to hirn for such
assistance. It does not depend upon his clioice
whether he shall be tempted or not, but it does be-
long to his choice, whether he will let sin have its
will ir him, or whether he Idmself shall rule over it.
Sin (though feminine) is presented in the figure of a
male beast, or of a masculine nature, — as a lion,
dragon, or serpent. On account of a supposed
strangeness in the express>n : rule over him (or it),
Ewald takes it as a quest; n : Wilt thou be able to
rule over it ? And Delitzsch holds that it does not
mean the ruling over the sin that is lurking for him,
but only over tlie inward temptation. But this in-
ward temptation, in so far as it is temptation only, is
just the sin that is crouching at the door; for the
door denotes the entrance to his inclination, or to his
will. Keil corrects Delitzsch by saying : " it is not
the holding down of the inner temptibility wliich is
commanded, but the withstanding of that power of
evil which invades man from without,'' — a view
which here gives no proper sense. The personitica-
tion of sin, and what is said about its desire and its
craving after men (as though to devour them), ap-
pears not without significance, yet still the remem-
brance of 1 Pet. v. 8 should not lead us to find
here, as Dehtzsch does, a conscious intimation of
Satan. More rightly does the Book of Wisdom
make a distinction between men's being raised out
of the fall, on the one hand, or their permitting sin
to charm them, increase in strength, and so give
power to the hereditary sinful tendency, on the other
(Wisd. of Solomon, i. 13-16; ii. 24 ;" x. 1). What
is said Rom. v. 12: "Death has passed upon all
men," bears alike upon all ; but what follows : 6^.' V
irdi/Tft ritiapT(i>, allows an endless diversity of indi-
vidual character, and within the ratios of its grada-
tions, forms that contrast between the pious and the
godless, between the seed of the woman and the
seed of the serpent, which the Scripture everywhere
Bets forth.
fl. The Fratricide. "Thus sin attains to its do-
minion, and in tlie outward act reveals its inhuman,
beastly, diabolical nature. DeviUsh hate, brutal sav-
ageness ; it is in these two together that murder has
its origin. At the same time there comes out openly
here, tor the first time, the conflict of the two seeds
in the relations of man to man. It is the serpent-
nature of Cain under whose stab in the heel Abel
falls — the first example of martyrdom ; in appear-
ance a defeat, but in truth a victory. From the in-
nocent murdered man, there goes on, even to the
case of Zachariah the son of Jehoiada, one great
stream of blood throughout the whole history of the
Old Testament (Matt, xxiii. 36). At the very head
of the New Testament history does the bloody deed
of Cain against his brother Abel again repeat itself
in its counterpart, the bloody act of the Jewish peo-
ple as committed against God's most ' holy child
Jesus,' their bi other in the flesh. Thenceforth flows
ot the stream of martyr-blood through the whole
history of the Church. Death and murder proceed-
hjg from him who was av^^wiroKTovos ott' dpx^s (a
murderer from tlie beginning, John viii. 44), become
indigenous in the history of man, and of the world,
and rule in a thousand forms." Delitzsch.
10. The deuth of Abel ; the second powerful proof
•f the proph'jtic significance of his bloody offering.
Abel appears as the special prophet and mediator ol
the peculiar idea of the Old Testament revelation, of
as the one who introduces into the world the typical
sacrifice — that is, the symbolical representation of a
yielding up of the individual will and life to God
through death, in order to the taking away the sepa>
ration between God and man ; and which represeuta
tion (as it unfolds) must >,ver become more and mor<
tlie t)'pe of the real propitiation as set forth in tb<
New Testament. Therefore would Abel be justified
by hill act of faith, even as Abraham was (ileb. xi.
4) ; and to such an extent must the offering of Abd
be n^ferred back to a divine occasioning, or some
divine institution.
11. The first murder of a brother proceeded fron
a strife concerning religion. It appears to be pre-
supposed that Cain, in his sacrificial worship, had
wilfully separated himself from Abel. This would
be the first separation. The second is that his offer-
ing, whilst it appeared in a stinted form, remained
throughout an unbloody sacrifice. Communion in
the offering would have made it of richer value. Th«
mark of servility, legality, joylessness, and an envioui
jealousy of his brother's altar, appears quite promi-
nent. Therefore it is, too, that he fails of the bless-
ing, and the seal of the divine acceptance. The
effect, however, is not repentance, but envy, fanati-
cism, hate, obduracy against God's word, and, finally,
the murder of his brother. The first war was a re-
ligious war. From thence have all the wars in the
world's history had their motive and their coloring.
Kven with the most modern wiirs religion has more
to do man is commonly thought. The altar, the cen-
tre as it is of all holy sacrificial acts, is the centre
also of all that is horrible in the history of the world ;
sino'. It is the religious idea, in some form, that is the
moving power of human history.
12. Already has the first-born lost his birthright,
through a proud confidence in its prerogative, out of
which is developed envy of his brother's prelerence,
and from this, again, in the course of its progress,
scorn and hate. In this form goes the story through
the history of the world, through the history of reli-
gion, of the church, and of the state. Thus, many
a time does the prerogative of birth, which in itself
and normally is a blessing, become transformed into
a prerogative of hereditary sin and guilt (Matt.
iii. 9).
13. As chapter 3d presents to us the archetype
of the genesis of sin, even to the evil act, so does
chapter 4th give us the form of the genesis, and of
the unfolding of obduracy. The commencing point
is irreligiosity, that is, an offering worthless and hypo-
critical in its idea (Rom. i. 21). The consequences
that immediately follow are unfriendliness, envy,
brotherly hate, rage, grudging, and moroseness. To
this succeeds an impenitent demeanor towards thij
divine voice of warning, as shown in a wicked silence.
Then comes the consummation of his evil behavior
towards his brother. The first example of this was
probably a mocking perversion of what God had said
into a presumptuous retort upon his brother ; theu
the bold throwing off the mask in the murder itself^
as it took place in the field, upon the boundaries of
their respective callings. Now again, on God's ar-
raignment, his impudent, diabolical lying, and Titanio
presumption, butwhicli becomes, after the imposition
of the penalty, a howling despair. Thus it is that
while in his presumption, and in his despondency, ha
becomes an enemy of God, so is he also a foe of man (
seeing that his disordered imagination peoples th*
M4
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
world with human beings who stand to him on a foot-
ing of deadly bostihty. When iu this spirit he goes
foith as a fugitive and a vagabond from tlie land of
Eden to a land ot^ soHtary exile, and there builds a
city, the main significance of it lies in Its walls. It
is d^fortnss to defend himself against any of Adam's
future children who may not belong to the Cainite
race.
14. The judgment on Cain, a parallel to the first
judgment, ch. iii., just as the behavior of Cain is a
counterpart, and a parallel, to the behavior of his par-
ents. As a parallel it reminds us of the behavior of
the serpent, *' CUvnitat ad ccelum vox sa^iguinU^ etc. ;
it is like the old saying of the tour heaven-crpng sins.
When the Epistle to the Hebrews tells us that by
means of his faith, Abel, though dead, yet speaketh
(AaAf?), it muj-t mean that the cry of his blood, re-
garded as still heard, is a proof that even after death
he is stiil an object of the divine care,* one still un-
♦ [Critth unto me, Gen. iv. 10, cJamal ad me, complains
unto me. This is one ot the texts which the blind Sad-
ducee had often read, but with the veil upon his heart, lie
had seen nothing in it. It w;is no proof to him of anything
vital and personal in man after death. But what a flood of
light is poured upon this, and similar language in the Old
Testament, by the divine interpieter : " He iw not the God
of the dead, but of the living." Matt. xxii. 32. It must be
liJfe that cries unto God, and that he hears. Abel yet lived ;
he yet spake; AoAel, in the present, he speaketh still. To
Christ, iu whom the veil is taken away, it was no figuie
merely, or rhetorical usus loquendi, as it was to the Sad-
ducee, and as it has become, in a great measure, to the mod-
ern interpreter wiio carries back the deadness und fripidity
of worn-out modem speech to chill the waimth and vitality
of ancient language. In isuch primitive forms there is noth-
ing unmeaning, or merely rhetorical. To the spiritual miud
of Christ it was all made real by that intimation of a divine
interest which guaranties a real personal being in those for
whom it is expressed. The soul of Abel, of which the blood
was the nearest material garment, was un-OKOTn) toO Bvaia-
WTTipiov, *' under the altar" of the Divine Justice, "^rpa
'j1'*b", in *'the secret place of the Most High;" it was
"lodyifig, tarrying ("(alSn"" Ps. xci. 1), under the shadow
of the Almighty." It was not for Cain's sake that this is
eaid, for his reformation, or for his punishment merely, or
for any preventive benefit of a police kind in the checking
of future murders among a race all of whom, if only the
worldly aspect is regarded, were soon to perish in someway
and be no more. It was not this, solely or mainly, that
made that voice effectual in its call. It was for Abel's sake,
as a pious son of God,— the still liWng Abel, in whom the
image of God had been assailed (ste Gen. ix. 6 ; Ps. cxvi. 1 ■'»).
And so we may say of other expressions in the Old Tes-
tament, now become mere metaphors, or dead forms of
speech, but anciently full of life and reality, representing
Bouls, especially the souls of the pious, as yet having some
kind of being, known at least to God "to whom they live,"
as our Saviour adds, Luke xx. 38. They are " gathered to
their people;" they have "gone to their fathers;" they
"yield up the ghost," not as a thing that perishes, but as a
most precious deposit ti> be kt-pt (laid up, or treasuretl in
Sheol, Job xiv. 13), "until the set time when God shall call
and they shall answer; for he will have a regard (C^OS^
Job xiv. 15, 16, will have a longing desire) to tlie woik of
his hands." They call themselves " pilgrims and sojourners
upon eailh"— a phrase that has no meaning except as con-
nected with the idea of another state of being, a homeland,
a rtst. This is the snlvatioji, as one of these pilgrims says at
the very close of his earthly life, when all thought of a more
worldly deliverance is necessarily exclndrd, and there can
remain only the hope of something beyond : " I have wait-
ed for thy salvation, 0 Lord." S'O how it breaks from the
dying Jacob in the very midst of his prophetic contomphi-
iion of the future worldly (h'stiny of his sons. Gen. xlix. IS.
Wliut could they mean 7 There are here no imagined bounds
of (fpaco and lime, no localitiew ; it is all pure sultjtetivene.ss,
h may be said ; but such a hope, indefinite as it mny seem,
OEM far more of mora'; power than any ]01ysi:in or Ilcspeii-
dean fancies. It was security, it was blcsseilriL'ss, and witli
this thoy were content. It wan tlie idea of protection, a" cov-
tring of wings," being under " the shadow of the Almighty."
It was all that wati contained in that mout mysterious ex-
pfeasion ri^3D IPO, "the secret of thy presence," Ps.
forgotten, not lost — still living." Delitzsch. At tht
same time is the cry of this martyr-blood the first
signd of that voice, whether of the blood or of th«
spirit, wliich ever calls for (lod's judgment, first upon
Jerusalem (Matt, xxiii. 15; comp. ch. ii. 18), and
finally upon the whole world (Rev. vi. 10). Only
the call of the blood of Christ it is that transforms
this judgment into a jutlgment of (ItJivoiancfc for all
who shall receive salvation (Heb. xii. 24).
15. The chief points in the sentence against Cain.
He is cursed from the ground. The very nature of
the ground, so to speak, becomes an angel (or min-
ister) of penal vengeance against the unnatural lran»
gressor. He hath aroused it against him in its inner^
most nature, in forcing it to drink his brother's blood.
Henceforth will earth deny to him its fruits. Where
the murderer perpetrated the murder, the grass grows
no more. The fratricide makes the ground the place
of judgment. The war desolates the land. The
curse proper, however, lies on the conscience itself.
His heavy consciousness of guilt, incapable of being
healed, and in its deceit, its presumption, and its
despondency, driven to despair, nmst make him a
fugitive and a vagabond upon the earth. He is ban-
ished beyond any protecting enclosure, from every
place of rest ; and though he may surround himself
with walls as high as heaven, he is still a banished
Azazel (Lev. xvi. 22) — the prince of exiles. There
lies in the passage before us a germ of the church's ex-
communication and of the civic outlawry. The ban-
ishment into immeasurable space appears as a warn-
ing prelude to the endless exile of damnation. We
may ask : Why was not the punishment of death im-
posed on Cain, as is demanded by the later law, ch.
ix:. 6, instead of exile ? It is not a suffieient answer
to say, that the parents of Cain could not execute
such a sentence; the cherubim might have crushed
him. But it becomes evident, already, that the re-
ligious social death of absolute bani.shmciit from hu-
man society, constiiutts the peculiar essence of the
death penalty (see Langk, Die Gesetzlich-Catholiache
Kirvhe altt Sbmbild^ p. 71).
16. In respect to the repentance of Cain and
Judas, see the Exegetical annotations to v. 13.
17. The Caiuitic race. Development of the ear-
xxxi. 20, "the hiding (11203) in God's paTiUon," where
they have that unimae:inaltle bein^ which Christ calls
"living unto God," iravTe^ yap avTtZ ^Cjtrtv, Luke xx. 38.
Some may see in such expressions nieri-ly the hope of tem-
poral deliverance, and yit even the most unspintual inter-
preters can hardly avoid the feelint; that this lower idea, how-
ever it may be partially aceonmiuiiated to a seeming' secular
context, does not satisfy the holy earnestness of the lan-
puage, or fill out that idea of blessedness and protection so
far beyond what could be afforded by any earihly taberna-
cle, or in any temple made by hands : " U how great is Thy
goodness which Thou hast ia I rf U;p(ri!E2I comp. Job xiv. 13)
for those that fear thee ! Thou wilt hide them in the sr.crcl of
thy presence, thou wilt treasure them in thy pa\'ilion," away
from all the strife and ccnsuie of this presi-nt life, P(~. xxaa.
20, 21. We cannot be wn'np when we have our Saviour to
guide us in the interpretation of such language, as proving
a b( 1 ef in immortahiy, or a continuoa-^ being, from the ex-
pression of the divine care and protection Inr the pious liv-
ing and the pious dead. Identity, contiimily, iHrsonalily,
are inseparable from the idea of such mi intnest, ami we
must HUiipose that the thought was vivi'liy jaesenf tn thB
minds of those in early times wlio so jiasviunately expn'sseij
it. Ono thing is certain, that SaddueeriMii or mateiialism
Would never have given rise to t^mit modes of speech, al-
tliough they may be satisfied with them after tney have
divested them of all meaning. We may >ay, inu, tlmi alter
surh an exposition as Christ has given us, the denial ol llu-re
beinu^ any idea of a future life in the Old Testament is lie-A^-
ritrhl inl'ul'lity, however it may be presented bj piolensed
Christian theolof^iaQs, or even by learned biiihop'} in tlu
Church.— T. Ii.1
CHAP IV. l-!it).
:^^^
llest world— culture in its reciprocity with the ad-
vancing Cainitic corruption. Delitzsch finds it sig-
nificant that Cain gave the same name, Henoch, to
his son aud to the city which lie built tor him, and
«hat he must have had regard in both to the funda-
mental beginnings of a peculiar and special histori-
cal development. He cites the words of Ao'Gusti.ne,
De Civitate Dei, cb. xiv. 28 : " Fecermit ig'itur civi-
tates duos amoves duo, terrenam scilicet amor sui
ttsgtie ad contemptum dei, coeleslem vera amor Dei
u»gue ad contemptum xui ; ilia in .sc ipsa, Jucc in
Domino gloriatur." Yet still even Delitzscli makes
prominent the value of each Cainitic advance in cul-
ture. In writings which set forth the origin of all
things, there could not fail to be something in rela-
tion to the origin of trades and arts. At a later time
would these inventioas come into the possession of
God's people. Still the Cairutic race has the honor
of every important advance in worldly culture ; be-
cause this race of the promise has suffered in the
ruin of the world, whilst the race of the curse falls
naturally into it, or make it their home. We can
only say, however, that the one-sided, worldly ten-
dency, favored a precocious development of every
power of culture among the Cainites — or that the
children of this world are mser in their way than
the children of light. It is not the inventions them-
selves, but their morbidly active development, and
their abuse, that have on them the mark of the
curse. Again, it is in the direction of tbe dualistic,
theosophie assumption of a deeper, or hidden sense,
when we read (Delitzsch, p. 21.3): "Even to this
day the arts cannot disown the root of the curse, out
of which they spring." " There is, moreover, re-
maining in all music, not only an unspiriluali/.ed
ground of material naturalness merely, but a Cainitic
element of impure sensuality" (p. 213). Neverthe-
less, through the subjectivity of the artist shall " that
fundamental being of art which in itself is sinless "
attain that to which it is morally destined," p. 215.
Further on Delitzsch well says : " With a deed of
murder began, and with a song of murder closes, the
history of the Cainites. In the seventh generation all
is forgotten — immersed in music, revelry, luxury,
decoration and outward show," etc. Again he says :
" This is the genesis of the most spiritual art, such
13 poetry, music, etc." (p. 216). More happily, at
least in respect to its outer consequences, did there
precede all this that pious song of jubilee at the cre-
ation of the first man (p. 123). Thus much is true,
that as art, and especially poetry, points out the dis-
tance between the real and the ideal on the side of
culture, so does the sacrificial offering do the same
on the side of cultus, or reUgion.
18. Concerning the worship of Jehovah as begin-
ning among the Sethites, see the Exegetical explana-
tions.
HOMTT.F.TICAI. AND PRACTICAl.
See Doctrinal and Ethical. — Adam's Family. His
guilt, his suffering, his salvation, and his hope. —
The first family picture in the Bible. — The tragic
sorrow in every family (indicated in the baptism of
children) — The family the root of every human ordi-
nance— both of church and state. — The first form of
education as it makes its appearance in the firsi sac-
rifice, and in the varied callings of Cain and Abel.
What education can do, and what it cannot. — Unlike
children of like parents. — Pious parents may have
»ickei children (.Caiu — Abel). — Eve's precipitancy
even in the utterance of her faith. — Eve's materna,
joy, in its divine trust, and in its human mistakmgs.
1. The divine truthfulness in her hope of salvation j
2. the moumful disappointment in her expectationa
of Cain ; 3. the happy disappointment in respect t«
Abel (not a vanishing vapor : Abel "yet speaketh").
— The two ground-forms of the human vocation. — The
acceptable and the rejected ofl'ering. — The contrast
between Cain and his brothers in its significance:
1. Cain lives, Abel dies ; 2. Cain's race perishes, tbt
race of Seth continues (through N'oah), even to th«
eml of the world. — Cain the first natural first born
(like Ishinael, Esau. Reuben, the brotliers of David,
etc.), Abel the first spiritual first^buriL — Cain and
his pride in the carnal birthright and prerogative,
a world-historical type : 1. For the reUgious history,
2. for the political. — Cain and Abel, or the godless
and the pious direction inside the common pecca-
bility.— Cain and Abel, or the history of the first
sacrificial offering, a prefiguration of the most glori-
ous light-side, or of the darkest and most fearful
aspect in the world-history. — Cain and Abel : the
separated altars, or tbe first religious war, or tho
divinely kindled flame of belief and the wrath-en
kindled flame of fanaticism. — Cain, or the world-
history of envy. Abel, or the world-history of mar-
tyrdom.—The brother's murder. — Tlie brother's
blood. — The first slain. — -And death with sin. — The
first appearing of death — War. — The obduracy of
Cain, or Cain warned by God in vain. — Cain's free-
dom and bondage. — Cain's sentence. — The curse of
Cain. — ^Cain's repentance (first presumption, then
despair). — The evil conscience in the history of
Adam and in the history of Cain. Comparison. —
The b,anishment of Cain. — The sign of Cain. — Caia
and his race, or worthlessness as regards religion
and worldly spiritual power, a reflected image of the
Satanic kingdom. — The progress of corruption in the
Cainitic race. — It was not the worldly cultivation of
Cain that was evil, or from the evil one, but its
worldliness. — The first city. — Lamech, or the misuse
of weapons, or the misuse of art, or of all culture. —
Polygamy. — Seth, or the on£ ranaining, established,
compensation for Abel. — The Sethites, or the first
beginning of a new and better time indicated in this,
that men begin to proclaim the name Jeiiovah, the
God of the covenant. — Enosh, denoting frail humani-
ty, a name of htmiihty. — When God becomes great
at any time, or in any race, then man becomes
small. — Does man fiist become small, then God be-
comes to him great. At the birth of Cain, Eve was
hasty in her joy ; at the birth of Abel, hasty in her
despondency ; at the birth of Seth, quiet and confid-
ing.— Seth, or the established people of God ; " And
the gates of hell shall not prevail against them."
Stakke : Ver. .3. God himself instituted the offer-
ings, as we see from Heb. xi. 4, that as the belief
of Abel in his offering had for its necessary ground
the divine command, promise, and revelation, so the
^offerings themselves must be types of Christ.—
ver. 4. We cannot doubt that from the very be-
ginning God reserved to himself the firstUngs oi
first-born. Such a command He repeated, Exod.
xiii. 2 ; Numb. iii. 13. It was for j type of Christ
the first-l)orn before all creations. — Ver. 5. Cain
ever oppresses aud murders Abel. What else is it
than the strife between the flesh and the spirit, the
enmity between the seed of the woman, and th*
seed of the serpent ? Arndt's " Christianity." — 7'ub.
Bible: Wouldst thou that thy service be accept-
able to God, perform it with unfeigned belief, and t
ZG'i
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
pure heart (Matt. t. 23, 24 ; ix. 13 ; 1 Tim. i. 15).—
Cramer : Wlieu God builds a church, then does the
devil build a eliape! close to it (Ps. xxvi. 6). — How
beautiful and lovely is it when brothers dwell togeth-
er in harmony (Ps. cxxxiii. 1 ) ? but how rare ? —
Envy and je.alousy have their origin from the devil,
and are the root of aU evil deeds. — When the godless
ought to be allured to reforn]ation by the example
ofthe pious, they often become thereby only the
more embittered (Acts vii. 54). — Ver. 8. Accord-
ing to the Jews, Cain maintained that there was no
juilge, no judgment, no reward of the good, no pun-
ishment of the wicked, no eternity, all which Abel
contradicted ; wheretbre Cain became so embittered
that he slew his brother. There is no ground for
the pretence of the Masorites that there are wanting
here tweiuy-eight verses, which contain the speech
of Cain with Abel. — Abel prefigures Christ. As
Abel was a shepherd, so also was Christ. — Freiherg
Bible : Cain is an exact type of Antichrist. — Osian-
DER : The preaching of repentance avails not with
all men ; especially is this the case with those who
are given up to a reprobate mind (Acts vii. 49, etc.).
— Cramer : Sin grows rapidly, and after a small
beginning takes wide steps (Wisdom of Sirach xxviii.
13,14). — Where there is an evil heart, there is an
evil eye, and wliere both these are, there is also
an evil hand. — T!ie Wiirtemb. Bible : It is a very an-
cient stab in the heel by the malicious devil, that
the false church hates the true, and persecutes it
even unto blood. — Hed-inokk; How early the date
of martyrdom in the world ! The first man that dies
dies for the sake of religion. He whose offering is
acceptable to God, becomes now himself the victim.
— ^Ver. 10. When Cain thought that he had won,
that he was now alone the beloved child, that Abel
was wholly forgotten, then did the latter still live,
stronger and mightier than before. Then does the
Majesty on high assume his cause ; He cannot bear
it, lie cannot keep silence when His own are op-
pressed. And thouL'h they are crushed for a little
while, they only rise to a more glorious and stronger
state; for they still live. — Cramkr: There is nothing
secret that shall not be made manifest (Matt. x. 26;
Exod. ii. 12, 14 ; Josh. vii. •.!2 ; 2 Sam. xii. 9).— Ver.
13. When ni:in should humble himself, he goes rather
into despair, and rejects the means of grace. He
falls, therefore, into a bitter enmity towards God,
and into an ever-deepening unbelief, since he refuses
to acknowledge the grace of God, and the service of
Christ, or to let tliem avail for his salvation. — It is
in this way that Satan plays his game ; he sets the
sins before the conscience in their most frightful
fonn, whilst he takes from the eyes Ihe grace of
God. — Mark the steps of sin, how imperceptibly
they advance I 1. Cain was arrogant ; by reason of
his birthright he thought bin. self better than he was ;
2. he thereupon falls from arrogance into mocking
hypociisy, and secret presumi)tion ; 3. thinking that
there i.s nothing hke him, he becomes envious; 1.
from the foregoing sins he falls into nmrder, even the
(laying of a br</ther ; 5. then he falls into lies, where-
with lie thinks to palliate or excuse his brother's
murder; 6. linallylu falls into utter despair. — Ver. 14.
Surely in the anguish of his conscience must Cain be
afraid of everything, of angels, of men, of wild be:ists
even ; yea, even inanimate things cause him distre.-s
and I error. — Vei. 15. Ch,\mkr: No sins are too gieat
10 be l,(irgivc-n ilsa. i. IN). — No man shall arbitrarily
take from Him the iiillictiun of vengeance upon evil-
loerg (Kom. xii. 19). — Tub. Bible: All godless men
bearin their souls a mark of the curse, which numben
them among the goats. God marks al! evil-doen
with a brand in the conscience (1 Tim. iv 2). — Ver,
16. Wiirt. Bible: It is the mind of all the children
of the woild, theii' trade and business ; they ask not
after the true church ; gladly are they separated
from it ; they rejoice if it only goes well with the
body (Ps. xlix. lu). — Ver. 24. Confident men wil-
lingly delude themselves with the example of others,
and thus did Lamech comfort himself with a false-
hood.— Ver. 21. (0 ye musicians, bethink yourselves
that ye are descended from a godless and murder-
ous race ; cease to abuse your art, otherwise will
your end be hke theirs !) Handicrafts, arts, and in-
ventions are gifts of the Holy Spirit, and come from
God, who bestows them upon both the believing and
unbelieving ; blessed is he who uses everything for
the honor of God ! (Dan. i. 17; SiMch xxxviii. 6;
Exod. XXXV. 31-35). — Ver. 26. Cramer ; God can
wonderfully console Christian parents in affliction ;
has he taken from them an Abel, he can give them
back a Seth. — W^e can do no more precious work on
earth than to help in propagating and spreading the
true and right service of God (Sirach xlix. 4).— Ye
teachers in schools and churches, follow the blessed
example of these holy forefathers, and let it be your
chief business to proclaim and make known the name
of the Lord to old and young (ch. xviii. 19 ; Deut.
vi. 6, etc.).
Schriider : The first revelation of the divine
holiness is renewed in the second ; and in the same
proportion is the advancing progress of the curse. —
Ver. 1-5. After the character of the parents has
become fixed in the probation, then must the men-
tion be of their children ; they nmst be born that
others may be born from them. In her song of joy,
she forgets what lay right before her eyes ; with
her glance of hope into the future she calls the in-
fant " a man." She looks at the child of her womb,
and thinks it the seed to whom God has promised
the victory. This common reference to the divine
promise in ch. iii. 15 is ever held as truth in the
interpretations of our fathers. — Li-'tiiek : But the
poor woniiin is deceived; she does not yet see her
sorrow aright, nor understand that from flesh can
nothing else than flesh be born, and that by flesh
and blood sin and death can uever be vanquished ;
she knows not, moreover, the day nor the hour.
Eve's joy and Mary's song of praise, Luke i. 4(1, how
ditt'erent ! (Yet Mary too knew not yet that at a
later time a sword nmst pierce her own soul). The
one birth from Eve is followed by a second, — the
first is the Patriarch of the fiilse, the other of the
true church. The name of the one forms an exact
contrast to the name of the other. In Cain does the
mother of the living repose all her longing and her
hope ; Abel, on the contrary, the second-born, must
serve as the foil of her heart's puin and sorrow.
The best description of this name Abel (nothingness
or vanity) we read in Ecclesiastes (or the Preaching
of Solomon), ch. i. 2. That whole book, indeed,
may be regarded as a diffuse commentary on the
name Abel. According to the ojiinion of some of
the fathers, Abel was never married. — Luther:
Adam and Eve are not simjily parents to nourish
and instruct their children : they bear towards tliem
also a priesily ollice (in that they lead the children
to the sacrifice). The sacrifice is as old as religion
(that is, as the religion of fallen men).--LuTni:n :
All the histories of the Old Testament show tha«
God, in his superabundant ^ruce, hath ever gives
CHAF. IV. 1-26.
261
tnd maintained in close connection witli his word an
nutward and visible sign of grace, tliat men, as
reminded by sucli sacramental sign, might the more
conlidontly believe. Therefore it is tliat after the
flood the rainbow appears. ,^nd so to Abraham was
given the sign of cii'cumcision. In respei-t to the
supposed sign of God : let one think on tlie blessing
of God upon Abel's cattle-keeping in the year that
followed, whilst Cain's agriculture miscarried, or on
the svmbolic upward-mounting, earthward-steaming,
sacrificial smoke. For other biblical analogies, in
strictest accoidance with this, we may think of a
glance of light for Abel, and which would become
for his offering a consuming flame of fire (Exo<l. xiv.
24, (fee). In Matt, xxiii. 35, Christ makes Abel the
beginning of the church of those that fear God,
which will remain to the end of the world, whereas
Cain is the beginning of the church of the malignant
and the murderous, which will also continue to the
end of the world. Abel is not slain on any worldly
or domestic account, but only on account of the
service of God. The good and the evil conscience
are described here as though they were visible to our
eyes ; the one oiJy lifts its face on high, the other
casts itself despairing down. — Vers. B, 7. [On this
field {of the murder), so runs the story, was Damas-
cus afterwards built, whose name hints at the bloody
deed]. — He who according to his mother's hope was
to have been the slayer of the serpent, becomes the
murderer of his brother the son of his own mother.
— Herder : What a dramatic spectacle ! the first
slain upon the earth. — Krummacher : Here is the
first brother's murder on the very threshold of
Eden, — the first war. — Vers. 9, 10. Herder: Who
shall take vengeance, when God does not take ven-
geance '? The father ? — Ldther : Cain intends, by
this, his exculpation ; but when he uses the name of
brother, what else is it but an acknowledgment that
he ought to be his brother's keeper. It is not for
slaughtered sheep and cattle slain that God asks ; it
is for a slain man that he inquires. It follows that
men have the hope of a resurrection, the hope in a
God who out of the bodily death can bear them up
to everlasting hfe, and who asks after their blood as
a very dear and precious thing (Ps. cxn. 15). What
can be that still small voice which comes from the
earth, and which God bears high up in heaven ? Abel
had, heretofore, whilst yet in life, endured violence
with gentleness and silence ; how is it that now when i
he is dead, and rudely buried in the earth, he is im-
patient at the wrong ? How is it that he who before
spake not one word against his brother, now cries
out so complainingly, and, by his cry, moves God to
action ? Oppression and silence are no hindrance to
God in judging the cause which the world so mis-
"takeuly fi-ncies to be buried. — Vers. 11, 12. As
Adam's siu develops itself in Cain's deed of murder,
BO does the first curse of God reveal itself in the
second. Cursed be thou ; that is, thou art not the
one from whom the blessed seed is lo be hoped.
By this word is Cain excommunicated, cut off like a
twig from the branch, so that he can have no more
hope of the honor which he coveted. That which
with Abel had a figurative or prfefigurative power,
becomes in Jesus the most perfect realization ; " and
the earth did quake" (Matt, ixvii. 62). Adam had
already become a stranger in the earth ; Cain is now
a fugitive. — Calvix : Not to bodily exile alone is
Cain condemned, but subjected to a much severer
punishment ; there is not a spot of earth th;it he can
find where he shall not be confounded and mazed in
soul ; for as a good conscience is rishtly called a
wall of ii on, so neither a hundred walls, nor as manj
fortresses, can protect the godless from their unrest.
— Vers. 13-16. In this way, although not excusing
his sin, does Cain complain nevertheless of the fear-
ful severity of that judicial sentence which deprives
him of every refuge. 8o too the devil. — He must
hide from God (Ps. v. 5), and yet he cannot (Ps.
cxxxix. 7). God's face or countenance means hia
presence as revealed in guiding care, or in forgiving
mercy (Exod. xxxiii. 15). — And this his misery he
imputes, not to his sin, but to the account of God.
Cain considers not merely that he is stripped of
God's protection, but also that every creature in the
world is now armed with weapons to take vengeance
upon him. According to an ancient legend it was
the destiny of Cain to be slain from the house in
which he dwelt. The Jewish tradition makes Mm
perish with his race m the flood. — In respect to the
mark of Cain : some have conjectured that God
placed upon his brow one of the letters of the name
Jehovah ; others say that it was a dog that continu-
ally ran before him ; others that it was a horn which
grew out of his forehead, and others, finally, main-
tain that it was a particular robe which God com-
manded him to wear, that every one might know
him. Then follow the views respecting this mart
that were held by Luther and the author (Caivin),
that it was something that lay in his apjiearance,
especially in his look. — Vers. 17-21. Luthku : la
this case the afHiction of the parents is the greater
in that they must have lost three children at once
(Abel, Cain, and his wife who went into exile with
him). — Even in his city, too, did Cain remain a
fugitive and a vagabond. — Zillah, " shadow,'" either
meaning the dark, the brunette, or the one shaded
by a rich head of hair. — Calvin: We have here the
origin of polygamy in a perverse and degenerate
race, as we also find its first author to be a man
ferocious and alien to all human kindliness. — Xaama:
Jewish tradition ascribes to her the first poetry and
gift of song; othei-s make her the inventiess of the
arts of spinning and weaving. — Baumgarte.n : True
it is that originally all, as created by God, was very
good : but since the entrance of sin, the whole out-
ward world of nature is loaded with the curse of
death. And yet is this testimony of Holy Pcripture
against the pomp of the world far removed from the
monastic rigor ; as is shown by the subsequent
course of the Scripture history. It is true that Cain
builds the first earthly city, but alterwards comes a
city of God. [In support of this, there follows men-
tion of the beauty of the mother of Israel, the rich
tents and herds oi' Abraham, the harp of David, the
watchword of Gideon ("the sword of the Lord and
of Gideon," in contrast with that of Tubal Cain), —
and then legends concerning Cain's old age and
Lamech's death, p. 99.] Men are very fond of
boasting before their wives. The first poet in the
world was an old man rejuvenated, a hero in words,
a praiser of himself. His song is without doubt a
song of triumph on the invention of the sword.
The Arabians have a whole book full of names and
praises of the sword. — Zieglek: The sin of Cain
becomes fearful in the sword-intoxicated Lamcch. —
Vers. 25, 26. We see that culture and science are
as old as humanity itself Barbarism and brutality
follow after a corrupt civilization. Immediately
after the ever-stronger manifestations of a Cainitic
world-spirit, we find the strong revelations of the
covenant Jehovah. — Lcther- 'There are traditionl
268
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
of Adam'3 daughters Salmana and Deborah, but I
know not of any ground for believing in them. Eve
had shghted Abel, wliilst she thouglit much of Cain
as the one who should inherit and possess the prom-
ise ; now (on the birth of Seth) she holds the con-
trary, and seems to say : in Abel was all my hope.
for he was righteous, but him the godless Cain hath
slain ; therefore has there been given to me another
seed in ])lace of Abel. She does not adhere to him
in the motherly Way, and after the motherly heart.
She does not excuse or palliate the sin of her son.
The Set/ntes : They unite together in a community;
but there arise not therefrom cities full of lust and
lu.\ury ; no, no, but places of holy meditation and
devotion. And so there emerge the iirst delicate
outlines of a church and community of life among
the pious. Adam and Eve, we may believe, assem-
bled their children and descendants for the maintain-
ing of a solenm divine service. In contrast to the
Belf-congregating of the wicked were the good gath-
ered into a church by God himself.
Gerlach : The gross deeds of individual sin, as
well as the original sin of Adam, had their primary
seat, not in the temptations of the sense, nor in any
momentary outward occasions, but in the disposition
of the heart towards God. This is manifest here on
the occasion of the first outward divine worship
through the sacrificial olTering, in which man, sepa-
rated indeed from God, yet outwardly feeling his
need of him, might hope to merit the divine accept-
ance in such religious service ; whereas, with God,
Buch a work has worth and significance only as the
outer manifestation of the inner yielding of the
heart to him. — Ver. 3. The use of the earUest do-
mestic animals, and the cultivation of grain, were
derived to man out of their primitive condition. The
Bheep cannot live without the human care and pro-
tection ; the grain is nowhere found wild upon the
earth, and it degenerates without human cultivation.
• — Ver. 4. When man joms in covenant with this
divine will, nothing can ever overcome him, for he
has omnipotence on his side. — Ver. 10. Here comei
in now the division of works ami occupations.
Lisco: The offerings. As o/fered in faith, which
ever rests on the word of God, they are to he re-
garded as divinely instituted. Abel is God's friend ;
liis cause is, therefore, God's cause, and God is his
avenger. — Ver. 13. First presumption, then de-
spair ; both are contrary to Holy Scripture. Unbelief
in God's righteousness before the evil deed, tends,
after the act, to unbelief in the greatness and power
of the divine mercy ; — to a repentance that is full
of despair. — A tortured conscience fears every-
thing : the murderer fears murder, the treacherous
fears perfidy.
Calver Handbook: How many vain offerings
and gifts in the heathen world ! — Where faith is,
there is the wiUing miud, and there can God make
demands of men. — Instead of a crusher of the sei^
pent, Cain is one of the serpent's seed. — Bunsen:
The land of Nod, that is, the land of flight, of wan-
deriug, of banishment, the strange lanil (the inter-
pretation that refers it to Turanin opposition to Iran),
MiCHOw: The first evil fruit of the evil seed.
He cites the saying of Schiller :
The evil deed's avenpint;: curse it is.
That evil evermore it shiiU beget.
Tacbe; 1. As thou staudestin relation to the God
of mercy, so art thou, — either believing or unbe-
lieving. 2. Remainest thou unbelieving, then, in
spite of all attempts to obtain deliverance from God,
thy course is onward from sin to sin until it lands
thee in despair. — W. Hofmann : The seed of the
woman : 1. In its first manifestation ; 2. in its re-
mote future ; 3. in its prefigurative significance.
Delitzsch : Whilst the race of the Cainites de-
veloped itself in outward show, and on the ground
of a corrupt nature, the community of the Sethites
built itself up through the common calling ujion the
name Jehovah, — that is, of a God revealing himself
on the ground of mercy.
THIRD SECTION.
Adam and Seth. — The Sethites or Maerobii (the Icmff-lived). — TTie living Worship and the Blessing
of the Life-renewing in the Line of the Sam of God.
Chapter V. 1-32 (compare 1 Chron. i. 1-t).
1 Thi.-? is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day that God created man,
2 in the likeness of God made he him. Male and female created lie them; tind hkssud
3 them and called their name Adam [man] in the day when they were created. And
Adam lived a hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after hia
4 image, and called his name Seth [fixed, compensation]. And the days of Adam after he
6 had begotten Seth were eight hundred years; and he begat sons and daiighlers. And
6 all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred tmd thirty years; and he died. And
1 Seth lived a hundred and five years, and begat Enosh ' [man, weak man]. And Seth lived
after he begat Enosh eight hundred and seven years and begat sons and daughters,
8 9 And all the days of Seth were nine hundred and twelve years ; and he died. And
10 Enosli lived ninety years and begat Cainan [iiaiu, gainful, industrious]. And Euosli lived
after he begat Cainan eiglit hundred and fifteen years, and begat sons and daiip'iterj
CHAP. V. 1-32. 26a
11, 12 And all the days of Enos were nine hundred and five years; and he died. And
13 Cainan lived seventy years and begat Mahalaleel ' [renown, praise of God]. And Cainan
lived after he begat Mahalaleel eight hundred and forty years, and begat sons
14 and daughters. And all the days of Cainan were nine hundred and ten years ; and he
15 died. And Mahalaleel lived sixty and five years and begat Jared [descent, one descendinaj
16 And Mahalaleel lived after he begat Jared eight hundred and thirty years, and begat scat
17 and daughters. And all tiie days of Mahalaleel were eight hundred ninety and fiv«
18 years; and he died. And Jared lived a hundred and sixty and two years, and he begal
19 Enoch' [the devoted, mysterious]. And Jared lived after he begat Enoch eight hundred
20 years, and begat sons and daughters. And all the days of Jared were nine hundred
21 and sixty and two years ; and he died. And Enoch lived sixty and five years, and
22 begat Methuselah [Oesenius: man of the arrow ; Fiirst: man of war; Delitsach: man of growth]. And
Enoch walked* with God [lived in communion with God] after he begat Methuselah thret
23 hundred years and begat sons and daughters. And all the days of Enoch were three
24 hundred and sixty and five years. And Enoch walked with God and he was not
25 [disappeared suddenly], for God took him. And Methuselah lived a hundred eighty and
26 seven years, and begat Lamech [the strong young man, or hero]. And Methuselah lived aftei
he begat Lamech seven hundred eiglity and two years, and begat sons and daughters.
27 And all the days of Methuselah were nine hundred and sixty and nine years; and
28 he died. And Lamech lived a hundred eighty and two years and begat a son.
29 And he called his name Noah [rest, rest-bringer], saying. This same shall comfort us '
concerning our work and toil of our hands, because of the ground which the Lord
30 hath cursed. And Lamech lived after he begat Noah, five hundred ninety and fivf
31 years and begat sons and daughters. And all the days of Lamech were seven hundred
32 seventy and seven years; and he died. And Noah was five hundred years old
and Noah begat Shem [name, preserver of the name] and Ham [heat, from can] and Japheth
[wide-spreading, room-making, from nps].
[' Ver. 6.— 'i'ijX . In general little reliance can be placed upon the etymological significance of these early names aa
tflven by the lexicographers, whether we regard them as purely Hebrew, or as having been transferred from some older
Shemitic tongue, lu a few of them, however, there appear contrasts that can hardly be mistaken. Thus, for example,
between Seth the established, the firm, and Enosh the weak, the ^rait Oporo?. mortalis, homo), the contrast is similar to
that between Cain and .\hel (gain, as the promised seed, and vanity or disappointment), as though the liopes of men,
from generation to generation, were alternately rising aiid falling. — T. L.J
[^ Ver. 12.— bxbirn: : Praise of God, or erne uyho praises God. This is very plain, and seems to be followed by
another contrast in the name ^"^ , a descending, whether it denotes degeneracy, despondency, or a plain, pious himiiUty
without the high rapture which seems to be indicated in that of the predecessor. — T. L.]
[' Ver. 18— rj':Pl : rendered devoted, initialed. This, however, seems to be a later sense of the root, although it it
well applicable to the one to whom it is applied. From the Arabic there may be got the sense of instructed, learned, and
from this came the notions of the Mohammedans and latf-r Jews respecting Enoch's great scientific attairmients. as also,
perhaps, the other name. Edris, by whi -h he is mentioned in the Koran, though it would seem also as though they most
unchronologically confounded him with Ezra. — T. L.]
[< Ver. 22.— -^nn"'. Compare the sunilar phrase Gen. xvii. 1, xxiv. 10, xlviii. 15, to walk before God. Here and
in Gen. vi. 9 to walk with God. In both cases it denotes concord, and the LXX. were justified in rendering it eurjpeffTTiffe,
"pleased God.'>— T. I,.]
['Ver. 29.— 121; n:'^. The Jewish interpreters regard this as explan.^tory of the name Noah (rest), but not its
etymological ground. 'Otherwise, says Eashi, he should have been called cnir, Menahem. They also distinguish
between etymology in the sound, and in the sense. They say (see Aben Ezra) that Noah invented instruments of agri-
culture (as the son of the Cainite Lamech invented weapons of war), and thus delivered their atrriculturt-, in some
measure, from the barrenness which had been brought upon it by the curse, and by bad tillage. This is grounded by
"them on the words of Lamech, and on what was said of Xoah after the flood, that he was n^"xn tl*"X, vewpybs,
agricola, Gen. ix. 20, a husbandman. !|3'Cr3^, shall comfort, rather, shall rci'i're, restore, make us breathe again, liks
the Greek ivaifivx". Compare Ps. xxiii. 4: '"Thy rod and thy staff shall revive me." It is the good shepherd
festering to life and vigor the fainting, dying sheep— to bring back the gasping breath. Hence the Syriac ^a.aaj
fop the ruurreetton. It is not the sense of consolation, as some give it, but resuscitation, revivification. — T. L.]
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL.
1. The line of Seth, as the line of the pious wor-
shippers of God, is carried on to Noah, with whom
the first humanity from the stem of Seth, now puri-
fied in the flood, passes over to a new age : so that
the name Seth, as in verification of Eve^s maternal
not the superscription placed before the 25th verse
of the fourth chapter? The documentary hypothesia
answers : it is because here again the Elohim docu-
ment takes up the history. We let that question
rest, though here verse 29th, wiih its name Jehovaii,
does not have the loolv of an interpolation. It must
be remarlvcd, nevertheless, that in the preceding
prophecy, becomes established in contrast with .\bel section it was necessary for Seth to appear as the
the mere breath of life, and the hne of Cain drowned . representative of Abel. But here again begins the
in the flood. The question may be asked. Why is | history of Seth as the history of Adam himself: s'ncf
«70
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
only through Seth does Adam live on beyond the
flood, and even to the world's end. In respect to its
inner nature, therefore, is the section Eloliistic ;
that is, it presents the universal grounding of the
whole human race, not merely that of the line of
Shem or of the theocracy of Abraham. Kiiobel
represents the section according to the doeunientary
hypothesis : " The Elohist ranges the genealogical
table of Adam immediately after the account of cre-
ation, ch. i. (?), and connects witli it directly his
history of the flood, ch. vi. 9, etc. ; it forms, conse-
quently, an essential part of his work, without which
it would have had a hiatus (rather with it, we may
add). From the same author who concerned him-
self with the connected genealogies and chronolo-
gies, as being predominantly Elohistic, whilst the
Jehovist took little notice of them, originated also
the other genealogical tables and chronological series
that are introduced in their order throughout the
Peutateuch." The section before us, in its entire
contents, evidently presupposes ch. ii. and iii. There
is special proof of this in verses 3, 24, and 29, as
also in the constant rel'rain : and he died.
2. Ver. 1. The book of the generation of
Adam. — The genealogies of Adam liecome perma-
nent and continuous alone through Seth.
3. Ver. 2. In the likeness of God. — This is
expressed here by ~, not by 3, as in ch. i. It means,
when Ho created him He 7nade him in the likeness,
etc. ; that is, the divine ideal form was the model of
his making^ — or of the Jinishing of his human form
in distinction from its creation. The name tnan
(Adam) is ascribed here in common to both man
and woman. The creation in the divine image is
repeated, because the line of God's sons is grounded
on its divine origin (see Luke iii. 38).
4. Ver. 3. Seth. — For the significance of the
name in relation to the names of the Cainitic line,
see the preceding section. Of Seth it is said. He
begat him in his own likeness, after his image. 'That
is, as his image, Seth was similar to him, indeed, but
not identically like ; he was distinguished from him
individually, he was like him in his Adamic nature.
And tills is said, doubtless, with a consciousness of
Adam's fallen state, although in the ground ideas of
this fifth chapter the nature of Adam as made in the
divine image, and its pious direction, are still made
prominent. Even if the names further on denote,
in the average probability, the first-born of the gen-
ealogies (although this does not always hold good,
as is sliown by the examples of Ishmael, Esau, Ken-
ben, etc.), yet it does not follow that Seth also is to
be regarded here as a first-born ; just as little as the
three sons of Noah, taken together, can be thus
regarded. Seth has become the spiritual first-born
of the Adamitic house ; he is the continuance of tlie
line of Adam in its pious direction, and in its his-
torical duialion.
5. Ver. 4. The ages of the Patriarchs who lived
before the Hood are individually staled in the fol-
lowing manner: 1. Adam 9:iii years, 2. Seth 912
years, .3. Enosh 905 ypars, 4. Cainan 91ii years, 5.
Mahttlaleel 895 years, 6. Jared 9(12 years, '7. Enoch
865 year-, then translated, 8. Methuselah 9tl9 years,
9. Lwrnecli 777 years, 10. Noah, before the flood, (idU
years (cli. vii. 6), ii., the whole 950 years (ch. ix. 29).
In relation to the dates, the following things arc to
be remai'ked. Adam is IHO years old at tlie beget-
ting of Seth, whom Cain and Abel naturally pre-
ceded. Seth begets Ennsh when \Kt years old.
V^»ai. w nrAoanta/i to US as a tixther at the age of 90
years, Cainan 70 years, Malialaleel 65 years, Jared 16S
years, Enoch 65 ye:irs, Methuselah' 187 years, La-
mech 182 years, Noah even 500 years. Since, ninre-
over, there is mentioned in each case the begetting
of other sons and daughters, it becomes veiy quea.
tionable whether we are to understand all these gen-
ealogical heads as being firsi-born. The numbeis, as
given, do, indeed, indicate late marriages hnviug
proportion to the length of life. That, however, no
ascetic idea is necessarily bound up in this, is shown
by the case of Enoch, who with Malialaleel had a
son the earliest of all the patriarchs. Even between
the repeated mention, moreover, that he walked with
God, It is said that he begat sons and daiighters.
The age 65, as a year for begetting, is also worthy
of note, as showing to be impossible every attempt
to reduce these patriarchal years to shorter sections
of time. This numbering of their years is of richest
significance. It expresses clearly the blessing of
longevity as emphatically exhibited through the
Sethic piety ; it is the history of the devout Macro-
bii, or long-livers of the primitive time. In Enoch
the line reaches the highest point of its life-renova-
tion ; since in him the peculiar death-form falls
away ; he departs without dying, and by a divine
translation. In Methuselah this grand march of life
reaches its extreme longevity in this world. The
line then sinks down in Lamech, as is indicated by
his sighing over the labor and pain that comes from
the curse-ladened earth. The whole line, in ics ap-
parent monotony, is a most lively expression of a
powerful strife of life with death, of the blessing
with the curse. They advance far in yeais, these
pious sons of God ; the numbers leach a high figure,
but ever again there comes that tragic word r"'"! :
and he died Once, and only once, is there reached
the silver glance of the life-renewing, and of that
Ufe-transl'ormation without death, which conies up
to the original form. Tliis is in the life of Enoch,
the seventh patriarch. It nmst be observed, in ac-
cordance with what is inii>lied in the following clnip-
ter, that the line of Seth, in its development, sutlers
a gradual disturbance, which does not permit it to
reach the ideal aim, — a fact which seems to be indi-
cated by this name Methuselah, and the sighs of
Lameeh. When in respect to this long life-endur-
ance, we add the consideration of the enormous
breaking up that was suddenly occasioned by the
flood, it must not be overlooked that Noah, allhough
already six hundred years old when the flood took
place, survived its storms three hundred and fifty
years.
Two main difficulties are objected to the forego-
ing statement : 1. the length of life ; 2. the authen-
ticity of the chronology. " 'I'he highest possibla
age," says Valentine ('* (.'ompendium of Physiology,"
ii. p. 894), "appears to be from about 15o to lOO
years ; and in fact, none of the highest ages which
men are known to have reached attain the height
of 200 years (Pritcliard's 'Natural History of the
Human Haee'). It cannot be shown that men after
the flood dilTcred in any remarkable nianiuT from
those who lived before. In ch. xi. 10, moreover, the
narrator represents some as attaining, even after the
flood, to the age of 4110 or COo years." Kuohel.
Special treatises on the preceding ([ucstion are con-
tained in the writing of Uk Lapassk : Kami siir la
conseri'ation tie la f/e, Parvi, Maamv^ ISOlt. In
general, there is no deciding this (lufstion by any
iippeal tf) strong constitutions, simple modes ol" life,
unweakoned powers of life, &c. i'irst of all, d«
CHAP. V. 1-S2.
a7l
both extremes of humanity need to be settled ac-
cording to the Scriptures and theciiristological ideas;
and, in fiiet, in con espondeuce with tlie middle point
of humanitj'. The truth of ("hrist's resurrection, not
ds a return out of death to the lite of this world,
but as a transition from the first form of human life
into a second imperishable form, casts light as well
upon the paradisaical beginning as upon the es-
chatological end of humanity. It testifies to an
ideal capabihty for the preservation of life even to
the point of a death-like, yet not deathly transforma-
tion into the incorruptible. To this testifies also, in
Bymbolical form, the paradisaical tree of life, as well
as, in its dogmatic acceptance, the words of Paul
concerning the longing " to be clothed upon " (2
Cor. V. 1-5) that hes in the depths of human nature
(compare Lange's Miscellaneous Writings, ii. p.
232). So also what he says of Christ as the Ufe-
giving spirit of man from heaven, and of the trans-
formation that awaits those who live long :it the
world's end (1 Cor. xv. 45, 51). The christological
idea that lies at the foundation is this : As the his-
torical death, the death of corruption, in its gradual
course first breaks through from the spiritual sphere
of sin into the province of the soul, and from the
province of the soul into the corporeity, so also does
the healing ofl the new Ufe make its passage ; first
in renewing the spirit-Ufe, then the life of the soul,
and finally becoming visible in the restoration of a
new corporeal capacity for transformation at the
world's end. Thus the decreasing longevity of the
primitive time furnishes the contrast to the increas-
ing longevity at the end of the world (see also Is.
Ixv). But it was not only through the original
power of a corporeity not yet wholly shattered that
the death of the Sethites was retarded ; it was also
kept back through the progress of Ufe in the Jeho-
vah-faith of the Sethites, as it culminated in Enoch,
and had, therefore, already, as its consequence, a
typically prophetic pre-representation of the trans-
formation and the resurrection in his mysterious
taking. The difficulty which is found in the suppo-
sition of such long Ufe in the Sethites, has given rise
to various hypotheses. Some have supposed that
along with the patriarchs named their races and
peoples are meant to be included ; Rosenmiiller,
Friedreich, and others, think that from these
orally transmitted genealogies, many names had
fallen out; Hensler holds that the expression naiT
(year) denotes among the patriarchs lesser spaces of
time, namely, three months, till the time of Abra-
ham, thence to the time of Joseph eight months,
and afterwards, for the first time, twelve. Raake:
from Adam to Xoah the year was equal to one month.
See against this, Knobel, p. 68 ff. To the first sup-
position is opposed the definite characterizing of
single persons; to the second the fact that in the
same manner the son always follows the father; to
the tliird the constant signification of the year as
tropical, periodical.* *' No shorter year than the
period of a year's time have the Hebrews ever had.
•'Besides the reasons given by Lange gainst the idea
•f any lesser time being denoted by n3C , there are others
arising from the etymology of the word. This makrs it
the most fixed and most distinct of all the min^ures of
time. Xot only in the Hebrew, but in the Greek, the radi-
tal idea of the word for year is rcpetifwn, or a corning over
igain in a second recurrence of the same astronomical
•eries. Thus the primary sense of the verb nSlU is to re-
pea/, to do a s&iond time ; hence the word for the numeral
*v>n. In Greek there can be ao doubt that croc has the
Against any shortening of the n:ir stands the fad
that in that case some of the patriarchs must have
begotten children at an age in which they were not
capable." Knobel. By him and many of the mod-
erns it is explained as a mythical conception, with
reference to the old represcntatiou that in the irore
happy primitive period, men lived lunger, but were
ever becoming weaker and ot shorter Ufe. " This
representation ^of the brevity of life) presents itself
very clearly in the Old Testament. In the historical
time a man among the Hebrews became 70 or 80
years old (Ps. xc. 10) ; in the Mosaic and patriarcha*
time, when there meet us statements of luO, 120,
123, 133, 137, 147,175, and 180 years, man reached
an age between 100 and 200 years; for the time of
same idea, aa we see it in Hom. Odi/ss. i, 16, «to5 ^Afl«
irepi7r\ofi.evtitv fviavTojv. Compare it with the particlL' en
(Lat. et, iterum, iterare, Saxon yet, addition, repetition).
So also in the word ii'iavTos (that which leturus into itself),
an eljTnology which, though condemned by some, is not to
be rashly rejected. In harmony with this is the Latin
annus, a ring, or circle. 8o the Gothic tar, jar, Jer, the
old Anglo-Saxon gear, German ja/ir, English year, seem
all to carry the same thought, that which comes again.^
being connected witli the Greek iap (Lat n ver), the spring^
the repetition, the new life, and not with the iiidt-tinito
Greek icoipos, as some lexicographer.-* suppose. So marked
a word carrying this distinct concepiion in all these lan-
guages, would be the last one to be used for any smaller, or
less marked dinsinn, and this view is confirmed b\ the fact
that neither iu the Hebrew uTitings nor anywhere else do
we ever find any such substitution. Years in the plural,
ni3C! , seems sometimes to be used for larger designations,
or lor aeonic time; as in such expressions as 'j'^'a'^ nlSO
V??? t " years of the right hand of the Most Iligh,'' Ps,
Ixxvii. 10, or "thy years, Tt'^PI^lli, are for ah genera-
tions," Ps. cii. 24 ; though even in these cases it may have
its fixed astronomical measure, denoting God's doings in
time and human history.
We get a c infirmation of these views by considering
how the whole idea of time is divided for us into the as-
tronomical and the seonic, — the former measured by the sun
and other heavenly bodies, the latter above such measure-
ment, entirely independent of it, having its division fi^-om
inward evolutions, and thus presenting a higher and an
independent chi'onolog> of its own. In astronomical tim&
the day is the unit, complete in itself with its dual evolu-
tion, and having no smaller astronomical subdivisions,
although it may be cut up into hours and watches by arbi-
trary numbering?. In aeonic time, the sii gle aXiltv or olam
is the unit, and the greater measures are made by it^ redu-
plications and retriplica ions, its ages of ages (aiotves twk
axilivtov) and worlds of worlds. We see from this why, of
all astronomical measures, the day is used to represent the
Eeonic unit, and to stand fur an aiiov or an olam, as in the
i)tj.epa aiwco? of 2 Peter iii. 18. From its pecubar po^vitioii
as the iinit in the one department, it heeotnes the most easy
and natural term for this purpose in representing the higher
chronology on the earthly scale. For the opposite reason,
year and month are less fitted for such a parallelism ; ani
hence we find the usage referred to so strongly verified ia
so many, perhaps in all, languages. A year is noi only as-
tronomical in itself, but internally divided by astronomical
periods. Hence it is generally used for nothing longer or
shorter than its own solar measurement. Everywhere,
however, day is thus employed, not only in I'hilosophical
language where a mognus annus is arliiJcially spoken oi^
but in common idioms, where we feel its natural propriety
as used to denote any long internally completing, or sell-
evolving time, series, or cycle ; as in that lii.e of Viroil»
^n vi. 745 :
Douec longa dies perfect© temporis orbe,
or in that peculiar Latin phrase venire in diem, to be boro,
to come into the world, or in the stiil greater Scriptural
phrases "before the day I am He,'* Is. xliii. 13, or th»
ijMe'pa atui'os already Cited. We should feel it as a philo-
logical discord if year were thus used, whether in poetry,
or in any other animated language. On the same grouna
it must appear as forced when any one would inteii^ret
n:'i! , Ito?, iviavTOi, jahr, rear, of any shorter period. Be-
sides, the Hebrews had two distinct names for months,
neither of which is ever used in giv ng the lengths of lives,
or ill keeping the record of genealogies, aJthnuBLb on-.r i-vw*^
in tL;** 'designation of festal times.— T «-
272
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Abraham, and thence up to Xoah, the dates maintain
themselves, with one exception, between 200 and
600 years (ch. xi. 10-32) : whilst in the time from
Noah to Adam (there too with one exception) they
are between 7Uii and lOUO years. According to the
Hebrew belief therefore, in respect to tlie duration
of human life, it became worse with men in the
course of the times. Thence the hope in a restora-
tion of the old longevity in the Messianic time (Is.
Ut. 20; XXV. 8). So also the rest of antiquity as-
sumed a greater length of life for the oldest time,
and JosKPHCS (Antiq. i. 3, 9) names Manetho, Bero-
Bus, Moschus, llesticeus, Hieronymus, Hesiod, &c.,
as giving accounts similar to that of Genesis." In
the number ten of tlie patriarchs, there is, in truth,
a symbolical significancy (the Chaldeans, too, accord-
ing to Berosus, number ten antediluvian patriarchs),
but a symbolical number is not on that account a
mythical number, and under the mythical point of
Tiew Knobel does not know what to do with the un-
like and uneven numbers.
Concerning the clironological treatises that relate
to our section, namely the assumed rectification of
the Bible chronology through the ^gyiJtian, com-
pare Delitzscii, p. 220 if. For the motives which
lie at the ground of the chronological clianges of
our text in the Samaritan Pentateucb iind the Sep-
tuagint, or their deviations (as well eh. xi. as ch. v.,
compare Knobel, p. 70) the reader is referred to
Keil, p. 76. According to our chronology, from
the creation to the flood there were 1G56 years,*
according to the Samaritan text 1307 years, and ac-
cording to the Septuagint 2242 years. The time
after the flood until Abraham was, according to the
Hebrew text 365 years, according to the Samaritan
1015, according to the Septuagint 1245. "The
translation of Enoch falls nearly in the middle point
of years from Adam to the flood, — that is, in the
year 9S7 after the creation of Adam. At that time
Seth, Enosh, Cainan, Mahalaleel, and Jared, were
etiU living, as there was also living his son Methuse-
* [In the excellent commentary on Genesis by Dr.
James G. Murphy, of Belfast College (p. 196), thrre is a
very c'.ear and convincing comparison oi the Hebrew test
chronology with that of the Septuagint, the Samaritan,
and Josepliiis. The internal evidence is shown to be de-
cidedly in favor of the Hebrew from its proportional con-
eisteney. The numbers in the LXX. evidently follow a plan
to which they have been conformed. This does not appear
in the Hebrew, and it is greatly in favor of its being an
authentic genealogical record. The numbers before the
birth of a successor, which are chiefly important fur the
chronology, aio enlarged in the LXX. by tlie addition of
just one hundred years In each of six cases, making ,\dam
230 years old at the birth of Seth, Seth 205 at the birth of
Enosh, and so on, whilst the sum-total of each life remains
the same as in the Hebrew, with a slight exception of 25
years in the case of I-aniech. The interest, here, is evi-
dent, to extend the total chronology without changing the
other numbers of the macrobiology. It is not e,isy to
ijna^ne what motive could have led in the other direction,
or to the shortening, if the original had been as given in
the SeptuaL'int ; evince all ancient nations have rather
ehown a disin.sition to lengthen their chronology. On
phyhiologicai grounds, too, the Hebrew is to be preferred;
eince the length of the life does not at all rcf|uire so liiTe a
toanhood at* those numbers would seem to intimate. There
in no proof that these were all first-bom sons. It was the
line of the pious, of those that had the spiritual birth-
right, The unevennesa of the Hebrew birth-iigures, vary-
ing from 6tj and 70 to 157, shows this, whilst the added 100
veare, in each ca^e, by the Septuagint, shows a design to
DrinK them to some nearer proportional standard, grounded
on some Bupposed physiological notion, and the unwar-
ranted idt-a thai each is ii natural firsl-bom. To all this
muKl be iuided the fjiet that the Hebrew has thi- best claim
to l>e regarded as the origirial text, from the well-known
KTUpulous, and even Riipei.stitious, care with whi/'h it has
been textoally prwerved.— T. 1^]
lah, and his grandson Lamech, then 113 jcais old;
Noah only was not yet born, and Adam of all th«
line was the only one dead." Keil. We will remark
m general, in relation to our treatment of the chro-
nology in the Introduction, that the genealogical
clironology throughout corresponds to the funda-
mental biblical ideas, or to that significance of per-
sonality which determines everything as actual tact.
In their experience, however, of the way in which
the blessing of piety advanced their length of Ufe,
tlie Macrobii must have found a special warning to
number their days, and in the uusymbolical form of
the numbers it was easier to admit misreckouinga
in single eases than any arbitrariness in respect to
the whole. In consideration of the extraordinary
impression which the year-period must have made
upon the first men of our race, in consideration of
its symbolical dying and living again with nature,
as well in the change [in the length] of day and
night, as in that of summer and winter, they could
have had, in general, no occasion or inducement to
learn the reckoning of numbers more vivid than
that which was furnished by these annual vicissitudes.
6. Ver. 1. This is the book. — " ^ED means
any finished writing, whether it c insists of only one
pair of leaves, or even of a single one ; as, for exam-
ple, tlie book (or bill) of divorce. Deift. xxiv." De-
litzsch. — The generations of Adam. — The nearest
bound to this book of the generations of Adam, ia
the genealogical register of Noah. In a wider sense,
then, does this register of Adam go on in the genea-
logical register of Noah (ch. x.) and in the genealo-
gical register of Shem (ch. x.), even to Abraham.
Alter that it goes on through the whole Old Testa,
ment, until it becomes the genealogical register of
Jesus Christ (Matt. i.;.
7. Ver. 4. And Adam lived. — " The narrator
reckons the years of each forefather unto the beget-
ting of his first-born, who carries on the main line,
then the remainder of his life, and after that he reck-
ons both periods together, so as to give the whole
length of his Ufe and name." DeUtzsch. — Begat in
his likeness. — Adam bore the image of God. Seth
bore the image of Adam: 1. according to its dispo-
sition in res])ect to the image of God ; 2. according
to the measure of its deformity by sin ; 3. according
to the hereditary blessing of his piety. " In that
primitive time the births did not rapidly follow each
other — a fact which had not a physical, but only an
ethical ground," says DeUtzsch. There is, however,
a phvsical cause, since in exact correspondence with
the increasing degeneracy and rankuess of human
life, is there, in a literal sense, the increase of a nu-
merous and wretched oflspring.
8. Ver. 5. And he died. — Baumgarten : " In
its constant return does tliis expression ri:^" prove
the dominion of death, from Adam onward, as an
immutable law (Rom. v. 14). Still, on this dark
backgiound of a conquering death shows still mora
clearly the power of life. For man dies when lie has
already propagated anew the life, so that in tha
midst of the death of the individual meniliurs, tha
life of the race holds on, and the hope grows .strong,
er and stronger in the seed that is to conquer the
author of death." The unceasing refrain, and kt
died, denotes here also the Umit of the long and ele-
vated line of life that seems to be ever mounting
towards heaven, but ever breaks oR' in the end, —
with the exception of Enoch. And so we get a clear
view of the battle of Ufe with death.
CHAP. V. 1-32.
278
9. Vers. 22-27. And Enoch walked with
Qod. — This expression, which occurs once more in
respect to Noah, ch. vi. 9, is afterwards enlarfjed. It
becomes (ch. xvii. 1 ; xxiv. 40), " to walls before the
face of God," — "to follow Jehovah," Deut. xiii. 5
— and similarly, Malachi U. 6, it occurs in respect
to the priest. It denotes the most intimate inter-
course with God, or, so to speak, a permanent view
of a present deity, a continual following after His
guidance. The word occurs here twice. In its first
usage it denotes the character of his life, and gives
assurance of the perseverance and soundness of his
piety ; lie walked with God three hundred years, he
begat sons and daughters. In the second, it gives
confirmation of the wonderful translation of Enoch.
According to the Jewish tradition, Enoch had, in all
probability, borne witness against the Cainitic anti-
DOmists of his day, and had annoimced to them the
judgment which came with the flood. From this
Jewish tradition the book of Enoch and the epistle
of Jude took in common (Dillmann, Buck Henoch);
for there is no necessity of referring the place in
Jude to the apocrvphal book, since the apostles, as
is well known, have cited popular traditions in other
places, although even DeUtzsch seems to connect the
epistle with apocryphal story. With this prediction,
and in correspondence with fundamental biblical
principles, does the epistle of Jude make him the
type of the prophetic testimony against that anti-
Christian Antinomiarusm of the New Testament day,
which is comprehended in its unity as " the last
time," and also a typical prophet of the last day
itself. The translation of Enoch has two sides.
153'S1 means, in the first place : he was no longer
there, he had disappeared (ch. xlii. 13, 36). There-
by is it indicated that his people had missed him, as
the sons of the prophets missed Elijah when he was
taken away (2 Kings ii. 16, etc.). Luther has pic-
tured in a most vivid manner this missing of Enoch,
as reflecting itself in the case of Jesus in His death,
and on Easter morning. According to Luther, they
had some thought that he had perished, had prob-
ably been slain by the Cainites, and then received a
special revelation concerning his taking away. —
God took him. — This word Pipb is also used in the
taking up of Elijah (2 Kings ii. 9, 10 ; Ps. Ixxiii. 24 ;
xlix. 16). A death so early in a line of men for
whom life was a blessing, could only be regarded, in
this connection, as a punishment. It would seem to
make Enoch of least worth among the patriarchs,
whereas, on the contrary, he was the most eminent.
It is clear, therefore, that there is narrated here a
transition which did not go through the form of
•death. The Christian tradition (Heb. xi. 5), as well
as the Jewish (Sirach xliv. 16; xlix. 16), hold fast
the umnistakable sense of the text, in which here, in
place of the ever-returning " and he died" there
comes in that other expression, "/or Qod took him."
It is also confirmed by the analogous representations
of the Bible (Elijah, Christ, the transformed, 1 Thess.
iv. 17 ; 1 Cor. xv. 51). But whither? and to what
atate was Enoch translated ? Dklitzsch : " To a
closer nearness with God, with whom he had hitherto
walked ; not that he became a partaker of that glori-
fication which awaits the justified in the resurrection ;
for in this glorification Christ is the first fruits."
On the contrary, Keil : " Not in the glorification is
Chi-ist the first fruits according to 1 Cor. xv. 20, 23,
but in the resurrection." By a transformation, or
bv a clothing upon, were Enoch and Elijah trans-
18
lated into everlastirg life with God. We must di»
tinguish, however, between the transformation and
the glorification, between the heavenly region of the
pious, that is. Paradise, and the perfect heaven of
Christ. " His 365th year of life corresponds prob-
ably to our 33d," remark Delitzsch and Knobel :
" Enoch lived ae many years as the year has days."
In respect to the legendary parallels in the extra
biblical antiquity, comp. Knobei,, p. 72 ; in which it
is clear that we must distinguish the biblical tradi-
tion from the kindred stories. According to Knobel
the motive for the translation was probably to rescut
Enoch from the age in which he lived, — with relation
to ch. iv. 10. Beyond a doubt, however, the main
reason was the fact that he had become personally
ripe for transformation, and that through his faith
there might he introduced into this world the faith
in a new life in the world beyond (Heb. xi. 5, 6).
If we would seek farther, we must compare the
translations that follow in sacred history. Elijah ig
translated because his consistent legalism must be-
come a judgment of fire, and a Last Day for the
apostate Israel ; Christ is translated, because His
staying longer in this world must have come to a
sudden conflict of life and death with the old world,
— that is, must have had for its consequence the
Last Day ; the believers at the end of the world are
translated, because now the Last Day has actually
appeared. Judging from these analogies, we may
conjecture that the translation of Enoch denoted a
decided turning-point in the life of the old world.
At all events, he had not m vain announced the
day of judgment before his departure. At this time,
it is probable, there was the beginning of the corrupt
alliances between the Sethitcs and the Cainites. It
is the probable middle time between Adam and the
flood. The Jewish and Arabian fables, according to
which Enoch is said to have discovered the art of
writing and book-making, together with arithmetic
and astronomy, must rest, for the most part, on his
name, TJn, from "|3n (to initiate, educate), and
upon the astronomical significance of the number
365.
10. Ver. 27. Methuselah. — The highest age,
969 years.
11. Ver. 28. Lamech "At so great an age
did these pious forefathers, who had renounced the
self-created worldly lust, confess their experience of
the burden and painfulness of life, in all its gravity
and in all its extent ; and it is easily explained how
it is that the history of the Sethites closes with lan-
guage of such a different sound from that of the
Cainites. Lamech the Cainite is full of an evil
drunken confidence. Lamech the Sethite, on the
contrary, is filled with the most extreme dejection in
respect to the present, and has no other joy than in
the promise of the future." Delitzsch. The name
nb, which he gives to his son, is put in relation to
ens , from which it does not follow that this relation
is etymologically significant. The confident hope of
the wearied is ever some bringer of rest. Without
doubt does the life-labor and toil of the Sethitci
stand in relation to the pride of the Cainites, even as
it forms a contrast to their confident and false secu-
rity. It is this pride which has power to trouble
their life more than the unfruitfulness of the earth.
In respect to Lamech's language in which he greets
Xoah as the bringer of rest, Lcther remarks :
Sicut Heva fallitur, ita quoque desiderio restitutionit
mundi fallitur etiam bonus Lamech. Still is he mi»
274
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
taken in supposing that Noah was to bring in the
closing sabbath of humanity ; that there came with
him a great reelioning, and a preliminary new world,
he correctly anticipated.
12. Ver. 32. And he begat Shem. — Ranke :
" The naming of the three sons of Noah leads us to
expect that whilst hitherto the line ha.s moved on
ever through only one member, in the farther course
of time all three of Noah's sons must simultaneously
lay the foundations of a new beginning." "The
order of the ages of Noah's sons is Shem, Japheth,
Bam (see ch. x. 21). In the enumeration, however,
Japheth ever stands hist, because his name of two
Byllables mates the best close in the collective ar-
rangement.' Knobel. The series of the three sons,
however, in regard to their age, makes a difficulty in
relation to ch. x. 21. (See Keil, p. 104.) Accord-
ing to the pawiige before us, Noah begat Shem first
when he was 5i)0 years old. According to ch. vii.
6, he was 600 years old when the flood came. Ac-
cording to ch. XI. 10, Shem was !00 years old two
years after the fiood. Either then must we here re-
gard the lOii yeati* of Shem as a round number, or
the word bnj, ch. x. 21, must relate to Japheth, as
Michaelis and others think. On the contrary, see
the remarks of Knolll, p. 120, and of Keil, p. 104.
Keil, however, would lake "lupn as merely a com-
parative designation of Ham, ch. ix. 24 : the young-
er instead of the youngest; so that the series Shem,
Ham, Japheth, would be the actual order of their
ages. This consequence <ioes not appear to be
confirmed by the bns of ou. x. 21, since "apn
expressly refers to Noah in connection with "133,
a position that fails in respect to bllS, in ch. x. 21.
Assuming it as not grounded on the analogue of the
theocratic history, that the phyjical first-born must
always be the spiritual first-born, it would remain
doubtful whether, in the passage before us, Shem
was not placed first on the ground of worth.
[Note on the Translation of Enoch, ano the
lARLIKST IDEAS OF DeatH AMONG THE PRIMITIVE
Men.— C^nVs IPX n;rb •'•S ISrx". A right un-
derstanding of this remarkable language respecting
Enoch, depends upon our getting the right stand-
point from which to determine the earliest notion
Chat man must have had of death. Tliis could hardly
have been the modern idea, either in its materializing,
or in its more spiritual, aspect. That is, it was not,
on the one hand, a cessation of being, nor was it, on
the other, any distinctly formed thought of a separa-
tion of two things, soul and body, one of which no
longer pertained to the man, or the selfhood, and the
other [la.ssed off to a wholly separate and immaterial
existence. God liad not defined to them the nature
of this fearful doom, and experience showed tiiem
nothing but the f;ict of an awful outward change on
the once moving and active personality. It had not
cciised In he, though now it was motionless and gha.st-
ly. They could not regard it as a fallen tree, or a
iJaip anitual, not from any metaphysical or physiologi-
cal distinetion, but from the strong feelinf/ of so<'ial
personality whicli they had ever connected with the
living man, and which they could not get rid of.
This was the germ, the Ood-implantcd germ, we may
B^, of the idni of a continuous being, or a futiiic
life, as we find it in the earliest parts and throughout
the (tid Testament. To this they held on even against
tppearancen, against the sense we may say, or any rea-
loning from geose, even as it is yet found among the
rudest and simplest nations, — the very antagonism!
it has had to encounter from the outer phenomenal
world only showing the strength and the indestructi-
bility of the sentiment. This one personality had not
wholly vanished, though wliat had once appeared as
a human form they now saw undergoing a rapid and
fe.'H'fuI transformation. Death presented itself in
contrast with that moving outward thing they called
life, but it was not necessarily a breach of all con-
tinuity, or an utter extinction of all selfhood, with
its rights and claims, as in the ease of Abel's com
plaining blood. The self, the man was there, but he
was dead, or in the state of beinr/ they called death.
Or he was still somewhere near, in what connection
with the body, or with themselves, they could not
imagine. They gazed in astonishment at this won-
derful phenomenon, but they did not reason about it,
or draw nice distinctions. They had no data from
whieli to draw them. It was the dread penalty of
which they had heard from their progenitors, and
that was all they knew about it. Of its extent, or
its consecjuences, or of any recovery from it, they
had little or no conception. Death was not to tliem,
as it has come to be regarded in our thinking, a sin-
gle teiTuinating event, but a state, a state of being,,
very strange indeed, but still real and actual. They
did not separate it into death (the aet of dying) and
something after death. All earliest language is
grounded on the idea of such after state as a going
on, or linked identity ; but they did not distinguish
between it and its ineipiency. Hence, among all an-
cient people, the great care for funeral rites, not
merely in memory of, but as something due to a still
continued being, and as essential to its quietude. It
was not the idea of resurrection, as some have
thought, that made this so ancient and so universal,
but the ineradicable feelhig of a personality, or self-
hood, as somehow inheiing in the poor remains,
whether embalmed with costliest spices, or buried in
the bosom ot" their niOther earth, or purified and so
preserved by fire. There w a selfhood in the body;
Paul aftirms it strongly of the sleeping Christian re-
mains; there is something sacred in the human dust;
it is not like other matter, though sown in corrup-
tion ; we may thank God that the I'eeling .■still lin-
gers in our souls, in spite of that contempt for the
body which is sometimes manifested by a reckless
science on the one hand, or a hyper-spiritual philoso-
phy on the other.
It is very important to bear in mind, that to the
early view there could be no distinctions such as we
now make. It was all death, whatever it might in-
clude, as opposed to acting, moving being ; and
when very early there arose the thought of a dwell-
ing in the earth (as an underworld), of a Sheol or
cavity, of a Hades or the Unseen — all arising from
the act of burying or putting out of sight — this was
not a state succeeding deatli, but the very world of
the dead, the cbi r n^3, the House of Olam (Eecles
xii. 5), the House of Eternity, not as a figure for non-
existence, but as real continuous being, though in
striking contrast with the busy, knowing (.sense-
knowing), remembering, loving, hating, upper lifn
" /jr7unl/i. t/if .fun " (Eecles. ix. 5, fi). Superstition
held that there was some mode of intercom sc with
these "E" ^:3Ta, or dwellers in Slicol. There is
little said about them in tlu; Hebrew Scriptures, for
tliere was little known that could he said; but there
is an nnderciirrent of thought and feeling throughout
the ( Mil Testament which shows that they are never
CHAP. V. Ir82.
275
forgotten. They were dead, but still in being ; they
had not perished {per-iit, inter-iit, gone Ihrouyh, fallen
«<), become extinct, ceased to be. Hence they called
them the D'^SSn , the weak, the weary, the inactive,
*s the Homeric and the ante-Homeric Greek called
'Jiem ot Ka^ovTis^ and a^^vriva Kapriva. In all this
there was great logical inconsistency, bewilderment
of conception, contradiction even of the sense, so far
as the phenomenal body was concerned, but it was a
holding fast of that idea of continuous being, in some
way, which was from the beginning, and which the
human mind never gave up until Christ came and
poured light upon this dark Sheol, this gloomy Hades,
or world of the unseen. The imagery everywhere
was drawn mainly from the last appearances in life,
or from the associations of sepulchral acts, but the
real underlying idea was never lost. Very early a
better liope dawned upon the pious, or it came as a
revelation from God, born in the travail of their
earth-weary, rest-seeking souls, but it was mainly of
a deliverance at some time from Sheol, or of blessed-
ness therein as lying under the shadow of the divine
protection. It was, however, still death, doom,
no'ipa, the great penalty, an idea expressed somehow
in the most ancient tongues, Shemitic or Japhetic,
with which we are acquainted. It was the great
wrath for whose iurn'mg the pious dead are repre-
Bented as waiting; as Job prays, "0 that thou
woulJst hide me in Sheol until thy wrath be past,
TjES n^ir ns (until thy wrath Iur7i), that thou
wouldst appoint me a time and then remember me "
(Job xiv. 13).
From such a doom Enoch was spared. No grave
received him. He disappeared from earth. He was
not found, as the LSX. have rendered lira's , and as
it is given in Heb. xi. 5 ; that is, his body was not
found, though men, doubtless, made long search for
him, as tliey did afterwards for the body of Elijah
(2 Kings li. 16, 17). Enoch may be said to have
shared in the great penalty in so far that for 365
years he bore a dying and corruptible body, and yet
it is testified of him that he did not see death, Heb.
xi. a, that is, he did not enter into Hades, which is
the real death, although the change that his body
must have undergone in the translation was greater
than that which passes upon the dissolving human
frame. See the clear remarks of Dr. Murphy on
IJJ'^X, in his excellent Commentary on Genesis.
Dr. Lange has well disiinguished between this
Old Testament beUef of a future life, or rather of
continuous being, and the s,"a>7) uhinos, the eternal
life, reve.aled by Christ. Great confusion arises from
confounding the two, and the distinction becomes
of great importance in refuting the reiisoning of those
who teach the annihilation of the wicked.
The word npb here, though a common one, is to
be noted as used in a strikingly similar connection
in the account of Elijah (2 Kings ii. 9, n- fes), Ps.
xlix. 15, " God shall redeem my soul from Sheol, for
He shall take me," "JniSI , and Ps. Ixxiii. 24 : " Thou
rilt guide me by thy counsel, and afterwards take
me (to) glory." It is worthy of note, too, how ex-
actly in Ps. Ixxiii. 24 the Hebrew nnx corresponds
If the use of the cognate Arabic «'., ^{ (Heb. n"'^n!<
Numb, xxiii. 10 et al.), the frequent Koranic and ante-
Hohammedan word for the after or future life. In
these two passages from the Psalms, npb may not
denote the hope of a translation, yet the similaritj
of context, which strongly seems to be suggested by
the passage in Genesis, takes them clearly out of th«
Rationalist's limitation to a mere worldly deliver-
ance.—T. L.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. Concerning the line of Seth, see the Exegetical
aimotations. No. 1.
2. Concerning the meaning of the image of Adam,
see the Exegetical annotations. No. 3 ; as also for
the significance of the names that here occur. No. 4.
3. Concerning the Macrobii, or the long-lived of
the primitive time, see Exegetical annotations. No. 5.
It ought to be considered that not only had death,
as yet, fiiiled to make his full breach upon them,
but that, on the other hand, through their inward
intercourse with God, their life-power had been
wonderfully advanced in the opposite direction of
the transformation form. Concerning the chro-
nology, see No. 5.
4. For the meaning of Enoch, see No. 7, Exegeti-
cal annotations. Enoch, the seventh from Adam, is
a very ancient witness: 1. For the degrees of piety ;
2. for the truth of the mystical or the mysterious
core of religion, communion with God ; 3. lor that
assurance of eternal life that wells out of a life of
faiih and peace in God. In this is he, in a special
sense, a type of the life of Christ: 1. His divine
human walk ; 2. his glorification and translation to
heaven. Concerning the language of Lamech, see
No. 8.
5. For the meaning of Noah, see the extracts
from Starke below. According to Heb. xi. 1, Enoch
is the mediator of the idea of a revelation of deliv-
erance, or of salvation from judgment.
6. A main point of view of the Holy Scriptures
and of the religion of revelation, is the significance
of the personal life. This presents itself in the
genealogies as they stand in their simple grandeur
even to this day. It is like the granite of the earth
in a highland landscape.
7. Enoch, Elijah, Christ, three stages in the un-
folding of the facts of the world beyond, of the
higher fife of the world beyond, of its region of
glory, and of the wonderful transition to it, as well
as of the belief in those facts. In Christ the per-
fection of what is here prefigured.
8. Noah and his house a figure of the pious of
the last time (Matt. xxiv. 34).
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
The race of Adam, according to the ground-
features of its life: 1. Birth; 2. marriage and the
family ; 3. death. — The constant repetttion, and fu
died, a powerful memento inori. [Through this con-
stant refrain, atid he died, the reading of this chapter
is said to have awakened men to repentance.] — .\dam,
through Seth and Noah, the ancestor of the liumau
race: 1. In the continuance of the diiine vocation,
2. of sinfulness, pain, and labor upon the earth ; 3.
of strife with sin : Seth, Enoch, Lamech, Noah ;
4. of the prospect of the future of the perfected
Seth (meaning compensation and established), of the
perfected Enoch (devoted), of the perfected Noah
(rest-briiiger). — The conflict of life with death in
the line of the Sethites 1. How it holds back death
276
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
through the blessing of piety (the long-living) ; 2.
how it ever opposes to death new generations (and
he begat sons and daughters) ; 3. how it finds a way
of life beyond death (Enoch). — Seth as the again-
risen Abei. — The time of Enosh, that is, of the feel-
ing of human weakness, as a time of the first glori-
fying of the divine power and covenant faithfulness.
—The names of the Sethites (see above). — Enoch
the mediator of the faith of a new hfe in the world
beyond (lleb. xi. .5, 6), on the ground of the experi-
ence of the divine complacency (justification in its
first form), through faith, tliat is, in tlie unfolding
of his communion with God, and in the bearing of
his prophetic testimony against ungodliness (Jude).
— Enoch's walk with God and his blessing. — The
long life of Enoch and the long life of Methuselah.
— Enoch the wonderful height in the experience of
the blessing, in the race of the blessing. — Enoch a
turning-point in the primeval history, as Elijah in the
history of Israel, and as the ascension to heaven of
Christ in the history of the human race generally.
— The history of Enoch tlie first germ of the doc-
trine of a heavenly inheritance. — Enoch as a type
of Christ. — The Cainitic Lamech and the Sethitic
Lamech. — Lamech's word of confidence in respect
to Noah, 1. a delusion, and yet, 2. no ilelusion. —
The lijie of the Sethites and the line of the Cainites:
1. Worldliness ; spirituaUty ; 2. pride and confi-
dence ; sorrow and patience ; .S. an end, with terror ;
a newer, fairer beginning of life. — Noah as a type
of Christ.— Adam the ancestor of two lines : a pious
and a godless. — Noali the ancestor of three lines :
a line of faith and worship, a line of human culture,
and a line of sensual barbarity.
Starke : It is this genealogical record that has
been preserved by God's wonderful care, and is to
be found, 1 Chron. i.. Matt, i., Luke iii. — Cramer :
There has always been a church of God, and will re-
main even to the last day (Matt. xvi. 18). The evan-
gelical religion is the oldest aud the truest of all. —
Ver. 3. All men are by nature children of wrath,
and stained with the hereditary sin (Eph. ii. 3). —
Long life is also from God ; well for him who seeks
to ajiply it to his honor. — Osiandkr ; We have lived
long enough when we know how to learn Christ. —
Ver. 0. It is an old covenant : thou, 0 man, must
die (Sirach xiv. 18). — Cainan. He had (like Enoch)
seen all the patriarchs. — The example of Enocli is a
glorious proof that the marriage state can aud ought
to be holily maintained. — Whether now childien and
babes enjoy any such intimate intercourse with God,
there are still degrees herein, so that husbands and
fathers in Christ have theTcby a much closi^r com-
munion with God. Jewish, as well as some old
patristic and papistical interpreters say, that he
(Encjcli) was caiiied into the earthly paradise, where
he will remain lo the end cf the world, when he will
come back and bi' slain by Antichrist, and there-
upon rise again and be taken up into heaven. We
may readily see, however, what a mere fable this is.
Rather has he been taken up into this heavenly para-
dise (Luke xxiii. 43). — Aim of Enoch's translation:
1. Thereby was the doctrine that the good man was
rewarded in a future lil'e established as against the
prevalent security of that day; 2. thereby, in the
seventh from Adam, was there given a pattern which
even to the time of the seventh trumpet should serve
a« an example to believers whom the day of Christ
might find alive; 3. thereby Enoch was set before
■H an a type of (yhrist in his ascension. (Then fol-
lows a compariBon of the translation of Enoch with
the ascension of Christ.) — Methuselah. No one of
the patriarchs reached a thousand years, for thai
number is a type of the perfection to which no man
in this life can attain. — He died in the year 1658,
and, therefore, in the year in which the flood brok*
in upon the world. — Noah (Luke iii. 36 ; 1 Pet. iii
20 ; Heb. xi. 7). Noah is a glorious type of Christ;
1. In respect to his name : Noah signifies rest and
peace, or consolation and comforting ; so is Christ,
too, our Prince of peace, who makes for us peace
and tran(iuillity (Is. ix. 6 ; Rom. v. 1 ; Jer. vi. 16).
2. According to his threefold oflBee : Noah was a
prophet (2 Pet. ii. 6), and announced many years
beforehand the destruction of the first world and it?
sons, which was to befall them (Matt. xxiv. 25)
Noah was a priest, for he oft'ered sacrifice ; ChiisI
has offered himself (Heb. vii. 27). Noah prayed foi
the wicked world (Ezek. xiv. 14) ; so also is Christ
our advocate (Kom. viii. 34 ; 1 John ii. 1 ; Heb. v.
7). Noah blessed Shem and Japheth ; so also Christ
(Mark x. 16). Noah was a king, the head of liij
family and of the new world, the builder of an ark
at God's command ; Christ was king and head of hia
threefold kingdom, the builder of the church (Ps. ii.
6). — The sons of Noah. They are not born in th(
order in which they here stand, but Japheth was the
first-born (ch. x. 21), Shem the middle son (ch. xi.
10), and Ham the youngest (ch. ix. 24),
SciiuiiDER : Genealogies may be called the threads
on which history, ehroBology, and everything else in
the first book of Moses moves. The Adamitic gen-
ealogical table, ch. v., throws a bridge between thf
fall and the flood. In the plan of Genesis, the eyf
of Moses is firmly directed to Israel. The object of
this constantly keeping the eye upon Israel, has for
its ground the placmg, in the most visible manner,
befoie the eyes of the latest descendants, Jehovah's
covenant faithfulness in the outer as well as inner
preservation and assistance of the woman's seed.
On this account the genealogies of the tlld Testa-
ment, and of Genesis especially, Ibrm a part not to
be overlooked in the great history of the divine as-
sumptions of humanity before the incarnation of God
in Christ. — Vers. 1 and 2. According to Luke iii.
38, man stands in a genealogical relation to God;
his descent loses itself in the divine hand of the
Creator (Acts xvii. 28). — Vers. 3-5. The significance
of the time depends upon the significance of the
person who is born, lives, and dies in it. The mean-
ing of the time is nothing else tli.-in that there ap-
pears in it the birth and life of the human ]ierson-
aUty. To the mere dead number the coming man
first gives life and content, and so too he first makes
history. — Abel is murdered, Cain is cursed ; and now
Seth enters, a first birth, as it were, into history. —
Val. Herbekger : Adam and Eve may have wept
long for the death of the pious Abel, and the wick-
edness of that wretched son Cain ; but now God
makes them to rejoice again in a pious child whom
he presents to their eyes. Such vicissitudes of joy
and sorrow befall all pious people. Be not, there-
for?, proud when it goes with thee according to thy
heart's wish ; be not cast down though it may lain
and snow crosses. God will again rtjoiee thee with
a cheerful sunshine in thy long, wearisome domestic
trouble. — Whether the rest of the patriarchs who
followed were all first-bom sons, is made doubtfu)
by the case of Seth. — "From Adam onward to tin
patriarch Jacob, hath the Holy Spirit signifiei' to u»
in what year each named ancestor, who propagated
Ihiit line out uf which Christ was lo spriny, begal
CHAP. V. 1-az.
2T»
Ihat son who in turn w:i8 to become a specially-named
ancestor in the course of descent." Roos. — Seth's
genealogical register is the line of " the sons of God,"
that is, of the true cliurch. " With reverence and
iwe do I draw nigh to thee, 0 holy people who
4well under his shadow and before his presence, 0
<hou light of the world, thou salt of the earth ! Thou
wast a chosen race, a patriarclial priesthood, to make
known the Tirtues of Him who called thee." Herder.
— LcTHKR Eve, too, it is probable, lived to the
eight hundredth year, and so must have seen a nu-
merous race. How much care must slie have had,
how much industry, and labor, in visiting, dressing,
and teaching, her children and her children's chil-
dren ! The first oral fountain of oral and written
traditions that have come down to us, could in this
way maintain itself through the possibility of a per-
Bonal converse between Lamech and Shem, between
Shem and Abraham. The original undying destiny
of the human race comes powerfully before us in the
numbers of this genealogical register. That sharp
appendage, atid he died, forms & standing refrain of
sorrow to the joyful picture of life that precedes. —
Roos: So should the thought arise in us : I too must
die, and after a shorter pilgrimage than that of these
fathers; I t(>o must watch. — Vera. 6-20. Arabian
stories concerning Seth and Jared, p. 111. Jared:
an enigmatical name, out of which, liowever, as out
of most of the Sethic names, there evidently enough
breathes a tone of sorrow and of pain. Sharp con-
trast with the namings of the Cainites, which express
might and pride. — Vers. 21-23 Wliilst the Enoch
of ch. iv. 17 bears upon himself the Cainitic conse-
cration, and gives to the earthly his consecration
(say rather receives it from the earthly), the Enoch
of our chapter shows the consecration of (5od (Sirach
xliv. 15 ; IJeb. xi. 5). The subjective side of patri-
archalism is its faith, the objective the divine ac-
ceptance.— Luther : From this we take it that there
was In Enoch a peculiar consolation of the Holy
Spirit and an excellent and noble courage, so that
with the highest confidence and boldness he bore
himself against the church of Satan and the Cainites,
in the presence of the other patriarchs. For to walk
reverentially with God means not to roam in a de,s-
ert, or to hide oneself in a corner, but to come forth
according to his calling, and to bear himself bravely
against the unrighteousness of Satan and the world.
(In this, however, the question still remains, whether
we are to think of Enoch as having the contempla-
tive Johannean, or the zealous Fetrine form ; we
may rather suppose the first than the second.) — •
Roos : We never find this mode of speech, to walk
with God, after the giving of the law, but rather the
terms perfect, upright. In the New Testament pious
men are called holy (saints), and beloved of God.
In this way there shines clearly before the eyes the
difference of the divine economies, namely : before
the law, and under the law, and under the grace of
the Xew Testament. In re.spect to the language, to
walk with God, it expresses the patriarchal piety in
a very becoming and lovely manner. There were, at
that day, no literally expressed prescriptions as to
what ought to be done or left undone. God himself
stood in place of all such prescriptions. — Hengsten-
BKRG : The main thing was that each should become
% partaker of the life of God. When this took place,
fren had he eternal Ufe, and the assurance of it in his
conisviousness. In all the Holy Scripture this term
(translation) is used only of three persons : of Enoch
b thu old world, of Ehjah ip the old covenant, and
of Christ in the new. The first is a " type of th«
second, anil both are Old Testament figures " of tha
last. — Hehder: The seventh from Adatn cannot bt
without God in a world which scorns him; God foi^
got him not, but made him immortal and an evei^
lasting moimment of this divine truth. — Henosten-
BERii : Everything arbitrary must be far removed
from a religion whose God is the unchangeable Jeho-
vah ; what God does in the case of one is, at tha
same time, a prediction of what he will do to all who
I occupy with him a like stand-point. — Baumgarten :
When we confine our looks to the bare catalogue,
we find, indeed, life followed close by death, but
this opens up to us a series in which we see no
close. But that this series has an actual conclusion,
namely, the victory of Ufe over death, is for the first
time assured to us through the translation of Enoch.
— LcTHER : So shines out, in the midst of this nar
ration of the dead, like a fair and lovely star, the
ple,ising light of immortality. The old doctors of
the church say: Abel confessed another life after
death, for his blood cries out and is heard ; Cain
acknowledged another life before death, for he waa
afraid to die, and his soul foreboded that something
more awaited him than this world's unhappiness;
Enoch confesses another life without death, for, out
of this world's misery, and without the pain of
dying, he goes straight to everlasting life. In the
Koran and among the Mohammedans Enoch bears
the name of Edris. So also the heathen leg-nds
mention him under the names of Aimak, t'aunak,
Nannak (for the further treatment of these stories,
p. 119). Methuselah means either man of the arrow-
shooting, because, by standing on his defence and using
his skill in weapons, in these last times of the first
world, he was able to resist the robberlike, murder-
ous Cainrtes ; or his name means man of the shout or
germ, that is, of a great posterity ; one rich in child-
ren and in children's children. — Val. Herbekger :
God can prolong our life, as in the case of Hezekiah.
While .Methuselah lived the great distress came not
upon the world, for he could pray from the heart
and keep back the wrath of God ; but as soon aa
Methuselah's white snow dissolves, and his gray
hair descends into the grave, then grows the weather
foul, the rain comes down, out swells the flood, and
all the world must drown. — At the speech of Lamech,
ch. iv. 1, it was the wife whose mother-feelings sang
joyfully together ; in the passage before us (of the
Sethic Lamech) we perceive the loud pulse of a
father's heart. — The advimcing corruption of the
time, and of his ootemporaries, give no doubtful col-
oring to his soul's longing ; on this dark background
first falls that hard fate of eating bread in the sweat
of the brow (ch. iii. 17). — In such a consohation of a
pious son did the old pious fathers find their rest. —
Roos : From such a man must the patriarchs have
been greatly comforted, and gained new courage.
(Similar examples in the t>ld Testament, Moses,
Samuel, Elias ; in the Xew Testament time, .John the
Baptist, the Apostles ; in modern times, Huss, Lu-
ther, and others.) It all presupposes Christ the
middle point. — Theodoret names him (Noah) the
other or second .\dam. — Dreciisler : Here, in the
mention of Noah, there is in extensinn to tlie whole
chapter in contrast to the previous concise declara-
tions.— (Comparison of the three sons of Adam and
the three sons of Noah.) Shem the first-born, the
most like to his father, who carries farther on
the golden thread; he is the representative of the
divine principle in humanity, p. 125 The opposit*
278
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
fiews of Luther and CaWn respecting the declara-
tion that Xoah was five hundred years old. Lu-
ther: He lived so long unmarried, because, in that
corrupt time, it was better to have no children than
evil, degenerate ones ; but then he may have become
married from the admonition of the patriarchs, or
the command of an angel. Calvin : It is not said
that he had hitherto been uimiarried, nor in what
year he began to be a father, but, on the occasion
of noting the point of time when the future flood is
announced to him, Moses adds that at this time he
had already become the father of three sons [this
explanation, however, is not in harmony with the
allegations of a middle time which he cites as analo-
gous to those in our chapter]. — Herder: Remark-
able history of humanity ; the form it ever presents.
These, imder the curse are singing their song of
jubilee; those others, under the blessing are full of
Bighs. These are building, singing, inventing ; those
live, bring up children, and walk with God. The
number of the one class is ever growing more
numerous, the gathering of the other grows ever less
and less. It ends with one race, with one man, and
the seven souls that are with him. So will it also
be, says Christ, at the end of the days. Be not dis-
heartened, little flock. — Luther: This chapter pre-
sents to us a form and image of the whole world.
As, therefore, there may be seen in our chapter a fair
form and image of the early world, so also is it God's
overwhelming wrath, and a most fearful ruin, that
we behold in the fact that the whole race of these
ten patriarchs perished, with the exception of only
eight tliat survived. — The same : We ought not to
think tliat these are common names of mean and
common men, for, in fact, they are great heroes. —
The same: Our world of t(>-day, the third, and
Btill a world of mercy, how full of blasphemy and
cruelty ! — It must be punished with a flood of fire ;
for so prophesy the colors in the rainbow (then fol-
lows an interpretation of the three chief colors).
Gerlacii : God himself stands at the head of
the genealogical table, not merely as creator, as he
is of all other beings, but as the father of men, as
appears Luke iii. 38. Not without purpose is there
mentioned the divine origin of the human race at
the very apex of this series. It contains the patri-
archs that remained true to the covenant of God,
and who, on that very accoimt, are called the Sons
of God (ch. vi. 2). — Ver. 5. " \^^lo was like his
image " This expression contains no allusion to the
fall, but there is rather indicated a contirmance of
the divine image according to the original position
of man. As Adam was created in the divine image,
so could he also beget a son who should be like to
his own iniMge. That the predominance of sin is
irdicrited along with it, is taken for granted through
the whole history (therefore is it here also indicatcil,
although the author rightly saw that here, in the
representation of the higher Sethic line, and in ac-
cordance with its connections, there should be a
•pecial emphasis given to the continuance of a side
of light in humanity). — Enoch : Most worthy of not*
as a very ancient witnessing to the earliest huaao
race of a ble.'^sed eternal life.
Lisco : Enoch, that is, devoted. He is the sev
enth from Adam, wherein there may be some indi-
cation that after the six long world-times of sin and
death, there should be introduced, in the seventh
period of the world, througli one, that is, Christ, «
divine life, with freedom from death [" Calculus ot
the Biblical Chronology," p. 23].
Calwer Handbcch : Set/i. Eve looks upon him
as a present fiom God ; but thinks no more, as in
the case of Cain, that she actually has the Lord.
Still does her faith behold a new beginning for the
promise, of the seed of the woman, bearing in itself
tlie pledge of its sure ongoing, whilst she behevingly
receives this "oiher seed" from the hand of Goi
[Indication that in ihe birth of Cain she had ascribed
to herself too great a share.] — Methuselah, the eighth
from Adam, lives nearly one hundred years cotempo-
raneously with Adam, whilst Noah lives (ightv-lbur
years with Enoch, the grandson of Adam, and, in the
other direction, was one hundred and twenty-eight
years cotemporaneous with Terah the father of Abra-
ham.— Abel died early a violent death ; Adam was
the first who died a natural death ( ? ) ; fifty-seven
years after him was Enosh translated. A thi-eelbld
way. [Enoch. Under the name of Idris (learned
man) he is said to have been the inventor of letters
and writing, of arithmetic, and astronomy.] — Bcnsen,
on the word of Lamech, v. 29 : This indicates very
hard times and great disturbing events of nature, in
the last period of the old world. Men labor hard,
but nothing thrives. They toil in vain ; the ciop is
little, or it is wholly lost. Now there is a breathing
agiiin (according to the root-meaning of tia/iam
(cnj) and the Arabic usage) after the fruitless la-
bor. [Here, in the first place, it is overlooked that
the object of Lamech's lamentation has an ethical
background (a commencing corruption), and in the
second place, that the destined limitation of that old
period through a sudden and destroying flood ex-
cludes earlier catastrophes.] — From the name of the
Cainite Mahujael, ch. iv. 18: " Detruit tie IJiru,"
and with reference to a Lydian and Indian tradition,
Von Rougemont concludes that : sa generation a
ete e7i majeure partie enlevee par urte effroi/able
seehercsse^ which lasted at least eighteen years.
Ilixtoire de la Terre, p. 98. [In reference, however,
to this meaning of the name Mahujael, it is to be re-
marked that it would be contrary to the .Tnalogy of
the Cainitic names]. — Taude: What Enoch's life and
ili'stiny proclaims to us: 1. That a godly life in
faith plea.scs God; 2. that God in his grace rewards
it with the gift of everlasting life. — The name of
Noah : 1. A significant index to the state of soul of
the Sethites and of all chiliiren of God; 2. a figure
of Christ. — HoFMANN (p. 40): Fathers ever hope foi
deliverance in their sons. [|Then follows a rel'ereuo*
to Setb, Enosh, Enoch, Noah.]
CHAP. VI. 1-8. 274
FOURTH SECTION,
J%e Univertal Corruption in consequence of the mingling of the two lines. — The anomimn
{or enormity) of ains before the food. — Predominant u7ibeHef — Tetanic pride. —
After the flood prevailing superstition.
Chapter VI, 1-8.
1 And it came to pass when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and
2 daughters were born unto them, Tliat the sons of God .^aw the daughters of men
["looked upon them] that thej were fair, and thej took them wives of all which they chosa
3 [after their sensual choice]. And the Lord said, my spirit^ shall not always strive* with man,
4 for that he^ also is fiesh; yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years. Ther6
were giants* in the earth in those days ; and also after that, when the sons of God came
in to the daughters of men, and they bare children to them; the same became mighty
5 men, which were of old, men of renown. And God saw that the wickedness of man
was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was
6 only evil continually. And it repented^ the Lord that he had made man on the earth,
V and it grieved" him at his heart. And the Lord said, I will destroy man whom I havfi
created from the face of the earth; both man and beast, and the creeping thing, and
8 the fowls of tlie air; for it repenteth me that I have made them. And Noah found
grace in the eyes of the Lord.
[1 Ver. 3.— "jIT^ sb. This word has given rise to a great variety of interpretations. The most unsatisfactory, m
well as the farthest from the Het^rew usage, is that of Gesenius, who renders it, non humiliiibitur, my spirit shall not hi
humbled, or become vile, in man, regarding it as cognate with the Arabic ,.»l0 ( .t«;^)> There is not a trace of such
a sense anywhere else in the Hebrew Scriptures. It is directly opposed to the strong sense of power, superiorittf, as it
appears in the frequeni "^iTS , lord, viastsr, "(iTO , judicial conjiict, and the name of Deity, ^3"IX , Dovii7ius. Compare
also l^ltl , Job xis. 29, judicium. The other form I'^T , if it is not rather an abbreviated Hiphil of '|n, hae always thi«
ruling judici.nl eeose, and corresponds to the other Arabic verb ,,»iO (,.vJ^^). The Arabic verb ,,««t^ may hav«
come from this by acquiring a modified passive sense. It may be said, too, that the view of Gesenius is out of harmorxy
with the whole spirit of the Scriptures. There is no such thought in ttn- Bible as God's spirit being humble l by dwelliiw;
or striving with men. It* philosophy is all the other way : God's " strength is made i erfect in our weakness." The
LXX. have rendered it, ov /atj Karajaeii^, shall not remain ; the Vulgate the same, non permanebit ; the Syriac in like
manner, • %/->V / |J , shall not dwell. The LXX. and the Syriac were probably in£uenced by some eirly Jewish Targum.
since Onkelos gives it Bnbstantially the same sense, D'^pH'^ K3, though he paraphrases the passage. The interpretation
of "pT^ has been much influenced by the interprtters' view of ^n*"i following, as denoting the natural life, the spirit or
eoul which God had given men (see Ps. civ. 29, 30 ; Eccles. xii. 7), and they have accordingly given "T^ any general
sense that, whilst harmonizing with such view, would not be opposed to the radical idea of ruling judicially. Hence we
need not regard these old interpreters as having read "IT' or ■|lb'', as some have supposed. Another view which la
found in some of the Jewish commentators would refer "^n""! to the spirit, mind, or disposition of God generally, repre-
sented as occupied with the care of man, and, as il were, wearied with it. So Rashi : my spirit within me shall not be
disturbed on account of man. Another very strange one mentioned by Aben Ezra connects ■|TT' with the rare noun
^^^^ , meaning a sheath (1 Chron. v-gj. 27), as though the body were the sheath of the spirit — shall not always be I'n-
sheathed, or inshealh itself—froux the root '^12 ; and they refer to the Aramaic of Dan vii. 15, " my spirit was grieved,
n3T3 "lilS, within my body "—literally, within the sheath. But this interpretation, besides being etymologically false,
Is too far-fetched and inconsistent with the simplicity of the early language. The Arabic translation (Arabs Erpeuii)
tenders it p vAJf) to be wholly occupied with^ according to the view of Kashi above. — T. L.)
[" Ver. 3.— •^n^in . Of this there have been nearly as many interpretations as of "1T^. It may mean the spirit of
God generally, as the mind of God ; it may mean the Holy Spii-it as a power or influence, or, in the New Testament
sense, as a person. It has been intei-preted as the spirit or life of man, which God calls ^n"n (my spirit), because given
by him (a-; in Ps. civ. and Eccles. sii., before referred to). This latter view may have two modifications : 1. aa the Iif«
generally, or ni~l taken for tUE2 or i^vxi?; or, 2. in the higher sense of wfeujao, according to the trichotomy — the highei
or rational power in man, and more nearly allied to the divine — the reason as distinguished froi i the sevse, and from th<
mers inductive intellect judging by sense, and for the sense. The decision between these depends on the context, on thi
forc-J of nbirb, and the true meaning of "^'sT^ Sin ":ii:;2 ; also, on the question whether, taken as a whole, it is th6
anguageof ajurf^men/ or of a jjred(c//(m on which the judgment isgi-ounded. On this see the Exegetical and Notes. — T L,]
[' Ver. 3.-02 C3 . All the old authorities, versions, commentaries, etc., take this, as it is rendered in E.V., as equivalent
to Oa "^l^;5t.2, in (hat also, or because also. Thus the LXX., Bta to ; Vulg., quia ; Syriac, 9 *^>.„Julo ; Onkelos, ^ 3^n3 ^
/onath.bb53 "jia. The As\hic of the Polyglotts, .^wXi^J % ^ '"^^^ - Arabs Erpenii, Jk.:^! ^^yjO- So also th*
Z-iO
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
tudem Tergions until very lately. The excellent Arabic version made by our American mi^otirWts, and lately
printed, has followed tlie most modern commentaries and lexicographers, (rashly, we think,) and render«'d it &jl,JO*J
11 ^^ *J6, '* because of his declination, or straying, he is flesh." The objection made by Gesenius and Roscmniiller tothu
abbreviation 113 for nttJN , that it belongs to the later Hebrew, has little weight. There are examples in the oldest books,
and t^:- conformity of the writing to the pronunciation is rather a mark of earlier orthography, though it may oe after-
wards imiuited, for brevity, in the later Rabbinical writings. There can hardly be a doubt that C;u.*- or CilTZ,
basshaggam, would give about the actual pronunciation (especially if rapid) of Di. nlTNS if written m full— 6aas7i«rpam
hatshargam — in wliieh the semi-vowel sound of "1 would become very feeble and disappear, as is the case with ! in othi-f
eombinations, so that shargam would become shaggam; the duplication by the dagesh compensating for the lost".
And this would answer the question why it is not more frequent in the early books. It is not the settled use of 13
for ^li;j< (which is a mere orthographical abbreviation of n^X becoming constant in later and Rabbinical writing), but
only a following the pronunciation in a peculiarly harsh combination that seldom occurs. The patach in place of the
Begol CCT) is explained by tLe Jewish grammarians, who, as their rich phont-tic system clearly shows, understood these
matters as well as the modern philologists. The last syllable is lengthened by the tone, and the compensating dagesh
requires the sharpening of the preceding one. An objection to the view of Gesenius and others is, that such a use of
the infinitive of 33C (if it can be regarded as an infinitive) is imesarapled in the Hebrew. Besides, this verb or noun,
as employed elsewhere, is always used of the more venial errors, or trespasses, and is, therefore, unsuited to the greatness
and malignity of the sins here denotmced. It may be said, moreover, that X*n , with the plural third person pronoun
immediately preceding, is an nngrammatical anomaly. — T. L.]
[* Ver. 4. — D^bS-. ^ephilim. The derivation of this word from 5E3, to fall, cannot be sustained, either in the
sense of fallen (from heaven), or in that of invaders (eiriiri'iTTocTe?, those who fall on—irruentes). It is evii'.ently the
ancient name they took to themselves, and that would not be, in the beginning, a name either of degeneracy or reproach.
Itfl connection with nDE, X5Sj is much more clear and consistent. Compare the Niphal, Ps. cxxxis. 14, n3E3, and
n^sbsS (contracted cbs:); also Exod. xxxiii. 16, CSn bSTS r|13S1 ■':s !|3"'bB51, " and I and thy people shall be
distinguished above all people." "When it became a proper name, C^xbs: or C^bsS (JViphlim) would easily be changed
to D^5E3 (Nephilun), the shewa becoming movable in the frequent use. Thus viewed, we may regard the expression
at the end of the verse, ClSJn ^IIJDX » as the intended exegesis of the word itself — z^7Zj , distinguished men; D^X-E3,
wonderful men — men of name — vim of renown. Thnt the same name should have been given afterwards to gigantic
robbers, as in Numb. siii. 33, is very natural, whether regarded as applied from a tradition of these wonderful men of
old or from inherent fitness, "p "^nnx DV , and also afterwards— clenrly intimating that some of these Jfephilim,
or wondrous men of violence, had existed before this event, or frum of old (a tim<-- comparatively ancient, going b;ick to the
days of old Cain), and that after these mesalliances, whatever they may be, there was an increase of such persons. — T. L )
[* Ver. 6. — Cnl'i*. T.xy , ive&vfiriBjj; Vulg., Puenituit eum. The Syriac and Arabic make it the repentance of grief •
the Samaritan version strangely renders it nESTX, iraius fuit, he was ^«rcelt/ enraged, making it the repentance of
anger. Both the Targums say : '^'^ -H'' , and Jehovah repented, but qualify it by Pl'113'^^S following— that is, in hit
word, or by his word. "What they meant by this is not very clear, but it is one of the methods" they take of avoiding tht
Beeming anthropopathisms of the Old Testament, of which the Jewish translators, paraphrasts, and commentators, seem
to have been more afraid than the Christian. Farther, see Excgctical and Notes. — T. L.]
[• Ver. 6.— I3b bs 2S5n'" . The LXX. give no translation of this, or they have softened it into SitTO^e?). The
Targums also leave it out, and put in its place a mere paraphrastic repetition of what follows. Among the Jewish cont-
menlators Aben Ezra worthily calls attention to its contrast with the language Gen. 1. 31. It is the opposite, he say;,
of (zod's rejoicing in his works', now that evil has so grossly come in and marred it all. See Exegetical and Notes. — T. L 1
PRELraiNARY aUESTION, EXEGETICAL AND
THEOLOGICAL, RESPECTING THE SONS OF
GOD.*
The question, what kind of beings are we to
understand '.jy the Sons of God, has been answered
In different ways from the earliest times, and has
lately, again, given occasion to lively tlieological dis-
cu3sion.s. We give h?re, in the first place, the state-
ment of Kurtz, who has engaged in the question
with peculiar earnestness (History of the Old Cov-
enant, i. p. 30, ?,(l ed., 18fi4, and in a long Appen-
dix to vol. i., under the title: Die Kliender SUhnt:
Ootlet mil den Tochtern der ilenschm, Ueilin,
IS!)?). " In respect to the Bne Elohim, we find
three principal views : 1. they are Jitii mnr/na-
Uim puellan plebeian rapicntes ; 2. they are angels ;
S. tliey are the pious, that is, the Sethites, in con-
trast with whom the " daughters of men " denote
Caiintish women. The first view is found in the
Samaritan, .lonathan (Targum), Onkclos (Targuin),
Symmachus, Aben Ezra, Kaslii, Varenius, &e., and
* Thin Diuousnon has been somewhat abridged by the
rranslator.
may now be regarded as exploded. The second view
is most strongly represented in the old synagogue
and church. It would seem to have its ground in
the Septuagint. At least the manuscripts vary be-
tween I'l'oi Tof. Sifov and S77eAui Tnv Stfou. Very
decidedly, however, it is presented (and mythically
improved upon) in two old Apocryjihal books, name-
ly, the Book of Enoch, and the so-called Minor
Cienesis, of which Dillman in Ewald's Year liooko
has given a German translation derived from the
Elliiopic. It i.s, moreover, recognized in the ?4iis-
tle of Jude (vers. 6 and "i ?) and in the Second
Epistle of Peter (eh. ii. 4, 5 ?;. It was also presented
by Philo, .losiphiis, and most of the Rubbiiiieal
writers (Ei.senmenokk's " .Tudaism Revealed," i. p.
380), as well as by the oldest church fathers : .Iu3
tin, Clemens Alex., Tertullian, Cyprian, Anilirose
and Lactantius. Since then it fell gradually into
disfavor; Chrysostom, .Augustine, and Thuodoret
contended zeahiu.>^ly against it ; I'hilastrius de-
nounceil it as downright heresy, and our old church
theologians tiirneil from it almost witli abliorreuce.
i t found also in the synagogue veheijient opposem
CH^. VI. 1-8.
'^1
Rabbi Simeon Ben Jochai pronounced the ban
against all who adhered to it. In more modern
times it has been seized upon by all exegetes who
regard the early history of Genesis as mythical,
notwithstanding "which a decided uumber of com-
mentators who are believers in revelation have not
allowed themselves to be detetred from deciding in
its favor, — for example, KiippEN (" The Bible a Work
of Divine Wisdom," i. p. 104), Fr. von Meyer
(Bldlttrfiir holiere Wahrheit, xi. p. 61 ff.), Twesten
("Dogmatics," ii. 1, p. 332), Nitzsch ("System,"
p. 234 f.) Dreschler (Einheit der Genesis, p. 91),
HoFMANN ("Prophecy and Fulfilment," i. p. 8.5, and
" Scripture Proof," i. p. 374flf.), Batimgarten ("Com-
mentary on the Pentateuch," ad k. /.), Delitzsch
(Commenl. ad h. I.), Stier ("Epistle of Jude," p. 42
ff.), DiETLEiN (" Comment, on the Second Epistle of
Peter," p. 149 ff.), Luther (" Comment, on the Epis-
tles of Peter and Jude," pp. 204, 341). The third
view is found in Ohrysostom, Cyril Alex., Theodoret,
(on the special ground that Seth, on account of his
piety, acquired the name dtos, and that, therefore, his
descendants were named viol rov ^eoO). It was held
by almost all the later church theologians. In mod-
ern times it has been defended with special zeal by
Hengstenberg ("Contributions," ii. p. 328 ft'.), Ha-
VEH.NiK ("Introduction," i. 2, p. 26o), Dettinger
("Remarks on the Section, Gen. iv. 1-ch. vi. 8," in
the Tiibmgen Journal of Theology, 1836, No. 1), Keil
("Luther. Periodical," 1851, ii. p. 239), and many
others.
The preceding statement has been made complete
by KoRTz in his Book ("The Marriages of the Sons
of God,") BerUn, 1857, p. 12; as Ukewise by Keil
(p. SO) by the citation of the treatise of Hengsten-
berg (" The Sons of God and the Daughters of Men,")
in the Evangelical Church Gazette, 1858, No. 29, and
No. 35-37 ; in the exposition of Philippi (" Church
Doctrme of the Faith,") iii. p. 176 ii', and the con-
troversial writings of Kurtz that have appeared
against the treatises of Keil and Hengstenberg
(" The Marriiiges of the Sons of God with the Daugh-
ters of Men)," Berhn 1857, and "The Sons of God,"
in Gen. vi. 1-4, and the " Sinning Angels," in 2 Pet.
ii. 4, 5, and Jude, vers. 6, 7. Mitau, 1858. Engel-
hardt also takes the side of Kurtz (" Lutheran Period-
ical," 1856, p. 4ii4). DeUtzsch appears as the latest
defender of the angel hypothesis of any considerable
note (" Comment." 3d Ed., 1860, p. 230 ff.). Its
latest opponent of note since Keerl (" Questions on
the Apocrypha," p. 206), is Keil (" Comment,"
1861, p. 80 ft'.)
It is shown by Keil (p. 80) that the relation of
ovir passage to the Sethites had its defenders, both
among Jews and Christians, before the time of Chry-
Bostom ; since Joseplms knew of this interpretation,
and the critical Juhus Africanus maintained it in the
first half of the third century. So also did Ephraim
the Syrian, to which add, among the Apocryphal
writings, the Clementine Recognitions, and the ori-
ental Book of Adam.
We take first into view the section as it lies be-
fore us, with its connection and the analogies of the
Old Testament, then the relations to our passage of
the New Testament, farther on, the exegetical tradi-
tions, and finally, the religious-philosopliical, dog-
matic, and practical significance of the question.
The Place itself in question ; its Connection, and
the Analogies of the Old Testament. The Sons of
God. Bne Elohiin. According to the augel hypo-
thesis, angels alone are here to be understood, not-
withstanding that there is no mention of angels im-
mediately before this, to stand as its antecedent, bu<
only of the pious race of Sethites. Chap. 5 gives ui
an account of pious ^nen, of chosen men, of a won*
derfully glorified man of God ; but of angels, on tb<
contrary, there is not a word, even to tliis place, ex-
cept the mysterious language respecting the cheru-
bim, in which we cannot at all recognize any personal
angel-l'orms. The single apparent ground for a sup-
position, at first view wild and abrupt, is found in tha
fact, that in the later books of the Old Testament,
not the pious are called DTi'ixn ''33, but the an-
gels. It is, however, simply incorrect to say that
anywhere in the historical scriptures the angels are
called sons of God without anything farther ; only io
a few poetical places, and in one nominally prophetic
(Job i. 2 ; xxxviii. 7 ; Ps. xxix. 1 ; Ixxxix. 7 : Dan.
iii. 25) are they so called ; and then, too, beside the
poetical language, there comes into view the eluci-
dating context. In Job i. they form the council of
God represented as administering government (there-
fore not bne Elohim, as nomen naturw in distinction
from ilaleak, as nomen officii), and in fact in contrast
to Satan. In the same way in chap. ii. In chap,
xxxviii. 7, they hail the laying the foundation of the
earth and the creation of man. Ps. xxix. 1, they are
called upon to glorify the Lord in tlie thunder-storm,
and in the restoration of his people. Ps. Ixxxlx. 7,
are they thus denoted by way of contrasting their
dependent state with the glory of the Lord. Dan.
iii. 25 hardly belongs here, but is, perhaps, to be in-
terpreted according to chap. vii. 13. In respect to
this, Hengstenberg has already shown that tlie name
bne Elohim belongs to the poetic diction.
Whilst, therefore, in the pure historical pieces the
angels are never styled sons of God, there does ap-
pear the indication of a filial relation, or of a sonship,
in respect to the people of Israel, to the Old Testa-
ment kings, to the pious or dependent wards of God,
and that, too, in various ways, even in the legal
sphere. DeUtzsch remarks, that the idea of a filial
relation in the Old Testament had ah'eady begun to
win for itself a universal ethical significance beyond
the limitation to Israel (Ex. iv. 22 ; Dent. xiv. 1) — as
though this filial relation of the children of Israel,
under the law, were a real step in progress in respect
to Abraham and the Sethites. But the case is ex-
actly the other way. In the Epistle to the Galatians,
the patriarchal standpoint of belief in promise is a
higher one than that of the Mosaic legality (Gal. iii.
16). It is to be specially remarked in regard to
Kurtz, that he knew not how to distinguish the diff'er-
ent economies of the Old Testament. When, for ex-
ample, the Apostle Paul tells us, that the law was
given through the ministry of angels, he concludes
that the angel of the Lord that appeared to Abi-aham
must have been a creaturely angel (History of the
Old Testament, p. 152). And yet Paul brings for-
ward this character of the angelic mediation for the
express purpose of showing that the revelation of the
promise was a more essential, and, also, a higher
form than that of the law-giving ; it could not, there-
fore, have been in this sense (of Kurtz) that the law-
giving is referred to the mediation of angels. The
explanation consists m this, that the promise vae a
revelation for Abraham, and, generally, for the elect
patriarchs, whilst the law-gi^■ing, on the other hand,
was for a whole people mingled and coarse, or at all
events, greatly needing an edticating culture. But
as the patriarchal economy, in respect to its rehtioiv
282
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MuSES
ehip to the form of the Gospel, had a superiority to
the form of the law-giving, and in so far appears Ulie
to the New Testament, so again had the economy of
the Sethites a superiority to the Abraliamic. The
epecitic distinction is the separation between the line
of the pious, and the godless, curse-loaded line of
Cain. Therefore it is that that peculiar designation
of Enoch's piety: "he walked with God," never oc-
curs again in the later law-tunes of the Old Testa-
ment. In a word, the Sethic economy is a ana^ Keya-
lifyoi' in the Old Testament, which has been funda-
mentally mistaken by the contenders for the angel
hypothesis. It has a prefiguration of the New Tes-
tament state, and acknowledges, therefore, the viol
deov, or sons of God, as is done in the New Testament
in our Lord's sermon on the mount. If the objection
is made, that the redemption is not yet perfectly in-
troduced, it is to be remarked, that the faith in re-
demption, in the thne after Christ, is not to be meas-
ured, in its degrees, by the chronological advance;
as is shown in the examples of Enoch and Abraham.
Luther, moreover, knew better how to estimate the
worth of this singularity in the economy of the long
living so greatly exalted througli the blessing of Seth,
and who reflected in their life the end of time : " They
are the greatest heroes that, next to Christ and John
the Baptist, ever appeared in this world, and at the
last day we shall behold their majesty." Since, there-
fore, even the law-period, notwithstanding Israel's
servant-relation, did not exclude the idea of Israel's
Bonship generally, or of the beheving especially, (as
the places Deut. xxxii. 5 ; Hos. ii. 1 (therefore not
poetical) and Ps. Ixxiii. 15 show to us, how much
more clearly must this idea have appeared, in its
typical significance and beauty, among the pious de-
acendants of Seth. In that case it has been said,
they ought to have been called bne Jehovah (instead
of bne Elohim) ; but this is not to keep clearly in
view, that the Sethites represented the universal re-
lation of humanity to God, and that tliey, like Mel-
chizedek at a later time, disappeared from the stage.
That the angels, however, in a physical oense, as
opposed to an ethical sense, could be called sons of
God. — that is, could be referred to some generation
of a physical kind, is a view that has been rightly de-
nounced by Keil (p. 11). And in this way, for the
unprejudiced, the matter might seem tolerably well
disposeil of But further on it occurs as a thing to
be considered, that the sons of God woo the daughters
of men. How, it is asked, when it is said in its gen-
eral sense (ver. 2) that men multiplied themselves,
can we limit the expression daughters of men, ver. 2,
to the daughter's of the Cairrites ? We cannot here
rest upon the usual mode of stating this. There is
no reason why the sons of God should have forrnd a
tempting beauty only among the daughters of the
C'aiirites. The daughter's of men may, in the fir'st
place, be women in general. In that case, however,
the first contrast would coirsist in regarding the ethi-
cally d'-fined sons of God as opposed to rhe physic-
ally di'firred daughters of merr, — among whom the
Cirinitic women might be pr'imarily understood, espe-
tially since the Sethite wonrerr too belong to the
children of (iod. Their hist Irarr.sgr'ession, however,
worrld cori8i>t Lq this, that in the choice of wives they
let th<:rnaelvett be deter'rnirred by the mere charm oi'
sensual beauty. Krorn this follows the eecornl trans-
gression, that they took them wives of all wlrora they
chose, that is, of all that pleased them. Orr the word
33TS, therefore, rests the emphasis of the exjiression
(out of all). Instead of lookirrg at the spiritrrtd kiris-
manship, they had an eye only to the pleasure of
sense. That was the first thing. Then there il
nothing said here of any mor-al satisfaction in beauty
This appears from the fact that they took ihens
wives of all that pleased them, of all that tlrev de-
sired. Instead of holding pur'e the Sethic line, they
took wives indiscriminately (^S'?), and that was tha
second and decisive transgression. Bj this was the
dam torn down which stood between the Cainites and
the Sethites, — that is, the dam wlrich kept b.ack th«
universal corruption, and which hitlrerto had pro
tected the race of the blessing. Therefore is it, ver.
3, that the corruption which now comes is charged
upon men, and not at all upon the angels. If we
look for a nroment at the angel hypothesis, it is not
easy to see how such amorrrs with individual women
could have had so decided an effect upon the destiny
of the whole race, at a time, too, when nrore than
now, men formed the deciding factor ; and this may
we say, without taking into view the fret, that in the
historical style angels are never called bne Elohim,
that angels do not seek nor are sought in marriage
(Matt. xxii. 30), and that the expression: "take
themselves wives," denotes marriage-ties, not by way
of unnatural amours, or romantic loves, as Kurtz
pictures it in his first treatise (p. 99). But indeed,
out of those demoniacal, fleshly amours, it is said,
must have proceeded the C'S? and n^T3S, and thus
they would bring the whole matter to a decision. In
the first place, however, must we remember, that the
sentence of God respecting the desperate condition
of the race (ver. 3) precedes this mention of the N©.
plrilim, and it is clear that the D"'bB3 must already de-
note a special form of the evil, which, with its fleshly
lust, stands at the same time in a position of recipro-
city. According to almost ail inter'j)retatiorrs, and
according to Numb. xiii. 33, " when the giant Ana-
kim are reckoned among them," the Nephilim were
gigantic, — or', more accurately, the distinguished, the
prominent or over'powering. According to such it is
from bsj , a near form to sbs ; other derivations see
below. In their bodily appearance the Nephilim
were not exactly what are called giants in the mythi-
cal sense, but prominent and powerful forms of men.
In strength, in courage, or pride, they were Gibhorim,
that is, mighty men, heroes ; in deeds, they were men
of renown ; but their deeds were especially deeds of
vioknce Oon (w. 11, 13), unrighteousness, and op-
pression. The meaning is, that tire fleshly nature
of pr'ide and cruelty ever associates itself with the
fleshly disorder of lust. Lamech the Cainite and his
sorrg were now the genera! type of the human race.
But as the tendency to violence came in cotempo-
laireously with the lust, and not as a gern'ration for
the fir'st time descending from it, so were the Nephi-
lim cotemporarreous with these fleshly mesirlliances,
having been, irr fiet, from the days o( Cain hitlrerto
•'men of renown." The Hebrew is ITI , not ITI'I ;
there were Nephilim, it is said, cnn D-Q'^a, in
tlrcrse same days, not thire became or came to be, aa
Krroliel trarrslates it. Add to this the oH'spring of the
soirs of God and thi' daughters of irren, that is, of the
grossly sensual marriages of the piou.s, and their
rrrirrgling with the (Jairritic race. Thus flow together
two origins of the Gibborim. In respect to the first
were they nrcn of renown, or men of old, cb'iya —
that is, the Cainites. Thus, too. In the easiest way
does our scctiorr corrnect itself with both the preced-
ing chapters, lu the fourth chapter there is described
CHAP. VI. 1-8.
283
the line of the Cainites as still divided from the line
of Seth ; in the fifth chapter we have tlie line of the
Sethites in its devotedness and elevation ; then, final-
ly, in the section before us, the mingliu;; of both lines,
and the universality and flagitiousness of corruption,
as, according to the programme of the Cainitic La-
mech, it cuhninates in the two fundamental features
of carnality and cruelty. Whoever reads Genesis, to
the passage before us, without any prejudice derived
from opinions alien to it, would never thinli of under-
standing by the bne Elohim anything else than the
pious Sethites, and by their connection with the
daugliters of men anything else than a corruption of
marriage and a mingling with the Cainites. Tliis
would especially appear fi'om the fact, that in this
section the sharp contrast between the two lines,
which is so prominent in the previous chapter, wholly
disappears. If we read further we find, too, that not
the Cainites alone perished in the flood, but both
lines together, with the exception of Noah and his
house. Further on, Ishmael, who is a "wild man,"
and whose "haud is against every man," appears as
the offspring of Abraham and " the maid," a copy, as
it were, giving us a clear idea of the Gibborim, and of
the way in which they originated, although the con-
nection of the patriarch was from a purer motive,
and more excusable. Hence the traditional and legal
abhorrence of untheocratic marriages in the theo-
cratic race; as we find it in Gen. xxiv. 3; xxvi. 34,
85 ; xxvii in ; xxxiv. 9 ; Deut. vii. 3 ; Josh, xxiii.
12 ; Judg. ili. 6 ; 1 Kings xi. 1 ; Ezra ix. 2 ; Nehem.
X. 30. The faUing away of the Israelites in the des-
ert came not from any amour between angels and the
daughters of men, but from an unlawful intercourse
between the Israehtes and the women of Midian
{Numb. XXV.). So the apostasies of Israel in the
time of the Judges were derived from the mingling
of tile Israelites with the daughters of the Canaan-
ites (Judg. iii. 6). The fall of Solomon, and the fall-
ing away of the people that followed it, came from
Solomon's connection with foreign wives (1 Kings
xi. 1 ). So the ten tribes sunk into the worship of
Baal in consequence of the connection of Ahab with
the Sdonian Jezebel, whose horrible significance goes
on even to the Apocalypse (1 Kings xvi. 31 ; Rev. ii.
20) ; and so, too, Ezra and Nehemiah, after the great
visitation, know no other way to secure their people
against a new degeneracy, than by contending earn-
estly against foieifrn marriages. Thus again and
again cio the theocratic mesalliances of one section
reflect themselves in the Israelitish history, without
the angels playing any part therein. For the first
time, in the apocryphal Tobit (Tob. vi. 15), does
there meet us a demoniac interest in human females,
and tills is characteristic for the origin of the angel-
hypoihesis. Here, too, it must be rem,arked, that
marriage with the heathen was nut absolutely forbid-
den to the Israehtes. When the principle was se-
cured, that the believing party might make holy the
unbeUeving(l Cor. vii.), such marriages appear some-
times even in a favorable light. It was only union
with the Canaauites that was absolutely forbidden,
since they, as well as the Cainites, were sunk in in-
curable corruption; and Hengstenberg has rightly
supposed that our history here was given for the pur-
pose of warning the Israelites against such marriages,
i TTie relatione of the New Testament to the
mstage before us. There is the passage of the
Epistle of Jude, ver. 6, which, in fact, we regard as
the original in its relation to the kindred pass.ige,
2 Peter ii. 4. He'e, too. Kurtz reasons from tlie
mode of speaking, but not happily: "Both epistlei
designate the actors who are punished as simpl)
&-yyf\oi. ^Vheu we interrogate the biblical style of
speech it shows us at once that this word is nevei
thus nakedly used of spirits if i-pxV '"^'^ have
fallen. These are ever called SoiVortr, and theii
head Sii£u\os or narafat." We will give presentlj
the simple solution of this objected difficulty
Wherever there is mention of the actual existenci
of Satan's kingdom it is naturally and generally of
Satan, of the demons, etc., although variations occur,
as Eph. vi. 12^ et al. Heie, however, when tha
original fall itself of the demons is mentioned, they
must be denoted according to their original state as
angels. Otherwise it would mean that the devil had
sinned, and thereby became a devil. In that case
our catechisms would have to be corrected where
they speak of fallen ajigels. When it is said, how-
ever, that there is here no special mention of Satan,
or that the sins of the angels cannot be particularly
described, or that the fall of Satan is nowhere desig-
nated as a leaving his habitation, all such assertions
we must hold as having no significance at all.
Tile Epistle of Jude is a prophetical word of warn-
ing against the beginning of antinomianism. Here
the Israelites who fell in the wilderness are the first
example. In respect to these it is confessed that
they did not fall in the wilderness merely on account
of sins of sensuality. Then are there named tha
angels who kept not their dominion {o.pxv) but for-
sook their own proper habitation — that is, their
sphere of life. The contrast iu the guilt of these
angels is made clear by that which precedes. The
Jews in the wilderness kept not their salvation, but
gave themselves up to unbelief and fell. The angela
kept not their dominion, but lost their station and
fell. To this corresponds the third example : Sodom
and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities are pre-
sented in a similar manner with these (thutois), that
is, the angels and the Israelites, as an example of such
as are exposed to the judgment of the eternal fire,
and this on the special ground of their excessive
sensuality, and their degenerate going after strange
flesh. The words ouotuc Tpon-or ro^'noi^ stand in re-
laticm to irpd^tivTai Seiyua, and the parenthetical
fKJTopv€viTa(Ta has its special interpretation as refer-
ring to the Sodomites. The Israehtes in the wilder-
ness furnish an example of a lost condition, as yaJj
TrttTTeutrai/re^, the angels as ,u7j r^)^)^)(Tav^fSy &c.,
Sodom and Gomorrah as eKTropvdiTaaai, &c. The
forms of antinomianism are different, the judgment
upon it is throughout the same. The distinction,
however, in antinomianism is this, that the Israelites
sinned through unbehef in the word of revelation ;
the angels sinned against the divine ordinance,
assigning their position, and in striving, beyond
their spliere, after a limitless dominion ; the Sodom-
ites sinned against the natural law of the sexual
relations, estabhshed as a moral foundation of life
itself The antinomists, against whom Jude con-
tended, resemble the before-named in this, that like
the Sodomites they pollute the flesh ; like the fallen
angels they contemn authority ; like the unbeUeving
Israelites they speak evil of 5(J|ay, glories (rendered
dignities — visible proofs cf the revelation of God in
Israel). So, too, iu the second chapter of the
second Epistle of Peter, the ground-idea is the inex-
orability of the divine judgment against an obdurata
auomism, without giving the special form of that ano-
mism. Of the angels it is merely said that they sinned.
Goil .-spared thein not although they were auaeU
284
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
And 80 he spared not the whole old world (Gen. vi.),
on whom there is here no other charge imputed
than aafSaa (impiety). So, too, Sodom and Gomor-
rah are here denoted as having incurred judgnjent
solely under the same point of view. Clearly, how-
ever, has the second Epistle of Peter distinguished.
In addition, the judgment of the fallen angels from
the judgment upon the old world (Gen. tI.). The
judgment agamst the angels, the judgment against
file old world, and the judgment upon Sodom, are
three judgment periods. And these places, it is pre-
tended, exactly conlirm the angel-hypothesis ! Com-
pare also Fronmiiller on the respective places, in the
Bible-work.
3. The exegetical tradition. The first interpreta-
tion, in which the bne Elohim were sons of the
magnates, or great ones, who wooed the daughters
of the low-born, Keil denotes as the interpretation
of orthodox Judaism. More correctly, however,
may it be denoted as the interpretation of tlie
Hebraistic or Palestinian Judaism, in its dry story-
telling tendency as represented in the Talmud. The
Becond interpretation Keil righdy describes as that
of the ethnizing, cabbalistical Judaism; however
zealous Kurtz may be on its behalf (Part i. p. 8).
It is not without significance that the first trace of
this interpretation appears in single codices of the
Septuagint. It is sufficiently acknowledged that the
Alexandrian Jews took pains in every way to throw
a bridge between the Old Testament and the Greek
tradition. Here now appears a fair probable
occasion to introduce into the biblical text an
analogous story of Sons of God and of divine beget-
tings. Thereupon present themselves two apocry-
pliid books as the first defenders of the angel-hypo-
thesis : the Book of Enoch and the Lesser Genesi-:.
Without doubt Philo tbund it already in existence,
and it suited entirely well with his system ; whilst it
is acknowledged, too, by the more hebraislic Jo-
eeplms. That Christian theologians of the Alexan-
drian school, like Clemens Alexandrinus, uncritical
fathers like TertuUian, Cyprian, Ambrose, should
find the angel-hypothesis suited to their peculiar
notions, is nothing to be wondered at. The fact that
from the font th even to the eighteenth century, with
some isolated exceptions, the taste of the church
discovered in the angel-hypothesis a suspicious theo-
sophic savor, cannot be set aside.
4. The reli</iou.t^ philosophical, doffmaiir^ a7id
practical Hignificance of mir ijuestion. In its rela-
tion to the iiliilosophy of religion the angel-hypothe-
sis would have the effect of confounding all the
ground conceptions uf revelation, and of obliterating
its distinctions. It authenticates a fact which per-
fectly destroys all distinction between revelation and
mythology, between a divine miracle and magic,
between the biblical conception of nature, as C(iii-
fomiity to law, am! the wild apocryphal slurics.
" We stand here," says Delitzsch, " at the fuuiitain
of heathen mythology with its legends, Imt this
primitive golileii age, to take it in the sense of
neathcnism, is divested of all its a]iotheosiziiig
gaudiness." Rather may it be said, if we take that
view, that an evident myth was implanted in the
garden of the primitive religious history; it is tlierc-
foie not to be wondered at, thiit all theologians who
maint-'iin the mythical character of Genesis, like
Rnobel for cxainple, shoidd go in most earnestly
for the angel-interpretation. "And no les.s," adds
DelitZKch, "do wc stand here at the fountain of a
dark magic that cariiea us back, ii' not to a sexual,
yet still to an unnatural intercourse with the de
mons." We stand rather by the troubled waters of
a paganistic apocryphal superstition, where the siren
of an apparent theosophic profundity would allure ua
to plunge into the dark floods of " baseless para-
dox." With what sort of superstitiun this angel-
interpretation had already connected itself in early
times we may learn from the twenty-second chapter
of Tertullian's Apologetic. When we regard it in
its dogmatic relation we find the must wonderful
things proceeding from the view in question when
fully carried out. There would be a double fall
into sill, one in the human, the other in the angelic,
family.
The effects of the second fall must be destroyed
by a flood, whilst those of the first remain through
and after it. The gnosticizing darkening of this
place has for a consequence that there should be
gradually drawn from it series after series of similar
deductions, according to the tenor of its biblical dog-
matic process of idealless, anecdotical inventiveness ;
for example, what is said on the passage (1 Peter
iii. 19, 20) respecting Christ's preaching to the spirits
in prison.
Instead of this, we hold that the derivation of the
angel-iuterpretation from an ethnizing, apocryphal,
gnostico-cabbalistical tendency in Judaism (as we
find it show'n in Keil) is the correct one. We hold,
too, that Hengstenberg had grounds for the affirma-
tion, when he said : The next thing is, that in the
maintaining of this supposed remarkable fact, men
are led into uncouth theories, which violate the limits
that separate the church's theology from the chimer-
ical ideas of Jews and Mohammedans, and that one
such distortion of a sound theological comprehen-
sion may possibly have for its consequence an exten-
sive process of tjisorder. In Uke manner does the
objection appear well grounded, that the angel-inter-
pretation robs our narrative of all significance and
practical applicabiUty. The same practical signifi
cance which is exhibited in the history of the Israel-
ites in the wihierness (Xumb. xxv.), and in the time
of the Judges in the history of Solomon, in the
history also of Ahab, in the history of Herod Anti-
pas — that same significance, though in a more pow-
erful and original way, is presented in the history
that lies before us. We may, therefore, with Cyril
of Alexandria, reckon the angel-interpretation among
the aToiriiToTa, things most strange and absurd.
EXEGETICAl, AXD CEITICAL.
1. Vers. 1-3. When men began. — The increase
of men under a physical point of view ; especially,
too, an increase of daughters. — The Sons of God,
that is, the Sethites esp.-cially, as sous of Elohim,
not of Jehovah, because their relation to tJod was
more universal than that of the latei- theociacy, and
because the Sethie religion had no contrast of the
Elohistic, as the later Abrahamic had, since the
opposing Cainitie line was not Einhisiicaliy pious,
but lived an utterly lawless life. — The daughters
of men. — Usually taken as the daughters ol the
other race, that is, the Cainilis. Hut they are the
daughters of men wholly iu the physical sense, and
therefore, too, according to the cone. ;pi ion of the
natural man, in contrast with the sons of (Jod in the
ethical sense, only that the thought is mainly iipoa
the Cainites, in proportion to their greater muIti|iU-
cation. — Saw that they were fair [Lange's ti.ia*
CHAP. VI. 1-8
281
lation : They looked upon them, how fair they
were]. — We must not reduce the force of the ex-
pression by rendernig: "they saw that they were
fan-." The sensual beauty captivated them. — Took
them wives of all. — The phrase nES npb means,
everywhere in the Old Testament, to talie in mar-
riage, but never occurs in the sense of mere soorta-
tory intermarryings (from wliich also we must dis-
tinguish the sense, to take as concubines). — Which
they chose. — The emphasis is on bsr (of all).
From this it follows that the sons of God let them-
selves be determined by the charm of sense to form
connections also with the Cainite women, and so to
rend asunder the protecting limits which hitherto
had guarded their race from the corruptive conta-
gion. Moreover, the prevalence of polygamy i.s
clearly presented in the expression. — My Spirit
shall not alvrays strive vrith man. — We cannot
understand nil here of the Spirit of God as the
spirit of life, but of the Spirit of God in an ethical
sense, as it belongs to its office to judge and to
punish sinful men. Von Gerlach says, indeed : " the
contrast of spirit and flesh in the moral understand-
ing, as in the Epistles of Paul, does not occur in ihe
Old Testament." But, what is meant here by say-
ing, my spirit shall not tarry in man as spirit of life,
for he ii feshf The flesh as flesh does not hinder
the life-spirit, but the flesh as corruption repels the
Spirit of God (Ps. cxxxix. 7 ; cxUii. 10). We take
^iT^ here in its simplest and most obvious sense,
not as the ruling of the life-spirit, nor as the con-
tinuance of the same in man (Septuagint), nor as its
degradation or depression. In the sinner who is yet
capable of salvation the Spirit of God exercises its
judicial office. But, when man has become wholly
obdurate, God withdraws from him his judging
spirit, and thereby he falls into the condemnation
of corruption. The circumstance is here inciden-
tally introduced. This is shown by the addition,
CStra , in their erring (which, without any necessity,
is turned into a conjunction: B5 "CXS, eo quod;
Knobel and Delitzsch), and the emphatic expression :
he isjlesh, that is, the whole species, like cue man,
is sunk in its flesh. Still, there is the expression :
" My spirit shall not aiwai/s strive in him ; " which
means that there is yet a respite appointed for the
race, and this is explained by, and explains, what
follows ; And his dai/s shall be an hundred and
twenty yeart. According to Philo, Josephus, and
others, along with Knobel, it means that henceforth
the period of human life shall be re<luced to one
hundred and twenty years. (See in Knobel a series
of quotations from the views of the ancients respect-
ing the life-endurance of man, p. 83). According
to the Targums, Luther, and many others, as well as
Delitzsch and Keil, (iod appoints a reprieve of grace
for one hundred and twenty years, which is yet to
be granted to men. Beyond a doubt this is the cor-
rect view ; since the age of the first patriarchs after
the flood extends much beyond one hundred and
twenty years. Another reason is, that the supposed
shortening of life would be no countervailing rule
bearing a proportion to the obduracy of the race,
whilst the time-reckoning agrees with the other
hypothesis, if we assume that Noah received this
revelation twenty years before the time given, ch. v.
82, in order that he might announce it as a threaten-
ing of judgment to his cotemporaries.
[Note ok the Spirit and the Flesh : Gen. vi. 3.
— The various interpretations of "Tll'i here must b»
tested by their harmony with words in thi? context
" The life that 1 have given shall not always rule (of
abide) in man." This does not seem tv^ cuit well
with cbiyb. Shall not long rule, &c., would hav«
been consistent. The word forever makes it th€
same with the original sentence of death pronounced
upon man: he shall not live forever — he shall die.
''-)/(/ spirit shall not strive with man" (morally)
makes a good sense in itself, but has httle congruity
with the reason given: "because he is flesh," or if
inchned to the flesh, whether we take the old or the
later interpretation of Daw3. That alone would
seem to be a reason why it should continue to strive;
since man had been flesh, or inclined to be flesh,
ever since the fall. Unless we take it, as Pareui
do&s, as denoting a feeling of hopelessness, ratio ab
inutili : it is of no use ; but this would be a form
of the anthropopathism the least acceptable of all
that are presented; unless it be that of some
of the Jewish interpreters: "My own mind, or
thought, shall no longer be occupied or troubled
with him " — 1 will have no more care about him.
Tliere is another view that may be offered, and
which would seem to harmonize these difficulties.
Some of the Jewish interpreters approach it, but do
not come fully up to it. " My spirit," meaning
man's spirit (the spirit that 1 have given him), but
in the higher sense of irceCwa as distinguished fiom
^vx■i^, according to the trichotomic view. The reason,
wherein appears the image of God, the spirit in man
as something higher than the animal nature, the
(pfj6vqfj.a TTi'fvfj.aros as distinguished from the tppurrj^a
(TapKcis, may, with a high propriety, be called " my
spirit," as nearest to the divine, or, that in mau
through which, or in which, the Holy Spirit strives,
or comes in connection with the human. It is not
always easy, even in the New Testament, to deter-
mine whether Trireifia, in certain passages, means the
rational spirit of man, or the Spirit of God, or both
in one joint communion. Von Gerlach has no right
to say that " the contrast of spirit and flesh in the
moral imderstanding, as in the Epistles of Paul, does
not occur in the Cdd Testament," unless it can be
shown that this is not a clear case of it.
When m-i is thus regarded as the spiritual, a
rationnl, in man, in distinction from the carnal, th»
sentence becomes a prediction, instead of a declara-
tion of judgment — a sorrowing prediction, we may
say, if we keep in view the predominant aspect or
feeling of the passage. The spirit, the reason, that
which is most divine in man, mill not always rule in
him. It has, as yet, maintained a feeble power, and
interposed a feeble resistance, but it is in danger of
being wholly overpowered. It will not hold out
forever; it will not always maintain its supremacy.
And then the reason given suits exactly with such a
prediction : He is becoming flesh, wholly carnal or
animal. If allowed to continue he will become
utterly dehumanized, or that worst of all cr«atures,
an auimal with a reason, but wholly fleshly in ita
ends and exercises, or with a reason which is but the
servant of the flesh, making tim worse than the
most ferocious wild beast — a very demon — a brutal
nature with a fiend's subtlety only employed to
gratify such brutaUty. Man has the supernatural,
and this makes the awful peril of his state. By
losing it, or rather by its becoming degraded to be
a servant instead of a lord, he falls wholly into
nature, where he cannot remain stationary, like tht
es6
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
•iiimal who does not "leave the habitation to which
ciod first appointed him/' The higlier being, thus
attpilv fallen, must sink into the demonic, where
evil becomes his god, if not, as Milton says, his
good. In this sense of the reai^on m man,, or the
<f>p6iriiua. TrreuuttTos, ruling over the flesh, there is a
most appropriate significance in "n^ , as denoting
the judicial power of the conscience, or of the
reason as the imperative, the commanding faculty.
On these deeper aspects of humanity, consult that
most profound psychologist, John Bunyan, in his
Holy War, or his History of tlie Town of Mansoul,
its revolt from King Shaddai, its surrender to Dia-
bolus, and its recovery by Prince Imnianuel. Bun-
yan was Bible-taught in these matters, and that is
the reason why his knowledge of man goes so far
beyond that of Locke, or Kant, or Cousin.
The whole aspect of the passage gives the im-
pression of something like an apprehension that a
great change was coming over the race — something
so awful and so irreparable, if not speedily remedied,
that it would be better that it should be blotted out
of earthly existence, all but a remnant in whom the
spiritual, or the divine in man, might yet be pre-
served. Thus regarded, too, as a prediction, it is
the ground of the judgment rather than a sentence
of judgment itself. It is in mercy to prevent a
greater catastrophe ; like the language used In re-
ference to the tree of life (see page 241, and note).
Men, left to themselves, might have realized upon
earth tlie irrecoverable state of lost spirits, or that
combination of the brutal with an utterly degraded
reason that makes the demon. In this view, too,
the divine sorrow appears heightened in such a way
that we can better understand what is meant by
God's " grieving," and being " pamed in heart." A
generation of men is to be removed to prevent the
utter deliumanizing of the race. It was this neces-
sity that made the intensity of the sorrow.
Delitzsch has a similar view, but it is strange
that he did not see how it is in conflict with his
angel-hypothesis. According to that, the deangel-
izing, if we may use the term, and the consequent
dehumanizing, was confined to these higher beings
and some of the daughters of men. And yet they
are not mentioned as having any part in the catas-
trophe, or in the intmediate evil that occasioned it.
Men alone are involved in it, and they because of
an excessive sensuality that had made it inevitable.
This, however, was purely human ; it was man that
was in danger of becoming wholly flesh, and it was
man lor wl)om Goil grieved with a divine sorrow.
It was man who was in danger of descending into a
lower grade of being, even as the ante-Adamic
angels who kept not their first estate. The antedi-
luvians were drowned lor the salvation of a race,
but for some of them, at least, 1 Pet. iii. 19, 20,
gives us the glimpse of a hope that their condition
wa'' not wholly Irrecoverable. — T. L.]
2. Ver. 4. There were giants The n^bsr ,
from b"E: , used only in the pluial, .Numb. xiii. 33.
All the old intrrpretaiions take the word as denoting
giants, 7i7ai'Tn. If we put out of view the mon-
strous popular representations, there are simply
meant by it stalely and powerful men. In this
■eniie Tuch explains the word as mentioned before,
namely, t/ie dixlinf/uis/ted. Keil understands by
the word, invaders, according to A(|uila {eiriwln-
ro^-TJi), ,Kyminai-hus (/3ioioi), Luther (tyrants). De-
Br7>ft''h, nevprtboloww, totiether with ilolniinin, pre-
fers to explain it as the fallen, namely, from heaven,
because begotten by heavenly beings. Here from
to fall, would he make to fall from, and from thii
again, to full from heaven ; then this is maik to
mean begotten ofhenve.nln beingx 1 The sense, caden-
tex, deftctores, apostatw (see Geseuius), would b«
more near the truth. "There «'«•<■ giants " (siTl'*,
not, there became giants, which wonUI have re-
quired flTl'l for its expression (see Keil). These
giants, or powerful men, are alreaily in near eotem-
poraneity with the transgression of these mesalliancea
(in those very same days), and this warrants the con-
clusion of Luther, that these powerful men were
doers of violent deeds. — And also after that
[Lange renders: and especially after that]. —
Keil shows that Kurtz makes trial of three mutually
inconsistent explanations of this verse, all of which,
too, ofl'end against the law of language (p. 89, note).
We take C5 as denoting a climax to the fact already
stated. "There were giants in those days, and
moreover,^^ etc. Here it comes nearly to the same
thing, whether we render ^fs ^""'nnx postea-
quam (2 Sam. xxiv. 10) or postea quum ; the fact
remains established that the Nephilim were already
before the mesalliances. — Came in unto: an euphe-
mistic phrase. — Mighty men [Lange renders it he-
roes]. — A designation, not merely of oifspring from
the mismarriages, but referring also to the Nephilim
who are earlier introduced, as it ap[)ears from the ap-
pended clause. The author reports things from his
own standpoint, and so the expression: "tliey irere
of old, men of renown," affirms their previous exist-
ence down to that time. Of these men of old, men
of renown, Cain was the first. But now there are
added to the Cainites the Cainitic degenerate ofif-
spring of these sensual mesalliances. It was true
then, as it has been in all other periods of the
world's history, the men of violent deeds were the
men of renown, very much the same whether called
famous or infamous. Knobel will have it that there
are described here postdiluvian races of giants.
3. Vers. 5-8. And God sawr [Lange correct-
'ly: And Jehovah saw]. — This increase and uni-
versal predonjinance of evil through the mismarriages
gives occasion now for a more decided sentence of
Jehovah upon the incurably lost race. The wicked-
ness of man in deeds had not only become great, but
the thinkinfls of the purposes (the phantasies or
imaged deeds) of his heart, were wholly evil all the
day. Judging from the singular •^33 , we hold here,
as intended, a concentration of the sentence against
man. For this reason is it singular.
[Note on the Doctrine of Total Dkpraviti.
Gen. vi. 5. — Every imagination of the thoughts of hig
heart, lab nactl-a ns;; b3. The Scriptures, it ia
said, were not given to teach us mental philosophy,
nor do they atfcct a philosophical language, but here
is certainly a psychological scala going down as deep-
ly into the human soul as was ever done by any
scholastic treatise. Here are the three stages of the
great original evil : the fashioned pmrpose, the thmight
out of which it is born, the feeling, or deep mother
}ieart, the state of soul, lying below all, and givino
moral character to all. Cir, to reverse the ortler of
the statement, there is, 1 the tuhu vabuhu, the
formless abyss of evil, 2. the thought (the fii'm-j, sec
Ueb. iv. I'i), by wliieli this rises into generic form,
8. the imaged or .v/KcJ/iV purpose (fr3i/i»iiu>), llirougli
which, again, this thoujjht makes itself mmifest ii
CHAP. VI. 1-8.
281
the objective sphere of the active life. In other
words, as the thought is the /onn of the /tt'/t.-i^, so is
the shaped ■pnvpoie^ or what is here called the imagin-
ation, the form of the evil thouglU. Our Saviour
gives the same gradations, Matt. xv. 19 : " Oui of the
heart proceed evil thoughts " (5iaAo7i(r^ol iroyTj/jii!, evil
thinkings, reasonings, subjective, not yet shaped into
outward intent), and then follows the awful brood of
the later born, (povot^ ^otxf'at, /cAoiral, &\a'rfpT}uiai,
•'murders, adulteries, thefts, blasphemies." They
are all in the thought ; they are all in the mother-
fleart, that deep seat of moral character that lies be-
low the formative consciousness — that is, the con-
scious thought and still more conscious purpose.
Take the worst one apparently of these hideous
births ; a man may not have formed the purpose of
murder, fear may have kept him from this extreme
stage ; he may never have entertained the thought
consciou.«ly, the habitual educating power of law, or
other inHuences of a social or of a gracious kind,
may have prevented eveu this objective form of evil
from rising in his soul ; but it may lie in his heart
nevertheless, and even be active there, for this dark
place is not a mere blank capacity, or receptacle,
but has its processes, its choosings, its willings, and
even its unconscious reasonings. Our Saviour de-
clares neither more nor less than this when he makes
it the procreative source of evil thoughts {bia\oyiirnoi),
and so does the Apostle, 1 John iii. 15 : "Whoso-
ever hateth his brother is a murderer." This idea
of the unconscious heart, as underlying all moral
character, is deeply grounded in the Hebrew lan-
guage. Hence the peculiar expression lb bs nil" .
to ascend, come up, in the heart, or above the heart.
See Jer. iii. 16 ; 2 Sam. xi. 20, with other places.
One of the most striking is in Ezek. xi. 6 : " Thus
shall ye say to the house of Israel, osH^i nbsa
rrriST^ ■'IN , the upgoings of your spirit, I know
every one of them," — implying how deeply unknown
they might be in their source, even to those who were
the subjects of them.
Cl'n bs SH pn : Only evil, nothing but evil,
all tlie dag — every day, and every moment of every
day. If this is not total d/ipravity, how can language
express it? There is an intense aversion to the
phrase in some minds. It is shared by many who
would admit that human depravity is taught in the
Bible, and that it is great. This term, however, of
our older and more exact theologians, shocks them.
The feeling comes, in some measure, from a misap-
prehension of its true meaning. It is a term of ex-
tensity, rather than of intensi'y. It is opposed to
partial, to the idea that man is sinfnl in one moment,
and innocent, or sinless, in another, or sinful in some
acts and pure in others. It affirms that he is all
wrong, in all things, and all tlie time. It does not
mean that man is as bad as the devils, or that every
man is as bad as every other, or that any man is as
bad as he possibly may be, or may become. That is,
there are degrees of intensity, lint no limit to the
iiniveraaliiy orfxfcfKof the evil in tlie soul. So say
I he Scriptures, and so says the awakened conscience.
There seems to be an allusion to the psychologi-
cal division of Gen. vi. 5, in Heb. iv. 12. The extent
and depili of human sinfulness are kept from the ob-
jective consciousness by the ignorance or d< niul of
the threefold distinction here conveyed — the pur-
poses, the thoughts, and the heart. According to
the Apostle, it is the office of " the Uving word
(A \6yos ^ttiv Kcu iy^pyriSyViuid an/l inworkiiigX sharp-
er than a two-edged sword, and piercing even to tht
dividing (the division line) of soul and spirit " (nvdifia
and if'i'xi;) to make these distinctions, and bring them
home to the human conscience. Hence it is called
KpiTiKfis (y^VfjLT}ae(vtf Kal ivvoiuiv Kaf-Sias — ** a critical
discerner (and cxposer) of the purposes and tht think-
iugs <_)( tha heart.^^ In this language ftf^vnTjnt^ corre-
sponds locally to "i3|^ , and en-oiai to n"3irriB . The
terms are no mere redundant tautology, any more
than those used above for soul and spirit. The bare
dichotomic view fails to explain the language of the
Scripture, whether as given in its Greek or Hebrew
terms. The Greek words, however-, are less precise
than the Hebrew, since both ei/roM and ci'^^/jri^Tit
may be used for the purpose or the thought. — T. L.}
And it repented the Lord. — Most truly, as
Keil rightly remarks, is this sentence so pronounced
on man alone, directly against the angel-interpr-eta-
tion. On that hypothesis the angels must have been
the original authors of the corruption ; and so in con-
sistency with Gen. iii., where the serpent is first sen-
tenced, ought the first doom here to have been pro-
nounced upon the sinning angels. — It repented
Jehovah, — A pecuUarly strong anthropopathic ex-
pression, which, however, presents the truth that
God, in consistency with his immutability, assumes a
changed position in respect to changed man (Ps.
xviii. 27), and that, as against the impenitent man
who identifies himself with the sin, he must assume
the appearance of hating the sinner in the sin, even
as he hates the sin in the sinner. But that Jehovah,
notwithstanding, did not begin to hate man, is shown
in the touching anthropomorplusm that follows,
" atid it grieved him in his heart." The first kind
of language is explained in the flood, the second in
the revelation of Peter, 1 Pet. iii. 19, 20, and ch.
iv. 6. Against the corruption of man, though ex-
tending even to the depths of his heart, there is
placed in contrast God's deep " grieving in his
heart." But as the repentance of God does not take
away his unchangeableness and his counsel, but
rightly estabhshes them, so neither does God's
grieving detract from his immutabiUty in blessed-
ness, but shows, rather, God's deep feeUng of the
distance between the blessedness to « hich man was
appointed and his painful perdition. Delitzscli does
indeed maintain it, as most real or actual truth, that
(iod feels repentance, and he does not equate this
position with the doctrine of God's unchangeable-
ness, unless it be with the mere remark that the pain
and purpose of the divine wrath are only moments
in an everlastmg plan of redemption, which cannot
become outward in its efficacy without a movement
in the Godhead. And yet movement is not change.
— I will destroy man. — To man in the wider sense
pertains the human sphere of life ; therefore it is said
that the beasts too shall be destroyed. Of any cor-
ruption that had entered into the animal there is no
mention (see ver. 12). The perishing of the beasts,
tliei efore, can only have meaning as a sharing in the
atonement for himian sins (Jer. xii. 4 ; xiv. 5 ; Hos.
iv. 3; Joeli. 18; Zeph. i, 3. Knobel). It is rather
as a consequence of the dependence of the animal
world upon man that it is joined with him in joy and
sorrow. We are not to think of it as something per
sonified together with man, but as the .syiuliohc im
personal extension of his organism. — But Noab
found grace.—" In these words there breaks forth
from the dark cloud of wrath the mercy which givei
security for the -"reseniation and restoration of hn
manity." Keit
88S
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSEB.
[Note on the Ditihk Repenting, Gen. vi. 6. —
We do not gain much by attempts to exiilain iihilo-
Bophically such states or movements of the divine
mind. They are strictly i^jirira — ineffable. So the
Scripture itself represents them : " For my thoughts
are not your thoughts, saith the Lord; as the heav-
ens are high above the earth, so high are my ways
above your ways, and my thoughts above your
thoughts," — that is, my thinking, my mode of think-
ing, above your thinking. And then these same
Scriptures, so far transcending all philosophy in the
abstract declaration of the inefl'able difference, fur-
nish us helps by means of finite conceptions, human
^^presentations, onthropopathisms, as we learnedly
call them, condescensions, " accommodations." Let
us not vainly attempt to get above ihem, as though
they were made for lower minds, whilst we, from
Bome higher position, as it were, can look over them,
or see through them, and are thus enabled to dis-
pense with their aid. If they are accommodations,
let us be accommodated by them ; since here all hu-
man minds are very much on a par. Our right feel-
ing is much more concerned in this than our right
understanding. We cannot rise to God, and we
should reverently adore the effort, if we may so call
it, which he makes to come down to us, to enter into
the sphere of the finite, to think our thinking, and
thus to converse with us in our own language.
Without this there can be no intercourse between
the infinite and the finite mind. God's putting hiui-
Belf in the place of man is the idea and the key of all
revelation. In this sense, even nature itself has an
anthropopathic language. We nmst put our feet
upon the lower rounds of this ladder thus let down
to us, — in other words, we mtist use these accommo-
dations, use them reverently, honestly, thankfully,
or have in the mind a total blank in respect to all
those conceptions of God that most concern us as
moral beings. Talk as we will of impassibility, we
tmiil think of God as having vridT), affections, some-
thing connecting him with the human, and, therefore,
human in some aspect or measure of agreement.
We must either have in our thoughts a blank intel-
lectuality making only an intellectual difference be-
tween good and evil (if that can be called any differ-
ence at all), or we are compelled to bring in some-
thing emotional, and that, too, with a' measure of
intensity corresponding to other differences by which
the divine exceeds the himian. Without this, the
highest form of scientific or pliilosnphic theism has
no more of religion than the blankest atheism. We
could as well worship a system of mathematics as
Buch a theistic indifference. The emotional in view
of the true and the right, the evil and the false, is a
higher thing than the intellectual perception of them,
even could we suppo.«e such separable cognition.
We do not rightly see the true, or truly see the
right, unless we l"ve it ; we do not truly see the evil
or the false, unle.ss we have the opposite affection.
It belongs to the very essence or being of the ideas.
6uch emotional is the highest thing in man, and is it
rational to suppo.-^e that all this is a blank in the
higher being of (iodV Reason may sometinjes go
Bafcly in allirniing what it cannot di'fine, and recon-
cile with other and lower affirmations. Thus here,
an intellectual and a moral necessity may compel us
to say that the idea of the emotional in the divine has
a veritable existence, though the conception utterly
fails to reach it ; just as reason truly affirms the infi-
nite in mathomatict, and with as clear a certainty as
that of any finite ratio, though sense and imagina-
tion are both transcended by it. It may know thai
a thing is, tliat it must be, though not how it is. So
here, a moral necessity compels us to hold that there
is such a region of the divine emotional, most in-
tensely real, — more real if we may make degrees,
than knowledge or intellectuality — the very ground,
in fact, of the divine personal being.
If we would carefully examine, too, our own feel-
ings, we would find that it is not alone a supposed
repugnance to reason that is the ground of the difS-
culty. We do not raise the objection of anthropo-
pathism when love is ascribed to God, and yet it is
as strictly anthropopathic as the divine indignation,
or the divine sorrow. An unemotional love is utterlj
inconceivable. It is inseparable, too, from the othci
elements. Love for the good has no meaning except
as involving displeasure at the evil; and sorrow, to
speak humanly, is but the blending of the two emo-
tions in view of the loss or marring of the lovely, and
the predominance of the unloved. And in this wa
have the thought so fearful, whilst so attractive and
sublime : the intensity of the one must be the meas-
ure of the intensity of the other. Depart in the least
from the idea of indifferentism, and we have no limit
but infinity. God either cares nothing about what
we call good and evil — or, as the heaven of heavens
is high above the earth, so far do his love for the
good, and his hatred of evil, exceed, in tlieir inten-
sity, any corresponding human affection.
The great business, therefore, of the interpreter
of Scripture is to determine philologically the nature
of the emotion expressed by these words, and then
the theologian is to take them in their highest inten-
sity, and in such a way as shall not be in contradic-
tion with other divine attributes, whether given to
us by clear reason, or revealed to us in the Scrip-
tures. Thus it will be found that this word, cnjj
rendered in Niphal to repent, has a dual relation, the
first and primary to the feeling, the second to the
purpose. The first connects itself with what may
be called the onomatepic significance, to »ig\ to
draw the breath ; hence ingeimdt, doluit, as Gesenius
gives it. Hence poenitnit emv, it repented him, in
the sense of sorrow. The anthrupopathism thus ex-
pressed is the more touching form, and the whole
context shows that it is the one predommantly in-
tended here. It is no change of purpose, no confes-
sion of mistake, but a most affecting representation
of the divine pity and tenderaess. The language
following shows this : " and he was grieved at the
heart," when he saw how this fair world, which he
had once pronounced " good, exceeding good," had
become marred and full of evil. In the course of
its applications the word naturally gets also the other
or more secondary, yet quite common sense of change
of purpose. It is thus used, 1 Sam. xv. 29 : " God
will not lie, neither does he repent ; he is not man
that he should repent " — hterally, " man to repent,"
— that is, he does not repent like man with change
of plan or purpose. The other, and more primary
idea, comes also in this very passage relating to Saul,
as appears ver. 3.5 ; unless, contrary to all rules of
criticism, we would bring the writer in immediate
and palpable contradiction with himself. See also
I's. ex. 4. The repenting of sorrow is the authiopo-
pathism that is always to be supposed when the lan-
guage is applied directly to Deity ; as Ps. cvi. 46,
I'non 313 t:n5''^, "and he repented according Ut
the greatnesa of his mercy;" Ps. xc. 18, "Return
CHAP. VI. 1-8.
288
Jehovah — how long ! — and let it repent thee concem-
\ng thy servants."
As an instance of the way in which words branch
out into various meanings, till they sometimes get al-
most a reverse sense, it may be noted how this word,
in this very conjugation, gets the meaning of reveng-
ing, or rather of aveni/inij. It comes from tlie prima-
ry idea of bycathing^ finding reUef from the letting out
of pent-up indignation. When thus applied to Deity
the anthropopathism is terrific, and yet the context
always shows that no other term could so express
the vehemency of the indignation ; as in Is. i. 24
•'-iS'3 cn:x, well rendered, to the letter, "I will
ease me of mine adversaries ; " yet even here there
is something touching in the anthropopathism, trom
the greatness of the long-suffering that appears in the
verses preceding. Compare Ezek. v. 13; .xxxi. 16;
xxxii. .SI. .More nearly allied, however, both to the
primary, and to the sense we have traced in Gen. vi.
is the Piel idea of consolation. It is the siimpaihiz-
ing sorrow, as in Gen. 1. 21, where Joseph comforts
his brethren by paUiating their guilt. Its primary
sense, as well as its tenderness, appears in what is
immediately added, D2b bs -aT^l cnis cns'l ,
"and he soothed them, and spake to their heart."
Compare Is. xl 1, " Comfort ye, cnmfort ye my peo-
ple," and especially Ps. xxiii. 4, where it expresses
the soothing care of the shepherd for the wearied,
panting sheep. It is this sense of sympathizing sor-
row that makes the exquisite beauty of its tender-
ness.— T. L.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. The character of the Alexandrian Judaism, as
inclined to the Gnostic and the apocryphal, needs to
be recognized in order that we may estimate its in-
fluence upon the old and traditional exegesis of this
passage, and on the passage itself as given in the
codices of the Septuagint.
2. There is a difference between the biblical and
apocryphal measure of the doctrine respecting the
demons, analogous to the difference between faith
and superstition, or the ditiei-ence between the census
commimh of a sound theology and the hankering
laste of a mere theosophy.
S. The Scripture distinguishes between corrupt-
ipg mixed-marriages of the pious and the godless,
which, according to their point of departure (that is,
sensual satisfaction), draw down the nobler part into
commuiuty with the base, and unlike marriages
among those of ditTeient religious communions,
which may draw up those of lower standing to the
staitd-point of the more elevated. Ic is because there
lies originally at the ground of the latter a moral
motive. To the first class belong, next to our his-
tory, the marriage of Esau, the .Uidianitie connec-
tions (Xumb. XXV., yet oidy in conditional measure,
since, in this case, there is mention only of licentious
amours), the marriages of the Israelites with the Ca-
naanitish women (Judg. Hi.), the Delilah of Samson,
the foreign wives of Solomon, Jezebel in Israel,
Athaliah in Judah (both baring a fearful efficacy for
the corruption of the people), the danghlers of San-
ballat (Neh. xiii. 2S), who gave occasion for the false
woi-ship on Gerizim. To these, if we regard the
essence of the matter, we may add the case of Hero-
dias in the New Testament, and connect with them
•nalogous examples in the history of the church and
•f the world, even to our own day. To the otner
in
class belong such cases as that of Thamar, the mar-
riage or the marriages of Moses, the ease of Rahab,
the marriages of the sous of Xaoun (see Book of
Ruth), the cases mentioned by Paul, 1 Cor. vii. 13,
the case of Eimice, 2 Tim. i. 5, and many examples
from old church history, where Christian princesses
have been the means of converting heathen husb^inds
and, through them, of the conversion of whole n*
tions. From this contrast it appears that a mer«
zeal in the abstract against mixed marriages is not
grounded on the Bible, but that it depends on this
whether the motive for the contraction of marriage
is the instruction of the one who occupies the lower
position, or a religious apostasy of the higher. And so,
too, the political and civic conception of mesalliances
is to be determined by fundamental positions of a
moral and religious kind. In the imiversal treatment
of tills question, there comes also into consideration
the moral predominance and the social priority of
the man, as well as the great religious influence of
the wife, especially of the zealous, or of the bigoted
wife.
4. Between the moral and ennobling satisfac-
tion in female beauty, as, for example, in the love
of Jacob and Rachel, and the satisfaction of sensual
desire, there is a specific difference. Beyond a
doubt, a satisfaction of the latter kind is meant in
our text, as plainly appears from the expression:
"they took them wives of all (that is, without ex-
ception) that pleased them." Such a wide choice ia
unknown to the moral love. The language appears,
too, to hint at a Cainite polygamy. The expression
ni^ta, as used of the daughters of men, is to be
thus determined.
5. The Bible conception of whoredom, as it
becomes a symbolical designation of a falling away
from God into idolatry, determines itself — not solely
by the outward mark, that Is, as lacking the ritual
of marriage — tfut also by the inward evidence as to
whether the spirit-life sinks into sensnaliiy through
the sensual connection. And such a sexual life ia
here evidently intended As the true marriage be-
comes a symbol of the connection between .lehovah
and his people, because in its looking to the eternal
it eohires with it in the generic bridal idea, so does
the impure sexual coimection become a symbol of
apostasy, because it has in common with it the
characteristic feature of unspirituality anii carnality.
It lies, therefore, in the very nature of the thing,
that the first kind of sexual intercourse conducts to
lawful marriage (the marriage-law), and conforms to
the true and faithful in the chasiity ol the spirit,
whilst the latter hates chastity ami loves change.
6. Lust and cruelty are psychologically twin-
forms, like despotism and mesalliance, or the harem
life in all its forms. Jezebel, Athaliah, Heroiiias,
are world-historical types. Women like these have
shown themselves to be murtleiesses of the prophets.
So, too, the authoress of Nero's persecutions had to
be his wife Poppaea, a bigoted Jewish proselyte
(see Lehman: "Stu'lies in the History of Apostolio
Times." Greifswald, 185ti). In this tendency of
lust can we explain the common disobedience of
degenerate sons towards their pious [larenis, the
disowning of modest Sethite mai.iens in favor of
Camite beauties, the existence of polygamy and
licentious disorder, and, ev^■rywhere, what is called
" the emancipation of the flesh." Therefore is it
that this nee is a prefiguring example of the antino-
mi.sts of "the la.st time" (Matt. xxiv. ; Epistle of
lude; 2 Peter ii.) From the violence of action.
290
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
moreover, can we explain tlie oppression of tlie
weak and miserable, and the spreading of infinite
Borrow.
7. A physiologist might find it Terv conceivable,
that the ottspring of such unbridled lust, as exhibited
in the intercourse of the hitherto unimpaired Sethites
with the Cainite women, might be a race in wliom
bodily strengtli would present itself in an unusual
degree, in connection with spiritual savageness.
This, however, is doubted by Kurtz (Part 1, p. 82).
8. The first mention of the divine judicial office
of the Spirit of God, ver. 3.
9. The first mention of worldly favor in instruct-
ive and warning significance, ver. 4.
10. In respect to God's repentance, see above
(comp. Numb, xxiii. 19; 1 Sam. xv. 29). A well-
known school does not hesitate to bring into the
idea of the divine being the conception of muta-
biUty, even in its relation to other questions (for
example, the doctritie of Coinniunicatio idiomatum).
We should, however, always distinguish between
symbolic and dogmatic anthropopathism. Besides,
we must not confound the judgment of God, ver. 5,
with the judgment of God, ch. viii. 21.
11. Noah found grace. As innocent children
died in the flood, and as, moreover, there may have
been always individuals less guilty who nevertheless
fell under the jmlgment, so does the yrace in the
exception of the pious Noah become still more con-
spicuous. But in Noah, moreover, the liernel, or
root-stem of humanity, still remaining comparatively
sound, was the subject of the divine mercy. The
"iPI , the gracious, fair, and saving condescension,
appears here for the first time in full distinctness.
This showing grace to Noah in this world casts a ray
of light upon the destiny of the iimocent infant-
world that sunk with the guilty, and of the race
generally, as judged in the other world (see 1 Pet.
iii. 19; ch. iv. 6).
HOMTLETICAI, AND PEACTICAL.
The fall and perdition of the first human race in
its detail: 1. Ungodly lust; 2. wanton deeds of
violence; 3. the lawless commingling of the pious
with the godless; 4. disdain of all warnings from
the Holy Spirit, and impenitent obduracy in their
sensual course. — How the w;irniiigs of God die away
unheard in a sinking race. — The higher the stand-
point the deeper the fall. — The sanctifying of the
true feeling ol beauty in contrast with the wanton
di-sposition. — The sanctifying of the true hero-power
in contrast with the wanton love of violence. — The
dei'p connection between carnality and cruelty. — The
sanctifying of marriage. The corrupting effects of
unchasiity. The contagious power of evil, especially
of lust and injustice. — God's beholding it at all
times. — How the divine repenting reflects itself in
the heart of the pious Noali. — The godly mourning
of the pious over the corruption of these times; its
high signilic.'ince: 1. as an animating sign of the
divine compassion ; 2. as a terrifying sign of the
divine judgnient. — How man draws with him, in
his doom, the surrounding nature — even in liis cor-
ruption— The sufferings of children on account of
their parents. — The sutVcrings of the animal world
on account of man — Noah the chosen of God; 1.
As the prophet of the divine spirit and of its judg-
ment upon the earth ; 2. as the priest of his house
ud of a new humaoitjr ; 3. as a kingly hero in his
steadfastness against a whole race. — The grace o?
God, how it excepted one man, Noah, out of the
common judgment. — Grace for the one, in its effect
grace for the many, that is, for the whole conjing
human race. — The second ancestor a child of grace
iu the most special sense. — The grace in its first
manifestation, ho^v all-powerful, and how wondrously
saring. — Noah found grace ; therefore he muse have
sought it, as it sought and found him. — "7n hi*
eyes ; " consciousness of the grace of the all-knowing
God as ever beholding hJTn ; this through his com-
munion with God.
Stakke: Ver. 2. Luther: It is a ^reat mercy
when the Holy Spirit through its word punishe.%
and strives with, men ; on the contrary, the highest
disfav or and punishment when it is withdrawn and
leaves the world unpunished. — Ver. 3 : After the
time God gave also to the Amorites four hundred
years (ch. xv. 16), to the Jews also, after the death
of Christ, forty years, to Nebuchadnezzar one year
(Dan. iv. 29 j, and to Ninevah forty days, for repent-
ance.— Ver. 4 : Th(^ security and carnality of men i»
a sign of God's judgments drawing nigh (Matt. xxiv.
33-38). — Evil examples (Book of Wisdom iv. 12;
Siriich xiii. 1). Reckless and anhke maniagea
draw after them only clear perdition, — The contempt
of the divine word is the most grievous sin, for from
it all others have their origin. How great the
patience and long-suffering of God ! The oppression
of the poor and wretched is a great sin, and chaws
God's judgment after it. — Ver. 7: Though the httle
ones are comprehended in the c:danuty, we nuist
not, on that account, charge God with unrighteous-
ness (he might have foreseen that they would tread
in the footsteps of their parents, or he may have
taken them without prejudice to their soul's blessed-
ness).— Ver. 8. LuTHKR : This way of sjieaking ex-
eludes merit and extols faith. — SciiRfDER: The fall
first begins its course in the sphere of Adiim .md
Eve's single personality, then, by and with Cain it
enters into the family life, thence showing itself in
the members of a whole Une, it now reaches its last
stage of antediluvian development; it advances to
the fall of a world. — Vers. 1, 2. Herder: The more
intimate they are, the nearer they live together, the
more do they infect each other with their breath,
and defile each other with their disease ; each be-
comes to the other the instrument of a more multi-
plied and subtle evil. All great kingdoms, states,
and cities are still mournful evidences of this fact. —
Calvin : By such a title of honor (sons of Gud)
Moses upbraids them with their unlhankl'uluess. in
that, forsaking their heavenly lather, they become
outcasts, as it were, and expose themselves to ruin
— Luther : The Hood comes not on this acooiujt
merely, that the race of tain was corrupt and evil,
but because the race of the righteous, who had be-
lieved God, had fallen into idolatry. So God does
not hasten the last day because heathen, Jews, and
Turks are godless, but because, by means if the
Pope, and the fanatics, the church itself has become
full of errors. — From all, that is, whom they loved,
took they to themselves wives. That would be the
love of diversity. Or, before all, namely, that to
them the female race (the sex without discrinjination)
had become everything. The worth or i',nw:uthi-
ne.ss of the person came not into ccmsideralioa
I'robably it w;is incest ; it was certaiidy polygamy
LiiTMKu: They ilisilaincd the .simplicity, seriousness,
and modest dcpoitment of their young womea,
which had atti acted the holy patriarchs, not amor-
CHAi'. VL y— VIIL 19.
291
onsly, but chastely, and suffered themsclveg to be
pleased with the fondlings, tlie adorning, and the
wantoning that proceeded from the lattiT (tliat I3,
the Oainite) race. — -Ver. 3. Calvin : Moses repre-
Bents God himself as speaking ; thereby K-ould it be-
come more certain that that punishment was as
righteous as It was tearful. — Lctiiee!: (The judging
(or striving) of the spirit relates to a public office in
the church, or the preaching of the truth, perhaps
to a cenaure pit)nouiiced by Methuselah or Lajnech).
They are the words of an anxious heart; according
to the language of Scripture, God is troubled, that
is, the heart of the holy people which is lull of love
to every man. Such sorrow is properly the sorrow
of the Holy Spirit (Eph. iv. 3(1). — The samk ; When
the spiri*; of docirine is gone there departs also the
spirit of prayer. — Calvin : As long as God holds
back punishment he contends, to a certain extent,
with men, especially if he would draw them to re-
pentance by threatenmgs, or with light chastenings
by way of example. Now he declares, as though in
weariness, that he desires no longi'r to contend. — •
Berlenbnrger Bible: Where the Spirit of God is,
there it condemns sin. His presence and his disci-
pline are inseparable (Book of Wisdom xii.) — The
same : Let no one believe that he can do without
such a chastening of the Almighty. We see it in
little children. — Calvi.n : This contempt of God
gave birth to pride, and, pride full blown, they be-
gan to break every yoke. They glorified themselves
in their deeds of shame, and became robbers of
renown, so called. — The same: That was the first
nobility in the world ; so that no one might please
himself with a longer or more renowned series of
iucestors. — The same: There is nothing iu itself
to be condemned in the desire of celebrity, it is
useful that rank should have place in the world ;
yet, as inordinate ambition ever deserves blame, so,
when there is added to it the tyrannical cruelty of
the more powerful, in their scorn of the weak, it
becomes an intolerable evil. — Vers. 5-7. Koos : Be-
fore, the Hood of sins ; after it, the sin-flood. With-
out a doubt has God impressed this feeling upon his
saints, though no one in a human way is capable of
it, according to its true divine nature. Wrath is
proper for a king and a magistrate, but pain (for
sin) is peculiar to the Creatoi-, who has love for hii
creatute, and before whose eyes that creature stand*'
as one utterly corrupt, unthankful, and apostate.—
The same: A destruction of man and beast must
be their end. But, whether this destruction is t4
be through water or through fire, God has not yel
in these words revealed.
Gerlach : The Sethites are here presented as ■
warning to the IsraeUtes. God allows no one of
his greater judgments to take place without giving
a respite for repentance after its announcement
Luther's inteipretation 'takes the repentance and
the grieving as the same with that which preeedel
in the genuine children of God. (Examples which
Luther presents. Abraham's prayer for Sodom;
Samuel's sorrow for Saul; Christ's weeping ovel
Jerusalem.)
Lisco : Flesh ; that is, a people wholly sunk in
sin. Despise not thy day of grace.
Calvee {Manual) : When members of the trua
church become degenerate, the judgments of God
are not distant. — The NephiUm : Despising God
above ; exercising violence and oppression towards
their brethren below. Now are these names un-
known, hke the names of many others who have
sought for empty fame. In the heathen world there
are such people as heroes, men honored as demi-
gods ; and triily there he in these and other early
indications of Moses, the fountains of many of the
heathen legends concerning the gods. (The demi-
gods of the heathen are, in fact, the heroes of
humanity, such as Hercules, for example; but they
htive, doubtless, an origitial national origin tor the
most part which doi-s not go back beyond the flood.)
— Noah, the one righteous man in an entire corrupt
world. — The eyes of the Lord are upon those »ho
fear him. — Talbe (p. 4S): The judgment of God
upon the first world a warning example for our
time : 1. In respect to the first world being ripe lor
judgment ; 2. in respect to the manner in which
God executed this sentence. — Miotiow : This is the
very climax of corruption, when men will not suffer
themselves to be reproved by the spirit of God. The
repenting of God (see Numb, xxiii. 19). It denotes
God's dealing with men, which, though at all times
just, must correspond to the behavior of men
THIRD PART.
tB* GENESIS OF THE WORLD'S JUDGMENT AND OF THE WORLD'S RENEWING BY MEANS
OF THE FLOOD. THE FLOOD AND THE DROWNED RACE. THE ARK AND THE SAYED
HUMANITY. (THE ARK AS A TYPE OF THE PIOUS FAMILY, OF THE PIOUS STATt;
AND OF THE CHURCH). (Chap. VL 9-Chap. VIU, 19.)
FIRST SECTION.
The Calling of Koah. Ttie Ark.
Chapter VI. 9-Chapter VII. 9.
9 These are the generations [tholedoth] of Noah ; Noah was a just' man and perfect in
10 his generations [in liis times], and Noah walked with God. And Noah begat tiiree srna
29'J <JES 2SIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
1 1 Shem, Ham and Japheth. The eartli also was corrupt " before God [in relatioD to God ], and
'2 the earth was filled with violence [in relation to men]. And God looked" upon the earth
and behold it was corrupt; for all liesh had corrupted" his way [walk or conduct] upon (he
13 earth. And God said unto Noah, the end of all flesh* is come before me ; for the earth
is filled with violence through' ihem [before them] ; and behold I will destroy ' them with the
14 earth. Make thee an ark of gopher-wood [cypress— a resinous wood] ; rooms shalt thou make
15 in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch. And this is the fashion
which thou shalt make it of; the length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits,
16 the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits. A window [a siiy-light]
shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above [downward— not abo>«
J on the side, but irom the top surface downwards tlirougli the different stories] ; 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 behold I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesli,
wherever is the breath of life under heaven; and everything that is in the earth shaL"
18 die [expire-yield the breath] : But with thee will I establish my covenant; and thou shalt
19 come into the ark, thou and thy sons, and tliy wife, and thy sons' wives with thee. And
of every living thing of all flesh, two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark, to keep
20 them alive with thee ; they shall be male and female. Of fowls after their kind, and ot
cattle after their kind, of every creeping thing of the earth after his kind, two of every
21 sort shall come unto thee, to keep them alive. And take thou unto thee of all food
that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee [for a store], and it shall be for food for thee
22 and for them. Thus did Noah according to all that God commanded him.
Ch. VII. 1 And the Lord said unto Noah, come thou and all thy house into the ark ; for
2 thee have I seen righteous before me in this generation. Of every clean beast thou
shalt take to thee by sevens, the male and his female, and of beasts that are not clean
3 by two, the male and his female. Of fowls also of the air by sevens, the male and the
4 female ; to keep seed alive upon the earth. For yet seven days, and I will cause it to
rain upon tlie earth forty days and forty nights ; and every living substance that I have
5 made will I destroy from the face of the earth. And Noah did according lo all that
6 the Lord commanded him. And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of
7 waters was upon the earth. And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and lii.s
sons' wives with him, into the ark, because of the waters of the flood [from before, or from
8 the face of the waters]. Of clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of fowls, and
9 of every thing that creepeth upon tlie earth. There went in two and two [by pairs] unto
Noah into ihe ark, the male and the female, as God [Elohim] had commanded Noah.
(' VeF. 9. — p^^S, primary sense, jiddity, truthfulness. D^lSt^, primary sense, soundness^ integrity. That the
terms are comparative is shown by the qualifying word that follows, l^PTni"13 , in his generations. Tho language
gives no countenance to the opinion of Knobel, that Noah is represented as a man of spotless innocence, and that the
author of this account knew nothing of any fall. So the Jewish interpreters take it, some of whom, as Itashiand Maimonides
both tell us, go so far as to say that he would not have been so called in comparison with Abrah-am. 7^2nrn CTliXn rfi<:
■ee remarks on this phrase as used in the account of Enoch. — T. L.] ■ ' ■ ■: '
[' Ver. 11. — rnirn" , primary sense, depression, sinking down. Hence, corruption, destruction. — T. L.l
[* Ver. 12.- X^*1 . "And God saw the earth "— ^oofced at the earth, and lo. Some would render: "saw that the
earth was ; " but the other mode is the more literal, as well as the more expressive. It may be called anthrnpopathic, w
expressing something like surpi-ise, but it is all the more striking on that very account. "Had corrupted its way."
■^3^:1 rx r"n'I,'n. This maybe taken physically as well as moniUy. *5^". its way, its mode of life. Men were
becoming monsters, sinking down into brutality — becoming dehumanized through lust and cruelty. "C'S ?^ , aU JUjh,
Br, Murphy well remarks, that "this should teach us to beware of applying an inflexible litenilitT to such tenu* as aU
when thus "used ; since the mention of the whole race '• does not preclude the exception of Noah ana his family." Com*
9untary on Oen. p. 210. — T. L.]
[« Ver. l.'i.— 1C3 hz yp. *' The end of all flesh is come up, •'SSb , before me (to my face).*' Or it may be rendered
in tho present, comes up before me, giving it more tho sense of a prediction (or an event seen to be inevitable unless pre*
Tented soon) than of a threatened judgment. The language is remarkably graphic ; as though the events of ^ime, as it
moves on, or the roll untolds itself, come up before the immovable, unchanging God, and the lax^t periods of a long series
were drawing nigh in their development. In this view, bs of ver. 13 would be taken in its universjiiity. Through human
wickedness and comiption there will be an end of man <of the whole human race without exception) unless means an
taken for tho preservation of a sound humanity, in tho destruction of these who are becoming dehumanized. CH^rDp,
another most graphic expression— filled with violence Itrfore the face of them. Wherever they spread, Wolence and corru|h
tion goes witli them, and before them. Compare the ilescription of Leviathan, Job xli. 14, n^X'H "j^^tn 1*^253 , "terroi
moves swiftly before him." "Lo, I am destroying them (with) the earth " yiXiTrS Cr'tT^Ja. Another view takei
yitt.-'TN aain apposition with the preceding pronoun, find as explanatory of it. It sounds harsh in rendering, bt-.i u
*on vhat favored grammatically by the fact that rs , where it is occasionally to be rendered with, always deiictes th4
jiiAP. VI. ^—vn. 9.
J!)3
•losest find most essential union, and, on this ^ound, it is that it comes to denote the nearest and most direct ohject of th«
TOi.l,_i. will destroy them, the very earth," as the means oi their destruction. Other renderings arc, upon ihe earlh
(nX for by), with reference to 1 Kings ix. 25; Ps. Ixvii. 2; and from Ihe earth (rS for PXB), 2 Kings xxiii. 35 ; bul
the examples cited for these fail to bear out the intei-pretatlon. See RosenmuUer. It may be offered as a conjecture entitled
to some attention, tliat the Hiphil participle PTIB'O may have the permissive sense which sometimes belongs to it (sei
Deut. ii. 28i Gen. xxiv. 17; xxv. 30; Is. Ixiii. 15 etal.; Otassii /"/li!., p. 836), instead of the causative, and then it
would be a case of double government : " And lo I am suffering them to corrupt the earth ; " in w hich case P X would
»ave its usual sense of the direct object, and there would be no need of the sudden change in P'^nUJB fi-om the sense ol
tarrupllvq to that n( destroying, although they are nearly allied; as though it were a reason for the interpos tion instead
»f a tlueatf'ning of it. Lo'l am letting them ruin the earth, if they are permitted thus to have their way. The intoipre-
tatiou.^ gi'uei ally are against this, but it may ho grammatically supported, and has some grounds in the context as giving
the merciful and remedial aspect of the passage the predominance over the retributive. It may at least be oflcred as a
conjecture. The PTIBn of vcr. 1 seems to be against it, but even that may be rendered, " all flesh is IMing its way
become corrupt upon earth." — T. "L. ■
[6 Ver. 14.— 1D5 ^1T . RentUred gopher-wood. The word occurs but once in the Scriptures. It is, however,
etymologically the same with the Dreek icuiripio-iroi (.cypress, the same radical consonants, g p r— k p r), and may also
be regarded as related to the Latin juni>crus (g(n) pr). It may denote any resinous wood which is at the same time light
•ndhrm.— T.L.J , , , . i,_
[« Ver. 17.— bsaan ; used only of the Great Deluge, except Ps. xxix. 10, where it comes in as a hyperbole in the
description of a great storm and inundation. LaULje, Geseuius, and others, derive it from SS^ , to which they give the
Bense /luzit, though it occurs only in some noun derivatives, the Hiphil sense being remotely secondary. The sense ol
flowing, however, in b3^ , if it has it at all, is quite different from the conception we have of the deluge. It is the flowing
of streams, rivers, rivulets, as seen in the derivative bz^ , Jlumen, rivus. Aben Ezra gives us the views of the older
Jewish grammarians. One class of these make il fiom t-:, comparing it with Is. xxiv. 4, }*~S<n Plbl^! '^;?'? i
" in mournms and desolate is the earth,"— giving to b;3 the sense of ruin and wasteness. This accoimts for the dagesh
in a. It is dagesh compensative, they say, for the smaftoiued 3, orb^iaa for blSaa , just as 5130 (from rSJ) forl'laSB.
It is certiiinly much easier, etymologically, to account for it in this way, than by making it from ba"', which would rather
give the form baiTfl . Others make it from bba confundit, and regard it as equal to b^baT3 , the dagesh arising from the
swallowing, as the Jewish grammarians call it, of the flrst b following. They compare' it, in its full foim, to b'bci?
from bbo , Is. XXXV. 8, or blba'.:J , Ps. Iviii. 9. Either of these conceptions of ruin, desolation, and confusion, suits better
with the idea of the great catastrophe than simply that of flowing, especially regarded as the flowing of a river. And
then, according to these acute authorities, we have a reason for the addition of Z.']'C , "the mabbul of waters," which
would be a mere tautology, and, in this case, a feeble tautology, if the word simply meant flowing. It was a wasteness,
a ruin, a desolation, a confusion, or mingling together of all things ( bib a ), by means of waters. Hence the special
descriptive term used only of this great event, and intended to show that it was sui generis, so that it comes to be used
like a proper name. — T. L.]
(' Ver. 18.— P^"l2 . Lange makes it from ri3 , a root not found ; and the metathesis from IPS is harsh and
unexampled. The Jewish grammarians and lexicographers make it from nia = S13 , primary sense, to c!i(, referring
to the severance of the victim in sacrifice on the making of a covenant. Sre Ps. 1. 5, nat ^b? "^P^na ^n"}a, "who
have made (cut) a covenant twith me) by sacrifice." Further on this word and idea, see Exegetical and Notes. — T. L.]
THE FLOOD. PEELIMINART EEMABK8.
1. T!ie Literature. — See Com. on Matthew, p. 6.
The present work, p. 119. Walch. : Bibl. T/ifOi.,\u.
D. 100. Danz: "UiiiversalIiexicon,"p. 918. Winer,
Real Lexicon, article, Noah. Herzog, Real Encij-
dopedia, articie, JS/'oah. Kurtz; "History of the Old
Testament,"!, p. 81. Knobel, p. 81. — [Article, Del-
'Uqe, KiTTo: " Bib. Eucvc " vol. i. p. 542. — Article,
Noah, Smith's "Bib. Diet." vol. ii., p. 562.— T. L.]
The Hebrew name of the Great Flood (bias)
Luther rendered by the word Sin-fltd, or Sindjiut.
The latest edition of the German Bible contains still
this designation. Through a misunderstanding of the
expression it became afterwards Swidjiut. Pischon
in the " Theological Studies and Criticisms," 1 8:14, III.
Delitzsch, p. 628. In old German the word sin is
found Only at the beginning of compounds : it has
the meaning ever, everywhere, complete. For exam-
ple, sin-griXn means ever-green.
2. The Stories of the Flood. No fact of Sacred
History reflects itself In a more universal and mani-
fold manner throughout the heathen legendary woild
than the Noachic flood. Compare here the copious
account of Li ckes : " The Traditions of the Human
Race," p 170 ; also Knobel, p. 75 ; Delitzsch, p.
242 It J especially interesting to study how the
difterent nations have heathenized, mythologized., in
other words, nationalized or localized the sacred and
aiiivei'sal traditioa (since by the very nature of
heathenism the patriarch of the flood belongs to
particular nations who received the account from
him, and who also regarded him as their national
middle point), and how they have confounded it
witli the story of Paradise, or of the creative days.
From this comes the varied deification of this flood-
patriarch. Delitzsch distinguishes, 1. the West .isia-
tic stories of the flood. The Babylonian flood of
Xisuthrus : " the last of the ten antediluvian chiefs,
as given by Berosus and Abydeniis, and the Ph(Eni-
cian story of the victory of Pontus over Demarus,
the earth sphere, as given by Sauchoniatlion."
With the Babylonian story of the flood lie compares
the narrative of the flood as given in the first of the
Sibylline books, which, in its ground features, has
some resemblance to the bibUcal. Next " the Phry-
gian story of King ^hwaKos or NacfaKiis (that ia,
Enoch) in Iconium, who, when over three hundred
years old, announced the flood, and prayed with
lamentation for his people ; with which are connected
coins of Apamea of the times of Septimius Severus,
Macrinus, and Phihp, representing a floating ark
and bearing the partial inscription, Nfi." So also
the Armenian, which, as might be expected, agrees
in its locaUty with the biblical (Nicol. Damascen.,
Strabo). Then a Syrian legend of which Luciab
makes mention {De Syra Dea, ch. 13). 2. Ea»l
Asiatic stories of the flood. The Persian, the Chi-
nese ; the Indian of Menu, to whom Vislinu, taking
the form )f a fish, announces the flood, and wbo8«
294
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
sUip, dr:iwu by this fish, buds upon Himarat. It
presents itselt to us in many forms. Tlie oldest,
yet tlie latest known to us, is the story in yatapatlia-
Brahmana( Weber, "Indian Studies," J850). Next to
that is the story in Mahabharata (Hupp, "Diluvium,"
1829), and in the Purana ; its latest form is present-
*i in the Bhagavata-Purana (ed. Bournont. 1827),
which, according to Wilson, does not go back of the
twelfth century after Christ. (In respect to all these
forms of the story, see Felix Nave : La Tradition
Ivdieane du Delur/e, Paris, 1851.) 3. Grecian sto-
ries of the flood. " In the first place the story of
Ogyges (Plato, in the TinuBus,)* and the more en-
larged account of Deucalion and Pyrrha (fiist in
Pindar, then by ApoUodorus, brought nearer to the
biblical account, also given by Plutarch, Lucian,
and Ovid.-I- — both, in their ground features, stories
of one and the same flood, but wholly Hellenized."
4. The stories of the people who were outside the
commerce or intercourse of the Old World. The Cel-
tic story of Dwyvan and Dwyvach, who, in the flood
that arose from the outbreaking of the sea of Llion,
and which swallowed up all men, made their escape
in a bare boat (without sails), and again peopled
Britain. More remote still, the flood-stories of the
Mexicans, of the island inhabitants of Cuba, of the
Peruvian.^;, of the races on the upper Orinoco, of
the Tahitians, and other insular peoples of the So-
ciety Islands Archipelago. To make an arrangement
according to the facts narrated, we may distinguish,
1. Stories of the flood which identify it with the cre-
ative catastrophes, namely : the Germanic story of
the blood of the slain Ymer, which deluged the earth,
and destroyed the oldest giant race. The Persian
Btory ol' the rain of Zistar, which flooded the earth,
and caused the death of the beasts of Ahriman. The
Chinese story of Riuhoa (Llcken, p. 193 ; see on
the other hand Bdnskn, vol. ii. p. 61). 2. Stories
of the flood in which the Bible flood is specifically
and distinctly reflected, such as the Babylonian, the
Phrygian, the Indian, the Chinese story of Jao, the
Celtic stories (Licken, p. 204). 3. Stories of the
flood which seem to connect or to confound it with
the deluge accounts of later floods. The stories of
the Egyptians and the Greeks (Licken, pp. 209, 196).
[♦ For a more direct and significant mention by Plato of
the flood, see the Dialogue, De Lfgibus, lib. iii. p. 677, A. B.,
where he suppo.sns that there may have bct'ii many such
eata^lrophc(. in the Lmmen^e past time, but spraks siireially
of one as well known— TauTTj;' ttj^ rtf KATAKAVSMfl noTe
yevQiJifvrjv. Alter which he speculates upon the condition
of those who may have escaped, and then- subsequent cul-
ture.—T. L.]
[t The description of Ovid (although he takes the Greek
names) is nearer to the Scripture account than that of Pin-
dar or ApoUodorus, and it may be inien-ed that he had ac-
cess to oilier tnuiitioual sources, Hebrew perhaps, or Syrian.
The moral ground in him is more promincnl ; and the
"nghleou)' man" who " tound grace" is brought out with
• clearer emphasis —
Soil lllo mi^llor qatsquam, oec kniRiitlor MqBi
VIr full, nut IIU luctuentlor ulla Deoram.
Eie manner, too, of describing the subsidence of the waters,
and the beenming visible of the mountains, is strikingly like
that of the .Scriptures, and makes it not extravagant to sup-
pose that he may have had some knowledge of tho Hebrew
■oootmt, and its graphic language, C""inn ^ITJtl *X^I .
FltimlnK Huhnl'lunt; cnllea exlre vvVntur ;
Hurclt liuniiiH; crL-Hriinl liicii ilf.'cri^aci-iiMliilH unillB;
PuNl'iuo 'lloin loiiKarii nudala rarumijia jnontium.
•*A11 the hiKh hills under the whole heaven were coTet«d."
The IjJitin jioet givr-s the same optical appearance, though in
iliferent language ;
•Inni'iiic tniirij «t icIluH nullum (lUcrlnioii tinhctinnt ;
Omulk pulitiu «r»ut', Ueeraut quuque litura puiito. — T. I..]
In the submersion of the island Atlantic, as given ii
Plato's Timaiis, there seems t(v be ref.ec'cd likewise
the tradition of the lost Paradise. !ii respect to the
facts that lie at the foundation of the lattev stories
compare the pamphlet of Unger, entitled " Thi
Sunken Island of Atlantis." Vienna, I8611. The
fundamental view here indicates revolutions of thi.
earth, upheavings and depressions of its surface,
whose effect is also of importance in the history &
the Bible deluge. 4. Stories of floods in which tiie
Bible flood forms the central point, towards which
all trailitions and legends of eaily terrestrial catas
trophes flow together, and in which the original
tradition cannot always be separated from later
modification through Christian and Mohammedan
elements. Interior African and American, or insular
flood stories. It is well worthy of remark, that th»
ethical interpretation of the flood, according to wlii^h
it comes as a judgment upon a condemned human
race, everywhere prominently appears in the storie»
of the deluge. The purest copy of our Bible history
is given in the Chaldaic narrative of Berosus, the
ancient priest of Bel, about 260 years before Chri.«>.
Xisuthrus, the last of the ten primitive kings, lieleld
ill a dream the appearance of Cronos (in (IreeV the
same as Bel or Baal), who announced to him, that
on the 15th day of the month Diisio, men would be
destroyed by a flood. It was commanded him to
write down all the sciences and inventions of man-
kind, and to conceal the writings in Syparis, the city
ol the Sun ; thereupon he was to build a ship, and
to embark on the same with all his companions, kin-
dred, and nearest friends; he was to put in it pro-
visions and drink, and to take with him the animals,
the birds, as well as the quadrupeds. If any one
should ask him whereto he was bound, he was to
answer: To the gods; to implore good for men.
Eo obeyed, and made an ark five stadia in length,
and two in breadth, put together what was command-
ed, and embarked with wife, children, and kindri'd.
As the flood subsided, Xisuthrus let fly a bird, which,
when it neither found nourishment nor place to
light, returned back into the ark. After some days
he let fly another bird ; this came back with slime
upon its fool. The third bird sent forth never re-
turned. Then Xisuthrus perceived that land was
becoming visible, and after that he had broken an
opening in the ship, he sees it driven upon a mount-
ain, whence he descends with wife, daughter, and
pilot, and when he had saluted the earth, /milt an
altar, and offered sacrijice to the gods, he disappeared.
Those who were left in the ship, when they saw that
Xisuthrus did not return, went forth to seek him, and
called him by name. Xisuthrus was seen no more,
but a voice sounded from the air, bidding them to
fear god, and telling them that on account of hia
piety he had been taken away to dwell with the gods ;
and that the same honor was given to his wife,
daughter, and pilot. (This disappearance has rela-
tion to his deification, or probably to his translation
among the st;irs, where the forms of the waterman,
the young woman, and the carrier (the wagoner) still
present themselves to us). They were comtnainled
to return back to Babylon, where it wa.s appointed to
them to take the writings from Syparis, and impart
the knowledge they contained to men. The country
where they found themselves was Armenia. In re-
spect to the ship, which had landed in Armenia.
Berosus adds that there was still a portion of it ou
the mountains of Kordyiier (or the Kurdistan mount*
ains) in Armenia, from which some persons cut off
CHAP. VI. 9— vn. 9.
pieces, took them to their houses, and useJ them as
amulets (according to LUcken). Amid all the simi-
larity which this story presents to the Bible history,
there is no mistaking the mythological coloring ; for
example, in the huge size of the ark. Just iis little
do we fail to hear the echo of the history of Enoch.
3. The Fad of llie Flood— The narr.itive of the
flood, like the history of Paradise, has in a special
measure the character of all the Bible histories — that
18, it is at the same time fact and symbol ; and it is
the symbohcal significance of this history that has
formed the significant expression of the fact. In re-
gard to the fact itself, the view is rendered in a high
degree difficult by reason of the mingling with it of
the following representations, resting solely on the
literal interpretation : 1. the supposition that the
history narrates not merely the extermination of tlie
first human race, and, therefore, the overflowing of
the earth according to the geographical extension
of that race, but an absolute uni* ersal submersion
of the whole earth itself; 2. the idea that the terres-
trial relations were the same at that time that they
are now, that the mountain elevations were com-
pleted, and that the mountain Ararat was just as high
as at the present time ; 3. that the branching of the
animal species had become as great at that day as it
is now : add to these a 4th, the ignoring of every
symbolical imprint in the representation. As to what
concerns the first two points, it is argued by Ebrard,
for example (" Belief in the Holy Scriptures," p. 73),
that .\rarat was 16,000 feet high. The waters stand
fifteen cubits above Ararat; consequently must the
whole earth have been covered, though it may still
remain a question whether single peaks, lilie the
Dhawalagiri, might not have projected above the
water-surface (in a literal construction of the text,
however, such a doubt caimot remain), since a bank-
ing limitation of so high a flood would be inconceiv-
able. This conclusion depends upon a supposition
wholly uncertain, namely, that the peak of Ararat
was in that day 16,000 feet high. In regard to the
first point, the remark of Niigelsbach (Art. " Xoah,"
Hkrzog's Real-Enci/clopedie) coincides wholly with
the view X)f Delitzsch, namely, that the theologic:il
interest does not demand the universality of the flood
in itself, but only the universality of the judgment
that was executed by it. In respect to the second
point, it is to be remarked, that the mountain forma-
tions of the earth had been, indeed, begun in the
creative period, but were not yet fully completed.
The history of the deluge is, without doubt, the his-
tory of a catastrophe in which the terrain of the earth
experienced important modifications through the co-
operation of fire. The deep sinking of the land in
the neighborhood of the Armenian paradisaical re-
gion, which is denoted by the Caspian Sea, might alone
have brought on a deluge catastrophe analogous to
that which must have had a connection with the ruin
of the legendary island of Atlantis. In respect to the
third representation, the Darwin theory of the pro-
gressive origin of races, though in itself untenable,
does nevertheless contain an indication of the truth
that the countless unfolding of organic memberships
in the animal life goes back to great individual anti-
types, as science theoretically sets forth. For each
species, perhaps, there may have been a ground type
iu the ark, out of which all varieties of the same
have proceeded. In respect to the fourth false repre-
sentation, which confounds the style of the Holy
History with the notarial expression of a worldly
pragmatism, we refer to the Introduction.
On the side of the mythologizing of the lelugl
history there are similar untenable representation!
that call for remark. 1. The apprehension in respec<
to the pos.sibility of building the ark. It is histori
cally established that, at all times, a necessity fun
damentally perceived, has, under the guidance of
Ood, brought to discovery the helps required for th«
accomplishment. Necessity learns to pray, learns to
build. •!. The difficulty of assembling such a multi-
tude of beasts in the ark. In reply to this, allusion
has been made to the instinct of animals, which, in ■
presentiment of natural catastrophe, seek an asylum,
sometimes, almost in violation of their natural hab-
its. Birds, in a storm, fly to the ships ; wolves coma
into the villages, etc. 3. The difficulty of the animal
provisioning. Answer: This would be of least weight
in respect to animals like those of the marmot and
badger species, whose winter torpor in the easiest
manner keeps them through the wintry storm-period.
But the deluge, in like manner, supposes, in the
main, a slumbering, dead-like transition from the
old existence into the new. Darkness, the roaring
and rocking of the waters in so peculiar a manner,
must bring on a benumbing torpor, and, in the case
of many animals, a winter sleep, whereby the feed-
ing would be rendered unnecessary. The ground
ideas of the deluge history are as high above tha
popular representations on the right, as they are be-
yond the scholastic thinking on the left. They may
be regarded as something like the following: 1. At
the moment when the first human race, through the
commingling of an angel-like elevation of the Sethic
line with the demonic corruption of the Cainitic, is
ripe for judgment, there is a corresponding catas-
trophe, having its ground in the earth's develop-
ment, forming an echo to the creation catastrophes,
and, at the same time, imposed by God as a judgment
doom upon that human corruption. 2. The pro-
phetic spirit of a pious patriarch, in whom there is
concentrated the heart of the old world's piety, takes
into its belief not only the revelation of the impend-
ing judgment, but also the deliverance which out of
that juilgment is to go forth for this world itself as
represented in his person, and in his family, whUst it
denotes thereby the progress of faith in revelation,
from the assurance of salviition in the other world
(which Enoch already hud), to the confidence of sal-
vation in this. 3. The inspiring of necessity teaches
him, under the divine guidance, to build an ark,
which, in its commencement, is to be a preaching of
repentance to the cotemporuries of the builder, but
which, in its completion, is distinguished neither by
oar nor lielm, but oidy by its gre;it spaciousness and
water-tight construction. 4. In this use of the ark,
as a common asylum, the instincts of the beasts act
in harmony with the prophetic presentiment of chosen
men, whilst the rest follows through God's care and
a peculiar success. 5. The history of the flood is av
£iro£ Ae-yrinci/oc in the world's history, analogous to
the creation of Adam, the birth and history of Christ,
and the future history of the world's end. Even
BuNSE-s (ii. p. 63) affirms, in general, the historical-
ness of the biblical tradition.
Therefore is this unparalleled fact in the highest
degree symbolic or ideal, whilst it is, at the same
time, a tvpical prophecy. 1. It is a prophecy of the
deliverance of Israel as the people of God in tha
passage through the Red Sea ; 2. a prophecy of th*
deliverance of the Christian church from the corrup-
tion of the world, through the washi ag of baptism
(1 Pet. iii. 21); 3. a prophecy jf the deliverance of
796
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
the congregation of Christ, at the world's end, out
of the tire-flood of the world i judgment. The ark
is especially reflected in tlia ark of Moses, in the
ark of the covenant which w 's carried througii the
Jordan, in the houseliold of tlie cburcli, and in She
congregation of faith at the end of tlie world. Kno-
bel thinks that in llie narration before us there is
to be recognized an Eltihistic foundation w'hich the
Jehovlst must have elaborated, not without a con-
tradiction of its fundamental ground. Thus the de-
BCription of the cornipiion, in ch. vi. 11, 12, he
says, doe-T not agree with the Jehovist, who repre-
sents the wiokedness in human life as having com-
menced at a much earlier day. As though the origin
of evil and an incurable corruption were not two
distinct grades ! So, according to the Jehovist, it is
(as Knobel would have it) that the human life-period
after the flood sinks down to one bimdred and twenty
years — an idea that rests upon a felse interpreta-
tion. Moreover, it would seem not to agree with the
ground-scripture, that of many kinds of beasts Noah
took more than a pair (ch. vii. 2, 3, 8). Knobel
supposes, therefore, that the special enlargement
was a contradiction to tlie more general appoint-
ment. In regard to the fact itself, says Knobel :
Unanswerable are the questions, how Noah came to
expect the great flood, and was led to the building
of the ark. So also would it be incapable of an
answer, how at any time one could attain to a pro-
phetic prevision. The question he regards as still
more difficult to answer: "How he was enabled to
produce such a structure," — that is, such a great
quadrangular box. Further : " How he got the
beasts in his power?" Experience shows, that in
extraordinary cata.«trophes of nature, the wildest
animals take refuge with men. Lastly : " How could
they all, together with the necessary provisioning
for a whole year, Hnd room in tlie ark 'i " This
point carries us back to a primitive time, when, as
yet, the species were comparatively less divided, and
to a stormy death of nature, which intensified to its
most extreme degree the phenomenon of the winter's
sleep; to say nothing of the point, that to the sym-
bolical expression there is needed only the general
fact of the savuig of the animal world, along with
man, by means of the ark. When Ebrard admits
that possibly tile highest mountain-peaks may have
projected above the surface of the waters of the del-
uge, it would allow the consequence of an Alpine
fauna existing outside of the ark. The point mainly
in view is the destruction of the human race, and the
saving of the Noachian family, in the deluge. Not-
withstanding his objections, Knobel supposes an
actual ground of fact in the narration, even as an
alter-piece lo the great earth revolutions of the crea-
tive period (p. 78). This la.st point of view carrier
us beyond the supposition ol' mere partial historical
inundations. A concussion of the earth permits the
conclusion that a. displacement occurred in its conti-
nental lelations, whence there might have arisen a
deluge of a very wide character, without our having
to a.s.'jume a corresponding inundation of the whole
earth's surface. Stormy deludes do not oliey the
law of standing waters. Such a deluge might have
passed over the whole inhabited part of the earth,
without making alike height of water as standing
over the whole sphere.
" The ground."," remarks Delitzsch, " on w liiih
Ihe Thora (ilie rentaicnch) dwells so emiihatically
upon the Heioil, consist in their signiflcancy for the
hiHtory of God's kingdom in general, and the history
of the Old Testament theocracy in particular. Th«
flood is an act of deepest significance, whether re
garded as one of judgment or of salvation. It is a
common judgment, making an incision in history so
deep and so wide, of sudi force and imiversality
that nothing can be compared with it but the final
judgment at the extreme limit of this « orld's history.
But the act of judgment is, at the same time, an act
of salvation. The sin-deluge is, at tlie same time, a
grace-deluge,* and so far a type of holy baptism
(1 Pet. iii. 21), and of life rising out of death;
therefore it is, that old ecclesiastical art was so fond
of distinguishing chapels of burial by a representa-
tion of it. The destruction has in view the preserva
tion, the drowning has in view the purification, the
death of the human race has in view the new birth ;
the old corrupted earth is buried in the flood of
water, that out of this grave there may emerge a new
world. In this way Ararat points to Sinai. The
covenant of Elohim, which God then made with the
saved holy seed, and with the universal nature, points
to the covenant of Jehovah."
4. The Geological Effects of the Dehtge. — In
earlier times, the traces of earth revolutions that
took place in the creative days (for example, the
mountain formations, the shells on the highest hills,
and similar phenomena) were brought forth as proofs
of the flood. Such a mode of reasoning must now
be laid aside by those who would reconcile revela-
tion with science. Neither can the assumption be
proved, that it rained for the first time in the flood,
and that, with the change in the atmosphere, human
life suddenly sunk in its duration, nor the supposi-
tion that at that time a sudden tran^fornlation took
place in the animal world, or that new animals were
originated. The following suppo^ition.s, however,
may be regarded as more or less safely entertained:
1. As the great flood denoted an epoch in the life of
humanity, so also must it have done in the life of the
earth; and through this epoch the giant-like in the
human imtural powers seems to have been moder-
ated, whilst, on the contrary, the development in the
earth's life becomes more conformable to law. 2. The
historical indications and signs of great changes in
the earth's surface, such as volcanic mountain forma-
tions, surface transformations (Caspian Sea, and island
Atlantis, for exanijile), may be coiinecied, in some
special mea.sure, with the catastrophe of the flood.
3. The flood in itself may, perhaps, have been par
tial (see F. Pf'AKF, " The Creative History," p. 646),
but the earth-crisis, on which it was conditioned,
must have been universal. With the opening of
the fountains of the deep stands the opening of the
windows of heaven in polar contrast. An exlraor-
tlinary rain-storm and full of water over the Noachian
earth-circle, was probably conditioned by an extra-
ordinary evaporation in other regions of the globe.
This must have been followed by an extraordinary
congelation on the same side. Does the " ice-period,"
the ]ieriod of the wandering boulders, stand in any
relation to this? As an earth-crisis, the flood wa»
prolKibly uni versa.'.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICA.i..
1. Nanh and hin Ifouxe, in contrast with the Con
teiiiporaries of Noah (eh. vi. 9-11). The history thai
{• I^uniio tolls usCsce p. 293). that Siittrljluf 'iid not onffln-
ftlly mciiii in (ionnan a sin-dt'tu{ft', but tlicrc- iti no other rea*
deiini,' that will preserve liis iiitLiided contrast. — T. Ii. !
3HAP. VI. 9— VII. ».
291
follows 18 distiuguighed by the name Tholedoth, or
Generations of Noah. For Noah is not ouly the lust
of the Sethic patriarchs, as the end of the antedilu-
vian period ; lie is, moreover, the first of the new,
through the patriarchal line that goes on in 81iem,
and, in this representation, is he also a type of the
future Christ, the finisher of the old, the author of
the new, worhi. In a typical sense, Noah is the
second ancestor of the Liumau race, as Christ, the
Man from Heaven, is such in a real sense (1 Cor. xv.).
As a continuer of tlie old time, >'oah is virtually a
repetition of Adam ; as a beginne of the new time,
he is a type of Christ. He was a righteous man.
According to Knubel, the autlinr (of this account of
the flood) knew nothing of any fall of Adam. One
might deduce a hke conclusion from Luke in his ac-
count of Zachaiias and Elisabeth (ch. i. 6). But
evidently the righteousness here meant is that which
represents him as justified in view of the judgment
of the flood, by reason of liis faith (Heb. xi. 1).
Therefore was the explanation added : he was D^'?n .
guiltless, perfect, blameless among his cotempora-
ries who perished in the judgment. The ground of
this was: he walked with God as Enoch did. That
he begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, is here
again related, as in ch. v. 32, because in them the
continuance of a new race is secured ; with Noah,
therefore, must his family also be saved. But, more-
over, to Noah, and his house, there is formed a con-
trast in the race of his time, and in the old form of
the earth that had been corrupted by it. — Ver. 5. To
represent the wickedness of man, our text goes fur-
ther, and expresses the incurable perdition of the old
earth itself, as having been produced by it. It was
utterly corrupt, in that it was filled with wickedness,
acts of violence, and pride. But it was corrupt be-
fore the eye of God in its most manifest form, so
that its judgment was imperatively demanded. —
And God looked upon the earth, and lo. — De-
litzsch correctly points out the contrast of these
words to ch. i. 31. "Everything stood in sharpest
contradiction with that good state which God the
creator had established." God's looking (or seeing)
denotes a final sentence. The earth was incurably
corrupt because all flesh had corrupted its way, that
is, its normal way of life, upon the corrupted earth.
Herein lies the indication, that as men grew wild and
savage, the animal world also threatened to become
wild. If, however, we suppose, with Delitzsch, an
universal corruption of the animal world, whence
could Noah have taken the good specimens for his
ark V Moreover, it caimot be concluded, fiom ch. ix.
4, that men, in their greediness for flesh, cut out
pieces from the yet living animal. According to
Knobel, the text denotes the beasts, inasmuch as
thev originally lived upon vegetables, but now had
partly degenerated into flesh-eaters. This, however,
would be all the same as introducing a representa-
tion into the text, just as DeUtzsch maintains, that
the eating of flesh had not yet been permitted. Keil
understands the words in question as referring gen-
erally to men only. Thereby, however, there is
loosened that organic connection of man, beast, and
earth, on which the text lays stress. More correct
is the emphasis he lays on the words " all flesh : "
humanity had become flesh (ver. 3).
2. The Announcement of the Judgmeni^ and the
Directinn for the Building of the Ark (vers. 13-22).
— And God said to Noah. — The revelation of the
divine disjileusurc with the human race, which ap-
pears first, ver. 3, as a conditional and veiled threat-
ening of Judgment with the granting of a space foi
repentance, ami which, in its second utterance, has
already become a resolution to destroy the buniao
race (ver. 7), becomes here an absolute announce-
ment of approaching doom. There had, perhaps,
been previous revelations, in the form of a pT-eachiug
of repentance, made by other patriarchs (such aa
Methuselah and Lameeh), as they, one after the
other, left the world. These had been gradually ex-
tended in time; but now are they all concentrated
in the one revelation made to Noah. With this
there was, at the same time, connected the promise
that Noah and his family should be saved. As
God's acts of deliverance are cumiected in time with
his acts of judgment (since his judgments are evei
xcparalious of the godly from the ungodly, and, in
this sense, xatvatimis and deliverances), so also are
the reivlatinnx of judgment at the same time revela-
tions of deliverance, and the faith of the elect which
corresponds to them is, at the same time, both a
faith in judgment and a faith in salvation. — The end
of all flesh. — An expression which strongly conveys
the idea, that the positive judgment of God is indi-
cated through a judgment immanent in the corruption
of men. The self-abandonment in this corru|)tion,
the clearly visible end of the same, is so fearfully de-
picted, that the positive end winch God is about to
impose takes the appearance, not of a judgment
merely, but of redress. StUl is the first concejition
the predominant one, as appears from the expiession
which tells us that God saw the end, the extreme
end of the world's corruption (Keil). — Is filled 'with
violence through them (Lange renders more coi-
rectly, from their faces, or, before them. Vulg.,
a facie eorum). As it is said, in immediate coimeo-
tion, ^^ before the face of God" we hold it unsatisfac-
tory here to render CHESS'S from them, or through
them. The flood of wickedness that comes up before
God's face goes out from their face ; that is, it is a
wickedness openly perpetrated; the moral judgment,
the conscience, goes utterly out in the direct behold-
ing and approbation of evil. — I will destroy them
■with the earth. — Destruction as set against cor-
ruption (1 Cor. V. 5). The earth as such can, indeed,
suffer no penal destruction, .^s one with man, the
destruction becomes to it a total destruction, which
comes upon men along with tlieir earth. And so in
the renewal of humanity must the earth also receive
a renovation of its form. — Make thee an ark. —
An indication of the mode bf salvation, in which he
himself must co-operate. Baumgarten: " He must
be not only the preserved, but also the preserver."
fl3tn , according to Delitzsch, probably (if the word
is Shemitic), from a;in = 3^S, to be hollow.* Chal-
[♦ Tlie etjonology of Delitzscli cannot be sustained, u
no such formation can be grammatically made from ^'X .
The reasons Eodiger gives for its Egyptian origin are in-
conclusive, and if something like it existed in the old Egyp-
tian, that would not prove that it had not come into il from
the still older language of Shem and Noah. Fuerst regards
it as Shemitic, from ilZTTi , to which he gives the sense t»-
cavare, hence hoUoiuness and capacity — cognate to the Latin
tuha, laberna. Kimchi makes it fi-om ZT\ , hut this is not it
all easy. The word is doubtless the one used ft the time,
— a peculiar archaic term for a very unusual i.'iing. liks
b^3*'3 , the term for the flood itself, ^though afterward*
transferred to any smaller vessel. It is not likely that it
would I'e ever lost, or another used for it by way of trans-
lation, in any subsequent version of the tradition. It might
be conjectured to be cognate to the Syriac wSa-^ . redui*
davit, supernatavit (Heb. "plJ), or the Arabic I o j^
298
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
daic, sr'-"ri, Sept. ki^ojtos, Vulg. area (other
meanings see in DelitzsehV Keil and Rodiger con-
jecture tiiat the word i» of Egyptian origiu. So
Knobel : "In Kgyptian, boat is called tept.^'' It is
likewise used of the small ark in which Moses was
PHved (but wliich In the Septuagint is rendered
SiSts or ^i&7}. — Of gopher-wood [Lange, resinous
wood]. Hieronynius: Uffna biiuminata% " Troba-
bly, cy press- wood." Keil (^S>, cognate to "^ES and
KvnaDiaao^). — Rooms shalt thou make [Laiige,
cells]. — Properly in cells, as cells (Uterally, nests —
lit'le cabins), or cell-containing. — With pitch. —
Sept. arf(pa\Tf}s^ Vulg. bifutnen. — And this is which
(what) thou shalt make it, — " The most probable
supposition is, that the ark was built, not in the forui
of a ship, but after the manner of a box, without
keel, with a flat deck, more like a four-sided moving
house than a ship, since it was destined not for sail-
ing, but only for floating upon the water. Thus
regarded, the measures 300 cubits long, 50 cubits
broad, and 30 cubits high, give a ground-surface
of 15,000 cubits square, and a cubical content of
450,0uu cubits solid, taking the usual measure of the
cubit (Deut. iii. 11), as the length from the elbow
to the end of the middle finger, or about 18 inch-
es." Keil. Knobel remarks: "The building sur-
passes in magnitude tlie greatest ships-ot-the-line.
Its arrangement, however, according to experiments
made in Holland, would be found in harmony with
its design." In the year 1609, at Hoom, in Holland,
the Xetherlandish Mennonite, P. Jansen, produced
the model of a vessel afier the pattern of the ark,
only in smaller proportions, whereby he proved, that
although it was not appropriate for a ship-model, it
was well adapted for floating, and would carry a
cargo greater by one third than any other form of
like cubical content.* See Delitzsch, p. 250. —
elatus fuit supra aquam^ were it not that the changf of
^ for B is so very rare a thing in Hebrew, although they
are letters of the same organ. It may be difficult to trace
it to anj' Hebrew root afterwards in common vize ; but that
the word is Shemitic is reDdered alm'J^t coi-tain from its
being sc constant in all the branches of that family. Thus
the Chaldaic XP^S'T (the Targum word for nUP), the
Arabic 5«jL3*, -Ethiopic i'l'T, and even the Maltese
Ubui. Thu SjToac Version, instead of the old Shemitic root,
uses f Z&^uc* or ) ^" P r . which is simply the Greek
ct^uTOf Get^enius regards the word ae Shemitic, though he
exprc-pes some doubt aliout it. — T. L.l
* [The ditliculty which some have in respect to the mag-
nitude of the ark, and the gieatn'-ss of the work, arises from
overlooking the extreme simplicity of its structure, the
length ct time allowed, the physical con.'^titution of the
fabricators, and the facilities ior obtaining the materials,
which, it is easy to suppose, may lave existed in abundance
in their near vicinity. Four men of iiriniitive gigantic
strength, to whom the architects of Stonehenge, the ^ai^e^e
of Oyfb'jH an walU (stiuctures found in Greece and in other
parts (jf Kurope, which, to our modem eyes, seem almost
Buperhuman), the lifters and di-awers i>f the immense stones
of the pyramids, and the diggers of the deep granite ravoms
of Upi>er I^gj'pt, were junior and inhMior,— four such men
(to saynotiiing now of any other probable heli)with iron
tools, himjile perhaps, yet well adapted to cutting, t^littiug,
and he\\ing (see Gen. iv. 22>, and surrounded by Kirests of
the gf'pher-pine, firm and aurable. yet light and easy for
working— could ccitainly have built such an ark in much
le»?^ time tlian is allowed for it In the Scripture It is noth-
ing tin.Tedible, nothing even strange, that they should have
Jnid Huch a llooring. .'(00 cubits l^ng (4'>0 feet), and 50 wide,
and that they should have raided upon it walls and a roof 30
cubito hi(!h, — thai they should have strengthened the whole
with we<lges, Bpikea, aud girding timbers (see the construo-
tim >f Ulysses* Schcdia, Odys. v. 24»-261>,
A window shalt thou make in the ark. — "'.ris
not in the roof (Kosenmviller and others), but a lighfc
opening (C*ins, dual, a double light)* see ch. viii
6. Baumgarten supposes that it must be regarded
as a light-opening of a cubit's breadih, extending
above the whole upper length of the ark ; Kuubel
and Keil, on the contrary, suppose that the wimiuw
was hxed on the side, to the extent of a cubit, under
the ridge of the roof. Then, indeed, according to
Tuch, would only one cabin have received light, per-
haps that of Noah ; at ail events, only the liighest
story would have had a dim twilight. We suppose,
therefore, with Baumgarten, that it must be regarded
as a light-opening in the deck, which was continued
through the ditierent stories. Against the rain and
the water dashing, must this opening have been
closed in some way by means of some transparent
substance ; for which purpose a treUis, or lattice-
work, would not have been sufficient. The expres-
sion *' to a cubit," denotes also precaution. In this
view of the case, moreover, it is not easy to take
■ins collectively, as is done by Gesenius and the
Syriac, and to fancy a number of light apertures,
although it might be that one light-opening in the
deck could be divided into a number of light-open-
ings for the interior.* — The door of the ark.—
making it like a large dry-dock rather than a ship— and then
have rendered it water-tight by a copious use of the rosin
and bitumen that abounded in that region. What is there
incredible in it, or even strange, we say ! Add to this the
considerations mentioned by Lange, the feeling of necessity,
the conviction of a divine impulse, together with the in-
creased vigor that ever comes from the consciout-ness of a
great wt rk, and the difficulties which at first appear so start-
ling are immediately diminished, if they do not wl)oUy dis-
appear.
There is more force in the objection arising from the
stowage of the ark, if we take the common estimate of the
animals. But here, again, everything depends upon the
theoiy with which we start. Throughout the account the
several alls, as already remarked in the text-notes, become
universal or specific, widen orcontrnci, according to our pre-
judgment of the universality or partiality of the flood itself.
See remarks on this in the Excursus, p. 318.
Had the narrator been more guiuded and specific in hia
language, it would have justly impaired his credit. It would
have been an affectation of knowledge he could not have
possessed. In giving hi^ divine convictions, as derived from
visions, or in any other manner, he presents them aecor-^ing
to his coneeptions a* dependent on his knowledge of things
around him. Greater Ciire in his language would have
looked like distrust in himself— like an anticipation cf axvil,
and an attempt to get credit for accuracy. And this is the
peculiar character of the narrative. Precise is it even to
minuteness in things that fall directly within tht; observa-
tions of sense; here the narrator gives us numbers, dates,
and even cubits of measui ement ; whilst he is general, even
to the appearance of hyperbole, in what was beyond such
range. It is the chara* teristic of a truthful style,— that is,
truthful to the conception and the emotion.— T. L.]
* [In interpreting the expression, "to a cubit shalt thou
finish it above, nbyTablO nrk^n n:2X bsl, much de-
pends on getting the right sense of the preposition, or ad-
verb, nbi'iabTj . The Hebrew language, so tense in other
parts of speech, rejoices in double, triple, and even quad-
ruple forms of its particles. Thus, by vpon, 7^13 '^^'^''e,
nb"T2 with local n , upward, JlbT'Cb to upward, or loabnvef
nhV'ch'Ci/rmn ahme to above. Thus, in Gen. vii. 20, 1^33
C^l^n the waters prevailed nby^bia from higher to hiyk-
er, from the top of the mountain to the summit of the flood,
or in the other diroetion, as in Josh. iii. 13, 16. There isaa
exactness here which is not to be disregarded : fnnn ihoeav*
of the ark up lownrd the lidgo of iU>i mof, thou shiilt.A>".'>'A it
to a cubit ; that is, leaWng a cubit itnfiuish'd, open, or un-
closed. There is also an emphasis in the Piel verb nS*-n ,
especially if we regard its objective pronoun as leferring to
the ark ilself, or the roof of the ark. Thou shalt make it
comjilr.te, all except a cubit space which was to be left. It
is not easy to untferstand liow Ihis vacant cubit could \ye is
CHAP. VI, 9 — VII. ».
29?
Here car only be meant an entrance wbit*h was after-
wards clused, and ouly opened a,i;ain at the end of
the flooa. And since there were three stories of the
ark. the word is to be understood, perhaps, of ihree
entrances capable of being closed, and to which there
would have been constructed a way of access from
the outside on the outside. " Is it held that so
eolossal a structure as the ark would have been im-
praciicable in this very early time; the objection
may be met with the answer, tl-at some of tlie most
gigantic .structures belong to m imnieiuorial anti-
quity." Baum^i^artea (compare also Keil, p. 98 ;
Bklitzsch, p. lioii).— And behold I, even I, am
bringing. — Noah must make the ark, for He, Jeho-
the side, or at the eave. In the other way we get the idea
which would seem to be s^iven by Aben Ezra, that "the
roof of the ark was triangular, cbll'^a m^a'IS , (that is, in
its section) with a sharp top, in IliJxSl , and so also its
comers or angles, T^rizr^SjrTD , so that it could not turn up-
side down ("^BriPn sib), whilst its door was on one side."
That is, the roof was not flat, but made by two planes, more
or less inclined. " To a cubit shalt thou fanish it." That is,
it was to be left open (or unfinished) on the ridge, to the
breadth of a cubit extending the whole length. This waa
the in^ (Zoliar), a word whose strong primary sense is
iig/tt, splendor, the light of heaven^ or of the meridian sun;
like the similar Arabic words, f\j^ , or ?.L^? • So it
was emphatically to the ark. Their light was fiom above.
This "ins showed the open sky, or heaven, through its
whole length, like a meridian line, and this suggests, and
is suggested by, that other use of the word in the dual,
C'^n^ , for noon, or the midday light (see Gen. xliii. 16,
25 ; Ps. xxxvii. 6 ; Cant, i. 7, etc.)* li^^e another Arabic word,
'^ still more closely resembling it. Its dual form in
Hebrew denotes exact division, or the noon splendor when
it divides the day (menrfiVs, ^ecn/jn^pivo?), or the lime the
Greeks called crraSepov ^/xap, when the day apptiars st.ition-
ary, or evenly balanced. It may be also said that ibe Hebrew
dual denote- not only what includes two things, but likewise
what is exactly fce/ioeen two things. As for e.^ample, w^S
C^iHn I S:im. xvii. 4, 23, an epithet applied to Goliath. It is
the dual of "3 , as though we should say, a man of betweens.
The LXX. have well rendt-red it 6 ainjp 6 ^eaaioy, and the
Vulgate, most absiu'dly, vir spurius. It denot<-s one who
comes out, as a champion, in the middle space between two
armies, like Homer's eiri jrToAe'p.oto yei^vpjj, the bridge, or
ridge, of the battle. The Hebrew and the Syriac ascribe
number to these prepositions, and to this mode of conceiv-
ing is also due the double use of "p-, as in Gen. i, 4, '*6«-
ivaeen the light and between the darknes-;."
The ^nSE , thus regarded, was a dividing, meridional
line to the ark itself. It very probably served, also, as a
means of kuowing the astronoraiciil meridian, when the solar
light fell perpendicular, showing tlie noon, or the shadows
falling in the line of the ark's longitude,holped to ascertain
the course. The same information might have been ob-
tained from observing the line of stars that appeared through
it at night. In this way it may have imperfectly answered
Borae of the purposes of a dial, or chronometer, and of a
eomp;i^. Such a view will not appear extravagant, when
we bear in mind that the observation of the stars for lime
purposes, annual and diurnal, was peculiar to the earliest
periods, ami that the very names now Lriven to the constella-
tions are lost in the most remote antiquity. The necessity
of some such guide for the year and its seasons, made these
early men more familiar with the actual aspect ot the heav-
ens than many in modem times who learn astronomy solely
from books. The "inS was evidently something different
from the '"iSn, also rendered window. Gen. viii. 6. We
need give ourselves no difficulty about the covering of the
■*n3 , when it rained. Noah, doubtless, found some method
for that purpose, whenever it was needed. The Vuliiate
rendering of Gen. vi. Ifi, comes the nearest to the vi(?ws
stated, although it does not exactly express them : Fenos-
tram in area fades, et in cubito consummabis summitalem
tiu-u— T. L.1
/^
vah, is about to bring a flood upon the earih, but at
the same time to make a covenant of sahatiou with
Noah. bl35 from b:^ or biZ, to undulate, t4
swell — an antique word, used expressly for the
waters of Noah (Is. liv. y), and which, out of Gene,
sis, occurs only iu Ps. xxix. 10." Keil. Therefore
Keil and Delitzseh take for its explanation the words
that follow : " waters upon the oaith," regarding H
as in apposition. Knobel, again, explains it ag
meaning the flood of water, whilst Michaclis and
others have changed D'^a into c^^a (from the sea)
without any ground, although in this conformation
of all collections of water to make the flood, the
co-operation of the sea comes into account. The di-
vine destination of the flood : to dedi-oi/ every living
thiiig under the heaven. In a more particular sense:
whatever if upon the earth. The sea-animals cannot
be destroyed by water. In respect to them, more-
over, the symbolical relation in which the beast?
stand to men, does not come specially into considei
ation. — But with thee -will I establish my cov
enant. — r''i3, Sept. Smdijicr;, Vulg. fadus, in tht
New Testament, testamentum (Rom. ix. 4). The re-
ligious covenant-idea here presents itself for the flrst
in literal expression ; although the estabUshment of
God's covenant with Noah presupposes a previous
covenant relation with Adam (Gen. ii. 13; iii. 13;
Sirach xvii. 10). In the repeated establishment of
the covenant with Noah (ch. vi. 18; viii. 21 ; ix. 9 ;
vers. 11, 16; Sirach xliv. 11), with Abraham, ch.
XV. 18; xvii. 9-14; xxii. 15; Ps. cv. S-10 ; Sirach
xhv. 24 ; Acts iii. 23 ; vii. 8), with Isaac (ch. xxiv.
25), with Jacob (ch. xxviii. 13, 14), with Israel (Ex.
xix. 6; xsiv. 7; xxxiv. 10; Ileut. v. 3), there are
unfolded the different covenants, or covenant foiins,
which bring into revelation the ground-idea of the
covenant between God and humardty in .\dam,
whilst they arc, at the same time, anticipatory repre-
sentations of that true covenant-making which is
reaUzed in the new covenant of God with believing
humanity through Christ (Jer. xxxi. 32, 33 ; Zach.
ix. 11 ; Matt. xxvi. 28 ; 2 C.r. iii. 6 ; Heb. vi. 17,
18), and which finds in the perfected kingdom of
God its last and conclusive development (Ucv. xxi).
The covenant of Goil with Noah, and that with Abra-
ham, form a parallel ; the first is the covenant of
I compassion and forbearance made with tlie new hu-
i inanity and earth in general ; the last is the covenant
of grace and salvation made with Abraham and his
l>'iieving seed, as a more definite covenant-making
on the ground of the Noachian covenant. The pa-
triarchal covenant which, iu its specialty, embraced
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Ex. iii. 6) as the cove-
nant of promise, takes the form of a law-covenant
for Israel ; this latter is the old typical covenant in
the form of an anticipatory representation of the
new covenant, and which, therefore, as the older and
more imperfect, must give place to the new ; where-
as the covenant with Noah and that with Abraham,
as beginnings of the covenant of faith, become one,
finally, with the new covenant of Christ, which, in
its stricter sense, embraces the children of faith as
partakers of salvation, but, in its wider sense, the
children of men as called to salvation. But the cov-
enant of Christ carries on the foundation covenant
made with Adam to its perfect realization in the eter-
nal covenant-life of the new world (Rev. xxi). The
revelation and recognition of the divine covenant
rests on the revelation and recognition of the fad
that God, as the absolute personality, placs himself
300
GENESIS. OK THE FIRST BOOK OB MOSES.
in a personal, ethicMlIy free, covenant-relation of love
and tiiiib to man as personal, and to the human
race. That the covenant of (jod has its root in the
personal relation is evident from the fact that in its
diflerent forms such covenant ever goes out from a
pei-son, as from Noah, Abraham, etc. Therefore it is,
that ever within the universal covenant relations, as
they widi-'n from the centre out, there are tlie making
of special covenants, such as that with Moses, with
Phineas (Numb. xxv. 13), with David. It is a con-
Bequenee of the etldcal signiticance of God's cove-
nant as forming the personal foundation of the
cH-sen kingdom, that the a^saults of the kingdom
of darkness are in like manmr comprehended as
covenants or conspiracies against God (the troop of
Korah, Ps. ii. ; Ixxxiii. 6; Luke xxiii. 12; Acts iv.
27). The word !^''"^3 from r^S, to cut, divide, is
derived from the sacritices of animals that are cut in
twain in the formation of a covenant ; and in this is
tlie peculiar explanatiou of the word, Gen. sv. 10,
17. — And thou shalt come into the ark. — God
makes his covenant personally with Noah, but there
is included also his house, which lie represents as
paterfamilias, and with it the new humaiuty medi-
ately, as also, in a remoter sense, the animal world
that is to be preserved. " The narrator supposes
that the beasts of themselves (as is held by Jarelii
and Aben Ezra), or at the instigation of God (ac-
cording to Kimchi, Piscat.), would come into the
ark." Knobel. Rather was it through an instinctive
presentiment of catastrophe, which was, at the same
time, God's ordering and an impulse of nature. The
collection of the provisioning is distinguished from
the gathering of the beasts, so that the ark repre-
sents a perfect economy of the Noachian household.
Noah's obedience in faith makes the conclusion of
the section (see Ileb. xi. 17).
3. 77ie approach of tfie Flood, and iJie Divine
Direction to JS'oak for cntcrifui into the Ark (ch. vii.
1-9). And the Lord said unto Noah. — Here
Elohim appeals as the covenant-God; therefore is
he named Jehovah. — Come thou into the ark. —
The signal of the approaching judgment. Enter, my
people, into thy chamber (Is. xxvi. 20) for thee have
I seen righteous / Jn the divine forum of the judg-
ment of the deluge, Noah is justified before God by
means of the righteousness of faith through the word
of the promise ; therefore is he saved, together with
his whole family, because his faith is imputed for
their pood. — Before me (Heb. before my face)
denotes the divine sentence of justification.. — In his
generation, denotes the 0|iposite sentence of God
against that generation. — Of every clean beast —
by sevens. — This appointment is a special carrying
out of the more universal one, ch. vi. 20 ; it is, theie-
fore, wholly in correspondence with the advancing
prophecy, and not in contradiction of it, as Knobel
thinks. Of the unclean beasts it says, " by two, a
male and a female ; " according to the analogy of
this expression, the number seven (as used of the
clean beasts) would denote also the numbei' of indi-
viduals (Calvin, Delitzsch, Keil, and others), not
seven pair (Vulgate, Aben Ezra, Jlichaelis, De Wctle,
Knobel). The prescription, therelore, is three pair
and one over. This one was probably de.'^tined for
% thank-ofrcring. " The distinction between clean
and unclean beasts is not fir.st nuidc by Moses, but
only becomes (ixod in the law as correpponding to it,
though existing long before. Its beginnings reach
back to the primitive time, and ground themselves
OD an immediate conscious feeling of the human s])i-
rit not yet clouded by any un.iatural and ungodly cul.
ture, under the influence of which feeling ii sees in
many beasts pictures of sin and corruption which fill
it with aversion and abhorrence." Ke I. But such a
distinction, so grounded, might make an analogous
division a permanent law tor Christendom. The
contrast of clean and unclean cannot, surely, have
here the Levitical sigiuficauee. More to the purpose
would be the contrast of beasts tame and wild,^-of
beasts that are utterly excluded from the society of
men, and roam about independent oT them, altliougb
this contrast is limited by the physiological concep-
tion of cleanness and uucleanness (see 13f.litzs(H, p.
25(5). The interchange of the divine names Jehovah
and F'ohira in our section makes trouble, as might
well inferred, for the documentary hypothesis (sea
Ke. p. 94, and the opposing view of Delitzsch, p.
256). — For yet seven days. — After seven days
must the flood break out; there is appointed, there-
fore, a week for the njarehing into the ark. — Kain
upon the earth forty days and forty nights. —
This is more widely expresseil, ver. 11, where the
phenomenon of the deluge is referred back to its
original cause, the breaking up of the fountains of
the deep. — And Noah was six himdred years
old. — According to ch. v. 32, he was live hundred
years old at the beginning of his married hfe. The
120 years, theretbre, of cii. vi. 3, go back beyond
this, — And Noah went into the ark That the
members of Ins household went in with him, denotes
their connection with him in obedience, and in their
fitness to be saved; with which the behavior of
Lot's sons in-law, and of Ids wile, forms a contrast.
That the beasts follow him into the ark, shows a
wonderful docility proceedmg from their instinctive
presentiment of the catastrophe.
[Note on the Bible Idea of Covenant. — It
is a most important remark of Dr. Lange (p. 299),
that "The revelation and recognition of the Dirine
Covenant rests on the revelation and recognition
of" the fact that God, as the absolute personnliti/,
places himself in a personal, ethically free, covenant-
relation of love and truth to man as j)crsonal, and to
the human race." It is strange, indeed, that our
philosophy should have so overlooked the glory of
this covenant-idea, whilst our more ordinary worldly
literature has so often treated it as a narrow dogma-
tic of an almost obsolete theology. God raised man
above the animal by endowing him «ith moral, ra-
tion.al, and religious facidties. This lifts him above
the plane of nature, and prepares him lor a still
higher relation. His Creatcjr makes a covenant with
him as being, though finite, a supernatural person-
aUty. He is placed upon higher ground than that
of natural law, or natural right, as deduced from
man's relation to the universe, or what might be
called the uinvcrsal nature of things. He is lak' n
out of this, and raised to a higher s]iiritual glory. No
longer an animal, however richly endowed, yet l.jound
in the chain of cause and eflect, but under the free
law of the promise, — living not by bread alone, but
by every word that proceedeth from the Lord. Child
of dust as he is fihysically, God makes a covenant
with him, and thus gives liini more tlian a natura.
right, — a legal or forensic tight — making him a son,
an heir of glory and immortality. Man has an un-
derstanding with his M.'tker ; he is elevated to a
platform on wliieh the finite and infinite pt r>onality,
the finite and infinite intelligence, converse together,
and become parlies in the same voluntarv, spiritua
transaction. True it is, that in the Bible even naiu
CHAP. VI. 9— VII. 9.
301
ral law is sometimca calleil a covenant, aa in Jcr.
xxxiii. 20, 25, but in such eases ihe language i« evi-
dently figurative, and derived, by way of analoj;y,
from "the higher idea. With man it is a real cove-
nant, a convening, or coming together, of tlie Divine
and human mind. The transaction belongs to a
higher world. It brings in a higher class of ideas.
In nature, and natural relations, there are forces,
gravities, attractions, affinities, or, as we approach
Its department of life and sentiency (tUo. gli still na-
ture), there are appetites, instincts, susi -ptiljilities,
having some appearance of freedom, yet itill Ijound
fast under the fatality of cause and ettt-ct ; in the
covenant, on the other hand, there are parties, prom-
ises, agreements, oaths, conditions, imperatives, ful-
filments, forfeitures, penalties, rewards. In the ten-
dencv of our modern ethics to become converted into
a system of physics — making all duty to consist in
the study and observance of natural law — we lose
sight of this higher glory of positive law, covenant,
or promise ; we fad to see how it is tlie very dignity
of the human soul, that, unlilce the animal, it can,
through faith, be in this forensic or covenant rela-
tion to the universal Lawgiver. The opposite of
this is the tendency, now so common, to place the
relations between God and man on the general basis
of " the nature of things," and to determine the hu-
man place tlierein as made out by science or philo-
sophy, in distinction from, if not in opposition to,
that expresn revelation winch is itself a carrying out
of the covenant-idea. When carefully examined, the
former process will be found to be a tracing of man's
obligation to the universe, rather than to (!od the
free, personal, sovereign lawgiver of the universe.
The word covenant is not in the first three chap-
ters of Genesis, but the spirit of the word is there,
and the term itself is expressly predicated of the
transactions there recorded when referred to in other
parts of the Old Testament ; see Hos. vi. 7. Imme-
diately after the inspiraiion that made the human
creation, we find this language of con-venmg, of nm-
tual intelligence, showing that God is now speaking
to a supernatural being, and in a style different from
that which had been used in the commands to na-
ture The expression Ti^^a nx Tiapn Gen. vi.
18, " I will establish MT covenant, 7(nX laith thee"
(literally, I will make it stand), evidently implies
something preceding that had been impaired — the
raising up of something that had fallen down. It
was the cbi" n^^a of Is. xxiv. 5, or coiienant of
eternitij, originally made with man as an immortal
being, and itself an e^adence of his designed immor-
tality ; or, as it may be rendered, world-covenant,
intended to last through the world or Eeon of human-
ity ; or it may have that still higher sense of the
covenant made " before the foundations of the world "
with him who was to be the second Adam, and whose
delight, during the aeons of creation (see Prov. viii.
31), was " with the sons of men " who were to crown
it all. The remarks of that profound critic and
philosopher, Maimonides, on this expiession, are
very noteworthy. He regards r^na as, from its very
form, in the construct state (Vike n'^'J^X"]), and where
there is no other expressed, the word with which it
Ig in regimen is clsis or 2''B.^" , being thus equiva-
lent to CTlbi' r"'n3 , the covenant of eternities,
"because, before we were, he commanded that it
ghould stand, Oipru;, and be forever with the
•igbteeua."
The word r'^^a has been derived from the sens*
of cutting in X"i:, as Lange explains it, but there i<
another verb of cutting (m:) usually join.d with it
making the common phrase exactly like the Uomerij
opKta Tiatiitv, derived, doubtless, from the same ides
of dividing the victim by whose death the covenani
was made. It is better, therefore, to derive it, ai
Maimonides seems to do, from the creative sense of
X12. It is making anew thing in the moral and
spiritual world, as the physical creations were in the
world of matter ; and so, says this Jewish commen-
tator, ^rx"" laa 'irna, "my covenant, as it
were, my creating."
There is no religion without this idea of a person-
al covenant with a personal God, and, therefore, all
such views as those of Comte, Mill, and Spencer are,
for all moral or religious purposes, wlioUy atheisticaL
They acknowledge no personality in God ; they can-
not u-e the personal pronouns in speaking of him or
to him. It may, in truth, be said that all reliyion ia
covenant, even when religion appears in its mo.st per-
verted form. It has some appearance of being in
the very etymology of the Latin word. Cicero
makes it from relego — reliyiosi ex relegendo — but a
better derivation would seem to be from religo, to
bind, bind back, — religio is a positive bond (higher
than nature) between straving, fallen man, and hia
ILiker. We find traces of this iilea of covenant even
m the heathen religions, as in n"i3 h~_- Baal beritli,
mentioned Judg. viii. 33, whom the children of Is-
rael, in their apostasy, took uistead of their covenant
Jehovah. It seems to characterize certain peculiar
epithets which the Greeks attached to Ztil?, their
supreme God. It was the moile they took to inti-
mate more of a personal relation between the deity
and the worshipper than was afforded by the general
or merely natural view. Or it denoted a greater
nearness of the divine in certain pecuiiarly sacred re-
lations which men held to eacdi other, as though im-
parting to them a more religious sanction. Thiw
Zei/i JeVios, who calls specially to account for the
violation of hospitality. More closely still suggest-
ing the idea of the Hebrew covenant God, or tliat of
the Phoenician Baal berith, is the Greek epithet Zfi/t
opKios, Zeus, the God of the oath, as the special pim-
isher of perjury, or violation of covenant, whether as
ag.ainst himself, or as a breach of covenants raeE
m.ake with each other, as though there were a special
guilt in it, greater than that of any naturd injustice,
or ordinary impiety. The very essential idea of the
oath itself is that of covenant, and it is, therefore,
that part of religion to which our politico-natnralista
exhibit the most deadly opposition. The same idea
may be traced in other epithets, such as Zf us fToiptios,
the God who avenges treachery to friendship, ca
though the obligation of fidelity were grounded on a
special and mutual relation to something higher and
more positive than mere human likings. Similar to
this Zetis e'cpetTTios, the protector of the hearth. So
also Ze'vs epK-6ios (Jupiter Herceus), the God of the
family enclosure, or of the sacred domestic relaticna,
as founded on positive institution, transcending any
mere natural or individualizing rights that may ba
claimed against it. These precious ideas are akin to
tliat of covenant as the everlasting groimd of the
church. The divine covenant, the DSiJ r''~a. was
confirmed with Noah, to be transmitted by hira as
the root of all that is most sacred in the rnlatioiu
of man to God. or to his fellow-men. — T. I- 1
802
GENESIS, OK THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
DOCTEINAI, AJtD ETHICAL.
1. The flood makes a division between the .idamic
antiquitj- aud the primitive time — between the first
(throughout symbolical) and the second svmbolical-
traditioual primitive religion, as well as between the
anomi.'Uic aud the aomistic or superstitious lurms of
heathenisin. In Uke mannT is there a division be-
tween the old (antediluvian, antiquity and the post-
diluvian or the Noachian human race It is a type
of the historical incisions, epochs, and periods that
follow.
2. The flood was indeed a sin-flood (Siini^lut), or
rather, a flood of judgment, and as the first world-
historical-judgment, it was a type of all following
judgments, a«pecially of the world's last judgment.
3. The flood is a synthesis of judgment and de-
liverance, forming a type for every following synlhe-
eis of judgment and deliverance, especially for the
double effect (of juiigmcnt and deUverance) of the
exodus of the oliildreu of Israel from Egypt — for the
middle point of the world's history, the cross of
Christ, and for the final deUverance brought out by
the final judgment at the world's end. To the judg-
ment by water corresponds the judgment by tire as
the higher potency of judgment; to the baptism by
water corresponds the baptism by fire as the second
potencv, or the power of baptism for salvation.
Thus the judgments are deliverances, inasmuch as
they separate the salvable from the lost, or incura-
ble; and so the salv,ations arc judgments, inasnmch
as they are ever connected with some separation of
this kind.
4. The universal tradition, atnong men, of the
great flood, and its ethical significance, stands in
connection with the universal expectation of human-
ity that at the world's end there will be a world-
judgment.
5. The flood at the same time fact and symbol.
See the previous remarks. No. 3.
f Tiie meaning of the name Noah. See the
Exegetical annotations. No. I.
7. Tlie announcement of the flood, or the whole-
some destruction, as a means of salvation from the
incurable corruption. "The end of aU flesh," not
so much a judgment of condemnation as a remedy
again-t it (see 1 Pet. iii. 19 ; ch. iv. e,). Tlieieby
does the expression : " the end of all flesh," denote
the fact that the immanent judgment of natural cor-
ruption ha." for its consequence the positive judg-
ment. "Wherever the carcass, there are the eagles
gathered together."
8. The right bi-lief in the judgment is, at the same
time, a belief in the diliverance. A presentiment of
the flood and a preparation of the ark went together.
9. The ])lan of the ark was imparted to Noah by
God. The Spirit of (iod is the author of all ideal or
pattern forms of the kingdom of God. So, for ex-
ample, the tabeinacle, or ark of the testimony. —
The building of the ark was not merely a means ot
salvation for Noah and Ids race, but also a .sermon
of repentance for his cotemporaries.
\<>. The ark was not a .ship (in forin\ but yet it
was the piimilivc ship of humaiiity ; Goil'fl teaching
men navigation, hi« word of blessing upon il, and a
qrmbol of deliverance in all perils of the deep.
11. Noah was not only saved, but also the savior
or the mediator of the divine salvation for liis house.
He wae a type of Chris', the ab.solnte mediator.
12. Noah was comprehended with his honsehold
Id the (lue baptism of the flood. Already in Noah's
history there conspicuously appears the theocratij
significance of the household (Matt. x.).
13. The religion of revelation is alone the r^
gion of covenoit. It alone has the idea of the vaj-'>
nant. On this grand and peculiar feature, compare
BtCHSER's " Concordance," art. Bund. But it is a
covenant religion because it is the religion of a per-
sonal Gcid, and of his relation to personal men (see
the Exegetical annotations. No. 2). Here we are
reminded of the covenant-theory of Cocteins. The
divine covenant la truly a divine instituting, not
merely a contract (n^"l3 ir: he gave a coeeimnt);
but this instituting is also a covenanting. IIV Mil-
erate the personal ethical relation betwten the ptrsorud
God atid personal man, when we '■bliteraie the coee-
naiit idea. This has special force in respect to the
sacraments of the covenant. Through them man re-
ceives the promises of God, which he appiopriates
along with the obligations of the faith. This applies
to the tree of life given to Adam, to the rainbnw of
Noah, to the stars of heaven as shown to .\hraham,
and to circumcision, to the passover of Mose.«, as well
as to the Christian sacraments. When we have out
of view the obhgations of the covenant, as, (or ex-
ample, that of tiie initiation of children in baptism, we
profane the covenant (compare Baumuakten, p. Iii9).
14. The difference between the chan and the un-
clean animals (see the Exeget. aimnt.). The con-
trast between the cattle and the wild beasts is not
the only thing determined, but, at the same time, the
eonlra.st between an animally purr, aud an animally
impure, physiologically-physical, disposition (>ee
Lanoe's Leben Jesu, vol. ii. p. 662). Con ectly does
Keil remark (ji. 262), that the reception by pairs of
" all flesh " into the ark, may be reduced to a certain
relativity. The measure, however, of this relativity
cannot be particularly determined : for the suppo-
sition of EiiKARn (p. 85), that the beasts of the field
that were upon the eartli after the flood did not come
out of the ark, but were originated anew by God, has
no support in our history.
HOMILETICAl AND PRACTICAL.
See the Exegetical notes, and the Fumlainental
Theological Ideas. The great flood as a miraculous
sign of (iod : 1. In nature, as pointing back to the cre-
ation, and forward to the end and renovation of the
world. 2. In the world of man ; pointing backward
to the fall, forward to the last apostasy. 3. In the
sphere of thetlivine righteous government ; a copy-
ing of the first judgment of death, a pn figuration of
the end of the world. 4. In the kingdom of grace;
pointing backward to the first deliverance ill the
fiisl judgment, forward to the completed salvatijn
in the complete and fin il judgment - — The world if
that day an oliject of displeasure in the eyes of (r..d.
— Noah's righteousness of faith. — Noah, .-tanine
alone in the generation of his day. — In the time M
greatest corruption, there are the chosen of Goa—
Noah comprehended with his house. — A witness ibr
the signifieance of the family in the liingdoin of
(iod and in the Chuich. — The covenant of (iod with
Noah in its significance, and the unfolding of this
covenant. — The covenant of God with Noah a cove-
nant ot salvation lor himself and his house, and for
the fircservalion of the human race, 'flic direction
for litiilding llie ark, or the sacred archetypes of the
kingdoiri of (iod. — The ark in its figurative .signifi
cance: 1. An image of a house consecrated \i, liod.
CHAP. VII. 10-24.
Mi
I. of the Church of Christ, S. of the Christian state.
—As the ark Heats on iu the great flood, so does the
jhip of ^he Chureli sad on amid tlio storm-judgments
of the \»orld's liisti ry. — As tlie arli never goes under,
iO never sinlss the Cliureh. — The ark a sermon;
1. In its own linie, 2 for all times, 3. for the last
times, and especially, 4. for our times. Ham, too,
was in the ark, so also the unclean beasts (in oppo-
Bition to the Donatist extravagances). — In the one
person, Noah, were both his house and his future
race delivered ; therefore is Noah a type of Christ
(s. V. 18): "Go thou into the ark," thou and thine
bouse, that is, thy sons. Noah as the middle mem-
ber of the line between Enoch and Abraham (with
reference to Hib. .xi.). — The distinction between the
pure and the impure animals, or, that which is proper
for an offering to God is also proper for tlie enjoy-
ment of men. — How the instinct of safety brings to-
gether man and beast into the asylum of deliverance.
— Through death to life. — The judgment of God on
the iiist world In its still enduring efficacy : 1. as a
sign of light for the understanding of the course of
the world; 2. as an everlasting sign of warning;
S. ai a sign of salvation full of the blrssing of salva-
tion. The humanity baptized to humaneness. The
heart iu the covenant of Elohim is the covenant of
Jehovah. Through faith is humanity saved.
Starke, ch. vi. 9 : The ground of Noah's piety
was grace on the side of God, ver. 8, but this was
obtained, in no way, through his chastity, as the
Papists allege, on account of which he remained five
hundred years unmarried. Grace went before all
his works. On his side, faith in the Messiah was the
ground of piety — faith in the God . f tht prumise,
and his word of prondse. He proved it iu fort
ways: 1. He was possessed by a holy fear, in «hiek
he held for true the threatening of (iod in re.^peei to
the flood, although the event was yet far ott'; 2. he
prepared the ark according to the divine command,
although he had to contend with the ridicule of the
Cainites on account of tlie judgment being so long
delayed ; :i. he preached righteousiie.ss to others
(2 Pet. ii. 5^, whilst, 4. he himself walked irreproach-
ably.— Noah walks with God. — What God says to
Noah has three parts ; the first is the announcement
of the flood, the second the command to build the
ark, tlie third a promise relating to the preservation
of his life.
Lisco : Noah's life deliverance includes in it that
of the whole human race; to this also does the cov-
enant of God with Noah have relation in its widest
sense. — Calwer, Handbuch: Noah, with tho.se that
belong to him, is to bring from the old into the new
world, not merely naked life, but the pure worship
of God, to which the offerings pertained. — SiHRiiDKR,
v. 13 : God speaks to Noah in his relation to him as
creator and preserver. And so his covenant with
him has in view the whole human race. The whole
of creature-life is embraced in this voyage from tlie
old to the new world.
Calvin, ch. vii. 6 : Not without cause is the
statement of Noah's age repeated ; for among other
faults of old age, it renders men sluggish iind obsti-
nate ; therefore Xoah's faith comes more clearly into
view, in the fact that even at sucn an age it did not
fail him.
SECOND SECTION".
3%« Flood and the Judgment.
Chapter VH. 10-24.
10 And it came to pass after seven days [literally, seven of days] that the waters of tlie flood
11 were upon the earth. In tlie sixth liundredtli year of Noah's life, in the second month,
the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep
12 broken up,' and the windows '^ of heaven were opened. And the rain' [oca, heavy rain,
13 imiier, cloud-bnrsting] was upon the earth forty days and forty nights. In the selfsame dav'
entered Noah, and Shem, and Ham, and Japheth, the sons of Noah, and Noah's wife,
14 and the three wives of his sons with them, into the ark. They, and every beast' after
his kind, and all the cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon
15 the earth after his kind, and every fowl after his kind, every bird of every sort. Anrf
they went in unto Noah into the ark, two and two of all flesh wherein is the breath of
16 life. And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God had com-
17 manied him ; and the Lord shut him in. And the flood was forty days upon the earth ,
18 and the waters increased and bare up the ark, and it was lift up above the earth. And
the waters prevailed, and were increased greatly upon the earth; and th<? ark went
19 [drove iiere and there] upon tile face of the waters. Ami the waters prevailed exceedingly
upon the earth ; and all the high hills that were imder the whole heaven were covered.
20 Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail ; and the motmtains were covered
21 And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of caitle, and of beast,
22 and of every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, and every man : . Vll in whoaf
804
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
23 nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land. And every living thing
was destroyed [Lange reads n^'; m Kal, and renders, /lerfes/royed] which was upon the face of the
ground, " both man and cattle, and the creeping things, and tlie fowl of the lieaven,
and they were destroyed from the earth; and Noah only remained alive, and they that
24 were wit.h him in the ark. And the waters prevailed upon the earth a hundred and
fifty days.
I* Ver. 11." ITfTZS , a very strong word. Sudden cleaying ; used of the earthquake or earth-cleaving, Numb, rri,
81; Zach. xiv. 4. Hence the noun nyp3 , a valley, as though the Hebrews had some notion of valleys having theij
oripin in fissures or violent separations of the earth. Comp. Hab. iii. 9, V"l5< ypsri P^"in3 , "Thou didst cleave th«
earth with rivers" — or tioods.— T. L.] "' ' '~ ■ ' =
[2 Ver. 11. — rSiX windows, openings — general sense very clear from parallel passages, such as Is. Ix. 5 and Eccles.
zii. 3, though in the fatter passage it is used metaphorically of the eyes as the windows of the body. LXX., KaTappaKTcu^
Syriac, | ^ f^ ^ , or pourers. — T. L.]
[^ Ver. 12. — Cll^y , the very great rain, that which comes down in a body, as it were. ^Zl'D denotes the common rain,
except when this word is jomed with it, as in Job xxxvii. 6, CC5 1I31C , and in Zach. i. 1, — when it is intensitied. In
the Arabic, ^ y. "^ is never used for the rain, but it keeps the primary sense of magnitude, weight, density, pinguit,
enusus.—T.Ij.]
I* Ver. 13. — ci'in 0^7 2, in ipso die, in that very day. It denotes a statistical particularity, which takes this
account entirely out of the legendary or mythical view. It is most exactly true, or it is the boldest of forgei-ies in everv
unit and decimal employed in its reckonings. — T. L.]
[^ Ver. 14.— 'r?2nn hz^ • "^'^n ^^V ^^ ^^^"^ only be remarked that all the aW«, here and elsewhere, in
this account, are to be taken as unlimited, or as specific, according to the view we are compelled, from other considera-
tions, to form of the universality or partiality of the flood itself. Elsewhere only the niatlS are mentioned, as is noticed
by Dr. Mubpht, p. 212, and there is good reason to regard it here as specifically limiting the more general word
n^n before it. Their coming to the ark by pairs was evidently supernatural, but this in no respect atfects the other
question.— T. L.] ,
[* Ver. 23. — miTsn ^:s by. Rendered in our version, " on the face of the ground." Bather, " on the face
of the Adamah," the word, in the chapters before, used for the inhabited territory in distinctioti from ^1S , as in Gen.
iv. 14 ; — Y~i^ , in thai connection, being used for the wide, unknown earth, into which Cain feared he should be driven,
as a wanderer and a vagabond. The use of ni^lX here certainly seems to imply some territorial limitation. Even
when y"iX occurs, it may be better rendered land, indetinitely, than with that idea of totiiUty which our modern knowl-
edge makes us attach to it. See further on this in the Excursus, at the end of the account. — T. L.]
EXEGETIOAL AND CRITICAL.
1. The Time nf the Flood.— The beginning of the
flood is first deteniiiued in reference to the age of
Noah. It was in tlie sixth hundredth year of Noah's
life, that is, in the year when the six hundredth year
of his life would be completed. The number 600
appears here to have a symbolical meaning, as also
the week for his going into the ark. Six is the num-
ber of toil and labor. Next there is fixed the date
of the beginning: on the sevetiteetith day of the
seconil month. According to Knobel, must this date
be reckouetl frotu the first day of the six humlredth
year of Noah's life. For this there appears no ground
here, if we assume that the narrator hail in view a
known and iletcrmincd numbering of tlie months.
The <|ue3tion is this — whether the months are to be
determined acconling to the theocratic year, which
the .Jews kept after the Exodus from Rgypt, and
which began with Nisan in April (so that the begin-
ning of the flood would have fallen in the inimth
Ijar, or May), or whothcr It was after the (Pconnmic
years' reckoning, according to which 'I'isri (September
and October) made the end of the yeiir (Kxod. xxiii.
Ifi; xxxiv. B2). Habbi Joshua, Lepsius, and other.s,
are for the thoncratic tinie-rcckoidng. Accor<ling
to this, the flood began in the nioiilh that followed
KLsan. Keil and Knobel, on the contrary, are for
the ajconomic reckoning, according to which the
iiecond month would have fallen In our October or
November. ".loseplms (Aiitiq. i. '.I, ?,) has in niir.d
the month named by the llebiews Marhezvan, which
follows after Tisri : so the Targiiin of Jonathan, as
well as Jarchi and Kimchi. The continuous increase,
theti, or swelling of the waters from the 1 7th of the
second month, to the 17th of the seventh month, a
period of five months, or 150 days, wouhl fall in the
winter months." Knobel. Instead of this, we hold
that in a cosniical catastrophe, such as the flood ap-
pears to have been, the regard paid to the season ot
the year becomes fallacious; and then we are not
here to think of any usual climatic events, such aa
took place in the case of the Egyptian plagues,
though miraculously effected. It appears, there-
fore, to us, to have no bearing on the case, that the
Euphrates and the Tigiis fall towards the end of
May, and in August and November reach their low-
est point, or the consideration that, for the ancients,
the winter season wtis a mournful time of desolation,
etc. Knobel. It would seem from ch. viii. 22, that
the flood broke through all the ordinary constitutioD
of nature. In the first jduce must we enileavor to
.«et ourselves right with respect to the connection ia
the dates as given in our narration. On the 17th
day of the second month, then, came the flood, ami
it mined, from that time on, forty days and forty
nights. The conse(|uenee was the height of water
ill the flooil which continued for 150 days (ch. vii.
24). Then began the waters fo fall, and, on the 1 7th
ihvy of the seventh intrnth, the ark rested ii|ion the
montilains of Ararat. Tims far five months have
passed. On the first day of the lOtli month, that ia,
after about eight months, the tops of the mountaina
appeared. Finally, in the six hundred and first year
of Noah's age, in the first dav of the first month, th«
ground was becoming dry, lud on the seven-and-
CHAP. VII. 10-24.
305
twentieth day of the next month, it had become
wholly dry (ch. viii. 14). From the statement that
this ensued in the six hundred and first yeai- of
Noah's age, it cannot follow that his birthday fell on
New Year, but only that about one year had elapsed.
The extreme end of the flood, however, was ten days
after the full year which the flood had continued.
Knobcl conjectures that the flood was originally reck-
oned acconiing to the solar year of 365 days, but
that the Hebrew narrator, reckoning by lunar years,
transposes the account to one year and eleven days
(p. 81). That would make the solar year to have
been before the hmar year, which seems to us im-
possible. It would seem to aid, to some extent, in
getting a right view of the times of the year, to bear
in mind that the dove which Noah let fly the second
time brought back a fresh olive-leaf in its mouth
(ch. viii. 11). That was probably forty days, and
fourteen days, after the first day of the tenth month,
and therefore, at all events, towards the end of the
eleventh month. If we must regard this fresh oUve-
leaf as belonging to the spring season, then the be-
ginning of the flood may have well fallen eleven
months before, or in the time of May. But this con-
clusion is insecure, because the olive-leaf, in its bud-
ding, is not confined to the spring. For the opposite
view, Delitzsch (p. '257) presents something that is
specially worthy of notice, namely, that the observa-
tion of the earlier oeconomic reckoning of time con-
tinued among the Jews after the introduction of the
theocratic computation. If, however, the flood be-
gan with the autunmal rainy season, it must have
ceased exactly as the rainy season of the next year
commenced. In regard to the reckoidng of the year,
Knobel remarks thai the Hebrews reckoned it ac-
cording to lunar months, 354 days, other nations by
solar months, making ^G.** days, — for example, the
Egyptians and the Persians, and also, in astronomi-
*\a\ matters, the Chaldfeans.
In regard to the world-year of the flood, the cita-
tions of Delitzsch (p. 244) are worthy of attention.
The mythologically enlarged numbering of the Baby-
lonians, Delitzsch and others, reduce to the 2o00th
year before Christ. In respect lo the day when the
flood commenced, the Babylonian legend gives the
15th of Dasios.* This statement favors the Bible
reckoning of the year from Nisan (that is, according
to the theocratic reckoning), not from Tisri. For a
table of the different monthly suns, see Delitzsch,
p. 246.
2. Vera. 10-16. The opening of the Flood the
shutting up of the Ark. — All the fountains of the
great deep ^rere broken up. — TheNipbal or pas-
sive form of "pS is tu be noticed. It denotes violent
changes in the depths of the sea, or in the action of
the earth, — at all events, in the atmosphere (see the
preceding Section). Dinn , the deep of the sea,
whose fountains (Job xxxviii. 16*; Prov. viii. 28) or
grigins are conditioned by the heights and depths of
the earth itself. This fact is placed first. The rain
appears to be mentioned as a consequence. ''Simi-
lar views of water in the interior of the earth found
place among the Greeks and Romans; from this, too,
many sought to explain the ebb and flow of the
tides." Knobel. Only, here there is expressed no
distinct view respecting the fountains of the sea-
• fD.isio.'? was the eighth month of the Babylonian
and Macedonian year. See the Table of Delitisch, p.
«46.— T. o.]
20
deep.* The expression, too, "the windows of
iieaven," is not lo be too literally pressed. — In the
selfsame day entered Noah, etc. — That is, by the
[♦ ** The great deepy" JlS'^ Olnn, vil. 21. Oomp. Gen.
i. 2 ; Prov. viii. 27, 28 ; Job xxxviii. 16 ; Ps. civ, 6 ; Jonah
ii 6 ; Is. li 10, and other places. Sometimes i'Mom ii
joined uith "■* , and seems to be used as synonymous with
the great sea, as in Ps. civ. 6 ; Jonah ii. 5 ; but for the pri-
mary idea we must look to Gen. i 2. In creation, it was all
watiT, or fluid (so conceived). Afterwards the land (th»
solid) is commanaed to appear, and the waters are gathered
to one place, nns DTpTS , whether it means the suriao*
sea, or the supposed great abyss beneath. In the poetical
parts of the Bihle, the conception is that of the earth (the
land or ground) as built upon the watt-rs lymg below. It
was the contrast to the heavet or skies above, as in Prov.
viii. 28, Dinn Pir^ TiTrs "■ .T3*a o^pna i^tiaxa.
In regard to all this, it may be said, that the Bible is responsi-
ble neither for Neptunian nor Plutonian theories. Facts ar*
given, but they are presented according to the cmiceptiona
of the day. \\ ater gushed from the earth, and the writer
describes it by saying that the fou' tains of the tehnm rahha,
the gi'eat deep, were broken up. Aside from the trudiiionai
creative account, nothing could have been more natural than
the idea that the interior earth, or the space under the earth
(whatever notions might have been had of the earth's shape
or support), was a region of water. It was a direct deduc-
tion (true or false) from the phenomena of springs and
wells, — and that, by a process strictly Baconian. After-
wards, but very early, the sight of voIcJinoes (see Ps. civ.
32) must have given also the idea of interior fire. We know,
even yet, hardly any thing about it. Kesearches on the
surface, or shell, of the globe, have given us much curious
knowledge as to its progressive surface-formation, and the
great periods which it indicates ; but beyond this, niu- know-
ledge of the vast interim r is about as great as that which one
who had pierced half through the shell of an egg, \vou!d, by
such means alone, have obtained of that most curious struct-
ure. He might conjecture that there w;is heal and fluid
there, but that would be all. Perhaps it is well that we
have so little means of penetrating this vast unknown. We
could not rest very securely if we knew all that was going
on inside the earth, or had even a glimpse of the surging,
boiling, or bmning, that may be taking place ten miles, or
even ten furlongs, rigbt beneath our feet. There is a tefiom
rahba there, filled with something th.it might make a rapid
ruin of our earth, if we had nothing to trust to but the un-
known nature, and no other inyuiance ;igainst it but our
much-lauded science. Our only secure trust is in One in
whom we believe, as having a higher than a physical purpose
inthe continuance of the earth, — one who " binds the Hoods
from overflowing," and the fires from yet bursting forth.
This conception of the tehoin rabba is most grapbic^lly
presented Gen. xlis. 25. It is there called TiE^I Cinn
rrri. "the abyss couchant below," like a wild beasi
crouching down and ready to spring upon his prey, just sm
in Gen. iv. 7 sin is described as V Z"l , ready to spring upon
a man at any moment. — In the Arabian tradition the waters
:u-e represented as coming out of an oven (the vaulted interior
earth), and as being boiling hot. See Koran, Surat xi. 41,
syjjij] )w* w^f ^L^ f«^1 , " when our com-
mand went forth, then boiled the furnace." This came
Jrom the idea of Geysers, or hot springs, and may have bad
some truth in it, since it does lot detract from Scripture to
sup])Ose that there may have been other minor facts respect-
ing the flood, preserved in other and independent accounts.
Sale says that the Arabians got tlds from the Jews ; and so
also Reckendorf states in the Introdnction to his Hebrew
translation of the Koran, citing from the Talmud (Sanhe-
drin), but this does not bear them out, since the word nrTi"! ,
there used, means simply the effervescence or tumultuoua
boiling motion which Sla'imonides says came from the vio-
lence of the eruption, and not from beat. It is by him, and
the Talmud, cnmparod with the violent fermentation!^ and
eruptions of sen^uality that brouglit on such an out bursting
flood as a fitting judgment ; and so says Rabbi Hasada, in
the passage quoted from the SanhedriJn : *' They corrupted
everything (^^nn''"13), in the boiling sensufvlity c* ■^b^ir
transirression, and by the boilings of an all-destroying
water were they judged." Such a mode of interpretation ii
peculiarly Rabbinical, but the fact of hot eruptions (like
thnse of the Icelandic geysers) may well have been, or of
boiline w;iter, as the Arabian aceoont states it.^T L. I
S06
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Ume of the breaking out of the flood was the diffi-
cult embarkation accomplished — happily accom-
plished, n^n denotes here the wild beast. All
birds, all winged creatures, Knobel takes as synony-
mous. But since the kind is named before, there
would seem to be intended a subdivision of the kiud,
and tliat what is said relates to birds in a nai rower
and in a wider sense — As God had commanded
him, and the Lord shut him in. — Here most dis-
tinctly presents itself the contrasting relation of
these two names. Elohim gives him the prescrifrtion
in relation to the pairs of animals for the preserva-
tion of the animal world, but Jehovah, the covenant
God, shuts him in, that is, makes sure the closing
of the ark for the whole voyage, and for the salva-
tion of his people. This inclusion was, at the same
time, an exclusion of the race devoted to death.
3. Vera. 17-24.— 7%« full Development of the
Flooit and its Effect, tlie Destruction of ever 1/ Lii'ing
Tiling. And the flood was forty days upon the
earth. — The tii>t forty days denote the full develop-
ment of the flood, which lifted up the ark and set it
in motion. The advance of the flood is measured by
reference to the arli. It is lifted up ; it is driven on.
With the waves she sails, and over the high hills.
The last is said in a general acceptation, as a meas-
urement of the height of the flood by the height
of the hills. The estimate that seems to be expressed
by saying, " fifteen cubits did the waters prevail over
the high hills," would neither give sense if taken lit-
erally, since the high hills have very difl'erent heights,
nor could it mean that the flood was fifteen cubits
above the highest mountain on the earth. But since
now Noah could hardly have sailed directly over the
highest mountain of the earth, much less have known
the fact, we must suppose that this exact estim.rte
was imparted to himself, or to some later writer,
through direct revelation — an idea wliich is little in
harmony with the true character of a divine revela-
tion. We must, therefore, suppose that the epic-
symbolical view according to which the flood rose
high over all the mountains of the earth, becante
conuected with the tradition that Noah found out
the measure denoted, by some kind of reference to
the mountain on which the ark settled. Knobel :
" The representation may amount to this : since the
ark drew about fifteen cubits water, its first settling
on Ararat in the falling of the flood would give
that measure. The 160 days, within which the de-
struction was accomplished, include the forty days
of .storm at the liegiuning. According to eh. viii. ■!,
the rain continued all through these 150 days Still
must we distinguish iis more moderated continuance
from the first Sturm of rain in the fcjrty days.'' In
respect to the universality of the flood, see Kcil,
whose judgment about it is similar to that of Ebrard,-
whereas Delilzseh is unwilling to insist upon it as an
article of faith, especially the geographical univci-
aality (p. 2G0). Compare the preceding Section.
DOCTEINAI, AND ETHICAL.
1. The threatenings of God are as certain as his
promises ; for God's word is certain. As sure, how-
ever, as is the word of God, so sure is faith in its
holy fear, its holy confidence and joy.
2 As God has provided hcl|) and deliverance for
men by means of exposed infants, or Bhandoncd
oipbans, so also through old men, as in the case of
Abraham, Moses, Noah. The like wonders happei
in all times.
3. Wiien the necessity is grealt^t, then is th4
help at the nearest, and the highest. When sin
(and the flood) become most powerful, then grace,
and the miracles of grace, become most mighty foi
dehverance.
4. The safe embarkation of a little world in the
ark before the breaking out of the flood. A won-
derful instinct, a still more wonderful procession, a
wonderful peace as the consequence of a wonderfu'
terror.
5. The animal-world in the ark, type and symbol
of the animal-world in general: the mention oi' man
and woman, man and wife, presents prominently the
fact that the ark was to become the point of depart-
ure for new generations.
6 Jehovah shut him in. — The innermost motive
for the salvation of every living thing is God's cove-
nant with his own. Christ is here the head and sta'
of history.
7. The ark, with its souls, in the waters of the
great flood (sintflut), which was at the same time a
sin-flood (siindflut), a destroying flood of wrath and
judgment ; in like manner Moses in the ark upon the
Nile, and Christ on the cross and in the grave. —
There are moments in which the kingdom of God
seems lost, or in the most fearful peril, and yet is
it all the more securely hidden and protected in the
truthfidness of God himself, in the everlasting love
he has for his people.
8. The terror of judgment in the flood immensely
great, and yet not equal to the terror of the last
judgment-day (1 Pet. ill. 4).
9. The waters of the flood as a symbol of the
judgment of redemption, of the baptism at the
world's end, and generally, of the passage of believers
with L'hrist through death to life (Ps. Ixix. 77), is to
be distinguished from the waters of the sea as the
symbol of peoples and nations, their births and rev-
olutions, as compared with the kingdom of God (P»
xciii ; Dan. vii ; Rev. xiii. 1).
It). The most fearful sorrows are measured by
comparing them with the height of water in the
flood, and the hardest days of sorrow are reckoned
as the days of the deluge.
11. The symbolic of the forty days. Four is the
number of the world, ten the number of the con'
plcted development. It therefore denotes the fulncak
of the world-times, and of the world's judgment.
12. God's dominion as great as God himself.
HOMELETICAI, AND PRACTICAL.
See the preceding — The embarkation into th«
ark. — .Jehovah's shutting in. — Tiie measured deepa
of terror, the numbered days of trouble. — The ark as
the cradle of the new human race rocked by the bil-
lows: 1. a frail dicst, an infinitely precious content,
2. fearfully threatened, securely protected ; trem-
bling in the deep abyss of waters, lifted high on the
wave of consecration. — The help of God in the floods
of distress. — The watery grave : I. deep for the liu-
mim eye ; not too deep for the eye of God. — The sea,
too, sliall give up her dead. — Noah's faith ; its grand-
eur: as in contrast, 1. to the universal apostasy,
2. to the impending judgment, 8. to its once great
task and labor, 4. to the sport of the woi-ld, 5. to
the terrors of the flood, 'J. to the roirors of the «ni
CHAP. Vm. 1-19.
301
mal world incloseii with him — the ark a lion's den. —
Noah in the floating; ark, and Moses. Both, though
seeming lost, preserved for the greatest things.
Starke; As God suffered the waters to increase
iradually, so Iiad tlie ungodly time for repentance;
a thing which may, perliaps, have happened in the
case of many, so that tlie soul was saved in the de-
struction of the flesh. According to tliis, it would
be false what the .lews say of the men who perished
in the flood, tliat tliey have neither part in the eter-
nal life, nor in the resurrection of the dead, — a con-
clusion wliich they draw from an improper interpre-
tation of ch. vi. 3. It may be easily believed that
the fish in great part died, not because the waters
were seething hot, as the Rabbins say, but because,
with the fresh water, there mingled itself the salt,
which is contrary to the nature of many kinds of fish.
Lisco : God .shut Noah in ; so was the pressure
into tlie ark prevented as against the godless, whilst
Noah was made safe.
GsKi^CH : The clean beasts. Before their use as
food they were offered in sacrifice, devote'i to God ■
partly because in each enjonuent thanks should b«
offered to God, and p^irtly because thereby even the
enjoyment itself becomes sanctified.
C.\LWER, Bandhuch: The first jud.gment of tli«
world through water, the last through fire (2 Pet
viii. 6). — So sinks the old world in its grave. Jehc
vah, the trusted, shuts him ia So, too, watches ovei
us the shepherd of Israel, who slumbers nut nor
sleepetli. — Schrodkr : There secst thou that all the
words of God have the power of an oath (Val. Her-
berger). — A night of death reigns over a world
abandoned to its doom. Because the earth was cor-
rupt, morally, the Lord destroys it — (that is, gives it
up to physical corruption). So Luther. To say the
fountains were broken up, and the flood-gates were
opened, is a biblical mode of speech whereby is ex-
pressed the fact, that the waters were not suffered to
flow in their wonted manner (Calvin). — The Lord
pi'eserved the ark and Noah therein as a treasur*
(Verleb. Bibel).
THIKD SECTION.
The Ark, and the Saved and Renewed Hvmanity.
Chapter Vm. 1-19.
1 And God remembered Noah, and every living thing, and all the cattle that was
with him in the ark ; and God made a wind to pass over the earth and the waters
2 assuaged.' The fountains also of the deep and the windows of heaven were stop-
3 ped, and the rain from heaven was restrained. And the waters returned' from off
the earth continually [to go and return, aiiai "iibn] ; and after the end of the hundred and
4 fifty days the waters were abated. And the ark rested' in the seventh month, on the
5 seventeenth day of the month, upon the 'mountains of Ararat. And the waters de-
creased continually imtil the tenth month ; in the tenth month, on the first day of the
6 month, were the tops of the mountains seen. And it came to pass at the end of forty
7 days that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made. And he sent forth
a raven which went to and fro' until the waters were dried up from off the earth.
8 Also he sent forth a dove from him to see if the waters were abated from off the face
^ of the ground [lipH, hadbecomelight or shallow, not had disappeared, as Lange says] . But the dove
found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into the ark, for the
waters were on the face of the whole earth ; then he put forth his hand, and took ber,
iO and pulled her in imto him into the ark. And he stayed (-n»:) yet other seven days,
11 and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark. And the dove came in to him in the
evening; and lo, in her mouth was an olive-leaf plucked off; so Noah knew that the
12 waters were abated from off the earth. And he stayed [bn«7 Niphal] yet other seveu
13 days' and sent forth the dove; which returned not again to him any more. And it
came to pass in the six hundredtli and first year, in the first month, the first day of the
month, the waters were dried up from off the earth ; and Noali removed the covering
14 of the ark, and looked, and behold, the face of the ground was dry. And in the second
15 month, on the seven-and-twentieth day of the month was the earth dried. And God
16 [Elohim] spake unto Noah, ."iaying. Go forth of the ark, thou, and thy wife, and tliy
17 sons, and thy sons' wives with thee. Bring forth with thee every living thing that ia
with thee, of all flesh, both of fowl and of cattle, and of every creeping thing, that creep-
eth ipon the earth; that they may breed abundantly in the earth, and he fruitful and
308 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
18 multiply upon the earth. And Noah went forth, and his sons, and his wife, and hi>
19 sons' wives with him. Every beast, every creeping thing, and every fowl, and what*
soever creepeth upon the earth, after their kinds, went fortli out of the ark.
l» Verl— S13J'*. "E.Y. assuaged. It differs from fOn, to ebb or fail (as \ised in ver, 3). TjStt; refert tc thi
quieting, or becoming calm, of the waters after the ebullition that followed their eruption from the earth, and the heavj pPlif
ingof the w:iter-spoutsCLXX(caTappfltjcTaO from above. Its primary sense appears Esth. ii. 1 ; Tii.lO,nD2ir ^^TSH man
the wrath of the king was calmed. So in Hiphil, Numb. xvii. 20, where it denotes the quieting of popular commotioi,
I4XX. iKonaae to ii6<ap, and the waUr grew tired. The Vulgate confounds it with "DH , imminulx sunl aqiite. The Syrii*
^ Ma.TZ^I , "the waters rested;" the late Arabic Translation (Amer. Bib. Soc.), very beautifully and significantly
sLa^I k^lO^^ • "^ waters became quiel. The distinction between this word and lOn is important in determining
the'stages of the Eood.— T. L.]
[^ Ver. 3.— ^ZTw"^ . Began to turn, or to return. It denotes the turning-point after the watere had become calm
At first this turning was veiy slight, and the whole decrease for 73 days (compare vers. 4 and 5) was only fifteen cubits, o.
from the Lrounding of the ark, when the hills disappeared (as is evident from vii, 20), and their coniingin sight again o»
the first d:»y of the tenth month This may bi- calle<t the turn of the flood ; so that we have three etngee, 1. the becom
ing caim of the waters, 2. a period almost stationary, 3. the more perceptible, but elill gradual subsiding expressed by
the peculiar Hebr-^w idiom -TtTT Tt^^H .— T. L.]
(' Ver. 4.— n:n' . The ark's grounding on one of the mountains of Ararat in the very height of the flood (whether
one of the lower, or on its highest peak), is so inconsistemt with the idea of the flood's having covered mountains known
to be more than two miles higher, that some have maintained that nSH here must mean resting oi^er, as though it wero
suspended quietly, and remained stationary at that distance, directly above the top of Ararat. If there were no other
objection, the decisive answer to thii. is that the word, as it appears in every such connection, means resting upon, like
the lighting of a bird, Thus it is followed by 5^, which cannot here be rendered over or above. Comp. Ex. x. 14 ; Numb.
X. 36 ; li. 25, 26 ; Isaiah si. 2. There is an example of the noun thus used immediately following, ver. 9 : " and the dove
found no re»t (TlM'O ) for the sole of her foot."— T. L.)
(* Ver. 4.— I3"~S;_ '^11^ hs . The subject here being in the singular, this can only be rendered, among the moimt-
ains of Ararat, or upon one of the mountains of Ararat. The force of the language, if there were no other objection, is
against the idea of its having been upon that high peak of Ararat that towers so much above everything around it. The
diversity in the old Versions is also opposed to so definite an<l marked a view. The Vulgate has, suj^er moiites Armenia;
LXX €jri Ta oprf to. 'Apapdr ; Targum t'f Onkelos, 'I'^np '^■^'113 3^ i upon the mountains of Kardu, or the Karduchian ;
the Syriac the same, c?^£ ^^Q^-^ ^*^, as also Arabs Erpen. t^* ^Ajf iJLa,^> i^*^ • The Koranic Arabic hasil
constantly |^ '^y^ ' ' ^^ S^^- The Samaritan Version (not the Hebraico- Samaritan) has the strangest of all. It sayk
the ark rested on the mountains of Serendib, which is in the island of Ceylon. These various renderings are only im-
portant as showing, that anciently the place was regarded as in a measure im^known and indefinite. The old transfatora
did not consider themselves as bound by the Hebrew yilS to confine it to the peak which afterwards solely acquired
that title. The name might have been transfc rred to Armenia, or to other countiies, just as the story of the flood itseU
wa-i transferred, and loMted i 1 different parts of the earth, according to the ancestral traditions of the various migrations.
The place wliere the ark i^rounded could not, at the time, have had a name to ?\oah and his j^ons, since, before this, there
are nt» geogiaphical distinctions recognized in the Bible except Eden, the names of the Paradise rivers (if they are not
Bubsequent). and the land of Nod, or of the wanderer, which is clearly metaphorical. It is to be tioted, that of all proper
names in the Bible, there is no one that has lees of the Shemitio form than tliis word l3"1'^X . As It occurs 2 Kings xix.
37 ; Jer. li. 27, it may have been a much later transfer, just as the old Pelasgi carried certain names through Asia Minor,
Greece, and even Italy, or as the early sons of Gomer tett traces of their ancestral name thiough Europe. In like man-
ner the names of the old ark-mountain, like the story it'^elf, may have been transferred to different countries ; so that, i(
we had nothing to guide us but the literal face of the Hebrew account, tlie direction of the ark's moving, and the place
where it rested, would be as indeterminable, geographically, as the land of Nod. The Samaritan Serendib would nave
as good a claim to be regarded as a right translation of l3^H5< , as the Armenia of the Vulgate, and the ^ardu (or ^arud)
of the Targimas and the Syriac. The argument, however, for the region now commonly recognized, has a good support
In the concurrence of the Chaldaean and Syrian traditions. — T. L.]
(» Ver. 7.— ^ill'' N^S"^ 5<2i;^j. "And it went /jac^: and /ortft." The liXX., Vulgate, and Syriac, render It, " and
did not return," as though they had read "2X0 Hj" . There can be, however, no doubt of the Hebrew text, fortified ns it
i" by the Tnrtnims, the Samaritan Codex, and the Samaritan Version. The LXX., etc., may have derived the negative
p.tr'iphni.'^ti. aly— the goini: bnek and forth being regarded as evidence that it did not re-enter the ark. Bochart, in hii
Uierozoikon^ vol. ii. pp. 209. 21 u, makes a labored attempt to reconcile them.— T. L.]
[• Ver. 12—" And he waiYed yet seven days." bn'*"! , as here pointed, is the regular JVipfta? of pH'' , whereas bn'"^
▼er. 10, ha« the foim of the Hiphil of PTl or b'^H , and is bo regarded by the modem commentators and lexlcograehen
fenerally. From b'^H , doluit, they get the sense of waiting anxiously, painfully. It seems strange, however, that^rher*
the connection ia so precisely similar, the word should be ahsigned to two distinct roots, though they are of forms that
sometimes interchange senses. It is safer, therefore, to follow the Jewish authorities, who make them both from bH^ .
The fir«t, eays Rashi, is Piel (bs>E''), as though he regarded it as equivalent to bn^^l (contracted into bpl''), and tha
second Hithpahel (b-TEH^ ) or briT^ » becoming by assimilation brT^*^ , like XSp f«r ^S^n*^ . Abon Ezra, however,
make? the sccnnd a regular Niphal, which is to bo preferred, rfne* there Is a pasf^ive or deponent sense in the idia o(
vaaiting, as is seen in the Latin moror, demoror, prvstohr ; Greek, fKSixofiat, wpo^Sexofiai. In regard to the first, it ia
easy to see how bn*^ would become bn*^ (yyS-hel = yS-hel), since to the ear there is hardly any perceptible difl"erence in
the pronunciation (tfie sounds ia, iya, and ya, being organically the same). So Rabbi Jndah would read b"'b''|i , Isaiafc
XT. 2, S ; xvi. 7, for b^b'^" (or y^-lH for yyi-lil'), as stated by Jon;i ben Gannnch in his Hebrew Grammar (lately edited
■ riebrew), p. 28.— T. L.i
CHAP. Vni. 1 19.
309
BXEOETICAL AND CBITICAL.
1. Stages of the Flood as taken in tlieir Order.
i. To its highest point : 1. Seven days, the going
In to the ark ; 2. f'oi-ty days of the flood-storm ;
8. one hundred and ten days, thereupon, of steady
rain, and of the steady rismg of the flood — so in
general one hundred and fifty days. Threefold
grade of advance: 1. The ark is lifted up fiom the
ground; 2. the ark's going upon the face of the
waters ; 3. its rising fifteen cubits high above the
mountains, b. 2o the disappearance of the waters;
In the seventh mouth, on the seventeenth day of the
month, that is, after five months, or one hundred and
fifty days, just as the waters begin to fall, the ark
rests on Ararat. On the first day of the tenth month,
that is, after two months and about twelve days
(Knobel : seventy-two days after the setthng of tiie
ark), the mountain-peaks project* above the surface
of the water. After forty days Noah opens the win-
dow and lets fly tlie raven. Next goes forth the
dove. It is not directly said how long after the
flight of the raven was the first flight of the dove.
The second fliglit of tlie dove, however, was seven
other days after the first, and therelbre it is inferred
that there were seven days between the fliglit of the
raven and that of the dove ; the third flight, again,
was seven days after the second. We must either
reckon in here an unnamed portion of time, or the
time between the flight of the raven and the flight
of the first dove must have been longer than seven
days. Hereupon follows the la.st section of time,
from the first day of tlie first mouth to the seveu-aud-
twentieth day of the followmg, or the period of the
full drying of the earth. /« the six hundred and first
year, etc. Luther, following the Septuagint, and by
way of explanation, adds, " of Noah's age."
2. Vers. 1-4. The first Decrease of the flood
to the Resting of the Ark upun Ararat. ' And God
remembered Noah and every living thing
God's remembering must be understood in an em-
phatic sense. God has always remembered Noah ;
but now he rememljers him in a special sense — that
he may accomplish his deliverance. There comes a
turn in the Hood, and the ground of it lay in the
government of God. To the rule of judgment upon
the human world, succeeds the rule of compassion
for the deliverance of Noah and humanity, as also of
the animal-world. It is his com/>assion, not simply
his grace. For God remembered also ihe beasts.
Thus did he remember them all, as Elohim, in his
most universal relation to the enith. Had there
been a longer continuance of the flood, there would
not only have been want in the ark, but the ark
itself would have been destroyed. A wind must
blow to disperse and dry up the'flood, whilst, on the
other side, the fountains of the flood were closed.
With the shutting of the fountains of the drep, or
with the restormg of the continental tranquillitv of
the earth, and of the equilibrium of the atmosphere,
there ceases also the extraoi dinary rain; and be-
tides, the windows of heaven were closed. It is an
inexactness of the narration, but whicli gives it an
• (The Hebrew SS^: here, in Kiptial, would seem to have
s more emphatic sense— bcrame dlstinctl)/ insiUe. It is an-
»ther esimplc of the remarkably optic.il style of this whole
Rsrrjtive. The Vuljafe beautifully rendere it, nj.parmrunt
eacumina 'K^nfium. Tliey mishl have proieelet before, but
now, on ;ihis day—perhaps the first clear day that afforded
Noah .%n opportunity for taking an ob.serration— they stood
fcrth as conspicuouB objects, iu ojien si0fu, — T. L. I
unmistakable historic character, that the time of thf
flood's advance is given as one hundred and fifty
days, and that the pomt of time when the ark settles,
and when, therefore, the actual sinking of the waters
must have commenced, falls in like manner at th»
end of the one hundred and fifty days. For Noah,
indeed, the first turning-point in the sinking of the
waters, which had commenced already before the
running out of the one hundred and fifty days, could
not have been a matter of observation. For'hini, the
first sure sign of the sinking of tlie waters was the
grounding of the ark. — And the waters- returned.
— Here is the whole process preliminarily described
— how the waters, in their undulations here and
there, kept steadily settling more and more. Then
follows the indication of the first decrease. — Upon
the mountains of Ararat. — '• U'^^X is the name
of a territory (2 Kings xix. 37) which is mentioned
Jer. li. 27, as a kingdom near to .Minni (Arr.jenia), —
probably the middle province of the Armenian terri-
tory, which Moses of Chorene calls Arairad, Araratia.
The mountains of Ararat are, doubtless, the mount-
ain-group which rises from the plain of the .\raxe8
in two high peaks, the Great Ararat, 16,254 feet,, and
the Lesser, about 12,000 feet, above the level of the
sea. This landing-place of the ark is of the higliest
significance for the dev elopment of humanity, as it
is to be renewed after the flood. Armenia, the
fountain-land of the I'aiadise rivers, a ' cool, airy,
well-wati.'red, insular mountain-tract,' as it has been
called, lies in the middle of the old coutment. And
so, in a special maimer, does the mountain of Ara-
rat lie nearly in the middle, not only of the Great
African-.Vsiatic desert tract, but also of the inland or
.Mediterranean waters, extending from Gibraltar to
the sea of Baikal, — at the same time occupying the
middle point in the longest line of extension of the
Caucasian race, and of the Indo-Germanic lines of
language and mythology, whilst it is also the middle
point of the greatest reach of laud in the old world
as measured from the Cape of Good Hope to Behr-
ing's Straits — in fact, the most peculiar point on the
globe, from whose heights the hnes and tribes of
people, as tliey went forth from the sons of Noah,
might spread themseh es to all the regions of the
earth (compare Vo.n Raumer, ' Palestine ')." Keil.
See also Delitzsch, p. 266. "The Koran has wrongly
placed the landing-place of Noah on the hill JuJhi*
in the Kurd mountain-tract; the Samaritan version
locates it on the moimtaiiis of Ceylon ; the Sybilline
books in Phrygia, in the native district of Marsyas.
* [There is no evidence of any hill so called among the
Kurd muuntiiins, or m any other region. In a note on the
Koran, xi. 46, Sale regards it a^ a con-uption for Jordi, or
tiiordi, but there is no trace of this in the Arabii;. In
the Koran and elsewhere, wherever the Arabian tradition
^^T,i
appears, it is constantly writtt-n i^«^)-^) j and is evi-
dently a descriptive name from <> j. -^ . piiestanSf bontu
fuit. It is. therefore, an tpitbet deuo'ti. g goodyiess, libera
alihj, or viercy: |^i^*^( ^N^^ , the hill of Mercy, oi
mount Mercy, as we s;iy, the cape of Good Hope. Com-
pare the Hebrew appellative, Deut, iii. 25, ^lisn "n , and
especially such epiti.ets as we find iu Gen. sxii. 14,
'^^"?- *"'}'^"' ^''^ y ^f^T^ Jehovah Jirach, '^oxmt in vfh\c\\
the Lord appears. On Al-jude, see Herbelot, Bib. Orient
37 J. A. He calls it Gi'iuda, and finds a difficulty in locatini
it, but conjectm-es it to be near a village called T/uimanin^
frum the eight persons saved in the ark, ok is si'ppo.sed.-
310
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
The Hindoo story of the flood names the Himalaya,
the Greek Parnassus, as the landing-place of the de-
livered ancestor.'' KnobeL Delitzsch and Keil agree
in the supposition of the Armenian liighlauds.
3. Vers. 5-12. Tlie time of the Si(/ni of Ddirer-
anee^ and of the increasing Hope^ from the first De-
crease until the Disap/iearance of the Flood. The
first sign of deliverance was the resting of the arli
upon Ararat. Now it continues still until the first
day of the tenth month (Tammuz), or from seventy
to seventy-three days, when there appears the second
eigu: the -peaks of the Armenian higlilands become
visible ; at aU events, the ark, on their summit, had
\)ecome free from the influence of the water. Noah,
however, is not satisfied, until after forty days more,
that the flood will not return; and then he opens the
window fllbn) of the sky-Ught (^ns). Fresh light
and air awaken, or rather gradually reanimate, the
torpid animal-world, and Noah's longing desire sends
forth the raven through the opened window. (It is
to be remarked that the ark had only one male ra-
ven, because from the unclean animals there was
taken but one pair. From the staying out or return-
ing of the raven Noah might, at all events, draw
inferences ; but this bird is noted for his appetite,
that which makes all life in the ark strive for free-
dom. The raven, therefore, may be first ventured
on this craving flight, since he can find food from
the dead bodies left by the flood upon the moun-
tains. " In the ancient world, the raven was regard-
ed as a prophetic bird, and was therefore held sacred
to Apollo. Something of this appears (1 Kings xvii.
4, 6) in his connection with the prophet Ehas. He
was thus esteemed among the Arabians, who as-
sumed to understand the voice and flight of the
birds. Especially was he regaided as a prophet ol'
the weather, as inferred from his flight and cry.
Pliny describes him as a wild and forgetful bird,*
• [This is rather from Servius, in his Note on Virg. Geor-
gic. hb. i. 410, and who incorrectly ascribes it to Pliny. See
Bochart, Bieroz. ii. 207. B. The idea, however, may have
come from the tradition of the raven's not relumins to
the ark, as the story is told in other accounts than that of
the Hebrew. There was another wide-spread ancient be-
lief respecting him, which is givi-n by Pliny, x. 12, by
Aristotle, Hist. Nat. is. 31, and mentioned by the Rab-
bins, as well as the Christian Fathers, that this liird is
cruel to its young, and early ejects them from the nest
before they are prrpaiod to gather food for themselves.
Whether true or false, it seems lo have furnished the gnmi d
for one of the most touching illustrations of the divine
care for the helpless to be found in the Scriptures. See Ps.
cxlvii. 9. " who giveth to the young ravens when they
cry," JoD xxxviii. 41, " who providetb for the raven his
fond, when his young ones cry unto God, they wander for
lack of meat." The Arabians had the same tradition, and
employ it in a similar illustration of the divine compa^8io^,
givmg it in almost the very words of the Hebrew. Thus in
averse to be found in Hariri, Seance xiii. p. 151 (Be Sacy ed.).
a_Cu_f
^L^it ^i; IS
" O Tbou that providost for the young raven in his nest."
On whii'h the Scholiant makvg a very aiiitrular commfiit:
•• When thf youn^ ravt-u," he says, " or the iiaabu, hrvnks
the f'Kk', it comes uut white, wliieli so friiihteus the pa.r.inis
tbttt tlioy tly f;ii away ; for the raven is the most limi'l ami
cautious of birds, wheu this takes place Ah:»h sends to it
the tiiih that fall into the iiost. And bo it lives for forty
days, until it.s foatherr* are gi-own, and it Ijeoiiraes blark,
when the pareiitn acain return to it," etc The truth or
(aiw.'hood of sui-h a belief, or of the laet uf aban<lunment in
any way, does not allecl the force or beauty of the illuKtra-
kioM drawn from it. Our Saviour most teiidc-rly makes
Ofto of It, Luke xii. 24. On tlie i)rophetlc powers, or tlio
w«ather-forc-tiUiiij< powers, of the raven, see the strikini:
pasaai^e, Virg. Oeorglc. i. 410, and the philosophic cxpluna-
who forgets to come back to hia nest. And so h<i
came not back to the ark ; but Noali could know
from this that the earth was no longer wholly cov-
ered with water.*' Knobel. We may refer here tfl
the two ravens on the shoulders of Odin. WithoU
returniug into the ark, he flew here and 'here be-
tween the ark (to which he was bound by ioar and
sympathy, the attraction of his mate perhaps, and
on the outyide of which he could rest) and the
emerging mountain-tops, where he found food and
freedom. — And he sent forth the dove. — The
raven liglits everywliere ; therefore his remaining
out furnishes no proof of the drying of the lower
places But the dove lights upon the plains, and
not iu the slime and marsh; tlierefore does its flying
abroad give information whether or no the plains
are dry. The Septuagiut translates ■infi<^ by oniav
ai/Tov, the Vulgate, post eum^ Luther correctly, /Vom
himself. (So the English translation, frovi him. ) It
is perhaps indicated that he had to drive it trom
him. The time ot seuding away is reckoned by
Baumgarten, Knobel, and others (after Aben Ezra
and KimchiJ, as being seven days after the sending
of the raven; because it is said, ver. 10, he waited
other seven days. The delicate dove finds no place
fit for her lighting, because all the lower lands are
yet covered, and so she turns back. And Noah
drew her back again into the ark. The question
may be asked: Since the top of Ararat was free
from water, why did not Noah go out with the
beasts "i It is, however, a truthful characteristic
that he did no such thing ; since a hasty disturbance
of the beasts might have yet brought the whole in
danger of destruction. But the second sending
forth of the dove, after seven other days, brings to
iiiiu the fourth and fairest sign of deliverance : the
dove returns with a fresh olive-leaf in its mouth.
'bn*^ fut. i^//>Ai/ from b'^n,* to be in trouble, to
wait painfuUy and longingly." Delitzsch. "The
olive-tree has green leaves all the year through, and
appears to endure the water, since Theopurastus,
Hist Plant. 48, and Pliny, liiM. Nat. 13, 50, give
tion the poet there attempts to give of tho animal signs ol
the weather in general.
It iiii^ht be a question worth studying : how far the
whole scienci? of biid-divination, so prevalent in the an-
cient world, may have had iis origin, like tliat of other
[lerverled beliefs, in the use N'oah made of the raven and
the dove in detei mining idiviuiyig, we might say) the natu-
ral signs of salety for himself and the ark, and so ihe
gracious signs of the divine mercy and i)ronuse. So preva-
lent was tho belief and the practice, that oituvaq (.bird) in
Greek becomes a name for omen, or fortune, good or bad.
So the Latin aui^jiiciuin {av^sp^cn^v\)—^^\iv words uimpice^
auspicious, though tho latter is generally taken in a lavor-
able sense. The Hebrew words ')313'', part. "iSI-ia, (de-
noting divination by clouds,) as used Lev. xix. 2(>, Deut,
xviii. 10, et ah, show tho prevalencu of a precisely t^imilai
superstition, and furnish some proof of such an onj;iii, in
the perversion of what weie originally holy and believing
acts. Just so they perverted the luenioi^ of the laazen
serpent. Tbere may, however, have been anothei", or a
I nucurrent, ground of these bird-divining practices ol the
Oreeks and Romans, in a jirimitivo notion that the inhab*
itanis of tho ail' (tho birds of heaven, as Scripture callg
tliem) were nearei- to the divine, or that from theix- sujier-
eaithly position thej; may have had a 8iipe''huLmaii Mght
and knowledge of things on tho earth. Comp. Jc»' ■vx\'ui,
7, "a path which no lowl Unoweth, which the eagi^'s ty*
hath not seen." Also ver. 21, where of the mystercua
Wisdom it is s:iid ; *' it is hid from the eyes of all liviig,
ai d coi ccaled from the birds of the lu'avi;ns "— a poetical
mode of »ayiug, it is l}o\ond^all hiunaii divining, or human
investigatitin. — T. L.]
♦[See remarks on this derivation iu the textual not**
No. t,, pagcoOS— .T. 1*1
CHAP. Vin. 1-19.
311
ui account of olive trees in the Red Sea. It comes
early in Armenia (Strabo), ttioiigti not on tlie lieiglits
of Ararat, but lower down, below the walnut, mul-
I'frry, and apricot tree, in the valleys on the south
side (R[TTER, " Geogiaphy," 10. p. 920). The dove
must, therelore, have made a wide flight in search of
'be plains, and on this account have just returned
at evening time. Tliis olive-leaf, — which was not
something picked up on a mountain-peak, where it
might have been floated by the water, but (~^-)
something torn olf, and, therefore, fresh plucked
from the tree, — taught Noah what was the state of
things in the earth below. It was the more fitting
heie, since the olive-branch was an cmblein of peace
(2 Mace. xiv. 4; Dion., Halic, Virg., Liv.), and yet
in the text it is not an olive-branch (.Symm , Vulg.),
but only an olive-leaf." Kuobel. — -The sign gave
intelligence that at least the lower olive-trees, in the
lower ground, were above the water; the olive-leaf,
moreover, in the mouth of the dove, was a fair sign
of promise. — Yet seven other days. — This time
the dove returns no more. The attraction of free-
dom and the new Ufe outweighs the desire to return ;
in which it is presupposed that it is an attraction
which the others will lollow. " The dove is found also
in the classical myths. According to Plutarch (l)e
Solert. Animal, 13), Deucalion had a dove in the
ark, which indicated bad weather by its return, and
good weather by its onward flight." Knobel. It
was, in like manner, a prophetic bird at Dodona, ac-
cording to Herodotus and others ; and the ancients
were also acquainted with its use as a letter-cariier,
according to yElian and Pliny. On the significance
of the dove in the New Testament, see the account
of the baptism of .lesus. — In the six hundred
and first year. — Tins reckoning completes the old
life of Noah. His seventh humlred is the beginning
of his sabbath-time. — In the first month, in the
first day, etc. — This date looks back to the be-
ginning of the flood, in the second month of the
previous year, on the seventeenth day. Now Xoah
removes the covering of the ark, and takes a free
look around and upon the new earth. The waters,
no longer flowing back, were evaporating from the
earth, and the groimd was in the process of becoming
dry. Yet still he waited a month and twenty-seven
days, that he might not too hastily expose to injury
the living seminarium of the ark, the precious seed
of the new life that had been entrusted to his care.
But he waited only for the clear direction. — And
Noah removed the covering of the ark
nos'a . Because this word is used elsewhere only of
a covering made of leather and skins with which they
covered the holy vessels on the niarch (Numb. iv. 8,
12), and of the third and fourth covering of the ark
of the testimony (Exod. xxvi. 14, etc.), it does not
follow, as Knobel supposes, that the author had in
view a similar covering. The deck of an ark on
which the rain-storms spent their force, nmst surely
have been of as great stability as the ark itself —
And God (Elohim) spake to Noah -It is Elohim,
because this revelation belongs to the universal rela-
tion of God to the earth. "The time of the flood,
•ecording to verse 14, amounted to twelve months
ind eleven days, that is, three hundred and sixty-
five days, or a full solar year ; consequently in the
course of one full circuit of the natural cliange or
period (n:'l"), does the earth become destroyed and
renewed. In the fact that Noah might not leave the
»rk from hit own free, arbitrary will, there is ex-
pressed his preservation of the seal of the divun
counsel, and of the divine work." Baumgarten
New blessings upon the creatures, similar to thos«
which were pronounced at the creation, are connect'
ed with Ills going forth at the divine command; it ia
the beginning of a new world. " As in creation the
beasts were blessed bel'ore man, so is it here.*"
Baumgarten. In the beasts going out of the ark in
pairs there is given to us a clear idea of the stabilitj
of the new order in nature, and of the security for
its continuance.
[Note on the Week, and on the Seve.nth Day
Observance in the Ark. — '^ And he waited seven
days,^^ ver. 10. ^^ And fie waited seven other dat/s.^*
Dr. Lange gives little attention to the important
question connected with this language, as he passes
over, with a very few remarks, the wliole question of
the sabbath in Gen. i. There is certainly indicated
here a sevenfold division of days, as already recog-
nized, whatever may be its reasons. Of the^e, no ona
seems more easy and naluial than that which refers it
to the traditionary remembrance of the creation, and
its seventh day of rest, although some of those who
claim to be " the higher school of criticism " reject it.
Had such a reference to a sevenfold division been
found in some ancient Hindoo or Persian book, and
along with it, or in a similar writing closely connected
with it, an account of a hexameral creation with its
succeeding day of rest, they would doubtless have
discovered a connection between the ideas. But
here they do not hesitate to violate their own famous
canon, tliat " the Bible is to be interpreted like any
other ancient writings." Now it may be regarded
as well settled that such a division of time existed
universally among the Shemitic and other Oriental
peoples. (See this clearly sbowu in the article
Week, in Smith's " Dictionary of the Bible.") It is
a fact^ too, well established, that a similar division
existed among the Egyptians, as is particiUarly
stated, with the names given to the days of the
week, by Dios. Cassius (Hist. Bow. xxxvii. 18).
They are the names of the seven celestial bodies,
and yet there are no astrononncal phenomena that
could of themselves have given rise to it. It is evi-
dently an after-thought. The things named must
have been known before, and when the original
reason of the division was lost, the planetary series
was adapted to it, although it had to be taken in an
irregular and disproportioned manner. This was to
give it mystery and interest, and to accommodate it
to the astrological superstition, which early came in,
of lucky and unlucky days. The same names came
into the Roman (ecclesiastical) and ."^axon calendars.
They could not so readily have found place, had
there not been some previous ground in the Occi-
dental heathen ideas (Roman and Scandinavian),
although they do not appear in classical literature.
But how shall such a division be explained? The
reference to the lunar phases seems plausible, but
will not bear close examination. It is true that a
lunation (about twenty-nine and one-half days) is
approximately divisible into four parts, of nearly
seven days each, but the beginnings and endings,
especially of the second and fourth quartets, are so
obscure, and incapable of easy determination, that
it could never have been adjusted with the required
practical precision to any settled weekly reckoning
of definite days. Besides, in that case, the week
would have had its series commence and end with
the divisions of the lunation. But we find nowliera
any such reckoning. The week has no reference M
312
GENESIS, OR 1 EE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
the muntli. SucU a day, of such a mouth, h in all
calenJai's, but first or second week, of such a ijonth,
is nowhere found. Again, there were adjustments of
the months to the solar year by admitted inequalities
and intercalations, but there is no trace anywhere of
any sutb atteiupts to regulate the days of the week
with reference to the month. A seventh portion of
time computed from an ever-shifting beginning
would have been of no use, or woiUd only have in-
troduced confusion. The week, therefore, must
have had, and did have, its reckoning from some
point entirely independent of any annual, monthly,
or even astronomical calculus. It must, too, have
been from some remote period, fixed in itself (or
supposed to be so fixed), just as we reckon our weeks
from the day of Christ's resurrection, in a series
continuing steadily on, though there has been, since
then, repeated rectifications of the month (or moons),
and even a change of style in respect to the year.
The weekly series has been unbroken.
The Jewi.^ih reckoning of the seven days, and of
the sabbath, we know, was thus independent. In
Exod. xvi. 23, we find the particular sabbath there
mentioned as coming on the sixteenth day of the
second montli (the day after they came to the Wil-
derness of Sin), and on the twenty-third following,
as reckoned without reference to any monthly or
annual beginning. It comes on such a day, but
computed by itself, and seems to have been thus
known as something dating from some ancient, re-
mote period, and kept in remembrance even during
the ignorance and debasement of a servile bondage.
It must have come by tradition from their patriarch-
al ancestors, and was probably the same seventh
day which was recognized by the Egvptians (their
day of Saturn, Remphan, Hebrew ",S"3 , Arabic
.\^jS'i s^6 Amos T. 26, Septuagint version, and
Acts vii. 43), although with them the observance
may have lost its original idea and reason, and be-
come wholly idolatrous or superstitious. Therefore
does Moses tell the Jews to remember, and keep it
holy, calling back their minds to the primitive
groimd of its institution. So Kimchi and Aben
Ezra, in their comment on Amos v. 26, say " that
■1'2 (Kii/un) is the same with •'Pl2t', Sliahhut"'
(Saturn, or the sabbath-god), for they made to him
an image, whilst another interpretation m.akes it to be
■'rise :31S , the star of Saturn, and so is he called
isle's, Khivan, in the tongue of the Arabians and
the Persians." In the earliest F.gyptian mythology,
as in the most ancient Greek derived from it, the
dynasty of Saturn (Kp(iyos=xc<'''"s, time), or the old
creative, generative power, was before that of Zf us,
the light, or the Sun; that is, his day (dies .'^aliirni)
was before the dies Soli.s, or, su7t-daf/, the priniiti\e
dies Jovis.* So does the darkened mirror of heatlien-
ism give to all these early things both a pantheistic
and a polytheistic hue. Thellebrew revelation alone
preserves them tiuihful, pure, and holy. The silence
of the Scriptures in respect to the patiiarchal ob-
servance of the sabbath, religiously or otherwise
(unle.'s thin that is said of Noah be an exception),
fnmi^iliea no answer to the strong inference to be
derived from Kxod. xvi. and xx. See remarks on
this in Note on the Sabbath, page 197.
* tThis ntitr.c was also givnn to Thursday, or ruled by
the planet Jugiitor, liut in the mos-t ancient niythulOKy it
'QiUDt have cudio directly after Saturn, an dies tiulia. — T. L.]
The more we examine these acts of Noah, thi
more it will strike us that they must have beeti of s
religious jutture. He did not take such observations,
and so send out the birds, as mere arbitrary acts,
prompted simply by his curiosity or his impatielce.
liod had "shut bun in," and as a man of faith and
prayer he li oks for the divine directions in deter-
mining the times of waiting. Every opening, there-
fore, of the ark, and every sending forth of the
birds, may be regarded as having been accompanied
or preceded by a divine consultation. He " inquired
of the Lord," as the Scripture records other holj
men as having done. What more likely, then, than
that such inquiry should have its basis in solemn re-
ligions exercises, not arbitrarily entered into, but on
days held sacred for prayer and rehgious rest.
When this was dotie, then the other, or more human
means of inquiry that were in accordance with it,
would be resorted to. In this point of view, the
sending forth of the raven and the dove may be rev-
erently regarded as divine ausjiications. (See re-
marks in marginal note, p. 310.) They immediately
followed such stated religious exercises, and hence
his periods of waiting would, in the most natural
and appropiiate manner, be regulated by them. On
any other view, his proceedings would seem wholly
reasonless and arbitrary. The idea gives an interest
to the life of this lonely, "righteous man," during
his long sojourn in the ark. He did not forget God,
nor God's ancient hallowing of a certain day in
seven, and, therefore, is there the stronger emphasis
in what is said ver. 1, that " the Lord remembered
Noah." See Lange's most striking and beautiful
remarks on this expression, p. 309.
There must be reasons for such a seven-days'
waiting, and what more natural and consistent ones
could there be than those here staled ? It amounts
to nothmg to say that seven is a sacred or mystic
number. How came it to be such ? Though after-
wards thus used in Scripture, there could have been
nothing of this sacredne.ss at that early day, unless
it had come trom the still earlier account of the cre-
ation. It must have been founded on some great
fact ; for, of all the elementary numbers, seven may
be said to have the least of any mathematical or
merely numerical interest, such as gave rise to pecu •
liar specidations in the earliest thinking. "There
was a mystery about the number mie, as the foun-
t.iin of the infinite numerical series, or as represent-
ing a point, the principium of all magnitude. Two
had an interest as representing the line, and a.' the
root of that most regular of all series, the binary
powers. Tliree was the binditig of unity and dual-
ity, and represented the triangle, the simplest or
most elementary plane figure in space. Fovr (the
tetracti/s of Pythagoras) represented the tetraedron,
or the most elementary solid. Five was the number
of the fingers on the lianil, and thus beciime the
origin of the universal decimal notation. Six was
tlie double triad, and so on. Hut it is not easy to
find any such njalheniatical or nuineiical peculiarity
in seren that could have drawn speei:d attention to
it. as having, in itself, anything niystic.d or occult
It is not a square, nor a power of any kind ; it is not
what i< CitUed an oblong niinilier, or one that can be
divided into factors. It represents no figure that,
like the hexagon or pentagon, can be geometrically
prodi ced. Its sacredness, or mystery, therefore,
could only lisive arisen from some great historical
truth, or institution, supi)osed to have been con^
nectel with it ; and if we " interpret the Hebrew
CHAP. VIII. 1-19.
3ia
books like other ancient writings,'' this origin could
have heen no other than a belief in the grrat events
mentioned Gen. i., as laying the foundation for all
subsequent veneration of the hebdomadal number
and period. — T. L.]
DOCTMNAl AND ETHICAL.
1. The great turning. As the first half of the
flood pictures especially the judgment of death, so
the second half presents the redemption from judg-
ment, as it goes forth in its gradual development,
with its redemptive and anticipatory signs.
2. God remembered Noah. Everything (every
affliction of the pious) endure.s its time ; the good-
ness of God endureth forever. God's remembering
in a special sense. His righteousness makes a spe-
cial knowledge, and a special beholding, inside of his
general omniscience and omnipotence ; so his mercy
and his compassion make a special remembrance
within his consciousness, wherein there are known to
him all his works from the beginning. That is, God
is a hving, personal God, showing himself to be such
in his government, and in his revelation which makes
joyful again the believers in his grace, after they had
been exposed to temptation. Each deliverance, each
help, especially each experience of salvation, rests
upon a remembrance of God. God's remembrance of
man and man's remembrance of God meet each other,
as eye meets eye, in the actual manifestation of sav-
ing acts. The compassion of God embraced also the
animal-world, but conditions itself through the grace
that embraces believing men.
3. As the spirit of God moved over the waters at
the beginning of creation, so goes forth here, over
the floods of the deluge, the wind that saved, as an
emblem of tlie same divine spirit. It was a wind of
life — a vernal wind — for the new earth.
4. As the fountains of the deep were broken up
before the windows of heaven were opened, so also
were they closed before them. In order that the
rain might cease at Ararat, it was necessary that be-
fore this the evaporation in the opposite regions of
the earth should have come to an end.
5. Ararat. The home of Adam, the home of
Noah. Our first home the heights of Paradise, our
second home the salvation hills of Ararat, our third
home Golgotha, our everlasting home the highest
heavens.
6. The salvation is unfolded gradually, and an-
nounced in a gradual series of saving signs : 1. The
resting of the ark ; 2. the appearance of the mount-
ain-tops ; 3. the flying forth of the raven ; 4. the
olive-leaf of tlie dove ; 5. the dove's not returning.
Thus it is that the time of deliverance is a time of
patience, and of alternate desire and hope. " Blessed
in hope " { Rom. viii.).
7. The raven and the dove. The sympathy and
the co-opevation of the beasts in the kingdom of God.
The unity of the raven and the dove, and at the
same time their contrast, denotes the community of
creaturely interests, as well as the contrast between
the interests of the creature generally, and the king-
dom of God in particular ; for the raven is a figure of
the universal Ufe, the dove an emblem of the church.
8. The signs of hope increase from seven to seven
Jays — an indication of the idea of the Sabbath and
»f Sunday
9. " The fresh leaf from the olive-tree is the first
lign of life from the buried ee* Ih. A significant sign :
for the oil, as a gentle yet penetrating substance, ii
the symbol of the anointing of the Holy Spirit. This
is brought by that purest bird of the heavens, which
even among the heathen is held sacred (see Herod.
2. 56). The green olive-leaf in the mouth of the
dove is a sign that the earth is not merely laid
waste (we may rather say purified), but also conse-
crated by the waters." Baumgarten. And yet w«
must distinguish between the symbolic sigiiificane«
of the oil, of the olive-tree, and of the olive-lea£
The oil denotes the spirit, the olive-tree (Zach iv,
11-14; Rev. xi. 8, 4) denotes spiritual men, the holy
Israel ; and in correspondence with this the olive-
branch denotes the partakers of the spirit (Rom. xi.),
the blossoms of the spirit, the signs of love and
peace.
10. " If we take the human race and the earth ai
a totaUty, the flood is the dividing of the old from the
new. The old earth, with the humanity tliat had be-
come flesh, the apxaltis koo-mos,* is destroyed, but
even this destruction is the preservation of the right-
eous man, of Noah, in that he is delivered from the
corruptive community of the flesh. On this account
is it said, 1 Pet. iii. 20, ' eight souls were saved by
water,' and even there (ver. 21), the flood is named
a type of baptism. The water of the flood is, there-
fore, the baptismal water of the earth, which drowns
the old whilst it preserves and quickens the new.
This view of the flood, moreover, has passed over
into the consciousness of the Church. In the prayer
for the consecration of the baptismal water in the
Sacranteiitarium Gregorianum it is said: Deus tjui
nocentis mundi crimina per aquii& aUuens^ etc."
Baumgarten.
11. As baptism makes a distinction between the
old and the new man, so did the flood make a distinc-
tion between the old and the new humanity, which
were, therefore, types on both sides. So did the Red
Sea divide the children of Israel from the Egyptians,
who were droivued in the same (1 Cor. x. 2).
12. As Xoah went into the ark at the command
of God, so also must he, at the same command, go
out. That he was in no perturbation, did not wil-
fully and hastily go forth from the ark, is a sign that
we must not anticipate the hour of God's help, nor
tlirow ourselves hastily out of the ark of the church
in sectarian impatience, but wait the Lord's time in
which to go out of the ark into a new world.
13. The renewal of the blessing of propagation
upon the creature is a confirmation of the first bless-
ing (Gen. i.), a repeated expression of God's good-
ness, and of his complacency in life. Contrast aa
against dualism and a sickly asceticism.
HOMLLETICAL AND PEACTICAL.
See the Doctrinal antl Ethical. The figures of
the coming salvation. 1. The resting of the ark, the
firmly grounded church ; 2. the emerging of ihe
mountain-tops, the mountains of God as the sign of
heaven ; 3. the flight of the dove, " the longing of
the creature;" 4. the dove with the olive-leaf, tin
spirit of life, with the announcement of peace;
5. the remaining out of the dove and the opening of
* [This word Koafio^, 85 used by Peter, does not necessa-
rily denote the earth as a whole. It means a former statl
of things as distin^islied from the present. As employed,
it has the same (generality, and ttie same limitation, a4
oiKoujuei^, when used for the inhabited world, real or sup
posed.— T. L.
314
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
the ark. the free intercourse between the clmrch and
the consecrated world; 6. the going forth from ihe
ark, the passing over of the church into the new
world.
Starke : It is certain that God had not forgotten
Noah ; but the Scripture is wont to speak after the
manner of men, namely, as man, sometimes, repre-
sents to himself God as speaking. According to this,
God's remembrance denotes the revelation of his
gracious will and pleasure, according to which he re-
ve:ils to the wretclied that help which before was
hidden (Hieronymus). A life of faith is the most
difficult of all, — such a life as Noah and liis sons
must have lived, who could only cling to the hope
of aid from heaven, since the earth was covered with
water, so as to give them no ground of trust. It
was, therefore, no vain word when the Holy Spiiit
says that " God remembered Noah." For it shows
that from the day in which he first went into the ark,
God had not spoken to him, nor made to him any
revelation. He could see no ray of the divine mercy,
but mu^^t sustain himself alone upon the promise he
had received, wlnlst, in the meantime, the waters of
death are raging all around him, as though God had
indeed forgotten him (Luther). The leaf represents
the gospel, for oil denotes compassion and peace, of
which the gospel teaches. — Bibl. Wirt: "0, my
Christian friend, hast thou been a long time confined
in a wearisome ark, whether it be of some difficult
calling, or some painful state ; ask not counsel ol the
charniiT, but wait with patience until God, throuL'h
righteous means, shall bring thee help therefrom."
Gkrlach: God does, indeed, remember all his
works, in all times, and in every way, but the praver
"remember me" (Ps. x.xv. 7 ; Luke xxiii. 42) goes
forth from the image of God in man ; and by reason
of this we have no re-t until we can rejoice in all the
attributes of God through an inward, personal com-
munion with him. The word here denotes the trials
of Noah, when God hid himself, and the enjoyment
of his gracious favor, when he again revciils himself.
Calwer HandOucli : The olive-leaf has been ever
held as a symbol of peace.
ScMRiiDKR: God had exercised Noah's faith and
patience (Calvin). What is said of the raven, Luther
makes to corresjiond, allegorically, with the office of
the law. [" In the blackness of the raven is a sign of
Borrow, and its voice is unlovely. So, therefore, are
all preachers of the law who teach the righteousness
of works ; they are ministers of death and sin, as
Paul names the ministry of the law (2 Cor. iii. 6;
Rom. vii. 10). Nevertheless, Moses was sent out
wiih this doctrine even as Noah sent forth tlie raven.
And yet such teachers are nothing else than ravens
that fly round the a'-k, brlTiging no certain sign that
God is reconciled. But wliat Moses says of the dove
is a very lovely figure of the gospel."]
[excdrsds on the partial extent of tiik
Flood, as hkduckd from tiik very face of tiik
Hebrew text." — This account of the flood fur-
riehes a happy illustration of wliat may be called
the Kulijrctivp. truthfulness of the Sciij>ture narra-
tives. There is meant by this that the language is
• perfect reprcscntati(jn of an actual, conceptual, and
•fThe RTCat importance of the question, anil the fact that
Dr. Lnncre fails to (nve a decided view, form the pica for the
length of t!ii.'* JCx'-nrnUH. I»<'litzsch also seems undecided,
though he jircHentrt Home view(« btrongly favorable to the
Iheory of limitation.— T. L.l
emotional state in the mind of the author By lh<
author is meant the one in whose soul s'^ch emo'
tions and conceptions were Hr-t present, 'rom what-
ever cause, ouiward or inward, they may have been
derived. Whether this was ecstatic vision, or a c<in-
viction in the mind supposed to come from a divin*
influence, or an actual eye-witnessitig, it is all faith<
fully told, just as it was conceived in vision, impres*
ed upon the thought, or seen by the sense. The
words are in true correspondence with such a stata
of soul, an honest imprint of it, according lo the in-
fluences felt, and the degree of knowledge by which
those influences might be affected, or tlie choice of
language controlled. In either ease, tor, may tha
term inspiration be applied to it, if we admit the
idea of a divine purpo.-e as specially cofjeerned in
the communication. It is a special series of divine
acts in the physical world, and in the souls of men,
that makes revelation strictly, or in that higher sense
to which the term is limited in connection with
the scriptural narrations. It Ib this extraordinary
doing, whether in nature or above nature, commenc-
ing with creation and continued in a series through
the whole history of the Church, which constitutes
the real manifestation of the divine in the human,
of the infinite in the finite, in distinction from that
ordinary course in nature and history which cannot
thus reveal God personally, because it is merged in
the totality, or the one general movement, of the uni-
verse. This common movement may be called a re-
velation, but it is addressed to the universal reason,
and reveals only a general intelligence having nothing
special for man, either as a race or as individuals.
The other is a special epistle to humanity and to in-
diviilual men, having our n.ame throughout, attested
by chosen witnesses taken from a chosen people who
are the spiritual first-born, or representatives of the
race. But stUI it is this extraordinary doing which
is the revelation properly, whilst the bildical writings
are only the human record of it, sharing in the fini-
ty of the medium, or more or less iniperfi'ct accord-
ing to the necessary imperfections of knowledge,
conception, and language, in those to whom such re-
cording is given. Had writing never been invented,
it might have been a piu'ely oral or traditional
account, and then it would have been still more im-
perfect, but the actual revelation would have remain-
ed tlie same, to be ascertained in the best way we
could amidst the deficiences and obscurities of such
oral or monumental modes of traiisinission. Surely
the absence of writing could no more have prevented
God's having his witness in this world, than the ab-
sence, for .so many centuries, of the art of printing;
and the want, neither of types nor of alphabets,
could have been an absolute bar to that witnessing
being in the human, and tlirou;ih the human, as well
as to the human. Now in such record of revelation
the great thing required for the satisfaction of oiir
faith is a conviction of this perfect .subjective trutn-
I'uliiess on the part of the human media. It is a far
higher- thing, a nnich more precious thing, than any
scienlific correctness, or any outward verbal accura-
cy, which, even if it could be secured through human
language and human conceptions, could only be by a
meehanieal, automaton-like process, or with the loS9
of all that is truly human in the transmission. It
would not be a revelation, or the history of a revela-
tion, given to men thron;;h men, and so it would not
be truly God speaking in humanity. The element
of most value, through which we most truly draw
nigh unto God, and ile'into us, would be lacking ii
CHAt. VIII. 1-19.
319
the process. With this distinction between the re-
velation strictly, and the record of such revelation, we
are the better prepared to understand the import of
that third teim which is so often confounded with
them. Inspiration has respect to the manner and
means by wliich such hiniian conceptions are called
out and employed, whilst still remaining strictly hu-
man. This may be in various ways, and we may
apply the terms higher and lower to them, but
with danger of error, if in so iloing we make any one
of tliem to be less a true inspiration than tlie other.
All the faculties of man may be used for this pur-
pose. God may employ the imagination (the ec-
static imagination, for that is still human, and in
another slate may be ordinary and normal), the men-
tal convictions impressed by a divine power, or, whrn
no other means are required, tlie serise and memory
of holy, truthful men, wiiose holiness and trutlifulness,
in such case, are as much an eli'ect of divine inspira-
tion as any afflatus more immeiliately all'ectiiig what
are called the higher or deeper faculties of the soul.
Thus may we believe that all the Scripture is in-
spired, that it everywhere has this subjective truth-
fulness, whether it appears in holy visions of the
past and future, or in rapt devotional exercises, or in
the sublime doctrinal insight of souls drawn heaven-
ward, or in the pictures it gives us of musing, solilo-
quizing minds, presenting now their exulting faith,
and then ag^iiu their fears and sad despondencies in
view of the dark problems of Ufe. It shows itself in
its plain, un|ireteuding, unsuspicious narratives of
events, whether it be tlie supernatural, the great na-
tural, or that tilling in of the ancient home-life
which, though so far from us, we recognize as so true
and so consistent, calUng out the feeling that it is in-
deed a reidity that lies before us, and that these
words represent actual scenes and actual emotions
as true and vivid as any that now occupy our own
minds. Thus may we bidieve all Scripture to be an
honest record from beginning to end, bom the most
astoundingly marvellous to its minutest historical,
geographical, biographical, and genealogical details.
This view, although admitting human imperfections
of language and conceiving, is very dilferent from
that theory of partial inspiration tliat assumes to
choose what portions it shall ;iecept, rejecting others
as fabricated, false, and legendary. It is all laithfnl,
all eeoirKftiiTTos, all given to us for our "instruction
in righteou.sness," constituting in its totality the ple-
nary word of God, the honest human record of that
great series of divine doings in the world, in nature,
In history, and in the souls of men, to which we give
»he special name of a divine revelation. Thus re-
ceived and firmly held in its truthful hum.an aspet't,
the belief in a great objective truth corresponding to
it is irresistible for all sober, thoughtful, truly ra-
tional souls. The human in the Bible compels the
acceptance of the divine ; the ordinary and the na-
tural in its life-like narratives demands the superna-
tural as its complement. We are Ibreed thus to be-
lieve or to admit that the very existence in the world
of such a record so kept, so attested through the ages,
60 lying in the very heart of human history, is as
great a marvel for the reason, as any supernatural or
miraculous which it cont.ains for the sense.
It is this subjective truthfulness of the Scriptures
that furnishes the matter of interpretation. The great
end is to get at the conceptual and emotional states
which the words originally represented in the minds
of the first narrators. The objective truth tliey re-
present in the natural or supernatural belongs to the
theological reasoning as guided in its inferences bj
the general truths of the Scriptures, or other know
led^'C we may have of nature and of God. The on«
interpretation is to be according to the laws of rhe^
toric and language in their widest sense, the othel
aecordiug to "the analogy of faith," in all by which
God makes himself known to the hnman mind.*
Thus should we aim at interpreting the Scripture
narrative of the flood. We have, as tin outward
gi'Ound, the world-wide tradition of such an event faf
greater than any inundation of watei-s, or ch.inge in
nature, recorded in any later or more partial history.
The classical story, the Indian, the Persian, etc., are
well Icnown ; but it is found everywhere. In the re-
motest and most isolated region to which the travel
ler penetrates, there meets him this tradition of a
great catastrophe by water, and of a " righteous
man" who was saved in an ark. It is told with the
same general features, and otten with a surprising
similarity of detail, whether it be in the wilds of Si-
beria, by the rivers of southern Africa, or in the isles
of the Pacific. No other event ever iuade such an
impression on the ethnological memory ; and iience
it has survived through wastes of historical silence
in which other facts, however great their local or
tribal interest, have utterly perished. One of two
conclusions is inevitable : either the cat^istrophe was
of vast extent, reaching almost every portion of the
globe as now known, or it took place in the earliest
times of the hum.an existence, when men were con-
fined to a comparatively small part of the earth,
whence each wandering people carried it, localizing
it afterwards in their own history, tluir own gc-ogra-
phy, and ascribing the deliverance, each one. to the
ancestral head of their own race.
There is a ground of truth in all these stories.
Xo rational mind can doulit it. The most sceptical
of the German critics have felt themselves compelled
to admit its substantial verity. Now let any one
compare them all with this sublime seriptur.d narra-
tive, and then let his reason, his rhetorical taste, his
judgment of the truthful in styli', the subjectively
real in conception, and the life-like in narration, de-
termine which is the oiiginal, severely simple in its
chasteness and grandeur, and which are the legendary
copies, — -which is the iditio /n-iii^ep^, [)re.->erved (by
some strong influence in opposition to the ordinary
human tentlency) from grotesque exasgeration, from
mythical indistinctness and confusion, from false em-
liellishment, from interpolated deformities, from all
that characierizes the story-telling, wonder-making
style — and which are the spurious aihlndu, betray-
ing, by all these marks of their secomlary character,
that they are the far-off, dimly-seen, and monstrous-
ly disproportioned impressions of what, to the scrip-
• (In retpect to the first kind, the famous canon of the
ration.alist, undoubtedly holds true : the Scriptures, in their
human l.angu:ige, are to be interpreted as other books.
When, however, it is applied to the second, orwhat may be
called the theologicil ese^esis, it ignores an'l denies what
is most peculiar in the Biijle as a book composed dming two
thousand ye.ars, by ditlerent writers, in widely different
styles, and embiacinu a vast variety of ideas, yet preserv-
ing, from betantiii- to end, a holy aspect, and a relipoua
unity, that no other writings jKissess, and which have
given it a place in the very core of human history, such a4
no otiier book, no other literature, or literary series, can
lay any claim to. Not less absurd would it be than to inter*
pret Homers Iliad as an accidental or arbitrary seriea of
fragmentary unconnected ballads, after the nrofoundosl
criticism, grounded on the truest Homeric feeling, hal
derided it to possess an epic unity and an epic harmoaj
worthy of the high poetical inspiration from which it flows
— f. (..1
316
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOUK OF MObES.
tural nairator, iras aa oetual scene full of a. Bonl-
awing and fancy-re^tiftii^ing emotion.
Tlie Bible ;-tory has nothing of the wonder-mak-
in<; about it. It is too full of the overpowering i-cal to
allow of sueh a secondary excitement of the mind and
the imagination. The emotion is too high to admit of
my play of fancy. It is contemplation in its most
exalted stats, having no room for anything but the
great spectacle before it, and that as seen in its
grandest features. Hence so calm and yet so full
of animation, ?o severely chaste yet .'lo sublime. It
is a telUng from the eye, and it speaks to the soul's
eye of the thoughtful reader, giving the impression
of an actual spectacle. The style throughout is
adapted to produce such impression. It is a truthful
eifect, or the narrative is to be regarded as a most
skilful fiction, a most ingenious forgery, exhibiting
a life-like power of painting and invention utterly in-
consistent with any antiquity to which it can be
ascribed. The writer or relator is one who stands
in med u rebus. The awful spectacle ia present to
his absorbed sense or to his vivid memory. He is
startled by it to abruptness of description. Though
long expected, the catastrophe is sudden in its com-
ing. Torrents descend I'rom the heavens like burst-
ing clomJs ; chasms are seen in the opening earth,
and floods issuing from their subterranean reservoirs.
A writer less interested, less awed by the actual
scene, would have used comparisons here, or indulg-
ed in redundancy of language. The Scripture his-
torian gives it aU in one brief verse : " The fountains
of the great abyss (the tehom rabba) were broken
(!irp3D , were cloven), the windows of heaven were
opened." The attempt to reconcile this with any
scientific correctness is worse than trifling. To re-
solve it into a poetical metaphor, or any rhetorical
artifice of language, takes away all its emotional
power. He speaks according to his conception as
grounded on the state of his knowledge. He evi-
dently had the old idea of waters above the tirma-
mentum, now descending through the parted barrier
How ill-judging the interpretation that, for any fancied
reconciliation with present knowledge, would oblite-
rate the marks of this precious subjective truthful-
ness, so full of evidence for the great antiquity of
the accoimt, and the actuality of the scene sls con-
ceived and described. One all-absorbing image
of power is before him. The deluge from above and
the eruptions from the earth, whatever may have
been their cause, have an awful rapidity of effect ;
and with what graphic touches is this set forth in
the vivid Hebrew idioms ! The ark is lifted clear
from the c:irth C'l.Jjn br^), and goes forth (-'SP
walks forth), ="sn 'jB'bs , on the face of the wa-
ters. C'On !i"s;'l, the floods prevail exceedingly,
IXt: "IS": , stronger, stronger — higher, higher —
bij' T(lbn , ^^ go and increase" constantly waxing,
graiiu.il but irresistible, steadily visible in their rise
a^ me.isured by the submerged plains, the disappear-
ing hills, until to the remotest extent of '.he visible
horizon, 3 'HCn bx riTT, "under the vhole liea-
Tens," it is water everywhere as far as eye can see,
Jce vast ,sky-bounded wa.ste, shoreless and illimitable
M il a|)peared lo the absorbed and wondering gaze
of the one from whose sense and memory this story
has come down to us. This is what he wiw, and this
Is all that the interpreter can get from his language.
What he may have llmuylu, we know not. He may
bare supposed the flood to be universal. Probably
he did so ; but then his universality must have beet
a very different thing (in conception) from the notion
that our modern knowledge would comiect with the
term. He knew of no land that was not covered bj
water ; he had been told that God meant to destroy
the human race, and so far as the extent of the flood
was necessary for that purpose, he doubtless suppos-
ed the judgment executed.* But we have only to do,
as interpreters, with what he actually saw, the laO"
guage in wluch he has recorded it, the necessary con.
ceiiticms which it suggests, and by which it was itself
suggested. We have no right to force upon him, and
upon the scene so vividly described, our modern no-
tions, or our modern knowledge of tlie earth with its
Alps and llimmalayas, its round figvire, its extent and
diversities, so much bej'ond any knowledge he could
have possessed or any conception he could have
formed. It may be said that such idea of terrestrial
universality is included in his words, such as "ISC
earth, — "under the wAoZc heavens," C^S'm P2 nnr,
— " all the high mountains under the whole hea-
vens ; " but then the question arises. On what scale
of knowledge are they to be interpreted ? If we say
the modern, calling it the absolute sense (on the sup-
position that such absolute scale has even yet been
reached), then we make him a mere mechanical ut-
terer of sounds whose intended meaning lay not in
his understanding, or a writer of words representing,
in their truthfulness, neither the emotions felt, nor
the spectacle that lay before his eye. A very slight
change in our English translation, and that a very
justifiable one, greatly affects this impression of uni-
versality. Read land lor eartli wherever the word
occurs, as, for example, the ichole land, or the face of
the whole land, and the scale, to our imagination, is at
once reduced. Thus we actually have, in one place,
oh. vii. 23, riBTX instead of ^"iS , and yet nothing is
more evident than th:it in the previous chapters the
first word is used of the Eden-territory and tiie region
adjacent. In like manner is this word niaTX used
in the account of the general corruption of the race
by the intermarriages of the Sethites and the
Cainites, ch. vi. 1 : " When men began to multi-
ply upon the face of the adamah," rriTsn "'rs 55 .
It is not only without any warrant from Scripture,
but in the liice of the fair inferences to Ite drawn
from its artless language, that some have regarded
the antediluvian human race as spread o\er the wide
surface of the earth according to our present know-
ledge. Equally, too, against the impres.sion to be
fairly derived from the account, is the idea of a vast
population as in any way to be compared with that
which has since existed and now exists. We know
nothing of any physical or moral reasons that may
have accelerated or retarded it. The Scripture simply
.says, in its introduction t(j the account of the flood,
that men began to multiply, ~~b bnn , evidentlj
imjjlying that they had not been very numerous
before in either line, and that the mixture and the
multiplication were, at the same time, cause and
effect of the corruption. The fair inference, there-
fore, is, that it took jilace, together with the judgment
that followeil, whilst they were yet confined to this
• [DolitzHph, ttiough undecided in the main, prcj^enti
the ttwioli; ease, or the whole ^-ouud of iirsunn nt for and
a[rllin^t. wlu'u iio navs, page 2(>2 : ''Thi; Srnnlmc domatids
the univcrs-ility of the nt)Oil, only for the earth as iuhiiiilcd,
not for the earth as sucit ; and it hixs no interest in the uni-
versality of tlie flooil in itnoif, but only in the univer«tlit)
of the judgment of which it ifl *lie execution.'* — T. L.I
CUAP. VIII. 1-19.
31',
tract, whatever may liave been its extent. It was
the open, easily cultivated part of the eartli (tliniigli
It iiail already become sterile in the days of tlie
Sethite fiamech), to which the early men in their
gregaiious habits yet adhered. There had not come
the roving, migrating, pioneering impulse which was
first given alter the flood, and for the very purpose
of breaking up the gregarious tendency whieh again
manifested itself in the plain of Shinar. This reluc-
tance to leave the adamah, or the old homeland
of the race near Eden, shows itself in Cain's lan-
guage. Gen. iv. 14 : " Behold thou art driving me
forth this day, nanxn 'JQ bsTS , from the face of
the adaraah, that I may become a wanderer y^XS
in the (wide) eartli," as distinguished from the father-
land where the protecting divine presence (T'??)
was supposed still to dwell. Cain, bold and evil as
be was, felt this. The thought, even though coming
from his own vengeance-haunted imagination, was
a terror to him, and we may rationally suppose
that the feeling was still more strongly shared by
his descendants, whom the account represents as
Btill living near the Sethites and corrupting them by
their vicinity. All great movements in the world
have come from a superhuman impulse, breaking up
previous habits, and strangely changing those fixed
conditions of human society into wliich races, when
left to themselves, .are ever tending ; sometimes
even when their talk is loudest of progress and
change as ever coming from themselves. The
course of history is marked by such new move-
ments, unaccountable in their beginning from any-
thing in the previous human (which may probably
have been tending strongly in the opposite direction),
yet afterwards, from the very fact of sequence, seem-
ing to fall inductively into the natural flow of events.
At all events, if we take the Scripture text for our
guide, there is no reason to believe that any of the
antediluvians (with the exception, perhaps, of a few
solitary rovers), had ever crossed the deserts, or ven-
tured upon the seas, or scaled the mountains, or pen-
etrated far into the dense wildernesses that separated
the primitive adamah from the vast unknown of
earth around them. We may fairly suppose, too,
that it was one of the designs of the deluge-judgment
to prevent a race which had so dehumanized them-
selves, or, in the language of Scripture, " corrupted its
way," from spreading ever the surface of the globe.
But how diflferent was it when the movement came
which is recorded Gen. xi. 8, whether we regard
the " confounding of languages " there mentioned as
the cause or the effect of the dispersion. It was, in
either view, equally supernatural, or, if the term ia
preferred, an extraordinary divine intervention, de-
flecting the course of the human movement from
what it would have been had it been left solely to
the antecedent human tendency. They were settling
down into the old adamah gregariousness, to be
followed by the same impieties, not only (for that
could be borne with), but by the dehumanizing
vices that demanded extinction. " Wherefore the
Lord scattered them from thence over the face of all
the earth." The Hebrew verb is a very strong one,
orx ys^l, "He drove them asunder" — He sent
them far and wide — He broke them up. Compare
Deut. xxxii, 8, Acts xvii. je. Their reluctance to
leave the old home-land, like that of Cain in the ear-
lier time, is shown by the same word, and that strong
oaiticle \d bo expressive of caution and alarm ; xi. 4,
y-ixn bs "':b br 7^23 -S, "lest we be scattered
over the face of the icJinle earth " — the wide earth,
the unknown, unbounded earth. We must take tb»
langnage according to the fe.-ling aud knowledge ol
the day. It was der itnaf)'iehhare Bann. as Lang4
expresses it. No. 15, p. 264, the illimitable exile ia
sp'tce which had something of the terror dt^ endlosen
Bmincs, of the endless exile in time. But though th«
pioneering eftbrt needs something extraneous to start
it, it is afterwards carried on by its love of novelty,
which, when once excited, ever feeds the impulse,
overcoming the sense of insecurity until it becomes
a passion instead of a dread. Thus, as the terror of
the unknown gives way, the new impetus soon ac-
quires a rapidity more strange even than the former
reluctance, as is attested by other and more modem
examples in the world's history. In the long
stagnation of the middle ages geographical know-
ledge, at least among the Europeans, had actually
receded. Less was known of the world in the d.aya
of Bede and Alcuin than in those of Ptolemy. But
how soon after the start given to Di Gama and Colum-
bus, and by these to others, was the state of things,
in this respect, wholly changed I The orbh terrarum
immediately Ijegan to expand, and so rapidly was the
horizon extended, that less than half a century added
more to the knowledge and civilized occupation ot
the earth than a thousand years had done before.
In less than thirty years after Columbus had seen the
light upon the shore of the first West India isle, Ma-
gellan had advanced to the southern extremity of the
.\merican continent and accomplished the circumnavi-
gation of the globe. It was not because the men of
the tenth and twelfth centuries lacked vigor of body
or mind, but because God's time had not yet come.
So was it when the first great dispersion of man-
kind commenced. Before the flood, there is no evi-
dence that even Egypt was known or inhabited— we
mean scriptural evidence ; and notwithstanding the
assertions of Bunsen and others, we think it can be
shown (in its proper place) that there is no reliable
evidence of any other kind. Dwelling as they did,
mainly, in the region between the Euphrates and the
Indus, the antediluvians had never ventured upon
the wide desert that intervened, nor attempted the
long way up the rivers and by the mountains of the
North. But now the tribes of Ham are streaming
down the Persian Gulf, following the Gihon as it winds
round Southern .\rabia, until they reach the n;irrow
part of the Red Sea. The new impulse soon carries
them over into upper Egypt or the ancient ^-Ethiopia,
whence they find tlieir way down into Mitzraim (the
Narrows), the country of the lower Nile, whilst others
start off again for the vast regions of Central Africa.
One branch of the sons of Japheth direct their coursa
to the dense Northern wilds, and thence dividing, be-
gin their long march through Middle and Northern
Europe in the one direction, or through Middle Asia
and towards the American continent in the other
Another branch of the same family roam tbrougb
Asia Minor, one part crossing at the Bosporis {Boo.
iropot, aa the Greeks afterwards translated the old
name, in accordance with one of their fables), tha
ancient Ox-ford, or cattle-passage, whence they pro-
ceed into the Thraciaii and Danubian forests; whilst
another host of pioneers make the jKgean isles theii
stepping places to Greece, Italy, and Spain. Th«
bold sons of Canaan have ventured upon ships, and
are making their way to the extremities of th«
Mediterranean and even to the Atlantic. In th(
318
GENESIS, OR TUE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
moan time the desceiuiants of Shem keep nearer to
the old homeland, barely diverging into Elam
(Persia) and Assyria, moTing m;unly up tlie Euphrates
to Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, and tLeuce to
Northern Arabia. There is every reason to believe
that under this mighty impulse that drove them
from Shinar, moi e was done in two or three centuries
towards settling the earth than had been accomplish-
ed in the 1,600 or 2,000 years of the antediluvian
period ; and this fact alone, when taken in connection
with its divine causality, is a sufiicient answer to
those who think that the Hebrew chronology does
not give time enough for the great historical be-
ginnings that so soon made their appearance. The
world has ever moved by starts, and races, hke
individuals, oftentimes do more, and live more, in
very short periods than they do in others compara-
tively long.
This is dwelt upon here as having a bearing upon
the position of the human race, and the spread of its
population, before the flood. The emphasis with
which the new movement is announced in the .lilh
chapter, and more fully described in the xth (see
especially ver. 32), furnishes the strongest reason for
believing tliat notliing of the kind, or on such a
ecale, had ever taken place upon the earth before.
"From these (nfcx'S) were parted (were divided,
ITie; , isolated), the nations in the earth after the
flooi."
In the antediluvian period there seems to have
been a distinction between yx and nanx, but the
former word had not acquired the greater definitcness
of after usage. In I'act. it must have been utterly
indefinite. This is safely inferred from the views
we are compelled to form of the primitive territorial
notions of mankind. In the earliest times the concep-
tion of the earth must have been that of unlimited
extent, and of an undivided wild or waste. Nothing
to the contrary had been made known, either by ex-
perience or by revelation. It was simjily the con-
trast of the sky above and the gromtd beneath, like
the conception presented in the earliest Greek anti-
thesis ef ouparbs and x^'-'"- We must ever bear this
in mind when we attempt, as we ever ought to do in
interpreting, to get back into the conceptions of the
ancient narrator. In no other way shall we get the
image of which the language is the necessiiry as well
as the only adequate reflexion. There had not even
come in the greater definitcness which belongs to the
Greek ya7a, although the Noachian conception, with
its heaven above and its abyss below, resembles very
much that which is presented in the Homeric oath,
Odi/8s. V. 184:
'lirro vvv T($5e Fata Kat Ovpavhi tvpitt vw€i>9iw,
»till less was it (in conception, at least, whatever may
liave been the speculative thought), tlie tellurinn
Idea (see Cicero's use of the word tr/lux, Rcpub. vi.
17, iellus media et injlma et in iptain fernntur omnia)^
of a body, whether spherical or otherwi.se, lying in a
limited space with space all around it. This is not
rationalizing again.st the authority of Scripture. We
must judge of this old writer's conception by his
knowledge, real or supj)0>ed, which we have no
reason to think was in any way changed by that di-
rinc afflatus of truth and holiness which made him
the faithful recorder of this wonderful scene. 'I'liis
10 the very ground on which we trust its graphical
COrrectnesa, an repreBenting, not a mechanical know-
ledge (connected with no sense-experience or actual
memory in the narrator), but a vivid seeing, with a
corresponding vividness of emotion.
The same may be said of other parts of the
account, which carry an air of absolute universality,
simply because we interpret them by tlie absolute or
scientific notion of our own day. Thus the expres-
sion already referred to, " under the whole heaven,"
is the primary optical language for the visible hori-
zon.* It might have been regarded as the real hori-
zon, but if so it would only be tlie writer's thought,
his speculative notion, and we have no right, as
interpreters, to suiistitute this for what he actually
sees and evidenily means to describe as seen. If any
will insist U|:ion this language as denoting an absolute
tellurian universality (as Wordsworth, Keil, and Ja-
cobus have done), let them turn to the same words.
Job xxxvii. 3, where they are applied to the thunder
and the lightning, and connected with other lan-
guage still more suggestive of extent in space.
" Hark, the trembling of his voice, and the deep mutter-
ing (nsri) that goeth forth from his mouth ; under
the whole heavens, C"'C"i:n ^3 rnn , he directeth
it, and its lightning, l'"!S$f7 ri'!E:3 bs , to the wings
(or extremities) of the earth." It is the long rever-
berating roar that is heard all rotmd the sky, and
the vivid flash which for a moment liglits up the
whole horizon. There are other passages where the
expression would seem to take in more than the im-
mediate sense, but it never goes beyond the concep-
tual limit which is determined by the knowledge,
real or supposed, of the utterer, or of those to whom
it is addressed. As in Dent. iv. 19 : it means there
generally the nations far and near, according to the
geographical ideas of the times. Its absolute uni-
versality would require us to believe that there is not
an island in the Pacific, nor a region in the Arctic or
Torrid Zone, to which the Jews were not to be
dispersed. And so in Deut. ii. 25, wliei-e the same
wide words, " under the whole heavens," are used in
a still more limited sense of the nations immediately
surrounding the Jews, though in every direction, —
around them on all sides.
In a similar manner are we justified in interpreting
the seemingly universal terms which relate to the
animals. They were all that the narrator knew.
He receives the divine command as measured by his
knowledge and convictions, and executes it accord
ingly. They were the familiar animals by which he
was surrounded in the district where he lived. In
the terror produced by the great catastrophe, they
instinctively come to the ark ; as in all great com-
motions of nature the most ferocious beasts are
known to seel; the protection of human sheltei-. Or
we may rationally suppose (taking the supernatural
as an essential part of the account), that they were
deterndned by a peculiar divine inslinrt, which would
be, to the lowei' nature, in analoi^y with ihe prophetic
inxifilit given to the higher, t^o far as mere natural
signs are concerned, their kei ner and more instinct-
ive senses would discern the coming on ol'thi' deluge in
its terrestrial and ufirial symptoms soonei' than it would
become manifest to the human cognition, and is thej
• [It iB the appcarnnce 80 graphically described, thouffh
In other lan(,Ti„i;,., ,jui, xxvl. 10: ■':d bj" jn p'pi
-llin C5 IIS p-brn 1? C'Srr, "Tlieclrelehehatt
iimtkcd upon the faci' (if tli ^ watcrn, it tlie ending of tlie
liplit in tlie darkiU'i's,'' — or where the visible disat \ ears tn
the invielble.— T. L.i
CHAP VUI. 1-19.
31{
crowd towards the ark or flutter around its protect-
ing roof, there would be given just that impression
of universality which the language convey?. The
conviction he had upon his mind of the diiine com-
mand, though from tlie very nature of the ease limit-
ed by his knowledge of the living things immediately
aro'ind him, would express itself In the same
gereral term= He was directed to take of the
nrna , the cattle, the common or domestic animals,
clean and unclean.* It was to be from all, 53^ , a
term general instead of distributive, and those taken
of the n'ona were to be in pairs of species. Thus
regarded, the language is all truthful iu the highest
sense of the word truthfulness. It is subjectively
truthful, that is, it gives the fact and the spectacle as
It is seen and/eVf, — not as calculated, or with that
logical and arithmetical precision whose tendency, in
a matter of such iudeterminateness, would have been
to produce distrust rather than the confidence of
faith. Greater precision would have betrayed the
mere wonder-maker, or the mere story-teJler, not
speaking from any conceptual experience ; whilst,
on the other hand, the largeness of the terms, even
where it looks like hyperbole, is evidence of the
actuality and truthfulne.ss of the emotion that pro-
duced theuL Thus the impression made on the
mind of the beloved disciple by his constant con-
templation of the person and the acts of his adored
Master : " And there are many other things which
Jesus did, the which if they were written every one,
I suppose that not even the world would contain the
books that should be written." What words coulii
more truthfully convey this inward state of soul !
*' And all Judea, iratra tj 'louSata, went out to him,
and all the country round about Jordan, irarra 7;
irepixu'po! TO ' 'loiiSduov, and were baptized." Matt.
iii. 6. " Ai d there were dwelling in Jerusalem
Jews, devou" men, ft-om every nation, anh Tranos
eii">vs, under the heaven." Acts ii. 5. The language
in these cases is the trice and natural expression
of emotion produced by a vast and exciting spec-
tacle. How much more worthy of our trust it is —
how much stronger a conviction of an eye-witnessed
actuality does it produce, than it would have done
had the writers been more guarded and exact in
♦ [There is no mention of " the wild animals ae includ-
ed " in the n^na, as tliat judicious comiaentator. Murphy,
well observes (p. 211). There were "the fowl, aud the
creeping thing." The first i;icludeii the birds in general
(who would be most defenceless, and who would most ua-
tnraiiy, of themselves, resort to the ark fur shelter), and
the smaller well-known animals, wlio would coioe under
the general denomination. There is no evidence of its
here including insects or reptiles. And then again, it must
be ever borne in mmd how our view of the universal terms
in respect to the animals is aftect«d by the prejudgment of
the absolute tiniversality of the flood as c-'venng all th--
globe. The all in the one case is very much modified by
the all in the other. If the flood was confined to the b*^ih
of the Euphrates and Tigris, it would have swept awtiy tlie
then existing human race, but not the animal races who
had roamed farther into the wildernesses :ind deserts.
There is not a svUable to show that lions came from Africa
or bears frotn Siberia. The generality of the terms, then,
cannot be carried farther than the ends intended, which
rere the preservatiun of Noah and his family, as the seed
Df ft new human race, and of the animals ill the district
where he lived as " tt3 seed" of other animnls that would
be wanted for the new population, either in iheii- immediate,
•r their more remote and indirect, utilities.
(_>n the question of the universality of the flood, the
reader is reierred to the Commentary oh Genesis by ,lamGs
Q. Murphy, LL.D., Professor of Hebrew, Belfast. On this
■abject especially is he learned and judicious, yet with a re-
verence far remo ^ed ^om latitudinarianism. — T. L.]
their numerical proportion > So is it in the mod(
of representation that ive find in the account of th«
flood. There is something iu this subjective truth
fulness far more precious for ojr faith in the oW
document than any objective or scientific accuraCT
could liave been ; whilst, at the same time, it leave!
us perfectly free to draw, from other ideas coniiecl«J>i
with the event, such inferences of universality, or of
partiality, as its relation to other theological '.ruth,
as well as to later knowledge, may demand.
Again : those parts of tliis account which relate
the prophetic knowledge, or the prophetic conriction,
present, indeed, something different frotn the optical
representations, but are nevertheless to be inter-
preted substantially on the same principle o. theii
subjective truthfulness, leaving the higher objective
truth for which tliey stand, or of which they are the
human language, to be Interpreted by what we have
called the higher method of theological exegesis.
Now this is what we truly gather from the words
given to us ; A righteous and holy man, living in the
midst of a profane and sensual generation,-— a lonely
man, holding high communion with God, and con-
stantly in spiritual conflict with the earthly and the
vile aroimd him, — has impres^^ed upon his soul a
oonviction that the end of the world, or of the race,
is near. It is so strong, so deep, and constant, that
he feels it to come from God. It does come from
God It is so vivid, that it is to him tlie actual divine
voice to his inmost soul. It comes so near, that he
recognizes in tbe sharp impression which it makes the
very times in which the great catastrophe is to come,
and has impressed upon his soul, as by a divine direc-
tion, the way and the means through which he and
his family are to be preserved. Thus " warned of
God in respect to things not as yet seen, he prepares
an ark for the salvation of his house (Heb. xi. 7), by
which he condemned the world, and became an heir
of the righteousness which is by faith." These
divine conrictions are aU truthfully told, just as they
are truthfully felt, and given to us from the sense or
memory of the first narrator. We cannot doubt that
he was thus impressed, that he thus felt, that he thus
acted, that the events foUowmg corresponded to this
invid impression, and that they are most fdthfully
narrated. Thus believing in the suljjective, the con-
viction of an objective supernatural, and of a divine
objective reaUty, aud of a great divine purpose con-
nected with the history of the world aud tlie Church,
conies irresistibly to the spiritual mind having faith
in a personal God constantly superintending the
affairs of earth through a constant superintending
providence, both geneial and special
■As compared with other stories of the great
flood, it is the very simplicity of the account which
furnishes the conrincing evidence of its having been
an actual telling from the eye. Myths, so called,
are never told in this wtiy. There is no conceptual
lying back of them, presenting the appearance ol
having ever come from any sense or memory.
They arise, we know not how, like national songa
that never had any individual composer. They
represent ideas, notions, strangely combined, ratliei
than conceptions having their ground in any sense-
spectacle, real or supposed. In poetical picturir.4;,
on the other hand, or in rhetorical description, th;a'
is, indeed, a distinct conceptual, but it is one for the
most part artificially made by the writer or narratoi
himself. However accurate its limiung may be,
it carries with it its own testimony that it nevei
came from any actual or even possille seeing
820
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Tiis Ovid's description of the flood is most vivid,
■jid in some respects most true to nature, or whiit
.nay, very probably, liave been the actual state
of things — such as fishes swimming among the
oranches of the elm, or the sea-calves sporting
D the vineyards ; but no eye ever saw tliis ; it
e wlioUy imagined, whilst the power of thus iniagin-
flg, and of thus painting it in language, is wholly
jiconsistcnt witli that emotion which belongs to
the actual spectacle of such an event. Especially
IS this true of the more labored, or artistically
poetical, in such descriptions. Ovid's picture of
the south wind is, indeed, most admirable, but we
ecogiiize in it only the highest style of art, won-
ierful, indeed, in its grouping and in its coloring,
vet without feeling, and producing no impression
of reality.
Madidis Notus evolat alls,
Terribilem picea tectus caligine vultum ;
Barba gravis nimbis, c:inis Huit unda capiUis ;
Fronte sedent nebulee, rorant pennteque sinusque.
Metamoi-ph. i. 264.
'The south wind flies abroad with humid wings, his
('.readl'ul face covered with pitchy darkness ; his
)eard is loaded with showers ; the flood pours from
is hoary hairs ; clouds sit upon bis brow ; his wings
ind robes are dripping with the rain." We know at
once that a man who writes thus never saw the flood,
or anything like it. It is all poetry, not in the Bible
Btyle, as the name is applied to the more emotional
portions of the Scriptures, but in the Greek sense of
wo'ir\iTis, iro'iTDxa, something made, a fictitious conipo-
sitiou artificially colored and invented. Some have
regarded the language, Gen. vii. 11 — '"the windows
of heaven " and " the fountains of the great deep,"
as of this poetical or rhetorical kind. Thus Jacobus
compares the first to an " eastern expression " denot-
ing that "the heavens are broken up" with storms,
imdeven Murphy speaks of it as a "beautiful figure;"
but all such views detract from the real grandeur, as
they also do from the truthfulness, of the account.
This opening of the heavens, and breaking up of the
deep, were realities to Noah, so conceived by him,
and .as honestly related as the hfting up of the ark
and the disappearing of the mountains. The awful
scene itself would never have called out such imag-
ings as those of Ovid, or suggested such language.
The Syrian tradition, as given by Lt;ci4N in the Syria
Dea, comes nearest to the simplicity of the scriptural
narrative; but even there, there are.parts of the repre-
ientation which we feel instinctively could never have
come from any actual eye-witnessing. The rising of
the rivers, for example, on which this tradition dwells,
must have Ijccn a very insignificant part, if any part
at all, of so sudden and terrific a spectacle, as it is
8«t foi th ui the Bible, and as it must have been, from
the very nature of the case, when the floods from
above came like bursting clouds or water-spouts, and
the breaking and sinking of the earth made a scene
BO different from anything that could have been pro-
duced by a freshet, even of the most extensive kind.
So, too, in the Arabian tradition, though In most
things closely resembling the scriptural, we find the
same tendency to embellishment. See it as given in
the Koran, Surat xi. 40. There is also a mingling
with it of the romantic or sentimental which shows
the legendary or mere story-making style of perver-
■ion. It represents Noah as having a fourth son who
is an unbeliever, and it attemjils to make an affect-
ing sceue between this lo.st child, who flies to the
mountain, and his imploring father, as the ark is
borne past him by the sepanOnp waters T.ie Chal
dsean is evidently a magnified Ci">py of the Heoren
narrative, but in its enlargemont all propornoL j
lost sight of. The ark is represented as a stadium
or furlong, in length. It is in the same way tnej
have treated the modest Hebrew chronology, keep-
ing its genealogical division in the account of the ten
generations before Xisuthrus, but running iLs deci
nials and hundreds into thousands and hundreds of
thousands to agree with the excessive antiquity of
their fabled annals. It is the Bible record sweUed
out by the inflated Oriental imagination, which every
where, except in the ease of the Hebrews, was unre
strained by any divine check upon the tendency ot
each nation to give itself a mythical antiquity.
There is one point in the Scripture narrative ol
the flood which would seem to establish the fact of
its hmited extent, had it not been for that prejudg-
ment of universality which has influenced so many
commentators. In ver. 19 the narrator seems to
hurry towards the climax of the scene : " And tne
waters prevailed exceedingly, nsta, ISia, and all
the high hills under the whole heaven were covered."
The verse Ibllowing explains and confirms this by an
additional particular: "Fifteen cubits i.^ard did
the waters prevail (ti3J, they were fifteen cubits
strong, or, as we say, fifteen cubits deep), and the
hills (the same word, D"nn, thus rendered ver, 19
were covered." Now take this in connection «itl\
ver. 4 of ch. viii : " And the ark rested (njni) in
the seventh month, the seventeenth day of the
mouth (at the end of five months, one hundred and
filty days, or at height of the flood) upon the mount-
ains of Ararat" (::"i^S ''"in in the plural — or out
of the mountnins of Ararat taken as the name of a
range or niountainous country, one of whose peak^
alterwards obtained the name by way of eminence.''
Here we evidently have the place from which thct-e
fifteen cubits were reckoned, and it furnishes tiie key
to the right understanding of what tlie writer meant
to convey as the extent of his knowledge and experi-
ence, whatever might have been his opinions as to
anything beyoud. There is no evidence that this
was the high peak of Ararat; the impression (from
the use of the plural) is all the other way- Taking
all these things into consideration, the explanation is
most natural and easy. The ark had drifted up the
basin of the Euphrates and Tigi is imtil it grounded
on the highlands that formed its northern bank or
border, and tliat, too, not far from a land of the
olive and the vine. The surrounding mountains, or
high hills, had previously been in sight, but at this
tune, or just before it, they disappeared. These
are the same "mountains under tne whole heaven"
mentioned ver. 19. Filteen cubits strong were the
waters, and the mountains were covered, \\'hen the
ark rested, there was no land auywhere in sight.
Noah a-scertains the depth by measinement, or by bis
knowledge of the ark's draught of water, and as it
did nut float again, he takes this time as the summit
of the flood. He may have supposed the whole earth
covered, as liir as he knew anything about the earth
as a whole ; but we must take whiit he saw, what he
knew, and what he describes as coming evidectly
from his experience. Without some such view we
liave no standard. It may be said, too, that thii
moimtain on which the ark rested could not havn
• (See Iho marginal note on these woria, BTlJt ^""''
paite 308.— T. L.1
CHAP. VIIL 1-19.
8U1
been the Ugh peak of Ararat, nor one from which
that peak was in sight ; since, in the one case, the
eurrouniiing mountains must have disappeared much
earlier, and, in the other caae, the declaration of
their disappearaiice would not have been true.
Again, had it been the high peak of Ararat, then, in
the going down of the waters, a very large jiart of
it must have been wholly bare before the others be-
came visible ( 1X13 ), as is said viii. 5 ; but tiiis is
contrary to the whole impression derived from that
part of the account. All these difficulties (difficul-
ties, we mean, on tlie face of the account) become
arcatly increased, if we suppose that the flood was
•lOt only above Ararat, or one of the mountains of
Ararat, but also covered the whole globe, and mount-
ains known to be twelve thousand feet, or more than
two miles, higher than any in Armenia. In such case,
besides there being no standard of measurement for
the fifteen cubits, there would be a strangeness and
inconsistency in the language, since this highest
mountain would be as much covered by a rise of one
cubit above its summit as by iitleen. The expression
inipUes excess, as measured from some known condi-
tion, or it has no meaning. How did the describer
know it ?
This may be answered by saying that Noah knew
it divinely, that is, by a knowledge and a memory
having no basis in any actual knowing or sense-ex-
perience. It was all imprtssion made upon liis mind.
Now, had it been so related, it would have been per-
fectly consistent with that subjective truthfulness on
which we insist. Other things are thus stated among
the immediate antecedents of the flood, but this ap-
pears in the midst of the vividly optical, and in di-
rect connection with facts having every appearance
of being described from sense. As a thing utterly
unknown and unknowable without such divine inti-
mation, or as a fact that might have been, but which
sense necessarily failed to reach, it would be like
Ovid's " dolphins in the subaquean woods," or his
"sea-calves swimming in the vineyards," except that
it has an air of statisiical particularity, which, as
thus given, affects its credit, either as prose or
poetry. There are other things that, on the suppo-
sition of universality, must have been utterly beyond
experience, but which are very confidently stated,
and vividly described, just as things would be that
fall directly under the observation of the eye." A
:*phere of water covering the entire globe would have
left no means of determining the time of greatest
elevation, or the period of abatement betbre the hills
again appeared. The Jewish commentators maintain
the universality as essential to the honor of their
Scriptures. But they are critics who overlook noth-
ing, and they therefore keenly see ihese difficulties.
In order to avoid them, they distinguish between
what was known from the spirit of prophecy,
nxi:3 . and what is narrated from sense, nui'Jl .
or experience. Our Rabbins, says Uaiiiionides, were
led to this from the knowledge (afterwards obtained)
that there were mountains in Greece (Europe, he
means) higher than Ararat, which, he tells us, was
in the lower part of the earth-sphere ("ili^B), not
♦ [Such, for example as the liom 7|"bn . viii. 5, a
peculiar Hebrew idiom, denoting most graphically a graduid
yet constant subsidence (Vulg., ibant et decrtscebani a'jtis'),
or, the period of highest water, which could have had no
mark for the eye, if they covered the highest land upon the
«arth, twelve thouiaud fet-t. or more than two miles, above
•he high peak of Ararat itself.— T. L.)
far from Babylon. To overcome the objection, h<
adopts the singular view, that the resting on Ararat,
though at the height of the flood when the waiera
became even, was some time after tne highest
mountains were submerged. This submersion, or
rather supermersion, came from the great commotion,
the tossing or boiling of the waters (nriT^), — the
violent eruption from the earth causing them to dash
and surge over the highest parts, thus covering them,
but not as an even mass or aquor. He makes a di»-
tinction, which has some ground, between ~:'^, the
calming of the waters, and TOn , their abating. It
was after the going down of this wild commotion, or
when the waters came to a level, that the ark hap-
peiied to be (n'.p'Z ~ip'') over the region of Ararat,
and settled down upon it. It was also a part of thin
singular view that the ark, in consequence of its loaa
and its great specific gravity, did not truly float, but
was lilted up by the great force of the up-pouring
waters, and this, he holds, is what is meant by the
words vii. 18, D'sn •'3D bj ~|bn^ , "it went upon
the face of the waterx^''^ — wherever the waters drove
it. Such views, from so sober a commentator, are
only of value as showing the immense difficulties at-
tending this opinion of univer>ality — difficulties that
come not more from outside objections than from
the face of the account itself if we depai't from the
plain optical interpretation.
The whole argument may be briefly summed bj
a careful consideration of the three main aspects ol
the Noachian account: 1. The divine communica.
tions warning Noah ol the impending judgment, and
directing him to prepare an ark for the saving of
himself and his house. Whetlier these were mad*
in vision, or by vivid impressions upon the mind,
they are truthfully received and truthfully related,
that is, translated into human speech as repiesentiiig
the conceptions and knowledge of the relator in re-
spect to the subjects of such divine communicatioiL
The human race were to be destroyed, and the earth,
or land, they inhabited, was to be covered with
water. In such warning, God did not teach him
geography, nor give him the figure of the earth, nor
che height of the unknown, far-distant mountains.
2. The directions in respect to the animals. These
are to be interpreted in the same way, and with the
same limitations of knowledge and conception. He
was to take of the living thing (or the animals) under
the threefold specification of the beheina (the cattle),
the fowl, and the creeping thing. They were the
animals with which he was familiar, as belonging to
tlie region in which he lived. He was aided by a
divine instinct in tlie creatures, supernaturally givcB
in the begiiming, and now supernaturally excited
But God did not teach him zoology, nor the vast
variety of species, nor is there any evidence that ani-
mals came from the distant parts of the unknown
earth, such as the giraffe from Southern Africa, the
elephant from India, or the kangaroo from Austra-
lia. 3. The actual event itself, and this under two
aspects : o. The flood as optically described by some
one in the ark (Noah or Shem). Here we have cer-
tain data which seem tmmistakable in the inferences
to be deduced from them. If we look steadily at the
connections of events as they are most artlessly nar-
rated, the conclusion appears almost unavoidable,
that the mountains mentioned, vii. 20, as covered by
fifteen cubits, and that come again in sight, viii. 5,
as seen liom the same place when''e they disappeared
52a
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
at the height of the flood, and when the ark ground-
ed OB the sevi'nteenth of tlie seventh month, are the
same " high hills under the whole heaven," that are
mentioned vii. 19. We have here what Noah sau\
or knew from soise, — the visible objects around him,
the grounding, the disappearing, the reappearmg —
all icf'erring to the same phenomena, one part being
IS much optical as anollier, and the knowledge of
*ny one of these facts, as they appear on the face
of the narrative, as much referrible to experience as
that of any other. A. The inferred extent. Noah had
no means of measuring the distance to which the ark
drifted. We judge of it from what can be ascer-
tained of its termini. It started from a place near
the. old Eden-land (in the neighborhood of the Per-
sian Gulf), and it struck on one of the mountains of
Armenia in the north. This could not have been
the high Ararat, for then the lesser Ararat, which is
only seven miles distant, and four thousand feet, or
nearly a mile, lower, must have been long under
water, contrary to the vivid impression made by
what is said vii. 20 and viii. 6. It could not have
been the lesser peak, for then the higher (only seven
miles distant) would have been clearly visible, and
four thousand feet above the water during the whole
time of the ark's resting. It must, therefore, have
Deen some high litod on the borders of the mountainous
•egion, and at quite a distance, S. or E., from either.
rhiB distance of the ark's sailing before it grounded
taking into view the fact that there was no land
then visible from it in any direction, although ther»
had been just before) would give a flood which prob-
ably covered the old adamah, together with Baby
Ionia, -issyria, the neighboring parts of Persia and
Media, Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, Arabia,
and a good portion of Asia Minor, with peaks, per*
haps, here and there, projecting above its surt'ace
Subsequent events seem lo confirm this view. From
the unknown, rugged, mountainous region where the
ark rested, the Noachida; soon found tlieir way back
(at a time, too, when, as appears from xi. 4, the
flood was in fresh remembrance) to the plain of
Shinar. To this they were led by the primitive gre-
garious tendency (see remarks, p. Sll), ami their
aversion to being driven into the unknown, until
there came that remarkable divine impulse which,
for the first time, sent them far and wide to the re-
motest regions of the earth. Each pioneering family
carried with them the story of the terrible judgment,
locating it in different lands according to the tradi-
tions of their ancestors, and each distorting or em-
bellishing it after their own mythical or legendary
fashion. The Bible alone gives us the veritable ac-
count, truthfully and vividly told, carrying every
mark of being an actual eye-witnessing, and furnish-
ing the best data for determining its locality, ita
probable extent, its true chronology, and, what is of
greater value than all else, its theological bearing, aa
one of the great divine interventions in the history
of the world and of the church. — T. L.J
FOURTH PART.
THE GENESIS OF THE NEW, WORLD-HISTORICAL, HUMAN RACE; OF THE CONTRASl
BETWEEN THE FORM OF SIN THAT NOW COMES IN, AND OF THE NEW FORM Of
PIETY ; OF THE CONTRAST BETWEEN THE BLESSING OF SHEM (CDLTUS, THEOCRACY)
AND THE BLESSING OF JAPHETH (CULTURE, HUMANISM); OF THE CONTR.VST BE-
TWEEN THE DISPERSION OF THE NATIONS, AND THE BABYLONIAN COMBINING OP
THE NATIONS; BETWEEN THE BABYLONIAN DISPERSION, OR THE MYTHICAL HEA-
THENISM, AND THE INDIVIDUAL SYMBOLIC FAITH IN GOD OF THE FATRLARCHS.
THE FIRST TYPICAL COVENANT. Ch. VIII. 20-XI. 32.
FIRST SECTION,
fV Firtt l)/pieal CovenarU. The Primitive Precepta {Noachian Laws). The Symbol of the Rainbow.
Chapter VIII. 20-IX. 17.
20 AnJ Noali biiilded an altar unto the Lord, and took of every ' clean beast and of
21 t'Tery clean fowl and oH'Krec burnt oilerings on the altar. And the Lord siuelled a
sweet savour,' and the Lord said in his heart, 1 will not again curse the ground any
more for mr.n'.s sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth [bore,
22 eiraaing] ; nc.tlier will I again smite any more everything living as I have done. While
the earth remaincih | nil the duyn of th« earthj seedtime and iiarvest [tbo order of nature], and
cold aud heat, and sunjmer and winter,' and day and night, shall not cease.
CHAP. Vm. 20— IX. 1-17. 323
Ch. IX. 1 A.nd God [Eiohim] blessed Noali and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful.
2 and niultiplv and replenish the earth. And the fear of you and the dread of you, shali
be upon every beai t of the eartli, and upon every fowl of tiie air, and upon all thai
nioveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hands are they
3 delivered. Every moving thing that liveth sliall be meat for you; even as the greet
4 herb have I given you all things. But flesh which is the life thereof [itsBoui.itsaniiwtion],
£ which is the blood tliereof, shall ye not eat. And surely your blood of your lives'
[of each single life] will I require ; at the hand of every beast will I require it [take vengtiiict
for it], and at the hand of man; at the hand of every man's brother will I require the
6 hfe of man. Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man ^ shall his blood be shed : for in
7 the image of God made he man. And you, be ye fruitful, and multiply ; bring forth
8 abundantly in the earth, and multiply therein. And God [Elohim] spake unto Noalu
9 and to his sous with him, saying [^iasb], And I, behold, I establish my covenant with
10 you, and with your seed after you; And with every living creature that is with you,
of the fowl, of the cattle, and of every beast of the earth with you ; from all that go out
1 1 of the ark, to every beast of the earth [that shall proceed from tbem in the future]. And I will
establish mv covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the
waters of a flood ; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.
12 And God [Eiohim] said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me
13 and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations: I do
set my bow" in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and
14 the earth. And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the eartli, that the
15 bow shall be seen in the cloud : ' And I will remember my covenant, which is between
me and you and every livhig creature of all flesh ; and the waters shall no more
16 become a flood to destroy all flesh. And my bow shall be in the cloud; and 1 will
look upon it, that 1 may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every
17 living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth. And God [Eiohim] said mito Noah,
This is the token of the covenant, which I have established between me and all flesli
that is upoQ the earth.
l» Ch. viii. ver. 20. — 5373— /rem all the pure of the cattle, and from all the pure fowl. The word denotes selection.
ft can hardly mean one of every kind deemed pure among the cattle ; much less can it have this large meaning in respect
.0 the fowl (or the liiids), among whom the pure species far excelled tlie impure, which are mentioned as excejitiona
twenty-four in number), Lev. si. 13 ; Deut. siv. 12. If Noah had had every earthly species of bird in the ark (seven
>f ail thai were rei,'ardcd as pure), and ofl'ered of each in saci-ifice, it would have required .an immense altar. There was
5vidently a selection, and such use of the term bs^.; here may serve as a guide in respect to its antecedent uses, justifying
us in limiting it to the more common kinds of all species known to Noah, and inhabiting the portion of the earth visited
r>y the flood.— T. L.)
["^ Ver. 21.— nn^3 A word of a very peculiar form, like VS^S , Is. i. 31. Aben Ezra compares it with r,?ISX3, Hos.
i. 4. It denotes rest intensively ; the rest, not of mere quietude, or cessation, but of satisfaction, complacency, delighL
^n odor of rest — of complete and gratified acceptance. Compare the suggested language, Zeph, iii. 17, expressing God's
ireat satisfaction in .Jerusalem, ln^riX3 llJ^in' , He shall rest in his love. The word niT'a occurs here for the first
.ime, and is evidently meant to have a' connection with the name ns (Noah), but becomes the common phrase (n^T
nn^3) to denote the pleasant odor of the sacrifice, in Exodus, Leviticus, etc. Hence the New Testament Hebraism us
ieen in the word ei/uiSta, in such passages as 2 Cor. ii. lo, a sweet savour of Christ, Eph. v. 2, a sweel-siwlling savour, Phil,
X. 18, as also the u^e of oafi-q, 2 Cor. ii. Ui, the savour of life unto life. The Jewish interpreters here, as usual, are
ifraid of the anthropophatism, and so the Targum of Onkelos renders generally. The Lord received the offering graciously.
in like manner the Jewish translator Arabs Erpenianus. Aben Ezra affects a horror of the literal sense, nb'bn , h6
uays— *' O profane ! away with the thought that God should smell or eat." With all their reverence for their old Scrip-
tures, these Jewish interpreters had got a taste of philosophy, and hence their Philonic fastidiousness, as ever manifested
in a desire to smooth over all such language. — T. I..]
[3 Ver. 22.— Zl"in , rendered winter — more properly avAumn, though it may include the winter, as y^p may include
the spring.— T. L.]
[* Ch. ix. ver. 5.--D3^r"K;E5b DSBT , your blood of (or for) your souls. Maim-inides renders it Slnf DDTST
CSTlTiUES , your blood which is your souls. LXX., aVa Ton. li/vxi^v vijmiv, blood of your souls.— T. L.]
[» Ver. 6.— CT S2 . E. V. by man. This would seem i-ather to require the term "1^3 . by the hand of man, the usual
Hebrew phrase to denote instrumentality. That it was to be by human agency is very clear, but the ~ in mx3 may
be better taken, as it is bj Jona ben Oannach (Abul-W.alid), in his Hebrew Grammar, p. 33, to denote substitution,— fa^
nan, in place of man— life for life, or blood for blood, as it is so strongly and frequently expressed in the Greek tragedy
The preposition 1, in this place, he says, is equivalent to "!i;;'3 , on account of, and he refers to 2 Sam. xiv. 7, " Give
OS the man who smots his brother, and we will put him to death, :"'nN; IIJS33 , for the soul (the life, or in place of) hit
brother,'' Exod. xx. 2, IT 3" 32 "iS'Qil , " and he shall be sold /or his theft," 'as also, among many other places, to Gen,
Jliv. 5. 12 wHr lyna X-n", where, instead of " divining by it," as in our English versions and the Vulgate, he givtj
what seems a more consist<?ni rendering: "he will surely divine for it" (111 2"3). that Ib, find out by divination, -who
ftw in his possession the lost tup. Such also seems to have been the ide» \f ^}>r LXX. in Gen. ix. ', where they have
324
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
oolhing for D^X3 but ai^i Tou atfiaToc auTow, in re/urn /or fti5 6/ood. Arabs Erpenianiis renders it .L^aaJ! Um3 ,1
fry the irordy or command^ of maji, indicating a judicial sentence. So the Taigum of Onkelos, by the witnessr-s accord^ nff /*
the word r>f judgment, and so also Eashi and Aben Ezra, C^T"Z DIX^ , hy man, tliat is, by the witnesses.— T. L.)
[• Ver. 13. — ^P'"p, my how, as just before, ver. 11, "'n^"^Z , my covenant. The language seem;?, on the very face
oi it, to implv a thing previously existing, called, from its remarkable appearance, the bow of God, and now appjinted
3s a sign ol the previously existing covenant. Had it been a new creation, the language would more properly have been
I will make, or set, a buw in the cloud. See remarks (in the Introd. to the i. ch. p. 144) on the rainbow as the symbol
of coastancy in nature, from it« constant and regular appeai-anoe whenever the sun shines forth after the lain. Fcv
ftu^her vie^ s on this, and for the opinions of the Jewish commentators, see also note, p. 328. — T. L.]
[' Ver. 14. — This verse should be connected, in translation, w;th the one following. As it is rendered in E. Y., thi
•ppearing of the bow is made the subject of the sentence (though apparently the predicate), whereas the sequencf or i\%
oonjunction ^ , and of the tenees, would give the sense thtis: And it shall come to pass, when I britig the cloud, etc., a Id
whenever the bow appears in the cloud, that I will remember my covenant ; the conjunction before "Tl'^St having an
Uative force.— T. L.] ' "'
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
1. Vers. 20-22. The offering of Noah and the
acceptance and promiae of Jehovah. The offering
of Noah is not, as has been maintained, to be refer-
red back from the later time of the law, to the primi-
tive history. It reflects itself, moreover, in the my-
thological stories of the flood (Delitzsch, p. 268).
An altar to the Lord. The altar is called naio ,
place of slaying the victim, from n3T, as SuuiaiTTT)-
pioy from Aifiy. That the sons of Adam offered
without an altar ia a mere supposition. According
to Keil there was no need of an altar, because God
was still present in paradise to men. In the judg-
ment of the flood was paradise destroyed ; the place
of his presence was withdrawn, and he had taken
his throne in the heaven, that from thence, hereafter
he might reveal himself to men. (Comp. ch. ii 5,7).
"Towards heaven must now the hearts of the pious
lift up themselves ; their offerings and their prayers
must go up on high, if they would reach God's
throne. In order to give the offerings this upward
direction, elevated places were fixed upon, from
which they might ascend heavenwards in fire.
Hence the offerings derived their name of niby
from nb", the ascending, not so much because the
animal offered was laid upon the altar, or made to
ascend the altar, but rather because of the ascending
(of the flame and smoke) fioiu the altar towards
heaven. (Comp. Judg. x-k. 40; Jer. xlviii. 15; Amos
iv. 10). In like manner Delitzsch in relation to Ps.
xxix. 10; (according to Hofmann : "Prophecy and
Fulfihnent," pp. 80, 88). If by this is meant that the
religious consciousness, which once received God as
pre.sent m paradise, must now, through its darkness
by sin, revere him as the Holy One, far off, dwelling
on high, and only occasionally revealing himself from
heaven, there woidd be nothing to say against it ;
but if it is meant a-s a literal transfer of the place of
the divine dwelling and of the divine throne, it
becomes a mythologizing darkening of the divine
idea (.sec Ps. 13!»). Clirist was gieater than the
paradisaical Adam ; notwithstanding, in jirayer, lie
lifted up his eyes to heaven (John xi. 41); and al-
ready is it intimated. Gen. i. 1, that from the begin-
ning, the heaven, as the symbolical sign of (iod's
exceeding highDes.s, had precedence of the earth.
Thiit, however, the word nbiJ may have some re-
lation, at least, to the ascendency ol the victim upon
the altar is shown by the expression nbrn in the
Hiphil. The altar was creeled to Jehovah, whoso
worship had already, at an carlirr period, commenc-
ed (ch. iv. 4). Everywhere when Eloliini had re-
vealed himeelf in his first announcements, and had
thus given assurance of himself as the trusted am
the constant, there is Jehovah, the God amen, in
ever fuller distinctness. As Jehovah must he es-
pecially appear to the saved Noah, as the one to
whom he had fulfilled his word of promise in the
wonderful relation he bore to him. — Of every
clean beast. — According to Rosenmuller and others,
we must regard this as referiing to the five kinds of
offerings under the law, namely, bullock, sheep,
goats, doves, turtle doves. This, howeyer, is doing
violence to the text ; there appears rather to have
been appointed for offering the seventh surplus
example which he had taken, over and above the
three pairs, in each case, of clean beasts. — And
offered it as a burnt offering. — We are not to
think here of the classification of offerings as deter-
mined ill the levitieal law. The burnt offering forms
the middle point, and the root of the difl'erent ofter
ings (comp. ch. xxii. 13i; and the undivided unity
is here to be kept in view. There is, at all events,
contained here the idea of the thank offering, al-
though there is nothing said of any participation, oi'
eating, of the victim offered. The extreme left side
ot the offering here, as an ofl'ering for sin and guilt,
was the Ilerem or pollution of the carcases exposed
in the flood (like the lamb of the sacrifice of Moses
as compared with the slain first-born of the Egyp-
tians) ; the extreme right side lay in that consecrat-
ed partaking of flesh by Noah which now commenc-
ed.— And the Iiord (Jehovah) smelled a sweet
savor. — The savor of satisfaetion. An anthropo-
morphic expression for the satisfied acceptance of
the offering presented, as a true offering of the spirit
of the one presenting it.* — And said in his heart.
— Not merely be said to himself or he thouglit with
* [The tlame mounting heavenward from the great altar
of Noah, the vast colxmin of smoke and incense majestically
ascending in the calm, clear atmosphere, transcending seem-
ingly tlie common law of gravity, and thus comi)ining the
ideas of tranquillity and power, would of itself present a
striking image of the natural sublime. But, beyond this,
there is a moral, we may rather say, a spiritual suMiniity,
to one who regardsthe scene in those higher relations which
the account here indicatcfl, and which other portions of
Scripture make so clear. It oilers to our contcmiilation the
most vivid of contracts. There comes to mind, oo *he one
hand, the gross selfishness of the antediluvian w t.d, ever
tending downward more and more to tiirth and a sensual
auimality — in a word, devoting life to that which is lowel
than tlio lowest life itself; wliilst now, on the contrary,
there rises up in all its rich siiggestivcness, the idea o'
sacrifice, of life devotion to that which is higher than ali
life, as symbolized in the flame ascending from tlio otlered
viclim. It is, moreover, the spirit of confession, of peni-
tt'iice, of I'erl'ect resignation to the \\ ill ofOod as the ration-
al rule of life, — all, too, prefiguring One who made the gi-eal
sncrilice of liiniself fur the sins of tho world, and who, al-
though historically nnlcnow7i to Noali, way essentially oln-
liraced in that recognition of human demerit, and of th*
divine holiness, which is sty ed "the righteousnos* of faith.''
CHAP. VIII. 20— IX. 1-17.
323
himeelf ; it meai 3 rather, he took counsel with, his
heart and eiecuced a purpose proceeding from, the
emotion of his diviue love. — I ^irill not again
curse. — In words had he done this, Gen. iii. 17, but
actually and in a higher measure, in the deeiee
ol' destruction Gen. vi. 7, 13. With the last, there-
fore, is the tirst curse retracted, in as far as the first
prehminary lustration of tlie earth is admitted to be
a baptism of the earth. According to Knobel, the
pleasing fragrance of the offering is not the moving
ground, but merely the occasion for this gracious re-
solve, liut what does the occasion mean here ? In
80 far as the saving grace of God was the first mov-
ing ground for Xoah's thank offering, was this latttT
also a second moving ground (symboliciiUy, causa
meriioria) for the purpose of <iod as afterwards de-
termined.— For the imaginations of man's heart.
— The ground here given for God's forbearance and
compassion seems remarkable. Calvin : " Hie in^
confitantioe vidditr deus accusari posfse. Supra jnoii-
turus horninem, causa rn consUii divity quia fin mtmtnm
cordh huinani malum est. Hie promissurutt komini
ffraiiam, quod posthac tali ira uti jioHt^ eandem cau-
sani aller/at." Between this passage, however, and
the one ch. vi. 6, there is a twofold ditference. In the
hitter there precedes the sentence : Jehovah saw that
the wickedness of man was great upon the earth ; in
connection with this corruption of actual sin, tiie evil
imagining of the human heart itself, is reckoned for
evil, as being its fountain. Here, however, the burnt
offering of Noah goes before. In connection with
'.his sacrificial service, expressing the feeling of guilt
ind the want of forgiveness, the evil imagination of
the human heart appears as a sufferer of terapta-
jon. The innate sinfulness is not disease merely.
lut as it stands in organic connection with the actual
iin, is also ffudt. It is, however, disease too; and
precisely in its connection with the disposition for
pardon, and the better desire of man, is it regarded
as disease by God, and as being, therefore, an object
of his compassion. Moreover it is called here simply
-^ ~'^!^ » t'l^ involuntary unconscious sense and ima-
gination, but there (Gen. vi. 6), it was "the ima-
gination of the thoughts (the purposes) of his heart,"
and, therefore, a matter of consciousness ; here it is
vrickedfiess from his youth up^ there, it is only wicked-
ness^ nothing else but wickedness, wickedness through-
out and continually. In the effect of the flood, ;ind
in the light of the sacrificial offering, which Noah
offers not only in his own name, but in that of his
family and race, the guilt of the iniiate sinfulness of
the human race appeirs typically weakened in the
same way as in the evangelical church-doctrine, the
condemnation of hereditary sin is taken away by
Wliilst thiis the new spirit of sacrifice ascends from, the bap-
tized earth, heaven is represented as bending; down to meet
the symbol of reconciliation ; the infinite descends to the
finite, and hum:inity, in verification of the Scripture para-
dox, rises through its very act of lowliness aud se//-abLise-
ment. The wrath all pone, infinite compassion takes now
its place, and this is expressed in that striking Hebraism,
nn^2 n^"l "the odor of rest," typifyinjj; the tvta&ia.
XpioTov (2 Cor. ii. 4) "the sweet savor of Christ in them
who are saved."
The writer of this old account knew as well as Philo, or
Btrauss, or any modem rationalists, that God did not smell
nor eat ; hut the emoti-mal truthfulness of his inspiralion
made him adopt the strongest and the most emotional lan-
guage without fear of inconsistency or anticipated cavil.
'■ How gross ! " says the infidel, " this representation of God,
muffing up the odor of burning flesh ;" hut it is he who
" ennflfe" at God's holy altar (Mai. i. 13). It is he who is
' gross" in his profane mockery of a spiritualiiy which his
carnal earthliness utterly fells to comprehend. — T. L.l
baptism, of which the flood is a type.* Knobel layi
stress on the fact that it is said from ku youth up
not from his mother^s womb ; but the word evidently
* [There is no need here of labored attempts to remove
apparent inconsistencies. The most simple and direct inter-
pretation of Script lu'e is generally that which is moit con-
servative of its honor as well as of its trutbfulnese. The
passage seems to assign the same reason for sparing the
world that is given vi. 3, 6, for its dej^truction ; and in both
cases there, is used the same particle ^3 . Some would
render it although: "I Tt-ill not again smite, etc., aUh<ni§h
the imag narion of the heart of man is evil." Others, like
Jacobus, would cnnect it with the words ClXJl "Tizys
for mail's sake, intimating that it should never more be done
for this reason. Hut nothing of the kind helps the difficul-
ty, if there be any difficulty. There are but very few places
(if any) where "'S can be rendered although. The passages
cited by Noldius under this heatl in almost every case fail to
bear him out. Ir, is « pai-ticle denoting a 7-easouj and some-
times a motive, like the two senses of the Greek on and the
Latin quod, or the two English conjunctions because and
that. The idea presented by Lange gives the key. Sin is both
guil! and disease. Man's depravity, therefore, is the object
botli of veiigeaiicp and compassi&n, two states of feeling
which can exist, at the same time, perfect and unweak-.-ned,
only in Ibe divine mind, but which are necessarily present-
ed to us m a succession, produced by varying ciicumstances
on the finite or human side. It is in reference to the fonner
that the language is useil, Gen. vi. 5, 6, where ^3 denotes
the reason of the vengeance. Here, in like manner, it ex-
presses the reason of the mercy. Noah's otleriuL^ ha^i inade
thedifl'erence, not changinijGod, but placing man in adifl'er-
ent relation ro him -is viewed under a changed aspect. He
is the poor creature, as well as the guilty creature. He is
depraved from his youth, not meaning, we think, a less
severe description of his sinlulness. as Lange seems to inti-
mate, but giving a deeper view of ii, as a greater calamity
It is not the mere habit-hardening or world-liardening oi
manhijod aud old ;ige, as contrasted with the comparative
innocence of childhood ; but the seens of the evil lie deep,
away back in his very infancy. It i- the hereditary, or
disease, aspect that induces the language, which eeems like
regret on the part of Deity for an act so calamitous, though
so just auil necessary : "'neither will I again smite every
living tliinEC as I have done." It is as though h^s heart
smote him, to use a transplanted Hebraism elsewhere em-
ployed (jf man, or as it is said of David. 1 Sam. xxiv. 6. It
would not be a stronger expression, ■ r more anthropopathic,
than that used Gen. vi. 6, " and he was grieved at his hearts*
It is not, however, simply tiie idea of hopelessness in view
of man's incorrigibilitj-, but an expression of holy and in-
finite compassion, such ae the clcsest criticism will more
and inore discover as abounding in this old book of Genesis,
evi-n in the midst of the severL-st threatening of judement.
The greatness of man's sin reveals the grL-atness of the cd-
vine sorrow on account of it. The sinner, too, is allowed to
feel it, and make it a ground of his pleading for forgiveness;
as the Psalmist prays, Ps. xxv. 11 '■'pardon mine iniquity,
for (''Z) it is great.'^ In that pa'^sage, too, sotue would
render "^3 aUho^tgh, to the great marring of the fon-e and
pathos of the supplication. Christ did not die for small
siof', as Cranmer has well said.
It is a peculiarity of the Holy Scriptures thus to set forth
unshrinkingly the sharpi contrasts, as we may revere; tly call
them, in the dirine attributes. None but inspired wriiera
could venture to do this; and how boldly du they present
them! often, too. In closest connection without 6etrayii:g
any fear of cavil, or charge of inconsistency. Th'' tremen-
dous wrath, and the most melting mercy appear in the same
chapiers, and sometimes in immediately succeeding verses.
Among others compare Xahuni i. 1, 7. What a burning
stream of indignation fiud^ its closing cadence in the words
" Jehovah, he is good, a stronghold in the day of trouble, ht
knoweth them that put their tinist in him ." Such strong con-
trasts appear especially in portions of Soriptuic wdich the
careless reader passes over as inde'icate, like Ezek, xvi ,
that awful picture of impurity and utter depravity, as pre-
sented in the hi^itory of the meretricious and utterly aban-
doned woman who symbolized the Jewish and Israelitish
people, A too fastidious taste would forbid the reading of
that cbapter, at least in any public r-ligions service, bnt it
is this most revolting representation (as some would style it)
which is the very thing that makes the divine foraivenesi
[ and compassion at the close so full of a raeltinir tenderness,
! beyond what any other kind of language could express
I "Nevertheless I will renumber my coveTUinl with thee Ii
I the days cf thy youth, and I will establish wit! ihee (
326
GENESIS, OK THE FIRST BOOK OF MOOES.
mean* that just as soon as the heart comes to its
peculiar imagining, or the seusu:il imagining that is
Appropriate to it, then immediately appears, the in-
nate 6iufuhie<s.— Whilst the earth remaineth. —
" The tliree first pairs of woriis do not denote, as tlie
Jewish interpreters (see Raschi) explain it, six times
of the year reckoned by two months each (a division
found in the Vedas and the Avesta), but they di-
ride the year into two halves each, as the old Greeks
did into 'd^pus and xf 'mu*'' (in Hesiod it is ifj-Tiroi and
a(ioTos), namely the summer (including the autumn),
beginning with the early rising of the Pleiades, and
the winter (including the spring, see Job xxix. 4) be-
ginning with the early setting (Ideler, Chron. 1, p.
241)." Delitzsch. And yet the antitheses are not
tautological. Seed-time and harvest denote the year
according to its most obvious significance for man.
Cold and heat are according to the equilibrium of the
year, lying at the ground of seed-time and harvest,
and conditioned by the regular change of tempera-
ture. tSunuiuT and wi?tter present the constant ap-
pearance of this change, the order of which is imaged
in the small and ordinary changes of day and night
that belong to the general course of nature. Delitzsch
supposes that this new course of nature, consisting in
interchanges of temperature, is opposed to a " serene
or uninterrupted warmth that prevailed before the
flood." That the earth in the primitive period had
an even temperature may be regarded as very prob-
able ; but not that the flood, in this respect, made
any sudden turning point, although such an epoch in
the earth's life must, at the same time, denote the
beginning of a change. At all events, the new order
of nature is not denoted as a mere imperfect earth,
lor this purified earth will God never again cover
with a flood. Dehtzsch admirably remarks : "they
are (iod's thoughts of peace which he givi-s to Noah's
inner perception as an answer to his oflering ; as
even now every one who prays in faith gets from the
heart of God an inward perception that his prayer is
answered." The doubled form, rpS S3 , has as in
Ib. liv. 9, the power of an oath. As an estabhsh-
ment of the new order of nature, this promise cor-
responds to the creative words ch. i.
2. The blessing of God on the new humanity^ its
dominion, its freedom and its laws (ch. ix. 1-7).
The benediction of Noah and his sons, ver. 1, corre-
sponds to tlie blessing of Adam and Eve, i. 28. In
like mauuer, the grant of dominion over the animal
world corresponds to the appointment there ex-
pressed. The distinct license here given for the
slaying of the beasts corresponds to ch. i. 29, and
ch. ii. 111. The prohibition of eating blood corre-
sponds to the prohibition of the tree of knowledge.
Finally, the command against murder has relation,
without doul)t, to the nuirder committed by Cain
(ch. iv). Delitzsch • " After that the general rela-
tions of nature, in view of such a ruin as has hap-
pened in the flood, are made secure by promise, there
•re givi.ii to men new physical, ethical, and legal
emtTiant nj Mmtly. Then shalt thou remember thy wnys,
and be ii-hnmed, and thou shalt know thai I am 1 by Lord,
that thou raayoHt remember and he cotifounded, and novur
open Ih) mouth any more* tj«cause of thy shumc, when I am
pacified t"wnrd thee for all that tliou hast done, saitii
Adonai Elohim, thy Lord and thy God." Tlie Hohrew is,
i4t«rally, wlten I liave ma'l0 an atonement (T^p "^IBSS )
Njr thee, or a covring for thee. Ezek. xvi. I>8. It is in
.hese BtroHK contrasts,— in these apparent inconr-iHlencioH,
Ha some would ca I them,— that Ihe great power and pathos
Dftfae Scripture appear ~T. L.i
foundations." — And the fear , f you. — You- fear
as tlie effect, xniB . The exciting of fear an.; '"rvot
are to be the means of man's doiiiinion ov».i the ani
mals, Dehtzsch remarks: "It is. beeausi the ori-
ginal hai'mony that once existed between mai» and
nature has been taken away by the fall and its con-
sequences. According to the will of God, man ia
still the lord of nature, but of nature now as an
unwilling servant, to be lestrained by eflbi t, to be
subjugated by force." Not throUf^hout, however, is
nature thus antagonistic to man ; it is not the case
with a portion of the animal world, namely, the
domestic animals. It is true, there his come in a
breach of the original harmony, but it is not now for
the first time, ami the most pecuhar striving of the
creature is against its doom of perishability (Rom.
viii. 20). Moreover, it is certainly the case, that,
the influence of the /ear of man upon th'> animals is
fundamentally a normal paradisaical relaivu. But a
severer intensity of this is indicated b) the word
dread. Knobel explains it from the fact, that hence-
forth the animal is threatened in its life, and is now
exposed to be slain. Since the loss of the harmonic
relation between man and the animals (in which the
human majesty had a magical power over the beast),
the contrast between the tame and the wild, between
the friendly innocence and the hostile dread of the
wilder species, had increased more and more, unto
the time of the flood. Now is it formally and legally
presented in the language we are considering. Man
is henceforth legally authorized to exercise a forcible
dominion over the beasts, since he can no longer rule
them through the sympathy of a spiritual power.
Also the eating of flesh, which had doubtless existed
before, is now formally legalized : by which fact it is,
at the same time, commended. A limitation of the
pure kinds is not yet expressed. When, however,
there is added, by way of appendix, all that liveth
(that is, is alive), the dead carcase, or that which
hath died of itself, is excluded, and with it all that is
oB'ensive generally. There is, however, a distinct
restriction upon this flesh-eating, in the prohibition
ot the blood : But flesh with the life thereof. —
Delitzsch explains it as meaning, " that there was
forbidden the eating of the flesh when the animal
was yet alive, unslain, and whose blood had not been
poured out, — namely, pieces cut out, according to a
cruel custom of antiquity, and still existing in Abys-
synia. Accordingly there was forbidden, generally,
the eating of flesh in which the blood still remained,"
It is, however, more to the purpose to explain this
te.\t according to Lev. xvii. 11, 14, than by the sav-
age practices of a later barbarous heathenism, or by
Rabbinical tradition. " With its Ufe," therefore,
means with its soul, or animatmg principle, and this
is explained by its blood, accoidmg to the passage
cited (Deut xii. 23) ; since the blood is the basis, the
element of the nerve-lite, and in this sense, the souL
The blood is the fluid-nerve, the nerve is the con-
structed blood. The prohibition of blood-eating, the
first of the so-called Noachian commands (see below),
is, indeed, connected with the moral rerrobatiou of
cruelty to animals, as it may proceed to the mutila-
tion of the Uving ; it is, therefore, also connected with
the avoidance of raw flesh CH nua , or living flesh,
1 Sam. ii. 15. Knobel). "The blood is regarded as
the seat of the soul, or the Hie, and is even denoted
as 113BS, or the soul itself (Lev. i. 5), as the anima
purpurea of Virgil, yEn. ix. :i48; even as here iulci
ia explained by the apposition "ic" . But the lil'e be
UHAf. VUl. 20— IX. 1-17.
32^
longs to Gofi, the Lord of all life, and must, there-
fore, be brought to him, upon his altar (Deut. xii.
27), and not be consumed by man." Knobel. This
is, therefore, the second idea in the prohibition of
the blood. As life, must the life of the beast go
back to God its creator; or, as life in the victim
offered in sacritice, it must become a symbol that the
soul of njau belongs to God, though man may par-
take of the animal materi;ility, that is, the flesh.
Still stronger is the restriction that follows: And
■urely your blood of your lives. — "Tlie soul of
the beast, in the blood of the beast, is to be avoided,
and the soul of man, in the blood of man, is not to
be violated." Delitzsch. At the ground of this con-
trast, however, lies the more general one, that the
slaying of the beast is allowed whilst the slaying of
man is forbidden. — Will I require; that is, the
corresponding, proportionate expiation or punish-
ment « ill I impose upon the slayer. The expression
n3''ni.'S3i3, Knobel explains as meaning "for your
souU," for the best of your life (comp. Lev. xxvi. 45 ;
Deut. iv. 15 ; Job xiii. 7). According to Delitzsch
and Keil b expresses the regard had for the individ-
ual. And this appears to be near the truth. The
blood of man is individually reckoned and valued,
according to the individual souls. — At the hand of
every beast, — The more particular legal regulation
is found in Esod. xxi. 28. Here, then, is first given
a legal ground lor the pursuit and destruction of
human m'lrderous and hurtful beasts. Still tliere is
expressed, moreover, the slaying of the single beast
that hath killed a man. " In the enactments of So-
'on and Draco, and even in Plato, there is a similar
rovision." Delitzsch. — And at the hand of man.
*- ' nx B'^X, brother man, that is, kinsman; comp.
ch xiii. 5 ; so, "iliS IIJ^X , a priest-man, etc. By the
words Tins CJ^S is not to be understood the next
of kin to the murdered man, whose duty it was to
execute the blood-vengeance (Von Bohlen, Tuch,
Baumgarten), as the one from whom God reciuired the
blood that was shed, but the murderer Idmself In
order to indicate the unnaturalness of murder, and
its deep desert of penalty, God denotes him (the
murderer) as in a special sense the brother of the
murdered." Knobel. Besides this, moreover, there
is formed from ttJ'^X the expression everi/ man (De-
litzsch, Keil). Every man, brother man. — The life
of man. — JIan is emphasized. Therefore follows,
emphatically, the formula : Whosoever sheddeth
man's blood, and at the close again there is once
more yuan (Clxn) prominently presented. — By man
shall his blood be shed : " namely, by the next
of kin to the murdered, whose right and duty both
it was to pursue the murderer, and to slay him. He
is called C^n bxa, the deraander of the blood, or
the blood-avenger. The Hebrew law imposed the
Eenalty of death upon the homicide (Exod. xxi. 12;
lev. xxiv. 17), which the blood avenger carried
out (Nimib. XXXV. 19, 21); to him was the murderer
dcliTered up by the congregation to be put to death
(Deut. xix. 12). Among the old Hebrews, the blood-
Tengrance was the usual mode of punishing murder,
tnd was also practised by many other nations."
Dehtzsch and Keil dispute the relation of this pas-
dage to the blood-vengeance. It is not to be misap-
l-rehcnded, 1. that here, in a wider sense, humanity
itself, seeing it is always next of kin to the murdered,
is appointed to be the avenger; and 2. that the ap-
pointment extends beyond the blood-vengeance, arc
becomes the root of the magisterial right of punish-
ment. On the other hand, it caunot be denied tiial
in the patriarchal relations of the olden time it was a
fundamental principle that the ne.\i of kin were not
only ju.stified in the execution of the law of blood
but on account of the want of a legal tribunal, were
under obligation to perform the ollice. This primi-
tive, divinely-sanctioned custom, became, in its ideal
and theocratic direction, the law of punishment as
magisterially regulated in the Mosaic institutions
(but which still kept in mind the blood-vengeimce),
whereas, in the direction of crude heathenism, which
avenged the murder even upon the relations of tha
murderer, it became itself a murderous impulse.
Dehtzsch remarks, that God has now laid in the
hands of men the penal force that belonged to him
alone, because he has withdrawn his visible pres-
ence from the earth, — according to the view, before
cited, of his transfer of the divine throne to the
heavens. — For in the image of God made he
man. — This is the reason for the command against
murder. In man there is assailed the image of God,
the personality, that which constitutes the very aim
of his existence, although the image itself, as such,
is inviolable. In murder the crime is against the
spirit, in which the divine kinsmanship reveals itself,
and so is it a crime against the very appearing of
God in the world in its most universal form, or as a
prelude to that murder which was committed against
the perfect form of man (or image of God in man),
Zach. xii. 10; John ill. 10, 16). — But be ye fruit,
ful. — The contrast to the preceding. The value of
human life forbids its being wasted, and commands
its orderly increase. — Bring forth abundantly in
the earth — In the spreading of men over the earth,
and out of its supplies of food (by whicli, as it were,
the Ufe of the earth is transformed into the life of
man) are found the conditions for the multipUcation
of the human race. Thus regarded, there is only an
apparent tautology in the verse, not an actual one.
a. Vers. 8-17. The covenant of God with Xoali,
with his race, and with the whole earth, — To Noah
and to his sons with him Solemn covenanting
form. The sons are aildressed together with Xoah ;
for the covenant avails expressly for the whole hu-
man race. — And I, behold I establish, — The
words, and I, ( ^3X1 ) form a contrast to the claiD>a
of God on the new humanity as an introduction to
the promise. According to Knobel, God had es-
tablished no covenant with the antediluvians. Not,
indeed, in the literal expressions here employed ;
since it was after men had had the experience of a
destroying judgment. According to the same (Kno-
bel), the Jehovist, in ch. viii. 21 presented tha
matter in a way different from that of the Elohist
here. Clearly, however, does the offering of Noah
there mentioned, furnish the occasion for the entire
transaction that follows in this place. The making
of a covenant with Noah is already introduced, and
announced eh. vi. 13; it stands in a development
conditioned on the preservation of Noah's faith, just
as a similar development is still more evident in tha
life of Abraham (see Jas. ii. 20-23). Keil remaika
that " r-'na C^pn is not equivalent to P''-ia p-^S ,
that is, it does not denote the formal concluding, bu«
the establishing, confirming, of a covenant, — iu other
words, the realization of the covenanting promise "
(comp. Gen. xxii. with Gen. xvii. and xv.). Delitzsch •
" Tliere begins now the t ra of the divine avo o
328
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
(Rom. Ui. 26) of wliich Paul preached in Lystria
;Acts xiv. 15)." In its most special sense, this era
iie^jius with iJie origin of heatlienisni, that is, from
the Babylonian dispersion. With a right fulness is
the snimal world also mcluded in this covenant,
for it is e'oliistic, — universaUstic ; it keeps wholly
predominant the characteristic of compassion for the
creaturely life upon the earth, although man forms
it.s ethical middle point, with which the .inimal world
f.nd the kosmos are connected. The covenant with
the beasts subsists not for itself, and, in respect to its
nature, is only to be taken symbolically. — Shall
not be cut oflf any more. — This is the divine
covenant promise — ao new destruction, — no end of
the woild again produced by a flood. — My bow in
the cloud, it shall be for a token. — In every
divine covenant tliere is a divine sign of the cov-
enant ; in this covenant it is said : viji bow do 1 set.
According to Knobel the rainbow is called God's
^cw, because it belongs to the heaven, God's dwelling
place. It is a more correct interpretation to say, it
ie because God has made it to appear in the heaven,
as the sign of his covenant. According to the same,
the author of the account must have entertained the
supposition that there had never been a rainbow
before the time of the flood. Delitzsch is of the same
opinion.* It is, indeed, a phenomenon of refraction,
which may be supposed of a fall of water, and some-
times, also, of a dew-distilling mist. But the far
visible and overarching rainbow supposes the rain-
cloud as its natural conditioning cause. We have
already remarked that from the appointment of the
rainbow, as the sign of the covenant, it by no means
follows that it had not before existed as a phenome-
non of nature (ch. ii.). The starry night, too, is m^ide
the sign of a promise for Abraham (ch. xv.). Keil
is not willing to infer that hitherto it had not rained,
but only presents the conjecture that at an earlier
period the constitution of the atmosphere mav have
been dirtereut. — And I will look upon it that I
may remember. — An anthropomorphising form of
expression, but which like every other expression of
the kind, ever gives us the tenor of the divine
thought in a symbolical human form. Here it is the
expression of the self-obligating, or of the conscious
covenant truthfulness, as manifested in the constant
sign. "In his presence, too, have they power
uid most essential significance." (Von Gerlach).
[XOTK ON THE APPOIiNTMENT OF THE RaINBOW AS
THE 8iGN OF THE COVENANT. — 1» regard to this it
may be well to give the views of some of the older
Jewish commentators, if for no other purpose, to
ehow that what is really the most easy and the most
natural interpretation comes from no outside pri-s-
Bure of science, but is fairly deducible froni tlie very
letter of the passage. Thus reasons ilaimonides
respecting it : " For the words are in past time,
■'Brj T]'-"[5 nx , my bow have I set (or did set) in
the cloud, not, 1 am now setting^ or about to set,
whicli would be expressed by iriS '^rx , accoriling as
oe had said just before, "in: ■'3X irx pinan ,
the covenant wliich / am now establishing. More-
jver the fonn of the word ^Pttif? my bow, shows
that there was something to him so called from the
• ^ginning. And so the Scripture must be inteiiiiet-
• jThp opinion of Delitzsch Is not so broad as this. Ho
tie«m>^. mther, to hold that the rainbow existed in M:iturc
bc/vre the liood, but had not opptnrtdt ou account of the
• I'y'jnoc of tho conditioDi. 8co Dbli'izsch, p. 276.— T. L.J
cd : the bow which I put ( ^nrj ) in the cloud .'n th*
day of creation, shall be, from this day, and hencO'
fortli, for a sign of the covenant between me and you,
so that every time that it appears, I will look upon it
and remember my covenant ol peace. If it is a.sked
then, what is meant by the bow's being a sign, I answei
that it is like what is said Gen. xxxi. 48, in the eov
enant between Jacob and Liban, n? nin bjtl TMT^^
lo^ this heap is a witness^ etc., or Gen. xxxi. 62^
naSBil iTIS , and this pillar shall he a leitness, etc.
And so also Gen. xxi. 30, "'IJ^ npn mc"33 yzvi r» ,
seven iambs shall thou take from my hand, n"!;b
fur a witness. In like manner everything that ap-
pears as thus put before two, to cause them to re-
member something promised or covenanted, is called
nist . And so of the eircumeisiou ; God says, it
shall be a sign of the covenant, r^^a rixb , between
me and you. Tlius the bow that is now visible, and
the bow that was in nature (J'3::3 ) from the be-
giiming, or from of old ( cbisa ) are one in this, that
the sign which is in them is one." He then proceeds
to say that there are other and mystic interpreta-
tions made by some of the Rabbins, but this great
critic is satisfied with the one that he has given.
Aben Ezra says that the most celebrati'd of the
Jewish Rabbins held the same opinion as Maimonides,
namely, that the rainbow was in nature from the be-
ginning, though he himself seems to dissent.
" And I will look upon it to remember the
ciis ^'^13 , the covenant of eternity." Let us not
be tioubled about the anthropopathism, but receive
the precious thought in all its inexpressible tender-
ness. Lange most beautifully characterizes such
mutual remembrance as eye meeting eye. We all
know that (ioil's memory takes in the total universe
of space at every ujonient of time: but there are
some tilings which lie remembers as standing out
from the great totality. He remembers tlie act of
faith, and the sign of faith, as he remembers no
other human act, no other finite phenomenon. May
we not believe that there is the same mutual re-
membrance in the Eucliarist*:' The ^^ remember ine^^
implies " I will remember thee." The eye of the
Redeemer looking mto the eye of tlie believer, or
both meeting in the same memorial : this is certainly
a " real presence," whatever else there may be of
depth and mystery in that most fundamental Chris-
tian rite — the evangelical cbiv IT^na PiS , or sign
of the everlasting covenant.
The Hebrew mx is not used of miraculous signs,
properly, given as proofs of mission or doctrine. It
is not a counteractian of natural law, or the bringing
a new thing into nature. Any fixed object may be
used for a sign, and here the very coveiuint itself, oi
a most important part of it, being the stability of
nature, there is a most striking consistency in the
fact tluit the sii/H of such covenant is taken from na-
ture itself The rainbow, ever ajipearing in the
" sunshine after rain," is the very symbol of constant
ft/. It is selected from all others, not only for its
splendor and beauty, but for the ref/ularity with
which it clieers us, when we look out lor it after the
storm. Noah needed no witness of the supernatural
The great in nature, in that early age when all wa»
wonderful, was regarded as manii'esting (lod etiualli
with the supernatural. Besides, in the flood itself
there was a sufficient witness to the extraordinary
CHAP. VIII. 20— IX. 1-17.
32'.«
There was wanted, then, not a miracle strictly as an
attestation of a message, or as a sign of belief, like
the miracles in the New Testament (when there was
a necessity for breaking up the lethargy of natural-
ism), but a vivid memorial for the conservation
rather than thi> creation of faith. The Hebrew word
for miracle is more properly xis , though it may be
ased simply for prodigy^ Uke the Greek rfpa?, in dis-
tinction from the New Testament anut'tov, which is
properly & proof or attestation of a miraculous kind.
Tffjos simply means anything wonderful, whether in
nature or not. Superstition converts such appear-
ances into portents, or signs of something impending,
but in the Bible God's people are expressly told
" not to be dismayed at the signs of the heaven.-; as
the heathen are." Jer. x. 1. The word there used
is this same ninix in the plural, but accommodated
to the heathen peivcisioii. To the believing Israelites
the signs of the heavens, even though strange and
unusual, were to be regarded as tokens of their cove-
nant God above nature yet ruling in nature, and ever
regulating the order of its phenomena. There is a
passage sometimes quoted from Homkr, 11. xi. 27, 28 :
'lpi(Tut.v eoiKOTes o(TT€ Kpoviiiiv
'Ef vitrei CTTjjpife TEPA2 fj.ep6nuitf ayBpioiTtoy.
" Like the rainbows which Zeus fixed in the cloud a
sign to men of many tongues." But repas there has
the sense of prodigy, or it may denote a wonderful
and beautiful object. We cannot, theietbre, certainly
infer from this any traditional recognition of tlie
great sign-appointing in Genesis. So Plato quotes
from Hesiod the genealogy of Iris (the rainbow), as
the daughter of ©aunt's or Wonder, as a sort of
poetical argument that Wonder is the parent of
philosophy, as though the rainbow were placed in the
heavens to stimulate men in the pursuit of curious
knowledge. But it is the religious use that is prom-
inent in this as in all the Bible appeals to the obser-
vation of nature. It is for the support of faith in the
God of nature, " that we may look upon it and
remember ; " and this is admirably expressed in a
Rabbinical doxology to be found in the Talmudic
Kidduscliin, fol. 8, and which was to be recited at
every apjiearance of the rainbow, n;n^ nnx "'■"'3
ir 'S-iribx, "Blessed be thou Jehovah our God,
King of eternity (or of the world), ever mindful of
thy covenant, faithful in thy covenant, firm in thy
word," comp. Ps. cxix. 89, Forever, 0 Lord, thy
word is settled in lieaven. The Targum of Oiikelos
translates Gen. ix. 13: "And it shall be a sign, "|^a
sols 1^-1 ■'"ilS^O, between myMorrf and the earth."
It is not unreasonable to suppose some reference
to this place in that difficult passage Hab. iii. 9,
TjntlJp TiSP f^^^S , most obscurely rendered in our
English version, " thy bow was made quite naked —
the oaths of the tribes — the word." Kimchi trans-
lates it revealed, made manifest. It is commonly
thought that all that is said in that sublime chapter
has reference to events that took place during the
exodus, but there is good ground for giving it a wider
ange, so as to take in other divine wonders, in crea-
aon and in the patriarchal history. — T. L.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAD.
1. There are the most distinct indications that
the flood, as the greatest epoch of the primitive time,
made a turning point, not only in the spiritual life
of humanity, but also in its physical relations, — yea
in the very life of the earth itself Only we may nol\
in the first place, regard this turning point as s
sudden change of all relations ; just as little aa the
fall ((Jen. iii.) suddenly brought in death, or as ths
cimfiision of tongues produced immetliately the
wide-spread diversities of language. And, in tha
second place, ag;un, it must not be regarded as (
change of all relations for the worse. There is an^
posed to liave been a change of the atmosphere (con-
cerning the lain and the rainbow, see above). At all
events, the paradisaical harmony of the earth had
departed at an earlier day. But, on the other hand,
there comes in now a more constant order of the
atmospherical relations (ch. viii. 22). Again, some
have called it a sudden change in the duration of
human life. But to this is opposed the fact that the
aged Noah lived 350 years after the flood. It ii
evident, however, that during the period of Noah's
life the breaking through of death from the inner to
the outer life had made a great advance. And to
this the fear which the flood brought upon tho
children and grandchildren of Noah (not upon him-
self) may have well contributed. As far as relates to
the increasing ferocity of the wild beasts towards
men, the ground of their greater estrangement und
savageness caimot be found in their deliverance in
the ark. .Already had the mysterious paradisaical
peace between man and beast departed with the
fall. Moreover, the words : "all flesh had corrupted
its way," (ch. vi. 12) indicate that together with
raeti's increasing wickedness the animal world had
grown more ferocious. But if the mode of life as
developed among men made the eating of flesh (and
drinking of wine) a greater necessity for them than
before, then along with the sanctioning of this new
order of life, must there have been sanctioned also
the chase. And so out of this there must have arisen
a state of war between man and the animal world,
wluch would have for its consequence an increased
measure of customary fear among the animals that
were pecuUarly exposed to it.
2. Immediately after the flood, Noah built an
altar to Jehovah, his covenant God, who hud saved
him. The living worship [cultns) was his first
work, the culture of the vineyard was liis second.
The altar, in like manner, was the sign of the ances-
tral faith, as it had come down from paradise and
had been transmitted through the ark. This faith
was the seed-corn as well as sign of the future
theocracy and the future church. It was an altar
of faith, an altar of prayer, an altar of thanks-
giving, for it was erected to Jehovah. But it was
also an altar of confession, an acknowledgment that
sin had not died in the flood, that Noah and his
liouse was yet sinful and needed the symbolic sancti-
fication. In this case, too, was the offering of an
animal itself an expression of the greater alacrity in
the sacrifice since Noah had preserved only a few
specimens of the clean animals. This readmess in
the offering was in that case an expression of his
faith in salvation, wherein, along with his prayer for
grace and compassion, there was inlaid a supplication
for his house, for the new humanity, for the new
world. His offering was a burnt-oliering, a whole
burnt-offering (Kalil) or an ascending in the flame
(Olah), as an expression that he, Noah, did thereby
devote himself with his whole house, his whole race,
and with the whole new earth, to the service of God.
The single kinds of offering were all included in tliia
central offering. It was this sense of his ofl'erinj
330
GENESIS OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
which made the strong burnt odor of the burning
flesh, - ''sweet savor" for Jehovah in a nieta-
phoricd^ sense. The attestation of Jehovah mal<e3 it
evident in what sense Noah offered it. It expresses
1. an averting of the curse from the ground, 2. the
fact tliat the liereditary sinfulness of man was to be
an object of the divine compassion. The sinful ten-
deni'V in its connection with the act of sin is guilt,
but in its connection with the need of salvation and
aalvaiion itself, it is an evil, the sorest of diseases and
suffering (see above) ; 3. the promise that Jehovah
woiUd not again destroy every living thing; 4. the
establishment of a constant order of nature ; such as
the prosperity of the new human race demanded.
On this promise of sparing compassion for sinful
men, and which God as Jehovah pronounces, there
is grounded the renewed relation into which, as
Elohim, he enters with all himianity, and the creature
world connected with it. This relation is denoted by
grants made by God to man, and demands which he
makes of man, whereupon follows the establishment
of the Elohistic covenant with Noah and all living.
The Grants of God : 1. the repetition of the blessing
upon Noah and upon all his house, as before upon
the animals ; 2. the renewed grant of dominion over
the beasts ; the sanction given to the eating of flesh.
In conti.>st with these grants that guarantee the
existence and well-being of the human race, stand
the demands or claims made in respect to human
conduct. The first is the avoidance of the eating
of fle.sh with the blood, whereby there is together
establislied the sanctification of the enjoyment, the
avoidance of savageness as against nature, and of
cruelly as against the beast. The second not only
forbids the shedding of human blood, but commands
also the punishment of murder ; it ordains the ma-
gistracy with the sword of retribution. But it ex-
presses, at the same time, that the humane civil
organization of men must have a moral basis, namely
the acknowledgment tliat all men are brothers
(vns II) ^S every man, his brother man), and with
this again, a religious basis, or the faith in a person-
al God, and that inviolability of the human person-
ality wliich rests in its imaged kinsmanship with
God. On this follows the establishment of the cov-
enant. Still it is irot made altogether dependent on
the estJiblishmeni of the preceding claims. It is a
covenant of oromise for the sparing of all living that
reaches beyond this, because it is made not for in-
dividuals but for all, not merely for the morally ac-
countable but for infants, not merely foi men but
also for the animal world. Notwithstanding, how-
ever, this transcending universality of the divine
covenant, it is, in truth, made on the supposition
th:it faith in the grace and compassion of Jehovah,
jiiety in respect to the blessing, the name and the
image of Eiohini, shall correspond to the divine
faithfulness, and that men shall find consolation and
composure in the sign of the rainbow, only in as far
as tliey preserve faiili in (iod's word of promise.
3. In the preceding Section we must distinguish
biitween what God says in his heart, and what Klo-
bim says to Noah and his sons. The first word,
which doubtless was primarily comprehensible to
>foah only, is the foundation of the second. For
God's grace is the central source of his goodness to
a sinful world, an on the side of men the believing
»re the central ground for the preservation of the
world, as they point to Christ the absolute centre,
Ae world's redeemer having, however, bis preserv-
ing life in those who are his own, as Ins word testi
fies: Ye are the salt of the earth. We must, thea
again distinguish between the word of blessing,
which embraced Noah and his sons, and with them
humanity in general, and the word of the coTe^jct
which embraced all living (ch. ii. 10).
4. The institutions of the new humanity: 1. A\
the head stands the altai witti its bumt-oiferuig aa
the middle point and commencing point of every
offering, an expression of feeling that the life which
God gave, which he graciously spares, which he
wonderfully preserves, shall be consecrated to him,
and consumed in iiis service. 2. The order of na-
ture, and, what is very remarkable, as the ordinance
of Jehovah, made dependent on the foregoing order
of his kingdom of grace. 3. The institution of the
marriage blessing, of the consecration of marriage, of
the family, of the dispersion of men. 4. The domin.
ion of man over the animal world, as it embraces the
keeping of cattle, the chase, manifold use of the
beasts. 5. The holding as sacred the blood — the
blood of the animal for the altar of God, the blood
of man for the priestly service of God ; the institu-
tion of the htmianitat,* of the humane culture and
order, especially of the magistracy, of the penal and
judicial office (including personal self-defence and
defensive war), ti. The grounding of this humaiitat
on the rehgious acknowledgment of the .spii tual
personality, of the relation of kinsman tliat man
bears to God, of the fratern;il relation of men to «ach
other, and, consequently, the grounding of the ftate
on the basis of religion. 7. The appointment of the
humanization of the earth (ver. 7) in the comnand
to men to multiply on the earth — properly, upon it,
and by means of it. As men must become divine
through the image of God, so the earth must be
humanized. 8. The appointment of the covenant
of forbearance, which together with the secui ity of
the creature-world against a second physical flood,
expresses also the security of the moral world against
perishing in a deluge of anarchy, or in the floods of
popular commotion (I's. xciii). 9. The appointment
of the sign of the covenant, or of the rainliovv as God's
bow of peace, whereby there is at the same time ex-
pressed, in the first place, the elevation of men above
the deification of the creature (since the rainbow is not
a divinity, but a sign of God, an appointment which
even the idolatrous nations ajipiar not to have wholly
forgotten, when they denote it God's bridgi', or God's
messenger); in the second place, their intioductiou
to the symbolic comprehension and interpretation of
natural plienomeua, even to the symbolizing of forms
and colors ; thirdly, that God's compassion remembers
men in their dangers, as indicated by the fact, that in
the sign of the rainbow hiseye n.cts tlicireye; fourth-
ly the setting up a sign of light and lire, which, along
with its assurance that the earth will never again be
drowned in water, indicates at the same time its future
transformation and glorification! through light and fire,
6. In the rainbow covenant all men, in their deal-
ings with each otlier, and, at the same time, with all
animals, have a conimon interest, namely, iti the
preservation of life, a common promise, or the a.ssutt
ance of the divine care for life, and a common luty
in the sparing of life.
fi. The offering as acceptable to God, ind its
prophetic significance.
♦ [Our word fiumanity will not dc here at all ; as it cone*
Bpontls to the Uemian itunsclilte.il ; whilst our huniHnitari-
anism, on account of its abuse, w>J.l be etill warte. It it
defined by what follows.— T. L.]
CHAP. VIII. 20— IX. 1-17.
3»
7. The disputes concerning original sin have
variously originated from not distinguishing its two
opposing relations. These are, its relation to actual
sin, Rom. v. 12, and to the desire for deliverance,
Horn. vii. 23-25.
8. The magical or direct power of man over the
beasts is not laken away, hut flawed, and thereupon
repaired through his mediate power, derived from
that superiority which he exercises as huntsman,
fisher, fowler, etc. In regard to the first, compare
Lange's "Miscelhuieous Writings," vol. iv. p. 189.
9. The ordinance of the punishment of death for
aurder, involves, at the same time, the ordinance of
the magistracy, of the judicial senteiice, and of the
penal infliction. But in the historical development
of humanity, the death-penalty has been executed
with fearful excess and I'alse application (for exam-
ple, to the crime of theft); since in this way, gener-
ally, all humane savageness and cruelty has mingled
in the punitive office. From this is explained the
prejudice of the modern humanitarianism against
capital punishment. It is analogous to the prejudice
against the excommunication, and similar institutes,
which human ignorance and furious human zeal have
80 fearfully abused. Yet still, a divine ordinance
may not be set aside by our prejudices. It needs
oidy to be rightly understood according to its own
•limitation and idea. The fundamental principle for
all time is this, that the murderer, through his own
act and deed, has forfeited his right in human soci-
ety, and incurred the doom of death. In Cain this
principle was first realized, in tliat, by the curse of
God, he was excommunicated, and driven, in self-
banishment, to the land of Nod. This is a proof,
that in the Christian humanitarian development, the
principle may be reaUzcd in another form than
through the Uteral, corporeal shedding of blood (see
Lange's treatise Gesttzliche Kirche als Sinnhild, p.
72'). It must not, indeed, he overlooked, that the
mention is not merely of putting to death, but also
of blood-shedding, and that the latter is a terrific
mode ot speech, whose warnings the popular life
widely needed, and, in many respects, still needs.
Luther : " There is the first command for the em-
ployment of the secular sword. In the words there
is appointed the secular magistracy, and the right as
derived from God, which puts the sword in its
hands." Every act of murder, according to the
Noachian law, appears as a fratricide, and, at the
same time as malice against God,
10. To this passage: "for in the image of God
made he man," as also to the passage, James iii. 9,
has the appeal been made, to show that even after
the fall there ia no mention of any loss of the divine
image, but only of a darkening and disorder of the
same. Others, again, have cited the apparently op-
posing language, Coloss. iii. lU, and similar passages.
But in this there has not always been kept in mind
the distinction of the older dogmatics between the
conception of the image in its wider sense (the spirit-
u;tl nature of man) and the more restricted sense
(the spiritual constitution of man). In like manner
el.ould there be made a fiirther distinction between
^^e di^^position of Adam as conformed to the image
(m^de in, or after the image) and the image itself as
freely developed in Christ (the express image, Heb.
xiii ), as also finally between the natural man consid-
ered in the abstract, in the consequences of his fall,
and the natural man in the concrete, as he appears in
the operation of the gratia prcevetiiens. This perfect
developed image A(fam could not have lost, for he
had not attained to it. Neither can men lose th<
ontological image as grounded in the spiritual na-
ture, because it constitutes its being ; but it maj
darken and distort it. Tlic image of God, however
in the ethical sense, the divine mind {<ppi>i'riua ir«u-
wuTos), tliis he actually lo.st to the point where tha
ffratia pniveniens laid hold on him, and made a poini
of opposition between his gradual restoratija and
the fall in ahstracto. But to what degree this image
of God in fallen man had liecome lost, is shown in
this very law against muider, which expresses the
inalienable, personal worth, tliat is, the worth that
consists in the image as still belonging to man, and
thus, in contrast with grace, nmst man become con-
scious of the full consequences of his sinful corrup-
tion according to the word : what would I have been
without thee 'i what would I become without thee ?
11. With this chapter has the K'lbbinical tradi-
tion coimected their doctrine of the seven Noachio
precepts. (Buxtorf ; Lexicon Talmudicum, article,
Ger, 15). They are: 1. De judiciis; 2. de benedic-
tions Dei ; 3. de idolairia fugienda ; 4. de scorta-
tione ; 5. de effusione sanguinis; 6. de rapina ,
7. de meinbrn de animali vivo sc. non tollendo. The
earUer supposition, that the Apostolical decree (Acta
XV.) had relation to this, and that, accordingly, in its
appointments, it denominated the heathen Christian*"
as proselytes of the gate (on whom the so-called
Noachian laws were imposed) is disputed by Meyer,
in his "Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles"
(p. 278), though not on satisfactory grounds. The
matter of chief interest is the recognition, that in the
Israelitish consciousness there was a clear distinction
between revealed patriarchal precepts and the Mo-
saic law. Sucli a distinction is also expressed by
Christ, John viL 22, 2;-;. So, too, did the Levitical
law make a distinction between such precepts a3
were binding upon aliens (proselytes of tlie g^te; and
such as were binding upon the Jews (Lev. xvii. 14 ;
see Bibctwerk; Acts of the Apostles, p. 215). It lies
in the very nature of the case, that in Acts xv. the
seventh precept of the tradition, according to its
wider appomtment, was divided into two (namely,
abstinence from blood and from thinis strangled),
and that, moreover, only those points came into the
general view, in respect to which heathen Christians,
as freer Christians, might be liable to fail. It was,
in fact, a monotheistic pat.iarchal custom, which, aa
the expression of the patriarchal piety and humane-
ness, became the basis of the Mosaic law, and on
this basis must the heathen Christians have come
together in ethical association, if, in their freedom
from the dogmas of the Mosaic law, they would not
endanger even the cburchly and social communion
of the Jewish Christians (see Lange : Oeschichte de»
Apostolischen Zeitalters, li. p. 187). The prohibition
of blood-eating has here no longer any dogmatic sig-
nificance, but only an ethical. The Greek Church
mistook this in its maintenance of the prohibition
(TruUanic Council, 692), whereas, the Western
C'hurch, in the changed relations, let the temporary
appointment become obsolete.
12. On the symbolical significance of the rain
oow, see Delitzsch, p. 277, and Lange's " Miscella
neous Writings," i. p. 277, from which Delitzsch
gives the following passage : " The rainbow is the
colored glance of the sun as it breaks forth from the
night of clouds ; it is its triumph over the floods — a
solar beam, a glance of light burnt into the rain-cloud
in sign of its submission, in sign of the protection of
all living through the might of the sun, or rather the
332
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
compassion of God." To this adds Delitzsch : " As
it lights up tlie dark ground that just before was dis-
charging itself in flashes of lightning, it gives us an
iiiea of the victory of God's love over the black and
fiery wrath ; origiiuiting a.s it does from the effects
of the sun upon the sable vault, it represents to the
feenses the readiness of the heavenly light to pene-
trate the earthly obscurity ; spanned between heaven
ted earth, it announces peace between God and man ;
arching the horizon, it proclaims the all-embracing
universality of the covenant of grace." He tlien
(rites some of the mythical designations of the rain-
bow. It is called by the Hindoos, the weapon of
Indras; by the Greeks, Iris, the messenger of the
gods ; by the Germans, Bifrost (livinri uat/), and
Aeen-briicke, ''^bridge of Asen ;'''' by the Samoeids,
the seam or " border of God's robe." Tiiere are, be-
sides, many significant popular savings connected
with its appearance. Knobel : " The old Hebrews
looked upon it as a great band joining heaven and
earth, and biiidingthem both together; as the Greek
(pis comes from ttfu!, to tie or bind,* they made it,
therefore, the sign of a covenant, or of a relation of
peace between God in heaven, and the ereatures upon
the earth. In a similar manner the heavenly ladder.
Gen. xxviii. 12." On this, nevertheless, it must oe
remarked, that the Hebrews were conscious of the
symbolic sense of the designation ; not so, however,
the Greeks, who were taken with the fable merely.
In like manner, too, did the Hebrew view rest upon
a divine revelation. How tar the mere human inter-
pretation may be wide of the truth, is shown by the
fact, that classical antiquity regarded the rainbow as
for the most part announcing " rain, the wintry
storm, and war."
[XOTE ON THE ANCIENT, THE UNIVERSAL, AND
THE Unchanging Law of Homicide. — The divine
statute, recorded ch. ix. B, is commonly assailed on
grounds that are no less an abuse of language, than
they are a perversion of reason and Scripture The
taking the hfe of the murderer is called revenge — no
distinction being made between this word, which
ever denotes something angry and personal, and
vengeaiice, which is the requital of justice, holy, in-
visible, and free from passion. On this false ground
there is an attempt to set the Old Testament in oppo-
sition to the New, notwithstanding the express words
of Christ to the contrary. This perverse misnomer,
and the argument grounded upon it, apply equally to
all punishment, strictly such — to all retributive jus-
tice, or to any assertion of law that is not resolvable
into the merest expediency, excluding altogether the
idea of desert, and reducing the notion of crime sim-
ply to that of mischief, or inconvenience. It thus
becomes itself revenge in the lowest and most per-
sonal sense ol the term. Discarding the higher or
abstract justice, giving it no place in human law,
severing the earthly government wholly from the
divine, the proceeding called punishment, or justice,
is nothing more nor less than the setting the mere
personal convenience of the majority, called society,
against that of the smaller numbers whom such soci-
ety calls criminals. This has all the personality of
revenge, whether with piission, or without ; whereas,
•he ibstract justice, with its moral ground, and ita
dft of intrinsic desert, alone eseajies the charge.
Intimately connected with this is the question re-
sjiecting the true idea and sanction of human gov-
♦ [Plato, ill the CratyluM, fanciftllly coniie<jtp it with
ilpu, «Ipo/jtcu = ^nifu, to tpeak, and civca it the idea of mtBien-
ftr (Hennesl, or inUrpretation, — T. L.]
ernment, — whether it truly has a moral ground, o:
whether it is nothing higher than human wills, and
human convenience, by whatever low and ever falUng
standard it may be estimated. If the murderer i^
punished with death simply because he deserves it,
because God has commanded it, and the magistrate
and the executioner are but carrying out that com-
mand, then all the opposite reasoning adverted to
falls immediately to the ground. It has neither
force nor relevancy.
The same, too, may be said in respect to much
of the reasoning in favor of capital punishment, so
far as it is grounded on mere expediency, and is not
used as a collateral aid to that higher principle by
which alone even a true expediency can be sustained.
Should it even be conceded that this higher princi-
ple is, in itself, and for its own sake, above the range
of human government, still must it be acknowledged
in jurisprudence ns something necessary to hold up
that lower department of power and motive which is
universally admitted to fill within it. Reformation
and prevention will never be eft'ected under a judi-
cial system which studiously, and even hostilely (for
there can be no neutrality here) shuts out all moral
ideas. There may be a seeming reform in such
case ; but it has no ground in the conscience, be-
cause it is accompanied by no conviction of desert,
to which such influences must be wholly alien. The •
d'terring power, on the other hand, must constantly
lose its vigor, as the terror of the invisible justice
fades away in the ignoring of the law, and there takes
its place in the community that idea of punishment
which is but the warring of opposite conveniences,
and the colhsion of stronger with weaker human wills.
Men are not merely permitted to take the lite of
the murderer, if the good of society require it, but
they are commanded to do so unconditionally. In
no other way can the comnmnity itself escape the
awful responsibility. Blood rests upon it. Impunity
makes the whole land guilty. A voice cries to hea-
ven. Murder unavenged is a pollution. Numb. xxxv.
33; Ps. cvi. 38; Mic. iv. 11. Such is the strong
language of the Scripture as we find it in Genesis, in
the statute of the Pentateuch — which is only a par-
ticular application of the general law— and in the
Prophets. Such, too, is the expression of all anti-
quity— so strong and clear that we can only regard
it as an echo of this still more ancient voice — the
Tpiyfpaiv wi'Soi, as .(Eschylus styles it in a passage
before referred to, Note, p. 257. The Greek dra-
matic poetry, like the Scriptures, presents it as the
crime inexpiable, for which no lesser satisfaction was
to be received : " Moreover ye shall take no satisfac-
tion for the life of the murderer, who is guilty of
death." Numb. xxxv. 31.
Ta iTo-vra yap Tic efcxe'aj av9' ac/iaTos
I.nvish M wealth for blood, for one man's blood--
*Ti8 all in vain. JEsca., Choifplt. 518
And this gives the answer to another false ai^u
ment : It was only a law for the Jews, it is said
The first refutation is found in this passage, which in
certainly universal, if anything can be called such.
It was just after that miist fearful judgment which
had been brought upon the earth by lust and mur
dor. It is not a prediction, but a solemn statute
made for all, and to all, who then constituted the
human race. It lias the strongest aspect of univer-
sality. The reason for it, namely, the as-.niling th<
image of God, not only embraces all earth. y liuiiiiiu
CHAP. VUI. 20— nC 1-17.
3:«
Ity. but carries uji into the spiritual and supernatural
woild. The particular law afterwards made for the
Jews refers back to this universality in that repeated
declaration which makes it to differ from all other
Jewish laws that do not contain it ; " Tliis shall be a
statute to you in all your jjlaces, in all generations."
The language is universal, the reason is universal,
the consequences of impunity are universal.
Such, too, was the sentiment of all antiquity, a
thing we are not to despise in endeavoring to ascer-
tain what is fundamental in the ideas of ethics and
jurisprudence. The law for the capital punishment
of homicide was everywhere. The very superstitions
connected with it, as shown in tlie expiatorv cere-
motnes, are evidence of the deep sense of the human
mind, that this crime, above all others, must have its
adequate atonement ; and that this could only be,
life for life, blood for blood —
tfiovot t^OfOlf; aiToOfxci'Ot.
Even in the case of accidental homicide, an expia-
tory cleansing was demanded. These ideas appear
sometimes in harsh and revolting forms. The lan-
guage is occasionally terriGc, especially as it appears
in the ancient tragedy; but all this only shows the
strength and universality of the feeling, together
with the innate sense of justice on which it was
grounded. ,\ri:;totIe reckons the punishment of
murder by death among the v6iitua fi7pairTa, the
universal " unwritten laws," as they are styled by
Sophocles in the Antigone, 454, although, in the lat-
ter passage, the reference is to the rights of burial,
and the sacredness of the human body — ideas closely
connected with the primitive law against murder as
a violation of the divine image in humanity. All of
this class of ordinances are spoken of as very an-
cient. No man knew from whence they came, nor
when they had their origin.
ov yap Ti vvv ye ieaj(0e's, aAA' aei ttot€
^1} TouTa, KOuSei? ol5ev e( orov 'ipairq.
Not now, nor yesterday, but evermore
Live these; no memoi^' tracks tlieir birth.
To the same effect does the philosopher quote the
lines of Empedocles, irepi tov flh Kr^ivnv -rh eu^i/v, ov,
"on the crime of taking life," or slayinir that which
has soul in it, — very much in the language of the
Hebrew phrase -Si 3^W . Xumb. xxxi. 19. .For
this, he say.s — namely, the punishment of homicide
by death — is not the law in one place, and not in
another,
aXXa To fiev ITaVTtov v6i±tfiov.
See Aristotle's Rhetorka, Hb. i. eh. xiii. Gonip. also
Sophocles: Ajaz, 1343, and the Oidipus Tnrnn. 867.
The " blood revenge," or rather, '• the blood
Vengeance," as it should be called. Die Blutrache,
nas an odious sound, because pains have been taken
to connect with it odious associations, but it is only
a mode of denoting this strong innate idea of justice
demanding retribution in language corresponding to
the horror of the crime, — the enormity of which,
nccording to the Scripture, is not simply that it is
productive of inconvenience — pain and deprivation
t,o the individual and loss to society — but that it is
aseailn.g the image of God, the distinguishing essence
of humanity. So that it seems to justify the Rab-
bins in what might otherwise appear an extravagant
saying, namely, that " he who slays one man inten-
tionally is as though he had slain all men." He has
tssailed humanity ; as far as lies in his power, he has
aimed at the destruction of the human race. Thl
same thought, Koran, v. 3.5.
The crime of murder must be punished, the Und
must be cleansed ; and so before organized human
government had, or could have had existence, to a
sufficient extent for prompt and methodical judicial
processes, it was not merely permitted, but enjoined
upon, those nearest the tran.saction, to execute the
divine sentence. Those who were disobedient to this
command were themselves stained with blood, ot
as long as it was unexecuted. Hence the phrase
-■nn bsi;, which becomes the general name for
the pnrsuer or prosecutor ; whence it has passed
into the law language of almost all criminal codes.
He is also called the Redeemer or rexcuer. In thia
sense it is transferred to the Great Redeemer, our
next of kin, the avenger of the spiritual murder of
our race, as against the great demonic homicide wh,
is called av^ounroHrnvos air* ap^iis — "a manslaye*
from the beginning," John viii. 44 ; compare alsC
Job xix. 25. From the ciiminal side of justice, w«
may say, this term, by a very natural transition of
ideas, is carried to the civil, and so the Goel, or
Redeemer, is also the next of kin who buys back the
lost inheritance.
Sometimes tlie objection to capital punisliment
assumes a pious tone, and quotes the Scriptural
declaration : " Vengeance is mine." See, however,
the true interpretation of this phrase, as given by
the Apostle himself, Rom. xii. 19, and in what imme-
diately follows in ch. xiii., about the magistracy as
ordained of God. It is God's justice, not merely
delegated to, hut imposed upon, human society, thus
making it the very antithesis of that revenr/e with
which it is so sophistioally confounded. The odioui
term, it may be repeated, is far more applicable to
that doctrine of expediency which, in discarding the
idea of desert, has nothing deeper or firmer to build
upon than the shifting notions of human conven-
ience, and the antagonism of human wills. There is
undoubtedly given to men great freedom in determ-
ining the details of jurisprudence, and in fixing the
gradations of punishment. Here, to a certain ex-
tent, expediency may come in as a modifying influ-
ence, harmonizing with the higher moral principle
which cannot be kept out of law without destroying
all its healthy, conserving power. But some things
are fundamental; and they caimot be changed with-
out weakening all the sanctions of human govern-
ment. Among these is the punishment due to the
crime of blood-shedding, (rod has fixed it. The
State, indeed, may disobey; it may contenm other
social ordinances having a like divine institution ;
but in so doing it discards its own highest idea, and
rejects the only foundation on which it can perma-
nently rest. It builds alone on human wills, and
that is building on the sand.
The reason here given ; " for in the image of God
made he man," seems to have an intensity of mean-
ing which forbids its being confined to the spiritual
or immaterial. It penetrates even the corporeal or
organic nature, as Lange appears to intimate. There
is a sense in which it may he said to inhere even in
the body, and, through it, to be directly assailable.
The human body itself is holy, as the residence of
the Spirit, as the temple in which this divine image
is enshrined, and through which it is reflected. Com-
pare the vahs @iov, 1 Cor. iii. 16. Something like
this seems to be implied in the strange expres'
sion TE: ;"'n. as it occurs. Numb. xxxi. 19, and
SM
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOE OF MOSES.
which is identical with the ancient Arabian phrase
. iffi q i' JkXJ' , as found in the Koran. See Surat.
T. 35, (j**ij -AJLJ (j*»iJ JjCi' |j-« , " he who
slays a soul except for a soul," that is, unless in
retribution for a soul. This is the literal sense,
Btrange as it may sound ; but -b: may be taken
here in the general sense of person, as \tiv\Ti is used
in several passages of the New Testament — the soul
put for the whole personality. Or there may he the
ellipsis of some such word as ^^5*1 ^^^ tabernacle
of the soul, an assault upon which is an assault upon
the soul itself; and this may also be the explanation
of the Hebrew phrase CE3 nss, he who smiteth a
Boul. Compare Gen. xxxvii. 21, CBS 133; N'.
" let us not smite him (Joseph) the soul." But in a
etill closer sense the body may be called the image
of the soul, the reflection of the soul, even as the
eonl is the image, or in the image of God. And
this furnishes good ground for such transfer of the
Bense, even to that which is most outward in the
human constitution. We may trace the shadow of
the idea as surviving even in the Greek poetry,
where the human body is styled (iyaXna demv See
Euripides: "Suppliants," 616, where it is applied
to the decomposed and mouldering remains of the
Argive warrior when carried to tlie funeral-pyre :
TO trov ayoAfio iroAeos eKKO^i^Ofiat
Trpos irvpav ii^pmSev.
To the funeral-pyre thine image bear I forth
Marred a.s it is.
It is spoken of as something sacred to the patron
deity of the Argive state, like a statue or a shrine.
See also Plato: Phcedrm, 251 A. The expression
tE! 3*n may also have some connection with the
old idea of the blood as the seat of the soul, regard-
ed MS rciircsenting it, and thus indirectly bearing the
image of God. In any view, there is implied .some-
thing holy in humanity, and even in the human
body — something in it transcending matter or mate-
rial organization, and which is not thus inherent in
any other oiganic life, or corporeal structure.
But the murderer, too, it may be said, is made
in the image of God, and therefore should he be
spared. The answer to this is simply the citation of
the divine command. His life is expressly demanded.
He Ls ="!r!, ii-adeMi, one devoted. See 1 Kings xx.
42 ; " Because thou hast sent away ""Sin IT'S , the
man of my doom (or of my dooming), therefore shall
thy soul be in place of bis soul," rcBJ rnn "t'E:
Sec also ^■2in z.~ , " the people of my doom," Is.
Iixiv. 5. The judicial execution of the nmrderer is
truly a sacrifce, an rxpiation, whatever may lie ob-
jected to such an idea by a fake liiimanitarianism
wliich seems to have no thought how it is bilittling
humanity in its utter ignoring of anything above man,
or of any relation between tlie human and the eternal
Justice.
Harsh as they may seem, we need these ideas to
give the necessary strength to our relaxing judicial
morality, and a more healthy tone to the individual
»nd social conscience. The age is fast going into
the other cxircinc, and crime, especially the crime
of blood-shediiing, is incieaning in the ratio of our
spurious tenderness. The harshness is now exhibit-
infj its other and more hypocritical jihase. TlioBe
who speak with contempt of the divine law, ue con^
stantly railing at society as itself the criminal in tht
punishment of crime, and as especially malignant
and revengeful in discharging the divinely imposed
duty of executing justice upon the murderer. — T. L.]
HOMTLETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical. Ch. viii. 20 wouI4
present a good text for a thanksgiving sermon. In
connection with ver, 21, it would be snitalile for an
exposition of thankfulness. Ver. 21 would be adapt
ed to a sermon on hum.in sinfulness in the light of
the divine compassion. How God's speaking in his
heart re-echoes in the innermost heart of the bfr
liever. Ver. 22 would be suitable (or a representa-
tion of the connection between the kingdom of grace,
and the kingdom of nature with its laws. Ch. ix. 1.
A marriage-blessiug at the celebration of a wedding
Vers. 2 and 3, The worth and sacredness of the
creatureiy life (sparing of the animal, consecration
of all enjoyment). Ver. 6, The holy estimation ot
human life. The chief point of view in the whole
Section is the covenant of God with Noah as the type
of all covenants that follow ; since they all rest upon
the personal relation of God to man ; all are of God's
free institution; all, moreover, as ethicully persona'
alliances (after the manner of a contract), are an iti-
terchange of divine promises and human vows, of
divine claims and human faith; all are saciamentally
sealed. How God bitids himself in his sacramental
signs, and in them truly remembers the man who re-
membeis him. How the divine eye of grace and the
human eye of faith meet each other in the sacra-
ment. The rainbow, the extraordinary phenomenon
of heaven, and, on that account, an image of the
divine kindness, compassion, and friendship. The
light of the heaveidy sun in the colors of the earthly
rainl.iow.
.Starke: Ch. viii. 2il. The building of the altar;
probably upon the mountains of .\raiat. Noah val-
ued thankfuluess before all earthly business. It is
not said through what means God made known to
Noah his acceptance of the offering. We may cou-
jeciuie that the offering was set on fire by fire from
heaven (but tlie expression of satisfaction here fol-
lows the burningof the ottering). — Ver. 21, concern-
ing the abuse of these words in the exculpation of sin
(in many ways does the element of mildness in them
become misapprehended). — Ch. ix. 1, Because before
the flood God was provoked at the sin of unchastity,
it becomes necessary, in consideration of the fearful
display of wrath, to show that he is not hostile to the
lawful connection of man and wonian, nor docs he
condemn, but rather designs through it the multipli-
cation of the human race. Therefore, in this text
is the marriage-state praised and celebratetl, since
thereout flows not only the order of the family and
the world, but also the existence of the church. —
Ver. S, Just as every herli does not serve for food,
so also is not everything thereto serviceable that, by
means of life, moves upon the earth. — Ver. -1, The
aim of the prohibition is mainly that the way of cru-
elty may he barred to men. — Ver. (>, The magistracy
is God's ordinance, and derives the swo'd from no
other authority (Rom. xiii. 14). Starke prefers the
view that the rainbow had existed before the flood,
as in like manner he supposes, that before the flooif
men might eat of flesh. — Ver. 15, I.UTHKii: When
the Scripture saya " God remembers," it mearif Oia*
CHAP. rX. 16-29.
335
me foe! and are conscious that he remembers it,
aamely, when he outwardly presents himself ii' such
a manner, that we, thereby, talce notice that he
thinks thereon. Therefore it all comes to this : as I
present myself to God, so does he present himself to
me.
Schroder : After God's curse on the occasion of
the fall, we meet with the offerings of Cain and Abel ;
again do offering and altar connect themselves with
the judicial curse of the flood. — " The Lord smelled
a sweet savor," in the Hebrew, a savor of rest (rest-
ing, or satisfaction) ; (" it denotes that God rests
from his wrath and has become propitiated." Luther).
Therefore is it a savor of satisfaction — a chosen ex-
pression that becomes fixed in its application to the
burnt-offering. — " Jehovah spake to his heart," that
is, be resolved with himself. In the creation of man,
oh. i. 26 ; ii. 18, and also in his destruction, there
precedes a formal decree of God ; and no less doeJ
the divine counsel precede the covenant for man'f
preservation. Prayer was always connected with th«
sacrifice ; in fact, every offering was nothing eisa
than an embodied prayer. — While the earth remain-
etk. There is, therefore, even to the earth in it«
present state, a limit indicated (2 Pet. Ui. 6, 7, 10;
Isaiah Ixvi. ; Rev. xx. 11 ; xxi. 1). — Ch. ix. 1, Thf
Noachian covenant is a covenant of Elohim, a cove
naut with the universal nature. Luther finds in our
Section the inauguration of an order of instruction,
of economy, and of defence (Noah's offering, the
blessing of the family, inauguration of the magis-
tracy).— Ver. 1, God does not love death, but life.
The covenaut is re-established, for as made with
Adam it had failed. According to Calvin the rain-
bow had existed before, but was here again conse-
crated as a sign and a pledge.
SECOND SECTION.
21k* Revelation of Sin and of Piety in Noah's Family — Tfie Curse and the Blasinff of Noaa —
The twofold Blessing, and the Blessing in the Curse itself.
Chapter IX. 18-29.
18 And the sons of Noah that went forth of the ark were Shera, and Ham, and
19 Japheth ; and Ham is the father of Canaan. These are the three sons of Noah ; and
20 of them was the whole earth overspread. And Noah began' to be a husbandman, and
21 he planted a vineyard; And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was un
22 covered within his tent. And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of hia
23 father, and told his two brethren without. And Shem and Japheth took a garment,
and laid it upon both their shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness ot
their father ; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their fatlier's nakedness.
24 And Noah awoke from his wine [his sleep of mt«xication], and knew what his younger son
25 had done unto him. And he said, Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants'" shall he
26 be unto his brethren. And he said, Blessed be the Lord God of Shem [Jehovah, God
27 of the name, or who preserves the name] ; and Canaan shall be his servant. God shall enlarge
Japheth' [one who spreads abroad], and he shall dwell* in the tents of Shem; and Canaan
28 shall be his servant. And Noah lived after the flood three htuidred and fifty years.
29 And all the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years ; and lie died.
\} Ver. 20. — n^TXil ^^X Flj 3 n'1 , rendered "and Noah began to be a husbandman," — man of the adamah, ot
man of flip soif—yeuffy6^—agricola. It cannot mean that this was the first time he had practised husbandry, but the
beginning of it after tne flood, when he and his sons had descended into the low country. — T. L.]
[3 Ver. 25. — C"t3~ "I^^l , " a servant of servants " — a Hebraism to denote the intensity or degradalion of Canaan's
servitude — the lowest and vilest of servants, or, as they are afterwards characterized, ** hewers of wood and drawers of
vater,^' in distinction from the ordinary subjugation of a conquered people. For remarks on ^t3^n 133 , "fti's younger
ion," or little son, and its reference to Canaan alone, see appendcl Note, p. 337, on Noah*s curse and blessings. — T. L.l
[' Ver. 27.— rS"b f ST' "shall enlarge Japheth." Europe (evpiimj), wide-faced, extensive, spacious. This sup-
posed residence, as it mainly was, of the sons of Japheth, had this name very early. From its unknown extent it was
(ircbably so called in comparison wi' h the bettrr known parts of conti^ous Asia. The Greeks may have simply trans*
ated the earlj tradition of the prophecy into the name evptltin), and afterward perverted it, according to their usual' course,
by one of their absurd fables. — T. L.]
(< Ver. 27.— paj'i", "and he shall dwell," etc. Who shall dwell? The Jewish authorities, with few excel toM
■ay it is God, the subject of the verb just preceding, and this is, doubtless, according to grammatical regularity. Set
Aben Exra, Rashi, and others. Sometimes, to avoid the seeming anthropopathism, they substitute for God th«
word i^ix, his light, or nj^ZC (SheUnah), deriving it from this very verb ■3\!:'' . Thus, the Targnm of Onkeloa;
b'Sn n:3'j1Da nri:2tl) ■^■^C^l, "lUs Shektnah [or indwelling) shall abide in the dwelling Imashker.eh) of Shem."
Bo the Arab c. both of the Polyglott and of Arabs Erpenianus, »m La^CJ»I jj ^)y^ ^^wX-jO« , " His Light alikl'
dwell in the tents of Shem." See further, appended note, p. 337. on the blessing of Noah. -T. L.'
»36
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
EXEGETICAI- AND CRITICAL.
1. The Signiiicance of this Jr/wrlstic Sectio^t.
This second event in the life of Noiih after tlie fiomi
is evidently of the highest meaning ; as was the first,
namely, Noah's offering and God's blessing and cov-
enant. In the first transaction there are delineated
the ground-features of the new constitution of the
eartli, as secured by the covenant of God with the
pious Noah. In the present Section we learn the ad-
vance of culture, but we recognize also the continu-
ance of sin in the new hiunan race ; still, along with
the earlier contrast between piety and perverseness,
there comes in now the new contrast of a blessed
life of culture as compared with the religious life of a
divine cultua^ or worship. In what Noah says of his
sons, we read the ground-forms of the new state, and
of the world-historical partition of mankind. In
Knobel's representation of it, this higher signifi-
cance of the Section is wholly effaced. In the
curse upon Canaan (according to this view), and in
his appointment to servitude, the Jehovist would
give an explanation of the fact, that the Caiuianites
were subjugated by the Hebrews, and that Pha'ni-
cian settlers among the Japhethites * appear to have
had a similar fate. But that the curre was pro-
nounced upon Canaan, and not upon Ham, was be-
cause other Hamitic nations, such as the Egyptians,
etc., were not in the same evil ca»e. Still, it is not
Canaan, but Ham himself, who is set forth as the
shameless author of the guilt, (? ) because the writer
would refer certain shameless usages of the Hauiitie
nations to their first ancestor. Now, on the simple
supposition of the truth of the prediction, and of the
connection between (he guilt of the ancestor, and the
corruption of his descendants, tliis construction must
fiill to the ground. Knobel cites it as "an ancient
view," that the cursings of those who are distinguished
as men of God, have power and effect as well as their
blessings.
2. Yer. 19. By them was the whole earth
overspread. — A main point of our narration. " The
second event in the life of Noah after the flood
shows us the germs for tlie future development of
the human race in a threefold direction, which is
prefigured in the character of his three son.s." To
this end the repetition of their names. The mention
of Canaan introduces the mention of the land in the
following verse, as used for the inhabitants of the
Land; as in ch. x. 26 ; xi. 1, and otlier passages in
which cities and lands are frequently named instead
of their population." Keil.
3. Vers. 2o, 21. Noahh Work, Iris ItuUlgetice
and hia Error. The translation : " and Noah began
to be a husb.-mdman" is rightly set aside liy I)elitz.sch
and Keil. The worri for husiiaiidman lias llic arti-
cle, and is, tlierefore, in ap|iosition with Noah.
Noah, as husbandman, began to plant a vineyard.
The agriculture that had been interrupted by the
flood, he again carrii.'S on, and makes it more com-
plete by means of the new culture of the vine. Ar-
menia, where he landed with the ark, is an anciently
known vine-land. "The ten tliou.-^and (Xkn., Amiii.
4, 4, '.') found in Armenia old and well flavored
• (The Phoenifiana, ns distiiipii«hod from tho Onnnnn-
itM antl .Sidonians, were probably .Slirmilejs, as they Mpiike
the Sh'rraitic lantrua(*e, uml tliuHm:ido it the lanEniapn ot the
whole di-'trict, Tbi.ic(irrOK]iondn to w))at \s Biiid by Herodo-
tus an'i Stnibo, that they camo from the Persian Gulf— the
land of Sbinar. the old liomi^luiid T. L.1
wines: even at this day the vine grows there, pro
ducing wine of great excellence, even at the hejghl
of four thousand feet above the level of the se«
(Ritter: Geography, x. p. 66^). That the culture
of the vine came i'rom Asia is well known. Th«
Greek myth ascribes it to Dyonysus or Bacchus,
representing it, sometimes, as deiived from the In-
dians, and again, as belonging to the Phrygians, who
were related to the Armenians (Hioo.' Sic. 362;
Strabo, 10)." Knobeh The story designat is a hill
on the northwest, adjacent to the Great Ararat, and
furnishing the means of its ascent, as the region
where Noah set out his vine-plants. The village of
Argnri (Agorri), which in 1840 was destroyed in an
eruption of Ararat, stood upon the place referred
to. Frequent projections of stones, and outpouring
streams of lava and mud, have, in the course ol
time, destroyed all the fertile soil of Ararat (K. Koch,
in "Piper's Year Book," 1852, p. 28)." Delitzsch.
The wine-garden of Noah is a mild reflex of paradise
in the world of the fallen human race ; and this
enjoyment, in its excessively sinful use, to which
Noah led the way, although he was not aware of its
effect, has become a reflex of -Adam's enjoyment of
the tree of knowledge ; with this difference, how.
ever, that Noah erred m ignorance, and not in the
form of conscious transgression. Intoxication by
wine makes men lax in respect to sexual sin ; and
this connection is gently indicated in the fiiot that
Noah, as he lay unguar-dcd in his tent, exposed him-
self contrary to the law of modesty. In the error
of the father there reveals itself the character of the
sons.
4. Vers. 22, 23. The Brhavior of the Som
Ham's conduct was, at first, a sin of omission. He
saw the nakedness (the shame) of his father, and
neither turned away his eyes nor covered him ; thei
he told it to his brethren without, and this was his
sin of commission. His behavior had the chanictei
not merely of lustful feeling, but of utter shameless
ness; whereas the act of the two brothers presents a
beautifully vivid image of delicacy, being at the same
time an act of modesty and of piety. Reverence,
piety, and chastity, are, in children, the three foun-
dations of a higher life ; whereas in impiety and sen-
sual associations, a lower tendency reveals itself.
Out of the virtues and the vices of the family come
the virtues and the vices of nation.*, and of the world.
At the same time, the mariner in which the two sons
treat the case, presents a charming image of prudence
and quick decision. They seize the first best robe
that conies to baud, and that was the n^Btt." , sjiread
it out, and as they go backward with averted faces,
lay it upon the nakedness of their father.
fi. Vers. 24-29. Koah's Curse and Blessing.
His end. — And Noah awoke from his wine ;
that is, tire intoxicalion fVoni wine (see 1 Sam. i. 14;
XXV. 37). — And knew. — This .«ecras to suppose that
his sons had told him, which, howei'er, may have
been occasioned by his asking aliout the robe that
covered him. The whole proceeding, however, must
have come to light, and that, too, to his t\vn\ liumih-
ation. — His younger son (liii'ially, his son, the liV
lie, or lire less; see cli. v. ;i2).— The eH'ect upoa
him of the account is au elevated prophitic stale cf
soul, in which the language of the seer takes the
form of poetry. — Cursed be Canaan. — The fact
that he did not cur.se the evil-doer himself, but hit
son, is (\\plaincd away, according to Origen, in a He-
brew Midrash, which says that the young Cimaan
had first seen his mandfathcr in this condition, aii4
JHAP. IX. 18-29.
33T
told it to hia father — clearly an arbitrary exegesis.
According to Havernilt and Keil, all the sons of
Ham were included in the oui-se, but the curse of
HaiD was concentrated on Canaan. Keil and Heng-
Btenberg find, moreover, a motive in the name 'iS!3 ,
which does not mean, originally, a low country^ but
the servile. " Uam gave to his sou the name of obe-
dience, a thing which he himself did not practise."
Hengstenberg supposes that Canaan was already fol-
lowing his father's footsteps in impiety and wicked-
ness. According to Hofmann and Delitzsch. Canaan
had the curse imposed upon him because he was the
youngest son of Ham (ch. x. 6), as Ham was the
youngest son of Noah. " The great sorrow of heart
which Ham had occasioned to his father was to be
punished in the sufl'ering of a similar experience from
his owu youngest son." Rightly does Keil reject
this. The exposition of Knobel we have already
cited; according to it the later condition of the Ca-
naanites was only antedated in the prophecy of Noah.
Before all things must we hold fast to this, that the
language of Noah is an actual prophecy ; and not
merely an expression of personal feeUng. That the
question has nothing to do with personal feeling is
evident from the fact, that Ham was not personally
cursed. According to the natural relations, the
youngest grandchildren would be, in a special man-
ner, favorites with the grandfather. If now, not-
withstanding this, Noah cursed his grandchild, Ca-
naan, it can only be explained on the ground that in
the prophetic spirit he saw into the future, and that
tne vision had for its point of departure the then
present natural state of Canaan. We may also say,
that Ham's future was contained in the future of
Cauiiau ; the future of the remaining Hamites he left
undecided, without curse and without blessing, al-
though the want of ble.ssing was a significant omen.
Had, however, Noah laid the curse on Ham, all the
sons of Ham would have been denoted in like man-
aer with himself; even as now it is commonly as-
sumed that they were, though without sufficient
ground (see Dklitzsch, p. 281). There is do play
upon the name Canaan, as upon the name Japheth
— a thing which is to be noted. But that in the
behavior of Canaan Noah had a point of depart-
jre for his prophecy, we may well assume with
Hengstenberg —A servant of servants ; that is,
the lowest of servants. If the language had had in
view already the later extermination of the Canaan-
ites, it must have had a different style. The form of
the expression, therefore, testifies to the age of the
prophecy. We must also bear in mind, that the re-
lation of servant in this case denotes no absolute
relation in the curse, or any developed slave relation,
any more than the relation of service which was im-
posed upon Esau in respect to Jacob. There even
lies in it a hidden blessing. The common natures
must, of themselves, take a position of inferiority ;
through subordination to the nobler character are
they saved, in the disciphne and cultivation of the
Spirit. — Blessed be Jehovah, God of Shem. —
The blessing upon Shem has the form of a doxology
to Jehovah, whereby, as Luther has remarked, it is
distinguished as a most abundant blessing, which
finally reaches its highest point in the promised seed.
" If Jehovah is the God of Shem, then is Shem the
recipient and the heir of all the blessings of salvation
which God, as Jehovah, procures for humanity." Keil.
— And Canaan shall be his servant.- -The word
i^s (regularly ons) is taken by Gesenius as a poeti-
eal expression for ib ; DeUtzsch refers it, as plural
22
to both brothers — Keil and Knobel to their descend-
ants. The descendants, how^ever, are represented G
the ancestor, and, therefore, the explanation of (ieoe-
nius gives the only clear idea. — God shall enlarge
Japheth, [or, as Lange renders it], God give en-
largement to the one vrho spreads abroad. —
In the translation we retain the play upon the word,
and the explanation of the name Japheth. Keil ex-
plains the word (meaning literally, to make room, to
give space for outspreading) as metaphorical. To
make room is equivalent to the bestowment of hap-
piness and prosperity. It must be observed, how-
ever, that the name Shem, and the blessing of Shem,
denotes the highest concentratio7i ; whilst in oppoai
tion to this the name Japheth and the blessing ol
Japheth, denotes the highest expansion., not onlj
geographically, but also in regard to the spread of
civilization through the earth, and its conquest both
outwardly and intellectually. This is the spiritual
mission of Japhethism to this day — namely, the
mental conquest of the world. The culture life of
Japheth, as humanitarian, scientific, stands in hap
monious contrast with the cultus, or religionism, of
Shem. Therefore, too, must Japheth's blessing come
from Elohim. — And he shall dwell in the tents
of Shem. — The words, Ac shall duvll, are by some
(Onkel, Dathe, Baumgarten) referred to Elohim.
But this bad already been expressed in the blessmg
of Shem, and had therefore nothing to do with the
blessing of Japhetfi. What is said relates to Ja-
pheth ; and that, too, neither in the sense that the
Japhethites shall settle among the Shemites, or that
they shall conquer them in their homes (Clericus,
Von Bohlen, and others), but that Japheth's dwell
ing in the tents of Shem shall be in the end his
uniting with him in rehgious communion (Targum
Jonathan, Hieronymus, Calvin, and others). The op-
posite interpretation (Michaehs, Gesenius, De Wette,
Knobel, and others), which explains Shem here (DUJ)
as meaning literaUy name, or fame (dwell in the tents
of renown), appears to have proceeded from a mis-
apprehension of the prophetic significance of the
language. To dwell in the tents of any one, Knobel
holds, cannot mean religious communion. That
would be true, if the one referred to had not imme-
diately before been denoted as an observer of the
true reUgion. That the Japhethites, that is, the
Greeks, early dwelt in the tents of renown, is, in this
respect, a matter by itself, which had already been
set forth in Japheth's own blessing, as implied in
what is said of his expansion. As the brothers,
whatever contrast there might have been in their
characters, had been one in their piety towards their
father, so must their posterity become one in this,
that they shall finally exchange with each other theif
respective blessmgs — in other words, that JaphetK
shall bring into the tents of Shem what he has woo
from the world, and, in return for it, share in the
blessing of the Name — the name Jehovah, or the
true religion. — And Noah lived. — In the Armenian
legend, Arnojoten, in the plain of the Araxes, has
the name of his place of burial. With the death of
Noah, the tenth member of the Genealogical table,
ch. v., finds its conclusion.
[Note o.v the Curse of Canaan — thk sup-
posed Cdrse of Ham — the Blessing of Siiksi
AND Japheth. Gen. ix. 24. And Noah awoke from
his wine, and knew what his youngest sort had doiu
unto him. ^p^'" , LXX. Hivriifc, became fully con-
scious of his condition, Comp. 1 Cor. XV. 24. ~Ti.
knew, became seiuible of. It is not the wi.rd ...iit
aoS
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
<»ould have been employed had he learned it from
me inlbi-mation of others. It denotes intelligence —
bv the eye, as Is. vi. ". — by the touch, Gen. xix. S3,
—experience by any sense, Deut. xi. 2, — or by the
exercise of the' mind as following such experience,
Judg. xiii. 21. Had done unto him, ib '^'^v This
\a souiothing more than an omission or a neglect.
The word is a very positive one. Something unmis-
takable, something very shameful had been done
onto the old man in his unconscious state, cither the
stripping off his robe, or some act of abuse or mock-
ery of such a nature that it becomes manifest to him
immediately on his recovery. It may be remarked,
too, that -CS rx may more properly be rendered,
indefinitely, u thing which, or sometliing which, his
youngest son had done unto him. But who was the
eulprit ? Of this, too, the patriarch appears to have
been immediately sensible, or to have immediately
inferred it from something he must have known of
the supposed perpetrator. He seems to have had no
doubt. Now Ham had done nothing to his father.
On discovery of his state he hastens to his brothers,
it may be with the same filial intentions that they
more promptly carried out. The sight appears to
nave been aceideutal and involuntary. The word is
e<n«1, he saw, not Ua'l , lie looked at, spectavit,
eSeairaTo, gazed at, implying interest, emotion.
There is in'the account no intimation of any of that
scoffing demeanor that some commentators have so
gratuitously charged upon him. He saw and told his
brothers. At all events, his fault, if there was one,
was simply an omission, which seems to fall alto-
gether short of the force of the words ib nil'y , liad
done unto him, regarded, too, as something obvious
or immediately discoverable by the one who liad suffer-
ed the indignity. There seems to be a careful avoid-
ance of particularity. The language has an euidie-
mistic look, as though intimating something too vile
and atrocious to be openly expressed. Thus regard-
e<l, everything seems to point to some wanton act
done by the very one who is immediately named in
the severe malediction that follows : " Cursed be
Canaan." He was the youngest son of Ham, as he
was also the youngest son of Noah according to the
well-establLshed Shemiiic peculiarity by which all
the descendants are alike called sons. Beside the
general designations, sons of Israel, bsiU)"' "iia,
sons of Judah, etc., see such particular cases as
Gen. xxix. 6, where Labau is called the son of
Nahor; Kzra v. 1, where the prophet Zachariah is
called the son of Iddo ; whereas, as appears from
Zach. i. 1, ho was his grandson, "lajsn "53 is ren-
dered in our English version, his younger son, to
make it apjilicalilu to Ham, on the .supposition that
he was the middle son, younger than Shcm. But
this will nrH do. It would be a vague way of desig-
nating him at any rate, even if the language would
allow it. But the term yjp can only denote the
younger (ndnor) when used of one of two, and stand-
ing in contrast with ^"li. Standing alone, as it
doeii here, or in connection with three or more, it can
only be rendered minimus, the little one distinctively,
the least or youngest of all. The terms arc derived
from the early family state with its disparity of ap-
pearance in size, thotigh afterwards i-etained or trans-
ferred to ex|)reHs simply juniority, :is the Latin
ttajor and minor in like cases. The |irimitivc asso-
mlion, however, is not wholly lost, and this makes
lie ieim such a favorite to express the very young-
est in the family, who is regarded as the little one lonj
after he has grown up to maturity of age and size
So Benjamin, even when hewas twenty-three years Ot
age, was still IBisH, the little olc. The term, it is
true, denotes comparative juniority, yet still it de-
rives its etymological emphasis from the fact that h<
was C^ip^ lb;; , TTjAuTfTos, the late-born, the child
of old age, and so still thought of as the little on»
of the family. To the father, especially, or lo the
grandfather, an epithet of this kind retains all its
force. Such, most likely, was the relation between
Noah and the young Canaan, until his vile abuse of
it called out the greater severity of malediction
So David, too, was specially named after he had ar-
rived at robust manhood. The other sons of Jesse
are called collectively -''bHs , and are nained, more-
over, first, second, third, etc., but of David it is said
"Opn sin , he was the little one, minim>is, youngest
of all. See also Gen. xxix. IS, where, from a sunila?
association of ideas, Rachel is called njajsn r^ria ,
thy little daughter, though in that case there werf
but two of them.
Everything points to Canaan as the youngest
son, at that time, of all the Noachic family. He
WHS the direct object of the curse, which, instead of
a.^eiidiiig to the father, contrary to everything else
of the kind in the Bible, was so fully accomplished
in Canaan's own direct descendants. So clear is this,
that some of the best commentators, including most
of the Jewish, although still keeping Ham as the
main figure, in consequence of the old prepossession,
reureseiit Canaan as playing an active part in the
business. It is the current Jewish tt-adition, that he
first saw the exposure and told it U> his father.
Others ascribe to him a shameful act of mutilation,
from whence it is thought came the old fable of
Saturn. "It was Canaan that did it," says Abeu
Ezra, " although the Scripture does not in words re-
veal what it was." Rashi also gives the story ol
mutilation, ''010 :'~'2"X IT"', and he refers to the
Sanhodrin of the Talmud. That most acute critic,
Scahger, not oidy ascribes the act to Canaan, whether
it was a positive exposure or anything else, but
acquits Ham of all positive blame : ■' Quid Cham
fecit patri suo ? Nihil ; taulum fratribus de patrii
pro/jro nunciua fuit." ScALiG., Elench., p. 04.
Ham might have been called the younger son in
res|)ect to Shem, as he was the elder in respect to
Japhelh, but this would neither answer to lap "3
here, nor suit the evidently intended distinctiveness
of the designation. On the other hand, he was in
no sense minimus or youngest, unless there is wholly
disregarded the order in which the names occur at
every mention of the three : Shem, Ham, Japheth.
See (ien. v. 32; vi. 10; vii. 13; ix. IS; x. 1. This
would make hun the middle one, at all events,
whether Shem or Japheth were regarded as the eld-
est. The deternunation of the latter question would
depend upon the interpretation of Gen. v. :'.2, and
X. 21. "Noah was five hundred years old and begat
Shem, llani, and Japheth." It is not at all credible
that the births of ihe-^e sons should have been so
ne:ir together that they all took place tit, or even
alxiiit, the time when Noah was five hundred years
old. It appears from Gen. .\i. 10, that Shem was
horn about this time, making him almiit one linn:iri'd
years olil at the begiiming of the year after the flood
Now, if we render Gen. v. 32: "Noah was five hun-
dred years old, and had begotten," or, when he hao
CHAP. IX. 18-2!>.
33S
oegottcu, etc., making the series cud at tbat time,
which is perfectly consistent with the Hebrew idiom,
then the first-named would probably have been the
youngest, as last begotten, and marking the date.
If they were all born afterwards, the inference would,
for the same reason, have been just the other way.
'.n favor of the first view, which would make Japlieth
the elder, there is the rendering which our Englir-h
version gives to Gen. x. 21 : Shein, the brotlier of
Japlieth the elder, instead of, the elder brother of Ja-
phe;h. Some commentators have favored tliis on the
ground that Shem must hiive been born after Xoah
was five hundred years old, because his own age is
stated as being one hundred years, two years (C^nsii'
or the second year, or, as the dual form more strongly
implies, between one and two years) after the flood.
But besides the minute trifling of such an interpre-
tation, there is a grammatical difficulty in the way
which is insuperable. In the expression TE" TiX^
Snsn , the two first words being in regimen, the
epithet "5^^5^^ must belong to the whole as a com-
pound : Japhtih'.i brother, the elder ; otherwise it
would be like making tlie adjective in English agree
with the possessive case. Compare Judges ii. 7,
binjn nin''_ niJSO bs, every great work of the
Lord; 1 Sam. xvii. 28, bnsri THS SS^bs, Eliab
his elder brother, where the pronoun corresponds to
the noun in regimen, and, especially, such cases as
Judges i. 13; iii. 9, which are precisely like this,
logically and grammatically: "itSiSP zbo 'ns .
Caleb\i younger brother, not, the brother of Caleb
'.he younger. So far the sense may be said to be
fixed grammatically, but the fair inference from the
context, and the fact that appears in it that there
were three brothers, would seem to give it not only
a comparative, but a superlative sense ; the brother
of Japheth, the elder one, — implying that there were
two brothers older than Japheth, and that Shem was
the oldest of them. If we look at the whole context
(Ham and his genealogy having been just disposed
of), we shall see that there was more reason for the
narrator's saying this than for merely mentioning
that Shem was older than Japheth. These consider-
ations would seem to fix the position of Ham as the
middle son; although, without them, it n]ight have
been reasonably argued that Ham himself was the
oldest, from the fact that his descendants, with the
exception of Canaan (unless we may reckon the
Phoenicians among then)), so get the start, in history
and civilization, of both Shem and Japheth.
A very strong argument against the hypothesis
that Ham was cursed here instead of Canaan, arises
from the want of allusion, in all other parts of the
Scripture, to any such sweeping malediction as in-
volving all Ham's descendants. The accomplishment
of the curse upon Canaan is mentioned often, and
',he frequent allusion to them as " hewers of wood
%nd drawers of water," is only an emphatic repetition
«f Noah's words, D^t:?. i^V, Mrvant of ■<:ervants
— not slare of slaves, as some would take it, but an
intensive Hebrew idiom to denote the most complete
Bubjugation, such as the Cauaanites were reduced to
kn the days of Joshua and Solomon.* How utterly
• (The fact that, of all the descendants of Ham, Cauaan
WBS \ 16 nearest object of interest to the Jews, and so histor-
ically of most importance lo thera. {dves the reason of the
SOBcewbat peculiar deeitmation. Gen. ix. 18, where a kind
?f note is ufllsed to Ham's name, i-tating tbat be was the
father cf Canaan, or rather that this was another name
Strange would such language have sounded, had ii
been applied, at any time during the national exist
ence of the Jews, to the lordly descendants of Cush,
Mitzraim, and Nimrod ! " Shall be servant to tliem,'"
"'sb , a collective term for the descendants of Shem,
who had just been blessed. So is it taken by all thf
Jewish expositors, who regard the antecedent Id
ver. 20 as being Shem alone, no other being men
tioned or implied, and in ver. 27, as being Sliem and
the (jod of Shem who should dwell in his tents. See
also Gesenius, Lehrgeb., p. 221. Instead of having
ever been servant to Shem, cither in the political or
commercial sense, Mitzraim held the IsraeUtes for
centuries in bondage ; Cush (the JSthiopians and the
Lubims) conquered them (see 2 Chron. xii. 3 ; xvi. 8) ;
the nation that Nimrod founded sacked their cities
and brought their land under tribute. Instead of
being servants to Japheth, the descendants of Ham
were founding empires, building immense and popu-
lous cities, whilst the sons of the younger brother,
with the exception of the Mediterranean or Javanic
line, were roaming the dense wilds of Middle and
Northern Europe, or the steppes of Centi-al Asia,
ever sinking lower and lower into barbarism, as each
wave of migration was driven farther on by those that
followed. The more abject race, as some would hold
them, were the pioneers of the world's civilization,
advancing rajjidly in agriculture and the arts, organ-
izing governments admirable for their order though
despotic in form, digging canals and lakes to fertilize
the desert, everywhere turning the arid earth into a
luxuriant garden, whilst the early Gomerites, and
those who followed them in their wilderness march
to the extreme west of Europe, were falling from
iron to copper, from copper to stone, from the im-
plements of Lamech, and of the ark and tower-
builders, to the rude flint axes and bone knives that
some have regarded as remains of pre-adamite men.
1'he Hamites go down to Egypt, or ascend the
Euphrates, and how soon uprise the pyramids, the
immense structures of Thebes, the palaces of Baby-
lon and Nineveh, whilst the other wretched wander-
ers of the wild woods and marshes were building
rude huts on piles, over lakes and fens, to protect
themselves fi-om the wild bea.-<ts, or herding in eaves
with the animals whose bones are now found min-
gling with their own. Such was their progress until
there met them again that primitive central light,
which had been preserved, especially in the Shemitic,
and had never gone wholly out in the Hamitic and
Javanic lines. Even this Greek or Javanic branch
of the Japhethan family, though ever preserving a
position so much higher than that of their Northern
consanguinii (this coming from their Mediterranean
route furnishing greater facilities of intercourse, and
keeping up an accessible proximity between the
different pioneering waves and the source whence
they came) derived, nevertheless, their earliest mU-
ure, from the Egyptians and Phoenicians, as, in still
later times, they received their highest culius from a
Shemitic source. The wisest among the Greeks ever
traced their best thinking to the East, that is, to *
specially given to him by the Israelites, as being best knowr
to them, or called to mind to them, thjongh his son ;
irjp ■'3S S^n any "Ham, that is, the father ol
Canaan," or Ham, that is, *Abi-Canaan, — accor'ling to a
method of naming that baa ever prevailed among the Ara-
bians, down to this day, .as Abu-lJeker, Abu!wa]id, or, as in
this case, Abu-Canaan, whi.'ie the son is better known, oi
an ol'ject of nearer interest than the &tlier wb" is thuJ
n.amed after him. — T- L.'
34G
GEiTESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Shemitic or Hamitic origin. They were ever kept in
;onDection with the primitive light and primitive
spiritual vigor, and this was the chief respect in
which they differed from our Japhethan ancestors who
were so early lost in the woods, and who had no
fresh emanations from this central life until long after,
when it had been renewed to more than its primitive
power by the coming of Christ and Christianity.
The appUcation of this curse to Ham was early
made by commentators, but its enormous extension
to the whole continent of Africa belongs to quite
modern times. The first, though having so little
support in the letter of the Scripture, hud some
plausible ground in the unfavorable contrast that
Ham's neglect, or carelessness, presents to the pious
earnestness of his two brethren ; and this may give
the reason why he is, personally, neither cursed nor
blessed. It derived countenance, also, from the sub-
sequent wickedness of the great Hamitic nations,
and that constant antagonism between them and
Israel which appears throughout the Bible. The
second feeling seems alniost wholly due to certain
historic phenomena that have presented themselves
since tlie discovery of America. What has favored
this tendency has not been alone, or mainly, the de-
fence of slavery, as some would allege ; since men
have supported it, like Dr. Lange and others, who
abhorred the idea of human bondage in all its forms.
It has been, rather, the desire to give a worldly,
political importance to the Scriptural predictions,
especially the early ones, thus magnifying the Scrip-
tures, as they suppose, and furnishing remarkable
evidences of the truth of revelation. Very modern
changes in the relative position of continents are
seized upon for this purpose, to the ignoring or ob-
scuring the true dignity of the Divine Word. It is
safest to regard prophecy as ever being in the direct
line of the church, and to judge of the relative im-
portance of woild-historical changes solely by this
standard. Except as standing in visible relation to
the chosen people, the chosen church, or to that
extraordinary divine doing in the world which is
styled revelation, the greatest earthly revolutions
have no more super-earthly value th;m have to us
the dissensions of" African chiefs, or the wars of the
Heptarchy. To the divine eye, or to the mind that
guided the Biblical inspiration, human politics,
whether of moniirchies or republics, and all human
I)oliiicai changes, in themselves considered^ or out of
this visible relation, must be very iiisignific.-mt things.
Judged by such a rule, Trojan wars, Peloponnesian
wars, or the wars of Bonaparte, fall in importance
below the wars of Canaan, or Hiram's sending cedar-
rafts to Joppa to aid Solomon in the construction of
the temple.
It is this feeling which has also affected the in-
terpretation ol Noah's blessing of Shem and Japheth,
Oen.ix. 20, 27, especially the words Ctr ■'bnsta "i^Viy^.
and he sfuill dwell in the tents of Shem. It is some-
what remarkable that the Jewish authorities should
have given what seems the more spiritual, and even
evangelical, interpretation here, whilst so many Chris-
tian commentators have been fond of what may be
called the political or secular aspect of the pro[)h-
ecy, referring it, as many of them do, to the mere
predoiiiinanci^ of European power and culture among
the Asiatic nations in these latter days. To support
»hi« there is carelessly assumed an ethnological view
untenable in the wide extent given to it. Kurojie is
Japheth, Shem Asia. Ham Africa. At all events, the
prophecy is supposed to set forth three types, em-
bracing aU mankind. It is thought to be greatly tt
the honor of Scripture that it should display such i
philosophy of history bearing upon the remote, lattei
ages, as though this were a greater thing than that
fixed spirituality of view which is the same for ali
ages, and for less or greater territory in space. It
is easy to find events which are regarded as supposed
fulfilments. The English m India, the French in
Tonquin, Opium wars in China. Russia forcing its
way into Central Asia ; it is all Japheth dwelling in
the tents of Shem; it is the fulfilling of the Scrip
tures. There is a bad moral influence in this. An
interest in the prediction, or in its supposed interpre-
tation, bhnds the moral sense to the enormity of
some of the acts by which it is thought to be veri-
fied. Much of it, moreover, is false ethnology. Thq
British subjugation of tlie Hindoos, instead of being
Japheth dwelling in the tents of Shem, is nothing
more than Japheth dwelling in the tents of Japheth.
This pohtical mode of interpretation has affected
other prophecies of the Bible, and there is reason to
believe that it has been especially blinding in the
study of the Apocalypse. It proceeds, often, upon
the idea that events which seem very Lirge to us,
greatly magnified as they are by nearness or othei
perspective influences, must have the same relative
rank in the divine estimation. Now, the Scriptures
teach us, that it is ofttimes directly the reverse ; see
Luke xvi. 16, what is said about " things highest in
the sight of men," rh iv ai^^pwivon viit-rjAov. Great
as they may seem to us, they may have compara-
tively little bearing upon that which is the special ob-
ject of the divine care in human history; whilst their
over-estimate favors the false idea, that the church
is lor the world, and not the world for the church.
They may even have much less to do, than is gener-
ally imagined, with the highest secular progress of
mankind. One political eruption may be the mere fill-
ing up of a vacuum produced by another, leaving
unaffected the general historical evenness, or making
even less deflection from the general course of things
than other events of seemingly much less show and
magnitude.
Now, in distiuction from the political, there ia
what may be called the spiritual interpretation of
this very ancient prophecy, as given by some of the
best Christian commentators (see the references to
them in Pole's " Syno])sis," and the Philologica
Sacra of Glassios, p. 1998), and held, with few ex-
ceptions, by the Jewish authorities. The Targum
of Onkelos interprets the Hebrew by making a^f136t
the subject of '|3'JJ7i and renders it paraphrastically,
Ctn nJS'rBa nnSDir "''::I1J:'1, His Shekinah shall
dwell in the dwelling of Shem (or of the Name).
Maimonides, Rashi, and Aben Ezra, all follow this,
though they also allude to a secondary sense: that
Japheth should learn in the schools of Shem, which
is also expressed in the Targum of Jonathan. This,
however, is founded on the former idea of the divine
indwelling light, in the blessing of which all nations
are ultimately to share. So the Judaico-Arabio
translation of Arabs Erpenianus: His Light shall
dwell in the tents of Shem ; the wordii light and
Shekinah being interposed to avoid llic seeming
iintliri)pomor|ihism. The rendering, the Shekinah,
is suggested to them, moreover, by the etymologic*
connection between "3U! (Shakan), the verb here foi
dwelling, and njipsj, the Shekinah; as though suni
Cl/AP. IX. 18-!i».
3li
language as we have Deut. xii. U, WS iou: "SC'? .
and Ps Ixxxv. 10, 13S-lNa T!:3 V2tt:b , came di-
rectly from this possage. Some Cliristian commen-
.ators carry this still farther, recognizing tlie same
etymology in the Greek euK-hfuirf (root, s K n) ol
John i. 14. Rurelv the fact has been so. <iod has
tpecially dwelt in the tents of Shem ; " He hath put
his glory there." The Shemite family alone pre-
served the pure monotheism a-i against the Eastern
pantheism and the Western polytheism lying on each
aide of it. Even tlie Arabians and the Syrians kept
the holy A'amf. A chosen branch had the Shekinah,
the visible, divine presence, tlie temple, the promise,
and the type of the Messiah. There is, finally, the
presence and dwelling of the Messiah with the spirit-
ual Israel down to this day. The interpretation, too,
must have been very ancient, antecedent to Targums
and Tahnuds, as it seems to have colored every-
where the poetry and language of the Old Testament.
Hence that frequent imagery of God's dwdlivij with
his people, or the converse in expression, though
essentially the same in thought, His being his peo-
ple's " dwelling-place in all generations." See 1 Kmgs
vi. 13 ; viii. 29 ; Exod. xxv. 8 ; Ps. xc. 1 ; Ezek.
xliii. 9; Zech. viii. 3. Such was Shem's blessing
here literally expressed, though clearly implied in
the previous verse : " blessed be the Lord God of
Shem (the name), which was the highest mode of
saying, blessed be Shem himself, the people whose
ijod is Jehovah. Ps. xxxiii. 12; cxliv. l.i.
But besides its Scriptunil and evangelical fitness,
this interpretation has the strongest grammatical
-easons. Two verbs in Hebrew, like PS'' and "31^^' ,
Joined bv the conjunction, whether taken copulatively
"or disjunctively (that is, whether rendered mul or
hut), must have the same giammatical subject, unless
A new one clearly intervenes, or the context jicccmo-
rili/ implies it. Neither of these exceptions exist
here, and, witlumt them, it is irregular to make the
object of the first verb the subject of the second.
He (God) will enhirge Jajjheth, but he will dvell in
the tents of Shem. The contrast is between the two
acts of Deity, the enlarging — the indwelling — an
antithesis that seems demanded by the parallelism,
but is wholly lost in the other version. If it is the
same subject (the blesser), then there are two ob-
jects; and two distinct blessings stand in striking
contrast. It is outer growth and inner sacredness.
Two states, moreover, and two dispositions are de-
Bcribed : Japlieth, the foreign rover, Shem, the home
devotee, abiding mainly in the old father-land, pre-
serving the
Sacra Dei, sanctosque patres.
Japheth is to have enlargement of territory, and,
ultimately, worldly power; Shem, though small, is
to have the special divine presence and indwelling.
He is the divine inheritance (see Deut. xxsii. 9)
among the nations.
The more secular interpretation has, indeed,
(onie strong points of seeming fulfilment, which may
»ffect the sense and the imagination ; but for the
leaton, as well as im faith, how much greater is tlie
iJea of such divine indwelling than that of any out-
ward ch mges, wh.-ther of power or culture, in the
relations of mankind ! Our estimate of causes, as
great or small, even in their earthly aspect, is much
aftected by an after-knowledge of the eU'ects with
which they are seen to be connected. As we look
back '.hey appear greatly magnified through the
medium of such sequence. It is like the mind cor
reeling the perspective errors of the sight in res])ecl
to size and distance. What Philosophy of History,
written three hundred years before Christ, even
though it had been more acute than any modern pro-
duction of the kind, could have given the true place
of the Jewish people of that day, or would even hav«
taken any notice of them, or regarded them as hav-
ing anv rank among the potent causalities of the
world ! How small, how secluded, how unrecognizet
their earthly position at that time ! Nothing short
of proplietic insight could discover what then lay
concealed from all the learning and wisdom of the
age, — the divine Name and the divine presence,
unfii'ured on Egyptian monuments, unTcnuwn in
Athenian temples (see Acts xvii. 23), but dwelling,
as a reserve power, in the sequestered tents o'
Shem.— T. L.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. See the preceding Annotations.
2. Noah the enlarger and the ennobler of human
culture. The dangers of progress in civilization.
Men become intoxicated with the success of theii
worldly efforts — especially in the beginning. Aftei
the waters of the flood the gift of wine. Under the
sacrament of the rainbow, Noah as husbandnian and
vineyard-keeper, prepares the elements of the New
Testament sacrament, bread and wine.
3. The vine is a mild reflex of the tree of knowl
edge ; how Noah's sin becomes a mitigated figure of
the sin of Adam.
4. Noah, whom all the waters of the flood did not
harm, received hurt through his unguarded indul-
gence in a small measure of wine. The history of
Adam teaches us the sacredness of limitation, the
history of Noah teaches us a holy carefulness in re
spect to measure or degree. Moderation was a fun-
damental law of the ancient Chinese, as the piety
that preserved Shem and Japheth.
5. The intimate connection between intoxication
by wine and sexual unguardedness, or sensual indul-
gence in the sins of voluptuousness (see the history
of Lot),
6. The three sons of Noah. The simple contrast.
Cain and Abel, or godless culture and a holy cultm,
develops itself in a more manifold contrast : Shem
and Japheth, Shem and Ham, Japheth and Ham.
For the interpretation of these contrasts, see just
above. It is evident, however, that many Christians
even now recognize only the contrast of Cain and
Abel; that is, they do not recognize that the line of
Japheth had likewise its blessing from (!od, although
he can only reach the blessing of Shem after great
wanderings. In the heart of the prophecy, Japheth
has already taken up his abode in the teiirs of Shem,
when, on the contrary, Shem himself, in the unbe-
lieving Jews, has been given up to a long-lasting
alienation.
7. Shem and Japheth are very different, but are,
in their piety, the root of every ideal and humane
tendency. The people .and kingdom of China are a
striking example ot the immense power that lies in
the blessing of (fihal) piety; but at the same timo
a proof that tiUal piety, without being grounded in
something deeper, cannot preserve even the great-
est of peoples from falling into decay, like an old
house, before their history ends.
8. The blessmg of Shem, or the faith in salvatioi
342
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
•hall avail for the good of Japheth, even as the bless-
ing; iif Japheth, liumanitarian culture, shall in tlie
Slid avail tor Shem. These two blessings are lecip-
rocal, and it is one of the deepest signs of some dis-
ease in our times, 'hat these two are in so many
WHYS estranged from each other, even to the extent
of open hostility. What God has joined together,
let uJt man put asimder.
P. It is a fearful abuse of God's word, when men
refer to the curse of Canaan in defence of American
■lave-tratfic, and slave-holding — as is done in the
Bouthern portions of the United States. For in the
first place, Canaan is not the same as Ham ; in the
second place, the conception of a servant in the days
of Noah is not that of a slave in modern times ; in
the third place, Canaan's servitude is the service of
Shem, therefore of the Prince of Shem, that is, he
becomes the servant of Christ, and in Christ is free ;
fourthly, as servant of Shem, and servant of Japheth,
he becomes a domestic partner in the religion of
Shem, as well as in the civilization of Japheth. On
the other side, however, it is a misapprehension of
the curse as exhibited in history, when the essential
equality of all men before God is regarded as a di-
rect abstract equality of men in their political rela-
tions. This comes from not taking rightly into
acc^^'jc the divine judgments in history, and the
graduaJness of the world's redemption (see Rom. x.
12). The reader is referred to Michel's " History
of the Cursed Races of France and Spain " (Paris,
1847), as also the "History of the Cursed Villages"
(Delessert, Paris). But such histories do not weigh
merely on Canaan, or even generally on Ham. They
are always economic, that is, temporary, not perpet-
ual dooms. They are districts in which human com-
passion shall yet appear as a prophet announcing the
turning away of the divine wrath, or as a priest in-
terceding against it.
10. The sons of Noah do not appear to clear up
the facts in respect to the race-formations. It is
quite evident, however, that Ham (the hot, the diirk,
ttie southern) forms a special race, and that with tJie
^Ethiopian type the Malayan stands in close relation.
On this side there becomes evident the whole power
of the life from nature, as the spiritual life becomes
subservient to it. Whilst, therefore, it is partly an
imperfect distinction when we regard the Shumitic
and the Japlicthic race (the people of renown, as
consisting in the name of God, the So^a tov dfw, and
the people of tlie outward and bold dispersion over
the earth) as having become blended in the Cauca-
sian, it is also in part a proof of the fact that com-
munity in the higher spiritual tendency may cause
very great contrasts to lose themselves in almost im-
perceptible distinctions. It is, however, (luite con-
sistent with the nature of the " outspreading," that
is, of Japlietli, thai wliilst, on the one side, he may
become one witli Sheni in tlie Caucasian, he m.iy, on
the other, represent the Mongolian, and in the ,\nieri-
can, even make a near approach to the race of HaK.
On the que.'<tion of races, .vee Langk's " I'osit. Dog-
matic," p. 324. On the theocratic signihcance of
Shem, Hum, Japheth, coii-pare Dei.itzmi ii, p. '282.
11. The fact th.it Noah lived three hundred and
fifty years after tin; flood, is a proof that the eosniical
thangc wiiich was brought on by the flood is not to
be regarded as sudden in all respects— not, at least,
ir itri relation to huinan life.
12. The poetical form of Noah's blessing shows
that he Sfiake in a highly rapt state of soul, in which
br was aH much elevated above any pa.ssionatc, in-
human wrath against Canaan, as above any weak
human s_\Tnpathy for him. The form of cui-se and
blessing, where both are divinely grounded, indicate
a prophetic beholding of the curse and blessing,
but not a creating, much less any arbitrary or mag-
ical pioduction of the same.
13. The tenor of the Noachian blessing in iti
Messianic significance, cannot be mistaken. It coi:
nects itself with the name Shem. The Protevangel
announced a ;uture salvation in the seed of the
woman ; the language here coimects the same with
the name of God which was to be entrusted to Shem
Shem is to be the preserver of the name of God, ot
Jehovah — the preserver of his religion, of his revela
tion. With this office is he, as the thoughtful, th
contemplative one, to dwell in tents, whilst, in son>.
way, God is to be glorified in him, a fact which Noa'.
can only express in the form of a doxology. In thij
way Shem has it as his task : 1. to rule over Canaan,
and to educate him as the master the servant ; 2. to
receive Japheth as a paternal guest who returns after
a long wandering, and to exchange with him good
for good — the goods of cullM and the goods of
culture.
14. The number of Noah's sons is three, the num-
ber of the Spirit. The Spirit will get the victory in
the post-diluvian humanity that has been baptized in
the flood.
HOMILETIOAL AND PEACTICAI,.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical. The form of life
in Noah: 1. Wherein sunilar to that of Adam?
2. wherein similar to that of Christ ? 3. wherein it
possesses something peculiar, that lies between them
both. Noah's wine-culture — the sign of a new step
in progress in the life of humanity. — The vine in its
significance : 1. In its perilous import ; 2. in its
higher significance. — God hath provided not merely
for our necessity, but also for our refreshment and
festive exhilaration. The more refined his gifts, so
much the more ought they to draw us, and make ua
feel the obligation of a more refined life. .Noah's
weakness ; its connection with his freedom, his strug-
gle and inquiry. The watchfulne.ss and discipline of
the Spirit is the only thing that can protect us again.at
the intoxication of the sense. — How one sensual ex-
cess is connected with another. — How the sins of the
old have for their consequence the sins of the young.
Impiety (irreverence, want of a pious fear), a root
of every evil, especially those of an impure tendency.
— Piety a root of everything nolile. It has two
branches: 1 . devoutness ; 2. moral cultivation. The
harmony of Shem and Japheth. O, that it were so in
our times. How they should mutually feel the obli-
gation to cover their father's nakedness ; that is, in
tliis ca.se, the harm of the earUer time and tiadition.
What glorious effects would come from the harmony
of Christendoni and civilization ? Shem, Ham, and
Japheth: 1. All three distinct characters and types;
2. regarded as two parts, they are two sons of bless-
ing, one child of the curse; 3. as one group. Ca-
naan the servant of Shem and Japheth. Jaiihcth
the guest and the domestic inmate of Shem. — The
blessing of Noah : 1. Its most universal significance;
2. its Messianic significance. — Noah's joy, .sorrow
and consolation after the flood : 1 . Ti:.e exjiandin^
race ; 2. the new development of evil ; 3. the pre-
signal of the patriarchal faith.
Stauke : Jncliriatiis e-it, ■ion quod viliosua (ssel
CHAP. IX. 18-jy.
34?
^d quod inexpertus meniturce asstimeruke. Basil. —
yoak ad unius horte ebriftatem nudnvit femornJia
y!ia, 'iwe per spxrenfos aiwos contejrerat. Ilieron. —
Qu'-tn iantie moles aquarum non viceranty a inodu'o
vitin viclus est. Epiiraem (X.italis Alexiinder i. p.
228 ; Etrictas htcc non xolum innoxia xed et mi/stica
/i,it Hieronymus interprets the planting of the
Tine of the planting of tlie Church ; Noah oxposcil,
he iiittrpreta of Christ on the cross ; Ham, of the
Jews, ami so on. In a similar manner Augustine).
(As it happens to people ii; sleep, when they become
warm; they uncovei' themselves uaconsciously to get
air; and so it happened to Noah.) The sin of ex-
cess cannot be excused by the example of Noah.
This transgression did not, however, cast him out of
the grace of God; for we see that in the prophetic
spirit he announces the future destiny of his sons,
which certainly could never have happened if the
Spirit of God had departed from him. But none the
less holds true in this respect what Lutlier says,
namely, that they who go too far in excusing the
patriarch thiow away the consolation which the
Holy Spirit has deemed it necessary to give the
Church in the fact that the greatest saints do some-
times stumble and fall (Ps. xxxiv. 9). — The nobler
the gift, the worse the abuse (1 Cor. ix. 7 ; Sirach
xxxi. 35 ; 1 Tim. v. 23). — Ham : Sic in sacro Dei
asi/lo ititer tatn patwos diabohia unun servahis est.
Calvin. — Hkdinger: The spreading of sin is just as
much an evil as the perpetration of sin. — Lant.e : The
curse went not forth properly, against the spiritual
in men, as though beforehand they had been declared
to have forfeited eternal life, but properly against the
corporeal only. So it was, that among the Canaan-
ites there were some who were actually blest (there
•re cited as examples the cases of Melchisedek and
the Gibeonites). Even :\t this day, it is true that
Japheth dwells in the tents ol Shem, since the prom-
ised land has come into the hands of the Turk in-
stead of the Egyptian sultan. This appears also in
a more spiritual manner, since in the New Testament !
heathen and Jews have become one in their conver-
sion to Christ. (Noah's long life after the flood is
represented as designed to instruct his posterity in
the knowledge of God.)
Gkrlach : It is worthy of remark, that the father
of Prometheus in the Grecian fable, and who was a
giant, bears the name of Japetus. — litJNSES: Ver. 18
is the introduction to an old family tradition con-
cerning the irreverence and dissoluteness in the fam-
ily of Ham, with special reference to Canaan.
C.vLWER Handbuch : Noah's human sin regarded
as excusable, gives occasion to Ham's inexcusable
ein. The curse comes mainly upon Canaan, since it
was just in his race that the most shameless and uu-
oatural abominations prevailed. At the present day
the last trace of this people, together with their
^u^me, haa disappeared from the earth. The highest
distinction is that which God hath appointed foi
Shem. It is the propagation of the kingdom of God
by means of his descendants (John x. 16). Ldther-
And 30 there was a real scandal in the case, in thai
when Ham stumbled upon his father's drunkennesa.
he judged him wrongly, and even took safisfacti->»
in his sin.
Schrouf.r: Valer. Herbergf.r ■ Here vill th»
reviler say, this is the text for me ; Noah behaved
himself in a sottish and unseemly way, and there-
fore may I do the same. Hold, brother. Noah't
example serves not at all your turn. Only once in
his life had Noah overshot the mark ; but how oft
hast thou already done as much ? Noah did not do
it purposely or wittingly. The lesson thou art to
learn from Noah is not drunkenness, but to guard
thyself from drimkenness, that thou mayest not,
through his example, come to mischief, and cause a
scandal. Wouldst thou be joyful, so let it joy re-
main. Pleasant drink, and wholesome food God
grudges not to thee. Drink and eat, only forget not
God and thine hour of death. Neither forget the
death of Christ; on this account it w.as, that formerly
the image of the cross was made in the bottom of the
tankard. Let a man come to the table as to an
altar, says Bernhard. In the weakness of Noah there
is enkindled the wickedness of Ham. '' Then saw
Ham." Love covers; he (Ham), instead of veiling
his father's nakedness, only the more openly exposes
what he had left uncovered. As a son he trans-
gresses against his father ; so, as a brother, would
he become the seducer of his brother. — Calvin : Hi?
age did not excuse him. He was no merely mis
chievous boy, who, in his inconsiderate sport be
trayed his own thoughtlessness, for he had alrendj
gone beyond his hundredth year. Luther; Whilst,
in other cases, the servant has only one master, Ca-
naan here is the servant of two lords, therefore
doubly a servant. (In this w-ay, indeed, it is, that
by Shem he is drawn to piety, whilst by Japheth he
is educated to a human civilization.) — The sins of
Ham, as the deep stain of the Hamitic race in gen
eral. Farther on the writer speaks of the corruption
of Canaan, and the evil reputation of the Phtpniciana
and Carthaginians.
Caltin : Shem holds the highest grade of honor.
Therefore it is that Noah, in blessing him, expresses
him.self in praise of God, and dwells not upon the
person. Whenever the declaration relates to soma
unusual and important pre-eminency, the Hebrews
thus ever ascend to the praise of God (Luke i. HS). — >
Japheth: God gives cnl.argement to the enlarged. —
Ldthek : Since Abraham, in his fiftieth year, had so
good and excellent a teacher in Noah, he must have
had quite a growth in doctrine and religion. — Her
berger: Fear not the cross, since here thou hast
before thee one wfio bore it for nioe hundred ani
fifty years.
344 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
THIRD SECTION.
The Ethnological Table.
Chapter X. 1-32.
1 Now these are the generations [genealogies] of the sons of Noah; [theywere] Shein,
Ham, and Japheth ; and unto them were sons born after the flood.
1. The Japhethites (vers. 2-6).
2 The sons of Japheth ; Gomer [the Cimmerians, in the Taurlan Chereonesns ; Crimea], and MagOB
Soythians], and Madai [Medes], and Javan [lonians], and Tubal [Tiberenl], and Meschech
3 Mosohi], and Tiras [Thracians]. And the SOUS of Gomer ' ; Ashkenaz' [Germans, Asen], and
4 Riphatli [Celts, Papiilagonians], and Togarmah [Armenians]. And the sons of Javan"; EH-
shah' [Elis, aiolians], and Tarshish [Tartessus; Kuobel: Etruscans], Kittim [Oypnans, Carians], and
5 Dodanira [Dardanians], B_7 these were the isles [dwellers on the islands and the coasts] of the
Gentiles [the heathen] divided ° in their lands; everyone after his tongue, after their fami-
lies, m their nations.
2. Tlie Hamites (vers. 6-20).
6 And the sons of Ham ; Gush [Ethiopians], and Mizraim ' [Egyptians], and Phut
7 [Lybians], and Canaan I Canaanites, Lowlanders]. And the SOUS of Cusll ; Seba [Meroe
and Havilah [Abysslnians], and Sabtah [^ihiopians in Sabotha], and Raaniah [Eastern Arabians ,
and Sabtecha [Ethiopian Caramanians] : and the sons of Raamah ; Sheba and Dedan
8 [SabEean and Dadanic CuBhites, on the Persian Gulf]. And Cush begat Niuirod [we will rebel] : he
9 began to be a mighty one in the eartli. He was [he became] a mighty hunter before the
Lord'; wherefore it is said, Even as Nimrod [is he] the mighty hunter before the Lord.
10 And the beginning of his kingdom was Babel [Babylon, see ch. xi. 9], and Erech [Orehoe],
11 and Accad, and Calneh [Ktesiphon], in the land of Shinar [Babylonia]. Out of that land
went forth Asshur' [Assyrians], and builded Nineveli [city ofNinus], and the city Rehoboth
12 [city markets], and Calah [Kelach and Chalach ; completion]. And ReseU [bri-dle] between Nine-
13 veh and Calah; the same is a great city. And Mizraim begat Ludim [Berbers? Maurita-
nian races], and Anamim [inhabitants of the Delta], and Lehabim [Libyans of Egypt], and Naph-
14 tuhim [middle or lower Egyptians], And Pathrusim [upper Egyptians], and Casluhiui [Cholcians ,
out of whom came Philistim [emigrants, newcomers], and Caphtorim [Cappadocians! CretansT .
15 And Canaan begat Sidon [sidonkms, fishers] his firstborn, and Heth [Hittites, terror ,
16 And the Jebusite [Jebus, Jerusalem, threshing-floor], and the AmoritS [inhaliitants of the hills ,
17 and the Girgasite [clay, or marshy soil], And the Hivite [paganus?], and tlie Arkite [inhabit-
18 antsofArka, at the foot of Lebanon], and the Sinite [in Sinna, upon Lebanon], And the Arvadite
Arabians on the island Arados, north of Ti-ipolis], and the Zeniarite [inhabitants of Simyra, on the western
foot of Lebanon], and the Hamatllitii [riamath, on the northern border of Palestine] : ami afterwards
19 were the families of the Canaanites spread abroad. And tlip border of tlie Canaanitea
was from Sidon as thou comest to Gerar [city of the Philistines], unto Gaza [city of Philistines,
stronghold] ; as thoii goest unto Sodom [city of burning |, and Gomorrali [city of the wood], and
Admah [in the territory of Sodom, Adanmh 1], and Zeboini | city of gazelles or hyenas], even tintO
20 Lasha [on the east of the Dead Sen, earth cleft]. These are the SOUS of Ham, after their &mi-
lies, after their tongues, in their countries, and in their nations.
3. The Shemites (vers. 21-31).
21 Unto Shein also, tlic father of all tiie children of Eber [on the other side], the brother
of Japheth tiie elder [Lange, more correctly, translates, elder brother of Japheth], even tO him were
22 children born The children of Sham ; Elam [Elymmans, Persians], and Assiiur [Assyrian!^
CHAP. X. 1-32.
345
and Arphaxad [Arrapachltis, in Northern Assyria, fortress, or territory of the Chaldeeansj, and Lur
23 [Lydians in Asia Minor], and Aram [Aramteans in Syna, highlanders]. And the children of Aram ,
Uz [Aisites? native country of Job], and Hul [Celo-Syria], and Gether [Arabians], and Mash
24 [Mesheg, Syrians], And Arphaxad begat Salah [sent forth]; and Salah begat Eber [fromthi
25 other Bide, emigrant, pilgrim]. And unto Eber were bom two sons : the name of the one wae
Peleg [division] ; for in his days was the earth divided ; and his brother^s naaae wa»
26 Joktan [diminished; by the Arabians called Kachtan, ancestor of all the Arabian tribes]. And JoktaD
begat Almodad [measured], and Sheleph [Satapenians, old Arabian tribe ofYemen,drawer»iofthesvrord J,
and llazarmaveth [Hadramath, in S. E. Arabia, court of death], and Jerah [worshipper of the raocntOL
27 the Red Sea], and Hadoram [Atramites, on the south coast of Arabia], and Uzal [Sana, a city in Yemen],
28 and Diklah [adistrictin Arabia, place of palm-trees]j And Obal [in Arabia, stnpped of leaves], and
Abimael [in Arabia, father ofMael, the Minseans?], and Shcba [Sabseans, with their capital city, Saba].
29 And Ophir [in Arabia, probably on the Persian Gulfl, and HaVllah [probably Chaulan, a ditttnct between
Sanse and Mecca, or the ChanlotBB, on the border of stony Arabia], and Jobab I all these were SOns of
30 Joktan. And their dwelling was from Mesha [according to Gesenius, Mesene, on the Perman
Gulf], as thou goest unto Sephar [mmyaric royal city in the Indian Sea, Zhafar]. a inount of thf
31 east. These are the sons of Shem, after their families, after their tongues, in their lands,
32 after their nations. These are the families of the sons of Noah, after their generations
[genealogies], in their nations : and by these were the nations divided in the earth after
the flood.
t* Ver. 3. — "ITDS, Gomer (G M R). These radical letters are found extensively combined in the history and geography
of Europe ; as though some early, rovins people had left the mark of their name from the Pontus, or Black Sea, to Ir^
land: GMR., KMR.. X y M MeRii (0/m7neWa/is), by metathesis, K R M., CRiMea, QUU., 3ermani, CyMRI,
Cymri, Cimbri, Cumbri, Cumberland, Humberland^ Nfirthumberland, Cambria^ etc. They may not be aU ety mi 'logically
connected, but there is every probability that they were left by the same old people, ever driven on Westward by suc-
cessive "waves of migration. T3311'K , Ashkenaz, by metathesis T3U.'3K , Aksenaz, Axenas, may be the old name for the
Black Sea, or the country lying upon it. The Greeks called it aferoj, for which they accordingly found a meaning in
their own language — the inhospitable — afterwards euphemized to eufetfos— the Euxiue.— T. L.]
[2 Ver. 4. — 'p^, Jwan, Javnn, hoan, Ion. There can be no doubt that this is Greece. Compare Joel iv. 6; Ezek.
xxvii. 13 ; Dan. viil 21. It is the name or patrial epithet of Greece in the cognate languages, as given to it iu historical
- p 7 ' I r *
terms : Syriac, (.aJo.^ , Chald. ""DT^ , Ai-ab. .Lj^J ^ and also by the Greeks themselves, when they would present
the name in its old. Oriental form; as in the Perste of -iEschylus, when the mother of Xerxes is made to call them
laocc?, and theii' land yijv 'laorw;' (line 175), and in another place, 563, Sia 5" 'laorwc x^P"5. See also, Heeod., i. 56, 58.
nir"'bi{ , 'EAAa?. C^DnT , in some Hebrew copies D^:"!"! , which the LXX read, and rendered PdSiot.— T. L.]
[3 Ver. 5. — ^I'lSS , were parted. Maimonides says this term was applied to the Japhethites because of their &t
roving, which parted them from each other in separate isles and coasts ; whereas it is not said of Ham's descendajit^
because they were near to each other, forming dense and contiguous populations. — T. L.]
[* Ver. 6.— D'^lS'G . This dual name has been supposed to denote the political division of Upper and Lower Egypt.
It would seem more likely to have a geographical significance : The N^arrows— the two narrows, or the double narrows —
the straits. What could be more descriptive of this long and very narrow strip of territory, lying on both sides of the
Nile, many hundred miles in length, and averaging only a dozen or so in breadth. It is strange th:it Rosenmullcr should
Bay of this name, that it is uncertain whether it is Hebrew or Egj-ptlan. It is purely Hebrew, and no other j^roper name
in the language t'ver had a clearer significance. This appearance of extreme narrowness, with mountains or deserts on
each side, must have suggested itself at the earliest date, whereas, the other idea must have had a later origin. The son
of Ham, who first settled Egypt with his children, must have been at once struck with this tenitorial peculiarity, so
diSerent from anythme; in the Northern or Eastern regions, whence he came. The name which he cave to it afterwards
came back to him as its settler and proprietor. There is reason to suppose that Mitzraim was not his earliest name. It
was rather a territorial designation, afterwards genealogically and historically adopted. The origiial name of this first
settler may Iiave been Gupl, Copt, or Cupht, from which came the other popular designation, Al-yuirr-o?, Egypt. — T. L.]
[* Ver. 9.—" Mighty hunter (whether of men or beasts) mrf "^izh before the Lord," to express his notoriety foi
boldness and wickedness, as something ever before the divine presence ; so bad, that God could not take his eyes from it
Compaxe with it Gen. vi. 10, the whole earth corrupt, C^H'^X ^3Sb .— T. L.] .
[• Ver. 11.— "l^lSJX N^" . In support of the view that "lITlJX here denotes the place whither^ mstead of being thi
■ti5jer(ofthe verbXS^, Maimonidesrefersto Numb, xxsdv. 4, 5, riDiaSi' "13^1 irix nsn N3^1 . "and it went ou
(to Hazar-addar, and passed over (to) Azmonah ;'* also to Numb. xxi. 33, ^SIIS ^lysri ~bl3 an" XS^I , " And Og
king of Bashan, went out (to) Edrei ; " in neither of which cases is there a preposition'. He' refers alac' tc Uicah v. 3k
irhere " Asshur and the land of Nimrod " are mentioned together.— T. L.]
GENERAL REMARKS ON THE ETHNOLOGICAL
TABLE, OR THE GENEALOGICAL TREE OF
THE NATIONS.
1. 77ie Liter aiure. - '^ee Matthew, p. 19; the
present work, p. 119; Kurtz : "History of the Old
Testament," p. 88 ; Knorel, p. 107; Keil, p. 108;
t full and w »ll-a'^anged survey see in Delitzsch,
p. 287 ; also the notes in Delitzsch, p. 629. 9ee
also the articles, Babe!, Babylon, Nineveh, and Meso-
potamia, in Herzog's Real-Encyclopedia. Layard>
account of *' Excavations at Nineveh," togethei
with the "Description of a Visit to the Chaldasac
Christians in Kurdistan, and to the Jezidi or Wor
shippers of Satan." German of Meissner, Leipsic
346
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
1862. Here belong also the " Ethnographical
Works, or the National Characteristics," etc : Laza-
rus and Steinthal. " Journal of Popular Psycho-
logy." Berlin : Dumler, 18.t9. Berghaus, Friedrich
von Raumer, VorlanJer, nnd others.
2. Tlie basis of the genealogical table. -Accord-
ing to Iliivemik and Keil, tliis document was ground-
ed on very old tradition, and had its origin in tlie
time of Aljraham. According to Knobfl, the knnwl-
edge of the nations that is represented in it, liail its
origin, in great part, in the connection of the He-
brews with the Phoenician Canaanites. Di'litzsch
assigns its composition to the days of Joshua. The
eigns of a high antiquity for this table present them-
selves unmistakably in its ground features. There
jelong here: 1. The small development of the Ja-
phethan line ; on which it may be remarked, that
they were the people with whom the Phoenicians
maintained the most special intercourse ; 2. the jiosi-
tion of the .j^thio] >ians at the head of the Hamites,
the historical notices of Nimrod, as also the supposi-
tion that Sodora and Gomorrah were then existing;
3. the discontinuance of the Jewish line with Peleg,
as well as the accurate familiarity with the branch-
ing of the Arnbian Joktanites, who have as much
space assigned to them alone as to all the Japheth-
ites, when for the commercial Phoenicians they would
be of least significance. The table indicates various
circles of tradition — more universal and more spe-
cial. The Japhethan groups appear least develojied.
Besides the seven sons, the grandchildren of Japheth
are given only in the descendants of (iomer and Ja-
van, in the people of anterior Asia, and in the inhab-
itants of the coasts and islands of the Mediterranean
Sea. Magog, Madai, Thubal, Meshech, and Tiras are
carried no farther. The table certifies a very copious
tradition of tlie Hamites. First, there are mentioned
the four sons of Ham, then five sons of his firstborn,
Cush, then tlie two sons of Raamah, the fourth son of
Cush. These two are, therefore, great-grandchildren
of Ham. Nimrod is next presented as a specially
prominent son of Cush. Then follows the second son
of Ham, Mizraim, with six sons. The sixth, Caslu-
hiin, is again presented in the mention of the Philis-
tini and Cafihtorim, who are, therefore, also great-
grandchildren of Ham. Phut, the fourth son of Ham,
is the only one who is carried no farther. The fifth,
Canaan, appears with eleven sons ; namely, Sidon,
the ancestor of the Phoenicians, and the heads of the
other t'anaanitish tribes. Shera, finally, has five
sons, of whom, again, Elam, Asslmr, and Lud, are
no liirther deveUipid. The liin' of his son, Aram,
afipcars in four .sons, grandchildren of Shi-m. Of ihf
sons of Sheni, Arphaxad is treated as most important.
The line goes from .^hem through .\ri»haxaii and Sa-
lah, even to the great-grandchild, Eber. Eber tbrnis
the most important jioint of connection in the Slienii-
tic line. Willi his son Pidcg tlie earth is ilivided ; that
is, tliere is fornicd the strong monotheistic, Abra-
hamic line, in contrast with the line of liis brother
Joktan and the Arabian Joktanites. Joktaii is devel-
oped in thirtc'-n sons, great-grandchildren of Sliem.
From this survey it appears: I. Tliat the table
has a clear and full view of the three ground-types
Or points of di-[)arture of the Noachian humanity —
Bbem, Ham, Japlictli. It however, inverts the order
of the iiairies, because Shem, a.s the ancestor of the
people of the promise, is the peculiar point of aim
in the rejiresentation. Japheth, however, conies
6r8t, because, since the history of Israel stands in
oeareet recifrocal connection with that of the Ham-
ites, the Japhethites in this respect take the back
ground. 2. The table has, in like manner, a cleai
view of the nearest descendants of the three soni
of No.ah, of the seven sons of Japheth, of the fouj
eons of Ham, and the five sons of Shem. It pr©
sents us, therefore, the sixteen ground-forms of com
mencing national formations. 3. In the case of five
sons of Japheth, one son of Ham, and three sons of
Shem, the genealogy is not carried beyond the grand-
children. 4. In respect to the Japhethites, it doei
not, generally, go beyond the grandchildren ; among
the Hamites it passes through the grandchild,
Raamali, to the great-grandchildren ; so, likewise,
through the grandchildren, the Casluhim ; among
the Shemites, through Aiphaxad, it proceeds to the
great-great-grandchildreu, and these, tlirough th(
great-great-grandchild, Joktan, are carried one step
farther. 5. The table occupies itself least with the
Japhethans; beyond the Medes, the people of Mid
die .\s!a and the eastern nations generally come tit
farther into the account. It appears, however, t(
have little familiarity with the Phoenicians proper
since it only makes mention of Sidon, .^ liilst it ex-
hibits a full acquaintance with the Egyptians, with tht
inhabitants of Canaan, and with the Araliian tribes.
In this peeuUar form of the table lies the mark of itf
very high antiquity. 6. It contains three fundamen-
tal geographical outlines, one political, and besides
this, an important theocratic-ethnou'raphic notice.
Geographical: 1. The mention of the spreading of
the Javanites (lonians) over the isles and coasts of
the Mediterranean; •!. the spreading of the Canaan-
ites in Canaan ; 3. the extension of the Joktanites ir
Arabia. Political: The first founding of cities (ot
states) by Nimrod. Theocratic: The division of the
world in the time of Peleg, the ancestor of Abrah<am.
Kurtz recommends the following as fundamental
positions in deciding on the names in the ethnologi-
cal table: 1. The names denote, for the most part,
groups of people, whose name is carried back to the
ancestor ; the race, together with the ancestor, form-
ing one united conception. 2. Moreover, the one
designation for a land and its inhabitants, must not
be misapprehended ; for example, the names Ca-
naan, Aram, etc., pass over from the land to the
people, and then from the people to the ancestor.
3. In general, tlie table proceeds from the statnx in
quo of the present, solving the problem of national
origin formally in the way of evolution (unity for
multiplicity), but materially in tlie way of reduction,
in that it carries back to unity the nations that lit
within the horizon of the conceiving beholder. The
last position, however, hardly holds of the sons of
Noah himself; just as little can it be applied to the
genealogies of the Sheniitic branching. In regard,
thill, to the sources of the table, Kurtz also remarks :
"together with Heiigstenberg and Delitzsch, we re-
gard the sources of this ethnological table to !,ave
been the patriarchal traditions, eiiri' hed b; the
knowledge of the nations that had reached the Isra-
elites through the Egyptians. Hengstenherg had
already begun to make av.ailable, in proof of thU
origin, the knowledge of the peoples that was ex-
pressed on the Egyptian monuments. In assigiiiai
its composition (as a constituent element of Genesis)
to about the year IIMIO B. c, Knobel must naturally
regard the ethnological knowledge of the Phojiiicianf
as its true source." On the significance of the table,
the same writer (Kurtz) remarks: "Now that the
sacred history is about to leave the nations to gc
their own way, the preservation of their namef
CHAP. X. 1-32.
34:
indicatee, that notwithstanding this, they are not
wholly lo?t to it, and that they are not forgotten in
the counsel of everlasting love. Its inierost for
the Old Testament history consists partieularly in
this, that it presents so completely the gcne.'ilogi-
cal position which Israel holds among the nations o(
the earth. It is, moreover, like the primitive history
everywhere, in direct contrast with the phiiosophenns
and myths of the heathen." In relation to the idea,
that henceforth the nations are to be suffered to go
their iwn way, Keil reminds us of Acts xiv. IB ; in
rfclation to the prospect of their restoration, he de-
scribes the ethnological table as a preparation for
the promise of the blessing which is to go forth from
the promised race over all the races of the earth (ch.
xii. 23). For the historiealness of the ethnological
table, Keil presents the following arguments : 1 . That
there is uo trace of any superiority claimed for the
Shemites ; 2. no trace of any design to fill up any
historical gaps by conjecture or poetic invention.
This is seen in the great differences in the narration
as respects the individual sons of Noah ; in one case,
there is mention made only to the second ; then
again to the third and fourth member ; of many the
ancestors are particularly mentioned ; whilst in other
cases the national distinctions alone are specified ;
so that in respect to many names we are unable to
decide whether it is the people or the ancestor that
is meant to be denoted ; and this is especially so be-
cause, by reason generally of the scantiness and un-
reliability of ancient accounts that have come down
to us from other sources concerning the origin and
commencements of the nations, many names cannot
be satisfactorily determined as to what people they
really belong.
Against the certainty of this ethnological table,
there have been made to bear the facts of linguistic
affinity. The Phoenicians and the Canaaiiites are as-
signed to Ham, but their language is Shemitic. Tuch
ascribes this position of the people aforesaid among
the Hamites to the Jewish national hatred, and would
regard it as false. But on the contrary, it must be
remembered that the Jews, notwithstanding their
national hatred, never denied their kinsmanship with
the Edomites and others. Knobel solves the philo-
logical problem by the supposition that the Canaan-
ites who migrated to that country might have re-
ceived the Shemitic language from Shemites who
had previously settled there. Add to this that the
affinity of the Phoenicians and Canaanites with the
Hamitic nations of the south seems to be establish-
ed (Kurtz, p. 90; Kadlen, p. 23.^). As to what
concerns the Elamites on the Persian Gulf, wo must
distinguish them from the eastern Japhethic Per-
sians. Besides these philological difficulties, there
has been set in opposition to the ethnological table
the hypothesis of autochthonic human races. We
have already spoken of this. And again, say some,
how, in the space of four hundred years, from Noah
till the Patriarchal time, could such a formation of
races have been completed? On that we would re-
mark, in the first place, that the American and Ma-
layan races have only been known since the time of
modern voyages of discovery. The Mongolian race,
too, does not come into the account in the patriarchal
Age. There is, therefore, only the contrast between
the Caucasian and the JitMopic. For the clearing
up of this difficulty, it is sufficient to note : 1. The
extraordinary difference, which, in the history of
Noah, immediately ensued between Shi-m and Ja-
oheth on the one side, and Han on the olner ; 2. the
progressive specializing of the Hamitic type in con
nection with the Hamitic spiritual tendency towardi
its passional and the sensual ; 3. the change that tool
place in the Hamitic type in its oiigintd yiehling con
i'ormity to tlie effect of a southern climate. Th«
Hamitic type had, moreover, its imiversal sphere as
the ^thiopic race ; this constituted its developed
ground-form, whilst sitigle branches, on the othei
hand, through a progress of ennobling, might mak(
an approach to the Caucasian cultivatioti.* Thai
Shem and Japheth, however, iti their nobler tenden
cy, should unite in one Caucasian form, is not to be
wondered at. The great difference between the
Shemitic type and the Japhethan, as existing withii
the Caucasian, is, notwithstanding, fully acknowl-
edged. Since, however, the Shemitic type in its no-
bler branches, may make transitions to the Cauca-
sian ; so also may sefiarations from the Japhethio
and Shemitic form, perhaps, the Mongolian and the
American races, in consequence of a common ten-
dency (see KoRTZ, p. 80. " The Direction of the
Noachidse.")
There have also been objected to the table
chronological difficulties ; in so far as it forms a mid-
dle point for the assumption of Jewish and Christian
chronology. According to Bunseu, the time before
• [Caucasian CuUivolion. Cau&isus, or Caucasia, de-
notes, geographically, the region between the Black and
Caspian Seas. Ethnologically, no term is more indefinite.
If we take it of the territory above indicated, it may be truly
said, that its inliabitants were, at this early time, and long
afterwards, the lowest in the human scale. Where it waa
not a^aTo<; 6p77jata,as described by ^Eschylus, it was occupied
by trilies proverbial for their barbarism. " The savage Cau-
casus " (aTrdydpttiiro^, aTfpKTjt;) becomes a name for all that wag
most rude and ferocious. See the accouiit given by Herodo-
tus of the wTCtched hordes that then lived the lowest no-
madic life between these two seas, dir t}A7)s aypirj^ fuJovTo,
deriving theli- sustenance from the wild products of the for-
est, painting themselves with the figures of animals, and
li\'ing like them, in ways so gross, that Rawlinson and others
omit the passage in their translations, — /iift*- re tovtwi' rdti
avOputtriov elfat kfi^avia Ka.Ta.iTep Totai. Trpo^arocai. llEROD.
i. 203. To say that the Egyptians and I'hcenicians, 01
the Hamites in general, or any single branehis of them,
"thi-ougb an ennobling (diirc/t rerede/«j|^j might make an
•approach to the Caucasian culture,*' that is. lie raided higher
in the scale ot civilization, would be very much like ascrib-
ing a similar elevating influence to the Finns and the Lap-
landers, as exercised upon the French and English. The
savage, as we now understand the teim, was not the piami-
tive condition of mankind ; but the earliest appearance of
it as a degeneracy, as a loss of the humaiw-ness, of spiritual
superiority, and "a tendency to the wilder animal state, pre-
sented itself in this very region. The mhahitants have
shown the same ever sinci'. No part of the earth, geograph-
ical iv kno\\-n, has had less of a history, or been less connect-
ed w^th history (if that is a criterion of ethnological rank)
than this boasted Caucasia, or Circassia. The Kalmuc, and
other Tartar tribes that even now roam its wilds, though
perhaps possessing a more comely personal appearance, like
the wild horses of the same region, .are inferior in civiliza-
tion, and in some kinds of liter.ary culture, to the inhabitanti
of Bomou and other kingdoms of Central .\frica, in which
the old Egjrptian and Ethiopian humane-ness has not wholly
gone out, or has been kept alive through Arabian influence.
The sons of Japheth, who went north, were the earliest of
the human race to become wholly savage, and the longest
to continue such, until m>t, at a much later day, by the
Southern and Mediten-anean streams of civilization carry-
ing with it the Christian cuUus. Even the Javanites, thfl
Greeks — not the earliest Pelasgi, merely, but the later Hel-
lenes and Dorians — were, for a long time, the Barbarians,
is compared with the Egyptians and the Phoenicians. Se«
how Homer everywhere speaks of these older and more civ-
ilized peoples, aji compared with his own countrvmen. Tha
ancieot stream of light has s nc« turned nortiiward, as it
may again be deflected to the south ; but all the boasting
about Caucasian supremacy is m the face of history. It is a
carrying of the most modem ideas, and the most irrational
of modern prejudices, into our estimate of the ancient world,
or of the huiiian race, during much the greater part of it^
existence.— T. I*]
o48
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK Of MOSES.
Christ must be reckoned at 20,000 vears, — namely,
to the flood, 10,000, and from the flood to Abraham,
7,000 (see, on the contrary, Delitzsch, [i. 2',)1).
Taking these 20,000 years, the ante-Christian human-
ity loses itself in a Thohu Vahobu running through
many thousand years of an unhistorical, beastly ex-
istence, wherein the liumau spirit fails to find any
recognition of its nobility.
Dehtzsch, in his admirable section on the ethno-
logical table, remarks, p 286 : " The line of the
promise with its chosen race, must be distinguished
from the confusion of the Oentiles ; such is the aim
of this great genealogical chart, and in accordance
with which it is constructed. It is a fundamental
characteristic of Israel, that it is to embrace all na-
tions as partakers of a like salvation in a participa-
tion of hope and love, — an idea unheard of in all
antiquity beside.* The whole ancient world has
nothing to show of like universaUty with this table.
The earth-describing sections of the Epic poems of
the Hindoos, and some of the Puranas, go greatly
astray, even in respect to India, whilst the nearest
lands are lost in the wild and monstrous account that
is given of them. Their system of the seven world
islands (tlvipax) that lay around the Meru, seems oc-
cupied with the worlds of gods and genii rather than
with the world of man. (Lassen, in the "Journal of
Oriental Knowledge," i. p, 341 ; Wilson, TOc Vishnu
Piiranit). Nowliere is there to be found so unique
a derivation of the national masses, or so universal
a survey of the national connections. A tinge of
hopeful green winds through the arid desert of this
ethnological register. It presents in perspective the
prospect that these far-sundered ways of the nations
shall, at the last, ccme together at the goal which
Jehovah has marked. Therefore does Baumgarten
complete the saying of Johannes von Miiller, "that
history has its bi-ginning in this ethnological table,"
with a second equally true, "that in it also, as
Its closing limit, sliall history hud its eud." We
may undervalue this table if we overlook the fact
that, in its actual historical and ethnological ground-
features it presents, symbolically, a universid image
of the one humanity in its genealogical divisions.
We may overvalue it, or rather, set a false value
upcin it, when we attempt to trace back to it, with
full confiilence, all the known nations now u[ion the
earth. Even the number 70, as the universal sym-
bol of national existences, can only be deduced from
it by an artificial method ; as, for example, in Dk-
LiTzscH, p. 289. It is only in the symbolical sense
that th<' catalogue may be regarded as amounting to
this number.
Neither can we derive this subdividing the na-
tions to such a inuitiplic'ty of national life, from the
IMufusion cjf languages at Babel, The natural sub-
divi.sion of the peojile has something of an ideal
aspect; the increased impulse given to it at Babel
had its origin in sin. We regard it, therefore, as a
• [The most secluded people in ancient times, the only
one posKeHvSini?, a nd carrymRwilh them in their historv, a
Korla^idca, and thiti datint? from the very eajiiest pi-n'od !
Bee Gen. xxviii, 11, and still earlier, Gen. iii, 1.^ : "in tlioc
ftcd in thy si-ed 'iliall all the fiimilics of the earth ho hlessed,"
This certjiinly prcHi-nts the JewiHli n.itirm in a most remark-
able liKlit, dvmaTidiiiK the (itiention ni all who talk ahout
tjie nliilN-oi)liv of liiHloiy, iinrl e.jn-cially nf tliose who arc
r<irid of deHcrii)ln-.' the Old ToHtament a.s jirenenlini; an out-
irard, nan«w, ai d exclaKive eeoiiomy. IIow tmiversal the
influence of Grecian culture and Koiiian connueHt, \ei nei-
ther of Ihem hud what may he culled a world-idea,' or any-
Uiing like the Mei4iianic conception.— T. L.)
Strong proof of the canonical intuition that tiiii
ethnological table precedes instead of following the
history of the tower-building, Kurtz treats the his
tory of Babel as earlier than that of the register ; sni
Keil, too, would seem inclined to identify the diversitj
of the nations with the confusion of tongues (p, 107).
After these general remarks, « e will confine out*
selves to the most necessary particulars.
EXEGETICAIj and CKITICAIi.
1. Vers. 2-5, — The Japhelhites. — Gomer. — Th(
Cimbri, as well as the Cutiiri/ or OiKitri/ iu Wales
and in Bretagne, are to be regarded as in relation
with the Cimmerians. They represent the north-
western portion of the Japhethaii territory. — Magog
appears to represent the whole northeast, as the
Scythians, in the most general way, denote the cycle
of the northeastern nations. "The Sarmatians, for
the most part, he to the west. The chief people in
the army of Gog, Ezek. xxxviii. 2, 3 ; xxxLx. 1, is
'rx". , that is the Rossi, or Russians." Knobel.
— Madai; the Medes, who inhabit the south nnd
Southwest. — Javan, belonging to tlie south, the
Graeco-Italian family of nations. — Thubal and Me-
shech as well as Thogarma, inhabiting the middle
tracts: Iberians, or Georgians, Armenians, Poutus,
the districts of Asia Minor generally. — Gomer's
Sons: Ashkenaz is referred to the Germans, by
others to A.sia Minor, the .\siones. Ashkenaz is ex-
plained by Knobel as denoting the race of .\sen.
The oldest son of the Germanic Mannus was called
Iskus, equivalen; to Ask, Ascanios. — Riphat is re-
ferred by Knobel to the Celts, by Josephus to the
Paphlagonians ; in which there is no contradiction,
since the Celts also (the Gauls) had a lionie in Asia
(Galatia). — Thogarma. — The Armenians to this day
call themselves the House of Tliorgi>m or Thorko-
matsi. — Sons of Javan : Elisa is referred to Ehs
and to the ^Eolians, Tarshish to Tartessus, and also
to the Etruscans, whom, nevertheless, Delitzsch holds
to have been Shemites ; Kittim is referred to the
Cyprians and the Carians ; Dodanim to the Darda-
nians.
2. Vers. 6-20.— TVic Hawiten. The three firsi
sons of Ham settled in Northern Africa. 1, The
.(Ethiopians of the upper Nile; 2. the Egyptians ol
the lower Nile ; S. the Libyans, west of the Egyp-
tians, in the east of Northern Africa. The Cushites
appear to have removed from the high northeast
(Cossce), passing over India, Babylonia, and .\rabia,
in their course towards the south; for "iu these
lands the ancients recognized a dark-colored people,
who were designated by them as Jitliinjiians, and
who have since, in part, j^erished, whilst a few have
kept their place to this day," Kudbel, — Mizraim.
— The name denotes narvowintj^ cjiclosinii ; its dual
form <icnotes the double Egypt (upper and lower
Egypt); AlyuTrTin is probably from Kah-ptah, land
of l*'ali. The old Egyptian name is Kemi, Chomi,
(with reference to Ham), — Canaan. — Hetween the
Mi-diterranean Sea and the western j^hore of Jordan.
— The name Pa>ni (Puni), allied to ((joi-dv, blood, and
(poii'iiv, blonii-red, denotes the Pho'nieiiins in theil
original Hamitic color. — Sons of Cush. Seba. —
Meroe, which, at one time, aeeoiding lo .foseiihns
was called Seba. — Chavila. — In the Se|ituagint,
EiiiAa. The Macrobiaus (or long living), .Ethiopians
of the modern Abyssinia. — Sabta. — Sabbata, a capi
tal city in Southern Arabia. " To this daj there i»
CHAP. X. 1-32.
34£
in Yemen and Iladramaut a dark race of men who
•re distinct from tlie light-colored Arabians. So it
is also in Oman on tlie Persian (iulf." Knobel.
— Raamah. — Septuagint: 'P€7iua, in Southeast era
Araliia — Oman. There, too, there are obscine imli-
cations of Raamah's sons Sheba and Dedan. — Sab-
techa,' — Dark-colored men on the east side of the
Persian Gulf, in Caramania. — Aside from these,
Nuyirod \a also made prominent as a son of Cush,
vers. 8-12. Knobel regards this section as a Jeho-
ristic interpolation, and so does Delitzseh. The
name Jehovah, however, as occurring here, is no
proof of such a fact ; it comes naturally out of the
accompanying thoughts. The only thing remarka-
ble is, that Nimrod Is not named in immediate con-
nection with the other sons of Ciish, but that the two
sons of Raamah go before him. It is, however, easy
enough to be understood, that the narrator wished
first to dispose of this lesser reference.* Interrup-
tions similar to it are of repeated occurrence in the
table, as is the case also in other genealogies (1 C'hr.
ii. 7 ; xxiii. 4, 22). — He was a mighty hunter. —
'• The author presents Nimrod as the son of Cush,
putting him far back before the time of Abraham,
and as.^igns him to the ^Ethiopian race. In fact, the
classical writers recognize .(Ethiopians in Babylonia
in the earliest times. They speak, especially, of an
..Ethiopian king, Cepheus, who belongs to the mythi-
cal time, and there is mention of a trace of the Cephe-
nians as existing to the north of Babylon." Knobel.
In the expression, " he began to be a hero, or a
mighty one upon the earth," there is no occasion for
caUing him a ''postdiluvian Lamech" (Delitzseh).
He began the unfolding of an extraordinary power
of will and deed, in the fact mentioned, that he be-
came a mighty hunter in the presence of Jehovah.
The hunting of ravenous beasts was in the early
time a beneficent act for the human race. Powerful
huntsmen appear as the pioneers of civilization ; a
fact which clearly proclaims itself in the myth of
Hercules. And so the expression, " Nimrod was a
mighty hunter before Jehovah," may mean, that he
was one who broke the way for the future institu-
tions of worship and culture which Jehovah intend-
ed in the midst of a wild and uncultivated nature.
There is iinother interpretation : he was so mighty a
himter, that even by Jehovah, to whom, in other re-
spect.s, nothing is distinguished, he was recognized as
such (Knobel ; Delitzseh) ; but this seems to us to
have little or no meaning. Keil holds fast to the
traditional interpretation : in defiance of Jehovah,
and, at the same time, takes th: literal sense of
auimal-lmnting in connection with the tropical sense
of hunting men, so that he explains it, with Herder,
as meaning an ensnarer of men by fraud and force.
Neither the expression itself, nor the proverb : " like
Nimrod, a mighty hunter before the Lord," justifies
this view. By such a proverb, there may be denoted
1 praiseworthy, Herculean pioneer of culture, as well
as a blameworthy and violent despot. In truth, the
chase of the animals was, for Nimrod, a preparatory
exercise for the subjugation of men. " For him anil
[* Maimonides seems to give a better explanation of this.
He says : "These, Seba and Havilah, were heads of peoples,
and the sons of Raamah became two peoples : but Nimrod
did not become a people (genealogically), wherefore the
Scripture saith t-imply, and ' Cush begat Nimrod,' and not,
the 'sons of Cush were Nimrod, and Seba, and Havilah.' "
That if, Nimrod does not come in the ethnological register
of peoples, though he L'* mentioned afterwards as a histori-
•al person. He applies the same principle of interpretation
A other similar cases. — T. L.l
his companions, the chase was a training for war, ai
we are told by Xexopho.n [Kiineffete, C. i.), the oW
heroes were pupils of Ciiiron, and so, /ia^rtrai kuvti-
yeuiuy, disciples of the chase." Di'litzsch. — And
the beginning of his kingdom was Babel,— •
K.NOBEL; " His yz'r.s^ kingdunj in contrast with hij
seecuid." This, however, is not necessarily involved
in the expression, " the beginning." It denote*
rather the basis. In thus playing the hero, Nimroa
established, in the first place, a kingdom that em^
l)raced Babel, that is, Babylon, Erech, or Orech, in
the southwest of Babylonia, Akkad (in respect to
situation 'Akktittj), in a northern direction, and ir
tlie .Northeast, Calueh, in respect to territory corre-
sponding to Chalonitis, or Ktisiphon, on the east
shore of the Tigris. This establishment of an em-
pire transforming the patriarchal clan-govenmienta
into one monarchy is not to be thought of as hap-
pening without force. The hunter becomes a subju-
gator of men, in other words, a contjueror. — Out of
that land went forth Asshur. [Lange translates:
Out of that land went he forth towards Asshur.j
— The Septuagint, Vulgate, and many interpreters
(Luther, Calvin) regard Asshur as the grammatical
subject, and give it the sense : Asshur went forth
from Shinar. On the contrary, the Targum of Onke-
los, Targum of Jonathan, and many other authorities,
(Baumgarten, Delitzseh. Knobel) have rightly recog-
nized Nimrod as the subject. Still, it does not seem
clear, when Knobel supposes that Nimrod had lefi
his first kingdom for the sake of founding a sec
ond. Moreover, it is not to be supposed that hi
barely extended his rule over an uninhabited terri
tory for the purpose of colonizing it. It was ratbei
characteristic of Nimrod, that he should seek still
more strongly to appropriate to himself the occupied
district of Assyria by the establishment of cities.
The first city was Nineveh (at this day the ruin-
district called Nimrud), above the place where the
Lycus flows into the Tigris ; the second was Reho-
both, probably east of Nineveh ; the third Calah,
northward in the district of Kalachan, in which
there is fouml the place of ruins called Khorsabad
the fourth was Resen, between Nineveh and Calah
— The same is a great city. — The first suggested
sense would seem to denote Resen as the great city,
or as the greater city in relation to the others named
with it. On the contrary, remarks Knobel : Reser
is nowhere else mentioned as known to antiquity
and could not possibly have been so distinguished
as to be called in this short way l?ie great city. Rath'
er does the expression denote the four cities taken
together, as making Nineveh in the wider sense, and
which, both by Htbrews and Assyrians, was thus
briefly called the great city." According to Ktesias,
it had a circumference of four hundred and eighty
stadia (twenty-four leagues), with which there well
agrees the three days' journey of Jonah iii. .3 ; it em-
braced the quarter founded by Nimrod, out of which
it grew in the times that followed Nimrod, whin the
Assyrian kings gradually combined the four places
into one whole; thus the whole city was named Nin-
eveh after its most southern part. The ancient
assertions respecting the circuit of the city are con-
firmed by the excavations. " These four cities cor-
respond, probably, to the extensive ruins on the east
of the Tigris, that have lately been made known bj
Layard and Botta, namely, Xebi-Junus and Kujund
schik, opposite Mosul, Khorsabad, five leagues north
icnd N'imrud, eight leagues north of Mosul." Keil
See also the note (p. 112) on the agreement of Raw
s&o
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
liiison, Grote, Niebuhr, and others, as opposed by
the ooiijeetures of Hilzis and Bunsen. — The sons
of Mizraim: 1. Ludim. As distinguished from
clio Sheniiiic Ludira, ver. ii ; Movers regards it as
the old Berber race of Levatah that settled bv the
Svrtis, — so o;Uled after tin; manner of other collect-
ive names of the Mauritauiaii races. According to
Knobel it was the Shemitic Ludim, who, after the
Egyptian invasion, were called Uyksos. This is in
the face of tlie text. 2. Anamim. This is n-f.'rred
by Knobel to the Egyptian Delta. 3. Lehabim.
.Egyptian Libyans, not to be confounded with -'S.
tlie Libyans proper. 4. Naphtuhim. According
to Knobel, the people of Phthah, the god of Mem-
phis, in Middle Egypt; according to Bochart, it
agrees with Ne<pdvs, that connects with the northern
cuast-line of Egypt. 5. Pathrusim. Inhabitants of
Pathros, Meridian land, equivalent to Upper Egypt,
or Thebais. 6. Casluhiiu. The C'olchians, " who,
according to Herod., ii. c. 105, had their descent
from the Egyptians." This may probably be held
of one branch of Mizraim ; whereas the origin of the
Cushites themselves would seem to point back to
Colchis (see Gen. ii.).— Out of whom came Philis-
tim. — The name is explained as meaning emigrants,
from the JSthiopian word fallasa. According to
Amos ix. 7 ; Jer. xlvii. 4, the Philistines went forth
from Caphtor. We may reconcile both these decla-
rations, by supposing that the beginning of the set^
tlement of the Philistines on the coast-line of Canaan,
had been a Ca-.luhian colony, but that this was after-
wards strengtheneil by an immigration from Caphtor,
and then their territory enlarged by the dispossession
of the Avim, Deut. ii. 23. — And Caphtorim. — By
old Jewish interpreters these are described as Cap-
padocians ; they are regarded by Ewald as Cretans.
Both suppositions may agree in denoting the course
of migration taken by the Caphtorim — The sons
of Canaan : — " Notwithstanding the Shemitic lan-
guage, the Phoenician Caiiaanites arc here reckoned
among the Hamitic nations, and must, therefore,
have had their origin from the South. In fact, an-
cient writers affirm that they came from the Ery-
thraean Sea, that is, from the Persian Gulf, to the
Mediterranean. And with this agrees the mythology
whicli makes the Phoenician ancestors, Agenor and
Phoenix, akin, partly to Belus in Babylonia, and
partly with Egyptus (Danaus the ^Ethiopian)." Kno-
bel. 1. Zidon. Although originally the name of a
person, this does not exclude its relation to the fa-
mous city so called, T2£, primarily, to lay nets ; it
appears, however, to denote fishing as well as hunt-
ing pro))er. Sidon was the oldest city of the Phoeni-
cians. 2. Heth. This also stands as the name of a
person, whereas the designations of the Canaanites
that follow have the form of national appellations.
In this position of Heth, together with Sidon the
first-born, they would appear to be denoted as tlie
peculiar point of departure of the Canaanitish lite.
The Uittilcs (llcthitesj on the hill-land of Judah,
and t specially m the neighborhood of Hebron, were
only a braiicli of tlie great original lliltite family
(1 Kings X. 29; 2 Kings vii. 6). The Kittini also,
and the Tyrians, arc, according to Knobel, compre-
hended in this name. 3. The Jebusites. Distin-
guished as the inhabitants of the old .luliu.s, Jenisa-
lem. 4. The Amorites. On the hill-land of Judah,
and on the other side of Jordan, the mightiest family
of the Canaanites ; therefore may their nuiiie eiii-
far»ce all Canaanites (chs. xv. IC ; xlviii. 22.) 5. The
Girgasites. (ch. xv. 21 ; Deut. vii. 1 ; Josh. iii¥
11) ; their relation to the Gergesenes (Matt. viii. 28
is very uncertain. 6. Hivites (or Hevites) ii
Sichein (ch. xxxiv. 2), at (Jibeon (Josh, ix. 7 ), and
at the foot of Hernion (Josh. xi. 3). " The live lasl
sons of Canaan dwelt nortliw.ird in Phoenicia." Kno-
bel. The Arkites. Denoted from tlie city Ar''a
north of Sidon. The Sinites, named from the citj
Sina, mentioned by Hieronymus, still farther north
More northern still the Zemaiites, named fioiu the
city Simyra (Sumrali, by the moderns). Farthest
north the Arvadites ^also on the island Aradus) ;
on the northeasi. the Hamathites, name from the
city Hamatli, still existing. — And afterwards were
spread abroad. — This spreading extends from the
Phoenician district along the coast. The Kenites,
mentioned ch. xt. 19-21, the Kenezites, and the
Kadmonites, are regarded by Delitzsch as people of
Hiimitic descent. So also the Rephaim, besides
whom there are s.iU farther named the Perezites.
The same thing may probably be said of the Geshu-
rum, mentioned 1 Sam. xxvii. 8. The Susim and
Emim, ch. xiv., he (Delitzsch) holds to be not Ca-
naanites, hut a people of a later introduction (p. 300).
An immigration of Sheniites must, in truth, have
preceded that of the Hamites into Canaan. — The
sons of Shem (vers. 21-31 ). The father (ances-
tor) of all the cliildren of Eber. — This declara-
tion calls attention beforehand to the lact, that in
the sons of Eber the Shemitic line of the descend-
ants of .\braham separates again in Peleg, namely,
from Joktan or his Arabian descendants. 1. dam.
Elamites, the most easterly Shemites who dwelt from
the Persian Gulf to the Caspian Sea ; at a later day
they are lost, together with their language, in the
Persians. 2. Asshur. Assyrians to the east of the
Tigris, from thence extending towards Syria and Asia
Minor. Their mother-country was a plain; hence
the name (from ^ItS). Their Shemitic language also
underwent a change, and became foreign to the He-
brew. 3. Arphaxad. Their dwelling-place was in
Arrapachitis, on the east side of the Tigris, from
which they spread out; by Ewald and Knobel it is
interpreted as referring to the Cbaldseans, whicli
Keil, however, regards as uncertain. 4. Liud. The
Lydians of Asia Minor, related to the Assyrians (see
Keil, p. 114; by Knobel they are referred to the
Canaanite and Arabian races). 5. Aram. Arama^
ans, in Syria and Mesopotamia. — The sons oi
Aram ; Uz and Gether, probably Arabians ; Hul
and Mash, probably Syrians.— The sons of Ar-
phaxad: — The names Salah and Eber {sending
forth and passing over) denote the already com-
inencing emigration of the Abrahamic race. The
two sons of Eber are called Peleg [division) and Jok-
tan {diminished, s?nail). With them there is a divi-
sion of the Abrahamic and the .\rabian lines. Peleg
is the ancestor of the first. This is the ex[ilanatinii :
in this manner was it that "in his day the earth was
divided." Kabri interprets this expression of a catas-
trophe that took place in the body of the earth,
whose form was then violently divided into the later
continental relations (in his treatise on the " Origin
of Heathenism," 1859) Delitzsch inteiprets it aa
referring, in general, to the division of the earlier
pojiulation ; Keil explains it of the division that took
place in con.sei|iiencc of the building of the tower of
Babel.* Knobel refers ihe language of the separa-
• [ThiB would BeL'm to be the interiiretaliun which nu'nl
readily commends itself to the plnln reader. Tho divifinl
utthe earth is referred to as something easily known frrn
CHAP. X. 1-32.
35
tion of toe two brothers, Peleg and Joktan, in which
Joktan and liis sons took their way to the south.
We find here indicated the germ of the facts by
which the earth, that is, the population of the earth,
became divided into Judaism and Heatlienisni. For
the separation of Abraham is no immediate or sud-
den event. The interrupted emigration of Terali had
been previously prepared ii\ Salah and Ebei' ; fully
80 in Peleg. Therefore is Peleg's son called IVf .
friend of God. In contrast with Salah (the sent),
Eber (the passing over), and Peleg (the separating,
division), Serug denotes agiin the complicated or cn-
taugled, Nahor, the panting, possibly the inejfectual
itriviup, and, finally, Terah, the loitering, the one
who tarries on the way. Then comes Abram, the
high father, with whom the race of the promise de-
cidedly begin?. We have no hesitation in taking
these names as at the same time historical and sym-
Dolicai. — The sons of Joktan: In their midtiplieity
they present a remarkably clear figure of the Arabian
tribes. " Thirteen names, some of which can still
be pomted out in places and districts of Arabia,
whilst others have not, as yet, been discovered, or
have been wholly extinguished." Knobel. Concern-
ing their strife, and perhaps, too, their merging in
the Ilamites, who were iu Arabia before them, com-
pare Knobel, p. 123— The beni Eahtan, sons of
Joktan, or Joktanidffi, form their leading point of
view in Northern Teman. 1. Almodad. Tliename
El Mohdad is found among the princes of the Djor-
homites, first in Yemen, and theii in Hedjez. 2. She-
leph, the same as Salif, the Salapenians in a district
of Yemen. 3. Hazarmaveth, the same as Iladra-
maut (court of death), in Southeastern Arabia, by
tlie Indian Ocean ; so named because of the un-
lealthy climate. 4. Jereh. Sons of the moon, wor-
shippers of the moon ; south from Chaulan. 5. Ha-
ioram. The Adramites, on the south coast of Ara-
bia. 6. Uzal, One with S.anaa, a city of Yemen.
'?. Diklah, meaning the palm ; probably cultivator
ot' the palm-tree ; they may be placed conjecturally
iu the Wady Nadjran, abounding in dates. 8. Obal.
Placed by Knobel with Gebal and the Gebanites.
9. Abimael. Father of Mael ; * undetermined.
10. Sheba. The Sabaeans, a trading people who.se
capital city is Mariaba. 11. Ophir. Placed by
Knobel to the southwest of Arabia, the land of the
Himyarites. Lassen, Ritter, and Dclitzsch, remove
Uphir to the mouths of the Indus. For the differ-
ent views, see Gesenius. It woiUd appear, how-
ever, that the point of departure for Ophir must still
be sought in Arabia. I'J. Havilah. District of
Chaulan, in Northern Y'emen ; probably also colo-
nized in India (seeDELiTzscH, p. 3ii8). 13. Jobab. —
And their dwelling vraa from Mesha Con-
what is contained in the narrative, or is soon to be men-
tioned. Had there not been such a division so prommently
put forth in the xith chapter, there might be r^ome room for
speculation. But the obvious connection seeras to shut out
every other view : He was called Peleg (di^Tsion), for in his
iay did that great event take plnce th:it is soon to be men-
tioned, and wiiich is the ground of all these gen^logical
divisions. See Bochaet : Phaleg.—T. L.]
* [ 55<73"^3N:. , Abi-mael — a kind of naming similar to
that by which Ham was designated, '"jr "'HX , Abi-
Canaan, father of Canaan, a method which afterwards be-
comes quite common among the ^ijabians. In this, and in
the appearance of the article in Tliisbx , El-modad, ver.=;e
26. above, we have germs of peculiar forms in the Arabic
dialect, showing thit it was already deviating from the He-
Drew, or the HebieT from it, whichever may have been the
sdeat. -T. L.
cerning these undetermined bounding districts o\
Mesha and Sephar, compare Keil. — AJad by thes*
vrexe the nations divided. — A preparation lb>
what follows, see the next chapter.
DOCTKINAL AND ETHICAL.
See the Esegetical.
1. The religious significance of the ethnologica
table : 1. Personal characters form the basis of the
human world ; the relation of God to humanity is
conditioned by the personal relation of God to per-
sonal being. The revelation of salvation, therefore,
tends also to take upon itself a genealogical form.
The ethnological table is the extended ground-outline
of the relation between God and humanity, and ol
those that men bear to one another. The genealo-
gies are trees of human life that God has planted.
2. In tlie christological point of view, the genealogi-
cal table is the prefiguration of the universality of
the gospel, corresponding to the universality of the
divine love, grace and compassion. 3. It gives us a
clear idea of the regular gravitation of humanity to
its centre in Shem, Eber, Abraham, Christ ; that is,
the genealogy of Christ. 4. As the branching of the
three principal races places them in contrast, so, iu
a special manner, is this the case with the branching
of the Hamitic race into the better lines, and in the
Canaanites; and so also the branching of the Shem-
ites, or that of the sons of Eber in the line of the
deseendantsof Joktan, and iu the line of the promise.
5. The signs of preparation for the later calling of
Abraham are already contained in the names of his
ancestors from Salah and Eber onward.
'1. On the names Babel and Nineveh, compare
the Theological dictionaries ; on the history of Babel
and Nineveh, see the historical works. We must be
careful here, not to confound the beginning of tliis
very old city, including in it the Babylonian tower,
with its later world-historical developtnent, and its
falling into ruin. Nevertheless, even the ruins of
that city are still a speaking witness, not only for
the fulfilling of the dirine predictions and threaten-
ings, by the prophets, but .also of the historical con-
sistency and truthfulness of these very narrations in
Genesis. Concerning the geographical relations,
especially the situation of Babylon on the Euphrates,
and of Nineveh on the Tigris, compare the maps of
the old world in the Bible-atlas of Wellaiid and Ack-
erman ; the Historico-Geographical Atlas of the Old
World, by Kiepert; the Atlas of Kutscheit, and oth
ers. Already, in Xenophon's lime, Nineveh lay in
ruins ; according to Strabo, it perished with the As-
syrian Empire (see in Ueiszog's "Real-Encyclopedia''
tiie article on the Ruins of Nineveh). Babylon waj
much broken by the Persian kings, especially by
Xerxes ; Alexander the (ireat would have restored
it, but contributed only the more to its destruction ;
the founding of Seleucia laid it in ruins. As Seleu-
cia lies opposite to the ruins of Babylon, so doea
Mosul to those of Nineveh.
3. Starke : In this chapter we see the origin of
many nations in all parts of the world, and therefore,
the power of the blessing which God, after the flood,
had renewed to men in respect to their mnltiplyuig
and propagation ; and so, finally, we learn the fathers
from whom Christ was born according to the tiesh.
Neither Noah nor his sons begat any offspring during
the time of the flood. The same may be conjectured
to be true of the animals which were shut up with lii™
352
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
in a dark dungeon, and as it were in the midst of
death. — Ljxge: Many readers, when they come to
>his tenth chapter, are wont to regard it as of little
talue ; some really think it to be superfluous, or of
ittle use, on account of su many unknown names
But. in truth, we ought to regard it as a right noble
eem in the crown of Holy Writ, the like of which
las never been, or can be shown, from any writings
of the old heathenism that yet remain to us.* —
Gerlach : There is no account of antiquity wliich
gives us so full and so general a survey of the an-
cient nations, as this ethnological table ; as appears
om the fact, that the exactness and truth of the
national divisions as presented in the same, are ever
more and more confii-med. The heathen had no
other relations to people who were foreign to them,
than those of war and trade, with the addition, per-
haps, of a certain community of religious legends,
Knowledge, and culture ; irrespective of this, how-
ever, each nation remained shut up within itself.
In the history of revelation, on the. other hand, be-
fore the narrative of the dispersion of the nations
stands the promise that Japheth shnll find a home in
he tents of Shera. — Bu.sses : So much is now clear,
jiat the races of Shem are the Shemites of philology,
this is not clear at all ; just as little, in fact, as that
the Gallic Franks must be of Romanic origin. Com-
pare in other places the learned explanation of the
ethnological table by Bunsen. Says the same author-
.ty (vol. i. part 2, p. 63): " The ethnological table is
the most learned among all the ancient documents,
and the most ancient among the learned. For tra-
Jition predominates far above research, though the
itter is not wanting. In its core it must be regard-
ed as earlier than the time of Abraham ; but this
,y no means excludes the idea that Moses may
nave made investigations respecting it." So says
Schroder : " Frocii this chapter must the whole uni-
versal history of the world take its beginning." To
tlie same effect Job. von Muller. Citation of the
Historical catalogues of Heathen nations, as they are
found in the palace of Kamak, a ruin of the old city
Thebes, in Bendidad, and on the monuments of Per-
•epohs. These have throughout a national charac-
ter. Ninii'od's chase of the beasts was the bridge
of transition to the hunting of men (Jer. xvi. 16 ;
Lam. iii. 52 : iv. 18 ; Matt. iv. 19 ; Luke v. 10).
4. On the numbering of the seventy nations,
which the Rabbins make out of this table, as De-
Utzsch farther constructs it, see Keil, p. 116. De-
litzsch traces a rcl-.ition between the seventy peoples,
and the seventy disciples, Luke x. 1, and designates
the number as that of the divinely-ordained multi-
plicity of the human. Probably, also, the name
of the Septuagint has reference to the heathen na-
tions for whom the Alexandrian translation of the
Old Testament was designed. Keil objects, tliat the
numbering cim only cotne out clean and round when
we assign the name of naiions to Salah and Eber.
ButSalah might have actually had more sons. And,
besides, it is not necessary that the symbolical num-
oers should always literally correspond to the histor-
ical. This frei|uent appearance of the number sev-
enty resolves itself into some early symbolizing.
Beven is the number of God's work, including his
• [Itinafl CRMntlal to an imderetandinpr of the Bible,
•ad of bUtory In [foncral, as is ilomcr'a ciitalopiu, in thu
laoond book of ttic Tliful. to a true knowledge of the flo-
neiic poems and ttie Homeric times. The Bll)lic:il fltutlent
MB no more uudervalaetbeone than tbeclatisica] student
btothPT.-T. LI
holy day of rest ; ten is the number of the perfect
human development ; the seventy nations were,
therelbre, the entire outspreading of God's host, un
der his rule.
5. Nimrod's despotic power, at least if we judge
from the name, w.as denoted as a rebellion, as a rev-
olution. It partook of both forms of revolution
against the divine ordinance: 1. From above down-
wards ; 2. from below upwards ; of which the first
seems, in truth, to have been the oldest.
HOMILETICAI, AOTD PRACTICAL.
In the homiletical treatment of the ethnological
table, we must, of all things, avoid giving way to un-
certain and etymological and histoiical ctmjectures.
It contains, however, enough points of certainty to
make it a page of Holy Writ rich in life and instruc-
tion. Thereto belongs the threefold division of the
nations according to the names Japheth, Ham, and
Shem, the wide, wide, world-wandering of Japheth,
in which the grandchildren and great-great-grand-
children disappear from the horizon of the theocratic
consciousness ; the early ripe, yet most ancient de-
velopment of the Hamitic culture, with its corrup-
tions, in which the ungodly Cainitic culture once
more mirrors itself; the reciprocal intercourse of the
Shemites and the Hamites in the early time ; finally,
the gradual, yet authentically historical preparation
for the calling of Abraham, and for the Messianic
theocracy in the line of Shem. If the sermon is
designed with reference to the ethnological table,
the best ground will be furnished by taking directly
ch. X. 1, or Deut. xxxii. 8 ; or better still, some New
Testament text most appropriate for the purpose, as
Matt, xxviii. 19 ; John x. 16 ; Acts xiv. 16, 17 ; sv.
18; xvii. 26; Rom. xi. X2; Eph. iii. 6; 1 Pet. iv. 6,
Rev. xxi. 24. — The baptism of the flood a forerun-
ning emblematic baptism of the whole human race
As God kuows the name of the stars (that is, theii
most interior being, Isaiah xl.), so does he likewise
know the name of all men and of all races (Matt.
xxii. 32). The theocratic, believing consciousness
hath ever proved itself to be tdso a humanitarian
consciousness, or one that embraces all humanity- —
The higher significance of historical tradition. — Ths
commendation of the world's history in the history
of tiod's kingdom. — The relation between the history
of God's kingdom and the world-history: 1. The
contrast; 2. the connection; 3. the unity (in its
wider sense is the whole world's history a history
of the kingdom of God). — Shem's history, the last
in the world, the first in the kingdom of God. — The
elect and their appointment to be salvation for all. —
The distinction: 1. Among the sons of Noah ; 2. of
Japheth ; 3. of Ham ; 4. of Shem — Nimrod's three-
fold position: 1. As the pioneer of civihzation ; 2. as
oppressor of the p.atriarchal Uberties; 3. as the instru-
ment of God tor the development of the world. — Pe-
leg, or the dividing and the uniting again of humanity.
ScBRciDER: Al' these sons, the white posterity
of Japheth, the yellow and dark sons of Ham, how-
ever they may live in temporal separation, are all
still God's children, and brothers to one another.
[Excursus on the Hebrew Cbronoloqt — TBI
STATE of the PRIMITIVE MeN THE RaPID BeOIN-
NiNOS OF History. The brief Hebrew chronology
is urged as an objection to the Scriptures. Hence
the tendency, even among believeis, to prjfer th»
CHAP. X 1-32.
3.=>:i
numbers given in the Septuagint. There is hardly
time enouffh, it is thought, for the great liistorical
commencements, and the scale on which they ap-
pear, so soon after the flood. Others, like Lepsius
and Bunsen, wonld go very far beyond the LXX.,
carrying up ihe human chronology, and that of the
Egyptian monarchy along with it, twenty thousand
years before tlie time of Christ, and twelve or fifteen
thousand ^•ears before the flood. The main ground
of this theory is not so much the monuments, though
Bunsen has much to say .about them, as an assump-
tion respecting the earliest condition and slow prog-
ress of the hmnan race. With regard to the monu-
ments, on which so much reliance is placed, there is
not space, nor occasion, to say mucli here. Those
who refer to them with most confidence have to ad-
mit that there is great dilliculty in determining their
meaning as well as their historical authority, even
if rightly interpreted. It is made a question, too,
whether, in many cases, they represent successive
or cotemporaneous dynasties. Their barrenness in
respect to almost everything else but names, detracts
Uso from their clironological testimony. Like the
Chaldean, Hindoo, and Chinese statements, they are
hardly anything else but numbers. There is Utile or
no filling up of these blank statisticstl spaces with
anything like a veritable life-like history. Had
much that is on these monuments been found in the
early Scriptures, it would have made them the scoff
of the infidel and tlie rationalist. There is. however,
one concise argument, which, if rightly considered,
ought to dispose of the whole matter. Egypt was
visited, two thousand three hundred years ago, by a
most intelligent Greek, whose v;iluable history has
come down to us entire. In faithful narrative of
what he saw, as he saw it, and of what he heard, as
he heard it, Herodotus is excelled by no writer, an-
cient or modern. His pains and fidelity are attested
by those immense journeys, whoso extent would be
deemed a wonder, even with all the facilities of
modern travel. Now this most credible witness saw
these monuments in their freshness, and when they
were as intelligible to the Egvptian priests, as would
be to us the contents of a modern census. They de-
cipher for him these hieroglyphics, now so puzzling,
and give him, as deduced therefrom, what they un-
derstand to be the Egyptian history. It if. contained
in his second book. Can we ever e-xpect a better in-
terpretation than the one made under such circum-
stances, and under the direction of such competent
guides? They had every motive to present their
nation in its most antique and imposing aspect,
knowing, as they doubtless did, that the inquirer
was collecting materials for a history of the world,
as then known. If they erred at all, it would most
likely have been on the side of an exees-sive anti-
quity. And yet, the chronology of Herodotus * may.
• (The Egyptian chronology here intended is that which
ean be made out, though in a very general way, from the
outlines of actual hi>tory as derived by Ilcrodoliis fi-om the
Biormnients, and the priests' interpretation of them, togeth-
er with otlier accounts, traditional or otherwise, which they
give to him. Mcnes was the first king, who stands away
hack at the beginnine of Egyptian history. The next one
of any historical note is Mau-is. who had not been dead 900
year-* when Herodotus was in Egypt, and must have been,
therefore, about 1,350 years before the time of Christ. All
that the priests had between these two wjis conLiined in a
papyrus roll, haviUL' the bare namf.s of 330 monarchs, whom,
if real, a thousand yeai-s, or so, would easily dispose of, on
the supposition of cotemporaneous dynasties, or frequent
revolutioDS, such as Egypt must have had as well as other
bfttions. reducing reigns to one or two years, and many of
2;i
without any great difficulty, be made to agiee with
that of the Bible — certainly with that of the Septua-
gint. In regard to the monuments, such a view
should be deemed conclusive. Herodotus is, aftei
all, the great historical authority in respect to the
antiquity of the Egyptian monarchy ; and he is likely
to remain so, since we have no reason to expect any
interpretation of these hieroglyphics that escaped hia
eager search, or the intelligence of his well-informed
and zealous instructors.
The other ground, that is, the necessity of a veiy
long time to bring about such results in the slow
progress of mankind, is a sheer assumption, inai
may at once be met by arguments drawn from the
intrinsic aspects of the case. It all depends upon
the hypothesis with which we start in respect to
the condition of the primitive men ; end this in-
volves, first of all, an inquiry as to the primitive
m«7i, or the primus hmno^ or whether there ever
really was such a distinct individual, tlie head of a
distinct race, having a supernatural beginning at a
distinct moment of time. Some, who favor the view
of the low primitive condition of man, from which
he struggled slowly up into language and a distinct
human consciousness, making his appearance in his-
tory only after he had been many ages upon the
earth, may still hold to something like a creation of
the species ; but logically it is very difficult to sepa-
rate such a doctrine from that eternal-development
theory, which, in op]iosition to the axiom de nihilo
nihil, or, what is equivalent to it, that more cannot
come out of less, would bring the highest life out of
the lowest forms of matter, and make God himself
(supposing it to acknowledge something under that
name) the end instead of the beginning of nature.
On the contrary, the admission of a creation, in any
intelligible sense of the word, is the admissioii of a
distinct time, a distinct moment of time, when the
thing created began to be, which a moment before
was not. Tliis, however, does not demand the idea
of an instantaneous coming from noiuii.g, or even
de novo, of everything belonging to, or connected
with the new existence, but only the new and dis-
tinct beginnning of that which especially makes ii
wh'it it hy a new, peculiar entity, separate from
everything else. To apply this to man, the origin
of his physical, his earthly, may have been as re-
mote as any geological theory of life-periods, or any
biblical interpretation supposed to be in accordance
with it, may allow. If we admit the idea of growth,
or succession in creation, as perfectly consistent with
supernatural starts regarded as intervening and ori-
f'\ lating its successive processes, then man may have
been long coming from the earth, from the deepest
them to months. Let the reader call to mind how rapidly
emperors succeed each other during some paits of the later
lloman history. These other kings, the priests tell him,
were ^^ persons of no account,^^ with the exception of Mosris,
before mentioned, thus ^howing, that with all their parada
of rolls and dynasties, Mones and Moens were the only two
conspicuous points m the Egyptian antiquity, until 1,400
years before Chrif. Such are the only data for chronol-
ogy, though the Egyptian priests pretend to fill up this
empty, unhistorical space, with 341 generations, makii.^
about 10,000 years (see Herod., li. 100, 142); but this ia
evidently due to that national pride which elsewhere led
to the same extravagant reckoning. They found little or
nothing of record or monument to confirm it, or they cer-
tainly would have civen it to the historian. What they
tell him, that durng this period of 300 genera«)ion8, the sun
had twace ris<'n where he uow sets, and twice srt where he
now rises, is enough to show what historical value belongs
to the empty numbers with which they would fill up this
waste extent of time. See Rawlinson's Herodotus.- T. L.1
354
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
p»rts of the eartli, as is said Ps. cxxxix. 15 The
formation of the human physicsl may have begun
in the eurliest stages of the KTian, or world-building.
The words is? "|'2, "from the du^t," may denote a
process comparati%'ely quick or slow. The essential
faith is satisfied either way; since it only demands
two things — a dual derivation of the completed hu-
manity, and an order, that is, a succession, whether
in nature or in time (or in both), rather than any
precise duration. Even the common notion of an
outward plastic formation of the body implies the
use of a previous nature in a previous material or
materials — that is, a use of them according to such
natures. There is essentially the same idea in the
employment of previous growths and processes, as
in that of previous material, although with the con-
ception of such successions there necessarily cornea
that of time, longer or shorter. How many steps
there were we cannot know ; but in tlius bringing up
the human physical through lower structural forms,
there may have been outwardly approximations to
the human, long before there was reached that hu-
manity proper in which nature and spirit unite.
Without scientific comparison and deduction, the
simplest inspection of nature is sufficient to suggest
the thought that man is built upon types from below
him, even as he is formed in the image of that which
is above him. If then such a view of successive
evolutions from the dust, instead of an immediate
outward plastic formation of the human earthly, be
not inconsistent with the comprehensive language
of Scripture, we should not be startled at the thought
of there having been anthropoidal forms* of various
degrees of approximation, some of them, perhaps,
larger than any now fbtmd upon earth, and which
may have perished, like some of the larger or mam-
moth species of mammaUa. If the explorations of
Bcience liave brought to light any such rem;iins, our
faith need not be disturbed by the question of their
pre-historicalness. The interpreter of Scripture is
little concerned, either in affirming or denying such
discoveries. Whatever be their date, we have not
yet come to the humanity proper, the Adamic hu-
manity, that humanity which Christ assumed and
raises to a still higher sphere- The animal world is
not yet surpassed. But there is n moment when the
human race now upon the earth had its distinct be-
ginning, and that, too, in a. primus liomn, — the "first
Adam " — even as there is a " new man," a new hu-
manity, that is to have its finish or compleiion in a
second .\uani, or last Adam (f.rxaToi A5an), as the
apostle calls him. This beginning of hunnuiiiy upon
earlh was not a physical act merely, or the mere
completion of a pliy.sical progress. It took place in
the spiritual sphere. The true creation of man was
not merely a. formation, or an animation, but an iimpi-
ration, a direct, divine inspiration (Gen. ii. 7); and
now there is what before was not, a nx^~3, a new
• [There in bo much of caricature and Krotesquencss in
the appoaraoc^ nf the simia triljc of animala, that we revolt
at the thiiaRDt of any conni'ctinn with them, even a« a link
In the mere phyBioril. Theii- actions are so aiisurd, thoy
are such a mere mimicry of reason, ludicrous, yet actually
lower than the- sober instinct of other kimls, that the out-
ward rc-embliinw! makes us the more diKdain the idea of
•Ten a phyMic;d relationship. It is thus that t he ape-iuit are
plao^js itself in stronKcr contrast to the human than that of
other animals h:ivinf; less outward likeness, either in form
>T in actioi;. And yet such reseralihmco, in some dcjrrci',
ut very (Tcnerul. There is homothinK in the most ccrainou
*nimal-?:ices around us, that wouhl startle us liy its human
^X)li if we had seen nothing of the kind bofTC. — T. L.I
thing upon earth, not simply something higher phy»
ically (though e^vn that would require a divine in
terveniioti), but an entity distinct as connected with
a higher or supernatural world. This .\damie man
thus divinely raised out of nature, and lifted above
the pure animality, is the one of whom tlie Bible
gives us so particular an account. He was the one
who first awoke to a true rational human conscious"
ness. Thus man "became a Uving soul." The em
phasis is in the manner of the inbreathing ; but to
distinguish it wholly from the animntion of other
kinds who are also called riTi ITEJ, the wondrous
event is described in other language as a sealing, a
forming into a higher type, pattern, idea, or image,
— not physically, but spiritually. The all-important
article of faith is the dual succession, whether re-
garded as an order in time, or as an order of consti-
tution without reference to time : " first the nalurak
(to \|<i/xikJi>', the animal), afterwards that which is
spiritual" (ri irj/Eufiarind^). First that which coined
from nature (tJi 4k 77)5 x"'*"'')) " '''o™ the eartlr,
earthy," second, that " which bore the image of the
heavenly," * or of " the Lord from heaven."
Corresponding to this is the specific designation
by which man is distinguished among the created
orders. The animals and plants are made each
injirb, after its T'O, eiSos, species, form, denoting
difference in organic structure, and therefore some-
thing ultimately outward as exhibited in its last analy
sis, however hidden it may seem to the primary ob
servatiou of the sense. It is not to be thought that
the Scripture writers, in their simplicity, intended to
speak scientifically or philosophically, but a deeper
term was wanted in the case of man, and we have it
in a remarkable change of language. Man is nowher*
said to be in3"'nb, juxta genus siium, or secundum
speciem siiam, but when this new entity is to be
brought into tlie kosmos, God is represented as say-
ing to himself, or as though addressing some higher
associate than nature, " Let us make man IS'obsa
* [There is a vei-y great difficulty iu confining this lan-
guage of the apostle, 1 Cor- xv. ■!(», 47, to the historical in-
carnation, or to the effect of the coming of Chiist at the
beginning of the Christian era. It must refer to something
constitutive of humanity in the beginning, before the fall,
and in the very process of the oecoming man. Otherwise
it would follow, that before such iiistorical advent, man was
an animal merely, wholly eai-thly and sensu d, i|*u;(i«6s,
XoiKof. If the iTvevfjLa ^wottoioDc, the "life-giving sjarit,"
iu distinction from the i|/ux»] C^aaAhc soul of life, or merely
" living Boul," was not in our humanity at its fii-st consti-
tution, then not only Ad.am, but Enoch, Noah, Abraham,
Moses, David, Isaiah, were only natural tiieii, animal men,
having nothing, in a true sense, spii-itiial about tlu*m. If
we would avoid this very strange consequence, the language
rofci-red to must have something of a creative or constitu-
tive sense, and the jrfeii/Aa ^taoTToiovv, mu^t bo regaided as
the ^iOt^ littari^ov -navra avdptawoi', "the Light that lighteth
every man coming into the world" of John i. 9, making, u.
the beginning, that peculiar constitution wliicli wo may call
the completed man, and which was never wholly lost as a
high spiritual power, however muL^h it may have been mar-
red in ils ethical aspect. Christianity is indeed leon-ij ktiVis,
"a new creation,' 2 Cor. v. 17, or the malciig of a "new
man," but this rs not inconsistent with the idea of a resto-
ration, a rc-creatiou, a renewed spirituality, or even the
bringing back to a higher state than that fiom which man
fell. 'I'he second Adam was not absent from the cieation
of the first. In the spititual image of Him who is himself
styled the express image, or hypostatic iiiiage, vapaitTija
vrroaTaatm, lleb. i. 3, was man spiritu.illy foi'med- Through
It ho Ijoearae man, and therefore it is truly said of the incar-
nate Logos, that " he came to bis own ; " and thus also is
lie trilh- bar-nashn, sou of man, the Hebrew ,nnd Ryi-iac teiTB
for the generic Aomo. In his etoruity, and io his historic^
Inoaniation, he la "the root as well as the otispring" of
humanity. — T. L.1
CHAP. X. 1-82.
S5i
.» our imar/e." The D^S , therefore, in the case of
bumanity, may be said to malie the "|"'a, or lo come
ui place of it. fn other words, it is the spiritual
•mage here, and not the physical organization, that
makes the species ; and most important is the dis-
tinction in all our reasonings about the essential
oneness of humanity, and what most truly consti-
tutes it.
From this primus homo, thus inspired, thus
•ealed, comes all of human kind that erer has been,
or is now upon the earth. To apply what has been
eaid to the more direct subject of this note, there is
here the decisive answer to that view which would
represent man as commencing in the savage state
regarded as barely and imperceptibly rising above
the animal. This inspiration is a great and glorious
beginning. It is a new divine force in the earth.
The fall does not at once destroy it, though giving a
tendency to spiritual death, and spiritual degeneracy,
carrying with it a physical decline. Even with ihis,
however, the primitive divine impulse in the first
man, and in the first men, makes them something
very dilferent from what is now called tiie savage
state, and which is everywhere found to be the dregs
of a once higher condition, the setting instead of the
rising sun, the dying embers fa.^t going out, instead
of the kindling and growing flHme. All past and
present history may be confidently challenged to
present the contrary case. Among human tribes,
wholly left to themselves, the higher man never
comes out of the lower. .Apparent exceptions do
ever, on closer examination, confirm the univcrsaliiy
of the rule in regard to particular peoples, whilst the
claim that is made for the world's general progress
can ouly be urged in opposition by ignoring the
supernal aids of revelation that have ever shone
somewhere, directly or collaterally, on the human
path.
The high creative impulse manifested itself in
the Antediluvian period in its resistance to the death-
principle, which, through the spiritual, the fall had
introduced into the human physical organization.
It showed itself in a rapidly developed, though a
suicidal or self-corrupting civilization, in the line of
Cain, and in an extreme longevity in the holier line
of Seth. With a branch of the latter it, passed the
flood, impaireil, it may be, but unspent. The pre-
served race, tending again to a sensual gregarious-
ne.s3. received a new divine impulse, which may al-
most be regarded as resembling a second subordinate
creation. It was not the renewal of holiness, but of
spiritual vigor, making humanity sublime even in its
wickedness. It was the spirit of discovery, sending
men over the face of the before unknown earth. It
was the pioneering spirit, ever leading then on to
make new settlements, to overcome new difficulties,
to engage in great works, all the more astounding
when we consider the little they possessed of what
may be called science. What a grand conception
w.as that of building a tower that should reach unto
the skies, and make them independent of the muta-
tions they beheld in nature ! How has such a
thought, though taking far more scientific forms,
ever swayed mankind, showing itself still in the pre-
tentious claims of our present knowleilge, so boast-
ing, yet so small in comparison with the great un-
known, and so little able to relieve the deep-seated
evils of our fallen race. " Go to," said they, " let
na build a city and a tower," as a defence against
^eaven. It was the same language that was after-
wards re-echoed in the Promethean boast,* and thai
we still sometimes hear fV<)m a godless scitoca
vaunting that it "has annihilated space and tiioe.
that it has disarmed the lightning :
Eripuit ccelo fulmen —
that it will yet deprive the ocean of its terrors, and
introduce, at last, that millennium of liuman achievo
nient which will make man independent of any power
above or without him.
It was but a short time after the flood, when
there appears this new heroic spirit, this vast ambi
tion, in the very opening of the wcji'ld's history.
Scripture gives us but few points in the picture, but
these are most impressive : Nimrod, " the mighty
hunter before the Lord," beginning the kingdom of
Babylon ; settlements rapidly following it on the
upper Euphrates; the descendants of Ham already
upon the Nile; the sons of Javan wending their way
by the islands and coasts of the Mediterranean ; Tyro
and Sidon taking their place " at the entry of tha
sea," as though already looking out to become "the
merchant of the people for many isles." It was
the time of the tower-builders, the pyramid-builders,
the great city-builders, the empire-founders. Along
wiih the pioneering and colonizing spirit, there was
also the associative tendency, so different from any
thing we now see iu any modern savagism. There
was, also, in vigorous exercise, the government idea,
or the government instinct, if any prefer thus to
name it, leading men to tbrm great polities, and to
recognize in government something of a divine or
supernatural nature. We may call it hero-worship,
but it was something very different from anything
now known in savage tribes, and led to results ut-
terlv unknown as ever following froiti such a state.
Such were the primitive men as the Bible pre-
sents them to us, although their mere worldly great-
ness was to the Scripture writers a wholly subordin-
ate subject. Secular history confirms the account.
This it does in two wa>s : 1st, by its silence as to aU
before. If men had been so many ages on the earth,
what were they doing all this time ? What traces
have they left of their existence ? At the most, onlj
a few ambiguous bones here and thei'e discovered,
after the keenest search, and in respect to whose
real antiquity men of science are still contending.
We ask in vain for the marks of progress, or of any
transition state. A speaking silence, like that which
seems to come from the blank chamber of the great
pyramid, proclaims that man, the Adaniic or Noachic
man, is not much older than the pyramids, — two
thousand years, perhaps, a little more or a little less.
If we pay no attention to this striking fact, of the
almost total absence of any human remains, it might,
perhaps, be said, that history only commences after
the emergence from the long savage state, and,
therefore, gives no testimony to the many ages of
human existence that might have be n before it.
This, hortever, supposes a sudden emergence, such
as would seem to demand some new power, some'
thing like a divine or ah extra impulse, unfelt in the
ages before, and which would not greatly differ — at
least in the inarvellousncss and apparent supernatu
ralness of it — from what the Bible tells us of a now
creation of humanity. It would imply someth'.ag
* Totoi' Tra\at(T'n}v vvv napaUKeva^fTai
*0s 6i) K^pavvov KpsiiTtTov' tupjjtrei i^Aoya,
©oAao'CTiat' re yrig TLvaKTeipav t'oaov
Tpiaivav, aixi^t}v rfv HoaeiS'itvoi; aKiSa.
Alsc iylp..;. Prom, Find. 913
356
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
coming into the human movement, greatly accelerat-
ing it, at least, if not wholly originating. It woulii
be something undeveloped, or very suddenly and
strangely developed, from what went before. And
this brings us to the second or positive evidence of
history. If it testifies by its silence, still more im-
pressive is it when it begins to speak, and this is
at the time when something in human action deemed
notable, or worthy of remembrjince, demands its
voice. The strong self-consciousness which is the
result of awakened action immediatelv seeks its
record. The observation of passing times, or chro-
nology, begins with it. It is this commencement of
movement that creates history, whether in writing
of some kind — which there is good reason to believe
was among the very earliest things, and called out
by this very demand for a recording medium — or in
the measured language of song, or in formal tradi-
tions, which, however vague and exaggerated, pie-
sent an expressive contrast to an utterly unrecording
Bilence.
The history that thus begins to speak has not the
exactness of modern annals, but, as compared with
■what might have been expected on the other theory,
its voice is loud and clear. It comes not with mut-
tered tones, inarticulate and unintelligible. Its ut-
terance is more emphatic in the very beginning than
in some of the lapsed ages that follow it. How
much more distinctly stand out the first Pharaohs,
whether of sacred or secular history (see Herod., ii.
100, 101), than the later shadows upon the monu-
ments ! The earliest history bursts upon us, as it
were. It begins with men doing great things, raising
pyramids, building cities," founding states. It opens
with the Egyptian and Babylonian empires, and
that, too, as new powers in fullest vigor, and pre-
senting every appearance of youthful greatness.
The proper names given to us, whether of men or
places, have nothing of the cloudy, mythical aspect,
but stand out with all the distinctness of veritable
life. Le.^s is known of the most early East, of India
and China, but sufficient to warrant the belief, that
by the Ganges, as «ell as by the Nile and the
• [Four preat cities are started in the very "beginning
of Nimrod's kingdom. Babe!, and Ereoh, and Accad, and
Oalneh in the land of Shinar," Gen. x. 10. This is cnn-
firmed by Herodotus. He speaks of it as a remarkable
peculiarity of Assyria in his day — the number and great-
Bess of its cities. They roust have lieen founded in the
earliest times, and by .a people who had a passion for great
structures — -ee Herod., i. 178. Rawlinson regards this
large number of important cities as one of *' the most strik-
ing features of the Assyrian greatness.*' He shows, too,
how icmrokahly it is confirmed by the modem discoveries
am-'ng the vast As-^yrinn i-uins: "Grouped around Nine-
veh were Calah (JV/mrwrf), Scripture Ctilneli ; Dur Sagina
(Khor.-abad) \ Tarbi-^a (.S7(«rj//.7(rtn) ; Ar\ic\ {ArhH) ; Kha-
zeh iSliaTiiamek); and Ae^hur (.S/iirf/uf). Lower down, the
banks of th'* Tigris exhibit an almost unbroken lint^ of
rnins from Tekrit to Bavrhdad, while Babylonia and Chaldea
are throughout studded with mounds from north to soutli,
the remains of the gre:it Ciijntals of u liicli \vc read in tltc
inscriptions. Again, in upper Me8i'pt)tomia, lietweeii the
Tigris and the Khahour, Mr. Layard found the whole coun-
try covered with mounds, the remnanfcj of cities belonging
to the early Assyrian period." Uawmnson's Herodotus,
vol. i p. 243. Those go back tn the very beginnings of his-
tory. They make history. There is none before thorn, as
there iB n'» historical place for them in later annals, when
tbuBe empires began to cnimtde, as Ihev did at a very early
period. S(. everything confirms (he idea, that the pyra-
midH and the gieat structures of Thebes and Memphis bc-
.ong to the very beginnines of Egyptian history. '1 hey are
Bonuments of the priman'ol nieii. From those ruins Ibi'V
yet speak to us of a period of great tietion, of a vast ambi-
tion suddenly manifesting itself, and before which silence
velicDed ov«r all th« earth.— T. L.I
Euphrates, a young humanity was giving e\ideDO«
of mighty bodily powers and high spiiitual ene'gy ,
different, indeed, from the present, and presenting
some aspects strange to our modern conceptions, ycl
veiy unlike the savage state, or a rise from such i
state, had such a rise been ever shown in any ea..y
or later history of the world. In brief — the first his-
torical appearances of men upon the earth are at wf.*
with this theory of savagism. Such independent
emergings as are contended for do not now take
place, and never have tali en place within the tiiues of
known hivtory. The savage comlition, as has been
said, and cannot he deniel, is one ever sinking lower
and lower, until aid is brought to it from without;
and at the early time referred to there was no such
aid except from a supernal and supernatural source.
On either view, we are compelled to admit tlie
fact of a great beginning of humaidty on the earth.
The primitive man was a spletidid being— not seien
tific, nor civilized, in ourmotlern sense of tlie words
but possessing great power, both of body and soul
He had all to learn, yet learned most rapidly. Re
searches among the earliest monuments sometimes
astonish us by the suggestions they offer of a knowl-
edge supposed to belong only to modern times, oi
to which, in some cases, modern discovery has not
yet reacheti. There is brought out evidence of re
suits in the arts, in manufactures, and in the em
ployment of mechanical aids, that we find it ver^
difficult to account for. If we cannot believe them
to have come from processes of investigation strictly
scientific, then must we ascribe them to other pow-
ers of a high order, and in which we fail to surpass
tlictn — such as keen observation awake to every out-
ward application of natural forces, most acute senses,
and imrivalled manual skill. If it was the greatness
of force and magnitude, it was greatness still, such
as was never attained to by any savage people ia
historical times. These early men had great aims,
they attempted great things, and they accomplished
them rapidly. We have oidy to take this view, forti-
fied .as it is by Scripture and the early profane his-
tory, to ticcount for what seems so wonderful to
some writers, and which has drawn them to their
long chronologies. As remarked elsewhere (p. 317),
the history of human progress has ever been one of
starts and impulses. As in the geological ages, so
also within historical times, there are periods in
which more has been done in a few generations,
than, under other eircutnstances, has been accom-
plished in many centuries. Thus the time that in-
tervetied between the Scriptural flood and the first
mention of the Egyptian motuarcliy, even as reckoned
by the shorter chronology, may have brought on the
world*s history faster than ages of cotnparativc tor-
]ior, such as have appeared in the varied annals of
mankind.
Again, there is an intrinsic difficulty in such
views as that of Bunsen, which, when closely exam-
ined, jiresents a gi'eater incredibilitv than anything
of whicli it professes to give the explanation. Ad-
mitting such idea of emeigence after ages of unliis-
torical savagism, still the questions arise: Why wan
not this more universal after it had commenced?
Why did it not appear in other jiarts of *he eartli?
Why iliil the early light confine itself to jnc jicople
for so long a time, inaliing Mihrnjrn historicalli
what it is geographically and etytiiologically, the
narrnwM, a line immense iti length with the scanfiesi
brcailth? During these fifteen thmtsand years, oi
more, of motnitnetital history, all the rest of the
CHAP. XI. 1-tf.
^F,'
•»»th was in comparative night. Established insti-
tutions, a regular nionarcliy for ten thousand years,
at least, king inheriting; from king, or dynasty suc-
ceeding dynasty, a political state unbroken for a
period three times as long as the whole series of
Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, Roman, Mongolian,
and Turkish empires — social orders uninterruptedly
transmitted, records of all this preserved, monu-
ments attesting it ! It is incredible in itself — much
more so when we consider the condition of the rest
of the earth, even the nearest parts. In Egypt,
ten thousand years of govsmment, of civihzatiun, of
advanced agriculture, of social order, and all this
time Greece, Italy, and even Asia Minor, in total
darkness — uninhabit'-d, or in the lowest unhistorical
savagism ! It is very hard to believe this. It pre-
sents a marvel greater than anything recorded in
Genesis about the origin and early condition of man-
kind— gre.iter for the imagination, far j;reatep for the
reason. Egyptian history would be like an Egyptian
obelisk standing in the tiesert, spindling np to a vast
height, whilst all around was desolation in the view
that height presented. Such an antiquity in this one
peoplt', should we reason from it a priori, and con-
nect with it the modern claim of progress, would
throw out of proportion all the other chapters of
history. It would bring the Roman empire before
'he days of Abraham, and make our nineteenth cen-
lUry antedate the Trojan war.
These considerations do not only support the
Sible chronology as prolonged in the LXX., but fur-
lish an argument in favor of the still shorter Hebrew
•eckoning. Taking the primitive men as the Bible
■epresents them, aiid the latter gives ample time for
Ul that is recorded. Connected with this there is
another thought. How came this Hehiew chrono:
ogv to present such an example of modesty as com
pared with the extravagant claims to antii|uity mad;
by all other nations ? The Jews, doubtless, had, at
men, similar national pride, leading them to magnifj
their age upon the earth, and run it up to thousands
and myriads of years. How is it, that the people
whose actual records go back the farthest ha^e the
briefest reckoning of all ? The only answer to this
is, that wliilst others were left to their unrestrained
fancies, this strange nation of Israel were under a
providential guidance in the matter. A divine check
held them back from this folly. A holy reserve,
coming from a constant sense of the divine pupilage,
made rhem feel that " we are but of yesterday,"
whilst the inspiration tl.at controlled their historians
directly taught them that man had been but a short
time upon the earth. They liad the same motive
as others to swell out their national years ; that they
have not done so, is one of the strongest evidences
of the divine authority of their Scriptures. And
how fair is their representation ! Egypt, Babylon,
Assyria, Tyre, the early Javanic settlements, all
starting about the same time, and from the same
quarter of a late inh ibited earth ; this is credible
probable, making harmonious sacred and profane
history. The other view of the long and lonely
Egyptian dynasties is monstrous, out of all propor
tion — incredible. Had the Bible given such a long,
narrow, solitary antiquity of twenty thousand, oi
even ten thousand, years, to the people whose his-
tory it mainly assumes to set forth, it would, doubt-
less, have called out the scoff of those whose sceptical
creduhty so easily receives the fabulous chronology
of other nations. — ^T. L.)
FOURTH SECTION.
The Tower of Babel, the Confusion of Languages, and the Dispemon oj xht Natioti*
,7hapter XI. 1-9.
1 2 And the wliole earth was of one language [lip], and of one speech.' And it came to
pass, as they journeyed^ from the east', that they found a plain in the land of Shinar,
3 and they dwelt there. And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and
burn them thoroughly [literaUy, to a burning]. And they had brick for stone, and shiue had
i tliey for mortar [cement]. And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose
top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name [a signal, sign of renown], lest we be
5 scattered abroad upon the face of tlie whole earth. And the Lord came down to see
6 the city and the tower which the children of men had builded. And the Lord said,
Belioki, the people is one, and they have one language ; and this they begin to do : and
7 now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have in igined to do, Go to, let
us go down, and there confoimd their language [on the very spot], that they m.ay not under-
8 stand one another's speech. So the Lord scattered them abroad from thence upon the
9 face of all the earth ; and they left off to build the city. Therefore is the name of it
called Babel' [forbsba. division of speecli, confusion ; other explanations : ba 23. gate of Belus, S3""13
castle of Beius], 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
S56 " GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
(- Ver. 1. — Z"TnX C^"lZ^^ PnX rtBTU one Up and one words, as near as our English can come to it. T.XX
»«tAo< el Kat i^wfi} fi-La iraat ; Vulg., labii unttu et sermonum eorumdem; the Syriac, ^ww ^ Vkxi^^y-. ^^ f ^ *^ >
one tongTie and one speech ; and eo the Targmn of Oukelos, "in ^^^"C^I in ■ttj'^b . So Greek writers desciibr thos" i
who speak the same lan^age as o^oyAcDrroi and ojno^wroi. Kashi interprets C^"i j1 as referring to tbe thoufjbts anqi
eouQSels rather than to language, regar.ling tliat as expressed by HEC : " They came to an understanding," or *' iiit#
one counsel." Pnx H^r 1X^ ; in which Vitringa agrees with him. Kaulen makes a labored diitinction betwcin TEB
(Ui J C^~— 1 . the first of which he refers to the subjective element in speech, producing the grammatical form, the titha
to the objective, or the words as the matter of language. In proof, he cites such passages as Ps. xii. 3, pipbn TStt!
Hp ofJlaUerits ; Esod. vi. 12, unctrcumcised lip ; Prov. xii. 19, lips of truth, etc. ; Is. sssiii. 19, nS'C ^p"'S" , detp fif'hp
But these examples only show that, when there is no contrast intended, nSO , lip, may be taken generally for lanrtag
(Lke lingua, the tongue ; see ver. 9, below), including not only words and pronunciation, but all of thought and e^ref-
iioii that belongs to it. To show that D'^""T and HEIU are not tautological here, he quotes Ps. lix. 13,'l?;"'rEiU*ia^
the xcord of their lips But this is needless. It is clear that thev are not tautoloi^ical. They express two distinot ideaf: ,
and yet we may doubt whether there is intended such a philosophical antithesis as K;iulen wou'd bricL' out, though most
true in itself, and most important to be considered in the science of language. The first though'i. would be the other way,
namely, that IZT (Adyo?) denoted the subjective, and HBC lip, the outward or objective in language ; since the first it
used of a thought, thing, subject, that which is expressed, as well mb the word or expression. The terms liere are neither
tautological, nor antithetical, hut supplemental and intensive. It is the unity of language described in the most compre-
liensive manner : one lip, that is, one pronunciation, and the same words (C^inx 0^"t!n , every one of them (the plnrei
taken distributively), that is, one name for each thing, and one way of speaking it. When they are put in, direct ocn-
trast, then HDC , instead of the subjective element, as Kaulen maintains, would denote mere sound in distinction from
oense. as in the phrase CTlSb ^^"H , Is. xxxvi. 5; 2 Kings, xviii. 20 ; Prov. xiv. 23— speech of the lips, that is, mere
eiLpty boasting, sound without sense. — T. L.]
['■* Ver. 2.— DS*D33 , literally, in their pulling up. It is used of the taking up the stakes of a tent (see it in its primary
aeLse, Is. xxxvlii' l2>," and is thus pictorially descriptive of a nomadic life, like the Arabic ^_^. . n jg usod ol the
marching in tbe wilderness, and suggests here the idea of an encampment. The descendants of Noah had hitherto kept
v.;;ctherin tbeirrovings.— T. L.]
■ ^ CTp'O —Tendered from the East. Armenia, the supposed landing-place of tbe ark, was northwest of Shinar. Tbia
has .ed s-ime to suppose, that the early human race made a detour through Persia, and so were travelling (}ast when they
came to Shinar. t)tberB have regarded the ark-niountain as situated to tbe east, a view which c-in onlj; be maintained
by supposing the naming of the Armenian Ararat to belong to a later period, as a transfer fromau older and more east-
erly region (see text, note p. 308). The original Scripture does not, of itself, determine tlie location as either east or west ;
so that the Samaritan version, that makes it Serendib (in Ceylon) is not to be rejected, as in itself false or absurd, any
more than tbe Vulgate location in Armenia, or the Targum and Syriac mountains of Kardu, or the Arabian Mount Judi
wherever that may have been. Rashi seems thus to have regarded it when he interprets DIISTD as a journeying from
Cip in (mountainof the East), mentioned just above, ch. x. 30. Others would render n"li5 13 eastTfvard, or to the east, refer-
ring to such paf^sages as Gen. xiii. 11 ; Numb, xxxiv. 11 ; Josh. vii. 2 ; Judg. viii. 11, etc., in all of which, except the first,
the term denotes position instead of moving direction, and may, therefore, be regarded as determined from the standpoint,
real or assumed, of the narrator or describer. Bochart regards -"|P. ^^ a name given to all the country beyond thq
Euphrates and Tigris, independent of the position of some parts ofit in respect to other parts or to regions on the other
Bide. This would seem the best way, if we must render -"jl?^ from the east. But there is an older sense to the root,
which may well be regarded as intended here. This primary sen-, i-^ ante, before, or in front of. Hence its application tc
time as well as to space. The old country is afterwards called the Kast, and so ni2lp' becomes a word of local direction
This primary sense of anteriority gives the idea here demanded, which is not so nnch any particular direction (the
geography not being the thing chiefly in view), as it is the general idea of progress As they journeyed onward, CTpT3
right ahead, in their nomadic roviug— from one b^ore to another, or from the pl>»ce before them to one still farther on—
they found a n3.'p3 , or plain country. Gen xiii. 12 seems to be like this, and .nay be rendered in the same way : Abra-
ham and Lot parted ; the former settled ( Z^^ ) in tli.- hmd where they were , or Abraham stopped, as we say in famiUar
English, but Ixtt J^rumti/ed on, Clj^ia 2r©»V Compare xi- 2, C12; 1p-'.}^» and they stopped there (in Shinar), where
ZW'i is in a similar contrast to the nomadic word "D"^ . Or it may ^"o taken as a word of position : he pitched his tent
eastward. In this place the Targum of Onkclos has fi<ri*>Onp%, in (he East, regarding it as denoting position. So
also the Arabic , k W-»-M A • The LXX., the Vulgate; and'the Syriac render it /ram the East.—T. L.]
r« Ver. 9.— 533 nr\i; S"ip called its name Babel, hhz Dl^ ""a , because there be confounded (b:del = balbel) the
language, etc. There is'difficulty, somotimes, in the elymologjes given in the Hebrew Bible, but this seems to be a re-
markablv clear and consistent one. It seoma strange that Dr. Lange sliould sh-.w himself inclined to the other far-fetched
derivation, which would make it mean either the "gate of Bel," or *' the gate of Kl." Naming cities from the gate is not
the most early way, thoigh It came in afterwards, from the gntc becoming the important place of commercial, judicial,
and political procedure. ScLell ng is right in Baying that 3X3 . ^^b , *"«»^ 6^*^, is confined alone to the Arabic, of all
tbe Shemitic tongues It Ib e't.rely unknown to the Hebrew, and if it is ever found in any very late Syriac, it comes
from the cctmparatively nodem Arabic use. ITiOt is reason, too, to regard bs • notwithstanding a doubt expressed by
Kawlinson niAWLiNSON : Herod., i. p. 247), as the sanu- with br3 , the deified power, or personage, that appears all over
the East — Banl, Lord, Master, and which becomes a g.neral name for monarchs, like Pharaoh in Etrvpt. In the iJaby.
binian it becomes Hel or Uelus ; and in addition to ibc Fhoonician lljtal, or Bal, (appearing in many Ph<rnician and C;ti^
*hatrini:m proper n-mcs, such as Hannibal, Adsrubul, etc.), we find a Lybian Belus (.see Viito. : ^n., i. 621), a Lydian
Bel connected hIko with a Ninus (Hekod., i. 7), besides the common Scriptural appellation of the idol deity so worshipped.
In view of these facta, there must be rejected the idea of an early Babylonian monarch, to whom the name was exclusively
given. They seem to have used the word in the plurul, as the Phcenicians did (S^bi'3 , Haalim), and this accounts for
tbe form it takes, as oxpree-ied in Greek, in tho P^ma- of .a-'.sCBYi.rs. ef>7,fiaJ^rivipxatov. Thougii with a singular adjective,
It can U nothing less than ■|"'^T3 (.Baaliv). or, »8 the whole would bo oxprefised in the later Hebrew, T^SiSll^n 7^53
Tomakothis very ancientai. d memorahlnn:imc'b33(Hab.l)equiv:ilent to the Arabic Jo tw»U , ^Z 3X3 orbr3 3a.
^te of Bet or Baal, would be greatly straining etymology as well as history. Had such a derivation been found in thi
CHAP. XI. 1-9.
8Sl
Blblet it would donbtleea have been contemptuously rejected, by some who go so far from the Bible to (fet it. Nothing
«an lie more direct and consistent than the etymology given in Genesis. The verb 35D is the same with the intenaivi
form ^353 , baUial, from which 5"* is softened after becoming a fixed and oft-pronouuci-'d name. 33b" , balbel, its nr
onoraatope, exactly like our word babble, and its sense of confusion is probably secondary, coming from this early onoma-
topic use. The letters L and R are cognate and interchangeable, in the Greek as well as in the Shemitic tongues. Henc<
balbal and fiapfiap are the same. Barbarian did not, originally, mean savage, but one who speaks a ditfcreut language
or who seems to the hearer to babble. It was the place where men first became barbarians to each other (see 1 Cor. xi^
U), though the name, as an onomatope, would seem still to belong to them all. — T. L.J
GENERAL PRELIMINARY DISCUSSION.
1. The literature: Bibelwerk, Matthew, p. 19.
The present work, p. 119, where the title of Nie-
buhr*3 work should be more correctly given : " His-
tory of Assur and Babel." Berlin, 1858. KtJRTz:
"History of the Old Testament." Haug, on the
" Writing and Language of the Second Kind of Cu-
aeifonn Inscriptions." Gottingen, 18.55. J. Brandis,
on the " Historical Results from the Deciphering of
the Assyrian Inscriptions." Berlin, 1856. Fabbi :
" The Origin of Heathendom and the Problem of its
Mission." Barmen, 1859. Tbelatest: Kaulen: "The
Confusion of Languages at Babel." Mainz, 1861.
Explorers of the ruins of Babylon, especially Rich,
Ker-Porter, Layard, Rawlinson, Oppert.
2. TTie histori/ of the building the tower at Babel
forma the limit to tlie history of the primitive tiini'.
It may be regarded as the genesis of the history of
the human striving after a false outward unity, of the
doom of confusion that God therefore imposed upon
it, of the dispersion of the nations into all the " oild,
and of the formation of heathendom as directly con-
nected therewith. In the proper treatment of this
there comes into consideration : 1. the relation of the
historical fact-consistency of the representation to its
universal symbolical significance for the history of
the world, and to its special symbolical significance
for the kingdom of Goil ; 2. the relation of the fact
itself to the common historical knowledge, as well as
to the history of the kingdom of God ; 3. the relation
of the confounding, therein represented, to the original
unity of the human race in its language, as well as to
the multiplicity that originally lay in human speech ;
4. the historical and archfeologieal testimonies; 5.
the reflection of the historical fact in the mythical
stories.
3. Kurtz correctly maintains (History of the Ola
Testament, p. 95) against H. A. Hahn, that this
place forms the boundary between the history of the
primitive time and the history of the Old Testament.
Evidently is the history of pruncval religion distin-
guished from the general history of the Old Testa-
ment by definite monuments, namely, by the charac-
teristic feature of the faith in promise, as presented
in the genealogies, through which faith Abraham, as
the type of the patriarchal religion, stands in contrast
with Melchidezek, the type of the primitive reUgion,
— even as the morning twilight of the new time
stands in contrast with the evening twilight of the
old. And so, too, according to Gal. iii. and Rom. iv.,
it is not Moses who is the beginning of the covenant
religion, but Abraham. Moreover, in the history of
the tower-building there is brought out not only the
grounl form for the historical configuration the
world is to assume, but also the contrast between
heathetiism and the beginnings of the theocracy.
For the sake of this contrast, according to our view,
the section may still be regarded as belongmg to the
first period from the beginnings of the Shemitic pa-
tnarehalism ; although when regarded in itself alone,
tad under the hi.'torical form of view of the Old Tes-
tament, it appears as an introduction to the historj
of Abraham.
4. The genesis of the human striving after •
false outward unity, or uniformity and confortnity.
As in the history of Cain, the first beginnings of cul-
ture in the building of cities, in the discoveries and
inventions of the means of living, of art, and of
weapons of defence, were buried in tlieir owu cor-
ruption (since the germs of culture, however law-
ful in themselves, are overwhelmed in their ungodly
worthlessness), and as in the history of Nimrod tha
post-diluvian beginnings of civilization, and of out-
ward political institutions, were darkened by the in-
dications of despotic violence, so also, in the history
of the tower-building, must we distinguish the natu-
ral striving of the human race after an essential
unity, from their aberration in a bold and violent
eflbrt to obtain an outward consistency, an outward
uniformity (or conformity rather) to be established
at the cost of the inward unity. Delitzsch says cor-
rectly (p. 3101 : " the unity which bad hitherto bound
together the human family was the community of
one God, and of one divine worship. This unity did
not satisfy them ; inwardly they had already lost it ;
and therefore it was that they strove for another.
There is, therefore, an ungodly unity, which they
sought to reach through such self-invented, sensual,
outward means, whilst the very thing they feared
they predicted as their punishment. In its essence,
therefore, it was a Titanic heaven-defying undertak-
ing." * The inward unity of faith ought to have been
the centre of gravity, the rule and the measure of
their outward unity. The historical form of their
true unity was the religion of Shem ; its concrete
middle point was Shem himself. It sounds, therefore,
like a derisive allusion to the despised blessing of
Shem, when they say: Go to, let us build a tower for
us, and make unto ourselves a name (a Shem).
When, therefore, the tower-building, the false out-
ward idea of unity is frustrated, then it is that
Abraham must appear upon the stage as the effective
middle point of humanity, and the preparer of the
way for the unity that was to come. Abraham forms
• |The more carefully the peculiar language of this Ba-
bel history is considered, and especially its heaven-defying
look, the more probable will appear the view supported by
Bryant, which regards it as the origin of the heathen fable
of the war of tlie giants against the gods. The war of th«
Titans was proliably the same, though it appears as a dupli-
cate of the event in the Greek mythology. The latter, how-
ever, being set forth as the more ancient event, may, with
some reason, be referred to the antediluvian rebellion de-
scribed in Gen. vith. Both of these myths must have had
some historical foundation in actual Human history ; for
nothing can be more wild in itself, or more inconsistent with
what we know, or may conceive, of the earliest thinking,
than those representations of allegorical wars of which some
writers are so fond. In the first period of human life, men
were too muirh occupied with the great actual, and this ij
shown by the verj" exaggerations of the form which it •*»•
sumed in histoi-y. Myth-making and allegorizing cam^- in
afterwards. The w.ar of ideas, of which some talk, showi
a previous philosophizir)g, however crude. The sight of
gi eat physical convulsions may have suggested some of thes^
stories ; but the actual occurrence of great events in humaz
history was their more probable source — T T- 1
>60
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
the tht 5cratic contrast to the heathen tower-building.
Since iliat time, however, the striving of human na-
ture has ever taken the other direction, namely, to
establish by force the outward unity of humanity at
the expense of the inward, and in contradiction to it ;
this has appeared as well in the history of the world
monarchies as in that of the hierarchies. The his-
tory of Babel had its prusignal in the city of Cain,
its symbol in the building of the tower, its beginning
in the Babylonian world-monarchy ; but its end,
«ccording to Rev. xvi. 17, falls in the "last time."
■ The contrast to this history of an outward forcc-
nnity is formed by Shem, Abraham, Zion, Christ, the
Church of believers, the bride of Christ, according
to Rev. xxi. 2, 9.
5. Tke gtiiesis of the confounding to which it teas
doomed bi/ God. The germinal multiplicity, as con-
tained in the unity of the human race, is to be re-
garded as the natural basis of the event. We can-
not, as has been attempted by Origen and others,
derive au organic division of the nations in their
manifold contrasts (and just as little the varied multi-
plicity of life in the world) from the fall merely, or
from human corruption. To this effect it is well ob-
served by Delitzsch, that "even without that divine
and miraculous interposition, the one original lan-
guage, by virtue of tlie abundance of gifts and powers
that belong to humanity, would have run through an
advancing process of enrichment, spiritualization. and
diversity." This germinal multiplicity forms, there-
fore, the other side, or the higher, spiritual side, in
the confusion of languages ; but this, too, we must
distinguish in its genesis and in its world-historical
consequences. Since the Babylonian tower-building
denotes the genesis of the national separations as
the genesis of heathendom (but not the monstrous
development of heathendom which goes on (lirough
the ages), so, in like manner, does it denote the
genesis of the speech-confounding, but not its great
development in the course of time. This genesis,
however, is to be considered in reference to the fol-
lowing points : 1. With the violent striving after an
outward unity there is connected the crushing of the
diversity. 2. This violent suppression calls out, by
way of reaction, the effort and intensity of the diver-
sifying tendency, or the conflict of spirits. 3. With
this conflict of spirits there develops itself, also, the
contrast of varying views and modes of exjiression.
4. The disordered and broken unity becomes dis-
solved into partial unities, which form themselves
around the middle points of tribal affinity, and so
form their watchwords. Thus far goes on the pro-
cess of di-^solution, in the sin and guilt of the strife
after an outward unity. But here comes in the
divine judgment in its miraculous impo.sition: the
Bpirits, the modes of conception, the modes of ex-
pression, the tongues themselves, are all so confound-
ed, that tliere becotnes a perfect breach of unity, and
more than this, a hostile springing apart of unfet-
tered elements that had been boimd up in a forced
•nity. So ilid the divine doom establish a genois
In the confusion of languages — a genesis which after-
wards, in the course of time, came to its full develop-
ment.
6. Tfie ffenenig of the dinperition of the peoples in
all the vjorld, and of the formation of heathendom.
thai from thence beijan. In opposition to the ci-n-
tripetal force of humanity, im|iaired by its own
BUpe;'»en8ion and the outward alienating tendency,
come* n(»w the reaction of the m(n'))id ceotrifugal
pownr set free by the sentence of Ciod. So com-
mence the national emigrations of antiquity, seti.ng
away from the centre of community, forming in thii
a contrast to the migrations of the Christian time,
which maintain their connection with the centre of
humanity, the host of the Christian church. Id
greater and smaller waves of migration do the na-
tions scatter abroad, and grow widely diverse in their
scfiarate lands, and in the midst of the views which
they awaken ; and this to such a degree that cvery-
wliere they lose themselves in a peculiarly paganistic
autoclithonic consciousness, or, as it may be generally
styled, a servile life of nature. The line of Shem
is least affected by the drawing of this centrifugal
power. It extends itself slowly from Babylon, in a
small degree to the east, and in great part to the
southwest. The main stream of the Ilamites takes
a southwestern direction towards Canaan and Africa;
another stream appears to have turned itself east-
wardly over Persia and towards India. The great
stream of the Japhethites goe.s first northward, in or-
der to divide itself into a western and an eastern
euirent ; a part, however, in all probability, taking
a still more northern direction, until, through upper
Asia, it reaches the New World. The most evident
division of the Shemites is into three parts, which
still reflect themselves in the three main Shemitic
languages. The fundamental separation has gone
on into wider separations ; for example, into the
division of the Indian and the Persian Arians. These
divisions are, again, in a great degree, eftaced by
combinations which proceeded from the contrasi
between earlier and later migrations in the same di-
rection. So, for example, in eastern Asia, the Ja-
phethites appear to have supervened upon the Ilam-
ites, in Asia Minor and Persia upon the Shemit'^s;
and so, in many ways, have the earlier Japhethite
features been overlaid and set aside by the later. In
Canaan, on the other hand, the Haraites appear to
have supervened upon the original Shemitic inhabit-
ants ; and then, again, at a later date, the Israelites
supervened upon the Hamitic Canaaiutes.
The most direct consequence of this dispersion
of the nations was the formation of races, in which
different factors cooperated : 1. The family type ; 2.
tha spiritual direction ; 3. the climate in its strong
effect upon the physical ground-forms which were
■,et in their state of childlike flexibility. A further
consequence was the formation of ethnographical
contrasts in civilization. In reference to this there
must be distinguished :
1) The contrast between the savage nations who
had become utterly unhistorical, or perfectly sepa-
rated from the central humanity, and the historical
nations.
2) The contrast of barbarian nations who for u
long time preserved a state of negative indift'erence
as compared with the nations that were within the
community of culture.
:',) The contrast presented by the nations and
tribes of isolated culture, as compared with the cen
trali/cd culture, or that of the world monarchies as
it api>eared in its latest form, the Graico-Roman-
hunianilarian sphere of culture.
■1) The ctmtrast presented by the nationa of this
centialized culture, or as it finally appeared in the
Gneco-Ronian-humanitariau culture, as compared
with the central theocratic people of cultua or re-
ligion.
The last contrasts reveal, as the second conse-
quence, a double counterworking against tiie pagan
ietic isolization : the first is a tendencv to the outei
CHAl". XI. 1-9.
36,
jnity (irorld-monarchy), the other a tendency to the
inner uuitv (tlieocracy). A third consequence was
the war lietweeu them.
7. 2'he relation of the historical fact-consixteririi
of the Biblical representation to its si/mbolical si(/jd/i-
tance for the universal hhtory of the world. It is
difiScult to determine tlie chronological order of the
tower-building in the Biblical history ; it is still more
difficult to fix its place in the universal secular his-
tory. It is, however, more easy to do this wlnn we
assume that the history of the tower-building was
that of a gradually elapsing event, which is here all
comprehended in its germinal transition-point (as the
commencing turning-point), conformably to the rep-
reaentiition of the religious historico-symbolical his-
toriography. Following the indications of the Bible
itself, we must di-stinguish two periods: first, the
founding of Babel, in consequence of an ungodly
centralization fancy of the first human race, and the
catastrophe of the commencing dissolution that
thereby came in ; secondly, the despotic founding of
the kingdom of Babel by Nimrod, as connected with
it. Add to tliis a third, which is in like manner at-
tested by the BiOle, namely, the further development
of Babel as it continued on in spite of the disper-
sion, and to whose greatness the stories of Ninus
and Semiramis, as well as the world-historical ruins
of Babylon bear testimony. It is in perfect accord-
ance with the theocratic historiography, that events
which occupy periods are comprehended in the ger-
minal points of their peculiar epochs. As this is tlie
ease with the tower-building, so does it also hold true
of the confusion of languages, and the dispersion of
the nations. In regard now to this germinal point
especially, it has been wrongly placed in the days of
Peleg, in supposed accordance with what was said,
ch. X. 25, concerning the meaning of the name Peleg.
Keil computes that Peleg was born one hundred
years after the flood, and draws from thence the wider
Conclusion, that " in the course of one hundred and
fifty to one hundred and eighty years, and in the
rapid succession of births, the descendants of the
three sons of Noah, who were already married and
a hundred years old at the time of the flood, must
have already so greatly multiplied as to render cred-
ible their proceeding to build such a tower " (p. 120).
In respect to the third designated period of the tower-
building, Delitzsch thus remarks in relation to the
Biblical interpretation of the name Babel (for Balbel,
a pilpel form in which the first Lamed has fallen
out) : " The name Babel denotes the world city where
men became dispersed into nations, as the name Je-
rusalem denotes the city of God, where they are
again brought together as one family. As the name
Jerusalem obtains this sense in the light of prophecy,
so is the name given to Babel, no matter whetlier
ivith or without the design of the first nainer, a sig-
lificant hiero-glyph of that judgment of God which
ffas interwoven in the very origin of this world-city,
ind of that tendency to an ungodly unity which it
nas ev2r manifested. That the name, in the sense
»f the world-city itself, may denote something else,
is not opposed to this. The Etymologicum Magnum
derives it inh toC S'iAou, and so, according to Masu-
di, do the learned Persians and Nabatseans. It has,
accordingly, been explained as the fiate or the hottse,
or, according to Knobel, the castk of Belus (2 etpial
to 33 or n^3 , or 13 for n-1^3). SeheUin'g's re-
mark that hab in the sense of gate is peculiar to the
Arabian dialect, is without ground ; it is just as much
Aramaic as Arabic. The verb 33 , intrare, liks dS
ascendere, is a very old derivative from X2 , inire
But Kawlinson and Oppert have shown, on the au
tliority of the inscriptions, that the name of tlie god
is not S2 , but bs (the Babylonian Phoeniciac
Kronos), and baa , therefore, denotes the gate of
El." If the development of heathenism, in a relig-
ious sense, and, therefore, the development of idol-
atry, is regarded as a gradual process, the heathen
ish tendency at the tiiue of Ximrod could not have
been far advanced. Its more distant beginning ia
probably to be placed in the very time of :he cata»'
trophe ; for the confusion of fundamenial religious
views may, in general, furnish of itself an essentia)
factor in the confusion of languages.
On the situation of the land of Shinar and Baby-
lon this side of the Euphrates, compare the Manuals
tor the old geography by Forbiger and others.
Concernmg the ruins of the old Babel, and Babei
itself, compare VViskr's "Real Lexicon," the " Dic-
tionary for Christian People," and Herzog's " Real
Encyclopedia," under the article " Babel." In like
manner Delitzsch, p. 212; Kxobel, p. 127, and
the catalogue of literature there given.
8. 71i£ special symbolic sijniflcance of Babel for
the Hni/dom of God. Here iliei e are to be distin-
guished the following stages : 1. The significance of
the tower-building ; 2, the Babel of Ximrod, or the
despotic form of empire, and its tendency to con-
quest ; 3. the significance of the world-monarchy of
Nebuchadnezzar ; 4. the Old Testament symbolic
interpretation of Babel (Ps. cxxxvii. ; Is. xiv. ; Jer.
1. ; Dan. ii. 37 ; vii. 4 ; Habakuk) ; 6. The New-Tea-
tament apocalyptic Babylon (Rev. xiv., xvi., xvii.).
Throughout Holy Scripture, Babel forms a world-
historical antithesis to Zion.
9. The relation of the confounding, as presented,
to the original unity of the human race, as also to tht
original multiplicity as lying at the foundation of
human speech. The two poles by which the catas-
trophe of the speech-confounding are limited, are
the following : In the first place, even alter the con-
fusion of languages, there exists a fundamental unity ;
there is the logical unity of the ground-forms of lan-
guage (verb, substantive, etc.), the rhetorical unity
of figurative modes of expression, the lexical unity
of kindred fundamental sounds, the grammatical
unity of kindred linguistic families, such as the
Sheiuitic, the Indo-Germanic, and the historical
miity in the blending of diflFerent idioms ; as, for
example, in the Kotvii, or common dialect, there are
blended the most diverse dialects of the Greek ; so
in the New-Testament Greek, to a certain extent, the
Hebrew and old Greek ; in the Roman languages,
Latin, German, and Celtic dialects ; so, also, in the
English; in the Lutheran High German, too, there
are diflferent dialects of Germany. Science takes
for its reconciling medium an ideal unity from the
beginning of the separations ; faith supposes a rea!
unity, and so, finally, Christendom and the Bible.
In the second place, however, it must be acknowl-
edged that in the original manifoldness of human
power and views there was already indicated a mani-
foldness of different modes of exprcssiuii. " In-
deed," says Delitzsch, " even if this wonderful divine
interposition had not taken place, the one primitive
speech would not have remained in stagnant immo-
bility. By reason of the richness of tlie gifts thai
are stored in humanity, it would have run through i
process of progressive self-enrichment, spirittializo
S62
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
tion, development, and manifold diversity ; but now,
when the linguistic unity of humanity was lost, to-
gether with its unity in God, and with it, also, the
unity of an ali-detining consciousness, there came, in
the place of this multiplicity in unity, a breaking up,
a cleaving asunder, where all connection seems lost,
but which, nevertheless, through a thousand indices,
points back to the fact of an original oneness. For,
OS Schelling says, confusion of language only origi-
nates wherever discordant elements which cannot
attain to unity can just a< little come from one an-
other. In every developing speech the original unity
works on, even as the affinity partially shows ; a
taking away of all unity would be the taking away
of language itself; and, thereby, of everything hu-
man,— a limit to which, according to Schelling's judg-
ment, the South American Indians are approacliing,
as tribes that can never become nations, and which
are yet a hving witness of a complete and inevitable
disorganization " (Delitzsch, p. 114, 116). In ac-
cordance with tlie religious character of Holy Scrip-
ture, we must, before all things, regard the confusion
of languages as a confusion of the religious under-
standing. Languages expressive mainly of the sub-
jective, languages of the objective, those of an
ingenuous directness, and those of acute or ingen-
ious accommodation, must very soon present great
contrasts.
In regard to the original language, which pre-
ceded the confusion, and formed its ground, the
learned men of the Jewish Synagogue, and after
them, the church fathers, as well as many oithodox
theologians (among the moderns with some limita-
tion, Pareau, Havernik, Von (ierlach, Baumgarten),
have expressed the opinion that the Hebrew was the
language of the primitive time and of Paradise, and
that it was propagated after the flood by the race
of Eber. On the contrary, however, it is observed
that Abraham himself did not origiiiiilly speak He-
brew, but Aramaic* "On tids account," says De-
litzsch, " we must legard as better grounded the po-
sition of the Syriac, .^.ramaie, and Persian writers,
that ihe Syriac, or the N'al)atiBan, was the primitive
speech, and that in the confusion of tongues it was
still retained as the language of Babylon. But,
moreover, the Sheniitic in its general acceptation,"
He continues, " cannot lay claim to that perfection
which must have belonged to the primitive speech.
We find nothing to urge against the supposition that
the original language, as .such, may have become lost
in those that are historically known" (Delitzsch,
p. S16 ; Keil, p. 119). Nevertheless, we do not be-
lieve that this supposition receives any strength from
what is a mere prejudice, namely, that in respect to
its structure the paradise language must have been
s very perfect one. The speech of holy innocence
has no iice<l to prove its clainis through forms devel-
ojied with great exactness. .\s the Sliemitic verbal
forms I'e in the middle between the monosyllabic
character of the Chinese and the polysyllabic char-
acter of the Indo-Germanic ; as they carry with
* [There could, at this time, have heen no great differ-
ence betwei-n Ilelirew anii Animaic. Even in the days of
Jaoob and Liilinn. they could not have diverffcd much ;
rince they apijpur to have well understood Cfich other in the
very bspinnint; of Jacob'i* residence. Afterwards, when
they parted, they trave two different numes (1"5-l and
6<r^"in^.^ ^3^ , Oen. xxxi. 47) to the monumental heap
of stones ; but in so doin^, they probalily sought us much
diversity ofl the growing change in their respective dialects
would aflbrd.— T. L.l
themselves, also, in a high degree, that impresiioi
of immediateness, of the onomatopic, of the sensiblf
presentation of the spiritual, cf tlie spiritualizing of
the sensible, so, without doubt, do they lie speciallj
near to the ground-form of different national tongues.
In respect to the relation of the different languages,
there may be compared the following writings at
specially belonging to the subject, namely: Dg-
LiTZscH : " Jeschurun ; " Ft'RST : " Concordance ; "
"Treatises of Knnic," Krnest Rkna.n ; see Delitzsch,
p. 632. Besides these, Kaolen, p. 70 (The Hebrew
in its peculiar character stands nearest to the con-
ception of the primitive speech).
Zahn, in his treatise (" The Kingdom of God," p.
90), presec's a clear idea of the similarity of different
languages. " The great ' Language Atlas ' of Balbi
is designed on the most carefully considered princi-
ples (Paris, 1826). After a keenly investigated di-
vision of language and dialect, he designates eight
hundred and sixty languages as spoken on the earth,
namely, fifty-three in Europe, one hundred and fifty-
three in Asia, one hundred and fifteen in Africa, four
hundred and twenty-two in America, one hundred
and seventeen in the fifth portion of the world; and
yet at this day must the whole sum be taken at a
greater number, especially in consequence of re-
searches in Africa." Kaiilen. Linguistic investiga-
tions that belong here are connected with the names
of Herder, Adelung, Vatcr, Klaproth, Balbi, Remii-
sat, W. Von Humboldt, Schleicher, Heyse, Bopp,
Steinthall, Pott, Schott, Ewald, Fiirst, Bunsen, Max
Miiller, Jones, Oppert. Hang, and others. In favor
of the original unity of languages, as against Pott
and others who call it in question, see Kaulen, p,
26 ; " Treatises on the Origin of Languages," by the
same author, p. 106.
10. TTie historical and archaoJogical tentimoviti
for the /net of the eoiifusioyi of langiiagex. Bu.nse.v :
"Comparative Philology would have been compelled
to set forth as a postulate the supposition of some
such division of languages in Asia, especially on tlie
ground of the relation of the Egyptian language to
the Sheniitic, even if the Bible had not assuied us
of the truth of this great historical event. It is
truly wonderful, it is matter of astonishment, [it is
more than a mere astounding fact,] that something
so purely historical [and yet divinely fixed], something
so conformable to reason, [and yet not to be con-
ceived of as a mere natural development], is hert
related to us out of tlie oldest primeval period, and
which now, for the first time, through the new sci-
ence of philology, has become capable of being his-
torically and philosophically explained." Between
this history and the previous chapter must lie the
primitive history of the eastern .\siatics, n;miely,
the time of the formation of the Chinese language,
that primitive speech that has no formative words,
that is, no inflecting forms. The Chinese can hardly
take rank as a radical language, but only as a very
ancient iind strikingly one-sided ramification. To
the linguistic testimonies there may be added the fact
that Babylon became the oldest world-monarchy;
there is also its very ancient fame, and the fact that
the influence which went out from Babylon has in
the most varied forms pervaded the whole history
of the world, to say nothing of its giant ruins and
the desolation which has so long rested as a judg-
ment upon them."
1 1 . The mirroring of Ihe confufion of tanguaga
ax found in the mythical stories. See Delitzsch, p
813 !>iXKEN, p 278; EusEiiins, Praparalio, ix
OHAP. XI. 1-9.
303
14. Abtdencs: " Some say tbat the men who first
came forth from the earth, being confident in their
greatness and strength, and despising tlie gods in
their fancied estimation of their own powers, under-
'.ools to buUd a high toiver in the place wliere Baby-
lon now is. They would already have made a near
approach to the Heavens, had not the winds come to
he help of the gods and overturned their tower.
1 s ruins have received the name of Babylon. Men
bad hitherto spoken but one language, but uow, in
the purpose of the gods, their speech became di-
verse ; to this belongs the war that broke out be-
•ween Kronos and Titan.
EXEGETIOAL AND CRITICAL.
1. Vers. 1 and 2. The settling in the land of
Sbinar. — The whole earth, that is, the whole hu-
man race. — One language and one speech (Lange
more literally, one lip and one kind of words).
The form and the mateiial of language were the
same for all. — Prom the East (Lange renders,
towards the East. Our margin. Eastward). —
From the land of Ararat, southeast (cp^a as one
word: the land of, or from the East). — A plane.
— For them, as they came from the highlands, the
plane was the low country, a valley plane (njp3). —
Shinar, the same as Babylonia, thongli extending
farther northward. — And they dwelt there. — The
preference for the hill country does not api)ear to
have belonged to the young humanity. Under the
most obvious points of view, convenience, fertility,
and easier capabihty of cultivation, seem to have
given to these children of nature a preference for
the plain. Even at this day do the uncultivated in-
habitants of the hUls sometimes manifest the sume
choice. In this respect Babylon had for them the
charm of extraordinary fruitfulness. Zahn ("King-
dom of God," p. 86) gives extracts from Hippocrates
and Herodotus in proof of the singular productive-
ness of this land of the palm, where the grain yields
from two hundred to three hundred fold. Thence
came luxury, which was followed by the cultivation
of the paradisaical gardens (Gardens of Semiramis)
and a life of sensuality, together with a sensual re-
ligious worship. ,
'2. Vers. 3 and 4. 2(^e building of the tower.
- -They said one to another, Go to. — Expressive
of an animated, decided imdertaking. — Let us
make brick. — The plain was deficient in stones,
whereas, on the contrary, it abounded in a clayey
soil which would serve for making bricks, and as-
phaltum, which was good for mortar. They burnt
them to stone instead of merely hardening them in
the sun, which otherwise was the more obvious prac-
tice.— And they said (again) Go to. — Their suc-
cess in preparhig bricks for their dwellings enccur-
»ged them to go farther. They resolved upon the
building of a city, and a tower whose top may reach,
etc. At the ground of this there evidently lies the
impression of immensity as derived from the Baby-
lonian plane, which actually, in its great extent, as
nome travellers have described it, gives the concep-
tion of the sublime. The visible middle point of
ihe same must have been the tower, standing up as
a sign of unity for the whole human race. Accord-
ing to the representation, therefore, the words, " even
to the heaven," would mean that the heaven was
regarded as something that could be reached ; al-
though at a later period such language occurs u' i
hyperboUcal sense. — And let us make us a name
— The expression CB lb nias denotes the appoint,
ing or establishing for one's self a signal of renown
(Is. Ixiii. 12, 14 ; Jer. xxxii. 2ii) The sign of secu
rity shall be for them, at the same time, a sign of
their fame, and thus, doubtless, would they give
themselves a name as a people. — Lest we be scat-
tered abroad. — Not only as a visible signal, but bj
the glory ol' its fame shall the tower hold them to
gether. Tliis is the exi)ression of the political and
popular feeling of antiquity ; in the pride of tlie na
tional spirit the individual is lost with his strength
and Ills conscience. Such is the characteristic fea-
ture of Babel everywhere, whether upon the Euphra-
tes, the Tiber, or the Seine. The individual with his
convictions, his freedom, his personality, must ba
wholly sacrificed to the name of uniformity, whethei
it be worldly or ecclesiastical. What is said here
relates not merely to an ungodly, arbitrary, ambi-
tious, individually titanic undertaking, but to the
first introduction of that atheistical and antichristian
principle which would not merely promote the pros-
perity and authority of the whole in connection with
the well-being and the freedom of the individual per-
son, but also make the individual an involuntary
saciifice to a unity, which becomes, in that way, a
false unity, as well as a false idol placed on the
throne of the living God, — and this whether it be
called Babel, Kome, the Church, or " la grande
nation." Goethe :
'* Be it truth, or be it fable,
Tbat in thousand books is shown,
All is but a tower of Babel,
Unless love shall make them one."
Or we may adopt as a various reading,
When love of glory makes them one.
The question here relates to the destruction, in their
very principles, of the Shemitic call to religion, and
the Japhethio tendency to civilization, by a Hamitic
confounding of reUgion and culture, to the obstruc-
tion of the true progress of the world and of the
state, by resolving the constitution of human history
into an immovable Hamitic naturalism. According
to Knobel, the whole significance of the fact becomes
resolved into one view. "This view (he says) the
author imputes to them after the event, siuce Baby-
lon, that most splendid city, as the Greeks regarded
it (Herod, i. 178), did, indeed, redound to the fame
of its builders, but, at the same time, would thereby
furnish a proof of their im()ious pride." And yet,
even in Knobel, the world-historical substratum in
the representation very clearly appears, when he
says, that " according to Berosus and Eupolemus,
there wtre stories among thi- Chaldasans that those
who weie saved in the flood, when they came to
Babylonia, again restored the place, and especially
built there a higli tower. For that purpose theie
met together in Babylonia liverse masses of people,
etc." He proceeds to say, moreover, that Batylon
in later times became the central point of the na-
tions, that it was, besides, a very ancient city, tha*.
two thousand years before Semiramis it was built for
the son of Belus, and that, by reason of its huge
magnitude, its temple of Belus, its high tower and
its dissolute morals giving it the appearance o!' the
very home of sin (Curtius, v. 1, .S6), as well as OD
account of its name, it had a peculiar fitness for th«
Scriptural author's narration. The symboljcai slg
3t>4
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
J^
nifioaiice, however, of the appearance of Babylon, as
matter of fuut, is, in this way, wholly eftaced.
3. Vers. 5-8. TIce intervention of Jehovah^ his
eourtsel and his act. Without the thought of any
Jehovistio document, it would be readily conceived
that the frustration of such an undertaking must
proceed f:~om liod as Jehovah, the founder aiid pro-
tectoi of the divine kingdom. The coming down *
♦ ;Yer. 5.— mn^ nn'T , And God came down. The Tar-
paxLof Onkelos reniers thia ■'^ '^ 7 d'TMi* , and Jehovah was
manifested, or revealed hi^mself. So most of the other Jew-
ish authoriiies. They derived tlie idea, prohably, Irom such
passages as Hosea v. 15, where ihe oppotsite expression seems
to represent God as retiring, and leaving the world tu itself :
•"^aipiC bx nnnrXT Tl^l<. I win go and return to my
place. So in the seventh verse, Onkelos renders it, Come,
let us be revealed. The Arabic follows the Turgum, and has
\j IkUtJ'- Compaie also Micah i. 3, nSfl "3
Tn"1 "i^SlpTQTQ X:iV nin^, "For lo, Jehovah goes forth
from'his place, and comes down and walks upon the hifih
places of the earth." There is a spirituality in Rabbi
Schelomo's interpretation of this which is lacking in most
Christian commentators. *'It represents God," he says,
"as coming do\sTi from his throne of mercies, D^T3n"i XOD ,
to his throne of judgment," ■,''nn NOD , as though the one
were in the serene upper heavens (comp. Ps. cxiii. 6), and
the other nearer to the sphere of this turbulent earth, — im-
plying also that the divine mercy is more retired^ le&s visi-
ble to the sense, because more general and ditfused, though
eeen by the eye of faith as sending rain upon the just and
the unjust, whilst God's judgments in the world are more
manifest, more extraordinary, more palpable to the sense.
It is ^^hisstrange work," mcy ?3 "iT , Is.xxviii. 21 ; imH"
iT'^DD , " his extraordinary doing." The commentary of
Aben'Ezra on T^"", Gen. si. 5, is very noteworthy: "This
is thus said, because every thing that takes place in the
world 6e?oni defends from the powers that are above; as is
seen in whatis said (1 Sam. ii. 3) mb^b?. =132r* C'Taii-'niG.
from the Heavens events are arranged (in our English Ver-
sion it is given very poorly, actions are weighed). "Where-
fore God is said to ride upon the /ieai";?is CC^^^TI "311.
Deut. xsxiii. 2R) ; for thus the Scripture speaks with the
tongue of men." With thi& citation of Aben Kzra, comp.
Ps. Ixviii. 5, " Praise him that rideth on the Heavens by
his name Jah," although many modern commentators ditfer
from the Jewish in their rendering of n'i3"iy . The riding
on the Heavens is explained, by the commentator on Aben
Ezra, as referring to the outer sphere (according to the astro-
logical technics), in wliich there are inherent the higher
or ultimate causalities, as Rabbi Tanchum says nib">b!?
should be rendered in the verse above quoted, 1 Sam. ii. 3
(see Tanchum: "Comment." Lam. i. 12), or mSD, de-
Jlecting or turning causalities, as it is explained by him
(see 1 Kings xii. 15). Similar interjireiations are given by
the Jewish commentaters of such words as nZTl , ver. 7,
Oo to now, Let us po down. They are used to express the
most direct opposition between the ways and thoughts of
men and tlioso of God. Says Rabbi Shelomo: "It is
niia "1333 n'H'Q, measure for measure (^ar ;>ari.'). Let
us buid up, say they, and scale the heavens ; let us go down.
Bays God, and deieat their impi.'us thought." Other llab-
biiiM, and Jewish grammarians, have a method of explain-
ing such pus>Hugc8 by a very concise yet most signifii ant
phraso. Thif* mode of representing things, more huviano,
they call "IS^iH ]1irb , the language or " tongue of the
ftvonl," or the action speaking. Thus Rabbi Tanchum
characterizes the words HXI xb '^D^X , the Lord not sec it,
Lam. iii. 30, lis (Jl,^f ,.%L-w*Jj the tonguo or speech of
ate condition (the supposed lan^'ungr of the wicked actions
juiit liofoie dcschljcd), wht'ther rogardfd as actually uttered
or not. I'hjH here, God speaks in what he doe.i, inmost di-
rect contrariety to the ways and thoughts of men. The
arent to be narrated by the saiTcd historian is tlie divino
intervention in counteraction of humau wickedncHs and f'diy.
To \m intelligible, it necesnanly includcK some Btatcuu.'nt of
khe divine thoughts or purpoHCH, as inKoparabb^ iiaits "f tin*
of Jehovah forms a grand contrast to the rebeUioii
^iprisiug of the Babylonians with their tower, Th«
higher they build, so much deeper, tu speak anthro
popathically, must he descend that he may rightlj
look into the matter. Moreover, the expression g<i
to, as used by (jod, forms an ironical contract to the
two-fold (70 ^o(n^n , come on, give way now), as used
by the Babylonians. The one nullities the other an
res gestse. This must be done after the manner of men, or il
cannot be done at all. These divine purposes and acts are,
therefore, represented as speaking, in lact ihey do speak ;
and this is what they say most emphatically. It is analo-
gous to the tiequent usage in Homeric Greek of 0»jfii, to
spt-ak, for oionai, to think ; and, in Hebiew, of ^1*1 , word^
for thought or thiny,~a. connection of ideas which is obvioua
in the- English think and thing, as also in the Genn.m duig
and denken. This language of the event, if it would be ex-
pressive, must be characteristic and idiomatic. The n^Jl .
go to, of man, is met by a dii-ect response on the part of Deity,
and to this end the vei-y same term is u^ed, not ironically,
as Lange thinks, but as the most speaking foriLi of the anti-
thesis. This is not like the language of the prophet who
hears words spoken in vision. In that case they are truly,
though subJLCiiveiy heard, as the mediate language of the
inspiring power, aud not alone of the insjiiied human me-
dium. But in such narrations ;is these, nothing could better
discribc the rhetorical peculiarity th:in this ibimula of the
Jewish critics. It is " the language of the occasion," not aa
uttered objectively, or heard subjectively, but still as virtu-
ally representing most important pai-ts of the event.
Those who are otlended at such a style Ciinnot consist-
ently St op short of a denial of al 1 revelation, as either actual
or possible. When we make the objection, we should con-
fider how far it goes. Not only is there shut out the
thought of any direct divine intervention in the world's
history, but also every idea whatever of any divine action
or personality. Look at the question carefully, and \\e are
compelled to say that thinking, in any such way a> we think,
and even knowing, in the sense of any particular recognition
of anything finite as finite, are as truly anthropopathic ex-
ercises as remembering and speaking. It is truly pitiable,
therefoie, when KosenmuUer, and other commentators like
him, indulge in their usual apologizing and patronizing
talk about the simple belief of the early agc^, deos descetidere,
atque, ut ex ontiqua persuasione credebatur, ad humanmn
movent consiUa agitare, dclibtrare^ rebus er ojnni parte per-
pensis, deccrnere, — "that the gods actually come down to
see, etc," How far have we got, in these respects, beyond
these simple "early people!" "What advantage has tbe
most rationalizing commentator over tliem in the use of any
language that will enable him to think of God, or talk of
God, without denying the divini- personality on the one
hand, or bringing in something implieilly and essentially
anthropopathic on the other. This language is as much for
one age as for anotlier ; since here all ages, and all human
minds, are very much on a par. Uut why, it may be asked,
could there not have been used terms more general, and
which would not have suggested such crude conceptions I It
might have been simply said, God intenened to prevent the
accomplishment of evil purposes, orhe_pro(»i(i£rfmeansin the
course of his general providence, or government of nature
and the world, tor such an end. This, it may be thought,
would have sounded better, and better preserved the dignity
of the Sciipture. But what is an intervention, but a coming
betweeii, and a. prevention but a going before, and b. provid-
ing, or a prooidenci', Imt a looking into, a coming down to
see what the chddi-en of men are doing? We gain nothing
by them. Instead of helping the matter, oiu- most philosoph-
ical language would only be the substituting of worn-out
terms, whose early primary imagtshad faded uut, or ceased
to artect us conceptually, for oilier language equally lepre-
sentativo of the idea, whilst exci-Umg in that piitorial vivid-
ness in which truly dwells that which wf must neud. Thia
ifi the suggestive and emotive power, making words some-
thing mui-e than arbitrary signs of unknown quantities, like
the xy z of the algebraist, wheio the tljings signified are
mere notions, hav ug no meaning or value except as they
preserve the cquililnium "f n logical equation. We would
nave the Bible talk to us nhilosophically : " the infinite in-
telligence condition-* the hnile ; th<-- divine power i.s the con-
serving i)rintiplc ever immanent in nature." But hear liow
much better the Scripture says this : "the (Jod of old is tin
dwelling-place, and underneath are the everlasting arms,"
cbl3? m;*Sl , the anas of eternity, (he arms that hold uj
the world. The divine wisdam has adopted this style. Il
is a mode of diction ever fi-esh, yet equal to any other as ■
representative of that wliicli is strictly inofl'able, that is, un
CHAP. XI. 1-9.
HK
turns it against them.— This they begin to do,
and now nothing Tvill be restrained from
them. — This reminds us of the deolanition : Adam u
become like one of ns. Under the form of apprehen-
sion Ihere lies an ironical expression of the conscious
certainty of the divine rule. — And the Lord came
down. — Delitzseh here again reminds us that (ac-
cording to Hoifman) Jehovah, after tlie judgment
of the flood, had transferred his tlirone to tlie
heaven. Keil, however, correctly finds, at least in
this place, only the anthropopathic expression of the
divine interposition — Behold, the people is one. — •
D3, connection^ cotmnunity. The people, as a com-
munity, physically self-unfolding, is called "'13 (from
mj, probably in the sense of mound-like, extending,
tweJling *)'^ the people, as an ethical community, a
State, as constituted by an idea, is called C", from car
(to bind together, to associate). — They begin to do.
— An indication of the future Habel in the world's
history: — And now nothing will be restrziined
from them. — In truth, if God interpose not, the
prospect is opened, that the pride and confidence of
men will advance with extreme rapidity towards
the destrnction of freedom, of the personal life,
of the divine seed and kingdom. — Let ns go down
and there confound their language. — Upon
the descent of Jehovah in his beholding, there fol-
lows his descent in his counsel. — Let us. — And here,
again, according to Delitzseh, does Jehovah include
with himself bis angels, the executors of his penal
justice. Here, as elsewhere, an inappropriate idea. —
Let us confound. — Knobel would understand by
3 5" to separate, and accordingly translates IJabel as
meaning separation. But thereby is the conception
Df the act carried into the unmeaning. What is said
does not refer properly to a separation merely of hu-
man speech. The manne- in which it is confounded
is not described. According to Koppen, the miracle
must have consisted wholly in an inward process, that
is, a taking away of the old associations of ideas con-
nected with woids, and an immediate implanting of
new and diverse modes of expression.f According
to Lilienthal, Hoffman (A. Feldhoff and others) \l
uttera'ole in any of those sense-forms in wliich all hum.an
LiDguase must terminate, though still bclonpinfr to tlie spir-
itual intelligence, and linown tiv it as something that truly
IS. Paul oni-e heard the di\-ine ideas expressed in thr ir ow-n
^.roper words (2 Cor. sii. 4), but he could not translate these
appjTTa fttftiaTa into the speech of the lower sphere. The lan-
^age of the Bible is the best that could be given us. It
may present stumbling-blocks to the careless i-i-ader, or to
those who wish to stumble, but still is it true, that the more
we study the Holy Scriptures, even in their earliest parts,
the more reason do we tind to thank God that they are
written just as they are. — T. L ]
* [The senses oiHoicing together v\\idh Gesenius gives, or
of exlending, swelling, as here presented, are not found in
an\ use of the root M or n"a , but are .accommodated, as
supposed primary senses, to the meaning required. It is
better, however, to deduce t from the sense of inlerlority,
inclusion (implying, exclusion, seclusion, separateness),
which is common in the Chaldaean and Syriac. Thus re-
prded, it would be the political, rather than any physical
idea — a nation as a political unity by itself, separate fixjm
all others— whilst CS would denote association. A com-
muuity within itself in its two .aspects, of outward exclusion,
KQd inner binding.— T. L.]
t [How easily this is done, whether by a power purelv
physical or divine, is seen in the cases of paraivtics, where,
the mind remaining clear, the connection between it and the
vocal organs is suddenly changed ; so that though sp»*eeh is
not lost. Its utterances are misplaced, the n.ame of one thing
.8 given to another, or the connection between the usual
*crd and the usual idea seems almost wholly broken up.
must have been wholly an ontwai'd process, a con
fusion of the Ups, of pronunciation, of dialects ; whils'
Scdliger holds that differing meanings were connectec
with like words or sounds. The historical symbolica
expression, however, may mean, perhaps, th.it thi
process of inward alienation and variation, the groun<3
of which lay in the manifoldness of dispositions, and
the reciprocity of spiritual tendencies, became fixed
in diverse forms of speech aud modes of expression,
by reason of a sudden catastrophe brouglit upoti them
by God. The heathenish Babylonian tendency i'&
fleets itself still in the enigmatical, capriciously vary,
ing dialects of the same people, which is sometimes
to be remarked in different quarters of the same city,
or in the different peasantry of the same commimity,
but which must have especially had place in the
earlier times, when isolization became jjredominant.
The first germ of the speech confounding must, ac-
cordingly, have shown itself as a diseased action
which the fall introduced into the original innate
germ of speech development. For a long time it re^
mained naturally latent in the family of Noah, but
manifested its full power in the time of the tower
building ; and then the effect of that epoch piolonga
itself through the whole history of the world. In
like manner, however, was there a counter influence,
too, from the days of Abraham onward. According
to Kaclex (p. 2*20), the miracle consists in this,
" that at that time, and in that region, there was in-
troduced a linguistic change which, although it would
have naturally come in in the course of things, would
nevertheless have required for its full development
other conditions of space and time than those pre-
sented." If there is meant by this only a wonderful
acceleration of a natural development, the view does
notsatisfy. Rightly says Kabki (p. 31); "A confound-
ing of languages presupposes a confusion of the con-
sciousness, a separation of the original speech into
many, a disorder and a breach in the original com-
mon consciousness in respect to God and the world.
— The history of the tower-building is the history of
the origin of heathenism." — So the Lord scattered
them abroad, — (_)ut of their purpose comes its di-
rect opposite. — And they left off to build. — That
is, as a community of the human race with that dis-
tinct tendency. The idea, however, is not excluded,
that the Babylonians who remained behind kept on
building Babel. The success of the enterprise was
frustrated, but not analogous and limited undertak-
ings of the same tendency ; it appears, for example,
in the great world monarchies. Tiiis first disap-
pointment, however, was a type of all others, as they
successively become apparent in the catastrophes of
these world monarchies, and the last fulfilling will be
found in the fall of Babylon, as mentioned in the
Apocalypse. " That the structure itself was laid in
ruins by an exercise of divine power which after-
wards took place, is told us. Indeed, by the sibyl,
but not by the Scripture." Delitzseh.
4. Wherefore is the name of it called BabeL
— In deriving the name from bab, gate, gate of Bel,
The individual derangement is a very mysterious thing, as
inexplicable now as in the earliest ages of the world. Na-
tional and popular derangements are more rare, but history
records strange movements, that su.'gest the thought, as the
truest, if not the only possible, explanation. Ourknowledga
of man, of the immeasurable deep within him, of the infi-
nite unknown around and above him, is too small to war-
rant any positive denial of such statements, or the possibil-
itv of such events, whether i egarded as supematuiai, or ai
falling within those natural causalities of whieh we talk 81
much, and yet, comparatively, know so little.— T. L.i
566
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
}T El, the authority of the religious interpretation is
oot excluded, as Keil supposes in his second note p.
119. "Only we must distinguish between the Crustra-
tion of the tower-building and the destruction of the
later Babel that was still built on, and which, probably,
for the first after the dispersion of the nations, came to
be the seat of a heathenish worship." Concerning
the siffnifieance and the building material of Baby-
lon, the classical writers agree with the Old Testa-
tament, — for example : Herod, i. ch. 178 ; Stiubo,
16; DioDORUS, ii. 7; Arrian, A/ex. vii. 17; Ccrt.
Alex. 5, 1, 2.5; Ecstath. ad Dynnys. Periey. 1005.
According to them the huge walls of Babylon were
made of burnt brick, as were also the magnificent
structure of the temple of Belus, and the hanging
gardens. According to one, the circumference of the
city amounted to 480 stadia, or 60,000 paces; ac-
cording to others, 3S5 or 360 stadia (furlongs), mak-
ing, therefore, a journey of from 18 to 24 hours.
The building of most importance was the (|uad-
rangular temple of Belus, each side of which was two
furlongs in length ; out of this there arose, by eight
terraces, a strong, msissive tower, which, according
to Herodotus, was one furlong in length and breadth,
and, according to Strabo, one stadium (that is tiOO
feet) high. The accounts of modem travellers amoimt
to a confirmation of tlie ancient statements. The re-
mains of the tem.ple of Belus tliat was overthrown by
Xerxes, and now called Birs Nimrod, form a huge
mound of ruins, consisting of burnt and unburnt
bricks, cemented partly with lime and partly with
bitumen. The whole plain of Babylon is covered
with mounds of rubbish from the same materials (see
Kee-Porteu ; " Travels," vol. ii. p. 301 ; Buckingham :
"Travels in Mesopotamia," p. 472 ; Layard: "Nine-
veh and B.ibylori," p. 374 ; and Ritter's " Geography,"
xi. p. 876). "The ancients, for the most part, ascribe
the building of Babylon to Semiramis, but this can only
be true of its extension and fortification. According
to the ancient inscriptions, the city was older than
this (Knobel on the (ienealogical Table, p. 346), and,
according to cli. x. 10, it must have been already in
existence at the time of Nimrod." Knobel. In re-
spect to the city, see also Herzog's Keal-Encyclopw-
die, article "Babel." On the ruins of Babylon, see
Delitzscii. p. 312, with reference to the account of
the traveller, James Rich. The Arabians regard the
ruins of Birs Nimrod as the Babylonian tower that
was destroyed by fire from heaven. Delitzsch, who
at first regarded Birs Nimrod as the temple of Belus
(as Rawliiison, too, .supposes), remarks now, on the
contrary, that the temple of Belus stood in the mid-
dle ot the city, but that Birs Ninirotl was situated in
the suburb Bor.sippa, two miles south. But now,
according to Oppert's supposition, Borsippa riienns
tov:er of lanj^uayex^ and, therefore, the opinion has
much in its favor that tljc Birs Nimrod had been
already in the very ancient tinie, the observatory of
the Chaida-'au astrologers, with which tlie lower of tlie
epecch-coufounding stands in liistorieal connection.
I* seemg difficult to suppose that the tower, whicli
was to denote the centre of the earth, should be
Dluccd at a mile's distance outside of the city whicli
was distinctly regarded as the cajutal of the earlli.
Moreover, this tower might, at a later diay, have be-
come the tower of Beliis. Bun.sen, nuverlhelcss, de-
cides for Birs .Xiinrrjil (with rcfcicncc U) Rawlin.son),
and the name supports the conclusion that the iradi-
tion speaks lor this place. Of Hpecial importance,
besides, is the inscription of Borsippa, as given by
Oppert, which introduces Ncbuchadneszar as speak-
ing, and according to which the first building >f Bin
Nimrod is carried back, in its antiquity, 42 genem
tions. 8ee Fabri, p. 49.
DOCTRINAL A2fD ETHICAL.
1. See the preliminary discussion. Analogous
to this gigantic undertaking of the young humanity
are the later monumental buildings of the Egyptians,
of the Indians, of Greece, and of other lands. Like
the mythological systems of the civilized nations of
antiquity, thev present an historical contradiction of
a favorite modern view, according to which the whole
human race had only gradually worked itself out of an
animal (»r beastly state.
2. The character and the teleology of heathenism.
The essence of heathenism is strikingly characterized
in our narration as a diseased oscillation between the
attraction of humanity to unity, on the one hand,
and to multiplicity and unrestrained dismemberment
on the other. From the Babylonish striving after an
outward unity proceeds the first dispersion of the
nations. This afterwards takes the form of a dis-
memlierment of the same in a peculiar sense; it be-
comes, in otiier words, a heatlienish, national, or
local consciousness, an idolatrous, antochthonic
consciousness, growing wild srith the notions of a
national earth and a national heavens, whilst, in its
utter disorder, it sinks down to the mere prejudice
which regards every stranger as an enemy {hosfis)y
and proceeds, at last, to that absolute exclusiveness
which causes the inhabitant of the island to put to
death any one from abr(.»ad, and the Bushman to
threaten every new comer with his poisoned arrows.
In the same manner, from a religious striving after a
pantheistic world-view, there originates the first de-
clining of the spirit into polytheism. And then, too,
the (lifl'erent world-monaichies furnish a proof that
the diseased centripetal drawing in the world ever
works in interchange with that centrifugal tendency.
Upon the downfall of any such world-monarchy,
there follows again, in vaiious ways, a dissolution
and a dispersion of elements. Even in the history
of the Church do we find a shadowy outhne of tli
same process ; and yet it is just the task and the
dai!y work of the essential Church to mediate more
and more the true development and appearance, both
of unitv and variety, among the nations ; tliougli in
tiutli it does this tlirougli the light and law of the
Gospel as it goes out Irom the spiritual Zion, or that
tiue kingdom of God which has its organization in
the Church. The true reciprocity between uuity and
division constitutes the life of humanity. The false,
feverish, exaggerated reciprocity, which tends to the
overstraining, and, at the same time, the division and
dissolution of both these influences, is its disease
ami its death. The striving of the "orhl-monarcliies
breaks down agaiiLst tlie power of the national indi-
vidualities. Again, the national isolations are inter-
riiiiteil and broken up by the world-monarchies.
But di.spersion has the special ell'ect to distribute the
evil, to dismember, to send one people as a judgment
upon another, until tliere is awakened in all a feeling
of the need of deliverance and uniiy. Here belong
the cthiiognipliic and the mUliologic systems. In
res])ect to the fir.si, compare 1..\Nge',^ " Miscella'ieous
Writings, "i, p. 74. On tlie last, see Laiige's treatise
entitled. Die Oeaetzlich-Catholuche Kirche als tiinii-
hild.
3. As thi- myth of the Titans reflects itself in th(
CHAP. XI. 1-9.
361
erestive periods, so does it also in the Babylonish !
tower-buililing. I
4. Fabki, p. 44 : " In a manner more or less dis-
tinctly marked, since the time of Babel, has every
nation, and every group of nations, had spread over \
it its peculiar veil (Is. xxv. 7) which has impregnated
and penetrated the whole national consciousness.
Even in the present age of the world docs this re- |
mfun, not yet broken through, morally and spiritually, ;
by whole nations, but only by individuals out of every
nation, who in Christ have attained to the participa-
tion of a new and divine birth, — these, however,
being the very core and heart of such nations, and
forming with one another a people in a people. For
In Christ alone does man awake to a universal thean-
thropic consciousness." [True ii.deed, but Christ,
according to Matt, xiii., works aftei the manner of
leaven ; and in fact, as a principle ol new life for the
whole humanity (Rom. v. 12), and the veils of the
nations are gradually lifted up lefore they are
wholly removed or torn away. It is not the individ-
Hals and the nations that form the contrast in the
present course of the world, but the grain (the elect)
and the chaff in the nations, — in other words, the
contrast between the believing and the unbelieving
— between people and people.]
5. The ironical element in the rule of the divine
righteousness (see ch. iii. 22) appears again in the
liistory of the tower-building, after its grandest dis-
play in the primitive time. It is just from the false
striving after the idol of an outward national unity,
that God suffers to go forth the dispersing of the na-
tions. Without doubt, too, is there an ironical force
in the words : " and now nothing will be restrained
from tliem " (ver. 7).
6. In this demonical effort of the Babylonians to
build a tower that should reach to heaven, there still
remains an element of good. By means of it, in
later times, they appeared .as the oldest explorers of
the stars, who discovered the zodiac and many other
astronomical phenomena, — as astronomers, in fact,
with their searching gaze raised to heaven, although
their science was covered under an astrological veil.
The unfinished tower was transformed into an obser-
vatory ; and how vast the benefit that from thence
has come to man !
7. The heathenish yet Titanic energy of the
' Babylonian spirit proves itself in the fact, that whilst
in the one direction their worship went to the ex-
treme of offering human sacriBces, it became, on
the other, a service of revolting licentiousness.
8. " Let us build us a tower and make xis a
name." The antithetic relation which this watch-
word of theirs bore to Shem (the name), and the des-
tination that God had given to him that he should
be the potential central point of humanity, may
also be indicated by the name Nimrod (Tir: , come
on, now let us rebel). And so, according to the view
of Roos, may the race of Ham have become engaged
with special zeal in this tower-building, for the very
purpose of weakening the prophecy. But, then,
that would lead to the conclusion of a variance with
the Shemites, and an overpowering of them, whereas
aur history represents it as a universal underst ind-
ing. Moreover, in ch. x. 10, Nimrod appears, not as
the builder of Babel, but as the founder of the king-
dom of that name ; whereas ch. xi. relates to the
building of the city itself. We must, therefore, sup-
pose that in the understanding raeutioned, eh. xi.,
the Shemites were either infatuated, or that they
were silenced. Tbe text, however, supposas an un-
derstanding of the races. We may, perhaps, assumt
that, in the designation of the tower, Shem's priority
was symbolically indicated, and that on this account
his race would be satisfied. There would result, then,
a distinct consequence. Upon this free federal co
operation of the patriarchal races, there followed the
despotic exaltation of Nimrod, which contributed,
moreover, to hasten the Babylonio dissolution. We
make more difficult the view we take ol' the transac-
tion when we measure the greatness of the tower
before the dispersion by the later magnitude of the
tower of Belus, or of the Bris Nimrod. " Mesopo
tamia," says Bunsen, " is covered from noi-th t»
south with ruins and localities with which the name
of Nimrod is everywhere connected ; as in Babylonia
so also in Nineveh, lying farther off £nd ea.stward
from upper Mesopotamia; even the country of the
RiphiEan mountains, at the source of the Tigris, and
so the part of Armenia which lies north from Nine-
veh, and west of the lake Van, has its Mount Niro
rod."
HOSirLETICAl A^H PEACTICAL.
The tower of Babel in its historical and figurative
significance: a gigantic undertaking, an apparent suc-
cess, a frustrated purpose, an eternal sign of warn-
ing. 2. The repeating of the same history in the
political and ecclesiastical spheres. — The spiritual
history of Babylon to its latest fulfilling according
to the Apocalypse. The confusion of languages at
Babel, and the scene of the Pentecost at Jerusalem.
— Babel and Zion. — Babel, confusion ; Jerusalem,
peace. Christianity, God's descent to earth, to
unite again the discordant languages. Christianity,
in what way it makes the languages one : 1. In that
from all spirits it makes one spirit of life ; 2. from
all peoples one people ; 3. from all witnessings, one
confession of faith, one doxology, one salutation of
love.
Starke ; Supposition, that first after the flood
men drew from Armenia towards Persia, then east-
ward towards Babylon. Hedi.n'gek : Pride aims ever
at the highest. Avarice and ambition have no bounde
(Jer. xxiii. 23 ; Luke i. 51).
Lisco : The design of the tower-buildmg is three-
fold : 1. To gratify the passion for glory which would
make itself a name ; 2. defiance of God, reaching
even to the heaven, his seat of habitation ; 3. that
the tower might be a point of union and of rendez-
vous for the whole human race. Selfishness ever
separates ; so was it here ; love and humility alone
constitute the true and enduring bond ; but this is
found only in the kingdom of God, never in the king-
dom of the world. As here, so evermore, is Babtl
the name of pride, of show, of vain glory, of na-
tional subjugation, of fraud and tyranny upon the
earth. As in this place, so is it always the emblem
of 'ns-'.ence towards God, of soaring to heiveu, of
" making its throne among the stars,' and, at the
same time, of confusion, of desolation, of God's de-
risive irony in view of the giant projects of men
(comp. Is. xiv. ; Rev. xviii.). — Gerlach : There are
now formed the sharply separated fimilies of the
nations, each confined to itself alone, and standing
to others in an essentially hostile relation ; each must
now use and develop its own peculiar power. The
whole heathen world knows no more any unity of
the human race, until finally, through the Gospel,
men again recognize the fact that they are all of one
•J88
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOR Ut Ml»J!.h.
stood, that they have all one great cominon want,
and have for their father one God, — until, in short,
the languages which the pride of Babel separated
become again united in the love and humility of
Zion.
Calwee Handbcch : It is worthy of remark that
the modern researches into language have lecognized
the original affinity of most known languages to one
common original speech. The sundering and part-
ing of the nations is God's own work. As labor was
the penalty for the sin of paradise, so is separation
the punishment for this sin of pride. In both cases,
however, was the punishment at the same time a
blessing.
Schroder : It is the spirit of Nimrod that in-
flates humanity in the plane of Babylon. The tower,
as historical fact, is to form the apotheosis of hu-
manity.
Luther : They have no concern that God's name
be hallowed, but all their care and planning turns to
this, that their own name may become great and
celebrated on the earth. Thi« city and tower of mei
is fundamentally nothing else than an outward arti
ficial sub.stitute for the inner union before God, and
in God. — Roos : It is credible that Ham and his son
Canaan should have been especially zealous to hinder
this counsel of God, according to which a hard des-
tiny was to befall them — that is, that ihere should
be a separation of the nations, so tliat Canaan slicild
become the servant of Sliem and Japheth, — Li'thkr :
God comes down, that is, he gives special heed to
tliem, he ceases to be forbcii ring. His coming down
denotes his revelation of himsclt, his appearing in a
new and great act, whether taken in the sense of
mildness or severity. " 0 that thou wouldst rend
the heavens and come down " (Is. Ixiv.). — -Ver. '7.
The salvation of men is a matter of deep concern to
our Lord ; the boundary he would set to them is the
barrier of grace and compassion. — G. D. Kromma-
CHER : Human plans are confounded that the divine
order may proceed from them. Such is the coui se
of the world's history.
FIFTH SECTION.
'V race of Shem. The Commenced and fti/ernipted Migration of Terah to Canaan.
of the Contrast between Heathendom and the gertninaX Patriarchitliam^
The Genesii
Chapter XI. 10-32.
1. Genealogy of Shem — to Terah.
10 These are the generations of Sliem : Shem was a hundred years old and begat
11 Arphaxad' [Knobel: protabiy, highland of Chaldaea] two years after the flood. And Sliem
12 lived after he begat Arpliaxad five hundred 3'ears, and begat sons and daughters. And
13 Arphaxad lived five and thirty year.s, and begat Salah [sending]: And Arphaxad
lived after he begat Salah four hundred and three years, and begat sons and daughters.
14 And Salah lived thirty years and begat Eber^ [one from the other side, pilBrim, emigrant].
15 And Salah lived after he begat Eber four hundred and three years, and begat sons
16 and daughters. And Eber lived four and thirty year.s, and begat Peleg [division]:
17 And Eber lived after he begat Peleg four hundred and thirty years, and liegiit sons
18 and daughters. And Peleg lived thirty years, and begat Reu [friendship, friend] :
19 And Peleg lived after he begat Ren two hundred and nine years, and begat sona
20 and daughters. And Reu lived two and thirty years, and begat Serug' [vine-branch] :
21 And Reu lived after he begat Serug two hundred and seven years, and begat sons
22 and daughters. And Serug lived thirty years, and begat Nahor [GeseniuB : panting] :
23 And Serug lived after he begat Nahor two hundred years, and begat sons and daugh-
24 ters. And Nahor lived nine and twenty years, and begat Terah [tnming, tarrying] :
25 And Nahor lived after he begat Terah a hundred and nineteen years, and begot sons
26 and daughters. And Terah lived seventy years, and begat Abram [nigh father], Nahci
[see ver. 2], and Haran [Ocscniup : MontanusJ.
2. Terah, his Race and Emigration (vers. 27-82).
27 Now these are the generations of Terah : Terah bagat Abram, Nahor, and Haran,
28 and Haran begat Lot [veil, concealed]. And Haran died before [thefacoof] his father
29 Terah, in the lend of his nativity, in Ur [light ; flame] of the Chaldees (o^iit's). And
Abram and Nalior took them wives: the name of Abram's wife was Sarai [princess]:
and the name of Nahoi-'s wife, Milcah [Queenl, the daughter of Haran, the father of
CHAP. XI. 10-32.
369
30 Milcah, and the father of Iscah * [spier, seeress]. But Sarai was barren ; she had no ciiild.
31 And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran, his son's son, and Sarai his
daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife ; and they went forth witli them from Ur of the
Chaldees to go unto the land of Canaan ; and they came unto Haran and dwelt thero
32 And the day.'s of Terah were two hundred and five years; and Terah died in Haran.
ri Ver. 1.— I^'DQ^X. Arpbaxad.— pronunciation derived from the LXX., Ap4^a|a£ ; according to the Hebrew
pointing, Arpakshai it is a com|iound, evidently, of which the principal part is Ti'3 , from which the later D''ni23S .
Chaldffians. It would appear, on thetie accounts, to be the name of a people transferred to their ancestor, as in many
other cases. Among the early nations names were not fixed, as they are wilh us in modem times. The birth name waa
changed for something else — some deed the man had done, or some land he had settled, and that becomes his appellation
in history. Sometimes the early personal name is given to the country, ami then comes back in a changed form as a
designation of the ancestor. Tlius Josephus speaks of the five primitive " Shemitic people, the Elaviiles (or Persians),
the Assyrians^ the Aramites (or Syrians), the Lydlans (from Lud), and the Arphaxadites, now called Chaldaeans." — T. L.?
ja Ver 14.— "33? . The Ime of Shem in Arphasad seems to have remained a long time after the flood in the uppei
country ; and it may be doubted whether this branch of the Shemites, from whom Abraham was directly descended, were
with the great multitude of the human race in the plain of Shinar, or had much, if any thing, to do with building the
tower of Babel (see rem:irks of Lange, p. 367). Eber'a descef.dants came over the river, and began the first migrations to
the south- The word ISS may mean over in respect to eitl er side, and so it might be applied to one that went over, or
to one that remained. This passing over being a memorable event , the naming would come very naturally from it,
whether as given to the ancestor who stayed, or to the descendants who left the old country. Each side would be trans-
euphralensian to the other, and so truly "^laS C''"I3S , or Hebrews. It would be very much as we speak, or used to speak,
of the old countries as transatlantic, on the' other side of, or over the Atlantic ; the Hebrew "t:5 having every appearance
of being etymologically the same with the Greek un-ep, German Hber, and our Saxon orer. Compare Gen. xiv. 13, where
•^nSZjrt D"1"S< , Ahram the Hebrew, is rendered 'Afipap. 6 ir«paT»^, Abram the passenger.— T, L.]
'[J Ver.'sO.— 5a"lij) . Some would resort to the primary sense of JIB or J1D to get the meaning entangled (verwick-
kelter), to make it correspond to some other derivations which are fancied here as denoting either the advance, or the
retarding, of this early Shemitic movement. But besides the faintness and uncertainty of such derivations, the names
they seem to indicate could only have been given long afterwards, when the facts on which they are supposed to be
grounded had acquired a historical importance. Qesenins would render it pafmei, a young ri'ne-sftoot (from JIUJ , to wind,
tvtist). No name-giving could be more natural and easy than this. Compare C'^ii^^C' , Gen. xl. 10, 12 ; Joel i. 7 ; and
what is said in the blessing of Joseph, Gen. xlix. 22, n^B }^ "Ol"' ^^S > fruitfiilness Joseph, son of fruitfulness— our
translation, a very fruitful bough. — T. L.)
[* Ver. 29. — HSD^ , Iscah. The Jewish interpreters, generally, say that Iscah and Sarah were the same. Thtis
Rashi —" Iscah, that is, Sarah, so called because she was a seeress (riD'D) by the Holy Spirit, and because all gazed upon
her beauty," for which he refers to Gen. lii. 14. The root HDD (see. gaze upon) is quite common in the Syriac, the oldest
branch of the Shemitic, though it does not come in the Hebrew. It is revived, and becomes frequent, in the Rabbinical
It is equivalent to the Hebrew ilTin , Prophet or Seer. Aben Ezra has the same interpretation. —T. L.]
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE GENEAI,OGICAL TA-
BLE OF TEIE SHEMITES.
This genealogy of the Shemites is really an ap-
pendage to that of the Sethites, ch. v., and in this
way forms a genealogical series extending from Adam
to Abraham. It is continued on the litie of Nahor
(ch. xxii. 2i)-24), on that of Keturah (ch. xxv. 1-4),
of Ishmael (ch. xxv. 12, etc.), of Esau (ch. xxxvi.
1, etc.), on the line of Jacob (ch. xlvi. 8-27), etc.
(See the article: "Genealogical Register," in Her-
zog's Real Encydoptedu.) According to Knobel this
table has the character of an element of fundamental
Scripture (p. 129); we are satisfied to designate it
as elohistic universalistic, since it embraces not only
Abraham's race, but also the nearest branches of it
that at a later period became heathen. The table
of the Shemites embraces ten generations, as does
the table of the Sethites. The first (conformably to
the nimiber ten) denotes a perfect development, which
nins out in Abraham, the " father of the faithful,"
representing, as he does, a numberless race of tlie
believing out of all humanity. Abraham must be
reckoned here with the tenth, as Noah in ch. v. It
b clear, too, that this table is designed to indicate
the growth, or establishment of the patriarchal faith,
together with its previous history. Most distinctly
'.s this expressed in the migrations of Terah, — and
in the individual names of the patriarchs. In the
son of Arphaxad, Salah, there is announced a send-
ing., or nxission, in Eber the emigration., in Peleg the
24
division of the theocratic line from the untheocratic,
in Reu the divine friendship, in Serug the entangling
or the restraint of the development, in Nahor a core-
Jlict or a striving, in Terah a setting out from the
heathen world which in his tarrying comes to a stop.
And so is the way prepared for Abraham's departure.
We cannot maintain, with Knobel, tiiat these Shem-
itic patriarchs must have been all of them fir.-;t-born.
They are, throughout, the first-born only in the sense
of tlie promise Buusen interprets the name Eber
as one who comes over the Tigris. But in a wider
sense Eber may also mean pilgrim. The names Reu
and Serug he interprets of Odessa and Osroene. As
coming, however, in the midst of personal names,
these also must have been expressed as personal
names, from which, indeed, the names of couiitriea
may have been derived. On the interpolation of
Cainan in the Septuagint, and which is followed Ht
Luke (ch. iii. 36), compare Knobel, as also on the
varying dates of the age's, as given in the Samaritan
text and in the Septuagint. The numbers we have
here are 600, 438, 433, 464, 239, 239, 230, 148, 205,
and 175 years. Here, too, as in the ca-^e of the
Sethites, we can get no symbolical significance from
the respective numbers, although Knobel is unwilling
to recognize their historical character. It^ connec-
tion, however, with the general gradual diminutioL
of the power of life, there is clearly reflected the in-
dividual difference ; Eber lives to a greater age than
both his forefathers, Arphaxad and Salah. Nahor,
the panting (the impetuous), dies earliest. According
370
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
to Knobel, the genealogical table advances from the
mythical to the legendary period ; at least we have
no sufficient grouids, he thinks, to deny to Abraham
and his brothers an historical existence. The same
must liold true, also, of his fathers, whose names,
with their theocratic characteristics, must liave be-
longed, without doubt, to the most lasting theocratic
reminiscences. The table before us is distinguished
from the Sethitic by being less full, in that it divides
«he life-time of each ancestor into two parts, by the
date of the theocratic tirst-bom, whilst it leaves the
summing up of both numbers to th" reader. " In
ver. 26 this genealogy, just like the one in ch. v 32,
concludes with the naming of three sons of Terali,
since all these have a significance for the historv to
come : namely, Abram as the ancestor of the elect
race, Nahor as the grandfather of Rebecca (comp.
ver. 29 with ch. xxii. 20-23), and Haran as the father
of Lot (ver. 27)." Keil. The table in Dklitzsch gives
us a good view of the series of Shemitic families (p.
324). According to Bertheau the Septuagint is right in
its interpolation of Cainan. Delitzsch disputes this ;
comp. p. 322. " The Alexandrian translators insert-
ed tills name because the Oriental traditions have so
much to say of him as the founder of astronomical
science ; and, therefore, they were unwilling to leave
out so famous a name. There may have been a
brother of Salah, through whom the main line was
not propagated." Lisco. Delitzsch gives a reason
for its not being called the tholedoth, or generations
of Abraham, from the fact that the author makes
the history of Abraham himself a large and principal
part. That, however, would not have prevented the
setting forth of Abral'Tin's genealogical history. But
in such a representation there might have been, per-
haps, an joscuring of the idea that the seed of Alira-
ham in the natural sense goes through the whole Old
Testament, whiLst, in a spiritual sense, it pervades
the New (see Rom. iv. cf. Gen. 15).
EXEGETICAi AND CRITICAL.
1.
Ch. xi. 10-2fi ■ — Shem'nras a hundred years
old. — See the computations of Knobel and Keil. —
Two years after the flood. — This must be under-
etooil of the bi'ginning of the flood. — And begat
sons and daughters. — See the ethnological table ;
»lso, ver. 17. "For the sake of tracitig the Hue of
the Joktanides the author had already given, in ch.
X. 21-2.'), the patriarchal series from Shorn to Peleg;
he repeats it here, where he would lay down fully
the line from Shem to Abraham, with the addition
of the ages." — Arphaxad. — Arrapachitis, " in north-
em Assyria, the original seat of the collective Chal-
dseaii family." Knobel. " It was the home of the i
XaASaToi and KapSovxoi mentioned by Xenophon anil |
Strabo, as well as of the modern Kurds." The same [
writer refers the names tliat follow to cities or terii-
lories. to which we attach no 8[)ccial importance,
since in any case the districts here woidd be them-
Bclves derived from the names of persons.
2. Vers. 27-32. The famihi line of Terah, Ac-
cording to Keil, this superscription must embrace
the history of Abraham, so that the tholedoth of
Ishmael ch. xxv. 12, and of Isaac, ch. xxv. lit, cor-
respond with it. But then, in the spiritual ivliillon,
Abrahani wonlcl he sulKniliiiatt; to Terah, which can-
not be Bii])[io.sed. — And Haran begat. — " Aecor.l
ing to the con.stant plan of (iene.sis, it is hern related
of Haran, the youngest son of Terah, that he begat
Lot, because Lot went with Abraham to Canaan (cb
xii. 4), and Haran died before his father Terah,
whereby '.he band which would have retained Lot in
his father-land was loosed." Keil. — Before hia
father Terah. — Properly, in his presence, so that he
must have seen it ; it does not, therefore, mean
simply in his life-time. The first ease of a natural
death of a son before the death of his father, is 4
new sign of increasing mortality. — Ur of the Chal
dees. — This must either be sought in the name Ur
which Ammianus calls Persicunt Castellum, between
Patra and Nisibis, not far from Arr.apachitis, or in
Orhoi (Armenian, Urrliai), the old name of Edessa,
now called Urfa (see Kiepert and Weissenborn :
'Nmeveh and its Territory,' p. 7)." Keil. Delitzsch,
correctly perhaps, decides for the castle Ur men-
tioned by Ammianus, although, doubtless, the Ur
in our text has a more general, territorial, and, at
the same time, symbolical meaning. " The old Jew-
ish and ecclesiastical interpretation reads 'out of
"nx' (fire), meaning that Abraham, as an acknowl-
edger of the one God, and a denier of the gods of
Nimrod, was east into the fire, but was rairacidously
preserved by God." Delitzsch. The same writer
finds therein the idea that Abraham was plucked as
a brand from the fire of heathendom, or from its
heathenish fury. We would rather suppose, on the
contrary, that by Ur is meant a region in Chaldaja,
wheie the ancient monotheistic symbolical view of
the heavenly lights and flames had jiassed over into
a mythical heathenish worship of the stars, as a wor-
ship of Light and Fire ; wherefore it is that the
starry heaven was shown to Abraham as a symbol
of his believing progeny (ch. xv.), whilst, for the hea-
then Chaldseans, it was a region of divine (or deified)
forces. Knobel explains the word as meaning J/o!in.i
of the Chaldaans. Rawlinson holds to the reading
IIS as equivalent to 1"? (city). The interpreting
it of light and fire is both etymologicallv atui ac-
tually the more correct. " The family of Terah had
its home to the north of Nimrod's kingdom (in north-
eastern Mesopotamia), and worshipped strange gods;
as is clear from Josh. xxiv. 2," Delitzsch. — Iskah.
— By Joseplius, the Talmud, the Tiirgum of Jona-
than, and others, this name is held to be one with
Sarah. On the other haml, Knobel properly remarks
that according to ch. xx. 12, Sarah was the daughter
of Terah, and, according to ch. xvii. 17, onlv ten
years younger than Abraham ; she coidd not, there-
fore, have been a daughter of Abraham's younger
brother. It is probably the case that the Jews, in
deference to their later law, sought by means of this
hypothesis to weaken as much as possible .\braham's
kiiismanship to Sarah. Delitzsch assumes the possi-
bility that Haran was a much older half-brother of
Abraham, and that Abraham, as also Nahor, had
married one of his ilanghters. According to a con-
jecture of Ewald, Iscah is mentiimed because she
became Lot's wife. But it may be that Isciih was
thought worthy to be incorporated in the theocratic
tradition because she was a woman of eminence, a
seeress like Miriam, according to the signification
of her name. Knobel alludes to the fact tlitit Abra-
ham had his sister to wife, without calling to mind
that she was a half-si.ster (ch. xx. 12), or might evei;
have been his adopted sister. So also he says that
Nahor married his niece, and that in like manner
Isaiie and Jacob did not many strangers, but theii
owi) kindred. He accounts foi this im the ground
ol a peculiar family atlection in the hous* of Terab
CHAP. XI. 10-32.
371
(ch. xriv. 3, 4 ; xxvi. 35 ; Txvii. 46 ; ixviii. ' ) ; just
«8 at the present day niiiny Arabian families ever
marry in tlieir own, and do not permit one to 'ake a
wife from any other (Skbtzen : " Travels," iii. p. 22).
The ground, however, of such kindred marriage in
the house of Terah and Abraham, is a theocratic
one, and thus far are the children of Abraham placed
in a conditiim similar to that of the children of
Adam. As for the latter, there were, in general, no
" daughters of men," out of their own immediate
kindred, so for the sons of the theocracy there were
no spiritual daughters of like birth with tliemselves,
tha: is, of raoTiotheistic or theocratic faith, out of
the circle of nearest natural affinity. In this respect,
however, they did not venture to tread in the foot-
steps of the Sethites (Gen. vi.); for it was theirs to
propagate a believing race through consecrated mar-
riage.— But Sarah was barren. — .i^ prelude to the
history that follows. — And Terah took Abram
his son. — Without doubt has this removal a reli-
gious theocratic importance. At all events, this di-
vinely accomplished withdrawal from Ur of the Chal-
dees mast mean more than a mere providential guid-
ance, as Keil supposes. — And they went forth
with them. — The word cns« (rendered, with them)
makes a difficulty. It may be easiest understood as
meaning with one another. On the other hand, De-
litzsch reminds us that the suffix may liave a reflex
sense, instead of a reciprocal (ch. xxii. 3). This is
the very question, as otherwise the sentence would
be indefinite ; the expression, therefore, must mean
not only wit.li one another, but by themselves ; that
is, they withdrew as one united, exclusive commu-
nity. Besides this, there are two modes of taking
it. Keil understands only Lot and Sarah as the sub-
ject of the verb, and, therefore, refers cns to Terah
and Abraham. There are three tilings in the way
of this : 1. The withdrawing (or going forth) would
be separated from the previous introductory expres-
sion ; Terah look Abraham, etc., which will not do ;
2. it would be a withdrawing from that which leads,
md the accompanying would become the principal
persons ; 3. Abraham would have to be regarded as
a co-leader, which is contrary to what is said : Terah
took Abraham. Moreover, Abraham, regarded as aii
independent leader, would have been bound in duty
, to go furtlier on when Terali broke off from his pil-
grimage in Mesopotamia. Delitzsch, on the other
hand, together with Jarchi, Rosenmiiller, and others,
refers the words tJiey went forth to the members of
the family who are not named, namely, they went
forth with those named ; but this is clearly against
the context. By tlie expression with them, it would
be more correct to understand, with those, namely,
with the tirst-named (Terah, etc.), went forth those
just previously mentioned, or named immediately
after them. Later, is Haran denoted as the city of
Nahor (ch. xxiv. 10 as compared with ch. xxvii. 43 ;
xxix. 4 and xxxi. .t3). For other interpretations see
Knobel. — And they came unto Haran. — Terah
intended to go from Ur to Canaan, but he stops in
Qaran, wherefore he also retains his people there.
According to Knobel, the mention of Canaan is an
anticipation of the history that follows. — Haran. —
Carra, Charran, lay in northwestern Mesopotamia
fPadan Aram, xxv. 20), ten leagues southeast from
Gdesaa, in a feitile region, though not abounding in
»ater. The city now lies in ruins. It was the capi-
•ti of the Gabians, who had here a temple of the
Uoon goddess, which thev referred back to the time
of Abraham. In its neighborhood Crassus was slain
by the Parthians. More fully on the subjeC, see in
SciiRiiliER, p. 52ii; also in Knobel and Delitzsch. —
And Terah died in Haran. — Terah was two hun.
dred and five years old. If .\br;diam, therefore, waa
seventy-five years old when he migrated from Meso-
potamia, and Terah was seventy years old at hi>
birth, tlien must Abrahiin have set Ibrth sixty year*
before the death of Terah. And this is very imp.jr-
tant. The emigration had a religious motive which
would not allow liim to wait till the death of bit
father. As Delitzsch remarks, the manner of repre-
sentation in Genesis disposes of the history of the
less important personages, before relating the maiL
history. The Samaritan text has set the age of
Terah at one hundred and forty-five, under the idea
that Abraham did not set out on hia migration until
after the death of Haran. The representation of
Stephen, Acts vii. 4, connects itself with the general
course of the narration.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
See above : The significance of the genealogical
table of the Shemites.
1. The decrease in the extent of human life. In
the manifold weakenings of the highest life endur-
ance, in the genealogy of Shem, there are, neverthe
less, distinctly observable a number of abrupt breaks :
1. From Shem to Arphaxad, or from 6oO years to 438;
2. from Eber to Peleg, or from 4(54 years to 239 ; 3.
from Serug to Nahor, or from 230 years to 148 ; be-
yond which last, again, there extend the lives of
Terah with his 20.5, and of Abraham with his 175
years. Farther on we have Isaac with 180 yean,
Jacob 147, and Joseph 110. So gradually does tla
human term of life approach the limit set by the
Psalmist, Ps. xc. 10. Moses reached the age of 120
years. The deadly efficacy goes on still in the bodily
sphere, although the counter-working of salvation
has commenced in the spiritual. KeiL, with others,
finds the causes of this decrease in the catastrophe
of the flood, and in the separation of humanity into
various nations.
2. OhalJwa and the ChaJdaans. — See the Theo-
logical Real Lexicons, especially Herzog's Encijclo-
poedie. The Fragments of the Chaldsean Author,
Berosus, as found ir the Chronicon of Eusebius, and
the Chronographia of Syncellus. This people seem
to have been early, and, in an especial sense, a
wandering tribe. The priestly castes of Chaldseans
in Babylonia must have come out of Egypt. Strabo
and others transfer the land of the Chaldaeans to a
region in lower Babylonia, in tlie marshy district of
the Euphrates near the Persian Gulf; the same
author, however, finds also, as others have done, the
seat of the Chaldaeans in the Chaldtean Mountains,
very near to Armenia and the Black Sea. The
proper home of the Chaldaeans was, therefore, at the
head waters of the Tigris.
3. Ur in Chaldaea. See above.
4. On the indication of a great yet gradu;,; pro
vision foi' the variance that was to take p'ace betw.> ii
the race of Eber and the heathen, see tht -^xo':e*...cal
and Critical. The later Biblical accounts of Terah
and the forefathers of Abraham appear, in general,
to one their form to the reciprocal influence of
Israelitish tradition and the Israelitish e.fegesis o'
the passage before us. According to the languagi
of Stephen. At^ts vii. 2, Abraham was already called
872
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
at Ur in Chaldsea. We must, therefore, resrani him
»s the proper author of the migration of his father,
Terah. The passage, Josh. xxiv. 2, according to
which Abraham's forefathers, and Terali especially,
dwelt beyond the river (the Euphrates), and served
other gods, has special relation to this fact of
Terah's suffering himself to be detained in Haran. —
This, then, is to be so understood, that in consequence
of the universal infection, idolatry began to take up
its abode very near to the adoration of the one God,
as still maintained in Terah's family (see ch. xxix.
82, 33, 35 ; xxx. 24, 27 ; and to this belongs what is
said, ch. xxxi. 34, about the teraphim of Laban).
We may well suppose that Joshua, from his stem,
legal stand-point, judged and condemned that ming-
ling of worships, or that image worship, as strongly
as Moses did the setting up of the golden c ilf The
little group of wanderers, ver. 31, appears to have
originated from a similarity of feeling which, after
long conflicts in the line of Eber, was finally to tear
itself away from this conjectural capital of the Light
and Fire worship in Chaldfea, and, in that way, from
heathenism altogether. Their aim was Canaan, be-
cause there, partly from their decidedly foreign »tate,
partly by reason of iheir antagonism to the Hamitic
race, they would be protected from the contagion.
But Terah cannot get beyond Haran, and to this not
only does Joshua refer, but also the later Jewish
tradition respecting Terah. To this place, where he
settles down, Terali seems to have given the name
of his dead son, in loving remembrance, and it may
have been this name, as well as the fair land and ap-
parent security, that bound him there. The circum-
stance that Abraham, according to ver 32, does not
appear to have departed before the death of Terah
(with which, however, the history otherwise does not
agree), has been interpreted by Syncellus and others
as implying that Terah was spiritually dead. A like
untenable .lewish hypothesis, which Hieronvmus gives
us, assumes that the 75 years which are ascribed to
Abraham, ch. xii. 4, are not to be dated from his natu-
ral birth, but from the time of his deliverance from
the furnace of fire, which was like a new birth. But
that Abraham tore himself away before his father's
death has, at all events, the important meaning that,
in the strife between filial piety and the call of faith,
he olieyed the higher voice. The family group in
Haran. however, is thus distinctly denoted, because
it now forms the provisional earthly homestead of the
wandering patriarchs, and because, also, as the later
history informs us, it was to furnish wives of like
theocratic birth for their sons.
5. Legends concerning the migration of Abra-
ham. See Rahmer, "The Hebrew Traditions "(Bres-
lau, 1861, p. 24). According to a Hebrew Midrash
(Rabba 38, in Hieronvmus), Abraham, at Ur, was
cast into a furnace of fire, because he would not
adore the fire which the Chaldieans worshipped, but
was miraculou.^ly preserved by God. His brother
Uaran, on the contrary, was consumed, because he
was unresolved whether to adore the fire or not. It
was Nimrod who had him cast into the furnace.
Here belongs, also, the Treatise of Beer, entitled
"The Life of Abraham, according to the Jewish tra-
ditions." Leip., 18S9.
HOMILETIOAL AND PBAOTICAL.
As Abraham's life of faith develops itself in his
posterity, so did it have its root in the life of bis fore-
fathers.— How the life of all great men of God renH
upon a previous hidden history. — Comparison of th«
two lines of faith, that of Seth to Noah, and from
Sliem to Abraham: 1. outwardly, ever less (at lasi
reduced to one point) ; 2. inwardly, ever strongei
(attaining at last to the one who makes the transition)
[Thus Xoah passed through the corrupted rici
and through the flood; thus Abraham made the
transition through heathenism.] — Terah's migration
to Canaan: 1. its spirited beginning; 2. its failur*
?o go on. — Abraham and his kinsmen: 1. He was
probably the author of their movement; 2. they,
probably, the cause of his tarrying in Hiiran. — The
death of children before the eyes of their parents
(ver. 28). — Sarah's barrenness, the long and silent
trial in the life of Abraham.
Starke : The Sethites, among whom the true
church is preserved. — God's remembrance of the
righteous abides in his blessing. — Osiandeb: A
Christian when he is called, must, for the sake of
God, leave joyfully his fatherland ; he must forsak'
all that he loves, all that is pleasing to him in th<
world ; he must follow God obediently, and only
where He leads.
[Excursus on the Confiision of Languages.—
That there was here a supernatural intervention the
language of Scripture will not permit us to doubt.
We need not, however, trouble ourselves with the
question how far each variety of human speech is
connected with it, or regard, as essentially aftecting
the argument, the greatness or smallness of the nuni'
ber of languages now spoken upon the earth. There
is, doubtless, many a local jargon, the result of iso-
lation, or of unnatural mixtures, that has but little,
if anything, to do with an inquiry in respect to this
most ancient and world-historical event. It is so
difficult to determine what is a language in distinc-
tion from a dialect, or mere local variety of idiom
and pronunciation, that such lists as those of Baibi
and others can hiive but little philological value. For
all essential purposes of such inquiry, therefore, there
is no need to extend our view beyond that district
of earth in which languages now existing, either as
spoken or in their literature, can be historically or
philologically traced to peoples connected with the
earliest kLov\'n appearances ')f the human race. We
give this a very wide sweep when we include in it
Southern and Middle Europe, Western Asia, and
Northern Africa. Here ])hilological science, though
yet very imperfect, has found great encouragement
in its inquiries, and within this district has it begun
to make out, with some clearness, what must have
been the earliest divisions of language. The result
thus far, as stated by some of the latest and best
writers, has been the recognition of three general
families or groups. In giving names to thise, there
has also been recognized, to some extent, the ethno-
logical division snpposetj to be made from the sons
of Noah ; and hence some have been inclined to call
them the Japhethic, Shemitic, and Hamitic (Bunsen,
Khamism and Semism). It was early perceived,
however, that the ethnologic and linguistic lines do
not exactly correspond even in the Shemitic ; and
there is still more of aberration and intersection
within the supposed limits of the two others. The
first group has therefore been called the Indo-Ger-
manic, and of late the Arian. In the third the terra
Hamitic has been generally dropped for that of Tt»
raiuan. The general correspondence, however, givei
much countenance to the first ethnological naming
CHAP. XI. 10-32.
37?
But whatever method be adopted, it does not affert
the main characteristics belonging to each of the
three. These may be thus stated. The Shemitic is
the smallest, the most unique, both in its matter and
its form, the most enduring, the most easily recog-
nized, and ha\ing the least diversity in its several
branches. The group termed .Vrian, Indo-Germanic,
or Japhethan, is less marked in all these character-
istics, though retaining enough of them to make clear
the family relationship in all the best-known branch-
es. The third is so difftrent from both these, it
seems so utterly broi<in up, that Pritchard, and other
philologists, have given it, as a whole, the name
AUophylian, using it simply as a convenience of no-
menclature. There exist, however, marks of affinity
that show it to be something more than a mere arbi-
trarily separated mass (see Max Mi-llf.r " Languages
of the Seat of War," pp. S8, 90, and Rawlinson :
" Herodotus," vol. i. 624). To make use of geo-
logical analogies, as Bunsen has done, the Shemitic
may be Ukened to the primitive rocks, the Arian to
the stratified formations, broken, yet presenting much
clearness of outline and direction, the Turanian to
confused volcanic masses projected from some force
unknown, or solitary Ijoulders scattered here and
there in ways inexpUcable, yet showing marks of the
locahties from whence they came, and evidence of
some original correspondence in the very irregulari-
ties of their Iracture. Or we may compare them,
the first, to a temple still entire in its structural
form, though presenting tokens of catastrophes by
which it has been affected ; the second, to wide-spread
ruins, where whole architectural rows and avenues
still show a clear coherence, whilst even the broken
arches, fallen columns, displaced capitals, give evi-
Jence by which we are enabled to make out the
original plan ; the third, to scattered mounds of rub-
bish, in wliich shattered slabs, obscurely stamped
bricks, and faint marks of some joining cement,
alone testify to a structure having once a local unity
at least, though now exhibiting little of inward plait
and harmony. To drop aU such figures, it may be
said that the Shemitic has preserved what was most
enduring of the original form, the Arian what was
most permanent of the origitial matter, whilst in the
• Turanian has fallen all that was most frangible in
the one, or most easily deformed or defaced in the
other.
Xow to account for such a Condition of things in
language, especially in its earliest appearance, is
equally difficult, 'vhether we hypothesize the primi-
tive movement as a tendency to gregariousness and
to a consequent unity of speech, or as a tendency in
the opposite direction, or as being both combitied in
an attractive and repulsive polarity. The phenomena
iU each and all are at war with every such induction.
There is in the one family a strangely preserved
unity. There is in another a totally different pecu-
liarity of form stamped upon it from times that pre-
cede all historical memory ; it is full where the first
seems to be scant, free where the other is tense ;
sometimes just the reverse,* having as a whole a look
• (Tlius the Sliemitic greatly excels in the number of
rhat are called its coiiiug:atione, or ways of modifying the
primf^ry sense of the verb. Otherwise its foi-m may be char-
tcterned as the very (rrandeur of simplicity, siigsestin.; the
comparison of the majestic p.alm, whilst the Greek and S;in-
BCrit may be likeni d to the branching oak. .\nd so, again,
In some of its aspects, the Shemitic presents :i sui-prising
bareness. In the Hebrew and Syriac, for example, there is
the least show, or rather, only th"e rudimentiiry appearance
if i_ny optative or subjunctive modality, that is. in outward
so exceedingly foreign as never to be mistaken, ye<
with an equally unmistakable familiarity, or familj
likeness, of its own, witliin which the many dissimili-
tudes among its different branches never effaee th«
slrotjg and seemingly ineradicable affinities. There
is a third so marked by an almost total dissolution
that its very looseness would seem to make its only
classifying feature, were it not that certain indices
found in every branch (such as the numerals and
some pronomitial forms), point to a community of
origin, whilst appearances of correspondence, even
in its fractures, suggest a common disorganizing
catastroplie. Viewing these three families in theit
relations to each other, we find that there is not only
separation, and that of long standing, but great di-
versity of separation. The original cleaving dates
from a most ancient period, before which nothing ig
known, and in its general aspect remains imaffected
by time. The Hamitic, or Turanian, seems to have
been confused and tumultuous from ihe beginning.
Such is said to be its appearance on the early tiilin
gual inscriptions made to accommodate the incon-
gruous peoples in the Assyrian empire who had, in
some wav, been here and there wedged between the
Arian and Shemitic portions. See Rawlinson'?
" Herodotus," i. 527. Again, the Shemitic, thougl
oftentimes in close contiguity, has put on none of thi
essential features of the Arian, nor the Arian of thf
Shemitic. The German and Arabic are as distinct in
modern times, as anciently the Greek and Hebrew
The minor specific divisions in each family have va
ried more or less, but the great generic differences
have remained the same from age to age, still show-
ing no signs of blending, or of mutual development
into some common comprehending genus, according
to the process which Bunsen supposes to have pro-
duced such changes in the antehistorieal tiiuea
Wliat has stamped them with features so ancient anc
so diverse ? Nothing of any known natural develop-
ment, either of one from the other, or of all froij
a common antecedent stock, can account for it. L
Sinism, or Chinesian (the name given to this hypo-
thetical beginning of human speech), developed
Khamism, and Kliamism Semism, and Semism Ari-
aiiism, how is it that we.find nothing like it as actual
fact in historical times, and no marks of any transi-
tion-period in the ages before ? Surely, if Bunsen'a
favorite comparisons be good for anything, we ought
to find in language, as geologists do in the rocks, the
visible marks of the process, or if we are compelled
to adopt a theory of sudden or eruptive breakings in
modal form, since all the subjective states may be clearly
and effectively expressed by particles, or in some other way.
It is the same, even now, in the Ar tbic, only that tliis em-
bryotic appearance is a little moie brought out. Three
thousand years, and, -n-ithin the last thii-d of that time, a
most copious use (philosophic, scientific, and commercial, aa
well as colloquial), have given it nothing, in this res^-^ct,
that Qxa be called structural grnwili, nothing that can •«
regarded as an approach to the exuberant forms of modallt>
to be found m the Greek and Latin even in their earliest
stages. It has kept to the mould in which it was tirst mn.
Po also in the expression of time, the Shemitic still preserves
its rigidne.ss. Il keeps its two tenses immo'liJied in form,
thoug'h it has ways of denoting all varieties of time, relative
or absolute, thatany other language can express. Compare
it with the Greek and Sansciit copiousness of temporal
forms ; how early born are they, and how fruitful, in the one
case, how unyielding, how stubbornly barren, we may say,
in the other ! Surely, one who carefully co/ siders such phe^
nomena as these, must a-lmit that there is iti the birth anc
perpetuity of language some other power^either as favoi^
mtr or resisting — than that of miitaal development, or re-
ciprocal chanee, however long the peric Is tjiat may he a»
sumed for it as a convenience to certair .heories. — T. L. i
R74
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST i?OOK OF MOSES.
the ODe ca^e (whether we call them supernatural or
extraordinary matters but little to the argument) why
should a similar idea be regarded as iri-ational in the
other. Thus there are no linguistic marks in Greek
and Hebrew (regarded as early representatives of two
great families), or in Syriac and Sanscrit, showing
that at any time they were a common language,* or
*Dy beginning of mutual divergency as traced down-
ffarda, or any evidences of convergency as we fol-
low tliem up the stream of time. In fact, they stand
in most direct contrast in their earliest stages; even
as the fresh geological rupture must present, ^t^tubt-
less^ a more distinct breakage than is shown after
ages of wear and abrasion. When history opens,
these languages stand abruptly facing each other.
This mav be said with some degree of confidence,
for our knowledge here is not scanty. We have the
Shemitic all along from the very dawn of history to
our latest times. The Arabic of the present day,
copious as it has become in its derivative vocabulary,
is as rigid in its Shemitic features as the oldest
known Hebrew. There is some reason for regarding
it as retaining even still more of the primitive type.
The Greek was in its perfection in the days of Ho-
mer, and as Homer found it. It has never been sur-
passed since in all that makes the glory of language
as a spiritual structure, in its classifications f of out-
ward things, in its still higher classification of ideas,
• [This is said more especially in reference to the form,
or what may be called the soul of each language respectively.
Of the malfer, or vo< alized material, as it may be styled,
there is a ^'ood deal that is common. There are many roots
In the Arianthat are evidently the same with the Shemiiic,
whether coming from a common original stock of souuds,
or from a later borrowing fiom each other. Words pass
from one lantaiage to another, or original vocal utterances
are broken up, in an immense variety of ways ; but the
Btructiiral forms are unyieldins. In this resides the char-
acterizing principle of perpetuity ; so that it is no parados
to affirm a generic identity in la, guage, in which the greater
part, or even all the articulated sounds had bi-cn changed,
or have given place to others. "When we consider the great
facility of mere phonetic changes, through cognate letters
or those of tht- same organ, tlirough transition letters, by
whose intervention there is a passage from one family into
another Cas i and y make a transition from the dentals U^
the gutttirals, and w ot v from the gutturals to the labials),
or through nasal combinations, such as vg, nd, mb, which,
on dissolution, may i-ariy the syllable in the new direction
of either element with all its affinities, thus making, as it
were, abridge between them— when we bear in mind how
soondB wear out in the bcginnint^ or at the end of words,
entirely disappearing, or easily admitting in their attenu-
ated state: the substitution of others belonging to a different
organ, or how, in the middle of words, the compression of
ByllabU'S bringing together harsh combinations, crushes out
letters in some cases (especially if they be gutturals), or in-
troduces a new element demanded l>y euphony — we te;Lse to
wonder at th** gieat variety and extent of vocal changes.
It is seen how in various ways any one letter almost, or
syllabic sound, may pa-b into almost any other, and how the
same word, as trac^-d through it> phonetic ch:inges, presents
an appearance in one lanenagc that neither the eye nor the
ear would recogni/e in another. To take one example that
may nUind for an illustratiun of some of the most important
of soul, changes, who, by the sight or sound alone, or by
any outward marks, would recognize the I>atin diVs in the
French jowr, or the English tfariteaghr, 5aiepu) in the Latin
lacTy Uicrima. or the Knirli-ih Ifad in the Latin (a/>ul and
the Greek KtiftoAij, though nothing can be more certain than
their relationBhip a'l traced by; the phonetic laws. 'Iho rual
wonder is that the changes in thin department have not
been greater thiin they are found to be. It in the soul of
language, the unyieldmg rigidity of its form, that, by its
ossoCL'ttion, preventM the utter diHSolution and mutiition ot
the material. Ita eonsirvntism, in thiM respect, is shown in
the caxe of bintTingcs tliat are m<;rely spoken. It has its
most complete- ijlei-t in those thai have a written and print-
ed literature. — T. L.J
t [The nmingemi-nt. in the mind, of things to bo named,
helODgf Ui the formation of language, as much aw the n an-
ng, if it may not rather be oaid to be the most important
in its precision and richness of epithet, in the pro
found presentation of moral and aesthetic disMnctiona,
— in tt'is respect ever in advance of the people who
used it — in the elements it contained for the expres-
sion of philosophic thought whenever its stores should
be required for that purpose, and, withall, in the
melodiou.'^ness, the flexibility, and the exuberance of
its vocal forms. The Thucydidian Greek falls below
it in all these respects. Certainly it had not risen
above it. It is the tendency of language, when left
to itself, to dechne in the attributes mentioned. The
assertion may be hazarded that the evidence of this
fact is exhibited in most modern tongues. More co
pious are they doubtless, better adapted to a quick
political, social, or commercial intercourse, or to cer-
tain forms of civilization in which a greater commu-
nity of action, or of understood conventional pro-
ceedings, makes up for the want of pictorial and
dialectical clearness as inherent in the wonls them-
selves— but everywhere, in their old worn state, pre-
senting a lack of that vividness, that exquisite shad-
ing of ideas, that power of emotion, which aston-
ishes us in the early languages just mentioned. The
tendency, in fact, is towards Sinism, or a language
of loose arbitrary symbols, not away from it. A?
savagism is the dregs of a former higher civilization,
so Sinism is the remains of language, bearing evi-
dence of attrition and fracture; and this, however
copious it may be, or however adapted it may be to
a mere worldly civilization, such as that in which the
Chinese have long been stationary, or slowly falling,
and to which a godless culture, with all its science,
is ever tending. There is in language accretion, ad-
dition, looseness, decay; but we rarely find, if we
ever find, in any speech that has long been used,
what may be truly called growth in the sense of or-
ganic vigor, or inward structural harmony.* That
young and vigorous constitution which is discovered
in the earhest Arian and Shemitic speech, they must
have received in some way for which it is very ditti-
eult to account on any natural or ordinary grounds.
part of the naming itself. Things, thus regarded, may be
divided into three general classes: 1. Outward sensible
objects; 2. actions, qualities, etc., us the ground of their
naming, and themselves, therefore, demanding an antece-
dent naming; 3. mental acts and states, thoughts, think-
ings, emotions, etc., regarded as wholly spiritual. Id re-
spect to the ttrst, it may, indeed, be said that nature map-^a
the classification, but the mind must recognize it, more or
less coiTcctly, before it can give the names. The second liea
in both depai'tments ; since acts {doings^ sufferings) must be
the souice whence direct names are drawn for the first, and
flgures, jiictm-es, or spiritual representatives, for the thirdt
as ie shown in that large class ot words that are said to have
secondary meaninKS, or abstmct ideas denoted by something
material or sen-^ible in the root. The third cias^ific;ltion is
wholly spiritual or within, though its namings are thus
drawn from without. We fiid all this work done for \a
when we are bom. The earliest languages have it as vivid-
ly :is the latest, more vividly, we may say, if not oirried to
so wide ail extent in the elassification of outward olijccts,
more profoimd, as analysis would show, in the distinctions
of moral and asthetical ideas. Whence c;iiiie itV Wa
must ascend to the very taproot of humanity to find an an-
swer, if we are not to seek still farther in some divine teach-
ing or inspiration. The phenoniena lie ever before us j
their commonness sliould not diminish oiu: wcr.Jer at th«
mystery they present.— T. L.]
• [We may thank God that some of the nohletit «n-
piatres (Greek, Hebrew, Sanscrit, T^atin) died lo g ago, or
in their comparative youth. They have thus been em»
balmed, preserved from decay, made immorial, ever yoing,
—their ex]jre.--sive words and fonns still remaining as a re-
serve store fur the highest philosophicjil, theological, and
even scientific uye. They are Cilled " the dead langUL-tre*! ; "
but that which some would make an objection to what tifti
long and justly been deemed their nlace in eduo«lioii, if thf
very gn'uud of their excellence.- f. L.l
CHAP. XI. 10-SS
37{
Convention will not explain it, as Plato saw long ago
in tbe very dawn of philological inquiry ; ouoma-
topic theories fail altogether to account for the first
words, to say nothing of grammatical forms ; devel-
opment is found to be mere cant, giving no real in-
sight into the mystery. If the originating processes
'all wholly within the sphere of the human, then
must we suppose some instinctive logic, some sure
inlelligence working below consciousness, and some-
how belonging to the race, or races, rather than to
the individual. If this is difficult to conceive, or to
unde:«tand, then there remains for us that which
hardly surpasses it in wonder, whilst it falls short of
it in mystery, namely, the idea of some ab extra
supernatural power once operating on the human
Boul in its early youth — whether in the fiist cre-
ation, or in some subsequent early stages of re-
markable development, — and now comparatively
unknown.*
When we study language on tbe map, the diffi-
culty of any mere development theory bringing one
of these families from the other, or from a common
original stock, is greatly increased. Whilst the Ari-
au and Shemitic present, in the main, certain geo-
graphical allotments tolerably distinct, this Hamitic
or Turanian conglomerate is found dispersed in the
most irregular manner. It is everywhere in spots
thioughout the regions occupied by the more organic
families ; sometimes in sporadic clusters, as in parts
of Western Asia, sometimes driven far oft* to the
confiaes as is the case with the Fhinic and Lap lan-
guage, or, again, wedged into corners, like the Basciue
language in Spain, lying between two branches of the
Ariau, the Roman and the Celtic.
Had we found rocks lying in such strange ways,
it would at once have been said : no slow depositing,
no long attrition, no gradual elevation or depression,
has done all this. Tliey may have exerted a modi-
fying influence ; but they are not alone sufficient to
account for what, appears. Here has been some
eruptive or explosive force, some ab extra power,
whether from above or beneath, sudden and extraor-
* [It is not extravagan'; to suppose something like this
still lying at the ground of that mysterious process which
* we witness without wonder, because so common, — the rapid
acquisition of language by the infant mind. It is not the
mere learning to speak the names of outward, sensible, in-
dividual things— there is nothing much more strange in
that than in teaching a parrot to talk,— but the quick seiz-
ing of those hidden relations of things, or rattier of tliought
about things (ideas of the soul's o\\ti with which it clothes
things), and which it afterwards tasks all our outward logic
to explain. How rapidly does this infant mind adapt words,
not merely to chairs and tables hut to the relatioual notions
of number, case, substance, attribute, qualifying degree,
flubjoctive raodalitv, time relative and absolute, time as
past, present, and iuture, or time as continuous and event-
ual, knowing nothing indeed of these as technical names,
but grasping immediately the ide.as, and seeing, with such
amaziug quickness, the adaptability to them of certain
forms of expression, a mere termination, perhaps, or the
feintest intlectioa, and that, too, with no outward imitative
indices from tbe sense, such as may aid in the learning of
the names of mere sensible objects. This indeed is wouder-
fal, however common it may he. We never do it but once.
All other aCiiuisition of languages, in adult years, is by a
eroce-= of memory, comparison, and conscious reasoning —
I other wcrds, a sti-ictly scientific process, however certain
abbreviations of it may be called the learn'Ug of a foreign
longne by *' the method of naturi- " and of infancy. Some-
iliing in the race analogous to this process in the individual
Infant soul, may be, not iiTationally, supposed to have
eharacterized the earliest human history of language. The
feilure of every system of artificial language, though at-
tempted by the most philosophical minds, aided by the
bighest culture, shows that neither convention nor imitation
hail ^nvthing to do with its origin. — T. L.1
dinary in its effect, however generated in its causal
ity, and however we may style that causality, whethei
natural or supernatural, simply inexplicable, op di-
vine. Such eruptive forces are not coiiiined to rockt
and strata, or to sudden changes in material organi
zation. They have place also in the spiritual world
in the movements of history, in the souls of mec, is
remarkable changes and formations of language.
There are spiiitual phenomena, if the term may b«
used, for which we cannot otherwise easily account.
The evidence here of any such intervening power
may be less striking, because less startling to tha
sense, but to the calm and reverent reaxon they maj
be even more marked than anything analagous to
them in the outer world of matter. Gieat confusion
has arisen in our theological reasoning fi'om confin-
ing this word miraculous solely to some supposed
breakage or deflection in the natural sphere.
To say the least, therefore, it is not irrational to
carry this view into the history of man regarded as
under the influence of supernatural, as well as natu-
ral, agencies. And thus here, as we contemplate the
remarkable position of the early languages of tha
world, and especially of the three great families,
some force from without, sudden, eruptive, breaking
up a previous movement, extraordinary to say the
least, would be the causal idea suggested, even if tha
Scripture had said nothing about it, A primitive
formation has been left comparatively but little af-
fected ; all around it, east and west, are linguistic
appearances presenting the most striking contrasts
to the first, and yet the most remarkable fannly like-
nesses to each other ; elsewhere, as a third class of
elements show, the eruptive or flooding force haa
broken everything into fragments, and scattei'cd them
far and wide. Philology cannot account for it ; but
when we study the tenth and eleventh of Genesis
in what they fairly imply as well as clearly express,
we have revealed to us an ancient causation adeiiuate,
alone adequate, we may say, to the singular effect
produced. The language of the account is general,
as in other parts of Scripture where a mighty change
is to be described, universal in its direct and collat-
eral historical effect, without requiring us to main-
tain an absolute universality in the incipient move-
ment. From some such general terms in the com-
mencement of chapter xi. it might seem, indeed, as
though every man of the human race was in this
plane of Sliinar, and directly engaged in the impious
undertaking described. Taking, however, the two
chapters together — and it is too much to say, as
most commentators do, in the very face of the ar-
rangement, that the eleventh chapter is wholly prior
to the tenth — we must conclude that one line, at
least, of tbe sons of Shem, that of Arphaxad, the
ancestor of the Chaldteans, and of Eber, the more
direct progenitor of the Hebrews, remained in the
upper country of the Euphrates. It is fairly to be
inferred, too, that tlie Joktau migration to Arabia
had commenced, carrying with it the Shemitic ele-
ment of speech to modily or transform the Cushite,
whether introduced befoie or after it. Some of the
sons of Japheth may have already set off, west and
east, in their long wanderings (to (ji'eece and India
perhaps), whilst Sidon, a descendant of Haiu, had
even at this early day, founded a maritime settle,
ment, and ventured upon the seas. It is not easy to
understand why the nan-ation of the tenth chapter
should have had its place before that of the eleventh,
unless a portion, at least, of the movements ther/
recorded. ! ad been antecedent in time. It is com
S76
GENESIS, OR THR FIKST '^ >0F '"F ittiSEH.
moiilr siiiii that the tenth is anticipatory in respi'ct
to wliat follow.^, but this is not altoge Vr satisfac-
tory. As the story of the greater scattering comes
after tlie ethnological divisions iu the order of nar-
ration, it may be consistently maintained that it was
subsequent to some of them, at least, in the order
of time, whilst the seeming universality of ''le lan-
guage may be explained on the ground of ■i>-. mag-
nitude of the later event, and its \nrl-f -r.ae, r'fiect in
the human history. A close exam— ^ion, however,
ghows that, even in the diction, this universality is
not so strict as some interpretations would make it.
After these earlier departures, as we may supply from
chapter x., it proceeds to say, " the whole eartli (land
country) was (yet) of one language and one speech."
It had not been broken up, though it may have be-
gun to be affected by causes which would naturally
produce changes of dialect. " And in Ikeir journey-
ing," or " as thei/ journeyed onward (CTjl^a), the(/
found a plain in the land of Sliinar." " As tliei/
journeyed," that is, as men journeyed onward, or
migrated more and more. Who or how many they
were is not said, and these indefinite pronouns give
us no right to say that every man of the human race,
all of Xoaehian kind, were in this plain of Shinar.
There is the strongest proof to the contrary. We
cu2not believe that Noah was there, althougli he
lived three hundred and fifty years after tlie flood,
or that .Sliem was there, who lived one hundred and
fifty years later, aud even in the days of Abraham.
The idea is abliorrent that one so highly blessed of
God, and in " whose tents " God had promised " to
dwell " — Shem. the Name, the preserver of the holy
speech, and the direct antithesis of that false "name"
which these bold rebels sought to make unto them-
selves— should have had any participation, even by
liis presence, in so unholy a proceeding. As little
can we believe it of any of the line from which came
Abraham, or even of their not remote conxanguinii,
the Joktanite Arabians. The same feeling arises
when we think of the pious fathers of Melehizedek,
Wng of Salem, king of righteousness, and who had
consecrated I'im » priest to El Elion, that Most High
God of the Heavens (see Gen. xiv. 18), who is here so
blasphemously defied.' Who were they, then, that
composed this strange assemblage on the plain of
Shinar? A vast multitude doubtless, a majority of
Noah's descendants perhaps, yet still, as is most
likely, a colluviea ge^Uium, a gathering of the bad,
the bold, the adventurous, from every family, but
with the Hamitic character decidedly predominant.f
Nimrodiau, perhaps, might they be called with more
propriety, if we take the constant Jewish tradition
that Nimrod was tlieir leader iu rebellion. The no-
iler sons of Ham are to be distinguished from these
• iThua 'B.zJ.n interprets their n^n , " Go to, now let us
eliinl' tbe tirm.-imeiit and make war upon liie most Iligh."
lielchiZL'dL-k and his forefathers were, in all proljitbility.
Oanaanites. There uuKht Ix- piety and faith even among
these, !is is instanced, afterwards, and iu a time of still Kroat-
•r comiption, in the im^h of Itahab, who was a dii-ect iinces-
il«r> 'if our Lord I What I'.ml says (lloS. vii, .1) of Alel-
ohi£;dek's being airarup and afiTjTittp, '* without father and
Tithout mother," is not iiitcndc'l to deny his havins any
aartliiy linoaKe. -T. Ii.l
* [The opinion th:it ihe men in the plain of Shinar wcro
aot the whole huinuu race, but predominantly Ilumitts,
or follower*! "( Wiiurod, is miiintiiined bv Augustine, and,
amonK mod^^rn anthrnilios, liy Luther and Calvin. Ser ;iUo
the account of Jobki'uus ("Ant." i. 4;, who miiktis Kiin-
rod tho great leafier ol the tIjoIo rebslliou* »iv"-'^ineiit. —
T. L.i
riiibyliinis,n Hamit f". The founder of .ht Egyptiac
monarchy, aid, perutfDS, the Arabian t.'jshites, haii
in all jirolml -Jity gou*. to their respective settlements
The very name, Nimnid, shows a difference betweeo
them. It is not the name of a country, or of a fam
ily of descendants, Ul.o the others mentioned Gen. z.
8 ; a fact of which Maimonides takes notice (se*
marg. note, p. 849) win,n he calls attention to the
manner in which Nimrod is mentioned irregularly, aa
it were, or out of the line, after the other sons of
Cush had been disposed of. He was not, like them,
a "father of a people," a patriarch, or ancestor, but
a bold adventurer, a " mighty hunter of men before
the Lord," or in defiance of the Lord, who gathered
together, out of every people, those who were like
himself, not to settle the world, but to prevent its
peaceful settlement by engaging in bold and reckless
enterprises of an opposite nature. He may be said
to have represented the empire founding, instead of
the planting or colonizing, tendency. He was the
postdiluvian Cain, and there would seem to be a sig-
nificance not to be disregarded in the fact that here
there is given to this rebellious multitude that same
name, Ctsn ''32 , "sons of men," which, in its fem-
inine form, is used Gen. vi. 4 (D'7'f 'I '^''?) 'f* denote
the godless in distinction from the more pious. The
line here indicated, between the sons of God and the
" sons of men," was less distinct, perhaps, than tliat
which was drawn between the Sethites aud the Cain
ites, yet it still existed to some extent, making a di-
vision between the better branches of the Shemites,
with some from both the other lines, and this vast
rabble of the sensual and ungodly. The grammat
ical form of the name Nimrod (which is veryunusua
for such a purpose) shows that it had a popular, in-
stead of a family, origin. It is the hrst person j>lurai
future jussive, lSi2D , " co?/ie let us rebeiy It wa?
the watchword of the impious leader, afterward!
given to him as a title by bis applauding followers
" Let us break Jehovah's bands, let us cast his corda
from us," let us build a tower that lihaU reach llim
in the Heavens.*
On this impious host oi Nimrod, predominantly,
although not solely, Hamitic, fell especially the scat-
tering and confounding blow, like the bolts froEC
heaven aimed at the rebellious Titans ; and hencn
this rabble of tongues called Hamitic or Turanian,
or these allophylic conglomerates which philologists
find so remarkable as compared with the enduriug
unity of the Shemitic, and the diversified, yet unmis-
takable Arian relationship. These two were, drnbt-
less, afflicted by the shock ; one of them may have
had much of its subseque"' modification, if not its
origin, from it; but on lue Hamitic host fell th»
• [It was A thought exceedingly w-icked, yei. naving in
it a kind of teniiic sublimiiy. Neither culu the idea of
in
._ y. jNeituer culu llie laea of
. .'aching the heavens, or sky, be called irrational, or absur>i,
however unscientific. Theyreasnned inducluely, Baconian-
ly, we may say, from sense and observation Their limited
experience was not against it. It showed a vast ambition.
It was not an undertaking ol savages, but of men possessed
with the idea of somehow getting above nature, and havinf
much of that spu-it which, even at the jaeseut day, charao
tei-ines some Kinds of scientitic boasting (see remarks, _ p
:165). It was not the success merely oi t*-. . undertaking
(from wnich we are yet as far as ever), i._y the impiolU
thought, that Ood meani to confound, aud to strike down,
whenever it arose in the miuds of men. History is full of
ovurthi-own Babels; and it is still to be tested whether oul
ej-cessive modern boasting about what is going to bo achiev-
ed by science, progress, %ud democracy, will form an azoej^
five cose. — T. ti.i
CHAP. XI. 10-82.
371
Btone that ground tlu-m to powder. *'For there*
Jehovah confoundeil the language of all the earth"
{land or coimtrij). This Ninirodian Babel of tongues
wrought more or less of confusion everywhere, mak-
ing the universality in the effect rather than in the
immediate causality — a view perfectly consistent with
the soberest interpretatiou of the artless language of
Holy Scripture.
The causative influence, we may believe, was
primarily a spiritual one. It was a confounding not
only of their purposes {zh p-inuiniD , Gen. vi. 5)—
thus introducing confusion, madness,! and discord,
into their camp — but also of their ordinary thinkings
and conceivings, rwv fV^uw-TiTeair Koi ii/voiuiv wapSias,
Heb. iv. 12, "reaching to the dividing line of soul
andspmV," ^vxv^ "^^ fal Trrcu/uaros, holding back the
divine gift of reason, and thus introducing disorder
into the sense and the utterance through a prior con-
fusion in the spirit. It deranged their word-forma-
tions by a previous derangement of their thoughts.
The difficulty attendmg the mere outer view,
here, arises from a fundamental error which may be
found even in acute treatises of philology. Words
do not represent things, as outer existences merely,
according to the common notion, but rather what we
think about things. They are in truth symbols of our
own inner world as affected by the outer world of
things around us. They translate lo us our own
thoughts as well as help us to make them known to
others. The animal has no such inner world, and
therefore it is that he cannot use speech to represent
it to himself or to other animals. This would be
* [C'lJ ""S; for there. It may denote fact or circum-
stance as well as place. For there — in that event, or in that
confusion. Compare Ps. cxxxiii. 3, where this particle,
niT , is used in just the same way to denote the opposite
condition of brotherly love, and the opposite effect :
nirr^ ni:£ Cli; "^3, "/or (A^re Jehovah commanded the
blessing, even life forever more; "not in "Mount Her-
mon," or *' the mountains of Ziou,*' merely, but as belong-
ing to this holy affection of brotherly love. Compare 1 John
iii. 14. -T. L.]"
t [For a notable example of this, see 2 Chron. xx. 23,
where the hosts of Amnion, of Moab, and of Mount Selr,
who rose up against Jehoshaphat, are sudflenly turned
against each other. Profane history records such events as
I taking place, now and then, in great armies ; cases of sud-
den and irretrievable confusion, giving rise to hostility as
well as tiight. They are called panics, whether the terra
means simply unive^rsal disorder, or what was sometimes
called "the wrath of Pan" (Ilafbs bpyi^, see Eueip. "Me-
dea,'* 1169), bringine madness upon an individual or a mul-
titude; it denotes something inesplicable, even if we refuse
to call it supernatural. See Polt-exus : De Strateg., ch. 1 ;
also a very striking passage in the ^'Odyssey," xx. ^46,
which shows, at all events, the common belief m such sud-
den madness falling upon multitudes of men, whatever may
D6 the explauation of it :
tJ.vr\<jrrip<Ti. Se IlaAAa? 'ABiqirq
av^earov yeXui Sipce naftCTrkay^ev Be vorffio.
Among the suitors Pallas roused
Wild laughter irrepressible, and made
Their mind to wander far.
Even where there is nothing startling to the sense, how
many examples are there — they can be cited even from very
modem times— where the minds of assemblies, composed
sometimes of those who claim to be most shrewd and mtel-
ligent, seem strangely confounded, and, without leason, and
against all apparent motive, they do the very thing which
is the destruction of all their schemes Thi-y seem seized
with a sudden fatuity, and act in a manner which is after-
ward" unaccountable to themselves. We may explain it a-s
we will ; but so strong is the conviction of an ab extra
power somehow opei-ating in such cases, that it has passed
mto one of the most common of proverbs, quos Deus ruft
oerdere frills dementai — "those whom God would destroy,
te first makes mad."— T. L.l
readily admitted in respect to words repi-esentativ*
of thought alone ; but it ia true also of that lar^^a
class that seem to stand directly for outward sensibU
tilings per se. Here, too, the word called the nam#
represents only remotely the thing named, but nearh
and primarily, some thinking, conceiving, or emotion,
in our souls, connected with the thing, and giving
rise to its name.* As proper names are last of all^
• [The first thing denoted in outward lantjuage must
have been something purely inward ; a conscious state of
soul, a thought or an emotion, which demanded an outward
sign in some articulated sound representing it, not arbitra-
rily, nor accidentally, but by a conscious fitness for it, such
as other sounds do not possess, and of which there can no
more l)e given an explanation than of tlie correspondence
between a thought, or an emotion, and an outward look. It
is as real, and, at the same time, as inexplicable, as the har-
mony wbich is felt to have place between a feeling, or an
idea, and a musical modulation. From the primary Toott
representing these most interinr states, and which must ba
comparatively few in number, comes the next order of
names, namely, those of qualities and actions of outward
things regarded as affecting us. From these, in the third
place, come the names of outward things themselves, aa
having such qualities or actions, and as denoted by them.
Later, indeed, though still very early, there arise meta-
phorical words, or words derived from the second and third
classes, with secondary tropic^al senses intended to represent
mental states as pictured in some outward thing, scene, or
act ; but these do not belong to the prime elements of speech,
which must begin with radical sounds supposed to represent
something inward by a real or imagined fitness. That there
is some such primary fitness seems to be assumed by some
of the best philological writers, as by Kaulen in his Sprach-
verwirrung, and William Von Humboldt, in his work on the
Kawi language, although they are unabie to explain it.
It is not likely that pliilology will ever penetrate the mys-
tery. The great argument, however, for the reality of such
a correspondence between articulated sound and thought,
is, that, on the reverse theory, language is arbitrary
throughout, which we cannot believe it to be. The deni^
brings more dilficulty than tie assimapiion, however ine'
plicable the lattei' may be.
On this deeper psychology of language we have a hint,
it may be reverently said, in what is told us, 1 Cor. xiv.,
concerning the mysterious " gift of tongiies." It teaches u«
an important tact, though revealing nothing of its naturo
or mode. Although miraculous, it must be founded or
something in the essential human spiritual constitution
There was a real language here. It is a profane trifling
with a most sacred matter t-o treat it as a mere thatunaturgifi
babble, designed only to astonish or confound the unbeliev-
ing beholders. It was the true outward espreesion of an
elevated inward state. The words uttered mu.>t have been
not only articulate (that is, formod of vowels and conso-
nants) Kut truly representative. They were none of them
at^uvoi (ver. 10), or mere 4>^oyyoC., sounds, or noises. They
had a real Bvvant^ t^? f/xur-TJ? (ver. 11), a true "power of
voice," and thi^ could be nothing else than an inherent fit-
ness in the utterance to represent the entranced state, not
generally, merely, but in its diversities of ecstatic idea or
emotion. They were not understood by the hearers, be-
cause, in their" ordinary state, there was nothing within
them corresponding to it. Even the utterers could not
translate it into the common logical language of the vov^
(ver. 14), or understanding. They were spnken iv Tri'fi/juoTt,
in the spirit, and only in the spirit could they be under
stood, like the words that Paul heard in his entranced state,
"whether in the body, or out of the body, he could not
tell." Paul certainly does not mean to deny, or disparage,
the greatneiis of the spiritual t;ift in what he says, ver. 19,
hut only to set forth the Greater outward usefulness of tho
prophetic charisma. " 1 thank God," he sars (ver. IS) '* 1
sperik with toncues more than you all." He was often in
the state that demanded this languai'e to express itself tfl
itself. In respect to the connection of this pe^iuliar case
with the L'eneral argument, the analogy holds thus far,
namely, that the?e ecstatic utterances were real representa^
tive words. They represented an inward spiritual state of
thought, or emotion, or both, from a real inherent fitness to
do so. We may, therefore, rationally conclude that a simi-
lar correspondence between words and ideas was at the be-
ginning of all human speech. Had man remained spirit lal,
this connection would have continued as soraetliing inlui«
tively perceived, and leading ever to a rijht application of
articulate sounds to the things or acts sicmified, a? it seems
to have ffuided the first huniaidty in the naming of animali
from some spiritual effect their appearance produced. Thii
primitive gift or faculty of intuition became daikene'l by
nt^
GKNESIS» OR VHE FIRl/T BOOK OF MOSES.
so these Barnes of outward objects must hive come
after words donoting action or quality, and from
which their own naming, unless supposed to be purely
arbitrary, could alone have been derived. Orijrinally
they must have been all descriptive, that is, they Iiad
a meaning beyond their mere sign significance. lu
proportion as such primary mcaninj^rs have faded out
in modern langua.t^^es, have words lost vividness and
emotive power, tliough still remahiingasa convenient
classifying notation. Thus in early speech the names
of animals, for example, were all descriptive. We
find it so even now, as far as we can trace them in
the siguifieance of their roots. They invarialdy de-
note something which the animal does^ or suffers, or
M, or is supposed to do, to suffer, or to be — thus
ever implying some judgment of the human mind
respecting it; awd this corresponds to what is said
in the Scripture of the animals being brought before
Adam to see (r"X'b for Adam to see, judge, decide)
what name should be given to each one. This name
is ever taken from something more general, and the
name of that from sometliing more general still, and
''o back from the concrete to the more and more ab-
fitract, imtil we are lost in the mystery, and compelled
to admit that there is something in ourselves, and in
language, which it is not easy to understand. We
may be sure, however, that in all these primary names
of animals there was something descriptive, though
in many it may have been long lost. In some cases
it stUl shines dimly through the wear of time and
usage, enabling us to infer it universally. Thus6/W,
we may be certain, means something more than b'lrd^
and dog than rfor/, even as foid^ fu(jel^ vor/el^ siiW car-
ries with it some faint image o^ Jlyhig^ and ckien^
hund^ Kuoff, caiiis {cano, canot'us, tlZ'^p\ suggests
the clear, ringing, houndlike sound that denoted the
animal in tlie earliest Arian speech.* Connected
with this there is another thought that has impor-
tance here. The first impression is that nouns, or
the names of things, must be older in language than
verbs. Examination, however, shows just the con-
wary as a fact, and then we see that it must be so,
if names are not arbitrary, but ever imply some ac-
tion or r4uality of the thing, and so an antecfdent
naming of that action or passion. But not to pur-
sue this farther, it is enough to show that the spring
sin, eensuality, and earthliness tm-niner the mind outward,
and thus tending, more and more, to make words mere ar-
bitrnry signs With all this, there is evidence that in the
earliest speech of men there was more of vividness, more
of a conscious livintf connection between words and that
which they signified, than afterwartis existed when l;in-
guapes became moie copious and more mixed. In this way
may we suppose that the e^irly roots, ihouch comparatively
few in number, had more of a self-interpretinf; jiower, anil
that, in proportion as tliis continued, there wa;- the tneater
security apainst the changes Find diver'^ities which a h)wer
Bpirilual state must necessarily bring into languaiic. A
total loss of it amontr this rebellious Ilamitic host may have
led to a more rapid confounding of words and forms, and,
of con^Ofiuence, a greater ruin of language than ever ciimo
from any other event in human history. Then- are exani-
"ies enough to wliow how soon the best'language becomes a
Jargon in a community of very bad men, such as ihiuveB
fcnd evil ndventureta. Here was a similar fiuso, its we may
•onceive it, only on a vasi ly larger t-cale.— T. I*.]
* i'l'he name civen to an animal could lU'ver. of course,
be a lull dnsnriplion. It i^ the selection of some predomi-
nant tniit, afiii»n, or habit, as the dis^tinpul. 'filing or naming
feature. TU'.a may vai-y among different pi-dple. In nne
tongue the sumo animal may be denoted by lis color, if it
has Homethintf yieculiar, m another by bis manner of move-
ment, in another by a burrowlntr property, or by his method
of seizing his prey. These difTercnt Cdnci'ivingH may give
rise to ditferent names; and yet if tho actions ao ropre-
■entecJ by those names have the same or similar verbal roots
hoy may bo iodicative of a remoter unity.— T. L.1
of language is in the thought, the conceiving, th<
affection, as the source of names for things, and foi
the relations of things. Confusion here is eonfueioD
throughout, and this would be much more operatlvf
in a multitude thus atfectod than in an individual
Break up the community of thought and the com-
munity of language is broken up, or begii;s to break
up along with it. It affects not only the matter but
the form, the soul, the grammatical stnicture.* Go-
ing still deeper, it changes the mode of lexical deri-
vation, or the process through which secondary sen8e.i
(as they exist in almost all abstract words) come from
the primary — the inward etymologies, as they may
be called, which are of more importance in determiu-
ing the affinities of langnages than the outward pho-
netic etymologies on which some philologists almost
exclusively insist, and which are so easily lost — all
the more easily and rapidly wlien the more spiritual
bonds are loosed. So, on the other hand, the main
taining secure against mutation the higher ideas that
dwell in a language, especially its religious ideas, is
most conservative both of its matter and form. Thua
may we account, in some degree, for the way in
which the Shemitic endured the shock that left all
around it those masses of fragments which philolo-
gists call the Hamitic or Turanian. The great name
of God was in it in fulfilment of the promise. Those
other remarkable appellations of Deity, El, Allah,
Eloah, Elohim, Adonai, EI Sbaddai, El Elion, El
Glam, TrauTOKpdrwpy v\pi(nos^ anuuniSy have been to it
like a rock of ages, giving security to its other re-
ligious ideas, whilst these again have entered exten-
* [If our modes of conceiving individual flensiV>le objects
have such an effect upon ianifuage, much more important, in
this respect, are the more abstract conceptions, such as those
of time, relative or absolute. The conserving power thus
arising may receive an illustration from the scanty, yet most
tenacious, Shemitic tenses, as compared with the Greek.
In the Hebrew, time is conceived of as reckoned from a
moving present, making all that comes after it, future, al-
though it may be past to the absolute present of the narra-
tor or describer, nnd all before it, past. It need not lie said
how much more of a subjective cliaracter this imjiarts to
tho language, especially in its poetry. It has hail, besides,
the effret of giving a peculiar form to the two tenses, and
of making thrse, deficient as they may seem in number, de-
note all the varieties of time that are expressed in other
languages, but in a more giiiphic manner. Whilst dispens-
ing with an absolute present form, which would make it
fixed and rigid, it has a flowing presence which may become
absolute whenever the narration or description demands it.
Iti the Inrlo-Germanic tongues, on the other hand, there is
a fixed present and a fixed iorm for it, which will not allow
a dejiarture from the absolute time, except as sometimes
implied in tho assumption of a poetical style. Hence a
much greater number of tense forms are demanded, not
only for the past, present, and futui'e, simply, but for a past
and future to the past and futuie respectively, besides on
indefinite or aorist form. Thus there is a wide machinery
peifonning these offices— accurately, indeed, though with
little more precision than is found in the Shemitic — whilst
there is a loss of pictorial and dramatic power, 'i'hcre is no
tim<-, relative or ahsolute, denoted by the Greek tense forma,
thai may not, in some way, be expressed in the Arabic ;
whilst tlie manner in which the latter shifts its present, aa
we may say. by hanging it on a particle, or making it de-
jiend upon its place before or after, gives a greater vivldnesi
nf narration. It is astonishing how such scantiness of mode
and tensi- escapes confusion ind ambiguity ; and yet there
in a comparative test of this which is conclusive. The
Arabic is written and read without anything like capital
letiers or italics, \vithout any grammatical or logical puno
tuation, of anv kind, niikiiig any diWsion of paratrraphs,
sentinees, or clauses. I'Yom the beginning of a book to the
e id, 1 here are none of these helps to relieve defieii'neies of
expression, whether the result of carelessness, or comiiij
from unavoidable looseness in the language. In English
this could not be done. Without pucb outward heljis, tin
most fticurate writer, lake ho ever so much paitia, woubi bf
full of grammiiticAl cotistructions that might be taken if
different way«. and not a few unsolvable logical am aigui
ties.— T, L.i
CHAP. XI. 10-82.
37.
•iyely into its proper names, its common nouns and
verbs, conserving it against tlie corruption and de-
generacy of tliose wiio spoke it, and giving even to
its Arabic and Syriac branches a Iioly and religious
aspect beyond anything presemed in any anciout or
modern tongue. Well and worthily have the Jewish
Rabbis called it •i:;npn "iVrb , the holy tongue.
Truly it is so, whether we regard it as the original
Noachian speech, or something later preserved entire
from the wreck of the Babid confusion.*
How this extrnordinary breaking up of language
iool^ place we may not easily know, though main-
taining its possibility, and its strong probability, as a
fact, aside from the express Scriptural declaration.
There is no department of human inquiry in which
we so soon come to the mysterious and inexplicable
■s in that of language. Some have maintained its
onomatopic origin, as has been lately done in a very
clear and able treatise by Prof. Whitney. If this,
however, is confined to vocal resemblances in the
names of sounds themselves, it accounts for oidy an
exceedingly small number of words ; if carried far-
ther, to supposed analogies between the names of
certain acts, or efforts, and the effort of tiie organs
in pronouncing them, it takes in a very few more;
beyond tins it would be that idea of some inherent
fitness in sounds which has been already considered
in the note, p. 377, and to which the name onoma-
topic may be given in its widest sense ; though then,
instead of being the easiest, it would be the least
explicable of all. So the philologist may endeavor
to find the beginning of speech, especially in the
names of animals, in the imitation of animal sounds;
or lie may absurdly trace it to a conventional nam-
ing, overlooking the truth that for the initiation of
gucli a proceeding language itself is required — or he
mav deduce it from accident, or, give him time enougii
— and a past eternity is very long — he may fancy it
coming out of inai'ticulate or merely interjeotional
sounds, making its random "natural selecti'ins,"
until, after ages of chaos, a light inexplicidjle begins
to gleam, an inteUigence soj/tfAoto enters into the
process, and thus, ai last, language comes into form,
as a vehicle of rational, that is, of logical f thought.
But for human minds, A070S, speech, and logos, re^uion,
* [Th:s 16 on the supposition tliat the Shemitic (for any
diiference here between the earliest Hebrew, Arabic, and
Syriac, is of little consequence) was the primitive Nt achian
apeech that came out of tlie ark. The best argument for it
is that there is no good argument to the contrary. If no
other has any better claim on inward phiIologi>-al grounds,
the Bible history greatly favors the idea., to say the lest,
that tliis langu<age of the ark continued the purest in the
iiiie of Shem. Kaulen, however, in his Sprarhverwirrung
nt Battel, presents a philological arijument that certainly
seems to have weight, though, in itself, it may not be deemed
conclusive. He insists upon the fact that "throughout this
famil} , the most important modifications of the verbal idea
are m ide by vowel changes in the root itself, and not merely
by additions mote or less loosely made to a fised root, grow-
ing ouly by agglutination. Thus from one root, k~t-l (as
written without vowels), we have katat, katel, hold, katol,
katui, kiltel, katteU kultaU ktal, ktnl, ktol, etc., all presenting
iistinct tbough varying ideas. The modification of the idea
13 in the root, not attached to it, as in the Indo-Germanic
languages, by a modal or tense letter or syllable, taken
froni something without. The author connects this with a
view he maintains, that the vowels, as distinct from the
•vmsonants, represent the more spiritual element in lan-
il age. For the argtiment in its detail the reader is refeiTed
) the very able work above n.amed, p. 7-3. — T. L ]
t iSie the distinction that Plato makes in the Dialogue
if Legibits, p. 8'J5. D, between the thing, its spiritual word
or Koyoi (which is, in fact, the reason of the thing, or that
which makes it what it is for the mind, its constitutii ig idea),
•'id th«' ovQ^^.o^ the vocal name representative of the spiril-
• U word itself.— T. L.]
are one ; and the seiious thinker, .vho cannot sepa
rate them, takes but a few steps in this mysterioul
search before he is forced, either to acknowledgs
something superhuman, or to admit that in the birth
and growth of language, the instrutnent of all rea-
soning, there must be st)me strange generic intelli-
gence, if such a thing can be conceived, that W6
utterly fail to discover ia the individual logic. In
other words, men as a race, or race.-*, do what tha
individual singly never does, something of which hs
is wholly unconscious, and which he cannot under-
stand. The thought of divine intervention is thfc
less strange; it presents the less difficulty, and is
therefore, the more rational. We are not to be un-
necessarily introducing a divine agency into the
world's drama, but here, surely, it is a nodus vindict
digitus, a knot which a divine ititelligence can alont
unbind. There is not in all nature anything like
that spiritual mystery which meets us on the very
threshold of an inquiry into the origin and develop-
ment of human speech.
Leaving these more abstruse regions, and de-
scending again to the clearer field of inductive obser-
vation, there still meet us those geographical difficul-
ties to which some attention has already been given
as inexplicable on any theory of gradual or nutuaJ
development. Allusion was before made to the
appearances presented by those broken allopbylio
tongues to which has been given the common name
Turanian — showing themselves among the other
families, sometimes in contiguous beds, and then
again as lying far away and far apart in space, even
as they indicate a remote location in time. In such
cases everything indicates the sudden projection of
an early people, and of an early speech, entire. Suc-
ceeding waves of migration have pressed upon their
shores, but changed no feature of their language.
That seems to have had its form fixed in the begin-
ning, and to defy mutation. Its isolated state,
though surrounded by hostile elements, lias only ren-
dered it more unyielding in this respect. It will
perish rather than change into anything else. There
may be pointed out another geographical anomaly
on a larger scale, and only explicable, too, on tha
ground of some early intervention to change the
course of what might otherwise have been the ordi-
nary historical development. A little less than a
century ago, the learned began to perceive a striking
resemblance between the Greek and the ancient lan-
guage of India ; a resemblance both in matter antj
form. They are both of the Arian or Indo-Ger-
manic family, and yet we have no right to say that
one has been derived from the other. From a period
transcending all history they have been widely part-
ed, territorially, from each other. They stood in the
days of Alexander as distinctly separate as at any
time before or after. In all the antecedent period
there is no record or tradition of any co'.oniz:ng on
either side, of any military expedition of any com-
mercial or literary intercourse, that could have pro
duced any assimilating effect. All tliis time, and
for long after, there lay directly between them a
territory and a people, or peoples, having nothing,
socially or politically, in common with either, and
speaking a language, of all others, the most directly
foreign to both, or to any common language of which
they both could be considered as branches. From
Southern Arabia to Northern Syria, or the head
waters of the Euphrates nearly, there was the con-
tinuous strip of the Shemitic, imbroken and unaf
fected during all that time. This, as has before heel
J80
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSE&
remarked, was. and is, the most tenacious and en-
during of all linguistic families. It is still a wide
living spsech. although Greek and San.-^crit have
both died, and been embalmed in their common and
sacred literature, and although this parting language,
until comparatively modern times, had no literature
except the scanty and most secluded Biblical writ-
ings. A branch of the Shemitic, if we may not
rather call it the Shemitic itself, continuous and un-
changed, is still living, strong and copious. Not-
withstanding the addition of many new words, and
many new .senses that have attached tliemselves to
the old, the Bedouin still talks in a manner that
would have been recognized as familiar in the days
of Abraham. Could we suppose the patriarch now
listening to it, he would hear some strange words
mingled with the great body of its earliest roots, and
some few later forms, but in its pronouns, its prepo-
sitions, its tenses, its conjugations, its logical and
rhetorical particles, in the nerves and sinews as well
as in the bones of the language, it would strike him
as substantially the same kind of talk that had
passed between him and his sons Isaac and Ishmael.*
This most enduring ancient speech has suffered no-
thing that could be called development from any-
thing on either side of it ; and there has been no
development across it from one parted shore to the
other. ' Such theories as that of Bunsen, by which
he gets Ehamism out of Sinism, and Semism out of
Khamism, and so on, would never explain this. The
difficulty clears up somewhat if we bring in the ex-
traordinary, and suppose some early supernatural
cleaving and transformation, leaving one primitive
type standing in its place, another, greatly changed,
to b« carried east imd west by one people suddenly
parted, and meeting again historically after ages of
separation, whilst another type, broken into frag-
* [This would especially be the case in respect to sub-
jects fulling into the Scriptural or Kor.inic style. In Reck-
endorf's Hebrew translation of the Koran (Leip., If'S?),
there are, aometime-s, whole verses in which the Arabic and
Hebrew are almost wholly identical, both in the roots and
In the forms.— T.I..1
ments, is dispersed far and wide to remctc portioni
of the earth. This may be called cutting or break-
ing the knot, rather tlian untying, but even if tb«
Bible h;id been silent, it is better than any hypothe-
sis called natural, yet found to be wholly inadequat«
to explain the extraordinary phenomena to which it
is applied. It is true, give a theorist time enough,
and hypothetical conditions enough, and he maj
seem to develop almost anything out of anything
else. Grant him enough of '' natural selections,'
and he may show us how to njaUe worlds and lan-
guages by producing, at last, seeiijing congruities,
falUng into place after infinite incongruities. But
then, such a method of proceeding, su])posed to be
inherent in the nature of things, cannot stop (if it
goes right on without cycles) until it has abohshed
all things seemingly incongruous or extraordinary,
and introduced a perfect level of congruity every-
where, in the physical, social, and philological
world. Only take time enough, or rather suppose,
as some do, a past eternity of .such working, and the
only conceivable result is a perfect sameness ; all
disorders must long since have been gone, all species
must have become one, and that the highest or the
lowest, all languages must have become one, and that
the best or the poorest — something rising in its
linguistic architecture far above the Greek and San-
scrit, or sinking in its looseness below anything called
Turanian or Sinitic. The extraordinary, now and
then, would be not only the easier conception, but
an actual relief from the weariness of such a physi-
cal monotony.
But we have a more sure word of testimony.
The great Bible-fact for the believer is, that, in order
to prevent a very evil development of humanity, at
a very early day, God interfered with men and con-
founded tlieir language. There is nothing irrational
in this if we beheve in a God at all. The manner
of doing it is not told us. What is said in Gen. xi.
may not wholly explain the linguistic phenomena so
early presented, and even now so remarkable ; but
it may be safely affirmed that far greater difficulties
oppose themselves to any other stlution that has
been, or may yet be offered. — T. L.]
CHAP. Xn. 1-20. 38(
SECOND PERIOD.
The Genesis of the patriarchal faith in the promise and of the covenant religion ;
of the antagonistic relation, between the faith in the promise and heathenism*
of the harmonious oppositions between the patriarchs and the human civiliza-
tion of the heathen world. Patriarchal religion and patriarchal custom8.T—
Ch. XII. I. -XXXVI. 43.
A,
ABRAHAM, THE FRIEND OF GOD, AND HIS ACTS OF FAITH. Ch. XH. l.-XXT. 10.
FIRST SECTION.
Th4 call of Abram. The emigration to CoTiaan. The first promise of Ood. His companionship vitk
Lot. The first manifestation of Ood in Canaan, and the first homeless alienage in
the land of promise. Abram in Egypt and Pharaoh
Chapter Xn. 1-20.
1 Now the Lord had said [rather, said] to Abram, Get thee [for thyself, ?;b ] out of thy
country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will
2 show tliee [through a revelation]. And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bles3
3 tliee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: And I will bless them
that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee : and in thee shall all families of the
4 earth be blessed [not bless themselves, which is expressed by the nse of the Hithpael, ch. xxii. 18]. So
Abram departed [went forth] as the Lord had spoken unto him, and Lot went with him :
5 and Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran. And
Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother's son, and all their substance [gains]
that they had gathered, and the souls [all the living] 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.
6 And Abram passed tlirough the land unto the place of Sichem [shoulder, ridge oi
watershed] unto the plain [grove] of Moreh [teacher, owner]. And [Although] the Canaanite
7 was then [already] in the land. And the Lord appeared unto Abram and said. Unto
thy seed will I give this land ; and there builded he an altar unto the Lord who
8 appeared unto him. And he removed from thence unto a mountain on the east of
Bethel [house of God] and pitched his tent, having Bethel [nowBeitin] on the west [seawards],
and Hai [heaps] on the east ; and there he builded an altar unto the Lord, and called
9 upon the name of the Lord. And Abram journeyed, going on still [gradually further and
10 further] toward the south. And there was a famine in the land: and Abram went
11 down into Egypt to sojourn there; for the famine was grievous in the land. And it
came to pass, when he was come near to enter into Egypt, that he said unto Sarai hia
wife, Behold now I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon [or of fair appearance] :
12 Therefore it shall come to pass, when the Egyptians shall see thee, that they shall say,
.3 This is his wife: and they will kill me, but they will save thee alive. Say, I pray
thee, thou art my sister, that it may be well with me for thy sake ; and my soul shal'
live because of thee.
ilS2
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
14 And it came to pass, that when Abram was come into Egypt, the Egyptians
15 belield llie woman that she was very fair. The princes also of Pharaoh saw her, and
commended her before Pharaoh [Furst, 510 ] : and the woman was taken into Pharaoh's
16 house. And he entreated Abram well for her sake: and he had sheep [small cattle] and
osen, and he-asses, and men-servants, and maid-servants, and she-asses and camels.
17 And the Lord plagued Pharaoh and his house because of Sarai, Abram's wife
18 And Pharaoh called Abram and said, What is this that thou hast done unto mel
19 Why didst thou not fell me that she was thy wife? Why saidst thou, She is mv sisterl
so I might have taken her to me to wife; now, therefore, behold thy wife, take hei
20 and go thy way. And Pharaoh commanded his men concerning him : and they sent
him away, and his wife, and all that he had.
GENEEAL PRELIMINARY QUESTIONS.
1. The age and state of the world at tlie patriarch-
al period. A multitude of nations who were to share
in the salvation, through the faith of Abram, were
not vet born into the world, especially the Roman
and English peo|ile. The Germanic tribes lay still
in the bosom of the Scythian nomadic life. A thou-
sand years must roll away before the development of
the Greek life, and a much longer period before the
hisiorical a|ipearance of Rom& The foundation of
the patriarchal fanjily, out of whose fuller develop-
ment into the twelve tribes the Jewish people sprang,
begins with Abram. Patriarchalism appears still as
the fundamental form under which the pcfpular Ufe
exists and works. But out of this constitution a
multitude of small kingdoms have grown up in
Canaan and Syria. The first feeble attempt at
founding a grand world-monarchy was made by
Kirarod at Babel and Nineveh. In Egypt the king-
dom of the Phaiaohs already existed. The forma-
tion of national divisions began with the migrations
of the people, and to these we may probably trace
the rise of castes. The mechanical resemblance of
the kingdom of lieaveu in the dynasty Hia in China
appears to have been complete in its outline and
characteristic features, before the definite foundation
of the organic and living kingdom of heaven was
begun in Abram.
2. The Biblework will treat more fully of the
land of Canaan in the division, " Book of Joshua."
We refer in passing to the Bible-dictionaries, the
geographies, and journals of travellers. See also
Zabn : "The Kingdom of God," i. p. 105. In this
section we notice especially Sichem, Bethel, Ai, and
the central part of Palestine ; the Souths especially
the vifiiiiiy of Hebron. Sichem (now Nablous)
lying between Gerizim and Ehal, about eighteen
hours from Jerusalem and sixteen from Nazareih,
marks the northern principal residence of the patri-
archs. Hebron (also Kirjuth-Arba, from the giant
Arlia, now El Kalil, i. e., friend, beloved, in honor
of Abram), soutlierly about eight hours from Jeru-
Baleiii, a very old city, the city of Abram and David,
lying in a blooming and beautiful region, was their
p^ncipal dwelling-place in the south. Their cen-
tral residence is the region of Bethel (the name is
beii anticipated — originally Luz, eh. xxviii. 111, now
the ruins of Beitin), and Ai (the old Cunaanitish
royal city, .losh. vii. 2, two hours easterly from
Beitui, Tiorlherly from Jerusalem, now Medineh), an
elevated rich pasture-ground.
3. The noniaihc life forms the natural basis of
iie patriarchal society. The (ireek term nomad
.Vonos from vonds pas'ure cround) desiitnates the
herdsman in a specific sense, as one who roams with
his herds over uncultivated tracts, which as commons
are in one aspect wastes, in another pasture-grounds.
The nomads are thus pastoral tribes and nations
which have no fixed dwelling-place. According to
the Conversations-lexicon, " they stand higher in the
scale of human society than the tribes who live by
hunting and fishing, and lower than those who follow
agriculture and trade, and belong essentially to the
grade of baibarians." But as an original form of
human life, and indeed as the form of the most
quiet and retired life, the nomadic state is the basis
upon wliich both the highest human culture and the
most extreme savage wildness rest. Original thought-
ful minds grew up to be tlie spiritual princes of hu-
manity in the quietude of the nomadic life ; mere
common natures grew wild and savage under the
same influences. The nomadic state still covers
large portions of the race. " In Europe we find
only weak nomadic tribes on the great steppes skirt-
ing the Black sea, and in the high uncultivated
northern latitudes, there Tartar and Turkisli, here
Finnish tribes. Asia and Africa are the congenial
homes of the nomadic life. Nearly all tlie Finnish,
Mongolian, and Turkish tribes, and the mixed tribes
which have sprung from them, in the steppes and
wastes in the northern, central, and border Asia are
nomads; so also the Kurds and Bedouin Arabs of
border Asia and North Africa, and nearly all the
tribes of Southern Africa, Caffres, Belschuanas,
Koranas, and the Hottentots. In South America the
Gauchos, and in many respects some Indian tribes,
are to be regarded as nomads." For the nomadic
tribes of the East see Schroder, p. 27-3, Koiilrau.sch,
a description of the Caravan March, p. 282. For
the shepherd, herdsman, wilderness, tents, see the
articles in Winer [Kitto, Smith, Bible dictionaries.
—A. G.]
4. 21ie Period of the Patriarchal ReUriion, and
Form of Be/iflion. " In the New Testament the
term Trarpidpxv^ is applied to Abraham, lleb. vii. 4,
to the twelve sons of Jacoh, Acts vii. S f , and to David,
Acts ii. 29. Generally it designates the sacred an-
cestors of the early periods lA' the Israelites (Tob.
vi. 21, Vulgate) whom Paul, Kom. ix. 5, xi. 28, calls
oi naTfpf!. Hence it has becotiie customary even in
historical language to call all the fat hers of the early
human races, and especially of the l.-racUti.sh people
(including the twelve sons of Jacob), who are refer-
red to and distinguished in biblical history. Patriarchs
(German Jirzvalcr). Its history, I'lom the old theo-
logical point of view, is given by J. II. Heidkocer.
ezercitat. Hc/crt. dr htsloria uicrti patriorrhur. (.\m-
Bterdam, 1CC7-8, Ziirich, 172H), and is, ijcrhaps, more
critically treated by J. Jak. Ukus; "History of th«
CHAP. XII. 1-20.
383
Patriarchs" (Ziirich, \116). Winer. Tlie patriaich
is the heginniT or founder of a race or family (the
word is formed from fipx" *^*^ Trarpid), The Hebrew
de.^^ignation n:y. t'Xi , whicli the Scptuagint trans-
lates S()x<»'Tf! Tai;/ narpLUf (1 Chiou. ix. 9 ; xxiv.
31), but in 1 Chron. xxvii. 22, wliere the Hebrew
term is ^Xnia^ ■'B:\13 i"iilJ , and 2 Chron. xix. 8, 6
waTptdpxvf, does not refer to our patriarchs (which
Bretschneiiler labors in his lexicon to authorize), but
to the heads of individual branches of the triljes of
Israel. Even in the Xew Testament, as is clear
from Acts ii. 29, the word has a more comprehensive
meaning. In Herzog's Real-Encyclopedia, article
Patriarchs, there is a threefold distinction drawn
between the biblical and theological, the Jewish
usage as to the synagogue officers, and the churchly
and official idea of the word. The Jews, e. g., even
after the destruction of Jen?salem, call the presidents
of the two schools at Tiberias and Babylon, patriarchs,
In the Christian Church all bishops were originally
termed patriarchs, but the council of ChalcfdoQ
limited the name to those renowned bishops who
tiad raised tliemselves above bishops, and metro-
politans. Here we are dealing only with the
biblical and tlieological meaning of the tei-m. In this
relation we must distinguish the genernl, the narrow-
er, and the most restricted idea of the word. In the
general and widest sense, all the theocratic ancestors
are included in the term, since the patriarchal faith,
as the faith of salvation, forms the liighest unity
running through the Old and New Testaments. In
the wider, earlier usual acceptation, the patriarchal
period is viewed as including the pious ancestors of
biblical history, from Adam to the twelve sons of
Jacob, or to the Mosaic era. See Winer, the article
in question, the work of Heidegger above referred to,
and Hase's Hutterus redhmus (Relhiio pntriarchalis
antediluviana et postdituvlana). Still, Hess, in his
history of the patriarchs, has correctly placed the
patriarchs before Abrani in an introductory history,
and begins the history itself with Abram. The
earlier division of the Old Testament revelation into
patriarchal, Mosaic, and prophetic religion (i. e., form
of religion) is not now at all satisfactory. This divi-
sion must be completed in one direction through the
period of the national IsraeUtish piety or religious-
ness (from Ualachi to Christ), and in the other
through the period of the symbolic original mono-
theism from Adam to Abram, which may be again
divided into the two halves of the antediluvian and
postdiluvian primitive history. The S3mbolic mono-
theism is distinguished from the patriarchal period
both as to form and essence. As to the form of the
revelation, the symbol has there the first place, the
explanatory word the second (paradise and the para-
disiuc word, the rainbow and the covenant with
Noah) ; but in the history of the patriarclis the word
of revelation holds the tiist rank, and the signs of the
theophany enter in a second line, as its confirmation.
Thus also the patriarchal religion stands in a
relation of opposition and coherence ivith the
Mosaic system. " The Mosaic system is a remnuld-
iny of the patriarchal religion so far as Israel,
grown into a people in Egypt, may require a prepa-
ratory, and thus a legal and symbohc iustrucliim as
to the nature of the faith of Abram and to receive
that faith ; it is a lower form of that religion so far
as the refigious fife, which already in the patriarchs
began to be viewed as an inward life, is here set be-
fore the people, who are strangers to it, as an exter-
nal law ; but is also a higher form of that religion 3»
far as the ideas of the religion of promise are unfold-
ed in the law, and in this explicit form arc introduc-
ed into the life of the people. The law, how ever,
is not the fundamental type of the O.d Testament,
but the faitli of Abram. In the patriarchal religion
the word of God is prominent, the symbol is subor-
dinate ; the Mosaic system, as also the primitive re-
ligion, brings the symljol into proraiuencc (although
the symbol as an institution). In .\bram the di-
vuie promise occupies the foreground, the divine
command rests upon it ; in the legal period, as to the
outward appearance the relation is just the reverse.
Evidently the patriarchal religion, as also the pro-
phetic period succeeding to the Mosaic system, re-
garded in a narrower sense, bears a marked resem-
blance to Protestantism, while the Mosaic system ap-
pears as the primitive type of the Mediaeval Catholio
Church." (See Herzog's Encyclopedia, article Pa-
triarchs.)
As to its nature, the faith of Abram is distin-
guished from the faith of the pious ancestors in this,
that he obtains and holds the promise of salvation,
not only for himself, but for his family ; and from
the Mosaic system, by the fact that ii expressly holds
the promised blessing, in the seed of Abram, as a
blessing for all people. In reference to the first,
there were earlier lines of the promise: the line of
Seth in contrast to that of Cain, the Unc of Shem
in opposition to those of Japheth and Ham. But
the line of Seth, through its corruption, is gradually
lost in the line of Cam, and the fine of Shem forms
no well-defined opposition to the one all-prevailing
heathenism. It is gradually infected with the taint
of heathenism, while on the other hand pious be-
lieving lives ajipear in the descendants of Japheth
and Ham. Melchisedec, with his eminent piety, be-
longs to the Canaanitish people, and thus to the
family of Ham. During the whole period of the
symbolic primitive religion, the theocratic and hea-
then elements are mingled together. The dark
aspect of this religion is a mythological, ever-grow-
ing heathenism ; its light side the symbolical, ever-
waning, primeval monotheism. Heathenism gathers
gradually, as a general twilight, through which gUm-
mer the men of God, as individual stars. Thus Mel-
chisedec stands in the surrounding heathenism. In
a reUgious point of view he is dwdTtap, duVfrw^, a76-
viaXo-yr]ros. And he is so far greater than Abram,
as he stands as the last shining representative in the
Old Testament of the primitive religion looking
backwards to the lost paradise (which, however, did
not entirely cease in the whole Old Testament pe-
riod, and is not absolutely extinguished even in later
periods of the world) ; whQe Abram stands as the
first represent;itive of the decided religion of the
future, who, as such, has already the promise, that
in his seed all the famiUes of the earth should be
blessed, who is neither ayiv^a\uyr\Tos nor aTrarajp,
since the beginning of his calling appears already in
his father, Terah. But the old religion develops
itself more definitely into the religion of the future
at every step, when the corruption for the time has
reached such a degree, that faith, looking out beyond
the jiresent and the judgment resting upon it, irwat
fix in its eye a new beginning of salvation. Thus it
was in Noah, thus also later in the .Messianic proph-
ets. But while Noah out of the flood o.'' waters
saved a new race of men, Abram has, thro'igh the
overflowing flood of heathenism, to found a new
particular people of faith, who should be a blessing
3S4
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
for all. The blessing is already a Tery advanced
idea of the salvation. For Eve the salvation as-
eumes the idea of v'wtory^ for Lamech, reaty for
Noah, tne preservation of the divine name and the
human race ; for Abram, it forms the opposition
to the curse. For as the curse is the endless, mys-
terious, progressive destruction of life, so the bless-
ing is the endless, mysterious, progressive enriching
and conservation of lif'. As the condition, indeed,
Abram must go out from the lieathen world. It is
only as in opposition to it, that he can introduce
the blessing which is promised in his seed. The
pious forefathers had indeed already taken the first
step of faiih (Heb. xi.). They have, by faith in the
creation of the world, uttered the denial of the in-
dependence of matter, the fundamental dogma of
heathenism (Heb. xi. 3). Abel has talien the second
step of faith ; he has introduced the sacrifice of faith
into the world, and on account of it sacrificed his
own life. Enoch has taken the third ; he sealed the
faitli in the new life and rewards beyond the present.
Noah carried faith on to the salvation of God in the
divine judgments. Abram, through the rer|uired re-
nunciation of the world, introduced the Israelitish
faith of the future, the hope for the eternal inherit-
ance of God, and its introduction through the inher-
itance of his blessing. It was the legitimate result
of his renunciation of the world that he sealed it
through the sacrifice of Isaac. The succeeding
patriarchs have developed this faith more fully, each
in his own way, Isaac learned to prefer the first-
born of the spirit before the first-born of blood ;
Jacob pointed out Judah as the central line of bless-
ing within the blessings of his sons ; Joseph proved
his fidelity to the promise until his death. Thus was
prepared the renunciation and the calling of Moses.
(Taken from Lange's article in Herzog's Encyclo-
pedia.)
With the introduction of the Abrahamic religion
(see the foregoing section) correspond its mild na-
ture and form, and its rich development. As to
the first, it must be observed that Abram, notwith-
Btanding the decisive character of his separation
from heathenism, still opposes himself to the hea-
then without any fanaticism. Hence it is said in-
deed, " Get thee out ! " but the second word follows
immediately : " thou shall be a blessing, and in thee
fhall be blessed, or shall bless themselves, all the
families of the earth." Hence the patriarchs stand
upon a friendly footing with the princes of Canaan.
In the point of marriage alone, warned by the his-
U)ry of the Sethites, they dreaded theocratic mis-
alliunces (Gen. xxiv. .3 ; xxvii. 46). In the fourth
generation the first historical chara-teristic type of
fanaticism appears in the deed of Simeon and Levi
(Gen. xxxiv.). The judicial and solemn disapproval
of this deed by Jacob (Gen. xlix. 5) marks the true
epirit of the Israelitish religion ; the bold commenda-
tion of tills deed in the book Judith (ch. ix. 2) re-
veals the later pharisaic Judaism. Even the mixed
marriage is legal except in the case of the proscribed
Canaanites ; anil to the questionable and unhappy
connections, e. g. of Esau, there are opposed the
blessed connections of Joseph and Moses. The
only matter of question is whether there is such a
certainty of faith that the believing party may raise
the unbelieving into the sphere of faith. This was
precisely that which moililied the crime of Thamar;
her fanatical attachment to the house of Jacob, or
the tribe of Juilah. Mild as was this patriarchal
tpirit of separation (because it was actually spirit) it
was just as strict in the other aspect. Hence there
are relative distinctions of the elect from those wh«
are less strictly the chosen, running down through
the fam ly of Abram, fii'st in the opposition be-
tween Isaac and Ishmael, then in that between Jacob
and Esau, finally in the sliarp distinctions in tha
blessings of Jacob. (From the same article.)
As to the development of faith in the patriarchal
period, it proceeds from the acta of faith in the lift
of Abram, through the endurance (or patience) of
faith in the life of Isaac, to the conficts of faith in
the hie of Jacob ; but in the hie of Joseph the
opposition between the sufferings and the glory on
account of faith, comes into cle.ar and distinct re-
lief The promise also unfolds itself more and more
widely. The ble.^sing of the descendants of Abram,
who should inherit Palestine, divides itself already
in the blessing of Isaac upon Jacob, into a blessing
of the heavens and the earth, and Jacob's authority
to rule announces more definitely the theocratio
kingdom. But in the blessing of Jacob upon Judah,
the Shiloh is designated, as the prince of war and
peace, to whom the people should be gathered (a
further extract from the article iu question, p. 199).
For the periods of the history of the covenant, see
Kurtz, p. 135. For the nature of the patriarchal
history, Delitzsch, p. 241-249 ; [also BitiMOARTEN,
Commentary, p. 165-168 ; Keil, p. 123-126. —
A. G.]
[Kurtz arranges the history of the covenant un-
der the following periods or stages : the period of
the family, including the triad of patriarchs with the
twelve sons of Jacob ; the period of the people,
having its starting point in the tn elve sons of Jacob,
and running through the Judges ; tlie period of the
kingdom ; the period of the exile and restoration ;
the period of expectaiicy ; and the period of the
fulfilment. — A. G.]
[Delitzsch holds, as we may abridge and condense
his view s, that the patriarchal history is introductory
to the history of Israel, and is completed in three
parts — the histories of the three patriarchs. The
personal history of the patriarchs revolves around
the promise as to Israel, and Canaan its inheritance.
The characteristic trait of the patriarchs is faith.
This faith shows itself in the whole mighty fulness
of its particular elements in Abram ; ceaseles>ly
struggling, resolutely patient and enduring, over-
coming the world. He is the type of the conflicts,
obedience, and victory of faith — TraTTjp -navTuv rwv
wicrTi\j6vTii>i'. His loving endurance repeats itself in
Isaac, his hopeful wrestlings in Jacob. 'Et' eATriS,
Trap' eK-iriSa is their motto. The promise and faith
are the two correlated factors of the people of (iod
Renouncing the present, and in the midst of trials
its life passes in hope. Hope is its true life, impulse,
and aflfection. Desire is Israel's element.
Viewing the patriarchal history from the central
point of that history, the incarnation of God in the
fulness of time, its position in the history of salva-
tion may he thus defined. There are seven stages
in this history : 1. The antediluvian time, Itoth para-
disaic and after paradise, during which God was per-
sonally and visibly present with men, closing with
the Hood, when he retires into the heavens and frcm
thence exercises his judicial and sovereign provi-
dence. The goal of history is thenceforward th«
restoration of this dwelling of God with men. The
history has ever tended towards this goal. 2. The
patriarchal time during which God manifested hira-
pelf personally and even "lisibly upon the earth, but
CHAP. XII. 1-20.
3St
only at times and only to a few holy men, the patri-
archs, at important points in the history of salvation ;
and even these revelations cease from Jacob to Mo-
ses. The revelation of God in the name mn^, i.e.
as the one coming down into history, and revealinj:;
himself in it, belongs to this time of the completed
creation, of theopeninj; redemption of Israel, His pecu-
liar people. 3. The IsraeUtish period prior to the ex-
ile, duringwhich God did not reveal himself personally
and visibly as in the patriarchal period to a IVw, and to
these only at times, but to a whole people and perma-
nently, liut still only to a people and not to mankind.
There are two distinguishable epochs in this period.
In the first Israel is led by the Angel of Jehovah
in the pillar of cloud and fire — the glorious and gra-
cious presence of God, visible for tiie whole people.
The second is that of the presence of God in the
temple and in the word ; in the temjile for Israel,
but only through the mediation of priests, in the
word, but only through the mediation of prophets.
But even this lower, less accessible temple-presence
ceases when Israel filled up the measure of its ini-
quities. The glory of Jehovah departed from the
temple. As God at first withdrew his manifested
presence from the race and destroyed it with the
flood, so now from the Jewish people, and abandons
Jerusalem to destruction. As the first stage of the
history closes with a judgment from the ascended
God, and the second in the long profound silence
from Jacob to Moses, so the third again ends like the
first. 4. The time succeeding the exile, at its com-
mencement not essentially different from the close
of the third period. God was present in the word,
but tlie ark of the covenant, the covering, the cher-
ubim, the Urim and Thummim, and, more llian all,
the Shechinah, the visible symbol of the presence
of Jehovah, were wanting in the temple. But
' prophecy itself grew speechless with Malachi and
Daniel. The people complain, We see not our signs,
there is no more any prophet (Ps. Ixxiv. 9). They
named Simon the brother of the Maccabeean Jona-
than the liyuufiefos xal apx'€P«^y fis ^of aiwva^ but
it was ettis Tov avaarrivai TTpo(piiT7}v irnni'iv. Thus
forsaken of God, and conscious of its forsaken state,
the true Israel passed through this fourth stage of
the history, a school of desire for believers waiting
t and longing for the new unveihng of the divine I
countenance. Then at last tlie dawn broke, Jeho- 1
vah visited his people, and in the mystery now un-
veiling itself -dei? etpacepw^T) ec aapKi completes in
far-surp.'\5sing glory the antitype of I'aradise. 6.
The time of the life of Christ in the flesh. It is now
true in the most literal and real sense, eirK-hvoMrfp iv
T]ix1v. But at first Israel alone saw him. The rays
of his glorious grace reach the heathen only as an
exception. But Ins own received him not. They
oailed the manifested in the flesh to the cross. But
he who e^ arr,dtt'eias died, rose, eV Sffauews b^ov^
and ascended into heaven. He withdrew himself
from the people who had despised him. But as
Jehovah, after he had seated himself upon his
heavenly throne, sent down at the close of the hist
stage the judgment of the flood, at the dose of the
third works the destruction of Jerusalem, so now
the God-man ascended into heaven abandons Jeru-
salem to destruction and Judah to an exile which
still endures. For Israel he will come again, but m
the fire of judgment ; and for beUevers he will also
come again, but not visibly nor in the tire of judg-
ment, but in the firj of the Spirit. 6. The stiU-
«>during present, the time of the spiritual presence
23
of the incarnate God in his church. This presene*
is both more than the visible presence of Christ in
the days of his flesh, and less than the visible pres-
ence of the exalted one in winch it reaches its en-
largement and completion. We must not forget
that the Spirit sent upon us from the glorified Son
of Man is so far the TrapaKK-nro\ as he comforts ua
on account of his absence ; that all the desire of th«
Christian is to be at home with Christ; and that the
hope of the whole chiu-eh is eiTiltraced in the hope
for the revelation of Christ. Without sharing in tt«
exaggerated estimate of the miraculous gifts by tho
Irviugites, it caimot be denied that our time resem-
bles the second part of the post-exile i)eriod, and
that the church now, as believers then, desires the
return of the wonderful intensity and gracious ful-
ness of the spiritual presence in the primitive
church. This desire will receive its fulfilment in the
glorious time of the church upon the earth. 1. But
the seventh stage of the history of salvation, which
endures through the ^Eons of jEons, will first give
full satisfaction to all the desires of all believers, and
bring that glorious, transcendent restoration of the
paradisaical communion with God in the incarnation,
to its final perfection. The new Jerusalem (Rev.
XXL 8) is the antitype of Paradise. The communion
of God with the first man to be redeemed, has now
become his communion with the finally redeemed
humanity. His |>resence is no longer a transitory
alternating, now appearing then vanishing, but en-
during, ever the same, and endless; not limited to
individuals nor bound to localities, but to all, and
all-pervading ; not merely divine, but divine and
human; not invisible, but visible; not in the form
of a servant, but in unveiled glory. God ascends no
more, for sin is for ever judged and the earth haa
become as heaven. He descends no mote, for the
work of redemption is complete, the whole creation
keeps its soleiun sabbath, God rests in it, and it
rests in God ; Jehovah has finished his work, and
Elohim is now all in all, 1^a^Ta eV Traaw. See De-
LITZSCH, p. 239-249.— A. G.]
6. The fundamental form of divine revelation, par-
ticularly of the revelation of the old covenant, and
still more particularly of the patriarchal period (see p.
48, Introd. ). The historically-completed fundamen-
tal form of the divine revelation of salvation, is the
revelation of God in Chiisi, the God-man, i. e. in one
distinct, unique life, wherein the divine self-commu-
nication and revelation, and the human intuition of
God, are perfectly united in one, while yet as ele-
ments of life they are clearly distinguished from each
other. The progressive revelation must correspond
in its outline and characteristic features to this goal
to which It tends. In its objective aspect it must be
through theophanies, in its subjective the vision of
the revelation of God, in its plan, tendency, and de-
velopment, Christophanies ; the chief points in the
interchange between God manifesting himself per-
sonally and the receptive human spirits in the pre-
figurations of the future advent of Christ. The
individual phases in the development of this foira
of revelation are these: (1) The revelation of (Jod
through the symbolism of heaven and earth ; visibly
for the paradisaic spiritual and natural clear-sighted
vision ; and coming out in particular words and
representations of God, addressed to the ear and
eye, promptly, according to the necessities of human
development, and according to the energy of the
Spirit of God, who translates the signs ii:to words.
The form of the primitive religion. (2) The self-
oSO
GENESIS, OR THE I'lRST BOoK OF MOSES.
revelation of God in the form of an angelic appear-
ance, distinct from his being ; the pre-announcement
of the luture Christ, or the Angel of Jehovah in re-
ci])rocal relation and action with the unconscious see-
ing, as in vision, resting upon the unconscious ecnta-
sies of believers, manil'esting himself first through the
miraculous report or voice, then through miraculous
vision, I, e. first through the word, then through the
figurative aopearance. The form of the patriarchal
leUgion. (3) The revelation of God, distinguishing
Ids face, i. e. Iiis gradual incarnation, from his behig,
or nature, or the angel of his presence in recipiocal
relation and action, with the conscious visions, based
upon unconscious ecstasies. The Angel of his face,
or the face. The fundamental form of the Mosaic sys-
tem, (-i) The appearance of Jehovah himself in his
glory, in the biightness of his glory, surrounded by
angelic forms, in reciprocal relation with the con-
scious visions, resting upon the conscious ecstasy of
the prophets, or Jehovah appearing in his divine
Archangel and with his angel-bands over against the
prophets overwhelmed and trembling, drawing grad-
ually nearer to the incarnate angel of the covenant
(Mai. iii. 1). The fundamental form of the prophetic
period. (5) Tlie hidden pieparation for the advent
of the angel of the covenant, in the period of na-
tional religiousness; his work in the depths of hu-
man nature. (6) Christ the Angel of the Covenant,
the unity of the divine revelation and the human
intuition of God, and therefore also upon the divine
side the unity of God and his Angel, and upon the
human side the unity of the spiritual intuitions and
the natural vision of Clirist.
We have already, in what we have thus said, as
indeed elsewhere {Lebeu Jesu, p. 4i'> ; Doginatik, p.
586; Hkrzog, "Encyclopedia," Tlie Patriarchs t,f
the Old Testatiieiii), stated our view of the Angel
of the Lord; but we must here repeat that in our
conviction the exegctical prejudice, ever coming into
greater prominence, that the Angel of the Lord is a
creature-angel, as also the prejudice in reference to
the supposed angels (ch. vi.), burdens, obscures, and
confuses in a fatal way, Old Testament theology,
and leaves no room for a clear psychology of the
faith of revelation, an intuitive Christology, or an
organic unity of biblical theology.
In regard to this point, Kurtz has undertaken witli
great zeal the defence of the erroneous interpreta-
tion, although he had earlier defended the true one,
'" HistO'7 of the Old Covenant," p. 144, 2d ed. We
introilucp here his reference to the state of the ques-
tion before we enter upon its discussion. " The
views of interpreters, as to the nature and being of
the Angel of the Lord ( nin^ T\'^\y., also called
C^n^sn "si;^) who appears first in the patriarchal
history, have been divided into two classes. The one
Bees in him a representation of the deity, enteiing
perceptibly the world of sense, in a human form, and
as .'*uch regards hiia as tlie preligiiiation of the
incarnation of God in Christ; the other sees in him
•D angel, like other angels, but who, because he ap-
pears in nanje and mission as a representaiive of Je-
bovah, is even introduced and spoken of as Jehovah ;
Indeed, Ijiiiiself speaks and acts a.") Jehovah The
fiist view has alreaily made a beaten path for itself"
In the eldest theology of ilie synagogue, and in the
theological doctrine of the ilitalrun, of that, from
God emanatiiui, godlike revealer of the divine na-
ture, has assumed a defiiiile shape and form, although
■obracing lc.eiQ'\ elcnieuts (comp, IIenostknbkuu :
'Christology,' iii. 2. pp. 81-86). It was adhered t«
by most of the Fathers (Hkngstenberg, as above),
and with these must be counted the old churchly
Protestant theologians. In recent times it has been
defended most decidedly and fuUv by HEXGSi>:NBEKn
(i. p|i. 125-142, 2d ed. ; and iii. "2. pp. 31-86), who,
with the Fathers and tlie old Protestant theologian.s,
recognizes in the angel of the Lord the manifested
God, the logos of the Christian doctrine of the Trin-
ity, and holds this view to be so widely developed in
the history of the Old Testament revelation, that it
lays the foundation for the doctrine of the toijos in
the Gospel by John (compare his ' Commentary on
the book of Revelation,' i. p. 613). ISack (Comment,
fheol., Bonn, 1821), had already discusfcd the que*
tiou, and reached the conclusion, tliat the angel of
the Lord is identical with Jehovah, but that the term
does not designate a person distinct from him, but
merely a form of manifestation, on which account hB
prefers to render Tfi^'S ' the commission ' rather than
'the sent' (comp. his Apologetik, 2d ed. p. 172). In
the footsteps of these two last-named persons, the
writer of this [Kurtz] sought to prove, in Tholuck's
Anzeiffer, 1846, No. 11-14, that the Maleach Jeho-
vah is God, as presented in the authors of the Old
Testament ; appearing, revealed, entering into the
limitations of space and time, as perceptible by the
senses, distinguished from the invisible God, in his
exalted and therefore imperceptible existence, above
the world of sense, and removed from all the limita-
lions of space and time; still without bringing it to
a full, distinct consciousness, whether this disiinction
was merely ideal or essential, whether it was to be
regarded as supposed for the moment, or grounded
in the very nature of God. The most miportant
parts of this essay were included in tlie first edition
of this work. Dklitzsch : 'Biblical and Prophetical
Theology,' p. 289; Nitzsch : 'System;' T. Belk:
' Christian Science of Doctrine ; ' Keil : ' Book of
Joshua,' p. 87 ; H.-lveknick: 'Old Testament The-
ology,' p. 73 ; Ebraru : ' Chrisiiau Dogmatics,'
vol. i. ; J. P. Lange : 'Positive Dogmatics,' |i. iS6;
Stier: 'Isaiah, not Pseudo Isaiaii,' p. 758, and
others, all agree in the same exhibition of this theo-
logical question.
" The other view has found a defender in AuGCS-
TiN : Ue Trinitate, 11.3, and meets the approval of the
Catholic theologians under the influence of their view
of the adoration of angels ; and of the Soeinians, Ar-
minians, and Rationalists, from their opposition to
the ecclesiastical doctrine of the Trinity. In more
recent times, however, some eminent persons, who
are entirely free from these interested motives, have
adojiled this view, viz., Stecoel, in his Ffini/stpro-
i/ruiiime for 1830, and in his ' Old Testament Theol-
ogy,'p. 252 ff. ; HoFMA.NN: Weissatjung und Krfidl'
mif/, i. p. 127, and Schriflbiweis, pp. Ifi4-l.'i'.l and
321-3411; Baumgarten: 'Com.' p. 195; Tiioi.uck
' (iiispel by John,' 6th ed. p. 52 ; Pelt . ' Theo-
logical Encyclopedia,' p. 241 ; and siill more recent-
ly, Dei.itzsch, rciiouneing his earlier view, and
adopting that of Ilol'maun : 'Com. on Genesis.' p
241). Between Steudel and Holinann there is, how-
ever, this difference, that the former sees in the
Maleiich .lehovah an angel especially commissioned
by God for each p.arlieular case — it being left unde-
teraiined whether it is one and the same or not,
while, ill Hofinaun's view, it is one and ihc same
angel-prince, who here, as the Miileach Jehovah,
later as the captain of the hosts of tl'". Lord (Joslv
CHAP. XU. 1-20.
381
f. 14), as the angel of his face (Is. Ixiii. 9), under
the personal name of Micliael (Dan. x. 13, 21 ; xii. 1),
as the representative of Jeliovah, controls the coni-
mouwealth and history of Israel ( Weisxaifnn,/ uiid
Erfullmiff, pp. 131, 132). In his later work, how-
ever, Hofmann has moditii'd his view so far, that the
angel who performs this or that work is ever a defi-
nite aiif,'el, but the same one is not destined for all
time, while it is still true that Israel has his prince,
his special angel, who is named Michael (Schriftbe-
toej.f, p. 157).
" B.iRTH has in a most peculiar way attempted to
Dnite the views of Hengstenberg and Hofmann:
' The .^.ngel of the Covenant. A Contribution to
Christology. A Letter to Schelling.' Leipzig, 1845.
He holds, with Hengstenberg, the divine personality,
and with Hofmann, the angelic created nature of the
Maleach Jehovah, and unites the two views through
the assertion of a past assumption of the angelic
nature of the logos^ analogous to his later incarnation.
We leave tliis view unexamined, as utterly baseless."
Kurtz closes his reference (in the 2d ed.) with the
explanation, that he finds himself in the same posi-
tion as Delitzsch, constrained by his conviction to
bdopt the view of Hofmann.
According to the view of the old ecclesiastical
theology, the (First) argument in favor of the self-
revelation of God, in the Angel of the Lord, is the
personal and real identity in whicli this Angel-name
always appears. If Maleach Jehovah, Maleach Elo-
him, may flesignate some one angel of the Lord, in a
peculiar appearance, still it must be kept in view
here, that from ch. xvi. onwards this name, with
slight and easily explained modifications, is a stand-
ing, permanent figure. Hofmann replies: Maleach
Hamelech is not the king himself, but the king's
messenger. So also Maleach .Jeliovah is not Jehovah
himself. Certainly ! so also the king's son is not
the king himself. According to Hofmanu's view,
therefore, it must follow that the 8on of (>od is not
God. The nature of God in his self-distinction is
exalted far above that of earthly kmgs.
Secondli/. The Angel of Jeliovah identifies him-
self with Jehovah. He ascribes to himself divine
honors, divine determinations (Gen. xvi. 10, 11 ;
rviii. 10, 13, 14, 20, 36; xxii. 12, 15, Ifl, etc., etc.).
• Some one objects : The prophets also identify them-
selves in a similar way with Jehovah. This is sim-
ply an incorrect assertion. There is no authentic
passage in which the prophet, in the immediate an-
nouncement of the word of God, does not in some
way make a clear distinction between his person and
the person of Jehovah. The examples which De-
litzsch quotes, that amba.ssadors have identified
themselves with their kings, rest upon the political
rights and style of ambassadors, and are as little
applicable to the style of a creature-angel as to that
of apostles and prophets.
Thirdly. The writers of the history, and the
biblical persons, use promiscuously the names Angel
of Jehovah, and Jehovah, and render to this angel
divine honor, in worship and sacrifice (Gen. xvi. 13 ;
rviii. 1, 2; xxi. 17-19; xxii. 1-1; xlviii. 15, 16, etc.).
Our opponents answer : It is not high treason when
an officer, in the name and commission of the king,
18 the representative of the person of the king, re-
ceives the homage of the subjects. It is not his own
person, but the person of the Iving, whom in this case
he represents, which comes into strong relief. With
this halting, limping comparison, they seek to justify
the conduct of the men of taith in the Old Test.ament,
who, in their view, rendered freely and without re-
proof divine honor to a creature-angel, and did this con-
stantly, whenever this angel appears, notwithstanding
the Old Testament abliors and condenms the deifying
of the ereatuie, and that liere the express divin«
watchword is: "My glory will I not give to another
neither my praise to graven images" (Is. xlii. 8).
The following reasons are urged in favor of the
supposition of a creature-angel :
a. The name angel designates, throughout, a
certain class of spiritual beings. Kurtz formerly
replied to this that the name angel is not one of na-
ture but of office (Mai. ii. 7; Hag. i. 13). Although
the name angel now indeed points in many eases to
a certain class of spiritual beings, still the faet that
there are symbolic angel-forms is a sufficient proof
that the Angel of the Lord need not necessarily be
regarded as a behigof that certain class of spirits.
b. Hofmann urges that since the advent of Christ
the New Testament speaks of the 6.yyf\os nu^iou
(.Matt. i. 20; Luke ii. 9; Acts xii. 7). Kurtz has
answered that in the places quoted the expression
designates a different person from the Maleach Jeho.
vah of the Old Testament, or even of the speech of
Stephen (Acts vii. SO). He recalls this reply, how-
ever, with the remark that if Matthew and Luke
had even had a suspicion that the ayyiXos Kup.ou in
the Old Testament always designated the Son of God,
who has since become man in Christ, they would
never have used this expression even once in i-efer-
ence to a creature-angel. With this conception of
angelic appearances the transition to Hofniann's
view was surely possil:)le and easy. To his objection
(p. 120) we reply, that the incarnate Christ at Beth-
lehem could just as well be made by God to assimie
an angelic form, near at hand and remote, as the
Logos of God in the preparatory steps to his incar-
nation. To Kurtz this wonderful manifestation of
the " ubiquity " of Christ is only a '■ pure idea" or
fancy. But just as iGen. xviii. 19) the two anL'els
who went to Sodom are distinguished from the An-
gel of Jehovah before whom Abraham stood «ith
his intercessory prayer, and as Paul (Gal. iii. 19)
suggests the distinction between the angel giving
the law at Sinai and the Angel of his face, who was
the Christ of the Old Testament (1 Cor. x. 4), so
we can distinginsh in the New Testament between
the two men or the two angels at the grave of the
risen one (Luke xxiv. 4 ; John xx. 12), or the two
men upon the Mount of Olives (Acts i. lo) on the
one side, and the angel who announces the birth
of Christ on the other. Only Matthew, in his solemn
and festive expression, has embraced these two
angels in one symbolic form of the Angel of the
Lord, and this indeed upon good groimds, siuce in
the resurrection or the second birth of Christ the
Logos was active, as in his birtli at Bethleheni.
c. Baumgarteu urges: Why should the Angel of
the Lord first appear to the Egyptian bondwoman.
Gen. xvi.? Kurtz and Delitzscli have, in their earlier
work.s, given various replies to this question. We
answer with another question: Why should the riseo
Christ first appear to Mary Magdalene, and not to
his mother or John ? We think, according to the
simple law, that the Lord reveals himself first to the
poorest, most distressed and receptive hearts. It is^
besides, a mere supposition that tlie Angel of the
Lord lias first appeared here, where he is first namc(^
with this name, as we shall see further below
d. Kurtz urges again : It lies agaiust the ide*
of a continuous development of the knowledge o£
388
GENESIS, OB THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
the historical salvation, in the Holy Scriptures, if
there is actually in the very beginning of the Old-
Testament history so clear a consciousness of the
disliuction between the unrevealed and revealed j
God, and this consciousness is ever becoming more ,
obscure in the progress of tlte Old Testament, but
has vanished entirely and forever in the New Testa-
ment. But this is all as manifestly a pure supposi-
tion as when Hofmann thinks the Old Testament
cannot speak of the self-distinclion of God because
in that case it would anticipate the doctrine of the
Trinity. That indeed is the organic development
of revelation from the Old to the New Testament,
that the revelation of the Trinity in the divine being
was introduced througti the revelation of the duality.
But when the form of the Angel of the Lord in
Genesis, passes to the Angel of his face, or the per-
sonified face of Jehovah himself in Exodus, then to
the prince over the armies of God in Joshua, and
finally to the Archangel, the Angel of the Covenant
of the later prophets, the organic development of
the doctrine in question is manifest.
e. Kurtz remarks again the fact that in the New
Testament the law is said to be ordained by angels
or spoken by the angel (Acts vii. 63; Gal. iii. 19;
Heb. ii. 2), as in tavor of the doctrine of the created
angel. Here he plainly refutes himself. For Paul
(Gal. iii. 19) clearly refers to this feature of the law,
that it was (irJumed by the angel, in order to show
that the law was subordinate to the promise given
to Abram. But if the mediation through angels
is a mark of the imperfection of the law, it follows
that Abram could not have received the promise
through such a mediation of a created angel. To
this end he presses especially the appeal to (Heb. ii,
'1) " the great superiority of the promise to the law-
is derived from this, that the law was announced
ti ayy fKuiv but the gospel Sia tov Kvpiovy For the
answer see Rom. iv. where the promise to which the
law is subordinated appears as the yet undeveloped
gospel of the old covenant.
/. Heb. xiii. 2 refers to the three men who ap-
peared to Abram in the plains of Manire (Gen.
xviii.). But why not to the two angels whom Lot
received (Gen. .xix.) ? The words can refer only to
a peculiar kind of hospitality. Abram knew, how-
ever, that the men who were his guests were of a
higher order, while Lot appears not to have known
it at the beginning.
(J. The angel-prince Michael (Dan. x. 13, 21 ;
iii. 1) has the same position which the Malcach Je-
hovah lias in the historical books. But that Michael
cannot be the Logos is clear, since he is not the only
ins ita. Gabriel appears as a second archangel
(Dan. viii. 16 ; ii. 21), (Tob. xii. 15), add-* Raphael
and (4 Ezra iv. 1) still further Uriel. When 1 now,
from the identity of Gabriel or Michael with the
appealing figure in Rev. i., draw the conclusion, —
Gabriel or Michael are syndjolical manifested images
of Christ (as tlie old Jewisli theology saw in Michael
the manile.-ted image of Jehovah), and thus the one
syinbolical angel-lbrm of tlie Angel of the Lord or
angel-prince has branched itself into the seven
archangel forms of the coming Christ, Kurtz finds
in these forms " puic ideas " or fancies. But I call
them the veiled angelic modes of the revelation and
energy of Christ, in the foundation, limits, and life
of humanity and history. But Michael had need of
help tl);iti. xi. 1). Indeed ! that can in no case he
■aid of the Logos (Luke xxii. 43).
A. Zach. 1 I'i the Angel of the XiOrd was sul>or-
dinated to Jehovah. The Angel of Jehovah as th«
intercessor for Israel prays to Jeliovah of hoett
(oompai-e the high-piiestly prayer John xvii.).
!. Mai. iii. 1, the Messiah was named the Angej
of the Ci>venant. "But," Kurtz argues, " if Mala-
chi had intended by the Angel of the Covenant tha
Angel of Jehovah, he w-ould certainly so have named
him." Then Moses could not have meant the Angel
of the Lord when he speaks of the Angel of his
face. Certaiidy it is true that in the Angel of the
Covenant the union of the divine form of the Augcl
of Jehovah and of the human Sou of David, as th(
divine-human founder of the New Testament, ii
prophetically consummated.
k. The Angel of his face (Exod. xxiii. 20), of
whom Jehovah says. My name is in him (Exod.
xxxii. 34 ; xxxiii. 15 ; Is. Ixiii. 9), is accoiding tc
Kurtz the same with the Angel of Jehovah in Gene
sis. But now (Exod. xxxii. ;i4) Jehovah appears so
to distinguish tliis angel from himself that we can-
not think of him as one with Jehovah. We can-
not indeed freely use the ingenious answer to this
difficulty by Hengstenberg,* which Kurtz contests
(see p. 164). But the opposition here is not this,
that either a created angel goes with Israel, or thf
Logos-angel, but this, that he would not longer him
self be present in the camp of Israel (Exod. xxxiii
5), but beyond it (ver. 7), that thus a stricter dis-
tinction and separation should be made between the
impure people and his sanctuary.
I. In the history of the three angels who visit
Abram in the plains (the oaks) of Mamre (Gen
xviii. 19), not only the one angel who remains will
Abram er.ters as Jehovah, but the two others,
so soon as they were recognized by Lot in their
super-earthly being, were addressed by him with the
names of God, Adonai, etc. Kurtz overlooks here
the ci\ange of persons w-hich appears in the narra-
tive (ch. xix. 17-19). The peculiar work of the two
angels continues until ver. 16. They lead Lot out
of the city and set him without (before) the city.
The angels now retire to the backgiound, and Je-
hovah comes into view and says, " Escape for thy
life." That Jehovah had gone up from Abram into
heaven, and here again stands before Lot, can only
be a souice of error to the literal conception, which
attributes to Jehovah a gross corporeal form, and in
the same measure the local changes in space. We
do not wonder now that Lot clings to the vanishing
angel-forms with the cry, Adonai, Now the one
unique appearance presents itself clearly before hun
(ver. 21). Then (ver. 24) Jehovah rained upon
Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from Jeho-
vah out of heaven. Without a perception of the
change of different voices and visions, and the cor-
responding change of different revelations, any one
will liave great difficulty in finding his way through
this statement of the struggles of Lot.
We now bring into view the gradual develop-
ment of the specific revelation of God, which begins
with the call of Abram. Hofmann asks: Ought we
not to expect that the manilestations of God, so
fat- tis they form a preparation lor the coming of
Christ, should from the vei-y beginning of the histoi-y
of .salvation, and not first from Ahiam, be de-
scribed as manifestations of the Malcach Jehovah f
• f tlonRwtenbLTjj: fiolde that after the hiu witli the goldei
calf, God tlireatpnod tlio people that the Matcach Jehovah,
the inineiited iiuRel, bhouM no longer go with tln-m, l>ut a
lower, t.ui'Oidili;ile, creiiled angel ; but that in :iiibwer to
the pray(-r of Muses he a^uia puiiuitti the uuureated ajigtj
to uccoiupjiiiy them.— A. li.J
CHAP. XII. 1-20.
{8V
The whole distinction between the piimitive and
patriarchal religion is thus overlooked. The faith
of salvation first takes on the form of a definite
religion of the future and liecomes a more definite
preparation for the incarnation of Christ, in the
faith of Abram. Hoftnann himself, as he in other
places admits that the Maleach Jehovah is the one
only form of theopliany in the history of the old cove-
nant, notwithstanding the numerous changes in the
designation of the revelation : e. g. " Jehovah aji-
peared," etc., deprives the implied objection in the
above question of any force. Indeed, the appeurance
of the Maleach Jehovah is announced with the patri-
archal revelation. It is recorded (Gen. xii. 1), And
Jehovah said to Abram. Starke holds, agreeing
with the older theologians, that the Angel of the
Lord (see Gal. iii 16) is the Son of God himself
But Stephen (Acts vii. 2) says the God of glory
(Sdfa) apjieared to our father Abram when he was in
Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Haran. The ques-
tion meets us here therefore : In what relation does
the Maleach Jehovah stand to the So^a or Ti;3
of Jehovah ? In Luke ii. 9 there is a very significant
parallttlism — &yyi\u^ Kvpiov iireaTTj auru'is^ Kal bi'i^a
KUfjiov 7repteAau4'6*' avruO^, i. e. both ideas are bound
together in the closest manner and by an inward tie.
In Exod. xxiv. 16, eh. xl. 34, the 5o|a of Jehovah
is in the same way intimately conuected with Jeho-
vah. But in ch. xxxiii. the 56^a of Jehovah, \er.
18, is fully identified with the face of Jehovah, ver.
'20. According to ver. 14 (compared with ver. 2
and Is. Ixiii. 9), the face of Jehovah is identical
with the Angel of his face. The Angel of Jehovuh
is thus the manifested figure of Jehovah, in the same
way as his So^a. The glory fills the holy of holies,
ind Jehovah appears in the holy of holies (Exod.
il 34 and other passag^-s). According to Isaiah vi.
8 the revelation of the 5dja of Jehovah shaU fill the
whole earth (compare Ezek. i. 28 ; iii. 12, etc.). In
Titus 'i. 13 Christ who comes to judgment is de-
scribed as the 5d|a (glorious) appearing of the great
God, and in Heb. i. 3 he is styled iiroii7atTwo t^s
So^Tji Sifav. It is certain that the word So^a has a
manifold signification, and that when used to desig-
nate the theophauy it points rather to the manifested
jBplendor of the Spirit, than to the spirit of this
glorious appearance. (Hence it is closely connected
with the pillar of cloud and of fire.) But so much
is clearly proved, that the 5o|o of Jehovah can
properly be personally united with Jehovah himself,
with Christ, but not with any creature-angel. It is
now in accordance with the course of development,
as it is with the character of the patriarchal theo-
phany, that it should begin with the miraculous
report or voice, the word (Gen. xii. 1), and advance
to the miraculous vision or manifestation (ver. 7). For
the word of Jehovah is in the first place the primary
form of revelation in the time of the patriarchs, and
in regard to the vision, it is the more interior (sub-
jeelive) event, which appears already in a lower stage
or grade of the development in the line of visions.
After the separation of Abram from Lot (ch. xiii. 14)
he receives again the word of Jehovah, which bless-
es him for his generous course, and in a way corre-
•ponding with it. So also after his expedition (ch.
%y. 1). The blessings in both cases correspond to
his well-doing : to his renunciation of the better
portions of the land, the promise of the whole land
is given, and to the pious man of war, God gives
himself as a shield and reward. In the important
i;t of the justification of Abram (ch. xv.), the mi-
raculous appearance enters with the word of Jcho
vah. The word of the Lord came to him in vision
If now the Angel of the Lord first appears under thii
name in the history of II agar (xvi. 9), wo have th<
reason clearly given. Hags: had learned faith ig
the house of .\brani, and her p jwer to behold or per-
ceive the vision was developed in accordance with
her necessities But the Angel of Jehovah, as tht
Christ who was to come through Isaac, had a pecu
liar reason for assisting Hagar, since she for the sake
of the future Christ is mvolved in this sorrow. Be
sides, there is no increase of the divine revelation in
this appearance; Abram saw Jehovah himself in the
Angel of Jehovah, and Sarah also in the manifesta-
tion of Jehovah sees above all the Angel.
Between Abram's counection with Hagar and
the next manifestation of Jehov.ih there are full
thirteen years. But then his faith is strengthened
again, and Jehovah appears to him (xvii. 1). The
most prominent and important tlieophany in the life
of Ahram is the appearance of the three men(ch.
xviii.). But this appearance wears its prevaiUng
angelic form, because it is a collective appearance
for Abram and Lot, and at the same time refers to
the judgment upon Sodom. Hence the two angels
are related to their central point as sun-images to
the sun itself, and this central point for Abram ia
Jehovah hiniself in his manifestation, but not a com-
missioned Angel of the Lord. Thus also this Angel
visits Sarah (ch. xxi. 1 ; compare xviii. 10). But the
Angel appears in the history of Hagar a second
time (xxi. 17), and this time as the Angel of God
(Maleach Elohim), not as the Maleach Jehovah, for
the question is not now about a return to Abram's
house, but about the independent settlement with
Ishmael in the wilderness. The person who tempts
Abram (ch. xxii. 1) is Elohim — God as he mani-
fests himself to the nations and their general ideas
or notions, and the revelation Is eflected purely
thi-ough the word. Now also, in the most critical
moment for Abram, the Angel of the Lord comea
forward, calling down to him from heaven since
there was need of a prompt message of relief. In
the rest of the narrative this Angel identifies him-
self throughout with Jehovah (vers. 12, 16). To
Isaac also Jehovah appears (ch. xxvi. 2), and the
second time in the night (ver. 24). He appears to
Jacob in the night in. a dream (ch. xxviii. 12, 13).
Thus also he appears to him as the Angel of God in
a dream (ch. xxxi. 11), but throughout identified
with Jehovah (ver. 13). Jehovah commands him
to return home through the word (ch. xxxi. 3).
Laljan receives the word of God in a dream (xxxi.
24). The greatest event of revelation in the life
of Jacob is the grand theophany, in the night,
through the vision, but the man who wrestles with
him calls himself God and man (men) at the same
time. According to the theory of a created angel,
Jacob is not a wrestler with God (Israel), but merely
a « restler with the Angel. It is a more purely ex-
ternal circumstance which God uses to warn Jacob
through the word to remove from Bhechem (xxxv.
1 ). In the second pecuUar manifestation of God to
Jacob after his return from Mesopotamia (xxxv. 9),
we have a clear and distinct reflection of the first
(xxxii. 24). In the night-visions of Joseph, whicl
already appear in the life of Isaac, and occur more
frequently with Jacob, the form of revelation during
the patriarchal period comes less distinctly into view.
But then it enters again, and with new energy, in the
life of Moses. The Angel of Jehovah (Ex. iii. 2) if
39C
iJENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK. Of MOSES.
connected with the earlier revelation, and here also
is ideutified with Jeliovah and Elobim (ver. 4). But
oe assumes a more definite form and title, as the
Angel of his face, since with the Mosaic system the
rejection of any deifying of the creature comes into
Sweater prominence, and since it is impossible that
the face of God should be esteemed a creature.
' The reasons which are urged for the old ecclesi-
astical view of the Angel of the Lord, aie recapitu-
lated by Kurtz in the following order: 1. The Maleach
Jehovah identifies himself with Jehovah. 2. Those
to whom he appears recognize, name, and worship
him as the true God. 3. He receives sacrifice and
worship without any protest. 4. The biblical writers
Mnstantly speaU of him as Jehovah. We add the
following reasons: 1. The theory of our opponents
opens a wide door in the Old Testament for the dei-
fying of the creature, which the Old Testament every-
where condemns; and the Romish worship of angels
finds in it a complete justification. 2. The Socinians
also gain an important argument for their rejection
of the Trinity, if, instead of the self-revelation of
God, and of the self-distinction included in it in the
Old Testament, there is merely a pure revelation
through angels. As the fully developed doctrine of
the Trinity cannot be found in the Old Testament, so
no one can remove from the Old Testament the be-
ginnings of that doctrine, the self-distinction of God,
without removing the very substructure on which the
New Testament doctrine of the Trinity rests, and
without obscuring the Old Testament theology in its
very centre and glory. 3. It would break tlie band
of the organic unity between the Old and New Tes-
taments, S' it could be proved that the central point
in the Old Testament revelation is a creature-angel,
and that the New Testament revelation passes at one
bound from this form to that of the God-man. The
theory of the creature-angel in its continuation
through a colossal adoration of angels, points down-
wards to the Kabbinic and Mohammedan doctrine
of angels which has established itself in opposition to
the New Testament Christology, and is bf>und to-
gether with that exaggerated doctrine of angels in
more recent times, which ever corresponds with a
veiled and obscure Christology. On the other hand,
it removes from the New Testament Christology its
Old Testament foundation and preparation, which
consists in this, that the interchange between (iod
and men is in full operation, and must therefore pre-
figure itself in the images of the future God-uan.
4. The doctrine of angels itself loses its very heart,
its justification and interpretation, if we take away
from it the symbolic angel-forTn which rules it, as its
royal centre, i. e. that angelic form wluch, as a real
manifestation of (iod, as a typical manifestation of
Christ, as a manifestation of angels, has the nature
and force of a symbol. But with the obliteration of
thesymliolic eh;'iiienl,all the remaining symbolic and
angelic images, the cherubim and seraphirn, will dis-
appear, and with the key of biblical psychology in
its representation of the development of the life of
the eoul, to an organ of revelation, we shall lose the
key to the exposition of the Old Te'ftament itself.
5. Augu.stin \va.s consistent when, with his interpreta-
tion of the Angel of Jehovah as a creature-angel, he
decidedly rejects the interpretation which regards the
Bona of (iod (ch. vi.) as angel-beings ; for the assump-
tion of angels who, as such, venture to identify thcm-
■elvcR with Jehovah, and notwithstinding they are
in peril, abandon themselves to lustful plca.sures
»ith the daughters of men until it i-sues in aposnisy
and a magical transformation of their nature, com.
bines tn o groundless and intolerable phantoms. Wc
hold, theretbre, that Old Testamei t theology, in itf
very heart and centre, is in serious danger from
these two great piejudices, as the New Testament
from the two great prejudices of a mere mechanical
structure of the Gospels, and of the unapostolic and
yet more than aposiohc brothers of the Lord. (See
the defence of the old ecclesiastical view in the
Commentary by Keil,* also with a reference to
Kah.ms, de Angela Domini diatribe, 1858. The as-
sertion of the opposite v lew held by Delitzsch in hia
Commentary, meets here its refutation).
6. The aspect of all theophanies as visions. It is
a general supposition, that divine revelation is partly
through visions, or through inward miraculous sight*
and sounds. We must, however, bring out distinctly
the fundamental position, that every theophany is at
the same time vision, and every vision a theophany;
but that in the one case the objective theophany,
and in the other the subjective vision, is the prevail-
ing feature. The subjective vision appears in the
tnost definite form in dream-visions, of which Adam's
sleep, and Abram's night-horror (chs. ii. and xv.),
are the first striking portents. It develops itself
with great power in the lives of Isaac, Jacob, and
Joseph, and is of still greater importance in the lives
of Samuel and Solomon, as also in the night-visions
of Zechariah. We find them in the New Testament
in the life of Joseph of Nazareth and in the history
of Paul. It needs no proof to show that the mani-
festations of God or angels in dreams, are not out-
ward manifestations to the natural senses. In the
elements of the subjective dream-vision, veils itself,
however, the existing divine manifestation. But
what the dream introduces in the night-life, the see-
ing in images — that the ecstasy does in the day or
ordinary waking life (see La.ngk : " Apostolic Age ").
The ecstasy, as the removing of the mind into the
condition of unconsciousness, or of a different con-
sciousness, is the potential basis of the vision, the
vision is the activity or effect of the ecstasy. But
since the visions have historical permanence and re-
sults, it is evident that they are the intuitions of
actual objective manifestations of God. Mere hallu-
cinations of the mind lead into the house of error,
spiritual visions build the historical house of God.
But in this aspect we may distinguish peculiar dream-
visions, night-visions of a higher form and power,
momentary day-visions, apoealyptic groups or circles
of visions, linked together in prophetic contempla-
tion, and that habitual clear-sightedness as to visions
which is the condition of inspiration. But that theo-
phames, which are ever at the same time Angelopha-
nies and Christophanies, and indeed as theophanies
of the voice of God, or of the voice from heaven, of
the simple appearance of angels, of their more en-
larged and complete manifestations of the developed
heavenly scene — that these are always conditioned
through a disposition or fitness for visions, is clear
from numeious pas.sages in the Old and New Testa
mcnts. (2 Kings vi. 17; Dan. x. 7; John xii. 28,
29; XX. 10-12; Acts ix. 8; xii. 7-12; xxii. 9-14.
In theology the psychological aspect of revelation
has been hitherto very much neglected. All possibly
• [The Btatemont and defence, by Keil, of the ordinar?
view held by tlic Cliurch, is admirable, and completely sat>.
iafactory. As it is now within the reach of the KnKlisb
reader, it is not necessary to quote it here. Those whc
would see this subject thorouphly and exhatistively treated,
may consult IIengstknbeho'b •' Clinetology." 2d ed., pp
124-14;) of vol. i. and 31-86 of the 2d part of vol. ui.— A. O
CHAP XU. 1-20.
391
forms of revelation have been placed side by side
witliout any connection. Starke 8ay3, tbe Son of God
has appeared to believers under six forms or ways :
1 . through a voice and words ; 2. in an assumed
form either of an angel, at least under that name, or
lu the form of a man, preti?uring his future incar-
nation; 3. in a vision; 4. m dreams; 5. in a pillar
of cloud and fire ; 6. especially to Paul, in a light
from heaven.
EXEGETICAl AND CEITICAi.
1. The call of Abram and his migration to Ca-
naan until he reaches Sichem (ch. xii. 1-7). The
call of Abram demands from him a threefold re-
nunciation, increasing in intensity from one to the
other : 1. Out of thy country. — The fatherland.
The land of Mesopotamia as it embraced both Ur of
the Chaldees and Haran. — 2. And from thy kind-
red.— The Chaldaic descendants of Sbem. — 3. From
thy father's house. — Terah and his family (ch.
xi. 81, 32). With the threefold demand it connects
a threefold promise : 1. Of the special providence of
God, leading him, indeed, to a new land (see Heb.
li,) ; 2. of the natural blessing of a numerous seed
(ch. xiii. 16; xv. 6; xvii. 2, li, 16; xviii. 18; xxi.
13 ; xxii. 17); 3. of a spiritual blessing for himself,
and in its wide extension to all the f imilies of the
earth, making his name glorious, and constituting
about his person in its spiritual import and relations
the great contrast between the subjects of the bless-
ing and the curse. — And will make thy name
great. — That is, as the divinely blessed ancestor and
lather of a renowned people (Knobel). The name of
tile father nf believers should shed its light and
vield its inrtueuce through the world's history. —
Thou shalt be a blessing. — Lit : Be thou a bless-
ing. It is a superficial view of this word which in-
terprets it, thy name shall become a formula of
blessing (Kinichi, Knobel: so that those who desire
the greatest happiness shall wish tiiemselves as happy
as Alirami. It is through the union of men with
him (in that they pronounce and wish huo blessed),
that the mercy and blessing of God passes over to
them, and through their enmity to him, which only
reveals itself in calumnies and blasphemies* they
draw upon themselves the curse of God. The ore-
iude to the ecclesiastical blessing and the ecclesi-
astical ban or curse. The curse : (Gen. iii. 14 and
17; iv. 11; V. 29; ix. 25; xxvii. 29).— In the«
shall all the families of the earth be blessed.f
— The rendering it as reflexive is arbitrary, since we
have the special form of the hithpael to express this,
and the interpretation all families shall desire that
their prosperity may be as thine, is shallow and in-
con'ect (Jarchi, Clericus and others). The reflexive
rendering is not necessary, indeed, in ch. xlviii. 20. —
* [3^p the reproaches — blasphemous curses of men — in
diftinctioQ from ~7^ the judicial curse of God. Keil. —
A. G.]
t [ We must not miss here the fundamental meaning of
the " i7>, while we include its instrumcDtal sense, through.
Abram is not only the cbaanel but the source of ble&'ong for
(11 Keil. —A. G.; {The families refers to the division of the
081C human family into a nnmher of families or races. (See
X. 5 ; XX. 31). The blessing of Abram will bind into unity the
cow dissevered parts of the race, and transform that curse
which now rests upon all the earth on account of sin, into a
.Messing for the whole hiuaan race. Keil.— A. G.] [The
Did Testament is as broad and catholic m its spirit as the
New Testament. Mubpht, pp. 262, 263.— A. G.l
T. 4. The obedience of Abram. He left what he
was required to leave, and took with him what it waa
in his power to take. Lot, although Lot was a burdeu
to him rather than a source of strength (see artieU
Lot, in the "Bible Dictionaries"). The emigration
was the more heroic, since he was 75 years old, and
his father was still living* (ch. 11). He probably
went by Damascus (see xv. 2). — V. B. The souls
that they had gotten. — Strictly, made, descriptivt
of the gain in slaves, male and female. t — Sichem
— The first resting-place of Abram, who came to the
place Sichem, | and, indeed, to the oaks of Moreb
(Deut. xi. 30), the oak-grove of Moreh. — Moreh.—
Probably the name of the owner. Knobel : the oaka
of instruction, which appear to be the same
with the oaks of divination (Judges ix. 37). I*
is not probable that Abram would have fixed
his abode precisely (as Knobel thinks) in a grove,
which according to heathen notions had a sacred
character as the residence of divining priests.
The religious significance of the place may have
arisen from the fact that Jacob buried the images
brought with him in his family, under the oak of
Shechem (xxxv. 4). The idols, indeed, must not be
thrown into sacred but profane places (Isa. ii. 20).
But, perhaps, Jacob had regard to the feelings of hia
family, and prepared for the images, which, indeed,
were not images belonging to any system of idolatry,
an honorable burial. At the time of Joshua the place
had a sacred character, and Joshua, therefore, erected
here the monumental stone, commemorating the sol-
emn renewal of the law. Thus they became the oaks
of the pillar at which the Shechemites made Abimelech
king (Judges ix. 6). — Then also the Canaanite
was in the land. — This explains why in his migra-
tions he must pass through the land to Sichem, to
find a place suitable for his residence.§ It does not
follow from this statement, either that the narrative
originated at a time when the Canaanite was no
longer in the land, or that the term here desigiiates
only a single tribe of this name, which in the time of
Moses dwelt upon the sea-coast, and in the valley
of the Jordan (as Knobel thinks), comp. ch. xiii. 7 ;
xxxiv. 30. It is a tradition of the Jews, that Noah
had assigned Africa as the home of the children
of Ham, but that the Canaanites had remained in
Canaan against his command, and that therefore
Abram, the true heir, was called thither. Ver. 7 . The
first appearance of Jehovah in vision. Abram's life
of faith had developed itself thus iiir since he had
entered Canaan, and now the promise is given to
him of the land of Canaan, as the possession of the
promised seed. The second progressive promise)
comp. ch. xiii. 15, 17; xv. 18; xvii. 8; xxvi. 3;
xxviii. 4, 13 ; xxxv. 12. Abram's grateful acknowl-
• [But according to Acts vii 4, his father was dead.
Terah died when he was 205 years old. and as Abram left
Haran when he was 75 years old, he must have been bom
when Terah was 130 years old, and thus have been the
younger son of Terah. — A. G,]
t [Not only gotten a^ secular property but had mad«
obedient to the law of the true God Wordsworth A. G.]
I [See Jacobus ; " Notes on Genesis," vol. i. pp. 227. 228.
-A. G.j
§ [The author of Genesis evinces in this clause a knowl.
edge of the Canaanites, and presupposes their character to
be known in such a way as a late writer could not do.
Jacobus, p. 228. — A. G.]
'i [Abram is the first person to whom the Lord is said to
have appeared, and this is i he first place at which the Lord
is said to have appeared lo Abram, and at this plaot
Christ, tti£ Lord of glory, first revealed himself as the Mepi*
siah (John iv. 26; to the Samaritan woman (the type of '.hi
Gentile Church). "Wordsworth, p. 66 — A. G.l
392
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
edgiuent : the erection of ar altar, and the founding
of an outward senic? of Jehovah, which as to its
first feature consisted in the calling upon his name
(cultus), and as to its second, in the profession and
ackuow lodgment of his name.* Thus also Jacob
acted (ch. xxxiii. 20 ; Josh. xxiv. 1, 26). Bethel,
Jerusalem, Hebron, Beersheba are places of the
came character (i. «., places which were consecrated
by the patriarchs, and not as Knobel tliinks, whose
consecration took place in later times, and then was
dated back to the period of the patriarchs). Abram's
altars stood in the oaks of Moreh, and Mamre, in
Bethel, and upon Moriali. Abram. and the patri-
archs generally, served also the important purpose
of preaching through their lives repentance to the
< 'anaanites, as Noah was such a preacher for his
time. For God leaves no race to perish unwarned.
Sodom had even a constant warning in the life of Lot.
2. Abratn^s migration through Canaan from
Sichem to Bethel and still further southwards (vers.
8 and 9). The want of pasture for hig herds, ihe
presentiments of piety, the yielding of the patriarch
to the divine guidance, led him further southwards
to a new residence east of Bethel. He pitched his
tent between Bethel and Ai. " In the time of the
Judges there was a sanctuary of Jchov.ah at Bethel
(1. Sam. X. 3), and at one time also it was the abode
of the ark of the covenant (Judges xx. 18, 20). In
later times it was the chief seat of the illegal worship
(cultus) established by Jeroboam (1 Kings xii. 29 ;
Amos vii. 10), and hence its name Bethel in the
place of the o* 1 name Luz (ch. xxviii. 19 ; Josh, xviii.
1.3 ; Judges i. 23). In Genesis it bears this name
already in the time of the patriarchs, who here re-
ceived manifestations of God and offered sacrifices to
him (ch. xiii. 4 ; xxviii. 22 ; xxxv. 7)." Thus Kno-
bel explains the name as if there was an internal
necessity for denying the fact of the consecration of
Bethel through the dream and vision of Jacob. But
that Bethel should be geographically known as Luz
by the Canaanites, long after the patriarchs had
made it theocratically Bethel, involves no real diffi-
culty, f — Abram journeyed (broke up his en-
campment and ■went). — The whole statement
brings to view and illustrates the nomadic life,
as also the allusion to his dwelling in tents. J —
Going on still toward the South The southern
part of ("anaan toward the wilderness, a rich pasture-
land, A particular definite residence in Hebron is
spoken of in ch. xiii. 18.
3. Ahram's journey to Egi/pt (vers. 10-20). —
There was a famine in the land.— The frequent
famines are a peculiar characteristic of early times
and of uncivilized la:ids. Kgypt .as a rich and fruitful
land was even then a refuge from famine, as it was
in the history of Jacob (Joseph., Antiq. xv. 9, 2). —
Say, I pray the© (or now, still), thou art my
Bister. — The women at that time went unveiled, and
• [He thus also look possession of the land in the uamo
of his oovonant Ood. See BuSB, :J64 ; .Jacobus, 229.— A. O.]
t [*' Jacol> gave thisuame to tht* placo twico(Gi'n. xxviii.
19; xxxv. !.'>). As tlie name was notjirsf fiiven in tho sec»ind
butancc, so it may not have lieen in the first. Accordioffly
we meet with it as an existing name in Al>riim'M timi:,
without being constrained to account for it by Biipjujsing the
present narrative to hnvo hecn compusod in its present
form after the time of .Jacnh's visit. On tlio other hand, wo
may regard ii as an interesting trace of early piety having
been prosriit in the land even before tho arrival of Abram."
Murphy.— A. (}.]
] I*' Jle hftfi loft his AffMJfff at Haran. and now dwelt in
lentt as in a u'-ange country " (Heb. xi. 0). Wonlswurth.
-A. 0.1
this receives confirmation from the Egyptian mont.
ments. The custom was changed after the conquesi
of the land by the Persians. Sarah was ten yean
younger than Abram (ch. xvii. 17), and, therefore,
about 65 years of age. In the patriarchal mannei
of life, her age would not make so deep a mark ; and
there is no real ground for questioning the continu-
ance of her youthful bloom and beauty. It is more
remarkable that Abram should adopt the same
course again (ch. 20), and that Isaac should onco
have imitated his example (ch. xxvi. 7). Modern
criticism in this case, as often in other cases, chooses
rather to admit, that there is a remarkable confusion
in the narrative, than that there should have been a
remarkable repetition of the same act. " It is held
with good reason," says Knobel, " that one and the
same event lies at the foundation of these three nar-
ratives." But the result of the first act of Abram
did not necessarily restrain hhn from the second,
and Isaac, especially in moments of anxiety, may
have easily yielded himself to a slavish imitation
of his father's conduct. The name Abiinelech lays
no real ground for the identity of the second and
third narrative, since this was a standing title of the
kings of Phihstia, as Pharaoh* was of the kings of
Egypt. According to (ch. xx. 13) Abram had al-
ready in his migration from Haran arranged with
Sarah the expression referred to for his protection
while among strangers, and this explains the re|)eti-
tion of the act, the prominent point in the moral
problem (see below). " The Hebrew consciousness,"
says Knobel, " pleased itself with the thought that
on different occasions the ' mothers ' were objects of
admiration for their beauty, while they were kept
from insult, and their husbands protected in their
rights by God." Since the " Israelitish consciousness "
has not concealed by silence that Leah, the mother
of the larger part of the Jews, was not beautiful, we
may trust its account of the beauty of .'<arah. Re-
bekah and Kachel, and the more so since the beauty
of that type ajipears still in Jewish women. "It must
be observed also that by the side of the Hamitic wo-
men in Egypt and Canaan, Semitic women, even
wiien advanced in years, would be admired as beau-
ties. Abram desired that Saiah should say that she
was his sister, lest he should be killed. If she was
regarded as his wife, an Egyptian could only obtain
her, when he had murdered her husband and pos-
sessor ; but if she was his sister, then there was a
hope that she might be won from her brother by
kindly means. The declaration was not false (ch.
XX. 12), but it was not the whole truth. Knobel. —
Ver. 15. And commended her before Pharaoh.
— " Modern travellers speak in a similar way of ori
ental kings, who incorporate into their harem the
beautiful women of their land in a perfectly arbitiary
way." Knobel. " The recognition of Sarah's beauty
is more easily explained, if we take into view that
the Egyptian women, although not of so dark a com-
plexion as the Nubians or Ethiopians, were yet of a
darker shade than the Asiatics. The women of high
rank were usually represented upon the luonntnent?
in lighter shades for the [mrpose of Hattery."
Uengsteuberg. " According to older records ths
* ['' nj''"lB from tho Coptic Ouro with the masculine
article pi oi p, Pmiro, king. The dynasty and residence of
the king cannot 1)0 certainly doteimiiied. L'ut it is wortny
of notice that there is no trace here of the later Egyptian
ci)ntimT>t for the nomadic life and occupation ; a farr whicb
speaks decidedly for the antiquity and historical characta
of the narrulive." Kurt*. — A. G.l
CHAP. xu. 1-ao.
:»»;•
Egyptian court coneiMed of the sons of the most
llfustrious prie3t3. — Into Pharaoh's house, i. e.,
barem." Schreder. — Ver. 16. The possessions of the
Qomadic chief. "According to Burlvliardt and
Kobinson all the Arabic Bedouin hordes do not own
dorses. Strabo already relates this as true of the
Nabataeans (p. 16)." Knobel. The horse does not
appear with the patriar'r'.is, and as a costly, proud
animal, both as a war-horse and in ordinary use, was
generally in tlie theocratic view regarded as a symbol
of worldly splendor.— Ver. 17. The Lord plagued
Pharaoh with great plagues [blowsj. — I'hey
were such plagu>'S of sieliness as to guard Sar:ii
from injury (ch. xx. 4, 6). — Ver. 18. This Pharaoh is
not hardened like the later king of that name. lie
concludes that he is punished for the sake of Sarai.
Whence he draws this conclusion we are not told.*
— V. 20. Now follows the dismissal of Abram, but
still a dismissal full of honorable accompaniments.
"Pharaoh's conduct moreover shows how under all
that idolatry which then held the Egyptians in its
embrace, there was still existing a certain faith in
the supreme God, and a kind of reverential fear
bef'x^e him.*'
DOCTRIIfAi AND ETHICAL.
1. Keil: "The history of the hfe of Abram from
his calling to his death unfolds itself in four stages,
whose beginnings are marked by divine revelations
of special significance. The first stage (chs. xii.-xiv.)
iiegfns with his calling and emigration to Canaan ;
the second (chs. xv. xvi.) with the promise of an heir
and the formation of the covenant ; the third (chs.
xvii.-xxi.) with the establishment of the covenant
through the change of name and the introduction
of the covenant-sign of circumcision ; the fourth (chs.
ixii.-xxv. 11) with the trial or temptation of Abram
for the preservation and perfecting of his faith. All
the divine revelations to him proceed from Jehovah,
and the name Jehovah prevails through the whole
life of the father of the faithful, the name Elohim
appearing only where Jehovah, accordmg to its sig-
nificance, would have been entirely out of place, or
less appropriate." Viewing his life with respect to
' his faith, the first Section (chs. xii.-xiv.) marks pecu-
liarly the calling of Abrah.am ; the second states his
juskjication, confirmed through his reception into
the covenant of Jehovah — obscured, but not weak-
ened, through the erroneous workings of his faith
in his connection with Hagar (chs. xv. xvi.) ; the
third states his cotisecratio7i to be the father of the
faithful, and therewith the legal separation of his
house, and the establishment of his mild and yet
strictly marked relations to the heathen (ch. xvii.-
xxL) ; the fourth treats of the sealing or cojijirmation
of his faith. (From these we must distinguish as a
fifth Section the time of the solemn festive rest of Ids
faith, or the evening of life (chs. xxiii.-xxv. 10).
For the nature of the patriarchal history, compare
Dklitsch, above.
2. The translation of Stier (xii. 1), t/it Lord had
taid, is based upon an mcorra:!! interpretation of the
• [Y. 19. So I might have taken, Heb. And I took.
The constnictioii of the Hebrew does not require the -sup-
position that she actually became his wife. Our version,
(houffh not literal, gives no doubt the correct sense. If
ihe present narrative admittei of any doubt, the doubt
iH removed by a reference to the parallel ;:ase, ch. ss. 6.
- A. O.l
passage, in accordance with a misunderstanding ol
the words of Stephen (Acts vii. 3). As the first call
of Abram in Ur is by no means excluded here bj
the second call in Harau, so in Acts, the second call-
ing in llaran is not excluded by the first in Ur. Thf
first calling was plainly to Abram and his father'l
house. In the call before us he was told to go ou.
from his father's house, while his father with thi
rest should remain in Haran. Starke also fails tc
distinguish these two callings correctly.*
3. The particularism entering with the calling
of Abram must be viewed as the divine method ol
securing universal results. '* In the i);irticular we
see the general, in the individual the whole, in the
small the great ; Abram's calling is the seed out of
which springs the great tree under whose shade
many nations rest ; all indeed shall one day rest."
Lisco. — There is no mere external preference for
Israel in the Old Testament. God has, in his word
threatenings and judgments, dealt as strictly witt
Israel as w ith any people ; with peculiar strictness,
indeed, according to the peculiar gifts and gracea
which Israel had received. But the proper restric-
tion is the truest universality. " In the example ot
the Jewish people God declares, that which was con
cealed, the method and law of his wisdom, and
authorizes us to apply it for direction m our own
fives, and to other subjects, people, and events." A
quotation in Lisco. — The elements of Abram's char-
acter: heroic faith, humility, and self-sacrifice, en-
ergy, benevolence, and gentleness. His call in the
East : Christians, Jews, and Mohammedans trace
their origin back to him. The purer elements of
Islamism come from him.
4. The calling of Abram : 1. In its requisitions;
2. in its promi.ses (see the Exegesis) ; 3. in its mo-
tives, a. The grace of God. The election of Abram
The choice of God reflects itself in the dispositions
of men, the gifts of believers. As every people has
its peculiar disposition, so the race of Abram, and
especially the father of it, had the reUgious disposi-
tion in the highest measure. 6. The great necessity
of the world. It appeared about to sink into hea-
thenism; the faith must be saved in Abram. c. The
destination of Abram. Faith should proceed from
one behever to all, just as salvation should proceed
from one Saviour to all. The whole Messianic proph-
ecy was now embraced in Abram.f
• [" There is no discrepancy between Mosee and St. Ste-
phen. St. Stephen's desig-n was, when he pleaded before the
Jewish Sanhedrim, to show that God's revelations were not
limited to Jerusalem and Judea, but that he had tirst spoken
to the father of Abram in an idolatrous land, Ur of the
Chaldees."
" But Moses dwells specially on Abram's call from Ha-
ran, because .\bram's obedience to that call wad the proof of
his fliith." Wordsworth.
There is no improbability in the supposition that the call
was repeated. And this supposition would not only recon-
cile the words of Stephen and of Moses, but may explain the
tilth verse; "And they went forth to go into the land ol
Canaan, and into the land of Canaan they came." Abram
had left bis home in obedience to the original call ot God,
but had not reached the land in wliicb he was to dwell.
Now, upon the second call, he not only sets forth, but ccn-
ttnues in his migrations until he reaches Canaan, to which
he was directed. — .^. G.l
t [" Willi the closing word of the promse. ' in thee shall
all the families of the eartli be blessed,* the final goal of all
histoi-y is proclaimed, for there is nothing beyond the bless-
ing of all the families of the earth. Thus the whole fulnest
of the divine purpose in reference to the salvation, is stated
in the call of Abram, and connected with him in the closes!
manner. For the T^Z dot-s not designate any relation what,
ever of Abram to the general blessing, but designate? hin
SSI4
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
a. The calling of Abram to the pilgrimage of
faith (Heb. xi. 8). His migration: 1. into Canaan;
2. through Canaan; 3. to Egypt; 4. his return,
llis calling and migrating an example of the calling
and pilgrimage of his race. — A type of the calling
md pilurimage of all believers.
ti. The diameter of the Hfe of faith: a. The ex-
perience of faitli. Personal revelation of God, the
personal providence of God. 6. The work or couces
gion of faith. Personal trust and personal obedience.
7. The word of God to .\brahiiu, sealed through
the manifestation of God in Canaan, as the word of
the gospel is sealed to the believer through the sacra-
ment. Keil : " The promise was raised from its
temporal form to its real nature through Christ,
through him the whole earth becomes a Canaan."
8. Abram and the companions of his faith. Sarai,
Lot. The blessings and perils of the companionship
of the faithful, " The father of believeis and his suc-
cessors appear constantly in ih« Bible as one whole:
hence it is said so often, ' To thee will I give this land
(ch. XV. 17, etc.)'" Gerlach.
9. The solitude of the nomadic life of the patri-
archs, a source of the lifeof prayer and illumination —
a prerequisite for the higher revelatioiL The solitude
of Moses, the prophets (" by the rivers of Babylon,"
"in the desert,") of John the Baptist, of Christ the
Lord, of the Christiana in deserts, of the mystics in
the cloisters of the middle ages, of Lulher (Jacob
Bohme, Fox, etc.). In tranquil retirement. " Abram
was a rich, independent herdsman, just as the Be-
douin chiefs are still in the deserts and the broad
pasture-grounds of Syria, Arabia, and Palestine."
Gerlach. There were already a variety of pursuits ;
huntsmen, husb:mdmen, and shepherds. Their sepa-
rations and variances (ch. xliii. 32 ; xlvi. 34). For
the tents, deserts, pasturages (uncultivated regions),
see Biljle Dictionaries.
10. The consecration of Canaan, through the
manifestations of God, and the altars of .\bram (as
well as of the other patriarchs). The heavenly signs
of the Church of Christ ; the setting apart of the old
eartli, to a new. The chosen laud a type of the
Christian earth and of Paradise. " Abram takes his
church with liim." Calwer Haudbuch.
11. Abram's altars, or his calUng upon the name
of Jehovah, is at the same time a testimony to his
name. The true worship is a source of the true mis-
sionary— the cuitus itself a mission.
12. Abram's maxim or rule, lo report thai Sarah
was his aiater." It was determined upon in the
early period of his migrations (ch. xx. 13), but was
here tirst brought into use, and from its successful
issue was repealed once by himself, and once imi-
tated by Isaac. It was wiih respect lo his faith a
fearful hazurd. Faiili is at the beginning uncertain
as to the moral (|uestions and complications of life.
Every broad view of the general is at first an uncer-
tain view as to the particular. Thus it is in the
broad synthetic view in science ; it is at first want-
ing in reference to the critical and analytical knowl-
edge as to the particular. Still the scientific Syn-
•a tlie organic means or instrument through whicli blessing
•hould come." Haumgarten.— A. O. I
[••The Apostle Paul expounds the promiso (Gal. iii, 16),
ahowiiig : 1. that by its express terms, it was made to ex-
tend to the Gentiles- uuu, 2. that hv the term * need* is
meant Christ Ji'sus. The promise looEis to the world-wide
t>enefits of redumption which should come through Christ,
the seed of Aiiram." .Ucmdi s, p U2-').— A. (i.j
* [8ee liENusTS.NUEUu's Ucilrdyft, iii. p. b'2&S. — A.Q.]
thesis is the source of all true science. And tha(
faith, the great synthesis of heaven, is at first uncer
tarn as to the moral problems of the earthly life. Th«
his'ory of all the great beginnings of faith furnishes th«
proof. But still, the great life of faith is the sourct
of all pure and high morality in ihe world. Abram's
venture was not from laxity as to the sanctity of
marriage, or as to his duty to protect his wife ; it
was fc om a presumptuous confidence in the wonder-
ful assistance of God. It n as excused through th«
great necessity of the time, his defenceless state
among strangers, the cu-tomary lawlessness of those
in power, and as to the relation of the sexes. There-
fore Jehovah preserved him from disgrace, although
he did not spare him personal anxiety, and the moral
rebuke from a heathen. It is only in Christ, that with
the broad view of faith, the knowledge of its moral
human measures and limitations is from the beginning
perfect. In the yet imperfect, but growing faith, the
word is true, " The children of this world are wiser
in their generation than the children of light." As
a mere matter of prudence, Abram appeared to act
prudently. He told no untruth, although he did not
tell the whole truth. His word was, at all events,
of doubtful import, and therefore, through his anx-
ious forecast, was morally hazardous. But the ne-
cessity of the time, the difficulty of his position, and
his confidence that God would make his relations
clear at the proper time, serve to excuse it. It was
not intended to effect a final deception: his God
would unloose the knot. In his faith Abram was a
blameless type of believers, but not in liis apphca-
tion of his faith to the moral problems of life. Still,
even in this regard, he unfolds more and more his
heroic greatne.ss. We must distinguish clearly be-
tween a momentary, fanatical, exaggei-ated confi-
dence in God, and the tempting of God with a selfish
purpose (see the history of Thamar, Rahab). Baum-
garten is not correct when he says: "Abram aban-
dons his wife, but not so Jehovali." The modern
stand-point is too prominent even in DeUtzsch : " He
thus thinks that he will give the marriage-honor of
his wife a sacrifice for his self-preservat on ; at all
events, he is prepared to do this." Abram knew
from the first, that the promise of bh'ssing from Je-
hovah was connected with his person. Hence the
instinct of self-preservation is lost in the higher im-
pulse for the preservation of the blessing. And if,
in relation to this impulse, he placed his marriage in
a subordinate position, this occurred certainly from
his confidence in the wonderful protection of Jeho-
vah, and the heroic conduct of Sarai. His syllogism
was doubtless morally incorrect, but it rested upon
an exaggeration oS his faith, and not upon mora]
cowardice.' Upon any opposing interpretation, the
same conduct of the patriarchs could not possibly
have been repeated a second and third time. Jeho-
vah himself could not have recognized any tempting
of God, nor any moral baseness, in his conduct; but
* [We are not to be harsh or censorious in our iudgmentl
upon the acta of these eminent saints. But neither are we
called upon to defend their arts ; and if the view of Lange
dees uut satisfy every one, it is well to bear in mind that
the Scripture rei^ords these aets without oxpressine distinctly
any moral judt.Tnout upon them. It impliedly coudeiiins.
The .Seripture, however, contains clearly the great princi-
ples of mural truth and duty, and then oltcDtimos leaves tha
reader to draw the itifercnee as to the moral quality of tha
acts which It rec'trds. And its faithfulness in not concealing
what may bo of quosti'tnaide morality. " in tlio lives of th*
greatest saints shows the honesty ana accuracy of the histo*
riau." Wordsworth says well : *' the weaknesses of thi
patriarchs sirengthen our faith in the Pentateuch." — A. C
CHAP. XII. :-2o.
3ys
indeed ooncems himself in tlic leading of Abram's
faith (as in the life of Stilling), wliile he prepares for
the presumptuous and erroneous syllo.^ism of his faith
Its deserved rebuke. In a similar way Calvin recog-
nizes the good end of Abram, but at the same time
remarlia that he failed in the choice of his means.
13. That the Bible speaks in this frank and sim-
ple way of ihe female beauty, as it does generally of
beiuty in life, and the world, shows liow free it is
from the gloomy, morose, monkish asceticism, while,
however, it does not conceal the perils of beauty.
14. The Pharaoh of this early period, and more
simple life, had already his courtiers, flatterers, and
harem. How soon the misuse of princely poiver has
been developed with the power itself! In this ct^e,
too, as it often occurs, the prince is better than his
court. Pharaoh treats the patriarch with honor,
humanity, and a magnanimity which must have put
him to shame.
15. As we find recorded in Genesis the begin-
ning of polygamy, of despotism, of the harem, and
even of unnatural sexual crimes, so also we have here
the first corporeal punishment of these sexual sins
in the house of Pharaoh. We are not told, indeed,
what was the particular kind of punishment, but it is
represented as sent for these sins of Pharaoh.
16. Delitzsch holds, that the silence of Abram
under the reproof of Pharaoh, is a confession of his
guilt. " Ashamed and penitent, he condemns him-
self." tt would be very difiicult, on this interpreta-
tion, to explain the twofold repetition of tids act in
the life of Abram and of Isaac. We may not trans-
fer our judgment of the ease to the stage of the
moral development of Abram.
1 7 The history of Sarai, in whose person God
guards the future mother of Israel from profanation,
is at the same time a sign of the fact, that God pre-
serves ti.e sacred marriage in the midst of the cor-
ruption of the world.
18. Among the rich possessions which fell to
Abram in Egypt, more through the protection and
blessing of God, than his own prudence, was most
probably the Egyjitian maid, Hagar, who afterwards
exerted so important an influence upon his course of
life. EUezer, of Damascus, and Hagar, from Egvpt,
are undesigned testimonies to the genuine historical
character of the account of his ndgration from Meso-
potamia to Canaan, and from Canaan to Egypt.
19. Abram's return from Egypt at this time, was
already in some sense a return home, and a tvpe of
the Exodus of his descendants from Egypt.*
20. The significance of the wonderful land of
Egypt for the history of the kingdom of God. Its
connection nith Canaan, and its opposition. How
often it moves down to Egypt (Egypt lay lower than
Canaan), and from thence moves back again ! There
'lie Hamiiic spirit blooms, here the Semitic (Ziegler) ;
there are enigmas, here mysteries ; there miracfes of
death, here of life ; there the Pharaohs, here spiritual
princes.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. — Jeho-
lah. 1. The profound nignificance of the name;
* ['The same necessity conducts both him and hig de-
fendants to Egypt. They both encounter similar danprers
m that land— the same mighty arm delivers both, and leads
them back enriched with the treasures of that wealthy
Mimtiy." Kurtz.— A. G.]
2. its eternal value and import.mce. — Calling ol
Abram. — Three first proofs of his faith : 1. Hi
must go out Irom his country and liis father's house,
into a strange land ; 2. he finds in Palestine " n<
continuing city," and soon suffers from famine ;
3. he must go further to Egypt, in danger of his Ufe,
marriage, and hope.* — Abram at his alt.irs u pieach
er of repentance for the Canaanites. — His pilgrimage
—The companions of his faith. — The providence of
(iod over the lives of believers. — The infallible faitt
of Abram, and his errors in the applications of hia
faith, or of his life : 1. That infallibility does not
prevent these errors ; 2. but it prevents' their dan
gerous consequences, and at last removes them.—
The consecration of Canaan. — The blessing of f lith.
St.irke : Wurtemberg Bible : Ver. 1 The call
from the condition of sin, or true conversion, springs
not from one's own strength, etc., but only from the
grace of God. — Cramer : Whoever will be a follower
of God, must separate himself from the world and it3
wickedness, must leave all consolation and help in
the creature, and place his confidence only and alone
in the Lord. — If we follow the call of God, we are
always in the right way. — The promises of God are
yea and amen. — Ver. 3. Whoever wishes and does
good to the saints, will receive good again, but who-
ever wishes and does them injury, must meet with
calamity. — Vers. 4, 5. The strength of faith can do
away with time, and present future tilings as if pres-
ent.f — Upon ver. 13. Since Abram was continually
dependent upon the grace of God, he must feel his
weakness, which betrays him into manifold acts of
insincerity and sins. For, 1. he acted from fciir,
when he should still have looked to God ; 2. he "ave
out that Sarai was his sister, when she was his wife ;
3. he had great guilt in the sin of Pharaoh ; 4. he
thought to secure his own safety, while he placed
Sarai and her chastity in the greatest peril. — Even
in the greatest saints, there are many and vari-
ous defects and transgressions. — God leads his own
out of temptation, even when they have fallen. —
Osiander: God avenges the injustice and disgrace,
which are inflicted upon his elect. — Lisco: Abram
obeyed because he trusted God ; the two togethei
constitue his faith.:j: — Wherever Abram comes, in
his nomadic life and wanderings, he works lor the
honor of God. — Ver. 13. The failures of this chosen
man of God appear, upon a closer survey, as sins of
weakness, which, on the one hand, do not destroy
his gracious standing with God, but on the other
render necessary in him a purifying, providential
training. The providence of God" watches over his
elect. — Gerlach : In the simple, vivid narrative of
the life of Abram, every step is lull of importance. —
Ver. 3 is the expression of the more perfect covenant-
relationship and communion. His friends are the
friends of God, his enemies the enemies of God.
God will himself reward every kindness shown to
• [There does not seem to be suflBcient ground for the
conjeclure of Murphy, that .\bram was now pursuing his
own course, and venturing beyond the limits of the l.ind nf
promise, without waiting patiently for the divine counsel ;
and tli,-!! he went with a vague suspicion that he was doing
wrong. There is reason to believe, that all the movementa
of the patriarch were not only under divine control, hut wer«
a part of G..d's plan for the testing and developing "f hii
faith. It was a sore trial to leave the land promised to him.
so soon after he had entered it. See also paragraph 20
above. — A. G ]
t [Ver. 7. " Wherever he had a tent, God had an altai
and an altar sanctified by prayer." Henry. — A. G.]
t [Faith receives the promise, and leads to cbediecoe.-
A. G.]
SV)R
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST COOK OF M DSES.
him, and avenge every injury (in word and deed),
Ps. cv. 13-lS. — Ver. 13. In the deception which
Abram uses, as in the later instances of Jacob and
Moses, we see a weakness and impurity of faith
which did not yet rely perfectly upon the help of
God in his own way and time, but selfishly and
eageily grasped after it. It is not without re-
proof.
CaJ.wer Hand.: To the command of God follows
the promise (ch. xii. 3). This advances upwards
through six steps, until, at the most advanced, the
Messiah appears, who should spring from the de-
scendants of Abram. I will make thee a great na-
tion, natural and spiritual — and still his wife was
unfruitful — will bless thee — and still he did not pos-
sess a foolbreadth of land — will make thy name
great — and yet lie must be a stranger in a strange
land. — In thee shall he blesse^^* etc. This promise
was repeated to him seven times : the third promise
of the Messiah. — The word of God never excuses the
imperfections of believers. — Bunsen: Abram is the
eternal model of all exiles, and the true father of the
pilgrim-fathers of the seventeenth century (of the
pilgrims of faith of all times, Heb. xi.). — And make
thy name great. The Arabians, after Isa. xli. 8,
call Abram the friend of God.^-ScHRiiDER : For a
long time, as is evident from examples in the family
of Abram, God had permitted the truth and its mar-
red image to stand side by side. There must come
at the last a moment of perfect separation, a moment
of declared distinction between truth and falsehood.
This moment also actually came. — Luther: It is
cheering, therefore, and full of consolation, when we
thus consider how the church began and has in-
creased.— With him it is so arranged that he cannot
remove his foot from his native ground, without
planting it upon an entirely distinct region — the re-
• [The promise receives its first fulfilment in Abram,
then in the Jews, more perfectly whe;i the Son of God be-
came incarnate^ the seed oj Abravx, then further in the church
Bnd the preachmg of the gospel, but finally and fully when
Christ shall complete his church, and come to take her to
himself.— A. G.l
gion of faith. — Krummacher: The East sviU re
sounds with the name of Abram. — Ver. 3. Abrair
becomes to many a savor of death unto death
(2 Cor. ii. 16), although he himself should not curse
That is the prerogative of God, he should only be f
blessing. — Blessing and making blessed is the desti
nation of all the elect. — Baumoarten: Ver. 10
Famine in the land of promise is a severe test foi
Abr im. For the land is promised to him as a good
which should compensate all his self-denial. — Ver
13. In fact, there are found in the oldest lustoriea
frequently, here and tliere, the seeds of the later
more developed boasted cunning and prudence. —
Passavant : (Abram and his children). Abram was
great before God. How so ? Through faith. Faith
does it. Qo out of th^ land. The father-land is
dear to us. But now it avails, etc. — He went out
with his God. — Schwenke : " Hours with the Bible."
Does not the call come to thee also : Go out V — And
go in faith? A life in faith is a continual prov-
ing— a permanent test. — Hepser: (The Leadings
of Abram.) Abram in his pilgrimage : 1. The goal
for which he strove; 2. the promises which secured
its attainment ; 3. the dangers under which he stood ;
4. the divine service which he rendered.— Taube :
The calling of Abram, a type of our calling to the
kingdom of God : 1. As to its demands ; 2. as to its
gracious promises.* — W. Hofmann : It is through
Abram that we receive all the sacred knowledge
until we reach back to paradise ; all that afterwards
was preserved for us by Moses came through his
mind and heart. — It was the believing look to the
past, which fitted Abram to look on into the future.
Delitzsch ; The facts (Abram in Egypt) are related
to us, not so much for the dishonor of Abram, as for
the honor of Jehovah. f
* [Abram also is an illustrious example to all who hoar
the ca]l of Uod. His obedience is prompt and submissive.
He neither delays nor questions, but went out not knowing
whither he went, Keb. xi. 8. — A. G.)
t [Hengsteuberg says: The object of the writer is not
Abram's glorification, but the glorification of Jehovah.—
A.G.I
SECOND SECTION.
Abram at a xmtneti for Ood in Canaan, and his self -denying separation from Lot.
Promise of Ood. His altar in Hain (oaks) Mamre.
l%e Ifnc
Chapter XIIL 1-18.
1 And Abram went up out of Egypt, he and liis wife, and all that he had, and Lot
2 with him, into the south [of Canaan]. And Abram was very ricii, in c:ittle [possessions], in
3 silver, and in gold. And he went on lii.s journeys [nomadic departures, stations] irom the
aouth, even to BolJiel, unto the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between
4 Bethel and liai ; Unto the place of the altar which he had made there at the first: and
B there A Ijrain called upon the name of the Lord. And Lot also, which went with Abram
5 ha<l flocks [lanaii cattle j, and herds [larne cattle], and tents. And the land was not able to
bear [»upport] tliem, that they might dwell together : for their substance was great, so thai
7 they could not dwell together. And there was a strife between the I'erduieu of Abrum's
cattle, and the herdmen of Lot's cattle: and the Canaanite and tne Perizziie dwelled
CHAP. XIII. 1-18.
'.at
8 then [m owners, settlers, ;c''] in the land. And Abram said tinto Lot, Ltt there be nc
strife, I pray thee, between me and thee, and between my herdmen and thy herdmen •
9 for we be brethren [men, brctliren]. Is not tlje whole land before thee [open to thy choice] 1
Separate thyself, I pray thee, from me. If thou wilt take the left hand [land], tiien }
will go to the right; or W thou, depart to the right hand, then 1 will go to the left.
10 And Lot lifted up his eyes, and beheld all the plain [literally, circle] of Jordan [thedown
flowing, desoemliiig- Khcin], that it was well watered everywhere, before the Lord destroyed
Sodom [burning] and Gomorrah [suhmersion], even as the garden of the Lord [paradise, 1p
Eden with its stream] , like the land of Egypt, as [until] thou COmest tO Zoar [smallne-s, th
11 little one]. Then Lot chose liirn all the plain of Jordan; and Lot journeved east [c"i;5i«
fiom the east, Septuagint and Vulgate i: correct] : and they separated themselves the one from the
12 other. Abram dwelled in the land [province] of Canaan, and Lot dwelled in the cities
13 of the plain [the circle], and pitched his tent toward Sodom [until it stood at Sodom]. Rii'
the men [people] of Sodom were wicked, and sinners before the Lord exceedingly.
14 And the Lord said unto Abram, after that Lot was separated from him, Lift up
now thine eyes and look [out] Irom the place where thou art northward [to Lebanon], and
15 southward [the desert], and eastward [toPerea], and westwards [the sea]. For all the land
16 which ihou [thus] seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever [to eternity]. And
I will make [have determined] thy seed as the dust of the earth; so that if a man can num-
17 ber the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered. Arise, walk through
18 the land in the length of it and in the breadth of it; for I will give it unto thee. Then
Abram removed his tent, and came and dwelt in the plain of Mamre [fatness, strength ;
name of the owner], which is in Hebron [connection, confederacy], and built there an altar unto
the Lord.
EXEGETICAIi AND CKITICAL.
1. 37w Return of Abram from Egypt, am} the
irUroduction of the Separation from Lot (vers. 1-9).
Into the soiith. — Abram returned with Lot, whose
migration with him to Egypt is thus presupposed, to
Canaan, not as in Luther's version, to the south, hut
northwards to the southern part of Palestine, to the
region of Hebron and Bethleliem, from wliich he liad
gone to E<rypt. The -53 is a term which had obvi-
ously attained geographically a fixed usage among
the IsraeUtes, and points out the southern region of
Palestine. But the pasture-ground in this region
eeems to have been insufficieut for Lot and himself
at the same time. Besides his treasures in poid and
silver he had grown rich in the posses&ioji of herds,
especially through the large presents of Pharaoh.*
Hence he removes further, by slow and easy stages,
to the earlier pasture-grounds between Bethel and
Hai. Here, where he had earUer built an altar, he
again sets up the worship of Jehovah with his fam-
ily. This worship is itself also a preaching of Jeho-
vah for the heathen. But even here the pasture-land
was not broad enough, since Lot also was rich in
herds, and the Canaanite and Pcrizzite then held the
greater part of that region in their possession. These
Perizzites are referred to, because they were those
with whom Abram and Lot came mo?t freciuently
into contact, and were their rivals. " The Perizzites,
who do not appear in the genealogical lists of the
Canaanitish tribes, but only in the geographical enum-
eration of th;- inhabit.ints of tlie land (ch. xv. 20 ;
Ex. iii. 8 ; Deut. vii. 1 ; Josh. .^d. 3), and whotii we
find in different parts of Canaan, are inhabitants of
the lowlands, who devote themselves to agriculture
md grt.zing (Ezek. xxxviil. 11 ; Zech. ii. 4; Deut.
* 'Ver. 5. To Lot also there were flocks. The blessing
«pon Abram overran and flowed over upon Lot. Jacobus,
p. M?.— A. G.)
iii. 5; 1 Sam. vi. 18). The Perizzites, as the author
intimates, were in possession of the best pastures;
those only remained to Lot and Abram, which thej
liad despised." Hengsteiiberg. Schrofler conjectures
that the Canaanites here designate the inhabitant?
of the cities in contrast with the Perizzites who dwell
in the open country. But the name designates, be
youd question, not only a mode of life, but a pecu
liar people, and they are brought into notice here
because they were thickly crowded in the region of
Bethel, with Abram. Gerlach ; '* Perizzites, prob
ably dwellers in perazoth, open courts, or villages,
iiihabitants of the country, in distinction from those
who dwelt in cities." But then the greater portioc
of the Canaanites would have been Perizzites, from
whom still Gerlach distinguishes the Canaanites.
They appear to have been nomads. In Gen. xxxiv.
SO, they appear in Sichem ; in Jo.«h. xi. 3, between
the Jebusites and Hittites, upon the mountains.
Against the interpretation, inhabitants of the open
country, see Keil, p. 137, who distinguishes the form
"I'lB."} and ^psn (Deut. iii. 5), inhabitants of the
low or flatlands.* — Let there be no strife be-
tween me and thee. — The strife between the
herdsmen, would soon issue in a strife between their
masters, if these should quietly or willingly permit
the disorder. It is possible that Lot's restless, un-
ea-iy temper, had already betrayed itself in the open
strife of his servants. The position of the words of
Abram, between me and thee, standing before the al-
lusion to the herdsmen, would seem to intimata
something of this kind. — We are brethren (brother
men). The law controversies, which, althougl
sometimes allowable between strangers, are yet m all
ways to be avoided, ought not to have place between
* [Keil adds, as of still greater force, the use of tht
name, now with the Canaanites, and now with the cthel
tribes of Canaan, who obviously derive their names &011
their ancestors, or the head of their tribe. — A. G.l
:^'.m
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
brethren. Here kindred, piety, and affection, sliould
make tlie utmost concessions easy. In his humility
.\bram places himself on an equaliiy with Lot, calls
him brot.ier, although he was his nephew, and owed
to him the duty of a son. Ituleed, he so far takes
the subordinate place, that he yields to him the
choice of the liest portions of the land. — If thou
wilt take the left hand. — The word of .\lirani lias
passed into a proverbial watchword of the peace-
.DTinjj and yielding temper, in all such cases when a
distinction and separation in the circumstances be-
comes necessary.
2. Lot's Choice, and the Separation (vers. 10-\S).
The bold, unblushing, self-seeking features in Lot's
character come clearly into view here. He raises
his eyes, and with unrestrained greediness chooses
what seems to him the best. The circuit of the Jor-
dan, t. e. the region of the Jordan (named simply
TS~n), includes the deep valley of the Jordan (the
Ghor), from the Sea of Tiberias to the Dead Sea.
The whole valley, until we reach the Red Sea, is the
Arabah, which takes its name from the region here
mentioned. It is the vale of Siddim (ch. xiv. 3), the
present region of the Dead Sea, which is here in-
tended. That the lower valley of tlie Jordan was
peculiarly well-watered, and a rich pasture-region, is
expressed by a twofold comparison ; it was as Para-
dise, and as the land of Egypt. The lower plain of
the Jordan was glorious as the vanished glory of
Paradise, or as the rich plains of the Nile in Egypt,
which were sidl fresh in the memory of Lot. I'or
the Jordan and its valley, compare the Bible Dic-
tionories, geographical works, and books of travels.*
— As thou comest to Zoar. — At the southeast of
the Dead Sea ((ihor el Szaphia). — And they sepa-
rated themselves, the one (a brother) from the
other. — The separation was brotherly in a good and
evil sense ; good in the mind and thought of Abram,
and as lo its peaceful fonn, but evil in so far as the
nephew acts as a privileged brother, and chooses the
best of the lanil. — And Abram dwelled in the
land of Canaan. — The opposition heie is not, as
Kuobel thinks, between Canaan and the lower val-
ley of the Jordan, but between the land of Canaan
in which Abram remained, and the plain rich in
cities — (y^ii must be emphasized in opposition to
■"^l" ). This also forms a distinct feature in Lot's
character. Abram remained in the retirement of his
oaks, from which Lot removed further and further
toward the cities of the valley, and indeed to those
most renowned; he soon liiis his pastures in the
neighborhood of Soilom, and his dwelling in Sodom
itself. In Sodon), even, we find him in the nntst
frequented place — at the gate. While there is no
doulit tli.it he lelt Mesopotamia in the characteristic
faith of Abram, yet the prominence of the wcjrldly
thought and inclination is revealed in him, through
these fiicte, although he on the whole [ircserves in
the very heart of his disposition and thought, the
essential fciitures of faith and reverence for liod.
" Sodom must have lain at the southwesterly end of
the Deid Sea. The allusion to the pillar of sail
points to this location (ch. xix. 26), and its n.ame is
•till preserved there in the present I'sdum. The
near vicinity of Zoar (ch. xix. 2ii), which nmst be
(ought in the Ghor cl Szaphia (see ch. xix. 22) ami
Ihe general nature of the southern part of the Dead
• (Stani.kt: "Sinai and Paleutine ;
'Not(.»"-A. 0.1
Jacobus :
Sea, are in favor of this location." Knobel. I: il
true, that the kindred of the Israelitish tribes left
Palestine (ch. xxi. 14; sxv. ti, 18; xxsvi. li), but it
by no means follows, as Knobel holds, that the writei
brings this in'O prominence from special and inter-
ested motives, for the same writer records also th»
joiirneyings of the Isr,aelites into Egypt.— -But the
men of Sodom. — We shall learn nioie fully the
wickedness of the Sodomites in the xixth ch. It is
referred to here, in order to show that Lot had
chosen foolishly when he thought that he was
choosing the best portion, and in "rder to make wa^
for the history of the punishment which came upon
Sodom, in which Lot also must suffer for his folly.*
3. 77ie Reneival and Enlargement of the Frcrmi»t
of the Land of Canaan, tnth which Abram's nev
act of self-deniat was rewarded, and his settle^nent in
the groves (oaks) of Mamre, in He/iron (vers. 14-18).
— Lift up nowr thine eyes and look. — After the
departure of Lot, Jehovah commanded .\bram now
also to lift lip his eyes, in pious faith, as Lot had
raised his eyes in impious and shameless self-seeking.
Since Bethel was about central in the land, and lay
high upon a mountain (ch. xii. 8 ; xxxv. 1, eic ), this
direction is evidently historical ; f probably Abram
conld look far and wide over the land in all direc-
tions from this place. — Northwa ds (towanls the
midnight), etc. — The designation of the four cpiartera
of the heavens (com. ch. xxviii. 14) — And I will
make thy seed.| As the land should be great for
the jieople, thy posterity, so thy people .■shall be
numerous, or innumerable for the land. The .seeti
of Abram are compared with the dust of the earth,
with reference to its being inmimeralile. At a later
point, the one hyperbole falls into two : " as the
stars of heaven, and as the sand upon the sea-shore"
(ch. XV. 5; xxii. 17). — Arise, etc. "The free pas-
sage through the land, should serve to animate his
faith, and be a sign for his ilescendanis of the sym-
bolic seizure and possession ot the land. The com-
mand is not 10 lie understood as a literal direction;
Abram could view the land pronji.-eil to him, at his
pleasure." — Then Abram removed his tent. ^
"The oak-grove of M.amre lay in Hebron, and is
often mentioned as the residence of the patriarchs
(ch. xiv. 13, 18; xxxv. 27). It had its name from
the Ainorite Mamre, a confederate with Abram (ch.
xiv. 13, 24), as the valley northerly from Hebron
holds its name, Esehol, from a Ijrotlier of Mamre"
(Num. xiii. 23;. Knobek .Accordhig lo Knobel, the
later custom of sacrificing to Jehovah at Hebroa
* [This is one of the numerous passages which prove the
unity ol' trenesi^. — A. G.]
t [Stanley describes the hill as the liiphe.st of n succes-
sion of eminences, from wliich .\bram and T.ot coiiUt lake
tlie wide survey of the land on the riplit liand and on the
lett, such as can be enjoyed from no other point in the
neit^hborhood. — A. G.]
t ["The promise of the land forapossess'on is Cbly n? .
The divine promise is unchanireable. As the seed uf Abram
sliould have an eternal existence before God, so also Canaan
is the eternal posaewsion of this seed. But this does not avail
for the niitnnil descendants of Abram as siii'b, or lii'^ seed
accoidint,' to the flesh, but for the true spiiitual seed, who
rreeive Ihe promise by faith, and hold it in believini: heartH.
This promise, therefore, neither prevents the "xclnsion of
the iinbelievinfi seed from Ihe land of Canaan, ror secures
to the Jews a return to the earthly Palestine, alter their
conversion. Throui,'h Christ the promise is raised from its
temporal form to its real nature; thiouph him ti.e whole
earth becomes a Canaan." Keil.— " Uumn terra in sirculum
promiltitur, iion siiuiilieiter notatur perpetuitas ; si d quBP
nnein aieipit cluisti iidventu." Calvin. -AG.)
S [*' liwilt setlleil down, made it the central point ?f blB
(iilbseuueiit aliode in Canaan." '"''^rdsworth. — A. G.l
CHAP. XIU. 1-18.
(2 Sam. XV. 7), is dated back to tlie times in Genc-
Bi.*. Still, lie can neither deny the migrations, nor
the pietv of Abram. .As to the circumstance that,
aocoiding to Josh. xv. 13, Hebron at an earlier date
was called Kiijath-arba,* see the Intrudiiction. For
the founding o. Hebron, see Numb. ,xiii. 23. Bun-
ben : " This remarkable narrative bears upon its
face every evidence of historical truth, and is most
eUy assigned to a time soon after 2900 years before
Christ."
DOOTEINAIi AND ETHICAL.
1. In the history of Abram we must distinguish
Ihroughout the providence of God, and the conduct
of toe patriarcli. In the previous chapter the provi-
dence of God preserves in safety the promise to
Abram, since it preserves Sarah inviolate. In this
a new confirmation of the promise appears in the
separation from Lot. The conduct of Abram is in
both cases marked by a renunciation of self, grounded
in faith. As the previous chapter portrays the self-
renunciation of Abram in reference to his country,
and his father's house, in regard to a fixed settlement
in Canaan, and to his connubial blessedness, so here
we meet a like renunciation as to the relative posi-
tion of Lot, and as to the best parts of Palestine
itself. For this new act of self-denial is twofold.
With the separation of Lot, leaving out of view now
the society and assistance which Abram might have
had in him, and which was renotmced, his former
patriarchal dependence upon Abram ceases, and
with the residence of Lot and his family in the best
of the land, there might arise a serious prejudice to
;he claims of tlie descendants of Abram to the land.
3ut in regard to this also he trusts God, and in this
case, without any exaggerated or over-hasty confi-
dence, such as appeared in the exposure of Sarah. -j-
2. Abram returns to the place of his altar in
Bethel. In like manner Christian settlements, towns,
and villages, cluster around their churclie^.
3. The wealth of Abram is referred to by the
early writers as an example that even rich people
may be pious, and also that the pious may be rich.
And indeed, without any contradiction to the word
lOf Christ (Matt. xix. 24), for Christ himself explains
•hat word more fully in the 26th verse, by the
thought, that through the grace of God, one coidd
be freed from the influence of his wealth, and ena-
bled in humility to use it as a moral good for the
glory of God. The writing of Clemens Alex., Tii d
ffu(6fj.ivot TTAoi'ffios, is in place here. Moreover, the
danger of riches appears prominently liere, in the
veiy first case in which riches, as such, are men-
tioned. His riches were, in some measure, a tax to
♦ t'* Its earlifst name was Hebron, but it was later called
Kiijath-arba by the sons of Anak. When the Israelites
ZAme into the possession of the land, they restored the ori^-
jllgl patriarchal name." Baumgaeten, p. 178. Also, Heng-
dTF.NBEEO's Bfilrdggy ii, p. 187 if. ; and Kurtz : " History of
the Old Covenant," p. 169.— A. O.]
t ["Abram went up out of Egypt. In the history of
Abram, the father of Isaac, the type and pattern of the true
Israelites, we see prophetic elimpses of the history of his
posterity. Abram went out of Efrypt rery rich in cattle,
ailver, a'vd gold. Abram had his Exodtu from Eeypt into
Oanaan, aiid it was a prefiguration of theirs, Ex. xii. 35, 38,
which in time prefiffurea the pilgrimage of the church
Ihrouch the world to the heavenly Canaan. Is not the life
f.f Abram, as presented in the Pentateuch, so wonderfully
prcadjusted to the ctrcnraslances and necessities of all the
Israel of God, a silent proof of its ijenuineneas and inspira-
tion''" Wordsworth.— A. 0.1
Abram, since he could not find room foi his herd?
and his possessions threatened to involve him in ho»
tility with his nephew. It is here also, as always,
tainted with a want ; the want in this case of suHi
eient pasturage, and the necessity for the separation
of Abram and Lot. But for Lot, indeed, his wealth
becomes a temptation, which he does not resist iir
any creditable way.
4. The germinal divisions of masters ofttimes re
veal themselves clearly in the strifes of their ,serv.
ants and dependents. Even the wives are often in
open hostiUty while their husbands are still at peace
Abram teaches us how to observe these symptoms in
the right way. His proposal to se|iarate arises from
his love of peace, not from any selfish regard to hi
own interests.*
5. A law-suit is always doubtful or hazardous,
although often necessary. Law-suits between breth-
ren are to be avoided with double care and earnest-
ness. How beautiful it is for brethren to dwell
together in unity (Ps. exxxiii. 1 ) ; but a peaceful
separation is also beautiful, if it prevents a dwelling
together in strife and hatred. This holds true also
in spiritual things. Abram must avoid with special
watchfulness giving an offence to the Canaanites.f
6. " Wilt thou to the left hand," etc. An eter-
nal shining example, and a watchword of the peace-
loving, magnanimous, self-denying character wluch
is the fruit of faith.:);
7. The character of Lot Its light side must not
be overlooked. He had left Mesopotamia and his
father's house, cleaving to Abram and his faith, and
up to this time iiad remained true to hini in all his
march through the land, to Egypt and back. Still,
the return from the ricli land of Egypt may have
awakened in him thoughts similar to those which
wrought with many of the Israelites, who murmured
against Moses. At all events, the lower valley of the
Jordan appears to him specially desiral)le, because if
bears such a resemblance to Egypt. And in the way
and manner, violating both modesty and piety, in
which he chose this province, and regardless of re-
ligious prudence, yielded himself to the attractions
of Sodom ; the shaded and darker feature.? of his
character, the want of sincerity, delicacy, and that
freedom from the world which became a pilgrim, .:re
clearly seen. He is still, however, a man who can
perceive the angels, and protect them as his guests.
In comparison with the Sodomites he is righteous.
8. Lot makes the worst choice, while he thinks
that lie has chosen well. For his worldly-minded-
ness, the sin in liis choice,§ he was first punished
* [The heavenly principle of forbearance evidently holdb
the supremacy in Abram's breast He walks in the moral
atmosphere of tlie Sermon on the Mount (Matt. vi. 28-12).
Murphy.— A. G.]
[" The practical nature of Abram's reltpion was most
strilringly developed here. His conduct was marked by
humility, condescension, and generosity." Bush the natu-
ral fruits of his faith.— A_ Q.]
t [The presence of those powerful tribes is mctloned to
show why Abi'.am and Lot were so straitened as to pastur-
age, to signalize the impropriety and danger of their qoap
relling among themseUes, and to 'how that Abram felt that
the eyes of these idolaters were upon him, and that any
misstep on his part, as the representative of Jehovah, would
bean occasion of stumbling to them. — A. G.]
J [" Abram could have cliimed the exclusive possession
on the higher ground of the Divine promise and plan. But
this exclusiveness is not the spirit of our holy religion.*-
JiCOBOS, p. 239.-A. G.]
§ [Murphy suggests tbat he was a single man when hf
parted from Abram, and therefore that he married a womat
of Sodom, and thus involved himself in the sin of the Ant*
diluvians. Gen. vi. 1-7. — A. G.l
too
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSER.
through the phmdering of his house, and his Ciiptivlty
in the war of tlie kintrs, whicli followed soon after
his choice, and then through his fearlul Hight from
Sodom, and the losses, misfortuiios and crimes wliich
were connected with it. Thus, the want uf regard
to true piety, the selfishness, the carelessness as to
the siiai es of the world, must ever be punished. And
indeed, it is just when one thinks, that in his own
wilful and sinful ways, he has attained his highest
wishes, he finds himself ensnared in the retributions
of divine righteousness, which rules over him and
•vorks with solemn irony.
9. We must distinguish clearly the times of the
revelation and manifestation of Jehovah in the life
of Abram, from the times in which he conceals
himself from view, which may be regarded as the
times of the elevation and sinking of the faith of
Abrani. He enjoys the first manifestation of God
after ihe first proof of his faith, his migration to Ca-
naan. On tile contrary, there is no intimation of any
revelation of God on his return from Egypt. But
after Abram's noble act of faith towards Lot, he
again receives a new promise in a new word of the
Lord. Then again, after his march for the rescue
of Lot (ch. XV. 1). From his connection with Hagar,
thirteen years elapse without any mention of a divine
revelation, and the revelation which then follows
(ch. xvii. 1 S.) wears the form of a renewal of the
covenant (ch. xv.). But now, after Abram had
obeyed the command as to circumcision, be enjoys
the fullest manifestation of God, with the most ex-
press and definite promise (ch. xviii. 1 ff. ). Thus
after his intercessory prayer for Sodom, he is re-
warded by tlie appearance of the angels for Lot, and
Lot's salvation (eh. xix. 29). After the events at
Gerar, and his deportment there (ch. xx.), the quiet
and ordinary couise of life is only broken by the
birth of Isaac, and then follows the great trial of his
faith, which he heroically endured, and receives the
seal of bis faith. Fioin this introductory completion
of his life, it unfolds itself in the calm coming and
going of the evening of his days But the promises
of (Jod always correspond to the acts and conduct
of faith whicli Abrain bad shown.
to. Lift up thine eyes and look (v. 14). A glo-
rious antithesis 1 1 the word : And Lot lifted up his
eye.s. The selfish choice brings disgrace and de-
struction, the choice according to the coun.sel and
wisd(»m of God secures blessing and salvation.*
11. "This is the third tlioocratic promise, in-
cluding both the fir.-^t (ch. xii. 1-3) and the second
(ch. xii. 7)." Knobel. But it has also, like the pre-
ceding, its own specific character. The first promise
relates to the person of Abram ; in him and in his
name are einbiaced all promised blessings. In the
second a seed was mOie definitrly prumised to .\bram,
and alsf» the land of Canaan for the seed. But lii'i'e,
in ofiposition to the narrow limits in wiiich he is with
his herds, and to the pre-occupition of the best pans
of (he land by Lot, there is promised to him rhe
whole laud in its extension towards the four i|Uarl(rs
of heaven, and to the boundless territory, an inini-
merable seed. It should be observed that the whole
fulness of ihe divine promise, is first unresi rvedly
declared to Abram, after the separation fron Lot.f
• ['• ThilH he who Bought this world lout it ; and be who
was willing to ^ve up iinytliing for the honor of God and
reliinon, found it." Fullr.T ; soo Busn, p. 219. — A. O.]
T ['• Ahrum hufi now obtainod * permaiioiit rcfltinK-placc
In the land, out not n font-lireiidtn belonps to him. His
bonaobo'd if tnualler in uuml)C>i than at flrHt. Hi- is old
Lot has taken beforehand his part of the good thingi.
His choice appears as a mild or partial example ol
the choice of Esau (the choice of the lentile-pottage).
12. Tlie Holy land: an allegory of Paradise, a
symbol of heaven, a type (germ) of the sanctified and
glorified earth.
13. For the piiinitive, consecrated Hebron, and
the oakgrovo Mamre, see the dictionaries, geograph-
ical hand-books, and books of travels, and also the
Bible-work, Book of Joshua.
14. Starke (the Freiberg Bible): "This is th«
first time that silver and gold are mentioned since
tlie flood, and we may infer, therefore, that mining
for these metals must have been practised." (Re-
flections upon Tubal-Cain).
15. The declaration that the Canaanites and
Perizzites were then in the land, like the allusion to
tlie Canaanites, ch. xii. 6, furnishes no ground for
the infi'rence, according to Spinoza, that the passage*
wire first written when there were no longer any
(^anaanites and Perizzites in the land. For the first
passage says plainly, that it was on account of the
Canaanites that Abram felt it necessary to go through
the land to Sichem; and here again, that owing to
their presence, he and Lot found themselves strait-
ened for pasture-ground, and were compelled to
separate.
HOMILETICAI, AND PRACTICAL.
See Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. The hap-
py exodus of Abram from Egypt, a prophecy or type
of the glorious Exodus of the children of Israel. —
Abram's return to the altar in Bethel. — The house
of God the consecration of the home. — .4brara and
Lot. — The love of peace characteristic of the be-
liever.^The scandal of kindred and family strifes. —
The eager watchfulness of servants. — The true sepa-
ration for the sake of peiice. — The watchword of
Abram in its typical significance. — The blessing of*
spirit of concession. — The character of Lot in its
lighter and darker aspects. — Lot's choice: 1. In its
fair promise ; 2. in its evil results. — The third prom-
ise of God to Abram. — The peril of the worldly life,
and the blessing of retirement : Lot in the gate of
Sodom, Abram in the oak-grove of JIamre. — How
(piickly tlie paradise of Lot's choice lay in the terri-
ble depths of the Dead Sea. — How firm the promise
of the eternal possession of the Holy land to Abram's
seed . 1 . The conditional character of the |)ioniise
with reference to his natural descendants (the Ara-
bians in Palestine are still his natural sons) ; 2. itg
unconditional character for his believing children
(.Matt. V. 5).
Starke ; Abram and Lot feared God ; they were
related, and fellow-travellers. Poverty, hunger, and
toilsome journeys to and fro, could not bring about
any strifes, but the ahnndiincc of temporal posses-
sions had nearly aecoinplishcd it, when Abram saw
and mari.ed the cunning of Ihe devil. If this could
happen to holy men like these, we may easily ses
how far Satan may carry those whose hearts cling
to this world's good.s. — L.\N(1K, ver 2 : It is one
thing to be rich, and ipiite another to desire riidies,
and bend all one's energies and efforts to that end.
It is not the former, but the latter, which is in oppo
and cliildlesfl, and yet his need ^hall be as the dust of thi
earth. All around him is liis, and ho is only one Hmo^^ th«
taiusands^bul «ir' cAiriSt nap fATrifia." Iluli1z&-'h -A. fJ.|
CHAP. XIV. 1-24.
401
sition to true faith, and the tiivine blessing (Sir.
ixii. 1). — Ver. 7. The devil is wont to sow tares,
misunderstandings, and divisions, even between pious
men and believers (Ps. cxxxiii. 1). — Vers. 8, 9. What
a beautiful example of humiUty and the love of peace !
The elder yields to the younger. — Whoever will be
a son of Abram, must strive to win his neighbor by
'ove, but never seek to prevail by violence. — Ver.
13. It is commonly (often) true, that the people are
more depraved in those parts of the land which are
more rich and fruitful (Ps. cvi. 24-29). — A good
land seldom bears pious people, and we cannot en-
dure prosperous days with safety (Ezek. xvi. 49). —
OsiANDEB, upon ver. IS: Religious worship at the
first and last. — Lisco : In this history, the principal
thing is the grace of God towards the chosen race,
the divine providence, through which circumstances
are so arranged as to separate from this race one
who was not a constituent portion of it. Under this
providence Lot freely concedes all his claims to the
land of promise, to which the plain of Jordan no
longer belonged (certainly not the plain of Sodom,
after its submersion). This interpretation is mani-
festly correct from the account vers. 14 and 15, that
the new promise of the land of Canaan was given to
Abram after the departure of Lot. — Ver. 16. In-
cludes not barely the natural but also the spiritual
descendants — the children of Abram by faitn (Jer.
ixiiii. 22).* — Ver. 17. This journey should be a
* (See also in confirmation the Epistle to the Hebrews,
ch. xi. 10, 16, where the apostle points to the true and high-
eat sense of the land promised. The spiritual st-ed require a
heavenly inheritance, and the heavenly ioheritance implies
a spiritual seed. — A. Q. ]
type of the possession which took place much latel
under Joshua. — Gerlach upon ver. 2. The outward
earthly blessing was, to this man of faith, a pledge
of the spiritual and invisible. — Passavant : 1 John
ii. 15; Matt. v. 5, 9; vi. 33.— Indei'd, if we onl7
assert our just right and posses.-^ious, harshli/ and
Jirmli^, there is no praise nor reward from God, no
promise — no pleasant bow of peace ; we have our
reward, blessing and peace therein. — Schbuder :
From all these notices in reference to Canaan, it is
clear that everything in this chapter bears upon the
land of promise. — Calvin : If no Canaanites sur-
round us, we still live in the midst of enemies, whiW
we live in this world. — Luther: To the service of
God, and the preaching of religion, and faith to-
wards God (ver. 4), there is added now a most beau-
tiftd and glorioiii example of love to our neighbor,
and of patience. — Abram's generous and magnani-
mous spirit conies out all the more clearly, through
the directly opposite conduct of Lot (ver. 10). — Be-
cause Lot had in eye only the beauty of the land, he
had uo eye for the far higher, inward beauty of
Abram's character. — Schwexke : In his faith, Abram
had placed a low estimate upon the world and its
good things, and found a much richer blessing. —
Heusee : Abram in his disturbed relation with Lot :
1. The disturbance; 2. the way in which Abram re-
moved it ; 3. the thought which gave him strength
for his work.*
* [The whole chapter remarkable, as it presents to us the
workings of faith in the domestic and ordinary life, in the
common transactions between man and man, and affords us
an opportunity of obser\iiig liow far his daily life was in
unison with that higher character with which the inspire*"
writers have invested him. Bush, 210. — A. G.]
THIRD SECTION.
Abram and his War with the Heathen robber-hands for the rescue of Lot. The victorious Champion
of Faith and his greeting to Melchizedec, the prince of peace. His conduct towards
the King of Sodom, and his associates in the War.
Chapter XIV. 1-24.
1 And it came to pass in the days ' of Amraphel [Oesenius : it seems to be Sanscrit Amrap4Ia, keeper
of the gods; M surer : perhaps, robbers; Fiiist : = Arphaxad] king of Sllinar [region of Babylon], Arioch'
[Oesenius, after Bohlen, Sanscrit Arjaka, venerated ; FQrst : the Arian, embracing Persian, Median, and Assyrian]
king of EUasar, [Symmaohua and Vulgate: Pontus; Gesenius : probably the region between Babylon and
Elymais], Chedorlaomer* [Maurer: band of the sheaf; FOrst: probably from the ancient Persian] kino- of
Elam [Elymais], and Tidal [Gesenius: fear, veneration] king of nations [Clericus : Galilean heath en] ;
2 That these made war with Bera [Gesenius = 5-}",a] king of Sodom, and with Birsha
[Gesenius = 5ia-;-ia] king of Gomorrah, Siiinab [Gesenius : father's tooth] king of Adraak
[Furst: fruit region, city in the district of Sodom, farm-city], and Shemeber [Gi-senius ; soaring aloft;
glory of the eagle 7] king of Zeboiim [Gesenius: place of hyenas] and the king of Bela [devoured.
3 destroyed], which is Zoar [the small]. All these were joined together in the vale of Siddim
[Aqmla? valley of fields ; Gesenius: depressed land, "Wadyj Furst: plain], which is [now] the salt sea
4 [aeaof asphalt. Dead sea]. Twelve years they served Chedorlaomer [as vassals], and in the
5 thirteenth year they rebelled. And in the fourteenth year came Chedorlaomer, and the
Icings that were with him, and smote the Rephaims [riants; Ewaid: long-drawn, tau] in Ashte
26
io2
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
roth Karnaim [horned Astarte ; from Astiirte-worehip, city in Batanaea, Dent, i, 4 ; Josh. liii. 12j, and thf
ZuzilliS FSusaer; Gesenitis : from the fertility of the cuimtrj* ; Septuagint and others: i0VT} Itrxvpa^ in HaiT
[treasures; probably an Ammonite region], and the Emiins [terrors; Emacr, originally in the land of Moab]
in Sliaveh [plain] Kiriathaim [twin cities in the tribe of Reuben, Num. xxxii. 37; lat«r in Moab, Jer.
6 xlriii. l]. And the Horites [dwellers in cave.=] in their Mount Seir [rugged; Gesenius: wooded;
Furst; hairy], unto El- [o.ik, terohinth] Paran [probably, cave-region], which is by the wilderness.
7 And thev returned, and came to En-mishpat [well of Judgment], which is Kadesh [sanctuary 1,
and smO«e all the country [fields] of the Amalekites [between Palestine, Idnmea, and Egypt],
id] also the Amorites [mountaineers?] tiiat dwelt in Hazezon-tamar [p:ilm-pnming, a city in tin
S wilderness of Jndea; later, Engedi, fountain of the kid]. And there Went Out the king of Sodolll,
and the king of Gomorrah, and the king of Admah, and the king of Zeboiiiii, and thf
king of Bela (the same is Zoar;) and tliey joined battle with them in Ihe vale of Sid
9 dim ; With Chedorlaomer the king of Elam, and with Tidal king of nations, and
Aniraphel king of Shinar, and Arioch king of Elksar; [wi.ich] four kings with five.
10 And the vale of Siddira was full of slime-pits [pits upon pits] ; and the kings of Sodom
and Gomorrah fled, and fell there [the warriors] ; and they that remained fled to the
11 mountain. And they [the victors] took all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah, aiid all
12 their victuals, and went their way. And they took Lot, Abram's brother's son, who
[for he] dwelt in Sodom, and his goods, and departed.
13 And there came one that had escaped' [fugitives], and told Abram the Hebrew
[immigrant] ; for he [who] dwelt in the plain [oak-grove] of Mamre [richness, strength] thf>
Amorite, brother of Eschol [vine-branch], and brother of Aner [i. e. -lyj , i^^p?] ; and these
14 were confederate with Abram. And when Abram heard that his brother was taken
captive, he armed [led out to war] liis trained servants [initiated, tried], born in his own
15 house, three hundred and eighteen, and pursued them unto Dan. And he divided him-
self against them, be and his servants, by night, and smote them, and pursued them
unto Hobah [hiding-place], which is on the left hand [northerly] of Damascus [restless activity].
16 And he brought back all the goods, and also brought again his brother Lot, and hi.'f
goods, and the women also, and the people.
1 7 And the king of Sodom went out to uieet him (after his return from the slaughter
of Chedorlaomer, and of the kings that were with him [confederates]), at the valley of
18 Shaveh [the plain northward of Jemsalem, 2 Sam. xviii. 18], which is the king's dale. And [But]
Melchizedec [king of righteousness] king of Salem [schaiem = cibr] brought fori h bread and
19 wine: and he was the priest of the most liigh God [of El-Eijon]. And he blessed him.
and said. Blessed be Abram of the most high God, possessor of heaven and earth
20 And blessed be the most high God, which hath delivered thine enemies into thy hand.
21 And he [septuagint: 'Agpa/i ; compare Heb. vii. 4] gave him tithes of all. And the king of
Sodom said imto Abram, Give me the persons [souls], and take [ret.iin] the goods to
22 thyself And Abram said to the king of Sodom, I have lifted up my hand unto the
2o Lord, the most high God, the possessor of heaven and earth. That I [the form of an oath : ifl]
will not take from a thread even to a shoe-latchet [the least], and that I will not take
'/■- anything that is thine, lest thou shouldest say, 1 have made Abram rich: Save only
that which the young men have eaten, and the portion of the men which went with me,
Aner, Eschol, and Mamre: let them take their portion.
» [Ver. 1.— Lange render-' *hifl first clause as independent. "And it came(,to pass after days, or, in the lapse ol
iays."— A. G.)
^ I Ver. L— Wordsworth and Murphy, lionine, or linn-like.— A. G.]
■ [Ver. 1. — ".Some identify it with Telassar ; others more probably regard it as Larsa. now Simkamh, about fifteen
oulcs Houtheasi of Wiirka. Eiawlin "on, Wokuswohth, p. (i9.— A. G.)
♦ iVer. I — '* Kawlinson cimpareh it with Kttdur-Mapulo , or ilaluh, whose name is found on the bricks of Chaldea.
■sd whose title is Apda Uartu, Havaeer ct the Wist."— Mdrpht, p. 278.— A. G.)
GENERAL REMABKS.
1. Th^ Modern Criticium — Knobkl (p. 143) ng-
Bi(rns the Section (with ch. xv.) to the Jeliovislic
enlar«enient, since the Klohistic author narrates the
founding of the theocratic covenant elsewhere (ch.
XTii). Wc must carefully liistinguisli, in a tlieologi-
cal point of ^lew, be'ween the permanent covenant
of faith (ch. xv.), and the special and temporary cov
en:int of circumcision * (ch. xvii.), which rests upon
it (see Rom. iv.). The idea that Ihe character of
Alirani and the narrative of Melchizedec are driwr
• I Temporary, however, only as to its external form, And
tho sign 01- seal of the covenant. The covenant itself ir oni
and permanoiit.^A. O.I
CHAP. XIV. 1-24:
40?
:r«ditionally from interested motives of the Hebrews,
a without foundation.*
2. For special literature upon ch. xiv. see Knobkl, I
p. 134.
S. T!u Warinal-ivg Powers. — According to
Knobel, wLj here agrees with Joseph., Antiq. i. 9,
the Assyrian must be viewed as the ruling power,
which leads all the individual attaclcmg kings, as
subject princes or monarchs ; for there is no trace
Bf evidence in history, that the elsewhere unimport-
ant Elymais (Susiane) has ever exercised a sort of
world-dominion. Josephus calls the Assyrian tlie
leading power, Syncellus the Syrian, which in this
case is just equivalent ; but according to Ktesias and
others, the Assyrians were the first to establish a
world-dominion (see p. 142, flf.). Keil, on the other
hand, holds that the kingdom of Amraphel of Shi-
nar which Nimmd founded, had now sunken to a
mere dominion over Shinar, and that Elam now ex-
ercised the hegemony in inner Asia. The beginning
of the Assyrian power falls in a later period, and
Berosus speaks of an earlier Median dominion in
Babylon, which reached down to the times of the
patriarciis. (He refers to Niebuhr's "History of
Assyria," p. 271). There is clearly a middle view.
At the date, ver. 1, Amraphel, king of Shinar, stands
at the head of the alliance of Eastern princes ; but
the war was waged especially in the interest of
Chedorlaomer of Elam. Amraphel appears as the
nominal leader ; Chedorlaomer the victorious cham-
pion of an Eastern kingdom, involved to some extent
ji decay. The Palestinian kings, or kings of Sid-
iim, opposed to them, are described as previously
fassals of Chedorlaomer, because the narrative here
treats of the history of Siddim, pre-eminently of the
history of Sodom and Lot ; but this does not exclude
the supposition, that the princes or tribes named in
vers. 6 and 6, were also at least partly dependents
of Chedorlaomer. For in order to subject the lower
Jordan valley, he must have somewhere forced a
passage for himself into the land. Keil : '' It seems
eignificiuit that at that time the Asiatic world-power
had advanced to Canaan, and brought the valley of
the Jordan into subjection, with the purpose, doubt-
less, to hold, with the valley of the Jordan, the way to
Egy(rt. We have, in this history, an example of the
'later pressure of the world-power against the king-
dom of God established in Canaan ; and the signifi-
cance of these events with reference to the historical
salvation, lies in the fact, thai the kings of the Jor-
dan valley and surrounding region are subject to the
world-power. Abram, on the contrary, with his
home-born servants, slays tlie victor and takes away
his spoil — a prophetic sign, that in its contests with
the world-power, the seed of Abram shall not only
aot be brought into subjection, but be able to res-
THe those seeking its help.
4. Ancient Damascus, also, first appears here in
Ihe dim distance.
EXEGETICAL AND CEITICAL.
1. The Rings at ITar.— (Vers. 1-3). " The
kings named here never appear again." Keil.f —
* [The ooimectioii of this chapter with what precedes and
follows is close and natumL It shows that Lot's choice,
ffiiiie apparently wise, was attended with bitter fruits; it
lays the ground, in Abram's conduct, for the promise and
transactions of the xvth cha|»ter. There would be a seriijus
Teak in the history were this wanting. — A. G.]
^ I Chedorlaomer, Upon the bricks recently found in
Shinar and Elam (see ch. 10). Ellasar, probabl)
Artemita, which is called also Chalasar, lying in
Soutliern Assyria. (Goiim *) Nations is here of
special significance (see translation of the text, als*.
upon ver. 2 ; compare Josh. x. 3, 5, 23). — Al]
these; namely, the last-named five kings. — In the
vale of Siddim f (see the text). "The five named
cities described (Wis. x. 6) as a -rnvTairoXis, ap-
pear to have formed a confederacy. The four
first (connected together; also ch. x. 19) perished
afterwards (Deut. xxix. 22 ; comp. Hos xi. 8).
On the contrary, Bela, i. e., Zoar, was net over-
taken in the ruin. The most important are Sodom
and Gomorrah, which are elsewhere exclusively
named, even here, vers. 10 and 11." Knobel. TIjere
is no ground for his conjecture that they were
not Canaanites, drawn from a misunderstanding of
ch. xii. 12, that this region did not belong to the
land of Canaan. Keil: "That there were five
kings of the five cities, is in accordance with the
custom of the Canaanites, among whom, still later,
every city had its king."J
2. liie H'[7r (vers. 4-12). a. Its cause {\er. 4).
b. The course of the Eastern Kings hi their March. —
'"They came, doubtless, in the usual way, through the
region of the Euphrates to Syria (Strabo, xvi.) ; from
here, as they afterwards directed their return march
to this region, advancing southwards, thev attacked
tho-e who had revolted ; at first, namely, the Re-
phaim in Bashan, i. e. the northerly part of the
country, east of the Jordan (Xumb. xxxii. 39), then
the Zuzims, dwelMug farther to the south, and after-
wai ds tlie still more southern Eminis." Knobel. —
The Rephaim. — " A tribe of giants of great stat-
ure, spread throughout Pt-raea ; also found westward
from Jerusalem, upon Mount Ephraim, and in Phi-
listia. They were gradually exterminated through
the Amorites, Ammonites, Moabites, and Israelites."
Keil holds that they were of Semitic origin (p. 140).
Ashteroth Kamaim, or simply Ashteroth, a chief
city of Bashan, the residence of Og, the king (Deut.
i. 4). The details may be found in Keil and Knobel. §
— Zuzima (an Ammonitish province), probably the
same with Zamsmnniims (Deut. ii. 20.) — Ham.
Identified (Deut. ill. 11) with Rabliah of the Ammon-
ites (ruins of Ammon). — Emims, terrors. The
older inhabitants of the cotmtry of Moab, like the
Zuzims, included with the Rephaim. — Kiijathaim.
Incorrectly located by Eusebius and Jerome ; the
ruins el Teym, or el tueme. — The Horites. The
original inhabitants of the country of the Edomites.
They drove the Horites to Elath, upon the east side
of the wilderness of Paran. The mount Seir be-
Chaldea there occurs the nnme of a king— i'uifurmapufa-
which Rawlinson thinks may be the same, especially since
he is further distingruished as the Rnvcgir of the West.
Jacobcs, p. 247. — A. tr.l
* [Delitzsch suggests perhaps an earlier name foi
"Galilee of the OenHles." Comp. Josh. xii. 23; Jndg.
iv. 2 ; anil Isa. viii. 23. — A. G.J
t [Which is the Salt sea, i. e., into which this valley waM
changed in the overthrow of the cities (six. 24). Km., p.
139.— A. G.]
t [The five kings belonged prol-ably to the family of
Ham, which hivd pushedits way northward, but had heen
here checked and held under the sway of the Shc-mitic king
for twelve years, but had now revolted. Wordswoeth, p.
69.— A. G.l
5 putter finds it in the Tell Ashareh. J. G. Wetst«»c
identifies it with Bosra, for which he urges the central posi-
tion of this city in Persea, and the similarity of the n.ime4
Bortra and n-prrs . "Porter sngge.--ts 'Afinth, eight
miles from Bosra", as the Samaritan version ha* *Anhln*
for 'Ashlarnth." A. G '
404
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
tween the Red and Dead seas.* — Yer. S. They now
turned from the south to the north (i^ee Keil, p. 141).
The victory ot the Amalekites wag gained in what
wa.s later the southern territory of the Hebrews.
Kail and Hengstenberg hold that it is not the Ama-
lekites themselves, but the inhabitants of the land
which later belonged to the Amalekites. It says,
indeed, the country of the Amalekites, f and (Gen.
ixxvi. 12, Iti) Amalek descended from Esau. But
then we should expect some account of that original
people. And the Amalekitish drscendants of Esau
may have mingled with the eailier con>tituent por-
tions of the people, as the Ishmaclites with the ear-
lier inhabitants of Arabia. Lastly, even the Amor-
ites, upon the west side of the Dead Sea, were
involved in the slaughter. Kiiobel denies that
Hazezon-tamar can be identified with Engedi, for
which, however, 2 Chron. xx. 2, bears its testimony.
A rapid march made it possible that these tribes
should be attacked and overcome one by one. It is
not said that they had all been tributary. Mean-
while, however, the five kings in the vale of Siddim
had time to arm themselves, c. The Battle in the
vale of Siddim. The five feeble kings of the penta-
polis coulii not resist the four mightier kings. — And
they fell there. The valley, we are told, was full
of pits of bitumen, or asphalt. This account is con-
firmed by the mass of asphalt in the Dead Sea. For
these masses of asphalt, see the condensed notices in
Knobkl, p. 136. 1 This remark, however, does not
explain why the five kings were defeated, but why
they found the flight through that region so destruc-
tive. They fell here, partly hindered by the pits,
partly plunging into them ; only a few escaped into
the mountains of Moab. The obvious sense appears
to be, that the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah were
themselves slain. Knobel thinks the troops or forces
are intended, and holds it as certain that the king
of Sodom escaped (ver. 17). But it may be his suc-
cessor in the government who is here mentioned.
Whatever of spoil, in goods or men, was found by
the conquerors in the city, was taken away ; and,
what is the main thing in the narrative, Lot with
tliem. It is most significant : for he dwelt in
Sodom. §
3. Ahram's March and Victory (vera. 13-16). —
One that had escaped. The article marks the
race or lineage. A fugitive who sought Abram in
Hebron, nju<t doubtless have stood in close relations
with Lot. — Abram the Hebrew, the immigrant. ||
Abram, as Lot also, was viewed by the escaped, who
was bora in the land, as an immigrant, and because
Lot the Hebrew was a captive, he sought Abram the
Hebrew. Tlie Amorite Mamre, and his two brothers,
were named as confederates with Abram, because
• [Ei Faram, terebinth, or rather wood of Parnn, Js with-
out doubt the later Elath, at the head of the AilaDitic gtUf ;
the pres'-nt Akaba. Keil, p. 141.— A. G.l
* [Kadfsb, probably at Ain-el Waibeh ; though Keil
tnd Wordsworth favor the location at Ain Kades, in the
east of the hit'best part of Jebel llalal, about five hours
E.8.E. from Morlinhi.— A. O.]
t f Alw) KoBi.NsoN*8 " Kesearches," vol. ii. pp. 228-230. —
A.O.I
5 (The p^iaaa^c is so conetmcted in tho Hebrew as to
brinf^ out thin Kit.Tiiflcauce. And they took Lot, and his
goods, AbraraV brother's eon, and departed ; and (for) h«
vaa dwellini^ in Sod(tm. — A. O.]
I ['I'he one fr'du the other side, who has come across tho
nver. But Miiroliy urtre.s in favor of taking Hebrew aa a
patTonymic; *'tn.'it every other tribe in the counti-y had
origllliilly migrated across tho Euphrates, and that the word
bete distinguishes Ahrain as the Hebrew, just as his coufed-
•otite, Mamre, is distinguished as the Amorite.**— A. Q.]
they assisted him now in the war (ver. 24). Thai
confederation shows his overwhelming influence.—
Abram heard that his brother was a captive. Th«
expression is significant. Instantly he arms hi.
trained,* u e., his proved servants, and practised in
the use of arms ; especially those bom in his own
house. "That the patriarchs carried weapons in
clear from ghs. xxxiv. ia, ; xlix. 5." Knobel. — Unto
Dan. Keil shows that the Dan alluded to cannot bt
the (Laish) Dan (Judg. xvhi. 29) situated iu the
midst of the sources of the Jordan, since it does not
he upon either of the ways leading from the valley
of the Jordan to Damascus ; but Dan in Gilead (Deut.
xxxiv. 1 ; 2 Sam. xxiv. 6). In Dan, Abram dividea
his little army into bands, and falls upon the enemy
from diflferent quarters by night, and pursues him
unto Hobah, " probably preser red in the village
Hoba, which Troilo found a quarter of a mile
northerly from Damascus." Keil. The Hebrews de-
fined the quarters of the heavens with their faces
to the East; hence the left hand is northward.
Victorious, he brought back the whole spoil of the
enemy, both in men and goods. — And also Lot his
brother.
4. Abram's Triumphant Return (vers. 17-24).
The kings who welcome him. — At the valley of
Shaveh, i. e. the (later) king's dale. The valley
proljably takes its name from this event. Absalom
erected his pillar here, 2 Sam. xviii. 18 (afterwards
remodelled in the Greek style). According to Jo-
SKPHCS, Antiq. vii. In, 3, it lay about two stadia
from Jerusalem. Melchizedec went northwards to
meet him, thus in the upper valley of the Kidron
(see Dictionaries). Melchizedec appears to have
anticipated the king of Sodom ; at all events he has
the precedence. Under his royal city, Saletu, we
must understand Jerusalem (Ps. Ixxvi. 3), and not
the di>taut Salim in whose vicinity John baptized
(John iii. 23). Comp. Keil, p. 143. In favor of
Jerusalem (11^ = ^^"i?, founding, or 'in""!, posses-
sion ; the name obujn^ is either the founding or
the possession of peace; the first is preferable,) are
JosKPHUs : Antiq. i. 10, 2 ; the Targums, Aben
Ezra, Kimchi, etc., Knobel, DeUtzsch, and Keil ;
Krahmer, Ewald : " History of Israel, ii. p. 41ii," are
in favor of the Salim of Jerome. That at the time
of Jerome, the palace of Melchizedec was usually
pointed out in the ruins of Salumias, lying about
eight Roman miles from Scythopolis, of which Rol>
inson .and Smith found no trace, proves nothing
Salumias lay too far to the north, for the statemem
in the narrative. Melchizedec (king of righteous-
ness— the language of the t-'anaanites was Hebraic)
is described as a priest of El Eljon. According to
Sanchuniaton (EusebijS: Pr<ep.i. 10), the Phojni-
cians called God 'EAior^, and Hanno the Carthaginian,
in Plautus Panulus^ names the gods and goddesses
Elo7iim or Elonoth ; but the term here used is differ-
ent, and its signification is monotheistic, " not God
as the highest among many, but in a monotheistic
sense, the one most high (jod." (Delitzsch). H«
brings from his city bread and wine to refresh Abram
and his followers. " The papists explain it with ref-
erence to the sacrifice of the mass, but the reference
is fatal to their own case, since Melchizedec gave
* [These tried, proved, thus trained servants, were bom
in hiK house, Prov. ttii 6. '* Abram had trained them in
spiritual things in the service of God, as well as in fidelity
to himself; see chai xviii. 19, and xxiv. 1* 49." Wokm
woBin, p. 71. — A. G.'
CHAP. XIV. 1-24.
to;
the wine also. He brought forth, not he brought
before God." Schroder. Melchizedec's prayer for
prosperity :md blessing is translated by Delitzsch
rhytlimieally as a double blessing.* The term i'ilp
denotes the ruler, but may also be used to denote
the creator and possessor. — And he gave him
tithes. As Melchizedec was a priest of the true
God, the gift of the tithe of tlie spoil was a sanctiti-
cation of the war and victory, as in the later history
of Israel the tithe belonged to the priest (Lev. .^.wii.
30), and the payment of the gift of consecration, out
of the spoils of war, to the priestly tribe, was se-
cured by law (Xumb. xxxi. 28 S. ; 2 Sam. viii. 1 1 ;
1 Chron. xxvi. 27). Compare Heb. vii. 4. — The king
of Sodom does not speak in a formal, solemn way,
but with obvious prudence, encouraged by the gene-
rosity of Abram, to whom, by the laws of war, the
captives belonged as slaves — Give me the per-
sons (souls). Tlien follows the noble declaration of
Abram, which is both a recognition of the God of
Melchizedec, or of tlie community of faith, between
Abram and Melchizedec, since it joins together the
names Jehovah and El Eljon, and at the same time
a noble expression of his unselfishness. He would
not retain anything from a thread to a shoe-latchet,
i. e., not the least thing, so that the king of Sodom
could never say, I have made Abram rich. As he
declares his intimate commimion with Melchizedec,
and introduces it into the very forms of expression
of his rehgion, so he utterly refuses an;/ community
of goods with the king of Sodom. He reserves only
what his servants had already consumed in the neces-
sities of war, and that part of the spoil which fell to
his three confederates, Aner, Eschol, and Mamre
(Numb. xxxi. 26 ; I Sam. xxx. 26).
DOCTKIKAl AND ETHICAl.
1. The first well-defined appearance of war in
Its different aspects. A war of the world against
the world — the kings — the alliances — the conquerors
— the rulers and their revolted vassals — the promi-
nent leader (Chedorlaomer) — the attack — the victory
and defeat — the plunder, and service of captives —
lOf the hard destiny of those who dwelt quietly in
the land (Lot) — of the wide-spread terror, an<l the
rebuke of that terror, before the true heroism with
which the true hero of faith opposes a defensive
and necessary war, to the attacks of tlie confident
and haughty prince. The children of God find
themselves unexpectedly involved in the wars of tlie
world, as the liistory oP Abram, Lot, and Melchizedec
proves. The destructive nature of war, so Car as it is
the fruit of human passions, and the providential
overruling of it unto salvation.
2. The fearful overthrow of the Sodomite pentap-
olis in the vale of Siddim, and the wonderful rescue
Dy Abram tlie man of faith, wrought no repentance
hi the people of that valley, although tliey were al-
ready weakened and enervated by their luxury, nor
even any gratitude towards Lot, for whose sake they
▼ere rescued (ch. xix. 9). Hence the lost battle, and
• " Gebenedeit sei Abram Gott, dem Allerliabenen,
Bern Erschaffer Himmels und der Erde
tlnd gebenedeit sei Gott, der Allerhabene
Der geliefert deine Dranger in deine Hand."
llCeil also refers to the poetical forms n^"HS and ISi'C .
4. O.l ' ' '■
the terrors of war in the vale of f iddim, became i
portent and sign of their later overthrow.
3. In the misfortunes which came upon him. Lot
must suffer the retribution for his misdeeds towardj
Abram. But Abram rewards his ingratitude with
self-sacrificing maguanimity.
4. The terrors of war in its desolating and [jara
lyzing power. How it may be interrupted, and is
usually checked and brought to an cud, through the
heroic faith and courage of some single hero, or it
may be, band of heroes.
5. Abram, the man of peace of the previous
chapter, the yielding child of peace, is instantly
clianged into a lion when the report comes to him,
that Lot, his brother, is a captive. One citizen of
the kingdom of God is of so great importance in his
esteem, that he will attack a whole victorious army
with his little band, and venture his own life, and
the lives of his servants upon the issue. Thus enter
in opposition to the gloomy heroism of the earth in
Chedorlaomer and his followers, the light and cheer-
ful heroism of heaven, to the war for oppression and
bondage in its dark form, the light form and aspect
of the war of salvation and liberty, to the power of
godlessness, inhumanity, and desperation, in union
with demoniac powers, the [lower of faith, and love,
and hope, in covenant with Jehovah.
6. It did not enter the thought of Abram, that
the princes against whom he went out to war were
for the most part descendants of Shem, and indeed
the people of his former home, and that those whom
he rescued, and with whom he conm-cts himself, are
the descendants of Ham. The motive for the war
was to save Lot,* and the alliance for the right,
against the alliance for wrong, was decisive for him.
The love to his brother, the Hebrew, has special
power- Brotherly love. Every Hebrew, in the best
and highest sense, must help others as his brethren.
But in " the Hebrew " here the important thing is,
that he '• comes from across tlie river," not as De-
litzsch holds, that he is descended from Heber.
7. Aiiram has not only, in his faith, a heroism
and self-sacrifice which overcomes the world, he has
also the heroic strength and spirit. His servants
are men trained to arms. He knew that, in an evil
world, one needs defence and weapons, and must be
armed. !n his war with the world, he does not de-
spise an honorable alliance with those who, in a reli-
gious point of view, may have different ways of
thinking from himself. Indeed, he acts throughout
in the true hero-spirit. The rapid, instantaneous
onset, the well-ordered and irresistible charge, the
outmarching and flanking of the enemy, the tailing
upon him by night, the fierce pursuit to the very
utmost, to the completed result, tliese are the orig-
inal, fundamental laws of all intelligent warfare.
And it does not admit of question, that Cromwell
* (** But his marcli and victory have another and b
higher refereuce in the object of the history. Even here
it is not to glorify Abram, but rather the wonderful prov-
idence of God over his chosen, through which all here
enters in immediate conuection with the divine plan
Abram i* the designated possessor of the land ; it is hia
concern, therefore, to guard the land from all assaults, and
to aven;;e its iniuries ; it is the part of God, who has desig-
nated lii'n to this et d, to give him the victoi-y." Kurtx :
•' History of the Old Covenant," p. 171.— A. G.)
[His title to the bind involves him in the war. He nmst
delend that which has been given to him. " He is no sooner
confirmed in his title, than the Innd is invaded by aconfcd.
eracy of hostile kings. Thus the kingditm of God is n«
sooner set up anywhere, tl an there is a tallying of thf
world kingdoms agauist it." Jacobus, p. 2^'.- A. G t
iOO
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
fundamental principles of warfare
and other Old Testament heroes, and
Uarned these
from Abram
X is probable that Xapoleon, in these, as in manii
other points, teas an imitator of Cromwell ; aa it is
lertaiii that GneisLnau and BlUclier have learneil
from the method of Napoleon. lu the spirit of
prajer Cromwell, the invincible, was greatly in ad-
v&nce of him (Napoleon) ; the heroes of the times
when freedom triumphs place victoriously the joyful I
longing for deliverance of the people over against !
the demoniac lust of conquest of the murderers of
the people.
8. Abram is assured of the good-will and help
of Jehovah through the Spirit of God inspiring him
with believing and sacrificing courage ; and therefore
joins his might, in the feeling of his individual weak-
ness, with omnipotenct, and makes himself and his
forces, to whom he communicates his own spirit,
invincible against the hosts of the enemy, whose
power, as demoniac and magical, cannot stand before
the terrors of God, but passes at once from haughty
confidence to trembling and despair. The germ-like
oriental world-power surges and breaks itself upon
the heroic heart of the father of the faithful, as all
the succeeding forms of the world-power, must break
into pieces upon the believing power of the kingdom
of God ; and for this reason, because, in the very
centre of the world's history, all the powers of the
world and of hell broke and went to pieces against
the divine stability of the heart of Christ.
9. In warfare, as in all the forms of civilization
and life, in political government, in poetry, the
Hebrew principle is dynamic, living, while the prin-
ciple of the world, especially of the (ireek and
Romish civiUzation, is lifeless, formal, or technical.
Here the living fountain of original, direct divine in-
spiration is prominent, while the ordinary cosmical
forming piinciples are throughout kept in the back
ground. But the dynamic principle is also the prin-
ciple of regeneration for the technical and artistic
system — even for science itself Thus, in our his-
tory also, the technical is sufficiently apparent.* " It
is remarkable, moreover, that corresponding to this
original mode of warfare, the almost exclusive order
of battle in later times, is the division of the army
into thi-ee parts, that the enemy may be attacked in the
centre and upon both flanks at the same time (Judg.
TJi. 16; 1 Sam. xi. 11 ; 1 Mace. v. 3.3)" Schroder.
10. Melchizedec aa priest and king in one per-
son, without genealogy in his priesthood, which he
executed for his people by virtue of a sovereign in-
dividual call, is a type of the Messiah, and is repre-
Bented as such, I's. ex. 4, but especially in the Epistle
to the Hebrews (eh. v. 6; ch. vii. 17). From the
circumstance that Melchizedec was not a worshipper
of the Canaanitisli Baal, but was a monotheist, oi- as
Knobel thinks, a worshipper of the Semitic principal
deity, El, Knobel concludes that he belongeil to the
Semitic tribe, Lud, to which also the triiies ai w;ir
belonged. The .supposition of a Semitic cliici' deily
is in an erioneoiis manner transferred from the re-
lations of a later time, to the times of the primitive
religion. It is the characteristic of the primitive re-
ligion, that in it throughout Heathenism and Mono-
• ("Tlin thinii:^ of fliiof importance liore aro Abram's
fcitli and tho liclp of God ; Imt wr; nhould not ovrrlook, tliat
hw for::*; muy havo ru.'irhoil ii thoiLsand men, inrliidintr lii«
confedrTatt'H, and fnriliur, tho effect of ttie Necurity of the
hotftlle fornt-H, tlio sudden terror, the darkiiesa of the niifht,
thoir coiifuwion amont; tliemisfdveH, and tho siralegic hkill
•f Abram." KouTZ, p. 170.— A. G.l
theism cleave together and go asunder. Melchize
dec might, therefore, well belong to the Hamitii
race.* He is not a Christ of the heavenly WDrld, at
perhaps the Gnostics would make hirj, nor Sb''m. noi
Enocli, as the Rabbins and the Church fath-.TS have
thought ; he is a type of Christ, because he is king
and priest at the same time, because his priesthood
rests upon his individual personality (iiraTuip, etc.,
Heb. vii. 3), and because Abram, the ancestor of thi
Levitical priesthood, gave tithes to him. He is not
" perhaps the last witness and confessor ol the prim-
itive revelation out of the night of heathenism," for
that is tlie splendor of an evening sky which reaches
through all time; but he is the last representative
of the period of the primitive religion, and therefore
he blesses Abram in a similar sense to that in which
the Baptist must baptize Christ the Lord, in Jordan.
He, in his way, stands as the last of the first world-
period ; Abram is one who belongs to the future, f
and therelbre he blesses Abram, and Abram doeu
him homage. That he is Melchizedec, is in the first
place significant ("it maybe concluded from Josh.
X. 1, 3, where a later king of Jerusalem, Adoni-
Zedek, i. e., lord of righteousness, is mentioned, that
this was a standing name of the old kings of Sa-
lem." Keil) ; then, the name of his residence, Salem ;
further, that he is priest and king at the same
time ("in the old Phoenician custom." Delitzsch) ;
finally, that he represents no legal and genealogical
priesthood, but shines singly and alone as a clear,
bright star, in the night of Canaan ; all these consti-
tute him a mysterious, renowned type of Chiist (see
DELirzsiH, p. 363 ; Keil, p. 144 ; Auberlen upon
"Melchizedec," in the Studien and Kntiken, lb57,
p. 153). I As he is the priest of El Eljon, that can
only mean, that he intercedes for his people before
the most high God with prayer and sacrifice, that
he sought either to lead back the Jebusites at Sa-
lem to a living monotheism, or to preserve them in it.
• [The name, however, is Semitic. It is probable thai
he was a Semitic chieftain, having his royal seat at Jerusa-
lem. The locality, as everything elr^e in connection i^-ith
this person, so briefly referred to here, and then di^■miseed,
is important. This is clear from the use which is made of
this liistory in the Epistle to the Hebrews. lie was a per-
sou.al tN,-pe of Christ: 1. As he was both priest and king;
2. as kiUK of righteousness and peace ; 3. as he was con-
structiVLdy, so far as the history goes, without father and
w.thout mother ; 4. as he held bis priestliood probably by a
special divine warrant. He acts as a priest : 1. In brmgmg
the bread and wine, here probably connected with a sacrifice
and sacraraental, refreshing this wearied warrior of th<- faith,
and welcoming him to the communion of saints ; 2. in bless-
ing Abram— which is here the solemn, jiriestly benediction;
3. in receiving tithes from Abram— through which Abram
recognizes his typical superiority — and in which the whole
Ijcviticiil priesthood, yet in the loins of Abram. recognizes
the superiority of that Priesthood of which he was the type.
It thus becomes evident, as the Apostle shows, that the Le-
vitical priesthood, and the whole Mosaic institution, were
intermediate and timporary, .and pointed to the higher
Priest to come— who is both Prie-t and King, and who
holds his priestliood not by descent, but by the expi-ess ap-
pointment and oath of God. — A. G.l
t Goriinm, F.in Weydender.
t [See also Kurtz : " History of the Old (Covenant," pp.
173-176, whose remarks here arc very suggestive, and .ja-
cobus : *' Notes," pp. 25(5-260.— A. (}.]
[ " Melchizedec brought forth bread and wine as the priest
of the most high God. There seems to bo an intimation
that this was a priestly art. and necordingly the crowning
part of a sacred iVast. It was probably connected with the
ottering of a sacrifice. This view of his acts is confirmed tij
the bli'ssing wliich ho pronounces as the priest of the most
high Oud." MUKPHY, p. 288, 28!).— A, O.)
[^Melchizedec stands as tlie persontil type of Christ, and
at the s:irae time in his acts and relations here, seems Is
tvpil'y what Christ, as our Piiest, is evsr doing for his new
pie. 'A. <l.l
CHAP. XIV. 1-24.
io:
11. It ia in the highest degree significant that
Abram honors Melehizedec with the tithes,* and
that he introduces El Eljon, in the oath, or the reli-
gious expression of it, while he will not take from
the king of Sodom anything from a tliread to a shoe-
latohet. (Knobkl : " Abraham is perhaps sensitive,"
etc.) This is the position of the religion of f lith to
the world both in its godly and ungodly aspects, the
whole connection and concern of faith in the forma
of its higher culture, the entire strength of its repel-
ling attitude and tendency towards its ungodly nature.
12. " If it is certain that the repetition by Mel-
ehizedec ol' tlie familiar title of God which he uses
was interideil, then tlie name Je/iovah, which Abram
adds to this title, and which, indeed, he places in the
greatest prominence, is not without a purpose. It
must serve the purpose to announce that Aljram, in
the common foundation on which they stand, has still
more than Melehizedec. Melehizedec, in tlie most
high God, recognizes the Lord of heaven and earth,
but not .Jehovah." Hengstenberg. This agrees
with the idea that Jehovah is the God of the cove-
nant. In the measure of this faith, a new period
of religion begins with Abram. God, an the Most
Hi(/h,\ does not designate the Highest in distinction
from lower gods, but in his exaltation above all the
symbols of his being, which the heathen began to
reverence as gods; thus it stands in opposition to
polytheism, and also to pantheism and dualism, the
true expression of the primitive religion. Hofmaim
finds here again an intimation of the ascension of
God from the earth before the flood. We have al-
luded to this in the previous part of this work.
13. The oath of Abram is the first exam pie of an
oath with the upUfted hand, in solemn appeal to God.
But Abram swears in his own method, and at tlie
same time in the deiiout, cuatumary mode of Mel-
ehizedec. For otlier examples, see chaps, xxi. 2o ;
xxvi. 28, etc.
14. In the elevated character of Abram, it is
worthy of particular notice and praise, that with his
entire renunciation of any advantage to himself, he
preserves the rights of his confederates, Mamre, etc.,
according to l)oth usage and equity.
1.5. It is remarkable, that this one chapter shows
us how the father of believers enters into these va-
* " Tfie brintrint; of the tithes was an actual recognition
of the priestly dignity of Melehizedec. Kur, in general
usage, the tenth is the sacred portion, which belongs to God,
and to his representatives." Baumgarten, p. 182 ; Bahr :
StjmboUk i. p. 179.— A. G.
(".A.bram, the blessed of Jehovah, and the mediator uf
blessings for all the people, allows hiinself to be blessed by
this royal priest, who stands beyond the line anil circle of
the pi-oinise. Abram, the .ancestof of Israel, of Aaron, and
Levi, of the people and the priesthood of the law, allows
himself to be blessed by this royal priest, who shows no t tie
through descent or the law. And not only so ; Abram, in
whom was the priestlv race which should receive the tithes,
^ve to this royal priest the tithes of all the spoil. There
IS, therefore, an estra-leg.il, royal priesthood, and priestly
kingdom, which this history typically prophesies, to whom
even Abram and bis seed should bow, to whom even the
Leviticjil priesthood should render homage ; for, just where
Abram stands in incnnip:irably the most striking typical
character, there Melehizedec enters and towers above bim.
Melehizedec is tlie setting sun of the primitive revelation,
which sheds its last rays upon the pati'iarchs, from whom
the true light of the world is to arise. The suu sets, that
when tte preparatory time of the patriarchs, the preparii-
tory tini3 of Israel, have passed away, it miy ^i^e again in
Jesus Chiist, the antitype." Delitzsch. — A. G.]
t ["There is here no indistinct allusion to the creation
of 'heaven a:id earth' mentioned in the opening of the
book of Gid. This is a manifest identification of the God
%i Melehizedec with the one creator and upholder of all
things." MrapHT, p. 289 — A. Q.!
ried forma of life, of war, of union with those whc
differed from himself in their modes of thought, o'
tithes, and of the oatli, as his intercourse witli the
world demanded. He uses the oath with the king
of Sodom, a man of the worhl, who a(>pear3 to have
doubted his unselfishness and inagnauimity.
16. We have here, also, the first stratagem, the
first celebration of victory, and the first priest.
\1. The first conflict of the hosts of faith with
the first appearance of the world-power. The hi*
torical examjile of the Maccabees, Waldenses, stc.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical portions. — Texts
for sermons on war, victory, deliverances, public
calls, and demands to duty, and upon the oath, etc.
War in a threefold form : 1. War of' violence ; 2. war
of a faint-hearted defence; 3. the rescuing war of
divine inspiration. — Alliances in a threefold form
1. Alliance for robbery; 2. the faint-hearted alii
ance for defence ; 3. alliance for life and death.—
Abram as a warlike prince. — Love of our brother as
a motive in war. — Abram's war and victory. — Cele-
bration of Abram's victory. — Melehizedec as a type
of Cliiist. — Christ also does not enter into worldly
wars, but he refreshes pious heroes with bread and
wine. — Bread and wine the refreshment of the king
of peace, for those who contend for God. — To every
one his own, particularly to faithful confederates.
Starke: This the first war which the Scripture
commemorates, and its cause was the lust of domin-
ion. (Let it be granted that Chedorlaomer had sub-
jugated the cities mentioned in ver. 2, in an unright-
eous way, still they were in the wrong, since the)
began to rebel, and in this way would regain their
freedom,* etc. — How can Abram help these rebels?)
— God used the four kings as rods to punish others.
Wurtemh. Bible: War and rebellion are evils above
all other evils ; indeed, a condensed epitome, as it
were, of all calamities and sorrows. — Osiaxder: If
the saints dwell with the godless, they must often be
brought down and punished with them. — (Query :
Whether Abram, with a good conscience, could
enter into a covenant with the Canaanites ? He
might make different excuses; e. g., it is not proven
that they were heathen ; finally, he could say cor-
rectly, one must discern and distinguish the times. —
Citation of Jewish fables : " In Abi-am's contest, all
the ihist (every staff?) became swords, and every
straw an airow.") Ver. 15. An instance of strata-
gem, Josh. viii. 2 ; Judg. xx. 29 ; 1 Sam. xv. 5. —
Cramer : God remembers even the poor captive.
— Covenants, even with persons not of our reli-
gion and faith, if made in a correct way, and with
a right purpose, are not wrong ; still, we must not
rely upon them (Deut. xx. 1). — Legitimate war. —
Against rash undertakings. — Osianohr : No external
power, but faith in God, gives the victory. — Ver. IS
Here, for the first time, a priest is spoken of. —
Cramer: Honor is the reward of virtue. — The tithes
of Abram. — Osiander : A Christian must even make
his possessions of service to the officers of the Church.
— Kings and princes, if God grants them victory
over their enemies, must not only give him public
* [It is not said in the narrative that they were wrong ;
and it is by no means clear that they were. Ilebellion may
be right. It is so, if the government is unjust and oppres-
sive, and there is good ri-ason to believe that success will at
tend their etforts to shake off the yoke of boiida^:.- -A. (i.
III?
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Ihanks, but present to him of tlie spoil tliey have
taken. — Teachers and princes must proft'er assistance
*o each other, and exchange temporal goods tor
epiritual (1 Oor. ix. 11. — Finally, upon the legitimate
oath ; renunciation of his own rights, the compe-
tency, the equitable vaijes or rewards of war,
Lisco; Abram's magnanimity overlooks all the
unbecoming deportment of Lot towards him ; he
Teiitures his life for him. — The central point in this
Darrative is the grace of God towards his chosen,
through which he plan's him in a condition to wage
victorious war with kuigs, and after the assured vic-
tory, the same grace brings kings to meet him, the
one in a thoughtful recognition, the other fawns in
subjection and begs. — Abram's freedom from sel-
fishness.— 0\LWER, Handfjuch : The humble man of
faith, a victorious warrior and hero. — The strength
of the Lord is mighty in the weak. — Schroder: No
greeting of blessing, no word of God falls from the
lips of this king of Sodom ; he is only thinking of
the earthly. — (Calvin) : It is worthy of praise, that
he is thankful to men if he is not ungrateful to God.
It is possible, of course, that tlds poor man, stript
of his goods, through a servile, hypocritical pretence
of modesty, might obtain from Al>ram, at least, tlie
captives and the free city for himself. (Calvin saw,
correctly, that Abram, as possessor of the people of
Sodom, and the conqueror of tlie rulers ol Sodom,
won for himself essentially a legitimate dominion
over Sodom, over which the king of Sodom would
pass as lightly as possible). — Abram bows himself
before Melchizedec, but before the king of Sodom
he lifts his hand. — Thus Abram recognizes and ac-
knowledges Melchizedec, while he penetrates to iti
depth the nature of the king of Sodom. As he ii
clearly conscious of his own high position, he con.
descends to the lower standpoint of the Sodoniitet
(out of which condescension the oath which h£
swears proceeds), in order thereby to recognize and
own the higher religious standpoint of Melchizedec
Tlie oath an act of worship. He testifies, thereby
tliat he had not undertaken the war from any lust of
gain, and cuts off the roots of all the soUcitation ti
covetousness (even all suspicion of the same) through
the name of God. — Passavant : Ps. .\ci. ; Rom. viii.
31. — Covenants for nmtual defence against such ex
peditions for plunder and lite were necessary, and
God permitted his servants among the Canaanites, tc
use such means of help and defence. — There is some-
thing greater than mine and thine, mightier than
victoiy and the power of the victor, stronger than
death, and it overcomes, indeed^ it inherits the world.
What is it? Every child of Abram can tell. — Taube:
We see in Abram's victory and blessing, the victory
and blessing of every one who is a soldier for God. —
The sacred history transplants us at once into the
midst of the turmoil of worldly aflTairs ; from the
quiet, peaceful tents of Abram, we are transferred to
the tumults of war of heathen nations. — Heuser:
The meeting of Melchizedec, the royal priest, with
Abram: ./. The historical event itself; h. the typical
elements in it; c. their realization; d. the importanc";
of these truths.
[This history must be placed in its New Testa-
ment light (Heb. vii.) if we would see its meaning
and importance. — A. G.]
FOURTH SECTION.
dbram tlie approved Warrior of Faith, and God his Shield and his Retcard. Hi* longing for an
Heir, and his thought of Adoption anticipating any exigency in the case. The great PromiM
of God. Abram's Faith under the Starry Heaven*. The Symbol of the Starry Heaveni
The righieonsness of Faith. The Covenant of Fuith, and the repeated Promise.
Chapter XV. 1-21.
1 After these things [events of the war] the word of the Lord came [renewed itself] unta
Abram in vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy siiield [in war even], and thy ex-
2 Deeding great reward [reward of the champion]. And Abram said. Lord God, what wilt thou
give me, seeing 1 go [continually] childle.s.=:, and the steward [the futuri' possessor] of my house
3 is this Ehezer [thcheipof Ood, Oodismy help] of Damascus? And Abram said, Behold to
me thou hast given no seed [bodily heir] : and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir
4 [on the way to become my heir]. And, beiiold, the Word of the Lord came unto him, saying,
Tliis shall not ha thine iieir; but he tliat shall come forth out of thine own bowels
5 [thine own nature] shall be thine heir. And he brought him forth abroad [oiien air], and
said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the star.s, if thou be able to number tlieiu. And
6 he said unto liim, So .sliall tliy seed be. And he believed in the Lord ; and he counted
7 it to him for righteousness. And he said luilo him, I am the Lord tliat brouglit thee
8 out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it. And he said. Lord God,
9 whereby [ijy what hii,^!] shall I know that I shall inherit it? And he said unto liim, Take
me [bring = sacriflm to inu] a lieiftT of three years old, and a she-goat of three years old, and a
10 ram of three years old, and a lurlle-dove, and a young pigeon. And he took un'o hnii
r8a«riflccdj all tliesc, and divided them [the animal sacrifice | in the midst, and laid each piece
CHAP. XV. 1-21.
*\»
1 1 one against another : but the birds divided he not. And when the fowls zt.me dowr
12 upon the carcasses [not carrion], Abrani drove them away. And when the sun was going
down, a deep sleep [na^np , chap, ii 2i ; Job w. 13] fell upon Abram ; and, lo, a horror or
13 great darkness fell upon him. And he said unto Abrara, Know of a surety that thy seed
shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs [thy desoendantsj, and shall terve them ; and
14 they sliall afflict them four hundred years ; And also that nation, whom they sliall serve,
15 will I judge; and afterward shall they come out with great substance. And thou ghait
16 go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt lie buried in a good old age. But in the fourth
generation they shall come hither again ; for the iniquity of the Amorites i? not yei
17 full [to the measure of judgment]. And it Came to pass, that, when the sun went - wn, and
it was dark, beliold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp [flame of are] that passed
18 between those pieces [of the sacrifice]. In that si>me day the Lord made a covenant with
Abram, saying, Unto tliy seed have I given [now in covenant] this land, from the river
19 of Egypt [Wady el Arisch] unto the great river, the river Euphrates : The [land of] Kenitea
[workers in iron, Judg. iv. 11, 17], and the Kenizzites [huntsmen
20 And the Hittites [fear, terror, in Hebron], and the Perizzites
21 And the Amorites [mountaineers, uplanders], and the Canaanites, [lowianders], and the Gir
gashites [dwellers upon the clayey soil], and the Jebusites [0127 . a place trodden as a threshinc-floor]
, and the Kadmonites [of the East],
rttstics], ami the Rephaim [giants],
GENERAL PEELIMINABT REMARKS.
1. The connection of this Section with the pre-
ceding events must be carefully observed. The two
chapters form essentially one history. Abram had
in I'aith waged war ag.aiust a fearful and superior
power ; hence the announcement to him : / (Jeliovah)
tm thy shield. He had renounced all claims upon
the spoil of war ; therefore he has the promise : I am
thy exceeding great reward, i. e., reward to the war-
rior. He had, through the fret^h, living, healthy in-
terchange between his faith and the world, which was
wanting in the hermit-like Melohizedee, kept himself
as a man of faith, to whom it belongs, to beget a
race of believers, who should stand in the midst of
the world, against the world and for the world.
2. The form of the present revelation of God
to Abram gives trouble to interpreters. Knobel
thinks that the communication, vers. 12-16, belongs
to a night-visiou ; on the other hand, the ue.\t suc-
ceeding utterances to the waking moments. Accord-
ing to Keil, the word of Jehovah comes to him in
visible Ibrms, neither through internal, immediate
converse, nor through dreams, but in an ecstacy
through an inward, spiritual beholding, and indeed,
in the day, and not in a nightrvision, as ch. xlvi. 2.
" The ntnaa , ver. 1, rules the whole chapter."
Against the first, it may be said, that the narrative
speaks of a vision from the very beginning ; against
the last, that Abram is led out to number the stars ;
against both, that they do not involve and bring out
any recognition of the psychological foim of the past
revelation. To us, it appears entirely in accordance
with the course of development of preceding revela-
tions, that Abram should first have received the
word of Jehovah, and then should have seen a mani-
festation of Jehovah, and that it is now said, the
word of Jehovah comes to him in vision. Abram,
truly, at tliis time, could not have received the reve-
lation from God without a dispo.sition for visions ;
but in the case before us, which treats of a revela-
tion of Jehovah by night, the visionary fitness of
Abram comes into special prominence. This dispo-
aition for the vision, and the prominence in which it
appears, does not exclude the reality of the following
jcts, which, also, Keil regards as only inward occur-
rence's But ak to the phrase : " Hp spal<;e to him in
visions ; " he accompanies the word in question with
the corresponding image : Abram saw the divine
shield and the divine treasures (Keil, p. 145).
EXE0ETICAL AND CRITICAL.
1. The promise of Jehovah, the starry heavens
and the righteousness of faith (vers. 1-6).* — Pear
not. The coward fears before the danger, heroic
spirits after. Abram had now an experience of the
world in its wicked violence, as he had victoriously
resisted its defiant challenge, and the beaten kings
might easily visit him with vengeance Therefore
he receives the consoling promise, that Jehovah him-
self would be his shield, his defence in all conflicts
(Ps. iii. 3 ; xviii. 2). — Thy exceeding great re-
'ward.'t' Not, perhaps, for thy general piety, but
the reward for thy heroic conflict. — .Vbram received
the promise of God with the same feeling of wtari-
ness of his natural life, with which Moses at eighty
years received the divine call to go to Egypt and free
the people. He wished to establish his family. la
Jehovah his exceeding great reward, then there
naturally follows some one application of the prom-
ise to his personal relations ; but he sees no other
application, than that God himself would be his ex-
clusive reward, that thus, as to this world, this Elie-
zer of Damascus,}; his steward (cli. xxiv. 2), must be
his heir. The thought is painful to him, but he
acquiesces in the purpose of God, and desires only
light as to the meaning of the promise, whether it is
to be understood only of an heir by adoption, in
* [ Tilt word of the Lard came or luas. " This is the first
place in the Bible where this phrase occurs, and it intro-
duces a prophetic vision and promise of Abram's posterity
in Christ — the incarnate word." Wordsworth. — A. G. ]
[The "i::!* is emphatic— A. G.)
t [The rendering " thy reward is exceeding great," al-
though consistent with the original, and yielding a good
sense, fails to bring out clearly the prominent thought In
the promise. It is not the great tilings which Jehovafc
would give, but Jehovah himself, to which the mind of
Abram is turned as his reward. — A. G.]
I [There i;* an obvious paranomasia here — btn-mtstiek —
Dnmmesek. Wordsworth, after Lightfoot and others, callc
attention to the f ict, that the name Eliezcr is the same ax
Lazarus in our Lord's parable (Luke svi. 20), and to thf
anabtgy between that parable and this history. These
"silent analogies between the Old and New Testament*"
are strildng and important. — A. G.l
«10
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
which case lliis Eliezer appears to him the most
worthy. He desires mdst of all a decisive sentence,
therefore his proposition of the thing by anticipation.
Upon this allusion depends the marvellous tradition
that Abram had been king of Damascus (Joseph.,
Antiq. i. 7, 2 ; Justin., xxxvi. 2). — To me thou
haat given no seed. The pious complaint of hu-
man weiikuis-; beffire God must be distinguislied
from the impious murmurs aeiainst God (Exod. v.
11; xxxiii. 12-15; Numb. xi. 11, 21; .(osh. vii.
7 ; Job ; the prophets). — One bom in my house
(son of my house).* It is not synonymous with house-
born. It has a deeper meaning; it designates the
most esteemed servant of his house. — Eliezer, he
says, is already upon the way to become my heir.
It is a complaining thought, which forma itself into
a resigned proposition, but a proposition which veils
a question. Upon this follows the divine decision
(ver. 4). Jehovah leads him out of his tent, under
the heavens as seen by night. His disposition, pre-
paredness for the vision, does not exclude the reality
of these events.f He had promised him at first one
Datura) heir. But now tlie countless stars which he
sees, should both represent the innumeralile seed
which should spring from this one heir, and at the
eame time be the warrant for his faith. Jehovah
shows him the image of his descendants, in the stars
of heaven. We recognize here the orientalist from
Dr of the Chaldees, for whom the lights of heaven
have a religious significance, but at the same time
the free monotheist, who no longer seeks in the stars
his gods, but the image of his children. Tliat God
who speaks to him, can give to him a seed, count-
less as the stars in heaven, is truly prosu|)posed ;
the representation of the countlessness of his de-
ecendants is the main thought, to which cleave the
tll0ught^ of their shining glory and their he;ivenly
character fsee chap. xxii. 17; xxvi. 4; Exod. xxxii.
13). — And he believed in the Lord. This can-
not be either an element of a dream, or merely of a
mind prepared peculiarly for visions, for it is an act
of faith on the part of Abram, which was counted to
him for righteousness by Jehovah. Knobel re-
marks: " ."Vbram did not laugh, incredulously, as in
the Elohistic section, xvii. 17," as if a believer, in
the long delay of the promise, could never fall into
doubt, (although there is no mention of any incredu-
lity in the passage referred to). Keil asks: "How
did Mipses know that Abiam believed? and that Je-
liovah counted it to him lor righteousness?" He
luswers: "He proves liis faitli, because, accor-ding
to the following directions, he brought the sacrifices,
and because what Jehovah did with the animals was
a real declaration on his part, that he counted to
Abram his faith for rigliteousncss." We must dis-
tinguish, however, the inward events IVoni these
sacramental signs, in which tliey are visilily mani-
t'estcd and sealed. The faith of Abram in llie prom-
ise of a boditi/ heir was tlie central point in the de-
velopment of his faith ; with this faith he enjoyed
the C'insciousness that Jehovah counted it to him lor
righteousness. Justification by faith, as an experi-
ence of the inner life, manifests itself in the peace
* rBftiunf^rten suggests that Eliezer vaa bom at Domas-
tUM ; then the T'^a ^3 is not Eliezer, but his son, p. 185.
-A. O.l
[IIi-li. Smt 0/ my house i» inlieritinff vie; 80 also in the
Ith verso, there thall not inherit thee thii one.— A.. 0.1
t ('I'horo IM no inipji8sul)le cleft or abyss between tbo
•phoreff of vision and of senst-, or between *bo superseUBi-
ble and the sonmblo. — A, 0.)
of God ; and Abram could have given testimony ai
to this to his children, if nothing had occurred as tc
the sacrificial animals and their consumption by fire
The explanation of Knobel, " a right disposition ot
heart is of just as much avail to him as integrity in
acts," is both tame and shallow.
[This is confessedly an im[iortant passage. W«
liave here, and in the promise (ver. ! ), the geim o{
the great doctrine of the Lord our righteousiieM,
We may not attach to the words here used the idea*
in all their definiteness, which have been derived
from the use which the Apostle makes of them
in his discussion of the question, how a sinner can
be justified (Rom. iv. 4, 6, 10, 18-25) ; but neither
may we overlook his inspired exposition, and strive
to interpret the words, as if they stood entirely by
themselves. Leaving this out of view, however, it
is clear " that Abram had no righteousness of his
own, that righteousness was imputed to him, that it
was faitli in Jehovah in him which was counted for
righteousness ; " and further, that this faith is viewed
here, not merely as the root of all true obedience to
the will of God, and thus the sum of righteousness
or personal holiness, but as embracing and stead-
fastly resting upon (as the word rendered believed,
here means) God, as the God of grace and salvation.
It is the act by which he goes out from himself, and
reUes upon God, for righteou.^ness and grace. Thn
history clearly shows that there was this entiio re-
moval from the natural ground upon wliich he had
stood, and this entire, hearty, steadfast n.'sting upon
Jehovah, " who is just and having siilvation. The
promise which Abram's faith •■mhruced \\as the
promise of salvation through th"> covenant seed, and
lie so regarded it. His faith, therefore, was essen-
tially the same with that specific faith in Christ
which is said to justify (see Rom. iv. 13). The Notes
of Kurtz, Baumgarten, Murphy, are suggestive and
valuable ; and the exposition of Calvin is admirable, —
:'wn . to think, desire, purpose ; then to esteem, reck-
on, impute, set to one's account, 2 Sam. xix. If; Pa.
xxxii. 2 ; Lev. vii. 18 ; xvii. 2 ; Num. xviii. 27 .^A. G.]
2. T/ie Covenant Sacrifice and the Covenant in
reference to Canaan (vers, 7-17). Jehovah gave to
Abram the starry heavens as a sign of the promise
of an heir. Now he promises to Abram the laiul of
Canaan for his possession (ver, 7). Abram asks a
sign for this.* Jehovah appoints the covenant which
lie would conclude with him over his sacrifices, for a
sign. He determines, also, at first, the sacrifice
which Abram should bring. The animals named
here, are the sacrificial animals of ihe Levitical
cultus. The future possession of Canaan was repre-
sented beforehand in the sacrifices of Canaan. ■]• The
sacrificial animals were all divided (hence n''"i3 ns ,
to hew, cui a covenant), except the birds, and the
dissevered parts laid over against each other.
" The ceremonial of the covenant of old consisted
in the contracting parties pa.s.sing between the dead
animals, with tlie imprecation, that in case of a
breach in the covenant, it might be done to them as
to these animals." Against which Keil (who, how-
* [Not, however, na expressinp any doubt, but as th«
natural wnrkinp and fruit of his faith.— A. (i.l
[Ver. 7. ■ I am the Lord that brouplit thee, etc. Seetb*
*' Preface to the Ten Commandments," Jacobus, p. 268.—
A. ti.|
t I llaumKiirten say.s that ns tins sacrifice wiib a covona&l
sncrihce, ami lay at the foundation of all tbo sacrificee of th#
covenant, all the animals used in those sncnUrcs were hsa%
reuuircd. — A. Q.l
CHAP. XV. 1-21.
41]
ever, withoot sufficient ground, denies that this act
had the peculiar nature of a sacrifice), remarl;s:
" This interpretation of ancient usage is not sui>port-
ed by Jer. xxxiv. IS." "The interpretation wliich
the prophet here gives to the syniljolic usage, can
only be a fuller explanation, whicli does not exclude
another original idcM of the symbol. The division
of the s;icrificial animals probably only typified the
twofold character of the c-jvenant; and the passage
of the two contracting parties between the parts of
the one sacrifice, typified their reconciliation to a
unity." This would be in accordance with the anal-
ogy of the symbol of the ancients, the te^era /wspl-
ta is, which was also divided into two parts in order
to represent the alliance or union of the two posses-
sors of the divided little table. Jehovah himself
does not, indeed, appear as sharing in the offering
of the sacrifice, but as a sharer in the sacrificial least,
which was sign:dized in the later thank-offering, in
the show-bread, and essentially in all sacrifices. If
the man who presents the sacrifice gives himself
away to God, so Jehovah gives himself into commu-
nion with that man; forms a covenant with him.
The individual specimens of the collective sacrificial
:inimals, designate, in Calvin's view, all Israel in all
its parts, as one sacrifice. In the three years age,
Theodoret finds an intimation of the three genera-
tions of bondage in Egypt ; which Keil approves,
with a refereuce to Judg. vi. 25 (seven years' bond-
age, a seven year old Imllock). The further intima-
tions ol" numbers :n the passage, to wit, a number
seven, five, and eight, Keil rejects. — And 'when the
fowls came do'wn. The pieces lay for some time,
unconsumed by the fire, and attracted the birds of
prey, which would have polluted and preyed upon
them, had not Abram driven them away. These
are the heathen, the enemies of Israel, who would
corrupt and destroy it, impure powers like the birds
of prey, which were held as unclean by the Jews.
The hawk was sacred to the Egyptians, but the later
Jews represented the opposition between Jews and
heathen, through the dove and sparrow-hawk (see
Knobel). But Abram, in his faith, remained the
guardian-spirit of Israel, who secured its sacreil des-
tination (Ps. cv. 4-2). — Ver. 12. And when the
sun Twas going down.* From this reference to
the time, we may .judge what was the marvellous
attention and watchfulness of Abram. The great
scene of the revelation began on the previous night ;
he had stood under the starry heavens as holding a
solemnity ; the victims were slain, and the pieces
distributed, and then the watch over them was held
until the setting of the sim. His physical strength
sinks with it, a deep sleep (HTiTin) overcomes him.
But the disposition for visions preserves itself in the
sleep, and so much the more, since it is even the
deep, prophetic sleep. Abram sees hunself over-
taken by a great horror of darkness, which the word
of Jehovah explains to him. It was the anticipation
of the terror of darkness, which, with the Egyptian
bondage, should rest upon the people. This Ijond-
dge itself is pointed out to him, under three or four
circumstances : 1. They would be oppressed and tor-
mented in this service ; 2. it would endure four hun-
dred years ; 3. the oppressing people should be
judged ; t. they should come out of the bondage
with great substance. It is to be distinctly observed,
that the name of this people, and the land of this
•er»itude, is concealed. Moreover, there are further
* [Heb., was about to go down. — A. G. 1
disclosures which concern the relation of the patri
arch to this sorrow of his descendants. He hhnseli
should go to his fathers in peace in a good, that is
great age. But his people should reach Canaan in
the fourth generation after its oppression, from which
we may infer that a hundred years are reckoned as i
generation.* — For the iniquity of the Amorites
is not yet full. The Amorites, as the mo.>-t power-
ful tribe of the Canaanites, stand here for tl.t whole
people (Josh. xxiv. 15). Israel's inheritance of Ca-
naan is limited by the judgment upon the Canaanites;
but this judgment itself is limited and conditioned
by righteousness, according to which the measure
of iniquity must first be lull.^Ver. 1 7. Behold a
smoking furnace. This new manifestation must
not be regarded as belonging to the dream vision,
but as the intuition of the waking ccrasciousness,
under the form of a vision. For the divine accept-
ance of the sacrifice cannot be fulfilled in a dream,
any more than the faith of Abram, than his sacrifice,
or the making of the covenant itself. — The smoking
furnace is analogous to the burning bush, and pillar
of fire of Moses. That it here designates the anger
of (iod (Keil) is not supported by Ps. xviii. 9.f The
fire-symbols are not always symbols of the consuming
anger of God (as perhaps the seraphim), but also
signs of purifying and saving judgments, as the pillar
of fire, and pre-eminently the fire upon the altar of
burnt-offering. And beyond doubt, in the sense of
this passage, Jehovah goes with the sacrificial fire
between the pieces of the animals. That the pieces
were not laid upon the altar, arises from the mode
of forming a covenant, according to which the con-
tracting parties must pass between them. Abram
had gone between them long before the evening.
Now Jehovah goes through in the sacrificial flame.
The image of the sacrifice signifies that the sacrificial
fire should never be extinguished in Israel ; this is
visibly represented, moreover, under the flame of the
altar. We must recognize clearly, that it is incredi-
ble that the flame should pass between the pieces of
the sacrifice without consuming them. But the flanje
cannot designate the judgments of God upon the
oppressors of Israel (Keil), since the pieces indeed
designate Israel. But neither the judgments upon
Israel, since the pieces which signify Israel were
already divided, i. e., offered and dedicated to God.
The sacrificial fire, as an eflicient element of change,
changes the flesh into a sweet savor for Jehovah, and
the judgment of an earthly dissolution into an act of
deliverance, into a new, heavenly existence.
3. TTie foundinr; of the Covenant and its signiji-
c.Dice (vers. 17-21). — Unto thy seed have I given
this land. The covenant which Jehovah makes
with Abram relates especially to the grant of the
land of Canaan to his descendants. Hence, also, it
is sealed with the offering of the sacrificial animals
usual in the land. — From the river of Egypt.
Keil holds that it is the Nile, because it is nrj , not
bns (Numb, xxxiv. 5). Knobel, on the other hand,
rem.arks correctly : " The Nile cannot be intended,
since the Euphrates would not have been described
as the great river in opposition to it." It is thus
* [Ver. 13. Know of a surety. Know, ktww thou. Kno*
certainly. This responds to Abram's question, WberetJ
shall I know ? ver. 8. Mcepht, p. 218.— .\. G.]
t [Kiiriz regards tbis as the first appearance of the
Schecninah, and says : " It is the symliol of the graciouj
presence of God : tlie splendor of his glory, tbe consuming
tire of his holiness, which no mere human eye can bear, be-
fore which no sinful child of n m can st^nd, is veiled benca*!
his (trace," p. 180.- -A. G.l
«)2
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK DF MOSES.
tlie Wady el Arisch, brook of Egypt, otherwise called
Rhinocolura, lying at the southern limits of Israel
(Numb, sxxiv. 5; Josh. xv. 4; Is. xxvii. 12); not
the Nile, because an oratorical liyperliole would not
sfTee with the exact bounding of tlie land.
[HENosTE.NBERii, lieitriige, vol. iii. p. 265. urges
in favor of the Nile not only the term which is used,
^n:, and which is not interchangeable with the term
for a small stream or brook, bnj. but also that the
passage is rhetorical, as is clear from the fact that
the tribes which the Israelites were to dispossess
were purely Canaanitish, and no more extended to
the Euphrates than to the Nile. Kurtz adds, tliat
these two streams are here used as representative
of the two great world-powers between which Israel
should dwell. It is thus a prediction that the de-
scendants of Abram should have an independent ex-
istence by the aide of these two great empires, and
that no nation should have any permanent sway be-
tween them and these two empires. So tliat their
dominion may be said to reach from the Euphrates
to the Nile. — These two rivers aie, moreover, con-
stantly referred to in the later Scriptures, as the ex-
treme boundaries of Israel. See Is. xxvii. 12; Jer.
ii. 18. In its best days too, the Israelitish dominion
reached, to all intents, to Egypt, since all, or nearly
all the intervening powers were subject to David and
Solomon. Wilkinson liolds that the word IN"' .
river, a form of which is here used, is the Hebrew
form of the Egyptian word Jaro, river, applied to
the Nile; see BrsH, Notes, p. 255.— A. G.]
The Israelitish dominion should reach to the Eu-
phrates, and did actually "in its best days" reach to
it, but there is no record of its extension to the Nile.
We are not dealing here with a prophetic and spiritual
word, but witli the definite bounds of the land, for
the race of Abram, as is clear also from the follow-
ing enumeration. " Ten tribes are enumerated going
from the soutliern border to the north, in order to fix
and di-epen the impression of unirersahty and com-
pleteness, of which the number ten is the symbol —
no tribes are excepted oi- spared (Delitzsch). In
other passages, sometimes seven (Deut. vii. 1 ; Josh.
iii. 10), six (Ex. iii. S, 17; xxiii. 23; Deut xx. 17),
five (Ex. xiii. 5), or even two (Gen. xiii. 7), are
named; or finally, all are embraced under the com-
mon name, Canaanites." Keil. The number ten is
not, however, the number of completeness (that is
twelve), but the number of. a completed develop-
ment; here of the eoni[ilet'd development of the
Canaanites for judgment. The llivites (ch. x. 17)
are here omitted. The Hivites at Hermon, in the
region of Lebanon, were afterwards driven out, but
the Hiiites at Gibeon were graciously spared (Judg.
iii. 3; Josh. xi. 10). "The Kenites were an Ama-
lekitish — originally Arabian tribe, southerly from
Canaan (Numb xxiv. 21 ; 1 Sim. xv. G; xxvii, 1(1;
XXX. 2t)), of whom a pan afterwards removed to Ca-
naan (Judg. i. Hi; iv. 11, 17)." Knob.d.— The
Kenizzites. There is a reference to Kcnaz, an
Edomite (chap, xxxvi. 16, 42), with which Knobcl
joins the passage before us, but Keil objects, be-
cause he correctly assumes that Kenaz nnist have
descended from Edom, without bringing into account
the mingling of the Edomites with the original in-
hiiliitanlM of the land. The Kadmon.-.-«, also, are
never anywhere more clearly determined.*
* [They seom to have been tho more eastern, and to
nave neld the other extreme boundary o ' tho proiniHed land,
lowordi the Kupliratcn. Moupht. p. 31/0.— A. O.)
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. For the vision, see the Exegetical remarks
The vision of a shield and of a vast treasure, bring!
to remembrance the numerous revelations of God
through images in the prophets, especially in Jere-
miah and Zechariah. We must distinguish here tht
threefold form of the one revelation made througt
visions: 1. Revelation through images; 2. through
the woi'd ; 3. through the vision in deep sleep, upon
which there follows still a revelation to the waking
consciousness through the word The prophetic
frame of mind on the part of Abram is very extra-
ordinary, since it continued through a whole night
and day, and into the following night.
2. The stages of the promise which Abram re-
ceived, viewed, as to its genealogical se(iuence, may
be regarded in this order: 1. Thou shalt be a man
of blessing, and shalt liecome a great people (ch. xii.
1); 2. to thy seed will I give this land (ch. xii. 7);
3. to thy seed the land, to thy land thy seed (ch. xiii.
14). Here (ch. xv. 18), the promise of the seed and
the land was sealed in the form of a covenant.
4. The promise of a seed advances in the form of *
covenant to the assurarice that God would be the
God of his seed (ch. xvii. 7). 5. The promise is
more definite, that not Islimael Imt the sou of Sarah
should be his heir(ch. xvii, 15 fif,). 6. The heir was
promised in the next yeai' (ch. xviii. 10). 7. The
whole promise in its richest fulness was sealed by the
oath of Jehovah (ch. xxii.).
3. The grand thought : God is our shield, or de-
fence against all evil; God himself is our greatest
reward or highest good; is the introductory com-
pletion of all religious desires and hopes. But man
can remain upon this high standpoint only with the
greatest difficulty. This is manifest from the appli-
cation to practical uses and gains which Abram
makes: Lord, what wilt thou give ine ? Although
this application to his own advantage, carried out in
a childlike spirit, is perfectly consistent with his faith.
4. Abram under the starry heavens, and his
righteousness of faitli. The peculiar determination
of the character of the patriarchal religion. Here
first, the full importance of faith comes into view.
Here also, first, the reckoning ol' righteousness cor-
responding therewith. From this point onward, both
fundamental thoughts run through the holy scrip-
ture (see Rom. iv ; James ii.).* The future of the
Evangelical church was prepared on that night. It
was the one peculiar bloonnng hour of all salvation
by faith. But we must not, therelore, so weaken
and lower the idea of righteousness, that we should
explain it as equivalent with integrity, or in similar
ways. Righteousness is tlie guiltless position or
standing in the forum of right, of justice.f The
* [Righteousness must be had, or there is no salvation.
Men nave lost righteousness, and th.' ijower to gain it.
How can it be serured ? It is by faith. It is counted to
believers ; see for illustration Lev. vii. 18 ; xvii. 4 ; 2 Sam,
xix. 19, and Eoui. 4.— A. G.l
[JACOBUS, Notes, p. 267. 1. Abram had no righteousness
^r justification. 2 Faith is not imputed to him us a work,
as a meiit irinus ground of justifieotion, Init only as in-tru-
meutal, laying hold on a perfect ri£.dUeou>ness. 3. The
law could not el. I im any other than a perfect rii^diteousncss—
his own or anothel's imputed to liim— set to fiis aeeouDt,
And this is the gospel plan of salvation — to reelton the per-
fect rightoonsnesH received by faith, as oui' lighteousnjst
for lustiflciition. — A. O.l
t (KuttTZ : He is righteous who, througli the frocdoxu
of his will, confomlB to tlic divine idea and en 1 of his being
WoEDSwoBTH is bettor: Kightoousness is that itato ii trhiot
OHAP. XV. 1-21.
4i:i
forum in wliicli Abram stands here, is the forum of
the innard life before God. In this he was, on the
ground of his faith, declared righteous, through the
vroid and the Spirit of God. Hence we read here,
also, first of his peace, ver. 15.
6. The difference between the four hundred years,
ver. 13, and .^ets vii. 6, and the four hundred and
thirty years, Ex. xii. 40, is explained, not only by
the use of round, prophetic numbers here, but also
from the fact, that we must distinguish between the
time when the Israelites generally dwelt in Egypt,
and the period when they became enslaved and
oppressed. Paul counts (Gal. iii. 17) the time be-
tween the promise and the law, as four hundred and
thirty yeiirs. in the thought that the closing date of
the time of the promise was the death of Jacob (Gen.
xlix.). See the Introduction ; and for the difference
in question, Delitzsch, p. 371.
[Note upon the four hundred tears Afflic-
tion AND Servitude of Israel. — It is confessedly
a matter of dispute how these four hundred years
are to be computed. Some fix the birth of Isaac as
the starting-point, others the entrance of Jacob into
Egypt. The difficulty does not lie in reconciling the
different statements of the Scripture, but in bringing
any conclusion formed upon these statements, into
harmony with a general system of Chronology.
Baumgarten says : The principal thing in the threat-
ening, tlte first word in the description of the sor-
row, is an announcement of their condition as
strangers, """il ""''!'"!7 ''?• "^^^ description, there-
fore, in his view, covers the period of their sojourn
in Canaan, during which they were strangers. He
urges, in favor of this, the words of the Apostle (Gal.
iii. 17), and the fact that the Israelites were to come
out in the fourth generation ; a generation obviously
falling far short of a hundred years. They were to be
there,butthree gener.ations. The genealogical table,
Exod. vi. 16 ff. favors a much shorter residence than
four hundred years ; since the combined ages of the
persons there mentioned, Levi, Kohath, Amram, in-
cluding the years of Moses at the time of the exo-
dus, amount to only four hundred and eighty-four
years, from which we must take, of course, the age
of Levi, at the entrance of Jacob into Egypt, and
the ages of the different fathers at the birth of their
sons. It is better, therefore, with Wordsworth,
Murphy, Jacobus, and many of the earlier commenta-
tors, to make the four hundred years begin with the
birth of Isaac, and the four hundred and thirty of
the apostle to date from the call of Abram. — A. G.]
6. The demand for a sign relates to the promise
of the land, not the promise of a seed. The starry
heavens was the sign of the latter promise to him.
Compare the similar demand of Gideon (Judg. vi.
17), and of Uezekiah (2 Kings xx. 8). The pious
and believing desire for a sign points to a divine
assurance, the impious to an unsanctified knowledge,
or, indeed, a doubt. The constant form of the pious
desire for a sign, is the beUeving enjoyment of the
wcraraents.
7. The sacrificial animals. See Leviticus.
8. The birds of prey. Compare Matthew xiii.
18, 19.
9. The profound sleep. Compare ch. ii. 21 ;
Biblework, p. 209. 7%ou shall go to thy fathers in
peace. With faith in the grace of God, the future is
cnan's will is conformed to God's will — that state In which
Adam was created, bat from which lie fell by sin, u. 74. —
not only made clear ard t;lorified (John viii. 36), bir
the other world also i.-; illuiuiuated.
10. The iniciuities of the Amorites. See Ex
xxxiv. 11, 14 ; Lev. xviii. 24 ; xx. 23 ; Numb, xxxiii
52, 5.t; Josh, xxiji. 12. — No people is dcstroyec
whose iniquity is not full.*
11. Both Delitzscpi (p. 373) and Keil (p. 151),
assert that there is no account here of a peculiai
sacrifice of a covenant, nor of a peculiar covenant
Against the sacrifice of the covenant, it is said that
Abram did not pass between the pieces of the sacri
fice ; but this is a pure supposition, .^gainst the idea
of a covenant, that there is no account of a pactio, but
simply of a sponsio, a solemn promise of God to men.
Let it be observed, however, that upon this interpre-
tation the moral force in the doctrine of the covenant
relation of God to the believer is fatally ignored,
and that this interpretation also threatens to changt
the covenant lilessing of the Christian sacramenta
from a moral to a magical blessing. The subject o(
the promise, Delitzsch remarks, excludes the idea
of reciprocity. " In the covenant," says Keil,
" which God concludes with man, the man does not
stand as upon mutual and equal terms with God, but
God grounds the relation of communion, through his
promise, and his gracious condescension, to mat.,
whereljy he is first prepared to receive, and then,
through the reception of the gifts of grace, is pre-
pared to discharge the duties flowing out of the
covenant, and thus made obligatory upon him."
Although the covenant of God with believing hu-
manity, i« not a contract between equals, but God
founds the covenant, it does not follow, that his
founding it is a simple promise, although, even a
simple promise, without some moral motive giving
rise to it, would be absurd. But now, according to
Rom. iv. the foundation of the gracious covenant
of God with Abram, was not laid in the covenant of
circumcision (Gen. xvii.), but in the covenant of
faith (ch. XV. i.f Hence the Jewish Targums, and
after them. Christian theologians, have found in this
chapter the forming of a covenant according to the
explicit declaration, ver. 17. Delitzsch himself, upon
ch. xvii., says first: "God sealed his covenant with
Abr.ara," but then further, " God founded his cove-
uaiit with Abrjun." But Keil, p. 155, remarks :
" Long before, at least, long years before, God had
established his covenant with Abram." We make
the following distinction : in ch. xv., the eternal,
Viilid covenant of faith was concluded ; in ch. xvii.
the specific, old covenant of circumcision, the pro-
visional sealing of the covenant of faith, of which,
under the New Testament, baptism and the Lord's
Supper are the senls. If we recall, that the relation
between the Lord and his church is that of the
bridegroom and the bride, we shall truly dismiss the
assumption of a magical working and efficacy of the
covenant, and return to the high estimate of moral
relations in the kingdom of personal life, in which
also the passive position, which the Formula Cone.
recognizes and holds in conversion is to be conceived
as a moral state — in which the soul is held in the
* (The Lord administers th« affairs of nations on tlM
principle of moral rectitude. Murpht, p. iQtt. Words-
worth calls attention to ttiis sentence in its relation to th«
destruction of the Can.lanites by Israel, p. 76. — A. G.l
t [Kurtz holds th.at Abram did not now pass between
the pieces ; that this is but one side of the oovenant, in
which God. but not Abram, brintrs himself under covenan*
obligation ; and that the covenant is computed and ratified
by Abram in the transactions. Ch. xvii. p. 179.— A. G.l
♦It
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Attitude of waiting, and does not grasp beforehand —
produced in the strength of the iiratia prctveniens,
and not as a pure creatur ely and unconcerned yield-
ing of one's self to the pleasure of another.
HOMILETICAI, AND PEACTICAL.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. — The
great thought: God himself is our God: 1. Our
■hield; 2. our great reward (comp. Rom. viii.). — It
is allowed the saints, to ask : Lord, Lord, what wilt
thou give me? — We learn from Abram to con.'^ult
with God — as to our affairs; — to dehberate with
Jehovah as to our future. — Ter. 4. If the lesser is
denied us, that itself intimates a grant of the higher.
— In submission we are near the highest promises and
gifts. — Abram, the childless, shall become the father
of nations. — Abram in the starry night. — The word
of God in the starry night. — The faith of Abram:
1. Abram a believer ; 2. a father of believers (Rom.
iv.); 3. a father of all believers, especially of be-
lievers from the circumcision. — Abram's righteous-
ness of faith. — The key-note of his righteousness of
faith : 1 . The blessing has overcome the curse in liis
heart and life : 2. he will overcome it iu the world
through his seed ; his children shall be as the stars
of heaven. — The high antiquity of Evangelical faith.
— The covenant of God with Abram. — Abram's pro-
phetic sleep. — The holy land : I. In the hteral sense;
2. as a type of the promised fatherland of believers.
— The certainty of the promises of God. — The first
mention of the grave cheerful and friendly. — The
graTe already illuminated and glorified with the
glimpse of the life beyond.
Starke: Lange: Fear and discouragement may
Bometimes assail the strongest heroes of faith ; it is
well, however, when they are not allowed to reign
(Ps. Uxxiv. 12; Rom. viii. IT; Ps. Ixxiii. 25,26;
cxlii. 6) — [When some astronomers have attempted
to specify the immber of stars, and one asserts that
there are 1392, another 17ii9, and still another,
7uOO, these are pure conjectures, upon which they
cannot agree among themselves. 'Then, too, there
are the thousands of stars, so remote in space, that
they are not visiljle through the best telescopes. It
would have been a small consolation to Abram, if
his seed should only equal the small number of stars
specified.] — Rom, iv. 3 ; Gal. iii. 6 ; James ii. 23. —
Ver. 3. What a great thing, is it not, to be near
a prudent householder! — Ckamer: If we will be
counsellors of God, we will do it to our injury. —
tiod places before the reason, incomprehensible (and
incredible) things; for, what we can comprehend,
there is no necessity that we should believe.* — God
foreknows all things. — Ver. 15. This is a pleasant
description of death. — In what a good age consists.
— The burial of the dead is a primitive custom, of
which this is the first notice. We never find, in the
Holy .'Scriptures, any mention of the burning of tlie
dead, curtomary among the heathen ; or of any other
way than of buri:il (Judg. ii. 9). — God exi-rcises a
constant foresight, even over the seed of believers.
LiSRo: The war with the kings, although victo
rioiuly ended, might provoke retaliation afterwards ;
thus the present state of Abram's mind is connected
with his previous state. Ver. 2. God is here for the
* (Tbla sbvionaly needn modification.— A. O.I
first time called Adonai. — Ver. 6. Abram is imde)
the trial or test. — Although Abram possessed sc
many beautiful and noble qualities of heart, and it
his walk manifests so many virtues, yet he is not,
through all these, righteous before God, not iu the
possession of the divine favor, for there is also sin
in him, etc. This defect his faith, his living confi-
dence in God (more precisely, the word of tiod which
he grasps in his faith), supplies — The justification
of the sinner by faith, is the only way of righteous-
ness, before, during or after the giving of the law. —
Ver. 15. Go to thy fathers. They must then still live
upon the other side of death, in another state and
lite ; the contiuued existence after death is here evi-
dent, and, indeed, as the word in peace, iutimates, a
blessed exi.<tence for the pious. — Ver 16. All na-
tions hold their land, likewise, in fee from God, and
will be deprived of it when their rebellion against
the Lord their God has reached its full height. Thus
the Amorites, and thus the IsraeUtes at the exile,
and the second destruction of Jerusalem. — Ver. 17.
The flame of fire is the sign of the gracious presence
of God, and of his pleasure in the sacrifice (Lev. ix.
24). — Gerlach : Abram confesses his pain and grief.
— Without the least apparent human probability, he
trusts unconditionally upon the divine and gracious
promise. The word "believed" is here exact, or
precise ; he cleaves to the Lord (precisely : he stays,
supports, rests himself upon the Lord). — The three
years old animals, because fully grown ; faultless
animals nmst be chosen for sacrifice. — Ver. 16. To
go to his fathers(ch. xxv. 8; xxxv. 29; xlix. 29,
33 ; Diut. xxxii. 50 ; 2 Kings xxii. 20). The beauti-
ful expression for the life after death, testifies that
even in the highest antiquity, the outlook into the life
on the other side of the grave, was neither dark nor
gloomy. — (Ver. 17. Description of the oriental fur-
nace ; a great, cylindrical-shaped fiie-pot). — Calwer,
Handhuch : .^.brjim's doubt, and newly str-engthened
faith. He believed without the sight. — Bunskn : [a
marvellous translation ; The Son of Mesek, posses-
sion, is my house, Eliezer a Damascene]. — Schroder :
The present and future of Abram — He is suggesting
to God (with the Eliezer). Ch. xvi. states another
project, sprmgmg out of the weakness of his faith.
Abram sees not, he believes. — Here appears for the
first time the word, whose nature and strength we
have recognized from the first ijromise onward, and
especially in the previous history of Abram, — Hess:
Ver. 13. To prevent Egypt's becommg hateful to
him, the land was not named (this concealment ia
rather a trait which attests and authenticales the gen-
uine prophecy). — The flame of fire is typical of the
divine presence and majesty. — Schwenkb: Ver. 6,
We agree with Luther, this is the great word in tliia
book — TAtJBE: The temptation of the believer:
1. What is the highest necessity? 2. the highest
Consolation ? 3. How can one pass out from the higli-
est necessity into the greatest consolation? — HoF-
MANN : It was the review of faith which fitted Abram
to look out into the future. He looked onward to
the blessed re^t of the people of God, but he could
not do this, excejit as he recognized in (»ud, the re-
storer of that life of man — his own life, the lil'c of
his seed, and of the race — perverted and fallen by
sin, and buidened with the cur.-e. Dark Mnd troubled
it may well be, were the thoughts of the father of
the faithful, but the experience of his heart and lift
were sure
CHAP. iVI. 1-1«.
4i:
FIFTH SECTION.
Abram'i Coneestion to Sarai's Impatience. Abrani and Hagar. Hagar's Flight. The Angel o/ iht
Lord. Hagar^s Return, and hhmaeVs Birth.
Chapter XVI. 1-16.
1 Now Sarai, Abram's wife [in the face of the previous promise], bare him no children : and
2 she had an handmaid, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar [flight, fagitive]. And Sarai
said unto Abvam, Behold now, the Lord hath restrained me from bearing ; I pray thee
go in unto my maid; it may be that I may obtain [bebuiided] children by her. And
3 Abrani hearkened to the voice of Sarai. And Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar her
maid tilt, Egyptian, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave
her to 'ler husband Abram to be his wife.
4 Aiii he went in unto Hagar, and she conceived : and when she saw that she had
5 conceived, her mistress was despised in her eyes. And Sarai said unto Abram, My
wrong be upon thee : I have given my maid into thy bosom ; and when she saw that
she had conceived, I was despised in lier eyes : the Lord judge between me and thee.
6 But Abram rfald unto Sarai, Behold tliy maid is in thy hand ; do to her as it pleaseth
thee [is good in VI. '-ne eyes]. And when Sarai dealt hardly with her, she fled from her face.
7 And the aiigel of the Lord found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness, by
the fountain in the way to Shur [rocky. Josephus: Pelnsimn. Gesenins: Suez. Keil ; Dschlfar]
8 And he said, Hagsv, Sarai's maid, whence earnest thou? and whither wilt thou go?
9 And she said, I flee itom the face of my mistress, Sarai. And the angel of tlie Lord
'.0 said unto her. Return to thy mistress, and submit [bow] thyself under her hands. And
the angel of the Lord !>aid unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall
;1 not be [cannot be] numbered for multitude. And the angel of the Lord said unto her.
Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael
i2 [God will hear] ; because ihe Lord hath heard thy affliction [distress]. And he will be a
vrild man ; his hand wil! be against every man, and every man's hand against him ; and
13 he shaU dwell in the presence of all his brethren — [far and wide in a free country]. And she
called the name of the Lord that spake unto her. Thou God seest me [of true seeing] : foi
14 she said, llave I also here looked after bini that seeth me ? [after the peculiar seeing t]
Wherefort the well was called, Beer-l.ali;ii-roi [well of the uf? of seeing, or vision] ; behold,
it is between Kadesh [consecrated] and Bered [hail, gravei-iite bain].
15 And Hagar b.ire Aoram a son: and Abram called his son's name, which Hagar
16 b;ire, Ishmael. A. id Abram was fourscore and six years old, when Hagar bare Ishmael
to Abram.
PRELIMTNAET KEMAHK.
For the difficulties growing out of the sexual
relations in the history of the PaU'larchs, see the
[ntroductioD, p. 80.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL.
1. According to Knobel, this section is a Jeho-
fistic eulargement of a brief Elohistlc original
narrative. But the narrative bears upon its face
a complete and living unity.
2. Sarai's fanatical Self-denial (vers. 1-4).
Bare him no children. Not even yet, although
he had already received (ch. 16) the solemn assur-
ance of the great promise. She was barren in ch.
li. 30, and remained so after ch. iv, 2. The child-
less state of Abram's house was its great sorrow, and
the more so, since it wa,s in perpetual opposition to
the calling, destination, and faith of Abram, and was
a constant trial of his faith. Sarai herself, more-
over, the consort of Abram, came graduallv more
and more to appear as a hindrance to the fulfilment
of the divine promise, and as Abram, according to
ch. XV., had fixed his eye upon his head servant,
Eliezer of Damascus, so now, .Sarai fixes her eye
upon her head maiden," Hagar the Egyptian. Ha-
gar was probably added to the household of Abram
during his residence in Egypt (ch. xii. lo). Sh«
manifestly occujiied a prominent place in his house^
hold, and appears to have brought to that position
not only mental gifts, but also an inward p.iriicipa-
tion in the faith of the household. — The Lord hatb
* [Here, of course, hersla\e. bond-woman. -A. t5.1
♦16
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
restrained me from bearing.* (The mother's
womb closed — a figurative description of the ap-
pointed barrenness). The barrenness, also, is traced
back to the highest causality, the purpose of Je-
hov.ah (ch. xxix. 31; xxx. 32; Ps. cxxrii. 3; Is.
Ixvi. 9). The sexual relations, and the declarations
in regard to them, are sanctified by their ultimate
end, their spiritual reference. The dejection, at least,
the sorrow, breaks out in the words of Sarai, also,
as they had iu th>" utterance of .\bram, ch. xv. 3. —
Oo in unto. Euoliemisiic explanation of the sexual
connection. — It may be that I may obtain (be
builded) by her. As to the connection between
ns:. ". n''3. see the lexicons. To be built, is to
become a house ; to become a house, is to obtain
children, a family. Hagar should enlarge Sarai :
Hagar's child should be her child (see ch. xxx. 3).
The concubine, viewed in the light of this reason, for
which she is chosen, is not so much the concubine
of the husband, as supphmentary concubine of the
unfe. The moral idea of monogamy shines clearly
through this obscurity in its manifestation, and so
far this, "possession of concubines" (as Knobel ex-
presses it) must be distinguished from the later
polygamy, which appear-ed among the Jews. Sarai
practises an act of heroic self-denial, but still, in her
womanly and fanaticiil excitement, anticipates her
destiny as Eve had done, and carries even the patri-
arch away with her alluring hope. The writer inti-
mates how nobly generous sue was in her error.
This greatness clouded eveu the clear-sightedness
of Abram.f The narrator brings also into promi-
nence the extenuating fact, that they had been
already ten years in Canaan, waiting in vain for the
heir of Canaan. — When she saw that she had
conceived. " The unfruitful Hannah received the
like treatment with Sarai, from the second wife of
her husband (1 Sam. i. 6). It is siill thus, to-day, in
eastern lands (see Lane : ' Maimers and Customs,'
i. p. 198). The Hebrew regards barreimess as a
great evil and a divine punishment (ch. xix. 31 ;
XXX. 1, 23 ; Lev. xx. 20), and fiuitfulness as a great
good and a divine blessing (ch. xxi. 6; xxiv. 60;
Ex. xxiii. 26; Deut. vii. 14). The orientals regard
these things in the same light still (see Volney :
' Travels,' ii. p. 369 ; Malcolm's ' History of Persia ; '
andWiNKR: Eeal-wortcrbnc/i, a.it. Kinder}." Knobel.
Hagar, however, had not the position of a second
wife, and erred, when in her disposition she assumed
this position, instead of recognizing her subordina-
tion to her mistress. This subordination was as-
sumed by Abram, and therefore he does not seem
to have noticed her haughtiness and pride.:}:
3. <Sar«('.s' Displeasure aiid Hai/ar's Fli(ihl(\ev».
5 and 6). — My wrong be upon thee. I'recisely,
Trong ill an objective sense, wrong which I sulVei-.
Sarai, in her indignation against the pride and inso-
lence of Hagar, liclieved that Abram looked witli
approbation upon it, and therefore expresses herself
as if olfended.g The overbent bow files back with
violence. This is the back-stroke of her own eager,
• (Uch., thul mt up —A. O.I
t [Abram yicMn to the su^Restion of Sarai without oppo-
sition, becitas)-, fiH the prophet Malachi sa'-s, ii. 15, he
■OVfcht the «cod j-roinised by God. Keil, p. 152.— A O.J
t IAn<l it waw thitl apparent inditferctce wbicb probably
was Ine source of Marai'n senee of injury. She was led from
it to sasjiect that the affections of her husband were trans-
ferred-A. Ol
i [She felt that Abram ouKht to have redressed her
wroUK — rmifht to have seen and rebuked the Insolence of
Ihf bond-woman. — A. G.l
overstrained course. Still, her words are against
.\brani ; the consequences of her wrcng should faP
upon him ; she would leave his conduct to the judg
inent of Jehovah, more as an appeal to his eon.
science, than as a decided condemnation.* — Behold
thy maid is in thy hand. Abiam aaneres firmlt
to the original standpoint. He regards Hagar s'ill
as the servant, and the one who fulfils the part of
Sarai, and so far justifies himself against Sarai. But
this justification is turned now into the severe cen
sure and affliction of Hagar, and this is the result of
the wrong position into which he has allowed him
self to be drawn. — Sarai dealt hardly with her.
How, precisely, we are not told. Doubtless, through
the harsh thrusting her back into the mere position and
service of a slave. Hagar believed that she had grown
above such a position, and flees. The proud, unyield-
ing passion of the Ishmaelite for freedom, shows its
characteristic feature in their ancestress. Some have
ventured so far, as to suppose that Abram must have
hastened after her, and brought her back, full of honor.
4. The inierrention on the part of the Angel of
Jehovah, and Sagar'a return (vers. 7-14). — Th€
Angel of Jehovah. See the preliminary remarks
to ch. lii. [The expression nin" "S?^ appears
here for the first time. While the Angel of Jeho-
vah is Jehovah himself, it is remarkable, that in the
very meaning of the name, as messenger, or one who
is sent, there is implied a distinction of persons in
the Godhead. There must be one who sends, whose
message he bears. — A. G.jf That this Angel is iden.
tieal with Jehovah, is placed beyond question in vers.
13 and 14. The disposition of Hagar, helpless, for-
saken, with all her pride, still believing in God, warned
by her own conscience, makes it altogether fitting that
the Angel of Jehovah should appear to her, ('. e., Jeho-
vah himself, in his condescension — manifesting him^
self as the Angel. — She had found rest, by a fountain
in the wilderness ; and here, in her helplessness,
self-reflection, and repentance, she gains the dis|)osi-
tion or fitness for the vision. It was by the fount-
ain in the ■way to Shur. " Shur, now Dschifar,
is the northwestern part of the desert of Arabia, bor-
dering upon Egypt (comp. Ex. xv. 22 ; and Tocn :
in der dentschen morgenland. Zeitschrift, i. p. 175)."
Keil. (Ch. XXV. is'; 1 Sam. xv. 7 ; xxvii. 8). A
waste stretch of land, of five or six days' journey,
lying between Palestine and Egypt (see Knobel, p.
158). Her location was thus upon the old, worn
path, leading from Hebron by Beersheba to Egypt.
The respect which she enjoyed agrees with her per-
sonal, inward worth, as to her character and faitli,
but at the same time tends to the proper estimate ol
Ishmael, who, as the child of Abram, could not
be left undistinguishable among the heathen. The
Angel of the incarnation, even, could not pennit
that Hagar, in an erroneous zeal to become hia
future mother, should go on his own account into
helpless sorrow. His first address sounds as the
voice of her own awakened conscience: Hagar,
Sarai's maid, whence camest thou 7 Truly, out
of a wilfully sundered relation of duty and [liety, .ind
out of the house of blessing. [The angel brings her
to a sense of her true relation : Sarai's maid, not
• [The appeal is basty and passionate — springing from a
mind smnrtini; ander the sense of injury — and nut Cain
and reverential. — ^A. G.]
t I^Thc pbrnseology indicates to ns a certain inherent
plurality within the ee-ence of the ont only God, of whicV
we have had previous indications, ch i. 1, 26 ; iii 22. J»
COBUS, p. 277.1
CHAP XVI. 1-16.
411
Abram's wife. — A. G.]— And whither goest thou ?
indeed, wilfully into fruilt, disgrace, and sorrow. Ilcr
answer testifies to the oppression wliicli slie liad i-.x-
perienced, but also to the voice of her own con-
Bcience. — From the face of my mistress, Sarai.
— Return to thy mistress, and submit thyself.
[Submit, humlile thi/xelf ; the same word as that by
which Sarai's harsh-dealing is described. — A. (i.]
The command to return to duty comes first, then the
promise. It carries the joyous sound of an innumei-
able progeny — the tribes of Ishmael. — Ishmael, be-
cause the Lord hath heard. Misery sighs ; the
sighs ascend to God ; hence niisi-ry itself, if not sent
as a curse, is a voiceless prayer to God. liut this is
true especially of the misery of Uagar, who had
learned to pray in the hou.se of Abram. " According
to the later writers, it was the custom that the
mother should name the child (ch. iv. 1, 25; six.
37 ff.; xxix. 32 ff; xxx. 6 fif. ; xxxviii. 3ff.); but
the Elohist allows the child to be named only by the
father (ch. v. 3; xvi. 15; xvii. 19; xxi. 3; comp.
ch. XV. 1 8)." Knobel. This distinction is obviously
far-fetched. It is only on special occasions that the
mother is referred to as giving the name to the
cbild. In ch. xxxviii. 3. 4, the father and mother
are alternately concerned in giving the name. Abram
himself afterwards appropriates the maternal nam-
ing of Ishmael. — And he will be a wild man
(wild-ass man). The limitation of the promise is
connected with the promise itself. Hagar must be
cured of the proud delusion, that she is destined to
become the mother of the believing people of Abram,
and that therefore the hope of Abram depends upon
her personal self-destination ; a supposition which
doubtless had taken firm possession of her mind,
through the presupposition of Sarai herself. The
image of the wild ass is not chosen in a contemptu-
ous sense. " The figure of the XIB , onager, in the
desert, free, wild-roving and untamable animal,
poetically described in Job xxxix. 5-8, designates,
in a striking manner, the Bedouin Arabs with their
unrestrained love of freedom, as upon camel (Deliil)
or horse, with spear m hand, they ride over the
desert, noisy, hardy, frugal, delighting in the varied
beauties of nature, and despising life in towns and
cities : " and the words, his hand will be against
' every man, and every man's hand against
him, describe the ceaseless feuds among themselves
and with their neighbors, in which the Ishmaelites
live." Keil. Compare the characteristics of Esau,
ch, xxvii. 4(1. For the description of the Arabs in the
books of travels, see Knobel, p. 158.* Knobel
thinks that here also the prophetic image is diawu
after the descendants (the free sons of the desert),
and finds besides that the promises (ch. xvii. 20;
xxi. 2ii,) "have a more fitvorable sound." If this
were true, it would be only the other side of the
same figure. Hagar must know, above all other
things, that Ishmael could not appropriate to him-
self the inheritance of blessing. This is intimated
in the words. In the presence of all his brethren.
He will thus have brethren, but shall dwell in the
Dresence of all, a free man. Keil remaT-ks, that
''3B"3S signifies primarily, eastward, according to
ch. XXV. 9, but that there is more in the terms
than a mere geographical notice, to wit, that Ish-
mael shall dwell independently, in the presence of
»U the descendants of Abram. But history has
* [All the ir.odem travellers speak of theso s:>mc quali-
ties as Btill exu.ting amon^ the Arabs. — A. O.)
27
abundantly confirmed this promise. '' Un'il to-daj
the Ishmaelites are in unimpaiied, fiee possessior
of the great peninsula lying between the Erphrate.s,
the isthmus of Suez, and the Red Sea, from whence
they have spread over wide districts in North Africa
and Southern A.sia" (comp. Dki.itzscm, p. 377 if.)*
— And she called the name of the Lord (Jehc
vah). The naming of God by Hagar ("'STbx) haj
been variously interpreted. Hengstenberg, with
Tuch, explains the well named from this event " well
of tlie living seeing," or " visior," i. e. where a per-
son has seen the face of God, and reniains alive.
Delitzsch holds this to be a verbal impossibil-
ity. We add, that the actual [ rosi pposition also,
in this explanation, which app.Hts also in Keil,
is incorrect. We must distingu rU between the
patriarchal and legal periods. Of the \ep:a.l period it
is said ; thou canst not see my face, f. - ul man shal
see me and live (Ex, xxxiii. 20) ; tha was true of
Moses, so far as he was the mediato ■ of his sinful
people (see Ex. xxxiii. 13). The preji.„Moe 'n Israel,
that no one could see the revelation of Gol' and live
(Judg. xiii. 22), took its origin from thesi words.
But the sense of the words was, that the m<iuifesta-
tion of God in the midst of the sinful people of
Israel, and even for Moses, so far as he was the
representative of the people, would he fatal. Hence
the regulation requiring darkness in the holy of
holies. But of Moses, viewed in and for himself, it
is said : The Lord spake with him face to face (Ex.
xxxiii. 11). Moses, in and for himself, stood upon
ihe patriarchal ground, but as the mediator of the
people, he stood upon the ground of the law, and
must first, through the sight of the grace of the
Lord, be prepared for the sight of his glory (Ex.
xxxiii. 19). It is an error to confuse the two econ-
omies, patriarchal and legal. Here t'le Angel of
the Lord reveals himself, there the lai» is ordained
through the Angel. Here, those wearied of life, go
in peace to their fathers, there death is the wages
of sin. Here one sees God in the reality of true
vision, there God retires into the darkness of the
Holy of Holies. It is still a question, however,
whether ^X^ should mean, the one seeing mt/ person
(the participle from nxn with the suffix of the first
person) as Hofmaim, Baumgarten, and Delitzsch ex-
plain after the Chaldee : " thou art a God of sight,
whose all-seeing eye will not overlook the helpless
and forsaken, even in the most remote corner of the
desert." The meaning of the name Moriah (ch. xxiL
2, 8, 14) appears to be in favor of this reference of
the seeing, to God. But here, also, the seeing of Je-
hovah, was perceived from the appearance of Jeho-
vah, i. e. from his becoming seen (or visible). Keil
quotes against the interpretation of Hofniann the
expression 13S"l (Is. xxix. 16) and ■'3XT (Is. xlvii.
1"), as a designation of the one seeing — who sees
me. Thus: ^Xf in pause 'N1 is a substantive, and
designates the sight, the vision. Gesenius, Keil, and
* [Kaliech remarks in stiDsrance: "Every addition to
our knowledge of Arabia and its inhabitants, coi firms more
strongly the biblical statements. While they have car-
ried their arms beyond their native tracts, aiid ascendp«i
more than a hundi-ed thrones, they were never subjecttu te
the Persian Empire. The Assyrian and Baltylonian kings
had only transitory power over small portions of their
tribes. Here the ambition of Alexander the Great ana hie
successors received an insuperable check, and a Ronitin
expedition, in the time of Augustus, totally failed. Tb«
Bedouins have remained essentially unaltered sines t'ue
time of the Hebrews and the Greeks." — A G.t
*18
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
others: "God lias manifested himself to her as a
God of virion, who can be seen of tlie actual, most
perfect sight, in his iingel." — For she said, Have
I aUo looked after him. Do I see him still. This
'.s not said in the sense of the popular judgment of
the legal period : Am I actually still seeing, i. e. in
the land of the living, after I have seen Jehovah?
(Kiel, Knobel, etc.) ; but, what I now see in this
wretched desert, is that still to be regarded as see ng,
after I have seen the Angel of the Lord ? ( = the
glory of the Lord?)* This is a true, and in the
highest degree, real characterizing of the glorious
seeing in the condition of the vision {" I have seen
thy throne, 0 Lord, from afar"). It is at the same
time, in the highest degree natural, as H.agar express-
es the contrast between the two conditions, that cf
the ordinary seeing and that of the highest seeing
(vision ). — Wherefore the well was called. Thus
not the well of the life of aeeing or life of vision
JHengstenberg, Keil), but where the life = the Ufe-
giver — quickener, manifests himself, who grants the
vision. — Between Kadesh and Bered. "Al-
though Bered is not mentioned elsewhere, Rowland
has stUl, with great probability, pointed out the widl
of Hagar, mentioned again (ch. xxiv. 62; 25, 11),
in the fountain Ain Kadesh, lying in the camping-
ground of the caravans moving from Syria to Sinai
southward from Beerslieba, Moyle, or Moilchi, Mu-
weilch (RoBiNSOs : Palestine), which the Arabians
call Moilahhi (or Mai-lahhi) Hadjar ; who show there
also a rocky dwelling, Beit-Hadjar (see Rowland, in
Ritter's Erdkunde^ xiv. p. 10S6). Bered must lie
to the west of this." Keil.
5. Ifaffar's Return (vers. 15, 16). There are two
points which must still be noticed here. First, that
Abram receives the name Ishmael, with which, of
course, the re-reception of Hagar is expressed; and
secondly, the age of Abram, which is of importance
in view of the next recurring revelation of Jehovah,
«s showing the lapse of time between them.
DOCTEINAl AHD ETHICAL.
See the Exegetical paragraphs.
1. Sarai's character : nolile generosity, self-
denial, the female friend still more than the sister
or wife of Abram, but woman-like, and in a fanatical
way anticipating the patience of faitli (see 1 Pet.
iii. 6).
2. The moral motive or impulse of seeking the
heir of blessing, made availing to an erroneous and
selfish degree, is here torn away from its connection
with the love impulse or motive, and exalted above
It in importance (see the Introduction, p. 81).
• [Amidst tb(! variety of versions of those phra.sos, tho
general senwe is obviou-^. There is a recufaiition ol the pra-
rious and quiclteninK presence of God revealed to her, and
a devout wonder that she should have Iteen favored with
such a visinn. If we render the name which Ilagar pives
to Jehovah, as the Hebrew seems to demand, " Thou art a
God of vision, or visibility," i. e. who lia»t revealed thyself,
then tlie reason for this name is tilven in the fact, that she
hod enjoyed this vision. This would be true, whether tlie
Burprise she expresses was because she survived the sight
(vision), or because she here enjoyed such a vision at all.
This fact also gives the name t" the well^not the well of
tho Hvinif one seeinj? me, but of the livinp— and of course,
Itib-givinR, who here revealed himself. -It is true, that the
Heb. ^X" takes a ditfen-nt pointing in the 14th verse, from
that which It be-irs in the phrase rendered, " Thou Ood
leeat me ;" but the sense fdvoo above seems, on the whole,
auMt coDflijflflot, and is one which the words will bear. —
4.0.)
.3. This substitution of the maid for the mistres*
must, however, be dislinguislied from polygamy in
its peculiar sense. Hagar, on the contrary, regards
herself — in the sense of polygamy, as standing with
Sarai, and as the favored, fruitful wife, exalts herself
above her. The shadow of polygamy resting upoi
patriarchal monogamy. Isaac's marriage free from
this. It has the purest New Testament form. Rs»
becca appears, indeed, to have exercised a certain
predominant influence, as the wife often does this
in the Christian marriage of modern times.
4. Abram's wrong position between Sarai and
Hagar — the result of his yielding to the fanaticisre
of Sarai. *
6. The Angel of the Lord (ch. xU). The voice
of the Angel and the voice of the awakened con
science one, and yet distinct.
6. The words of the Angel leading to conver-
sion : 1. Clear description : Hagar, Sarai's maid ;
2. Whence earnest thou? 3. Whither wilt thou eo?
The beginning of conversion itself: simple, pure,
clear knowledge.
7. Obligation and promises are not to be sepa-
rated in the kingdom of God, for it is throughout a
moral region. But the form changes according to the
circumstances — now the higher (evangelical ) piom-
ises and obligations, now the lower (preparatory)
obligations and promises. — Ver. 10. Gerlach: A
blessing in its external form greater even than that
promised to Abram, ch. xv. 6. Still, even in the
feebler splendor, we should recognize the great
promised blessing of the fariier of believers. " Ara-
bia, whose population consists to a large extent of
Ishmaelites, is a living fountain of men whose
streams for thousands of years have poured them-
selves far and wide to the east and west. Before
Mohammed, its tribes were found in all border-Asia,
in the East Indies as early as the middle ages ; and
in all Northern Africa it is the cradle of all the wan-
dering hordes. Along the whole Indian Ocean,
down to Molucca, they had their settlements in the
middle ages; they spread along the coast to Mozam-
bique; their caravans crossed India to Cliin.i ; and
in Europe they peopled Southern Spain, and ruled it
for seven hundred years." Ritter.
8. Hagar's satisfaction with the future of her son,
a sign of her humiliation. -j- The picture of Ishmael
here the image of a scion of Abram and the maid
(Goethe : " From my father comes the bodily stat-
ure, the bearing of the higher life ; from my mother
the joyful disposition and love of pleasure." Se«
Lange: Vermischtt Schriften, i. p. 166.) The re-
lation between ancestors and their descendants. The
law of life which lies at the ground of the contrast
between the son of the maid and the son of the free
(John i. 13). The discord in the ottspring of misal-
liances. Ed. Piippiua : " Travels in Chili, Peru, etc."
p. 139. On the color. These mixed progenies re-
ward the dark mother with contempt, the white
father, with aversion. "A large part of the Bedouini
slill lead a robber-life. They justify themselves in
it, upon the ground of the hard treatment of Ishmael,
their father, who, driven out of his paternal iuherit-
• [A thousand volumes written against polygnriiy, wouic
not lead to a clearer, fuller conviction, of the eiils of that
practice, than the story under review. Bush, Kotea, p. 26fi
-A.O.j
t [This appears, too, in the answer which she makes tc
the question of tho angel : llagar, Sarai's maid, whence
earnest thou? And she faaid, I tlee from the taee of n^
•m'slrf'ss, 5trai. — A. G.l
CHAP. XVI. 1-1&
lib
race, received the desert for his possession, with
the permission to t,ike wherever he could find."
Geilach. " The Arabian's land, according to their
issutned right, reaches as far as they are free to
go." Ritter.
9. The importance of the Arabs in history.
Ishmael. Ood hears. The strong, world-historical
" wild-ass," springs out of the mercy of God towards
the misery of Hagar. His hand against every man :
this is true of the spiritual Ishmael, Mohammedan-
ism, in its relation to other religions It stands in a
fanatical polemic relation. — The Arabians have never
been overcome by any of the great world-conquer-
ors, while they have made great and world-wide con-
quests.
10. Hagar's expression in regard to her vision.
The divine vision a look into the eternal world.
Actual sight in the world of sense is no more sight,
when compared with this.
11. The living God is a God of human vision, be-
cause he is a God of divine revelation.
12. The well of the living God, in which he
makes men to see (the true seeing) a symbol of the
gospel of the kingdom of God, of the Church in the
desert of the world.
l.S. Hagar's return laid the foundation for the
world-historical dignity and honor of her son Ish-
mael.— Ishmael, also, must return to Abram's house.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
Vers. 1-4. The fanatical anticipation of men,
grasping after their destination, and its results, a
judgment in favor of the more paiient waiting and
expectation: 1. In the history of Sarai; 2. the his-
tory of Eve ; .3 in the history of the Church (the
mediaeval anticipation of the kingdom of glory). —
The perils of the husband in his relations to the wife :
1. Her fanaticism (Sarai); 2. her sensuality (Hagar).
— Sarai'.'i indignation : the reaction from fanatical,
over-strained zeal. — Ver. 4. Hagar's pride : the ex-
altation which we experience, is easily destroyed if
we are so disposed, through self-glorying. — The
wrong position of Abram the result of his conduct
not originating in himself — Ver. 7. The Angel of
the Lord ; or the most wretched in the kingdom of
God, enjoy tlie highest revelations of his mercy. —
The Angel of the Lord as an angel of conversion :
1. His address; 2. his question. Whence; 3. his
question, Whither; 4. his instruction; 5. his prom-
ises ; 6. the extent and order in his promises — Ha-
gar's experience, that sight, is no more sight after the
vision. — Man beholds by faith, because God looks
upon him in grace. — -At the wells in the desert. —
Hagar's return. — The perpetuation of the experience
of Hagar, in the name Ishmael. — Abram eighty-six
years old. — Age no security against folly. — God
turns the follies of believers to their gooil.— Ish-
mael's importance in history (field for missions in
the East).
Starkk : Ver. 2. That was an abuse of liie rui-
ng power over her maid, and of the power of mar-
liage which Sarai had over the body of her husb.and
(1 Cor. vii 3). Sarai, as well as Abram, was con-
cerned in the sin, hence the defenders of concubin-
age and polygamy have no ground upon which to
Btacd here. — (Foreign, and especially unbelieving
servants of strange religions, may often work great
Injury to a master or a fjoiernment). — We must not
do evil that good may come (Rom iiu 8). — Although
a man may counsel with his wife, and follow hei
counsel, it must not be done to go into evil.—
Lasgk: .See, fellow-christian, what one's own will
and choice will do for a man! It CTijoins often a
greater denial than God requires of him. — Cramer :
Ver. 4. It is a common fault, that the morals of
many are changed by their elevation to honor, and
that prosperity brings pride (Piov. xxx. 21-23). —
Kindness is quite generally rewarded by ingratitude.
Ver. 7. A proof that the Angel of tlie Lord was the
Son of God. — Ver. 5. It is a common cour^'e witl
men to roll their guilt upon others. — Lange; Xotb
ing is more injurious to the quiet comfort of mar
riage, and of the whole household, and to the training
of children, than polygamy : it is impossible, there-
fore, that it should be in accordance with the law
of nature. — The Same : Ishmael is the first of those,
to whom God has assigned their name before their
birth. Afler him there are five others ; Isaac (ch.
xvii. 19), Solomon (1 Chron. xxii. 9), Josiah (1 Kinga
xiii. 2), Cyrus (Is. xlv. 1)? and John (Luke i. 13).
Lastly, Jesus, the Saviour, is the seventh (Matt. i. 21).
— LniHKR : The positions in life are very unUke,
Therefore we should remember and hold to this con-
solation, which the Angel shows : lo, thou art a ser
vant, a maid, poor, etc. Let this be for thy com
fort, that thy God looks alike upon masters and
servants, rich and poor, sinners and saints. — Cra-
mer : It is according to the ordinance of God, thai
one should be lord, another servant, etc. ( 1 Cor. vii.
10). — Bibl. Tub. : Thou hast sinned, humble thyself,
take cheerfully the chastisement; nothing is more
wholesome than that which will bow our proud spir-
its into humility (2 Sam. xxiv. 10, 14). — Ver. 14.
He who not only holds Hagar in life, but is also the
life itself (John xi. 25; Deut. xx-\ii. 46), the living
God (Deut. V. 26; Ps. xHl 3, etc.). — In tliis God we
shall find the true Uving springs of all good and
mercy (Ps. xxxvi. 9; Jer. ii. 13 ; svii. 13; Is. Iv. 1).
Lisco: Sinful helping of ourselves. — Man must
not oidy leave the end to God, but also the means
(Rom. xi. 36). — Ver. 7. The (not onr) Angel of the
Lord, the uncreated Angel of the Covenant (MaL
iii. 1). — Ver. 13. These words designate the reality
of that revelation made to her and for her good. —
The breach of the divine ordinance soon avenges
itself, for the unnatural relation in which the slave
had been placed by her mistress herself, prepared
for the mistress the most vexatious grief — Geklach :
The Angel of the Lord, is the divine revealer of God,
the le^ider of the patriarchs (ch. xlviii. 16) ; the one
who calls and animates Moses (Ex. iii. 2); the leadei
of the people through the wilderness (Ex. xiv. 19,
etc. ; Is. Ixiii. 9) ; the champion of the Israelites in
Canaan (Josh. v. 13); and still farther, the leader
and ruler of the covenant people (Judg. ii. 1 ff. ;
vi. 11 ; xiii. 13); then he who in Isaiah is the Angel
of his face or presence (ch. Ixiii. 9) ; in Daniel,
Michael (and by whom Gabriel was sent to the
prophet, Dau. x. 13?) in Zecharinh, measures the
new building of Jerusalem (ch. ii. 1) ; and in Mala-
chi is the Angel of the Covenant (ch. iii. 1). — Cal-
WER, Handbuch: Moliammed is a son of Ishmael,
and Abram is thus, according to the flesh, tlie ances-
tor of Islam. — The Arabian, even now, grounds upon
this passage, in his pride and delusion, a claim that
the rights of primctreniture belong to Ishmael in-
stead of Isaac, and asserts his own right to lands and
goods, so far as it pleases him. — -Vengeance for
blood rules in him, and in many cases, also, the work
of tlie robber is seen all along his path. — Ver. Ii
vzo
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
In the presence of all his brethren: the Israelites,
Midianitej!, Edomites, and the Uoabites and Ammon-
ites, who were descended from Lot. — Scheodkr:
Ver. 7. The Angel of the Lord finds Hagar; that
presupposes he had sought her (Deut. xxxii. 10). —
God meets thee in thy ilesert ; he comes to thee in
thy conscience ; he kindles in thee tlie sparks into a
flame, and comes to thy help in his grace (Berleb.
Bibel). — Islamism occupies incontestahly the place
of a middle link between revelation and heathenism ;
as even the Koran calls the Ishinaelites, an interme-
diate nation (Ziegler : it names it thus in another
sense, however). — God tries us in such changes:
comfort follows sorrow ; hope succeeds to despond-
ency ; and Ufe to death. (Portraiture of the Ara-
bian, of the wild-ass. The Arabian = son of the
morning— Judg. vi. 3, 38; viii. 10).— Ver. 16. Mo-
ses records the age of Abram, that we might know
how long he had to wait for Isaac the promised son,
whom Sarai should bear (Calvin). — Passavant : Im-
patience.—Vers. 1-6. Ah, should God grant us our
own way, permit us to order our present, to arrange
our future, to adorn our houses, without consulting
with him, it would be no good and joyful thing ti
us. Whoever has, as to his way, separated Idmself
from him, and soi'-ght afar from him, without hil
wisdom, happiness, salvation, life, acts unwisel}
wickedly. His light is obscure, his step uncertain
tlie ground trembles beneath him and his light<
(lamps) are soon extinguished in darkness. — Th«
woman has learned, in AViram's house, to recognize
the God over all gods. — Schwenke: Ver. 7. She be-
hevcs that her departure from the house of Abram
would determine him to hasten after her and bring
her back, etc. She sits down by the fountain
vainly waiting, until Abram should come to lead hei
home. Her pi ide is broken. — The call of the Angel.
— That was the call of the good shepherd, who
would bring back the wandering sheep. Thus even
now the two peoples who received the promise, th«
descendants of Ishmael and Israel, stand as the
monument of the divine veracity, as pecnliar anc
even singular instances ; guarding with the greatest
care their nationahty, practising their old custom«
and usages, and preserving, in their exclusivenesg,
their spiritual strength (destination ?)
SIXTH SECTION.
Abram and the repeated Promise of God. The name Abram changed to Abraham. 7%e pertonal
Covenant of Faith, now a Covenant Institution for him, his Household and his Seed.
Circumcision. The name Sarai changed to Sarah. The iiew Names.
The promised one not Ishmael, but Isaac.
Ch. XVIL 1-27.
And when [after the lapse of a long period] Abram was ninety years old and nine, tho
Lord appeared to Abram, and said unto him. I am the Almighty God [El Shaddai] ;
2 walk before me, and be thou perfect. And I will make my covenant between me and
3 thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly. And Abram fell on his face: anil God
4 [Eloiiim] talked with him, saying. As for me [in the covenant promise], behold, my covenant
5 is witli thee, and thou shalt be a father of many [multitude of] nations. Neither shall thy
name any more be called Abram [high father], but thy name shall be Abraliam [father of a
multitude of nations; of a people of peoples" ; for a father of many nations [a people of peoples] have
6 I made thee. And I will make thee exceeding fruitful, and I will make nations of
7 thee, and kings shall come out of thee. And I will establish my covenant between pe
and thee, and thy seed after thee, in their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to
8 be a God [Elohim] unto thee, and to thy seed after thee. And I will give unto thee,
and to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a stranger [thou hast settled], all the
9 land of Canaan, for an everlasting po.ssessiou; and I will be their God [Eiohlm].
9 And God [God Klohim, as Elohim] said to Abraham [first after his new name], Tliou shall
10 keep my covenant therefore, thou, and tliy seed after tliee in tlieir generations. _^This
is my covenant, which ye shall keep, between me and you and thy seed after thee ; Every
11 man child among you shall be circumcised. And ye shall circumcise the.Hesh of your
12 foreskin; and it shall be a token [«ii?n] of the covenant betwixt me and you. And he
that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you, every man child in your gene-
rations, he that is born in the lioiise, or bought with money of any stranger, which is
13 not of thy seed. He that is born in thy house, and he that is bouglit with tiiy money,
must needs be circumcised [bia: blEn] : and my covenant shall be in your flesh for an
U everlasting covenant. And the uncircumcised u'an cl'ld, whose flesh of his foreskm
CHAP XVII. 1-27.
421
is not circumcised [who will not suffer himself to be drcnmcised, or avoids circumcision], that [tame]
soul shall be cut ofi' from his people ; lie Iiath broken my covenant.
iS And God [Elohim] said unto Abraham, As for Sarai thy wife, thuu shalt not caj,
16 her name Sarai [heroine], but Sarah [princess] shall her name be. And I will bless her,
and give thee a sou also of her : yea, I wdl bless her, and she shall be a mother of
17 nations; kings of people [D"'as] shall be of lier. Then Abraham fell upon liis face
and laughed, and said in his heart, Shall a child be born unto him that is one hundred
18 years old? and shall Sarah, that is ninety years old, bear? And Abraham said unto
19 God, 0 that Ishmael might [even yet] live before thee. And God said, Sarah thy wife
shall bear thee a son indeed; and tliou shalt call his name Isaac [he or one wiUlaugh] : and
I will establish my covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed
20 after him. And as for Ishmael [ood hears], I have heard thee : Behold, I have blessed
him, and will make him fruitful, and will multiply him exceedingly [evermore] ; twelve
21 princes shall he beget, and I will make him a great nation. But my covenant will I
establish with Isaac, which Sarah shall bear luito thee at this set time in the next j'ear.
22 And he left off talking with him, auJ God [Elohim] went up from 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 [Elohim] had said
24 unto him. And Abraham was ninety years old and nine, when he was circumcised in
25 the flesh of his foreskin. And Ishmael his son was thirteen years old, when he was
26 circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin. In the selfsame day was Abraham circumcised
27 and Ishmael his son; And all the men of his house, born in hia house, and bought with
money of the stranger, were circumcised with him.
OENEKAl. BEMAKKS.
1. This Section is described by the pseudo-
critical exegesis as Elohistic (Knobel, p. 161). But
here, also, the internal reasons for the use of the name
'Elohim, are obvious. The sealing or ratifying of the
covenant of God with Abram, whose foundation (not
Bomething holding a mere connection with it, its side-
piece) we recognize in ch. xv., embraces not only the
immediate bearer and mediator of the covenant, in
the narrower sense, Isaac and his seed, but all those
who, in a wider sense, are sharers in the covenant,
Ishmael and his descendants. If we do not distin-
guish these two conceptions of the covenant in this
chapter, we shall not thread our way through the
' apparent confusion, to a correct understanding of it.
It is entirely incorrect when Keil (p. 1,57), says,
Ishmael was excluded from the salvation of the cov-
enant, the grace of the covenant was promised only
to Isaac. Upon tliis supposition what does the cir-
cumcision of Ishmael mean? We must distinguish
the relations of the different parties to the covenant
as stated above ; and since here the covenant em-
braces all who share in it, God appears and acts ;cs
Klohim, although under a new title : El Shaddai.
2, That thirteen years should have rolled away
between the birth of Ishmael and this new revela-
tion, appears to us very important, Abram had an-
ticijjated the purpose ot God in his connection with
Dagar, and must now, therefore, pass through a long
time of 'discipline, of expectation, and of temptation.
['■Tldt which could not be reached by nature was
to be secured by promise, in the miraculoua seed,
thus pointing forward to Jesus of Nazareth, There-
fore the time has come when, after having first al-
lowed the unbeheving spirit to make proof of human
expedients (1 Cor. i, 20), God will show Himself
again, and place the fulfilment on the ba.^^is of the
promise alone (Gal. in. 18). The covenant, there-
fore, must now be solemnly and formally sealed."
Jacobes: "Notes," vol. i. p. 281, — A, G.] Thus,
indeed, Moses must wait forty long years after his
premature attempt to reach his destination. The di
vine decree over Adam and Eve mirrors itself in these
facts. They anticipated their destination, to be as
God ; and therefore a waiting time of thousands o(
years was decreed for the people, until the Messiah,
the image of God, should appear,
3. Tlie new Names. The groimd upon which the
neiD names are given to Abram and Sarai, lies in the
fact, that God reveals himself to Abram under anew
name. El Shaddai. For he is El Shaddai as the
omnipotent God, i. e., God of power to do wonders,
to create new things in the old world, and the very
centre of his wondrous deeds is the new birth, in
which man receives a new name, and of which cir-
cumcision is here set apart to be the typical sign.
The titles. El Shaddai, Abraham, Sarah, and circum-
cision, are coimected by the closest inward tie ; they
lie upon one line of thought. The name El Shaddai
may have been known to Abram liefore, as the name
Jehovah, and even circumcision ; but now it became
to him the specific name of the Coveuimt God, for
the patriarchal history, as circumcision was now
consecrated to be the sacred sign of the covenant,
and as later in the history, Jehovah was made the
specific designation of the God of cove^nmt truth,
(Ex. vi. 3). The names Elohim and El Eljon (Gen.
xiv, 18) have not lost their meaning and value un-
der the new economy of El Shaddai, and thus also
the name El Shaddai preserves its meaning and value
under the economy of Jehovah, which is modified
in the prophetic tunes into the economy of Jehovah-
Zebaoth. The wonders of El Shaddai run through
the whole kingdom of grace ; but the great wondtr
lying at the foundation of all that follow, is the birth
of Isaac, in the near future from his dead parent*
(dead in this respect, Rom. iv. 18-21: Heb, xi. II-
422
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSBB.
19), ill connection with the marvellous faith corre-
jponding with it, and with circumcision the seal of
the covenant, the type ol the great, eternal, central
miracle of the kingdom of God, tlie new birth of
Christ fiom heaven, and that new birth of Christians
which is grounded and coniirmed in his.
EXEGETICAL AND CKITICAL.
A. The CovenaDt of God with Abram in the
Jrider sense. Tfie sharers in the Covenant (vers.
1-14).
1. The Covenant in the wider sense on the part
of God (vers 1-8). When Abram was ninety
years old and nine. [Lit., a son of ninety and
nine years. — A. G.] The long interval between this
age and that given ch. xvi. 16, must be closely ob-
served. It marks a great delay of the promise, a
tarrying on the part of God, but which indeed cor-
responds with the over-haste of Abram (see 2 Pet.
iii. 9). — I am God the Almighty [El Shaddai ; ch.
xxviii. 3; x.\xv. 11; xliii. 1-1; xlviii. 3; Exod.
vi. 3]. "■'"iiB formed from TIHJ, to be strong, to
practise violence, with the nominal termination ^—
as ■'Sn festive, ^si"'!!)"' the old, ^5"'p thorn-covered,
and other nouns are formed." Keil. The idea of
omnipotence is inwoven through the whole Scripture,
with the idea of his miraculous works, the creation
of the new, or the new creation (Ps. xxxiii. 9 ; Kom.
iv. 17 ; Numb. xvi. 30 ; Is. xlii. 9 ; Ixii. 6 ; Jer. xxxi.
22 ; the new covenant ; the new man ; the new
child; Rev. xxi. 1, 3). DeHtzsch has raised this
idea to a supposition of violence done to nature,
whicli corresponds well witli tlie idea of a miracle
held in the seventeenth century ("that which is con-
trary to nature.") " Elohiui is the God who makes
nature, causes it to be, and preserves it — causes it to
endure ; El Shaddai tlie God who co7iis(rams nature,
so that it does what is at/ai7tst itself, and subdues it,
so that it bows and yiel'ls itself to the service of grace.
[" It designates Jehovah the Covenant God, as one
who has the power to fulfil his promises although
the order of nature may appear against them. It is
a pledge to Abram that notwithstanding ' his own
body already dead, and the deadness of Sarah's
wondj' (Rom. iv. 19), the numerous seed promised
could and would be given lu him." Keil. — A. G.]
Jehovah is the God who, in the midst of nature, causes
grace to penetrate and bieak through the Ibrces of
nature, and at la.st, in the place of nature, establishes
an entirely new creation of grace" (p. 381). A sad
dualistic conception of nature however lies ax the
bottom of this supposition. The creature is against
its will suliject to vanity (Rom. viii. 20; ; on the con-
trary, it .sighs after the liberty of the children of
God. We can only speak of an element of opposi-
tion to nature, in the miracle, so far as the lower
nature is penetrated by the higher, and must of
course give way to it. The play upon the letter n
by Delitzsch (p. 382), appears to us cabalistic, and
the more so, since the names Abraham and Sarah,
into which the n enters, are not grounded in the
Dame Jehovah with its n , but upon El Shaddai. —
Walk before me (see ch. v. 22 ; xxiv. 40 ; xlviii.
1.5 ; Is. xxxviii. 3). The great elements of Abram's
faith must be pennunent; he must walk continually
before the eye of the AInjighty, in the conseiousiiess
ef his presence who is mighty to work miracles. He
was still wanting in the developme Jt of this wondoi
working faith, and therefore, also, wa.s not blainelest
— And be thou perfect* — free from blame oi
guiltless. This is not, indeed, a new command, but
the result of the command: walk before me. Ht
will be guiltless, free from blame, if he remains in
the presence of the (iod who works wonders ; that,
indeed, will make him guiltless, free, puiify his con-
sciousness — Aiid I mill make my covenant.—
The n'^nS "iTS must be understood here after the
analogy oi' ch. ix. 12, where the previously formed
covenant (ch. vi. 18) with Noah, was presupposed,
as here the covenant with Abram (ch. xv.) is pre-
supposed. " It does not signify to conclude a cove-
nant (= ar'^S), but to give, settle, arrange," etc
KeiL ["At the former period (Gen. xv.) God form-
ally entered into covenant with Abram, here he takes
the first step in the fulfilment of the covenant, seals
it with a token and a perpetual ordinance." MuB-
PHV, p. 307. — A. G.] It thus denotes the establish-
ing of the covenant, or the giving it a traditional
force for his seed, the arrangement of a permanent
order or institution of the covenant (comp. Numb.
XXV. 12). — And Abram fell on his face. An ex-
pression of deep humility and trustful confidence,
and indeed also of the joy which overpowered him ; f
hence he repeats (ver. 17) the same act in the most
emphatic way. — And God talked with him.—
We must notice here the expression Elolinn, and the
T3T. God, as the God of the universe, begins a
conversation with Abram, when he should become
Abraham the father of a multitude of nations. — Aa
for me. I for my part. The ''JS evidently empha-
sizes the opposition of the two parties in the cove-
nant (what concerns me or my part). It answers to
nPltl of ver. 9. Just as in the ninth chapter the
■':5ri ■'3S1 of ver. 9 stands in opposition to the
7(X ~K" of verses 4 and 5 (comp. Exod. xix. ; ch.
xxiv). — And thou shalt be a father. The " an-
nounces the subject of the covenant. For it is not
simply the individual covenant of faith of Abram,
but the entire general covenant of blessing in him
which is here spoken of Knobel thinks that the
name Abraham was first formed after Abraham had
become the father of many nations. This is the
well-known denial of the prophetic element. His
own quotation, however, refutes him. " The He-
brews connected the giving of natnes with circumci-
sion (ch. xxi. 3 if.; Luke i. 69; ii. 21). The Per-
sians likewise, according to Tavermeb : ' Travels,' i.
p. 270, and Giiakdin : ' Voyages,' x. p. 76." The
cotmeclion of the giving of names, and circumcision,
effects a mutual explanation. The name announces
a definite human character, the new name a new
character (the new name. Rev. ii. 17, the perfect
stamp of individual character), circumcision, a new
or renewed, and more noble nature. J " Moreover,"
Knobel remarks: " we hear only in the Elohist the
promise of a multitude of nations (vers. 16, 20; ch.
XXXV. 11 ; xlviii. 4); the Jehovist uses only the sin
• r*'Not sincere merely, utiless in the primitive ^ens*
of duty, but complete, upright, holy ; not ouly in walk, but
in heart." Mubi-hy, p. 3(i8. — A ti.]
t iCulvin and Keil recognize in this proetration of thi
patriarch bis appropriation and reception of the promiso,
and liiB recognition of tho command. — .K. G.]
J ["l-'or the signiticance of names, and the change c*
names, nee UENosxENBBRn'BSci^rti^eL. \, 27011.;" Eubtj
—A. O.l
CHAP. X7II. 1-27.
4iJ«
gular (cli. xii. 2 ; xviii. 1 8 ; xlvi. 3). So likewise
the promise of kings and princes among the siicces
sors of tlie patriarch is peculiar to the Elohist (vet
20; eh. xxv. 16; xxxv. II; xxxvi. 31)." This dis-
tmotion corresponds entirely with the fact, that Je-
hovah, out of the (Goim) nations, which he lules as
Elohim, forms one peculiar people (CS) of faith, as
he at first changed the natural Israel to a spiritual.
As to this promise of blessing from God, the name
Abraham, father of a mass, noise, tumult of nations,
embraces the whole promise in its widest circum-
ference. 1. People and kings l"-' Kings. David,
Solomon, Christ, whose royal genealogy is given
Matt. i. 1-16." Wordsworth, p. 79. Especially in
Christ and the spiiitual seed of Abraham, who are
kings and priests unto God, Rev. i. 6. Jacobus:
" Notes." — A. G.] ; even rich kings should come
from him ; 2. the covenant of blessing from God
with him and his seed should be eternal; 3. the
whole land of Canaan should belong to his seed for
an eternal possession. It should be observed here,
that Canaan has fallen in the very same measure to
the Arabians as descendants of Abraham (Gal. iv.
25), in which it has actually been rent from the peo-
ple of Israel for indefinitely long periods of time ; it
has thus remained permanently in the possession of
the descendants of Abraham in the wider sense;
4. Jehovah will remain (be) the God (Elohim) of the
seed of Abraham. This promise, also, notwithstand-
ing all the transient obscurations, has been fulfilled in
the patriarchal monotheism in Palestine and Arabia.
The stipulated, imprescriptible, peculiar right of the
peeple of Israel to Canaan is included in this general
promise. [Literally to the lineal seed and the earthly
Canaan, but the everlaslinrj covenant and the everlaxt-
inff possession, show that the covenant and the prom-
ised inheritance included the spiritual seed, and the
heavenly Canaan. — A. G.] " In this new name, God
gave to him a real pledge for the establishment of
his covenant, since the name which God gave to him
could not be, or remain an empty sound, but as
the expression of nature or essence must win real-
ity." Keil. " A numerous posterity was regarded
by the Hebrews as a divine blessing, which was the
portion of those well-ploasiag to him (ch. xxiv. 60'
xlviii. 16, 19; Ps. cxxviii ; Ecc. vi 3)." Knobel.
2. The covenant of Abraham (on his pari) with
God, in the wider sense (vers. 9-14). And God
(Elohim) said unto Abraham. The covenant of
circumcision in the wider sense is a covenant of
Eloliim. In his new destination Abraham was called
to introduce this sign of the covenant for himself and
his seed. He came under obligation at the first for
himself with his seed to keep the covenant with Elo-
him. But circumcision is the characteristic sign and
seal of this covenant, as a statute and a type, i. e., with
the included idea of its spiritual import. In this sense
it is said_: This is my covenant, . . . shall be
circumcised. Upon circumcision compare Winer :
Real-Wiirlerbuch, and similar works. 1. The act
of circumcision ; the removal of the foreskin ; 2. the
destination : the sign of the covenant ; 3. the time :
sight days after the birth (see eh. xxi. 4 ; Lev.
lii. 3 ; Luke i. 59 ; ii. 21 ; John vii. 22 ; Phil. iii. 5 ';
Joseph.: "Antiq." i. 12, 2); 4. the extent of its
efficacy : not. only the children, but slaves born in
the house [and those also bought with his money
A G.] were to be circumcised ; 5. its inviolability :
those who were not circumcised shonld be cut off,
uprooted. — Circumcision, as a sign of the patriarchal
covenant, appears to presuppose its earlier existence
as a religious rite. According to Herodotus, circum
cision was practised among the Colchi, Egyptian.
[It has been urged, however, against the idea that
the Egyptians practised this rite generally; 1. That
Abraham circumcised all his male servants — among
them probably those who were presented by Pha-
raoh; 2. that Pharaoh's daughter knew that Mosei
was a Hebrew child— (Heb., and behold a male-child);
— 3. Ezek. xxxi. 18; see Bush: "Notes," p. 273. —
A. G.] and Ethiopians ; and the Syrians of PaJcscin*
and Puoeaicians might have learned it from the
Egyptians. In Ewald's view, its original home was
the valley of the Nile ; and it still exists as a national
usage among the Ethiopian Christians, and among
the Congos. With regard to the ciiciirncision of the
Egyytians, we remark, that while Herodotus and
Philo regard it as a general custom, Origen ascribes it
simply to the priests. [Wordsworth, p. 81, urges
in favor of this view, that circumcision was not prac-
tised by the other sons of Ham ; that Ishmael, the
son of an Egyptian mother, was not circumcised
until after this institution of the covenant; and that
Joshua is said to have rolled away the reproach of
Egypt when he circumcised the Israelites at Gilgal. —
A. G.] According to Ezek. xxxi. 18; xxxii. 19, the
Egyptians seem to be included among the uncircum-
cised. We need not, however, insist too strictlv
upon a prophetic word, which may possibly have a
higher symbohcal sense (eomp. Rom. ii. 28). And
Origen informs us of a later time, in which the
Coptic element was mingled with Hellenic elements
in Egypt. Some have viewed Egyptian circumcision
as an idolizing of the generative power. The bloody
act points rather to purification. Delitzsch remarks :
that circumcision, as some think, has been found in
America, upon the South Sea Islands, e. g. in a mode
resembling that in use among the Jews, in the Feegee
Islands, and among the southeastern Negro tribes,
e. g. among the Damaras in tropical South Africa.
And here we cannot a,ssume any connection with
the Abrahamic, nor with the Egyptian circumcision.
But the customs prevaiUng in the valley of the Nile,
might spread themselves widely over Africa, as those
of the Phoenicians over the ocean. The Epistle of
Barnabas, in a passage which has not been suffi-
ciently regarded (ch. ix.), brings into prominence
the idea, that we must distinguish circumcision, as
an original custom of ditterent nations, from that
which receives the patriarchal and theocratic sanc-
tion. " The heathen circumcision," as DeUtzsch re-
marks, " leaving out of view the Ishmaelites, Arabians,
and the tribes connected with them both by blood
and in history, is thus very analogous to the heathen
sacrifice. As the sacrifice sprang from the feeling
of the necessity for an atonement, so circumcision
from the consciousness of the impurity of human na-
ture." But tliat the spread of circumcision among
the ancient nations is analogous to the general prev-
alence of sacrifice, has not yet been proved. It re-
mains to be investigated, whether the national origin
of circumcision stands rather in some relation to
religious sacrifice ; whether it may possibly form an
opposition to the custom of human sacrifices (for it is
just as absurd to view it with some, as a remnant of
human sacrifice, as to regard it with others, as a
modification of eunuchism) ; whether it may liav«
prevailed from sanitary motives, the obligation of
bodily purity and soundness, (see Winer, i. p. 159);
or whether it has not rather from the first had its
ground and source in the idea of the consecration
of the genera'^ve nature, and of the propagation of
124
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
the race (Delitzsch, p. 385). At all events, circum-
cision did not come to Abraliam as a custom of his
ancestors; he was circumcised when uinetv-nine
years of age. This bears with decisive weight against
the generalizing of the custom by Delitzsch. As to
the destination of circmucision to be the sign of the
covenant, its patriarchal origin is beyond question.
[As the rainbow was chosen to be the sign of the
covenant with Noah, so the prior existence of cir-
eomcision does not render it less fit to be the sign
of the covenant with Abraham, nor less significant.
" It was the fit symbol of that removal of the okl
man, and that renewal of nature which qualified
Abraham to be the parent of the holy seed." Mur-
phy. See .also Kurtz and Baumgarten. — A. G.] (See
John vii. 22). Still it wag placed upon a new legid
basis by Moses (Exod. iv. 24, 25 ; Lev. xii. 3 ), and
was brought into regular observance by Joshua
(Josh. V. 2). That it should be the symbol of the
new birth, i. e., of the sanctification of human nature,
from its very source and origin, is shown both by the
passages which speak of the circumcision of the
heart (Lev. xxvi, 41 ; Dent. x. 16 ; xxx. 6 ; Jer. iv.
4 ; ix. 25 ; Ezek. xliv. V), and from the manner of
speech in use among the Israelites, in which Jewish
proselytes were described as new-born. As to the
terminus of eight days, which was so strictly ob-
served, that even the law of the Sabbath was held
Bubordinate to the law of Circumcision, Delitzscli ex-
plains the prescription of this period, from the fact
that the child was not separated and purified from
the sustenance of its embryonic state until this
period. It is better to regard the week of birth as a
terminus for the close of the birth throes and labor,
and at the same time, as the term fixed for the out-
ward purification. Keil explains : " because this day
fras viewed as the beginning of the independent life,
as we may infer from the analogous prescription as
to the age of the young animals used in sacrifice
(Lev. xxii. 27; Exod. xxii. 30).' He remarks also,
"that the Arabians circumcise at a late period,
usually between five and thirteen years, often during
the thirteenth year, because Ishmael was thirteen
years old when he was circumcised." For more ile-
tailed observations, see Knobel, p. 164. — The
threatening that the uncircumcised should be cut
off — uprooted, can refer only to the conscious, wick-
ed contempt of the command, as the same threaten-
ing must be understood in regard to other offences.
Clericus and others explain the " cutting-off" as a
removal from the people and its privileges. But the
theocratic death-penalty (which was indeed the form
of a final, complete excommunication from the pen-
pie) can alone be understood here, as it naturally
could alone meet the ease of the despiser of the
covenant-sign, and of the covenant itself jBiit it is
the covenant between Jehovah and the seed of Abra-
ham which is here before us, and exclusion from tlie
people of the covenant would be, as Banmgarten
urges, exclusion from all blessings and salvaiiou.
That this wua connecied with the death-penalty in
other passages (a« Exod. xxxi. 14), would seem to
show that ilie phrase itself did not necessarily imidy
such a penalty. — A. G.] (see Knobel, p. 163). The
reference by Delitzsch, to an immediate divine judg-
• [A ton of I'fjht dai/g. It was after a week's round,
when a new perlrx] was bejnin, and thns it was indicative
of 8tHrtin(r anew upon a tww lile. The Bcventli day was a
nacred d;iy. And thin period of fieven days was a sacred
period, so that with the citrhth day a new cycle vfim cum-
Ekicnccd Jacobus, p 287. — A. G.l
ment, or to the premature, childless death of the nn
circumcised, who had reached full age, implies an
extraordinary introduction or enlargement of the
theocratic regulation, which belongs to the Israel-
itish tradition. Keil strives to unite both views
(p. 15r.). But here also we must distinguish the
legal and typical elements. In the typical sense,
the "cutting-olT" denotes the endless destruction,
the total ruin of the man who despise^ the covenant
of God. [And it is worthy of observation, that to
despise and reject the sign, was to despise and reject
the covenant itself. He who neglects or refuses the
sign, ?iath broken my covenant. — A. G.]
B. — 3. The establishment of the covenant in a nar-
rower sense with Isaac — the more direct bearer and
mi'diator of the covenant (ver. 1.5-22). And God
(Elohim) said. God establishes the covenant in
this form also as Elohim, not as Jehovah, since not
only Israel, but Edom, should spring from Isaac, the
son of Sarah. — Sarah thy wife. " As the ances-
tress of nations and kings, she should be called miU
(princess), not ^^il) (heroine)." Knobel. Delitzsch
explains ''ys the princely, but this does not distin-
guish sufficiently the old name from the new. (Je-
rome distinguishes : my princess, my dominion and
princess generally). Even in this case the name de-
clares the subject of the following promise, and its
security. Now it was definitely promisi'd to Abra-
ham, that he should have a son from Sarah ; and it
was also intimated that the descendants from thia
son should branch themselves into (Goim) nations. —
Then Abraham fell upon his face, and laughed.
The cxiilanation of Knobel is absurd : " Abraliam
doubted the ])Ossibility, since he was an hundred,
and Sarah was ninety years old, and laughs, there-
fore, hut falls upon his face, lest God should notice
it" ( ! ). " In the other writer, the patriarch, as the
man of Goil, believes (ch. xv. ('>), and only the less
eminent wife, doubts and laughs (ch. xviii. 12). But
here as there, the laughter, in the name of the prom-
ised seed ( pnS^ ), passes into the history of Abra-
ham." That the interpreter, from this standpoint,
knows nothing of a laugh of astonishment, in connec-
tion with full faith, indeed, in the immediate experi-
ence of the events (Ps. cxxvi. 1, 2), is evident.
Delitzsch : The promise was so very great, that he
sank reverently upon the ground, and so very para-
doxical, that he involuntarily laughs (see also the
ciuotation from Calvin, by Keil, p. 151). ["The
laiishter of Abraham was the exultation of joy, not
the smile of unbelief." Aug. : de Civ. Dei. xvi. 26.
Wordsworth, who also urges that this interpretation
is sustained by our Lord, John viii. r,6. — A. G.]
We may confidently infer from the difl'crcnt judg-
ments of Abraham's laughter here, and that of Sa-
rah, which is recorded afterward, that there was an
important distinction in the states of mind from
which they sprang. The characteristic feature in the
narration here is, that Abraham fell u]>on his face,
as at first, afler the prnndse, ver. 2. — Shall there
be bom unto him that is an hundred years
old?* The apparent impossibility is twofold (see
* (" These questions are not addressed to God; thev
merely ajjitate the breast of tlie astonished patriarch.*'
Murphy, p. 311. "Can this bo? This that w.as only teo
(;(H)d til he tliought of, and too blessed a cnnsuramarion of a;l
his ancient hripes, to he now, at Ihis Kte day, so ilistinctlj
assured to him by God him.solf." Jacobus, p. 289. — A. G.l
CHAP. XVII. 1-27.
42£
the quotations, Rom. iv. and Heb. xi.). — O that
Ishmael might (still) live. The sense of the
prayer is ambiguous. " Abraham," says Knobol,
"turns aside, and only wishes that tlie son he al-
ready had should live and prosper." Calvin, and
others, also inierpiet the prayer ii: the sense, that
Abraham would be contented if Ishmael should pros-
per. Keil, on the contrary, regards the prayer of
Abraham as arising out of his anxiety, lest Ishmael
should not have ;my part in the blessings of the cov-
enant. The fact, that the answer of God contains
no denial of the prayer of Abraham, is in favor of
this interpretation. But in the prayer, Abraham ex-
presses his anticipation of an indeliiMte neglect of
Ishmael, whidi was painful to his parental lioart.
He asks for him, theiefore, a life from God in the
highest sense Since Abraham, according to ch. xvi.,
actually fell into the erroneous expectation, that tlie
promise of God to him would be fulfilled in Ishmael,
and since there is no record of any divine correction
of his error in the mean time, the new revelation
from God could only so be introduced when he be-
gins to be in trouble about Ishmael (see ch. xxi. 9),
and to doubt, as to the truth and certainty of his
self-formed expectation, both because Jehovah had
loft him for a long time without a new revelation,
and because Hagar had communicated to him the
revelation granted to her, as to the character of her
son — a prophecy which did not agree with the heir
of the promise. In this state of uncertainty and
doubt [Calvin, however, holds, that Abraham was,
all this time, contented with tlie supposition, that
Ishmael was the child of promise, and that the new
revelation startled him from his error. — A. G.] the
promise of the heir of blessing was renewed to him.
But then he receives the new revelation from God,
that Sarah shall bear to him the true heir. It puts
an end to the old, sad doubt, in regard to Ishmael,
since it starts a new and transient doubt in reference
to the promise of Isaac ; therefore there is mingUng
with his faith, not yet perfect on account of the joy
(Luke xxiv. 41), a beautiful paternal feeling for the
siill beloved Ishmael, and his future of faith. Hence
the intercession for Ishmael, the characteristic feat-
ure of which is, a question of love, whether the son
of the long-delayetl hope, should also hold his share
of the blessing, bas may, indeed, include so far the
granting of the prayer of Abram ; it may mean, still,
nevertheless. [IJetter, as Jacobus, indeed, as ad-
dressed to the transient doubt as to Isaac, which
may lie In Abraham's prayer for Ishmael. Indeed,
on the contrary, Sarah is bearing thee a son. — A. G.]
But the nineteenth verse distinctly declares that the
son of Sarah should be the chief heir, the peculiar
bearer of the covenant. Closer and moic definite
distinctions are drawn inver. 2(). — Twelve princes
shall he beget (see ch. xxv. 12-16). — At this set
time. The promise is now clearly revealed eveu in
regard to time ; and with this the revelation of God
for this time ceases.
4. The compliance with the prescribed rite of
circumcision (vers. 28-27). The prompt obedience
of Abraham [This prompt obedience of Abraham re-
reals his faith in the promise, and that this laughter
was joyful and not unbelieving. — A. G.] is seen in
his circumcising himself and his household, i. e. the
male members of his household, as he was com
manded, in the same day. According to the expres-
sion of tne text, Abraham appears to have performed
the rite uprjj himself with his own hands.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. See the General Remarks, and tie Ciitica.
Notes upon the double circle of the covenant, and
circumcision.
2. El Shaddai. We do not comprehend the
whole of this name, if we identify it with Elohim.
We make it too comprehensive if we represent it aa
including the idea of all the divine attributes, or as
an e.xpres.sion of the majesty of God. It is the name
of the Almighty, and stands here at the very be-
ginning of the announcement of theocratic miracles,
lor the same reason, that in the Apostles' CreeO, it
designates the nature of God the Father, for the
Christian faith. The Almighty God (itavroKpiToifi')
is the God of the Theocracy, and of all the miracle.s.
He makes the highest revelation of his miractdoua
power in the resurrection of Christ (Eph. i. 19 IT.).
3. Before my face. The anthropomorphisms of
the Scripture. The soul, head, eyes, arm of God,
are mentioned in the Bible. The Concordances give
all the information any one needs. It is not difficult
to ascertain the meaning of the particular descrip-
tions. His face is his presence in the definiteness and
certainty of the personal consciou.sness(Ps. cxxxix.)
4. Keil brings the narrower circle of the cove
nant into conflict with the wider, as was above re-
marked. [Keil puts his argument in this form :
Since the grace of the covenant was promised alone
to Isaac, and Abraham was to become the father of
a mass of nations by Sarah (ver. 16), we cannot in-
clude the Ishmaelites nor the sons of Keturah in this
mass of nations. Since, further, Esau had no part
in the promise of the covenant, the promised de
scendants must come alone through Jacob. But the
sons of Jacob formed only one people or nation;
Abraham is thus only the father of one people. It
follows, necessarily, that the mass of nations must
embrace the spiritual descendants of Abraham, all
who are eV ttiVteoi! 'Agpaafi (comp. Rom. iv. 11, 16)
He urges also, in favor of this view, the fact, that
the seal of the covenant was apphed to those who
were not natural descendants of Abraham, to those
born in his house and bought with his money. He
holds, also, that the promise of the land of Canaan
to this seed for a possession is not exhausted by the
fact, that this land was given to the literal Israel
but that as the 'ItrpaTjA kuto. aapKo. ai-e enlarged
to the *\(Tpa})\ Kara Trvediia, so the idea and limits
of the earthly Canaan must be enlarged to the limits
of the spiritual Canaan, that in truth, Abraham has
received the promise nK-npovoixov aiirhi/ flvac kuithov,
Rom. iv. 13, p. 138. — A. G.] Under the seed
promised to Abraham of a " multitude of nations,"
the descendants of Esa-u should not be understood;
on the contrary, the spiritual descendants of Abra-
ham Tnust have been intended, and reckoned with
the people of Israel, which constitutes, indeed, bul
one nation. But we must always clearly distin
guish between the promise, " in thy seed shall be
blessed all the families of the earth," and the prom
ise, "fiom thee shall spring a mass of nations,'
through Ishmael and Isaac, and these shall all bt
embraced in the covenant of circumcision, the one
as bearer of the covenant, the others as associates
and sharers in the covenant. Otherwise, indeed,
even the spiritual seed of Abraham m*t be circum
cised. But as circumcision is the type of the new
birth, so the mass of nations which should spring
from Abraham, is the type of his spiritual descend
126
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
ints, and in the typical sense, truly, he is here the
father of all believci-s In the typical sense, also,
the promise of Canaan, and the pioinise of tlie eter-
nity of the covenant, have a higher meaning and
importance. The reinarl<s of Keil, as to the estima-
tion of this spiritual significance of the Abrahamic
promise, against Auberleii and others, who sink the
relerenee of the promise to the spiritual Israel to a
" mere application," are well founded [and are most
important and suggestive. — A. G.]
o. Circumcision (as also baptism still more eifect-
ually, Rom. vi.), as the type of the renewing through
natural suffering, endently forms an opposition be-
tween the old and sinful human nature, and the new
life. It is therefore a testimony to human corrup-
tion on the one hand, and to the calling of men
through divine grace to a new life, on the other.
[The ground of the choice of circumcision as the
sign and seal of the covenant may be thus stated.
It lies in the nature of the blessing promised, i. e. a
seed of blessing. That which is born of the flesh is
flesh, but the promised seed were to be holy, and
thus channels of blessing. The seed of Abraham
were thus to be distinguished from other races. As
corruption descended by ordinary generation, the
seed of grace were to be marked and symbolically
purified from that corruption. It thus denoted the
purifying of that by which the promise was to be se-
cured.— A. G.] But as a sign placed upon the fore-
skin, it designates still more definitely on the one
side, that the corruption is one which has especially
fallen upon or centres in the propagation of the race,
and has an essential source of support in it, as on
the other side, it is a sign aud seal, that man is called
to a new life, and also, that for this new life the con-
ception and procreation should be consecrated and
sanctified (see John i. 13, 14). The male portion
of the people only, were subjected to this ordinance.
ITiis rests first of all upon natural causes. Luther
finds a compensation in the birth-throes and expos-
ure to death on the part of the females. The pains
of Ijirtli were truly translated to the male sex through
circumcision. But then this one-sidedne.ss of the
sacrament of circumcision declares the complete de-
pendence of the wife upon her husband under the
old covenant. [Kurtz : The dependent position of
the woman, by virtue of which, not without the man,
but in and with the man, not as woman, but as the
bride, and mother, she has her importance in the
people and life of the covenant, does not allow her
to come into the same prominence here as the man,
p. 188. Jacobils says: "Under the Old Covenant,
as everything pointed forward to Christ the God-
Man — Son of Man — so every ofli^ring was to be a
male, and every covenant rite was properly enough
confined to the male.s. The females were regarded
as acting in them, and represented by them. Under
the New Testament this distinction is not appropri-
ate. It Is not iiiidc anil female. Gal. iii. 28 ; Col,
iii. 11. That the rite was applied so expressly to
those bom in the house, and those bought with his
inoiey — the son of the stranger — wa.s intended to
point to the universal aspect of the covenant, the ex-
tcngioi^ of its blessing."! to all nations. — A. (!.] But
it was enlarged, or completed, in fact, through the
law of purification, to which the mother was sub-
jected. Its spiritual sisjnificanee is that it is
not birth itself but the sexual generation, as such,
which is the trnduz peceati. In the New Covenant,
the wife has an erjually direct share in baptism as
the husband. And this was tvpified in the Old Cov-
enant through the giving of the name. Sarah po«
sesses a new name as well as Abraham,
6. It scarcely follows from Exod, iv. 25, as De-
litzsch thinks, that circumcision proclaimed to the
circumcised man, that he had Jehovah for a bride-
groom ; although Jews, Ishmaelites, and Moslems
generally name the day of circumcision the wedding-
feast of eircimicision. The Scripture constitutes a
bridal relation between Christ and his Church, viewed
in its totality.
7. If Delitzsch in this, as in other passages, give!
to circumcision too great an importance, he does not
esteem sufficiently its importance when he remarks,
that it is no peculiar rite of initiation, like baptism.
''It is not circumcision which makes the IsraeUtea
what they are as such, i. e., members of the Israel-
itish church. It is through its birth [While it is
true that the Israelite by his birth was so far a mem-
ber of the congregation or church, that he had a title
to its rites and ordinances, it is true that circumci*
sion was the recognition of that membership, and
that if he neglected it, he was exscinded from the
people. — A. G.] ; for people and church are cotermi-
nous in the Old Testament." This is totally incor-
rect, just as incorrect as if one should say, Christen-
dom and the Church are coterminous, [It lies, too,
in the face of the whole New Testament, which
places circumcision and baptism in the closest rela-
tions to each other, and makes the one to come in
the place of the other. The differences between them
upon which Delitzsch dwells are just those which we
should expect under the two economies. — A G.]
As one must distinguish between Jacob aud Israel,
so one must distinguish between Israel as the natur-
ally increased ('ij) and Israel as the called people
of God (ns). Israel is, in a qualified sense, the peo-
ple of God ; viz., as it, through circumcision, purifi-
cation, and sacrifice, was consecrated a congregation
of God (pT^^). And thus we must distinguish cir-
cumcision as to its old national, its patriarchal, and its
theocratic and legal power and efficacy. In the last
meaning alone, it belonged to the people of Israel as
the Church of God, and was so far an initiatory rite,
that by means of it an Edomite or Moabite coulc
be incorporated into the people of God, while genu-
ine Jews, even the sons of Aaron, might be exscind
ed, if it were neglected. The Old Testament people
of God, has thus definitely the characteri.-^tic traits
of the spiritual New Testament Israel, a people of
God, gathered from all the nations of the earth. It
was precisely the fault of the Edomite Jews, that
they failed to distinguish between circumcision in
this higher sense, as it passed over into baptism, and
circumcision as a national custom. And this is the
fallacy of the Baptists, through which ihey, to this
day, commonly attempt to rend away from the de-
fenders of infant baptism tlie argument which they
draw from circumcision. They say, " circumcision
was no Siicrament of the Jews; it was a mere na-
tional custom.*' But it was just as truly a sacra-
ment of the Jews, as the passover, from which we
must distinguish likewise, the eating of a roasted
lamb in the leasts of the ancients We refer again
to the well-Unown distinction in the Epistle of Bar-
nabas (ch. ix.).
8. The moral nature of the divine covenant ap-
pears in this chapter, as in the earlier formation o
the covenant ; and here still more definitely throu{,ii
the opposition : I on my part (ver. 4), but thou on
thy part (ver. 0). Circumcision, according to thi»
CHAP. XVn. 1-27.
421
BOtitLesis, must be regarded by Abraham especially
as a duty, which declares comprehensively all his
duties in the rendering of obedience, in the sell-
denying, subduing, and sanctifying of his nature ;
while the giving of the name is the act of (iod, whicli
IS comprehensive of all his promises. There is no
conflict between tins first and nearest signitieance of
circumcision, and tlie fact, that it is a gift, a sign
and seal, and lype of the truth of the covenant of
(lOd. The application to the passover-meal, and in-
deed to the Christian sacraments, will be obvious.
['* As a si<jn^ circumcision was intended to set forth
Buch truths as these : of repentance and ticsh-
mortifying, and sanotification and devotement to
God ; and also the higlier truth of the seed of pi om-
ise which Israel was to become, and the miraculous
seed, which was Christ. As a seal, it was to authen-
ticate God's signature, and confirm his word and
covenant promise, and execute the covenant on
God's part, making a conveyance of the blessings to
those wlio set their hand to this seal by faith. Un-
der the New Testament economy of tlie same cove-
nant of grace, after " the seed" had come, the seal
is adapted to the more spiritual dispensation, though
it is of the same general import. Jacobus, " Notes,"
vol. i. p. 286.— A. G.]
9. The first laughter mentioned in the Bible is
that of Abraham, ver. 17. A proof that there is
nothing evil in the laugh itself. The first weeping
which is mentioned is the weeping of Hagar in the
desert (ch. xxi. 16). Both expressions of human
feeling tims appear at first, in a consecrated and
pious form.
10. The Jews declare that the law of circumci-
sion is as great as the whole law. The idea is, that
circumcision is the kernel, and therefore, also, that
which eiiiuprehends the whole law : a. as a separa-
tion from an impure world; b. as a consecration to
God. When they say, it is only on account of cir-
cumcision that God hears piayer, and no circumcised
man can sink to hell, it is just as true, and just as
false, as the extra ecclesiam nulla salus, according as
it is inwardly or outwardly understood.
11. We have here the first allusion to slaves who
were bought with money (ver. 27). Starke: "Thus
it seems, alas ! true, tliat at this time slavery pre-
vailed, which, indeed, to all appearance, must have
• begun from the Nimrodic dotuiuion. For when men
have begun to treat their fellow-men as wild beasts,
after tlie manner of hunters, they will easily enslave
those who are thus overcotne ; and this custom,
though against the rights of nature, soon became
general. When, now, Abraham found this custom in
existence before his time, he used the same for the
good of many of these wretched people ; he bought
them, but brought them to the knowledge of the
true God, etc. To buy and sell men for evil is sin,
and opposed both to the natural and divine law (Ex.
xii. 2); but to buy in order to bring them to the
knowledge of the true God is permitted (Lev. xxv.
44, 45)." — To buy them in order to give them bodily
and spiritual freedom is Christ-Uke.
12. Starke: " The question arises here, whether
a foreign servant could be constrained to be circum-
cised. Some (Clericus, e. g.) favor, and others op-
pose this opinion. The Rabbins say : If any one
dhould buy a grown servant of the Cuthites, and he
refused to be circumcised, he should sell biin again."
tralmonides.
1 3 As in the ark of Noah, so in the fact that
Atirahani should circumcise all the male members
of his household, the full biblical significance and
importance of the household appears in a striking
way; of the household in its spiritual unity, whicl
the theory of the Baptists in its abstract individual
ity, dissolves.
14. The promise of blessing which Abraham re-
ceives, repeats itself relatively to every believer. Hij
life will be rich in fruits of blessing, reaching on
into eternity. In the abstract sense this avails only
ol Christ (Isa. liii. 10), but therefore in some meas-
ure of every believer (Mark x. 30).
15. The word ver. 14 in a typical expression
cont!uns a fearful and solemn warning against the
contempt of the sucr;iments. The signs and seala
of communion with the Lord and his people are not
exposed to the arbitrary treatment of individuals.
With the proud contempt of the signs of communion,
the heart and life are separated from the communion
itself, and its blessings and salvation.
16. The New Testament fulfilment of circumci-
sion (Rom. ii. 29). If circumcision is the type of the
new birth, its essential fulfilment lies in the birth of
Christ. "The sanctification of birth has reached its
personal goal in his birth, which is a new birth. But
Christ must be appropriated by humanity through
his sufferings. Therefore he was made subject to
the legal circumcision (Gal. iv. 4), and the perfect
result of this communion with his brethren, was his
death upon the cross (Rom. vi. 6; Col. ii. 11, 12).
In the commuiuon with this death, into which Chris-
tians enter with baptism, they become the people
of the real ci"cumeision, over against which bodily
circumcision, in a religions serise, becomes a cruel
mangling of the body (Pliil. iii. 3).
17. We must distinguish the typical significance
of our chapter from its historical basis, and bitid
both sides together without confounding them. This
avails of the twofold circle of the covenant; of the
name Abraham ; of the blessing for his seed ; of the
eternity of the covenant ; of his sojourn in Canaan,
and the gift of the land to him for an eternal pos-
session ; of circumcision, and of the threatening of
excision. In all these points we distinguish the his-
torical greatness and spiritual glory of the covenant
of promise.
HOMIIETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
See the Doctrinal paragraphs. — The visitation of
Abraham after his long trial and waiting. — God's de-
la.y no actual delay (2 Pet. ii. 9). — The establish-
1 lent of the covenant between God and Abraham :
1. The precondition of the establishment of the cov-
enant (see ch. xv.-ch. xvii. 1); 2. the contents of
the covenant of promise : the name Abraham ; a. in
the natural sense ; b. in the typical sense ; 3. the
covenant in the wider and narrower sense ; 4. the
covenant-sign. — The new covenant of God in his
name (El-Shaddai, God of wonders), the basis of the
new name of believer.-'. — Faith in the miracle is faith
in that which is divineli/ new. — The renewed call of
Abraham : I.Asa confirmation of his calling ; 2. ai
the enlargement and strengthening of It — The con-
tents ol' the call : Walk before me and be perfect,
i. e., walk before me (in the faith and vision of my
presence, in grace and miraculous power), 1. so art
thou lilameless (pious, righteous, perfect); 2. so will
<AoM be blameless ; 3 so ^o«»« it thi ough thy pious
conduct. — The particular promises of God, whicli
are contained in the name Abraham : 1. According
428
GjiNESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
to its natural greatness ; 2. accoiding to its typical
glory. — The promises of God conditioned through
the covenant of CJod. — The two sides in the covenant
of God. — In the covenant of circumcision. — Circum-
cision as a type : 1. Of the new birth ; 2. of baptism;
8. of infant baptism. — Abraham's laughter. — Abra-
ham's intercession for Ishmael. — For missions among
the Mohammedans. — He will laugli. — Isaac's name
henceforth a name of promise. — The significance of
ttis name for the children of God (Vs. cxxvi. 2;
Luke vi. 21). — Abraham's obedience the Bpiriiual
gide of circumcision.
Starke : [derivations of El-Shaddai. More par-
ticularly upon the bibUcal anthropomorphisms].
The change of names. There is here a glorious
proof that even the heathen shall come to Clirist,
and become the cliildren of Abraliam. — Upon ver. 6.
But above all, the King of kings, Christ, is to de-
scend I'rom him (Luke i. 32 ; Kom. ix. 5). — Upon
ver. 7. As to the earthly prosperity wliich God
promised to the natural seed of Abratiani, namely,
the possession of the land of Canaan, the word Eter-
nal is here used to denote a very long time, whicli,
however, has still an end (vers. 8, 1:5, 19; Esod.
xxi. 6 ; Deut. xv. 17 ; Jer. xviii. 16). But as ro the
spiritual good which he promised to the spiritual
seed of Abraham, to all true believers, namely, the
grace of God, forgiveness of sins, protection and
blessing in this life, and heavenly glory in the Hfe
to come, it is surely an eternal, perpetual covenant.
[Thus also Wordsworth, essentially, and Murphy :
" The phrase, perpetual possession, has here two ele-
ments of meaning — first, that the possession in its
coming form of u certain land, shall last as long as
the co-existing relations of things are continued ;
ard secondly, that the said possession in all the va-
riety of its ever grander phases, will last absolutely
forever, p. 309." — A. G.]. — Cramer : The covenant
of grace of God is eternal, and one with the new cov-
enant in Christi Jer. xxxi. 33 ; Isa. hv. 10). — Osian-
der: Even the children of Christian parents, born
dead, or taken away before the reception of baptism,
are not to be esteemed lost, but blessed. — He intro-
duces a sacrament which, viewed in itself alone,
might be regarded as involving disgrace. But on
this very account it tvpifies, 1. the deep depravity of
men, in which they are involved from the corruption
of original sin, since not only some of the members,
but the whole man, is poisoned, and the member
here atfected in particular as the chief instrument in
the propagation of the human race. 'i. For the
same reason, it confirms the promise of the increase
of the race of Abraham. 3. Through this sign God
intends to distinguish the people of his possessioii
from all other nations. 4. He represents in it, the
ppiritUii! circumcision of the heart — the new birth. —
V'pon ver. 14. Cramer: Whoever despises the word
of God and the .sacraments, will not be left unpun-
ished by God (I.sa. vii. 12 ; Luke vii. 30 ; 1 Cor. xi.
80. — MusctTLHs: Saiali, although appointed to be
'.he royal mother of nations and kings, does not bear
them to herself, but to Abraham, her own husband ;
thus the Church of Christ, espoused to Christ, al-
though the true royal mother of nations and kings,
L «., of all believers, bears ihem not to her.scif, but
U) Christ. — (Jkamek: Although women in the Old
Testament had no sacrament of circumcision, they
sliare in iti virtue, tiirough tlu; reception of the
bames, by which tln-y voluntarily subscribe to the
covenant oC God (l.sa. xliv. 5). — (Jod is an Almighty
God, who i.f not bouml to nature. — Ver. 23. As to
the readiness with which all the servants of Abialian
suffer themselves to be circumcised, we see at onw
that they must have had already, through the in
struction of Abraham, some conect knowledge of
God, since otherwise they could not have understood
an act which, to mere reason, appears so preposter-
ous, foohsh, and disgracefuh — Osiander: Believing
householders, who yield themselves in obedience to
the divine will, shall have also, through the divine
blessing, yielding and docile domestics. — Cra.mer
As circumcision was applied to all the members of
Abraham's household, so all, great and small, should
be baptized (Mark x. 14 ; John iii. 5, 6 ; Acts xvi.
1.5; xviii. 8; 1 Cor. i. 16. — As Abraham used no
delay in the sacrament of circumcision, even so we
also should not long defer the baptism of infanta.
Liscii : The essential element of the covenant on
the part of God is grace ; on man's part, faith (still,
the grace here receives a concrete expression in a
definite, gracious promise, and faith likewise in obe-
dience, and in a definite, significant rendering of obe-
dience).— Gerlacii: ver. 19. Isaac ("he laughs,"
or "one laughs"), the child ol joyful surprise is now
announced as soon to appear. — Ver. 8. The eternal
]iossession stands in striking contrast to the tran-
sient, ever-changing place of sojourn, which Canaan
was, at that time, for Abiaham. This land, how-
ever, which God promises to Abraham and his seed
for an inheritance, is stiU at the same time a visible
pledge, the enclosing shell of the still delicate seed
or kernel, therefore the prophetic type of the new-
world, which belongs to the Church of the Lord ;
therefore it is pre-eminently an eternal possession.
This is true, also, of all divine ordinances, as circam-
cision, the passover, the priesthood, etc., which,
established in the Old Testament as eternal, are, aa
to the literal sense, abolished in the New Testament,
but are in the truest sense spiritually fulfilled. —
Calwek (Handbuch) upon ver. 1 : Walk before me,
etc. The law and the gospel, faith and works, are
brought together in this one brief word or sentence.
Ver. 7. Eternal covenant. Truly, in so far as the spir-
itual seed of Abraham take the place of the natu-
ral Israel, and the earthly Canaan is the type of the
heavenly, which remains the eternal possession of
aU behevers. — The female sex, without any external
sign of the covenant, were yet included in the cove-
nant, and shared its gmce, so far as through descent
or marriage they belonged to the covenant people
(ch. xxxiv. 14 tf . ; Exod. xii. 3; Joel ii. 16, Iti). —
ScHRooER : Ver. 1. This manifestation was given
to Abraham, when he had now grown old and gray
in faith, for the hope of the fulfilment of the divine
promise. How he rebukes and sliames us who are
so easily stumbled and offended, if we do not see at
once the fulfilment of tlie divine promises! (Ilam-
hach). — Upon the name Elohim. The .same epoch
which (ch. xvii.) introduces the particular view of
that economy (Rom. iv. 11, 12), opens also its uni-
versal tendencies and features. What profound di-
vine wisciom and counsel shine in these paradoxes!
(The foundation, however, of this opposition is laid
already in ch. xii. 1. and firstappears in its dciisive,
complete form in the Mosaic institutiuu of the law).
— Ver. 1. We need to mark more careluUy the
'* I am" of ver 1, because, so niiiny false gods pre-
sent themselves to our hearts, and steal away out
love (Berleh. liiljel). — Before Aliraham was cimmiand
ed to cironmcisi' himself, the righteousness of faith
was counted to him. through which he was alieadv
righteous (Lutlier). — Although he utters no word.
•-!HAPS. xvin., xrx.
his silence speaks louder than if he had cried in the
clearest and loudest tones, that he would surely obey
ihe word of God (Calvin). — The significance and im-
portance of names, among the Hebri'ws, esiiecially
in Genesis. — Ver. 5. Abraliam is not called the father
of many nations, because his seed should bo sepa-
rated into different nations, but rather because tlie dif-
ferent, nations should be united in him (Kom. iv. ; Cal-
vin).— Ver. 8. The land wherein thou art a stranger.
The foreigner shall become the possessor. — Upon
Ver. 14. The connection shows that the reference is
to the conscious contempt of the sacraments, not to
those children who, through the guilt of t.lieir parents,
were not circumcised upon the eighth day (Exod. iv.
24, ff.) — Ver. 17. Abraham laughed. In the region
of unbelief the doubt is of no moment. It has its
importance in the life of behevers, where it pre-
■upposes faith, and leads as a transition step to a
firmer fiiith. (There is, however, a twofold kind of
doubt, without considering what is still a question,
whether tljeie is any reference to doubt in the text)
Luther thinks that Christ points to this text (in .loin
viii. 5ii). Then the laughing also is an intimatiOQ
of the overflowing joy which filled his heart, and be
longs to Ills spiritual experiences. — Ver. 19. Isaa<
The name teaches that those who tread in the foot
steps of Abraham's faith, will at times find cause fo"
laughter in the unexpected, sudden, and great bless
ings they receive. There is reason in God, both fo.
weeping and laughter (Roos). — Ver. 'J3. We sec
how well his house was ordered, since even those
who were bought with money cheerfully submitted
to circumcision (Calvin) — Passavant ; (Abraham).
The .\lmighty God, the God who can do all, sees
all, knows all, he was, is, and will be all, to hu
servants.
SEVENTH SECTION.
Abraham in the OaX-Orove of Mamre, and the three Heaverdy Men. Hospitality of Abraham. Tht
definite announcement of the birth of a Son. Sarah's Doubt. The announcement of the jiidgmem
upon Sodom connected with the Promise of the Heir of blessing. The Angel of the Lord, or tht
Friend of Abraham and the two angels of deliverance for Sodom. Abraham's intercession foi
Sodom. The destruction of Sodotn. Lot's rescue. Lot and his Daughters. Moab and Amman
ChS. XVIII. AND XIX.
1 And the Lord appeared unto liim in the plains of Marare ; and he sat in the tent-
2 door in the heat of the day ; And he hfted up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men
stood by him : and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent-door, and
3 bowed himself toward the ground, An 1 said. My Lord ['ps not i?"i!<.],' if now I have
4 found favor in thy sight, pass not away, I pray thee, from thy servant : Let a little
water, I pray you, be fetched, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree
5 [enjoy the noonday restj : And I will fetch a mor.^el of bread, and comfort [stay, strengthen]
ye your hearts ; after that ye shall pass on : for therefore are ye [even] come to your
6 servant. And they said. So do, as ihou liast said. And Abraham hastened into the
tent imto Sarah, and said. Make ready [hasten] quicklv three measures of fine meal,
7 knetid it, and make cakes upon the hearth. And Abraham ran unto the herd, and
fetched a calf tender and good, and gave it unto a young man [a servant] ; and he hasted
8 to dress it. And he^ took butter, and milk, and the calf which he had dressed [caused to
be 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
10 tent. And he said, I will certainly return unto thee according to the time of life
[retnin when this time of the next year shall be reached] ; and lo, Sarah thy wife shall [then] have S
son. And Sarah heard [was hearing] it in [behind] the tent-door, which [door] was behind
11 him [Jehovah]. Now Abraham and Sarah were old awrf well stricken in age ; and'\\
12 ceased to be with Sarali after the manner of women. Therefore Sarah laugheij within
herself, saying, After I am waxed old shall I have pleasure, mv lord being old |gray]
13 also? And the Lord said unto Abrahaoi, Wherefore did Sarah laugh saying, Siiall I
14 of a surety bear a child, which am [and I am] old ? Is any thing too hard ' [an exception]
for the Lord ? At the time appointed I will return unto thee, according to the time of
15 life [this time in the next year], and Sarah shall have a son. Theu Sarah denied, saying, I
laugjiied not; for she was afraid. And he said. Nay; bttt thou di 1st laugh.
430 GENESIS, OK THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSKS.
16 And the men rose up from thence, and looked toward Sodom: and Abraham weni
17 will! them to bring them on the way. And the Lord" said, Shall I hide fiDm Abra
18 ham that thing which I do [«-iiido] ;' Seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great
19 and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him? For 1
know [have chosen] him, that he will [shall] command his children and his household after
him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment ; that the
20 Lord may bring upon Abraham that whicii he hath spoken of him. And the Lord said
Because the cry [of thesinB, ch. iv. lo] of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because theL
21 sin is very grievous, I will go down now, and see whether they have done [until a decisioiij
altogether* according to the cry of it, which is come unto me; and it not, I will know.
22 And the men turned their faces from thence, and went toward Sodom : but Abraham
stood yet before the Lord.
23 And Abraham drew near [bowing, prayinR], and said, Wilt thou also destroy the right-
24 eous with the wicked ? Peradventure there be fifty righteous within the city [concealed in
the mass] : wilt thou also destroy, and not spare the place for the fifty righteous tiiat are
25 therein? That be far from thee' to do after this manner, to slay the righteous witii
the wicked : and that the righteous should be as the wicked [that it is all one both to the right-
eous and the wicked], that be far from thee: Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?
26 And the Lord said, If I find in Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare
27 all the place for their sakes. And Abraham answered and said. Behold now [once] 1
have taken upon me to speak [toeay] 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, if I find tiiere forty and five, I will not destroy it.
29 And he spake unto him yet again, and said, Peradventure there shall be forty found
there [ifone should search for them]. And be said, 1 will not do [will leave off to do] it for forty's
30 sake. And he said unto Imn, Oh let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak ; Per-
adventure there shall thirty be found there. And he said, I will not do it if I find
31 thirty there. 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
32 it for twenty's sake. And he said. Oh let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak yet
but this once : Peradventure there shall be ten foimd there. And he said, I will not
33 destroy it for ten's sake. And the Lord went his way, as soon as lie liad left commun-
ing with Abraham : and Abraham returned unto his place.
Ch. XIX. 1 And there came two' angels to Sodom at even; and Lot sat [was sitting] in
the gate of Sodom : and Lot seeing them, rose up to meet them ; and he bowed himself
2 with his face toward the ground ; And he said. Behold now, my lords,^ turn iu, 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 ways. And they said. Nay ; but we will abide in the
3 street all night. And he pressed upon them greatly; and they turned in unto him,
and entered into his house ; and he made them a feast [literally, a banquet], 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 old and young, all the people, from every quarter [all collected] :
5 And they called unto Lot, and said unto him. Where are the men which came in to
6 thee this night? bring them out unto us, that we may know them. And Lot went out
■ at the door unto them, and shut the door after him, And said, I pray you, brethren, do
3 not so wickedly. Beliold 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 ; for therefore came they under the shadow [and protection]
9 of my roof [ihecross-bi'amsor rafters of the house]. And they said. Stand back. And they
said again, 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,
10 even Lot, and camt near to break the door. But the men put forth their hand, and
11 pulled Lot into the 'lOuse to them, and shut to the door. And they smote the men tha«
were Hi the door of .he house with blmdness [dazzling blindnesses], both small and gruat; ac
that tbey wearied hemselves to find the door.
.1 And the men ..-aid unto Lot, Hast thou here [in the city] any besidon ? son-in-law
and thy sous, and thy daughters, and whal.soever tliou hast in the city, bring tlie-n cui
CHAPS. XVni., XIX 43)
13 of this place: For we will destroy' tliis place, because the cry of them [the outcry of thab
Bins] is waxen great before the face of 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 tliis place; for the Lord will destroy [as a destroyer] tliis city
But he seemed as one that mocked ' unto his sons-in-law [Luther: he was ridiculous in Owireyei].
16 And when the morning arose, then the angels hastened Lot, saying. Arise, take
thy wife, and thy two daughters, which are here [are found and ^scued] ; lest thou be cott-
16 Bumed in the iniquity [the visitation for the iniquity] of the city. And while he lingered,
the men laid hold upon his hand, and upon tlie hand of his vfife, and upon the hand ol
his two daughters ; the Lord being merciful unto him : and they brouglit him forth,
and set him without the city.
17 And it came to pass, when they had brought them forth abroad [into the open country],
that he said. Escape for thy life [thy soul]; look not behind thee, neither stay thou in
18 all the plain [vaiiey-region] ; escape to the mountain, lest thou be consumed. And Lot
said unto them [the two passing trom him; between whom Jehovah had revealed himself], Oh, nOt SO,
19 my Lord!' Behold now, thy servant hath found grace in thy sight, and thou hast
magnified thy mercy, which thou hast showed unto me, in saving my life ; and I cannot
20 escape to the mountain, lest some [the] evil take me, and I die : 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
21 one?) and my soul [through its exemption] shall live. And he said unto him, See, I have
accepted" thee concerning this thing also, that I will not overthrow this city, for the
22 which thou hast spoken. Haste thee, escape thither; fori cannot do anything till
thou be come thither; therefore the name of the city was called Zoar [smallness].
23, 24 The sun was risen upon the earth when Lot entered " into Zoar. 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 grew upon the ground.
26 But his wife looked back from beliind him, and she became a pillar of salt.
11 And Abraham gat up early in the morning to the place wliere he stood before the
J8 Lord: And lie looked toward (■'3Q"bs) Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land
of the plain, and beheld, and, lo, the smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a
furnace [lime-kilns or metal-fumaces. The earth itself bumed as an oven].
29 And it came to pass when God [Eiohim] destroyed the cities of the plain, that God
remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow, when he over-
threw the cities in the which Lot dwelt.
30 And Lot went up out of Zoar, and dwelt in the mountain, and his two daughters
with him; for he feared to dwell in Zoar: and he dwelt in a cave, he and his two
31 daughters. And the firstborn said unto the younger [smaller]. Our father is old, and
there is not a man [besides] in the earth to come in unto us, after the manner of all the
32 earth : Come, let us make our father drink wine, and we will lie with liim, that we may
33 preserve seed of our father. And they made their father drink wine that night : and
tlie firstborn went in and lay with her father; and he perceived not [was not in a consciooa
34 state] when she lay down, nor when she arose. And it came to pass on the morrow,
that the firstborn said unto the younger. Behold, I lay yesterniglit [nights] with my
fatlier : let us make him drink wine this night also ; and go thou in, and lie with him,
35 that we may preserve seed of our father. And they made their father drink wine thai
night also : and the j'ounger arose and lay with him ; and he perceived not when she
36 lay down, nor when she arose. Thus were both the daughters of Lot. with child by
37 their father. And the firstborn bare a son, and called his name Moab [fi-om the father j m
seed of the father ; son of my father j brother and sou] : the Same is the father of the Moabites UntC
38 this day. And the yoimger, she also bare a son, and called his name Ben-ammi [sonol
my people, son and brother] ; the same IS the father of the children of Amnion [=Ben-ammrti
unto this day.
[i Ch. XVm. vcr. S. — The versions vary, some reading one form and some the other. The Septuj_?int has Kvpt«
Vulg. D&mine. So also the Syriao and Onkelos. The Masoretic test, therefore, is preferable to that used in our vcr
■ion.— A. G.l
1^ Ver. 8.— He, i. e. Abraham.— A. O.l
[■ Ver. 8. — was standing. — A. G.l
r* Ver. 10. — Heb., according to the living time. — A. G.]
rsa
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
(• Ver. 14. — Heb., difficult, wonderful, Sept. /i»j aSvvarritrfi. irapa rtS eeui prjfial see Luke L 37.— A, Q.|
[• Ver. 17. -Jehovah.— A. G.)
[' Ver. 18.— Lit., I am doing, am about to do. — A. G ]
[8 Ver. :;! — Heb. whelfier lliey have made compkleness^ or to & consummatinn. — A. Q.!
[• Ver. 25.— nibn , ahominalli.—A. G.l
[' Ch. XIX. vtr. I'.—lm) nf the angels.— A. G.]
(• Ver. 2. — ^-IS . Not the same form which Abraham uses.— A. G.]
[• Ver. 9. — u3"D — l-SC^ , will he always be judging. — A. G.)
{* Ver. 13. — Lit., are destroying. — A. G.l
[• Ver. 14— Lit., The taker's of his daugliters.—A. G.]
[• Ver. 14. — as a Jester. — .\. G.j
[' Ver. 16.— Heb. delayed liimself.—A.. G.]
(• Ver. 18.— ^3hx . O Lord. -A. G.l
[• Ver. 21. — have lifted up thy face. — A. G.]
['• Ver. 23.— Heb.," and Lot came unto.— A. G.l
GENERAL PREMMINAB.T EEMABKS.
1. It is evident that these two chapters form but
one section : the first verse of the sixth chapter forms
the direct continuation of the previous narrative.
[The connection of this chapter with the preceding
is twofold, and very close. This forms the more
complete unfolding of the promise, ch. xvii. 21, and
the friendly intercourse which Jehovah here holds
with the patriarch is the direct fruit of the symboli-
cal purification of himself and his house through the
rite of circumcision, ch. xvii. 23-27. Thus purified,
the way was opeu tor this fiiendly appearance and
fellowship. — A. G.] The modern criticism attributes
this section to the .lehovistic enlargement, and finds
it necessary, theiefbre, to regard xlx. 29, as an Elo-
histic intei'polation, wliich, in the original writing
must have immediately followed ch. xvii. (Knobel, p.
Iti6). But there are the same strong internal rea-
sons why the name Elohim should appear in ch.
xix. 29, as there are that ch. xvii. 1, should speak of
Jehovah, and afterwards of Elohim. In this section,
however, Jehovah appears in all other passages. The
complete tlieophany of God corresponds to the com-
pleted promise of Isaac, the bearer of the covenant ;
and in this completed form of revelation he is Jeho-
vah. But the announcement of the judgment upon
Hodom and Gomorrah is essentially connected with
the promise of the heir of blessing. The judgment
itself, also, is a judgment of Jehovah ; for, 1. The
overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah, through a fiery
judgment, is an end of the world upon a small scale,
with which the necessity, for that constant revelation
of salvation, for the rescue of the world, whose founda-
tion was now being laid, is clearly apparent. 2. With
the firm confirmation of the father of the faithful in
the future of his believing race, his relations to tlie
world must also Ije actually and clearly defined, i, c,
Abraham must prove his faith in his love, mercy,
and his intercessions for Sodom also. 3. In the
founding of this believing race, the overthrow of
Sodom and (iomoii'ah, as a judgment of Ji'hovah,
stands as a solerau warning for Abraham and his
children, and through them for the world in all ages.
The Dead sea could not remain without significance
for the dwellers in Canaan. 4. Even the issue of ihe
history of Lot belongs to the hisiory of the com-
tletcd promise; not only the position of Lot, inter-
mediate between Abraham and Sodom, nor even his
exemption and safety, which he owes to Abraham's
inierce.^.sioii, and his once better conduct, noi', on the
other hand, the danger, terrors, los.ses, want, and
moral disgrace into which he was betrayed through
his worldly mind and jjis unbelief; but the issue of
the hisiory of Lot, his lull separation from the theo-
cratic obligations and privileges, and the descent
from him of the Moabites and Ammonitis, who were
related to the Jews, and yet alien to them, belong
also to the full presentation of the antithesis between
the house of Abraham and the people of Sodom.
0. The abominations of Sodom, moreover, not only
find a bright contrast in tiie consecrated marriage
of Abraham and Sarah, but even a contrast in the
incest with which the household of Lot was stained
(see Introduction). — Knobel finds contradictions here
which have no existence; e. g., between ch. xviii.
12 and xvii. 17; between the recapitulation, ch. xix.
29, and the whole narrative of the overthrow of
Sodom. He reinarlis upon tlie narrative, that the
destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah is not, in his
view, a natural event, but a divine judgment, like
the flood. He explains the narrative of the impure
origin of the Moabites and Ammonites by a reference
to the odious Jewish motives. In answer to this
Keil refers to Deut. ii. 9, 19, accoiding to which
Israel should not possess the land of these two na-
tions on the ground of their descent from Lot, and
remarks, they were first excluded fiom a position
among the Lord's people, on account of their un-
brotherly conduct towards Israel (Deut. .\xiii, 4 ii'.).
Knobel here fails to recollect, that so fiir as the race
of the chosen Judah is concerned, it was derived from
an impure connection of Judah with his daughter-in-
law, Thamar, just as in the remark, that the Jews
gloried in the beauty of their ancestress, he failed
to remember that Leah is especially described as not
beautitul. He holds, that this narrative has an his-
torical support, in the terrible fate of the vale of
Siddim ; but as to the rest, it is a pure mythical
statement. [Aside from the lact that this supposi-
tion of the mythological character of the narrative
overlooks the opposition referred to in the Ibllowing
sentence, it overlooks, also, the historical basis for
this narrative in ch. xiii. 13, the close connection
with the subsequent history, and thr whole moral
bearing and use of this history in both the Old and
New Testaments. — A. (i.J Of the two sides or
asjiects of the history, the prominent .xide, viz., the
opposition between the manifestation of God to
Aliraham, and the judgment upon Sodom, is thus
not properly estimated.
2. This Section may be divided into the follow-
ing parts: 1. The appearance of Jehovah in ttie
oak-grove of Manire, and the promise (A the birth
of Isaac (ch. xviii. 1-16); 2. the revelation of the
apjiroaching judgment upon Sodnm and (lomomih
to Aliraham, and Abraham's intercesBiiry pt-.nei
(vers. l*)-3y); 3. the entrance of" the two angel? into
Sodom, and the complete manifestation of the cor-
ruption of the Sodomites, in opposition to the better
conduct of Lot (ch. xix. 1-11) ; 4. the comparative
unfitness of Lot for salvation, his salvation with diffi
CHAP. XVIII. 1.— XIX. 88.
433
culty, and the entrance of the judgment (vers. 12-
29) ; 5. the departure of Lot, *nd his descendants
(yer. 30-38).
EXEQETICAIi AND CRITICAL.
1. The completed vianifeMntion and promise of
Ood in the oik-grove of Mainre (ch. xviii. 1-15).
—The Lord appeared unto him.* — Both the
reality of the manifestation, on the one hand, and
the seeing in vision on the other, appear in the clear-
est and most distinct form in the history. The ele-
ments which belong to the vision appear first at the
very beginning : he lifted up his eyes and
looked; then, further, in the departure of Jehovah
from Abraham (ch. xviii. 33) ; and in his reappear-
ance to Lot(ch. six. 17). The objective element is
seen especially in the threefold character of the
manifestation, in the transaction between Jehovah
and Sarah, and in the history of the two angels in
Sodom ; especially in the assaults of the Sodomites
npon them. But the peculiarities serving to in-
troiuce these wonderful objective facts, lie partly
in the peculiar character of the history, as the narra-
tive of a vision, partly in its symbolic statements,
and partly in its peculiar ghostly form. The de-
struction of Sodom and Gomorrah is near ; for them
the evening nf the lonrld has come. It is a prelude
of the last day, in which the angelic appearance is
entirely natural, and is introduced through an inner
and spiritual anticipation of the judgment itself, in
those who seek to resist its influence, by indulgence
in wicked, or, as in the case of the Sodomites, in
abominable, courses. Delitzsch thinks that Abra-
ham recognized the unity of the God of revelation,
in the appearance of the three men. As to this, see
the remarks upon the Angel of the Lord, ch. xii.
He adds : " One should compare the imitations of
this original history among the heathen. Jupiter,
Mercury, and Neptune, visit an old man, by name
Hyricus, in the Boeotian city Tanagra ; he prepares
them a feast, and, though childless hitherto, receives
a SOD in answer to his prayer (Ovid's ' Fast.,' v. 494,
etc.)." And then, further, the heathen accompani-
ment to ch. xix. : " Jupiter and Mercury are jour-
heying as men ; only Philemon and Baucis, an aged,
childless wedded pair, receive them, and these,
therefore, the gods rescue, bearing them away with
themselves, while they turn the inhospitable region
lying around the hospitable hut into a pool of water,
and the hut itself into a temple (Ovid's Metam., viii.
611 ff.)." But the essential distinction between our
ideal facts and these myths, lies in this, that while
the first lie in the centre of history as causal facts or
forces, having the most sacred and real historical re-
sults, these latter lie simply on the border ground of
mythology. [How completely and thoroughly these
words dispose of the whole mythical supposition in
this as in other cases.— A. G.]— In the heat of the
day. — "The dinner hour, when they took their
principal meal (ch. xliii. 16, 26 ; 1 Kings, xx 16) and
their accustomed rest (2 Sam. iv. 5). Volney
(Travels, I. p. 314) says the Arab, when he takes his
meal, sits at the door of his tent, in order to observe
uid iuvite those who are passing; and Burkhardt
* [The Lord appeared, but the appearance was in the
lorm of three men or angels. There may be, as 'Words-
trorth sugeests, here a declaration of the divine tinity, and
»n iatimatioQ of the plurality of persons; perhaps of the
doctilne of the Trinity.— A. G.l
28
(Arabian Proverbs, p. 331 f.), it is a custom in
the East to eat before the door and to invite to a
share in the meal every passing stranger of respect-
able appearance." Knobel. — And bowed himself
to the ground. — Abraham instantly recognizes
among the thret the one whom he addresses as th«
Lord in a religious sense, who afterwards appears as
Jehovah, and was clearly distinguished from the -wo
accompanying angels, ch. xix. 1. [The original He-
brew word is used to denote both civil and religious
homage. The word itself, therefore, cannot deter
mine whether Abraham intended by liis bowing t*
express religious homage, though it' is probable thai
he did.— A. G.] " They are three," Delitzsch says.
" because of the threefold object of their mission,
which had not only a promising, but also a punitive,
and saving character." Against this interpretation,
however, there is the fact that Jehovah not oijy
speaks the promise, but sends the judgment also
upon Sodom, and that not one, but both angels con-
ducted the rescue of Lot. " If there lies," says De-
litzsch, further, " in the fact that God appears in the
three angels, a trinitarian reference, which the old
painters were accustomed to express, by giving to
each of the three the glory which is the characteris-
tic sign of the divine nature, still the idea that the
Trinity is represented in the three is in every point
of view untenable." The germ of the doctrine of
the Trinity lies, mdeed, not in the three forms, but
truly in the opposition between the heavenly nature
of Jehovah and his form of manifestation upon tht
earth in the midst of the two angels, i. e., in this
well-defiiieil, clearly-appearing duality. — If now I
have found favor. — Knobel and Delitzsch differ in
the explanation of the sp-CX , etc. (Knobel : " If I
have still found favor." i. c, may it still be the case.)
We agree with the supposition that Abraham uses
the expression in his prayer, out of the consciousness
that he had already found favor, i. e., that his ex-
pression presupposes a covenant-relation between
himself and Jehovah. The cordial invitation is in
this case far more than oriental hospitality, but still
Abraham uses the human greeting, as the heavenly
forms wear the appearance of human travellers. —
And wash your feet — This is the first concern
of the pilgrim in the East, when he enters the house
after treading the sandy, dusty ways, with nothing
but sandals. They were to rest themselves under
the tree, leaning upon the hand in the oriental man-
ner.*— A morsel of bread. — A modest description
of the sumptuous meal wliich he had prepared for
them. His humble and pressing invitation, his
modest description of the meal, his zeal in its prepa-
ration, his standing by to serve those who were eat-
ing, are picturesque traits of the life of faith as it
here reveals itself, in an exemplary hospitality.
" According to the custom still in use among the
Bedouin sheiks (comp. Lane, " Manners and Cus-
toms," II. p. llti), Abraham prepared, as soon as
possible, from the cakes made by his wife from three
seahs [About three pecks. A seah was about the
third part of an ephah ; the ephah was equal to ten
omers, and the omer about five pints. Murphy. --
A. G.] of fine meal, and baked under the afhea
(niJT, unleavened cakes, baked upon hot, rcjud
434
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
•tones), and a tender calf,* with butter and milk, or
curdled milk (Knobel : Cream), a very rich :ind
pleasant-tasting meal." Keil. — And he stood by
them. — [Wordsworth here calls attention to »he
points of resemblance between this history and that
of Zaccheus, Luke, xis. 4, 6, 8, 9, and then says
with great beauty and force : " This seems to be one
of the countless instances where, in the tissue of the
lluly Scriptures, the golden threads of tlie Old Tes-
tament are interwoven with those of the New, and
fb m, as it were, one whole, p. 84. — A. G.] "This
is the custom still in the Eastern countries. The
Arab sheik, it he has respected guests, does not
fit in order to eat with them, but stands in order to
wait upcm them." (Shaw, " Travels," p. 208 ; Buck-
ixGn iM, " Mesopotamia," p. 23 ; and Sektzen, " Trav-
els," I. p. 40(1, etc.) Knobel. — And they did eat,
— In Judges, xiii. 16. the Angel of Jehovah refuses
to eat. Knobel regards it as a mark of distinction
to Abraham, that these heavenly messengers should
eat. Since the two angels were entertained by Lot
in Sodom, it would appear that the peculiar reception
of the meal should be ascriljed in a special sense to
them. This, however, does not remove the difficulty,
in the fact, that those coming from heaven should
eat earthly food. The supposition of Neumaim, that
it is all a dream up to ver. 16, is refuted by the
whole tenor of the narrative, but especially by the
history of the entertainment of the two angels by
Lot. JosEpncs, "Antiq.," i. 11, 2, Philo, the Tar-
gums, and the Talmud, explain the eating as a mere
appearance. Tertullian, on the contrary (" Adv.
Marc," iii. 9), holds to a temporary incarnation.
Delitzsch and Keil [So also Jacobus, after Kurtz, re-
ferring to John i. 14; Phil ii. 7; Luke, xxiv. 44. —
A. G.] agree with him, and both refer to the eating
of the risen Saviour with his disciples. But the
idea of a temporary incarnation in a peculiar sen.'<e,
is an extremely anthropomorphic, and not well-
grounded, assumption; and the bodily nature of ihe
glorified Christ, of whom Augustin says : " that he
ate is a fruit of his power, not of his necessity,"
guod manducavii^ potestatis fuiX 71011 egestatis^ is not
to be identified with the form of the manifestation
of the angels. But Delitzsch gives still another
explanation. " The human form in which they ap-
peared, was a representation of their invisible nature,
and thus they ate, as we say of the fire, it consumes
(or eats) all (Jdstin, Dial, cum Tryph., ch. 34)."
There may be here an intimation of the mysterious
fact, that the spiritual world is mighty in its mani-
festations, and overcomes the material, according to
the figurative expression of Augustin: The thir.st-
ing earth absorbs the water in one way, the burning
rays of the sun in another ; that from want, this liy
power. [ " Atiier nhsorhet terra nquain siliens^ aliler
golin radius candenjt : ilia iiidigentia^ iste poientia.^''
Thus liinMOAHTEN: That the angels could eat lies
in their pneumatic nature, for the spirit has power
over matter ; that they <lid eat here is the very high-
est act of tliis divine sojourn or rest in the home of
Abiahatn, (>. 200. — A. (i.] — Which was behind
him. — The Angel of the Lord was placed with his
back towarls the door of the tent. But it greatly
ilreiigthens the real objective character of the niani-
fujtation, that Sarah also hears, and indeed heai'S
doubting, the promise of the Angel. — According
• [Klesh-mcftt was not ordinary fere. See Pict bible,
ud BciiB, NitCK, vol. 1. ]), 280.— A. O.)
to the time of life.* — " The time of returning to
life," is the return of the same time in the next year,
Time returns to life again apparently in the similar
appearances of nature. Thus one form of time in
nature expires after anotlier, and becomes living
again in the next year. — Wherefore did Sarah
laugh. — Although Sarah only laughed williin herself^
and behind Jehovah and the tent door, yet Jehovah
observed it. Her later denial (although, indeed, sha
had not laughed aloud) and her fear, prove that her
laugh proceeded from a bitter and doubting heart
Keil, however, is too severe when he says " that her
laugh must be viewed as the laugh of imhelie/," and
Delitzsch, when he describes it as the scoff of doubt.
It is sufficient that there is a distinction between hei
laughing and that of Abraham. The Scripture says
(Heb. xi. 11) that she was a believer in the promise,
and the fact of her conception is the evidence of her
faith. [It thus becomes evideut that one oljject in
this manifestation, the drawing out and completing
the faith of Sarah, has been accomplished. The
qtiestion, Is anything too hard for the Lord? is the
same which the angel Gabriel used when aimouncing
to Mary the birth of Jesus. Mary bowed in faith,
while Sarah laughs in doubt. But the words here
used, with the reproof administered to her laugh,
seem to have called out and strengthened her faith.
See WoKDSWouTH, p. 84; Baumgarten, p. 207. —
A. G.] [Delitzsch closes his exposition of this pas-
sage with the suggestive words: "This confidential
fellowship of Jehovah with the patriarch corresponds
to that of the risen Lord with his disciples. The
patriarchal time is more evangeUc than the time of
the law. As the time before the law, it is the type
of the time after the law," p. 286. — A. G.]
2. The announceme-nt of the judgment upon
Sodom anA Gomorrah, and Abraham^s intcrcessori^
pnnier (vers. 16-32). — And the men rose up
from thence.f — The travellers depart from Ili'liiun
in the direction of Sodom, i. e., over the mountain to
the valley of the Jordan. Abraham acci)mi).inies
them. There is a wonderful union of the state of
visions and of the actual outward Ufe. We do not
forget that this condition was habitual in the life of
our Lord, and that it is reflected in the history of
Peter (Acts, xii- 11, 12) as it is also in that of Paul.
According to tradition, Abraham accompanied them
as far as " the place Caphar-Barucha, from whence
Paula looked through a deep ravine to the Dead
Sea," " the solitude and lands of Sodom." Robin-
son thinks this is probably the present village Bni
Na'im, about one and a half hours eastei'ly from
Hebron ["Bib. Researches," voh ii. p. 18'.). — A. (i.]
(Von Raumer, "Palestine," p. 183).— Shall I hide
from Abraham. — The reason why God would an-
nounce to Abraham, beforehand, the judgment upon
Sodom, is given in the following woi'ds. There is at
first great regard to the excellence of Abraham, but
connected with this, however, a reference to hia
destination as the father of the people of promise;
he must understand the judgments of God in the
* [Literally, livinp time. Muhpht : " Socminsly tht
limP of birth when the chilJ romes lo manifest hfe," tv.
:U0.— A. O.]
t [.lacdlfus has a Btri.»rfp: note here upon the oonnejtion
of w'liat follows with what precedes. ** 'i'liese are v^nly the
rigtit and Ifft hand niovemrntB. Ttiorofords are ill thoil
pl'opor antithesis, as scttinf? forth the ilivino character and
counsel. The ri^ht and loft hand of the JudRe ure for the
opposite parties. I.ife eternal is for the one, and overla.st-
itifj punishnient for the other. " Matt. xxv. 46. All bist.cij
is full of this antithesis.— A. G.l
CHAP. XVIII. 1— XIX. 38.
48»
irorld. because he must unilerstaiid the redemption.
[All the principles of the divine providence in its
.elationa to the sins of men appear here ; Ids for-
bearance and patience, his constant notice, the
deciding test, and the strictness and righteousness
of the judgment, and hence Abraham is told here,
that these same principles might operate upon the
minds of the people of God in all ages. — A. G.]
For the judgment cannot be understood without the
redemption, nor the redemption without the judg-
ment. The "natural event" of Kuobel thus be-
comes to Abraham and his children, a divinely-com-
prehended event, and caimot remain a dark mystery ;
it presupposes his spiritual and moral significance.
But on this account especially, the event, as a judg-
ment, is of peculiar importance, in order that, hke
every following judgment, it may prove a monitory
ex;imple to the house of Abraham — the people of
God. — For I have known him. — Luther, follow-
ing the Vulgate, / know tliat he, etc. Thus the
good behavior of Abraham is (in an Arminian way)
made the cause of the divine knowledge. But the
IJnb is opposed to this. The knowledge of Jeho-
vah is fore-determined, like TTpuywuiaKeiii, Rom. viii.
29, and thus one with the eVAeyeffdai, Ep. i. 4.
Keil: "In preventing love he sees (ST'), as in
Amos, iii. 2 ; Hosea, xiii. 5," which, however, can-
not be included in the mere acknowledgment of
Abraham. [The word includes knowledge and love.
Sec Pb. i. 6 i xxxi. 8 ; 1 Cor. viii. 3 ; xiii. 12. Baum-
^ARTEN, p. 208. — A. G.] Kurtz explains this pas-
lage strangely. God has given the possession of the
and to Abraham, therelbre he would be sure of his
lousent in this arrangement as to a part of the land.
iEiL : " The destruction of Sodom and the neigh-
boring cities should serve as an 'enduring monument
of the divine punitive righteousness, in which Israel
Bhoidd have constantly before its eyes the destruc-
tion of the godless. Finally, Jehovah unveils to
Abraham, in the clearest manner, the cause of this
destruction, that he might not only have a clear and
perfect conWction of the justice of the divine pro-
cedure, but also the clear view that when tlie meas-
ure of iniquity was full, no intercession could avert
the judgment. It is both for the instruction and
I warning of his descendants." But still more cer-
tainly, also, at first, to give occasion to the prayer
of Abraham, and thus show to his children what
position they must take in regard to all the threaten-
ing judgments of God upon the world. — The cry
of Sodom. — It is right to refer to ch. iv. 10 for the
explanation of these words, and hence the cry which
is meant is the cry of sins for vengeance or punish-
ment. Outbreaking offences against the moral na-
ture, as murder and lusts, especially imnatural lusts,
abuse and pain nature, and so to speak, force from
it a cry of necessity, which sounds throughout the
world and ascends to heaven.* The infamy of
podom and Gomorrah in the world, is not excluded
from this tendency and result, but forms only the
reflex, or one element of the cry. The "'S gives the
etronge.st emphasis to the utterance. [Baumgarten
and Keil render it mdeal. The cry of Sodom, in-
deed it is great — their sin, indeed it is very grievous.
But the usual force of the ''I , for, because, gives a
good sense. It is for or because the cry is such,
that the Lord comes down to test and punish. — A. G.]
* fit is the moral demand wtiich sin makes for piuiisb-
neiit. BvsB : " Not«s," vol. i. p. 297.— A. G.l
— I will go do^wn noir. — The anthropomorphi*
expression include.^ also a divine *hought or |iuipose.
•lehovah could not be uncertain whether the cry ol
Sodom and Gomoirah contained the truth, but it
was still a question whether Sodom, by its conduct
against the last deciding visitation of G-;d, woiila
show that its corruption placed it beyond any help
or salvation. The translation of Luther, ''wlieihei
it has done according to tlie cry," does not meet thf
demands of the text. It must become eviden,
through its last trial, whether it has reached the
limit of the long-suffering patience of God Thus it
is not specially to convince himself, but to mtroducs
the final decision. According to Delitzsch and Keil,
the flis must be taken as a noun, as in Isa. x. 23,
not as an adverb, as Exod. xi. I, " i^^3 '^-?? i **
bring to an end, here to denote the most extreme
corruption, in other passages used to express th«
utmost severity of punishment (Nah. i. 8 f ; Jer
iv. 27 ; V. 10)." KeU. — I will know. — A sublime,
fearful expression of the fact, tliat Jehovah will at
l.ist introduce for the godless a decisive test, which
according to their situation is a temptation, the
judgment which in their case hardens, and the judg-
ment for tlie hardening. It will issue at the last, aa
they themselves have decided. Patience and anger
both have definite, sharp limits. — And the men. —
The two angels who accompanied Jehovah in the
form of men. It is observable that here it is the
men simply, and then in cli. xix. 1 it is the two an-
gels. This order presupposes a very clear conscious-
ness as to the distinction between the one chief
person and his two companions ; a distinction which
Delitzsch misses, according to his view of the Angel
of the Lord. Here, also (ver. 22), the two angels
disappear, as they go farther, while Jehovah remains
at the place, in the Angel of the Lord ; in (ch. xix.
1 7 ) on the contrary, the two angels receive an in-
crease through an undefined, but evident, new
appearance of Jehovah. It is with reference to the
later assault of the Sodomites, that the angels are
here described as men. Their departure to Sodom
is in fulfilment of the word of Jehovah : I will know.
They depart to introduce the final decision. They
depart, but Abraham remains standing before Jeho-
vah, upon that height whence the vale of Sodom
could be seen (ch. xix. 17), and addresses himself
to prayer. The Jewish conjecture, that Jehovah
remains standing before Abraham, is a wretched
way of bettering the connection, which presupposes
the distinction between the one Jehovah and the two
angels before Jehovah. — And Abraham drew
near. — The UJJ^ designates especially the nearness
to Jehovah, and more especi:illy the venturesome
[Rather the bold. Heb. iv. 16 ; x. 22.— A. G.], me-
diating nearness in the priestly and beUeviiig dispo-
sition which the prayer implies and contains (Jer.
XXX. 21). That Abraham in his prayer thought
especially of Lot, is evident, but that he interceded
for Lot only, is an assumption which wrongs not
only the divine thought of this prayer but the text
itself Abraham would not then have ceased with
the number ten, and his prayer also would havf
taken the form of an ambiguous circumlocution.
Keil is correct in his remark against Kurtz, Abrs
ham appeals in his prayer, not to the grace of tha
covenant, but to the righteousness of Jeho\ah. But
he is incorrect when he rejects the position of Cal-
vin : "Common mercy towards tb» fre r.a'ions"
impels Abraham to his prayer, and on the contrarj
436
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
■ brings into prominence the love springing from
faith ; for the one of tliese does not exclude the
other. Luther admirably explains his heartfelt de-
sire: " He asks six times, and with so great ardor
and atfection, so urgently, that in the very great and
bre:ithless interest with which he pleads for the
miserable cities, he seems as if spealiing foolislily."
In the transactions of Abraham with God, the press-
ing earnestness on the part of Abraham, and the
forbearance on the part of Jehovah, stand out in
clear relief. Abraham goes on from step to step,
Jehovali grants him step by step, without once going
before his requests. He thus draws out from Abra-
ham the measure and intensity of his priestly spirit,
while Abraham, on his side, ever wins a clearer
insight as to the judgment of God upon Sodom, and
as to the condition of Sodom itself. — The first prayer
or petition. Foolish, apparently presuming in form,
sacred as to its matter ! God, as he has known him
as the righteous one, must remain the same in his
righteousness, and cannot, in any exercise of his
punitive providence, separate his almighty power
from his righteousness. The prayer is a pious syllo-
gism. Major proposition : Jehovah cannot sweep
away the righteous with the wicked. (The empha.sis
lies upon the sweeping away. The prayer itself
proves that the righteous suffer through the wicked,
indeed, with him and for him.) The minor premise :
there might be fifty righteous ones in Sodom, i. e.,
righteous, guiltless in reference to this destructive
judgment. Inrwcenl children are indeed not intend-
ed here, but guiltless adults, who might form some
proportionate counterpoise to the rest. The ennclu-
tion : If it should be thus, the judge of the world
could not destroy the cities, for righteousness is not
the non plus ultra of strength, but power conditions
and limits itself through right. Fifty righteous, five
[twice five ?] in each city (the singular is used here
because Sodom represents all the five cities, or the
pentapolis appears as one city, whose character and
destiny is decided in the conduct of Sodom) of the
pentapolis, would be sufficient salt to save the city.
Five is the number of freedom, of moral develop-
ment.— Seconel petition. The lowly, humble form of
the second prayer, corresponds with the bold form
of the first, for Abraham has now heard that Jeho-
vah will spare it for the sake of fifty. — I have
taken upon me (ventured) to 8peak unto the
Lord. — This is not merely to pray unto the Lord.
He has ventured the undertaking, to exert a definite
infiuence upon Jehovah, i. c, on the supposition of a
moral and free relation, boldly he has venttired to
speak to him, altliough uncalled. — Which am but
duBt and ashes. — I)ELiTzscn : " In his origin dust,
and ashes at the end." Notwithstanding this crea-
ture nature, he has still ventured to place himself in
his person. ility over against the personality of Jeho-
vah, He has taken the step of faith across the
Rubicon, from tlie blind, creaturely subjection to
Jehovah, into the free kingdom of his love, — Per-
adventore there shall lack five. — He does not
eay: I'eradventure there are five and forty righteous,
but clings to the divine concession. If it is as thou
bast said, then the want of five cannot be decisive.
The forty-five will compen.sate for the want of five.
— TJiird petition. Since he knew now that Jehovah
would not insist upon the five, he descends at once
to the forty, and urges still that the righteous ven-
geance should t)e rcstraiiieif for their sakes until
perhaps tliey might l)e foimd. Still from this point
oc be ventures onlv to make the supposition, per-
adventure there are so many righteous there, with
out expressly joining to it the inference wilt thou
not spare, etc, ? — Fourth petition. But now, aftA
the number forty is iiUowed, Abraham feels that he
can take a bolder step, before which, however, h«
prays that Jehovah would not be angry. Jehovah
had twice yielded the five; he now comes to thirtj,
and prays that he would at once yield the ten.—
I'"ifth petition. The compliance of JehoviJi with
his requests emboldens him. Thus he excuses hll
boldness this time by the mere consistency of his
words, as he comes down to twenty, — Sixth petitiim.
He would venture only one more request, and that
not without the deprecatory prayer: Oh, let not
the Lord be angry. — He ceases with the ten, since
less than two men to each city could not avail tc
turn away the destructive judgment. But great as
the interceding Abraham appears in bis bold, pet
sistent progress in his petitions, he appears equally
great in ceasing when he did, although the human
motive to bring into the account Lot, his wife, his
two daughters, and his sons-in-law, and thus to go
on to the number five, was obvious and strong.
And thus there is still a distinction between the men
begging, which knows no limit, and the prayer whicL
is conscious that it is limited through the moral
nature or spirit, and, indeed, by the Holy Spirit.
When Delitzsch says " that apparent commercial
kind of entreaty is the essence of true prayer — is
the sacred dfoi'Seia of which our Lord speaks, Luke
xi. 8, the importunity (shamelessness) of faith, etc.,'
we would underscore and emphasize the apfparent,
and appeal rather to the repeated asking than to the
bargaining nature, and recollect that the importu-
nity, Luke xi. 8, has its full authorization only in
the figure, but cannoJ be identified without explana-
tion, with what is analogous to it, the full joyfulncss
of prayer. — And the Lord went his way : not
to avoid (as Delitzsch conjectures) further entreaties
on the part of Abraham, tor Jehovah's remaining
where he was, and the joyfulness of Abraham's
prayer, stand in a harmonious relation. '' The judg--
ment, which now follows, upon the five cities, shows
that not ten cp^^S , i, e., not sinless, holy persons,
but upriglit, who, thrr-ugh the fear of God and the
power of conscience, . id kept iliemselves free from
the prevailing sins and crimes of those cities, could
be found in Sodonj." Keil. Delitzsch : " His
prayer, however, has not fallen to the ground," He
refers to the rescuing of Lot and his family.
3, The entrance and sojourn of the two nngels in
Sodom, and the completed manifestation of its cor-
ruption in opposition to the better conduct of Lot (ch.
xix. 1-11). — And there came two angels, —
Stier: C'DSbo without the article; the peculiar
personal angels who here first appear definitely in
the history of the kingdom of God, although the
idea of the angel, in its wider sense, had been in
existence since ch. iii. They arrive at Sodom at
evening, having left Hebron after midday The idea
of an actual human journey from place to place is
thus complete ; but the inmost central points of the
narrative are the two great manifestations, of which
the first was given to Abr;iham about midday, and
now Lot shares the second at evening. But here
the objective character of the manifestation is far
more prominent than the possession and extent of
the power to perceive the vision, for Lot did not
recognize them at first a^ angels, and they appear to
have been seen by the Sodomites, unless we ptefei
CHAP. XTin. 1— XIX. 88.
r.i't
Ihe supposition that they had learned from Lot's
household of the two shining vouthful forms who
had turned in there for the night. [The term which
Lot uses in his address, '3TS , shows that lie regard-
ed them as men. — A. G.] — And Lot sat in the
gate of Sodom. — Knobel well says: "Jeliovah, as
the most holy, will not enter the unholy city," while
Dehtzsch asserts " that Jehovah came in them to
Sodom." That Lot sat in the gate of Sodoin, is
mentioned rather to his reproach than to praise his
hospitality. [It is a reproach to him that he is in
Sodom at all, but his sitting in the gate is not men-
tioned here as his reproach. — A. G.] He sits at the
gate in order to invite approaching travellers to a
lodging for thenighl, and is thus hospitable Uke his
uncle. Knobel remarks, ch. xix. 1 : '' This polite
hospitality is still practised among the Arabians ;
they count it an honor to entertain the approaching
stranger, and often contend with each other who
shall have the honor. Taversieh, 'Travels,' i. p.
126; BtTRCKHAROT, 'Bedoums,' p. 2S0, and 'Trav-
els in Syria,' p. 641 ff. ; Buckingham, 'Syria,' i. p.
285 ; Seetzen, ' Travels,' i. p. 400." " The gate in
the East is usually an arched entrance, with deep
recesses upon both sides, wliich furnish an undis-
turbed seat for the observer ; here below and at Ike
gate they gather, to transact business, as there are
usually also stands for merchandise in these re-
cesses, and to address narrower or wider circles upon
the affairs of the ciiy (ch. xxxiv. '20 ; Dent. xxi. 19)."
Pelitzsch. — Behold aovr, my lords ('^JiS). — He
does not recognize them immediately as angels,
which is the less remarkable since the doctrine of
angels must first make its way into the world
through such experiences, and which is not excluded
by the disposition or fitness to perceive visions
(Oomp. Heb. xiii. 2). — Nay, but we will abide in
the street [i. e., the open, wide place in the gate. —
A. G.] (comp. Luke xxiv. 29). — It appears to have
been the object of the angels to ascertain the state
of the city from the street ; but Lot's hospitable
conduct seems, on the other hand, to them a favor-
able sign for the city, which they will follow. — But
before they lay down. — The wickedness of the
city immediately develops itself in all its greatness.
< That the old and young should come ; that tliey
should come from every quarter of the city [literal-
ly the end; see Jer. h. .31. Kkil: "As we sav, to
the very last man." — A. G.] ; that they assault the
house, notwithstanding the sacred rights of guests ;
that they so shamelessly avow their pederastic pur-
pose ; that they will not eveu be appeased by Lot,
to whom they once owed their salvation (ch. xiv.),
and (as one may say, preferred their demonic,
raging, uimatural lusts, to natural offences) that they
did not cease to grope for the door, after they were
stricken with blindness ; this is the complete por-
traiture of a people ripe for the fiery judgment. —
That we may know them A well-known eu
phemism, hut, therefore, here an expression of shame-
less effrontery. It is the mark of their depravity
that they seek pleasure in the violation of nature,
and have their vile passions excited by the look or
thcught of heavenly beauty (see Gi>thk's "Faust."
ii division, at the close). "The lustful abomina-
tion, according to Rom. i. 27 the curse of heathen-
Bm, according to Judg. vii. a copy of demonic er-
ror, accordmg to the Mosaic law (Lev. xviii. 22 ; xx.
13) an abomination punishable with death, here
had no mask, not even the aesthetic glory with which
it was surrounded in Greece." Delitzseh. The vici'
of pederasty was reckoned among the abominalioni
of Canaan, and even the Israelites were sometime*
stained with it (Judg. xix. 22). — Behold now, 1
have two daughters. — •' The Arab holds iii?
guest who lodges with him as sacred and inviolable,
and if necessary defends him with his life (see Rus
SEL, ' Natural History of Aleppo,' i. p. .S34, etc.).'
Knobel. " He commits sin, seeking to preveu' ai::
through sin." Delitzseh. Keil remarks, " his duty
as a father should have been held more sacred.'
But it may be questioned whether there is not to be
brought into account in Lot ai] element of cunning
— a kind of irony — since he could reckon with cer-
tainty upon the taste for unnatural lust in tha
Sodomites (he so speaks because he knew his peo-
ple) ; or whether, rather, the important thing is not
found in the supposition that he acted in the confu
sion of the greatest amazement and anxiety.
[Which woidd naturally be increased if he had dis-
covered by this time that they were heavenly visitors.
— A. G.] We must take into account, in this whole
history, that a premonitory feeling of the destruction
of Sodom rested upon their minds, which had re-
leased in Lot the spiritually awakened disposition or
preparedness for desperate acts of virtue, as it had
in the Sodomites the demonic rage in wickedness ;
as the same influence luos elsewhere appeared during
earthquakes and similar events. In any case Lot
could not have miscalculated in the thought of a
stratagem in which he relied not only upon the op-
position of his sons-in-law, but much more upon the
unnatural lusts of the Sodomites.* — He 'will needs
be a Judge (Judge and Judge). — See the orig.
inal text. " We may thus see that there is a sting
in the words of Lot, because he would now reprove
their utjnatural passions, as he had indeed done before
(see 2 Pet. ii. 7).f — We will deal worse with
thee than ixrith them. — " They wouM smite and
kill him, but abuse his guests." Knobel. In the
words, they pressed sore upo7i the man, the narrator
intimates more than lies npon the face of the words.
They at the same time attempt to break thionirh the
door. The angels inteifered, and the Sodomites
were stricken with blindness. It is not natural
blindness which is meant, but the blinding in which
the spiritual power of the angels works together
with the demonic fury of the Sodomites, [cnijp ,
a blindness produced by dazzling light, probably
combining total privation of sight and a confusion
or wandering of mind. — A. G.] It marks the excess
of their wickedness, the continuance of their abom-
ination until the very midst of the judgment, that
they do not, even in this condition, cease from seek-
ing the door.
4. LoCr comparative unfitness for salvation, hii
salvation with difficulty, a?id t]ie entrance of the
judgment (vers. 12-29). — And the men said unto
Lot. — They reveal themselves now ;is he.ivenly
messengers ; and no loss distinctly their calling to
destroy the ci ty and their mission to save liiiu and
his household (any one related by marriage — son-in-
* [Only to these men do nothini;. The form ot the r'O-
nouii TLseci, tsxn , is archaic, and is used :ilso in ver. 25
ch. xxvi. 3, 4 ; Lev. xviii. 27 ; Dcut. iv. 42 ; vii. 22 ; xis. 11.
Keil, p. 163. Therefore came they under my rocf; viz., iol
the purpose of security. — A. G.J
t [Baumgai-tenurgesthal nxin 05 should be rendereJ
" come hither," mstead of " stand back," on the ground thAt
this is the usual meaning of the verb, and that it gives aa
equally good sense, p. 211 — A. G.l
Vii<
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
law). We regnrd the usual construction, hast thou
here any besides 7 son-in-law and thy sons,
and thy daughters, and whatsoever thou hast,
ftc, as incorrect. 1. Because then son-in-law would
precede the sous and daughters, and is used in the
singular, i. Because In the words " whatsoever
tl.ou hast," sons-in-law, as well as sons and daugh-
ters arc included. [The probable reference is to
those in the citv and not in the house — any one re-
lated :o him.— A. G.]— And the Lord hath sent
us. — The Angel of the Lord never speaks in this
way. — And Lot went out and spake, etc. — There
are two explanations: 1. T^ose taking his daugh-
ters, i, e.. who had taken his daugluers to wife. Thus
the Septuagint, the Targums, Jonathan, Jewish in-
terpreters, Schumann, Knobel, Delitzsch. Accord-
ing to this explanation, Lot had, liesides his married
daughters in tlie city, two unmarried daughters. 2.
DTip^ , those about to accept or take, bridegrooms.
Thus Josephus, the Vulgate, Clericus, Ewald, Keil,
and others. Knobel quotes (nsjsasn) ver. 15 in
favor of the first explanation; but Keil remarks
that this does not designate an opposition between
the unmarried and married daughters, but between
these and the sons-in-law who remained behind.
We may add, moreover, that there is no intimation
that Lot had warned married daughters to rise up.
— The angels hastened Lot.*— Since they were
sent to execute the destruction, there does not seem
any occasion for the haste, as if it proceeded from
some fate — from an agency beyond themselves.
But there is a threefold reason for their haste: 1.
The zeal of the righteousness of God, since the
measure of the iniquity of Sodom was full; '2. their
own holy affection ; 3. the conuection of their mis-
sion with the preparation of the judgment in the
natur^d relations of Sodom. — And while he lin-
gered.— It is clear in every way that Lot, from his
spiritless, half-hearted nature, which made it difficult
to part from his location and possessions, wa-s res-
cued with the greatest difficulty. [The Lord being
merciful to him, literally, by the mercy of Jehovah
upon him, i. e., which was exercised towards him. —
A. G.] — And set him dotim. — This completes the
work of the two angels in saving Lot, ami their work
of destruction now begins. — That he said (see the
remarks upon the Angel of the Lord, ch. xii.) — It
is " Jehovah speaking through the angel," says De-
litzsch. But why then does this form occur first
here? Before, the angels had said, Jehovah has
sent us. Because tlie ;ip[)roach of Jehovah is not
expressly mi'ntioned, Keil also admits here " that
the angel speaking, speaks, as tlie messenger of Je-
hovah, in the name of God." Upon the giound of
the miraculous help given to him, Jehovah calls him
now to personal activity in his own salvation. But
Lot, on the contrary, clings to the receding forms of
the two iingels, and it cannot surprise us, thiit in his
agitation lie should confound their ajij>earance and
the voice of .Ichovah — For thy life. — Lite and
•oul are here one, not merely according to the verbal
expression, but in the very idi'a of the situation ; it
includes the thought : " Save thy sold." — Look not
behind thee. — The cause is given in Loi's wile.
it is tlie rfHijioun expi-es-sion for the desire to return,
thtj hesitation, tlie lingering, as if one could easily
basten from the divine judgment (see Luke ix. G?).
Knobel draws analogies from the sphere of lieathen
* [At Itif. morning, Tlio dnwn, since the iun rOHO 08 Lot
TUtfVd Zour. Jacqbcb: " Notea," vol. ii. p. 23.— A. U.l
reli^ons. " In order not to see the divine provi-
dence, or working, which is not permitted tlie ey«
of mortals. For similar reasons the ancients in
completing certain religious usages did not look
around them (p. 173)." Certainly the Lord might
take into account the holy horror in Lot at the
spectacle of the fiery judgment. Still the first word
is e.s].lained by the second : Neither stay thru is
all the plain; and the second by the third- Es-
cape to the mountain. — It is the mountains of
Moali, on the other side of the Dead Sea, which are
intended. — And Lot sziid unto them: Oh, not
so, my Lord. — He could not distinguish the mi-
raculous vision of tlie appearance of tlie angels and
the miraculous report of the voice of Jehovah
which now came to him. He pleads in excuse for
his want of energy that fear presses heavily upon
him ; and fear weighs upon him iiecause, while he
was free from the abominations of Sodom, he was
not free from its worldly mind. [The evil, i. e , the
destruction which was to come upon Sodom. He
feared that he could not reach the moimt;iin. — A. G.]
Lot also now becomes, in his own interest, an inter-
cessor for others. He points to the Uttle Bela, the
smallest of the cities of the pentapolis, and thiid^s
it is a small matter for the Lord to grant him this as
a place of refuge, because it is so .small, and there-
fore exempt it from destruction. The name Zoar
was derived from these events. *' Zoar is not to be
sought in the Ghor el Mezraah, i. e., upon the penin-
sula which here stretches into the Dead Sea (see Is.
XV. 5), but rather in the Ghor el Szaphia, at the
south-i-astern end of the Sea, in the outlet of the
Wady el Ahhsa. This locality is well watered and
covered with shrubs and trees at the present time,
but is unhealthy. It is inhabited and well cultivated
liy the Bedouins, who have here a permanent settle-
ment ; and in the winter it is the gathering place for
more than ten tribes. Thus Sei-tzen, Burekhardt,
Robinson." Knobel. For further references to
Zoar, see in Knoiiel, p. IM ; Keil, p. Iij5; and the
Bible-Dictionaries. [Robinson, " Researches," ii. p.
480, 648, C61. — A. G.] — The svm was risen upon
the earth. — According to Keil, Lot was now just on
the way, but the text says expressly, that he had
entered Zoar. For the distances in the vale of Sid-
dim see Knobel, p. 175.— Then the Loid rained
[Heb. caused it to rain. — A. G.] fire from the Lord.
— The antithesis which lies in this I'xprcssion, be-
tween the manifestation of Jehovah upon the earth,
and the being and providence of Jehovah in lieaven,
is opposed by Keil. The nin^ n«i? is according
to Calvin an emphatic repetition. This docs not agree
with Keil's explanation of the Angel of the Lord.
Dehtzseh remarks here : There is certainly in all
such passages a distinction between the historically
revealed, and the concealed, or iinrevealed God
(coniji. Hos. i. 7), and thus a support to th« position
of the Council of Sirniium : "the Son ol God raioa
it down from (iod ihe Father." The decisive execu-
tion of the judgment proceeds from the manifesta-
tion of Jehovah upon the earth, in ompany with
the two angels; but the source of the decree ol
judgment lies in Jehovah in heaven. The moral
stages of the develoiiment of the kingdom of God
upon the earth, correspond with the providence of
the Almighty in the heavens, and from the heavens
reaehing down into the de|itlis of cosmical nature. —
Brimstone and fire. — Keil, in the interest of the
literal interpretatiun, misses here tlie religious and
syinbolieal expression. " The rain of brimston*
CHAP. XVIII. 1.— XIX. 3J>.
4a?
And fire was no mere thunder-storm, which kiniiled
nto afire the ground already saturated with naphtha.
[Whatever may be the explanation of this catastro-
phe, whether we suppose, as seems most proliuble,
that God used natural agencies, or make more prom-
inent and exclusive the storm from heaven, it is clear
on either supposition tliat the event was miraculous,
the result of the direct interposition of God. Upon
the Dead Sea, the ' Notes ' of Bush and Jacobus ;
the ' Dictionaries ' of Smith and Kitto ; Robinson :
' Researches ' ; Stanley on ' Palestine ' ; and the
numerous books of travels may be consulted. — A. G.]
For it caimot be proved from such passages as Pa.
xi. 6 and Ezek. xxxviii. 22 that lightning is ever
called in the Scriptures brimstone and tire, since
these passages evidently refer to the event narrated
here. The words must be understood in an entirely
peculiar sense, that brimstone with fire, i. e., the
burning brimstone, fell from heaven, etc." But
the words thus literally understood are not brim-
stone with fire, i. e., burning brimstone, but brim-
stone and fire. Brimstone cannot mix with fire, in
the air, without becoming fire. We might, indeed,
think of burning meteors, which stood in reciprocal
relations and efficiency with the burning gfound.
Knobel adopts the explanation of Josephcs: "An-
tiq.'' i. 11, 4; "Bell Jud." iv. S, 4; and Tacit.:
" History," v. 7. Fire ;\nd brimstone appear also
elsewhere as the instruments of divine punishment
(Ps. xi. 6 ; Ezek. xxxviii. 22). The author does not
point out more fuUy what was the concern of the
two angels in the destruction. But iu analogous
cases, when God was about to send evil diseases or
pestilences, he used the angels as his instruments (2
Sam. xxiv. 16; Is. xxxvii. 36). Delitzsch : "Not
only Sodom and Gomorrah, but, with the exception
of Zoar, the other cities of the pentapolis (ch. xiv.
2), as is stated Dent. xxix. 23 (comp. Hos. xi. 8), or
jjb it is here, the whole circle, all the plain, was sub-
merged iu fire and brimstone ; a catastrophe which
also Strabo, Tacitus, and Solinus Polyhistor, fully
attest, and which is constantly referred to in the
later literature, e. g., Ps. xi. 6 (see Hupfield upon
this passage), even down to the Revelation." — But
his vrife looked back from behind him.* —
Some conclude from tliis expression, that she went
• behind Lot, and thus looked back. But the looking
back is plainly not more to be understood iu a strict
literal sense than the account that she became a
pillar of salt. Female curiosity, and the longing for
her home at Sodom, led her to remain behind Lot,
and delay, so that she was overtaken in the destruc-
tion (see Luke xvii. 31, 32). Keil even departs
from the literal interpretation in the term, pillar of
salt, when he explains : she was encrusted with salt ;
resembled a pillar of salt, just as now objects in the
neighborhood of the Dead Sea, are soon encrusted
from its salty evaporations. This salt-pillar is men-
noned as still existing in the "Book of Wisdom," xi:
7, and in Clemens of Rome to the "Cor." U ; Jo-
BEPHDS: "Antiq." i. 11, 4, as that which they had
ceen. The biblical tradition has here passed into a
mere legend, which points out a pillar-like salt-cone,
»bout forty feet high, at the lower end of the Dead
• [The word here used for look implies a deliberate con-
wmplation, steady regard, consideration, and desire ; see
Is, Ixiii 3. The Sept. has i-tri^Ki^tv, looked wisttijll}-.
WoBDSwoRTH, p. 89. .S'/iC became, ht., she was a pillar of
talt. "The dJushii.g spray of the salt, sulphureous rain,
•eemii to have sutfoc;Lted her, and then encrusted t'^r whole
•ody." Murphy -A. G.]
Sea, as this pillar of salt (see Knobel, p. 176
Sektzen : "Travels," ii. p. 240; Lynch; " Report,'
p. 183 If.). This salt-cone is connected with th^
salt-mountain of Usdura (Sodom). Robinson : " R&
searches," ii. p. 481-485. [Also Grove's article on
the "Salt Sea," iu Smith's Dictionary. — A. G.] —
And Abraham gat up early in the morning.
[That is, the morning of the destruction. — A. G.] —
The catastrophe of the judgment was soon com-
pleted. The destruction, viewed from its universal
aspect and relations, is ascribed to Elohim. But it
is God, as Elohim also, who saves Lot, for Abra-
ham's sake (see the remarks upon liis intercession).
— Out of the midst of the destruction. — A vivid
description of the salvation of Lot from the ex
tremest peril, in a place which itself lay in the skirta
of the overthrow, — a statement which Knobel, with-
out the least ground, attempts to prove differs from
the earlier account.
The destination of this judgment, whose precon-
ditions lay in the terrestrial volcanic character of the
vale of Siddim (see ch. xiv. 10), for an eternal warn-
ing to the descendants of Abraham, i. e., all the mem-
bers of the kingdom of God. appears clearly in the
constant quotation in the Holy Scriptures. Sodom
is alone named, as the most important city (Is. ill. 9 ;
Lam. iv. 6 ; Ezek. xvi. 48 ; Matt. xi. 23), Sodom and
Gomorrah as the two greatest (Is. i. S), 13, 19, and
in other passages), Admah and Zeboim (Hos. xi. 8),
and in the " Book of Wisdom " the five cities are
named in a vague and general way.
The catastrophe, conditioned through the nature
of the ground, corresponds with the divine decree
of judgment. The fundamental idea is the burniug
of the earth, through the tiie from licaven ; but that
an earthquake, which are frequent in Palestine, may
have been in action, and that volcanic eruptiona
might have wrought together with this, is intimated
in the expression : All (lie plain was ove.rlhrovm.
The Dead Sea was formed through the flowing in
of the Jordan, in connection with the sinking of the
ground.
But there are two views concerning the Dead
Sea. According to one (Leake, Hoft, and others),
the Jordan before this flowed through the vale of
Siddim to the Ailanitic gulf of the Red .Sea. In the
other view (Robinson and others), there was an in-
land sea, before the catastrophe of Sodom, which
forms part of the Dead Sea. For tlie reasons in
favor of the latter view, see Knobel, p. 177. A
principal reason is found in the f ict that the northern
part of the Dead Sea has a depth throughout of
nearly 1300 feet, while the southern is only 13 feet
deep, is rich in asphaltum, has hot places, and is hot
at the bottom. Bunsen: " That nortlurn basin, ac-
cording to Ritter's statement (xv. 707, 778), is due
to the falling in of the ground ; the local elevation
of the southern part, to the peculiar character of the
ground." Upon the Dead Sea, see Knobel, p. 177;
Keil, p. 165 ; Delitzsch, p. 398 ; and the Diction-
aries, especially the article "Salt Sea," in the "Bible
Dictionary for Christian People." ["The earlier view
is now abandoned, and it has no decisive ground ir
the sacred history." Delitzsch, p. 289. See alsa
Grove, in S. D. p. 1339.— A. G.]
0. LoV^ departure, and his deseendaii/n (vers. 80-
38). — And Lot went out of Zoar. — ["Lot's res-
cue is ascribed to Elohim, as the judge of the whole
earth, not to the covenant Go J, .Tehovah, because
Lot in his separation from Abraham was removed
from I he special leading md providence of Jeho^
140
GENESIS, OR THE FIKST BOOK OF MOSES.
mil." Keil, p. 166. — A. G.] After he had recov-
i->recl fioQi the pariilyzing terrors which fettered him
in Zo;ir, a calculating fear took possession of him
and drove him from Zoar further into the mountains
of Moab, in the east. It was an unbelieving fear,
fo"- the Lord had granted Zoar to hini as an asylum ;
he could not trust that divine promise further. The
leeult is, that, poor and lonely, he must dwvU with
his two daughters in a cave in those cavernous chalk
mountains. Lot is thus now a poor troglodyte.
"There are in that region now those who dwell in
caves and grottoes (Buckingham and Lynch)." Kno-
BEL, p. 178. — And the first-born said to the
younger. — [Our father is old. This confirms the
assertion of St. Stephen, in which it is implied that
Abraham was not the oldest son of Terah ; fbi' Lot
was now old, and he was the son of Haran, and
Har.in was Abraham's brother. Thus one part of
Scripture confirms another, when perhaps we least
expect it. Worpswobth, p. 89. — A. G.] The de-
sire for posterity led her to the iniquitous thought
of incest, which she beUeves excusable because there
is not a man in the earth, etc. According to Keil
and Knobel, they did not think that the human race
had perished, but oidy that there was no man wlio
would unite himself with them, the remnant of a
region stricken with the curse. Their idea of the
world, accoriling to the terms of the narrative, ap-
pears to have been sad and gloomy. Wliat did
they know of the world, in their mountain solitude ?
This deed was worthy of Sodom, says Keil. But
there is a distinction and a wide difference between
incest and pederasty (see introduction). Knobel
thinks that they were represented by the writer as
moulded by the mother, who was probably a Sodom-
ite ; and, on the other hand, that Lot, as the nephew
of Abraham, was more favorably (i. e., partially)
represenied. Every one of these points is fiction !
The narrative, Knobel remarks, lacks probability.
It assumes that Lot was so inioxicated both times
that he should know nothing of what took place,
and still, an old man should, with all this, be capa-
ble of begetting seed. Keil, on the contrary, says
it does not follow from the text that Lot was in an
unconscious state during the whole interval, as the
Rabbins have, according to Jerome, described this
as an incredible thing, taken in connection witli the
issue of the event. Indeed, the narrative says (mly
that Lot was in an unconscious state, lioth when his
daughters lay down, and when they rose up; in thi^
evening perhaps through intoxication, in the morn-
ing through profound, heavy sleep. In any view, a
certain measure of voluntariness must be assumed,
according to the degree in which he was conscious
and therefore his intoxication can only be urged as
an excuse, and this a wretched excuse, since the in-
toxication was, like the deed ilself immcdiati ly
repeated. Psychologically, the reaction from gnat
mental effort and tension is to be taken into :icc()unt
in pronouncing upcni the pleasures of rest in an
Indolent and sensual nature. — Moab. — There are
two derivations: ZH'C,J'roin the father, or ia , water
(as the xerien virile is eu|iliemistically called in
Arabic), for semen and :x. Keil decides in favor
of the first derivation, from a reference to the ex-
planatory expressions (vers. 32, 34, 36). |.\nd also
the analogy of the ■<B""33. — A. G.]— Aminon. —
''BS-33,Hon of roy peo|fle. Ac^conliiig to Delitzsch,
the forin "liss designati'H simply the dcBcendMiils of
Ibv people. For the chancier o' the MoabiteB and
Ammonites, especially in reference to their origin,
see Knobel, p. 178, who, however, in his usual
method, draws the inference as above remarked, thai
this narrative has its origin in Jewish animosity.
Besides the reply of Keil [See Dent. ii. 9, 19, and
xxiii. 4. Lot here disappears from the history
and, as Kurtz renjarks, it is the design of this narra-
tive to give a support for the hiter records of th«
relation of these tribes with the Israelites. — A. G.l
Delitzsch also may be consulted (p. 401). Knobel
himself recognizes the fact of the descent of both of
these peoples from Lot. The nomadic hoides of
Lot gradually extended themselves east and north
east, and pnrtly subdued and destroyed, and partly
incorporated among themselves, the original tribes
of the Emim and Sugim.
DOCTEINAX, AND ETHICAL.
See the preliminary and Exegetical remarks.
1. Upon the manifestation in the oak grove of
Mamre compare ch. xii. We observe, however, thai
the manifestation which was given to Abraham, was
complex, because it had reference in part to him and
the birth of Isaac, and in part to Lot and Sodom.
Hence it resolves itself, in the course of the history,
into two manifestations.
2. The connection of the promise of redemptioi:
and the announcement of judgment, which is peculiar
to this section, runs throughout the whole sacred
Scripture.
3. The oriental virtue of hospitality appears here
in the light of the theocraiio faith, and so likewise its
blessing, which is proclaimed throughoul the whole
Scripture, down even to the epistle to the Hebrews
(Heb. xiii. 2.) It is a contradiction in the natura
custom of the Arabs, that they will rob the pilgrim
in the desert before he enters their tents, but receive
him with the greatest hospitaUty, as it is generally true
that the natural virtues of people are tainted by con-
tradictions. Hospitality, however, is the specific vir-
tue of the Arab, his inheritance from his fiilher
Abraham. But iu Abraliam himself this virtue is
consecrated to be the spiritual fruit of faith.
4. The feast of God with Abraham. [How true
it is that Abraham has now become the friend of
(lod, James ii. 23. And what light this history casts
upon tlie meaning of that term. — A. G.] A New
Testament and heavenly sign, whose later reflection
is the table of shew-bread in the temple, the Loi'd's
Supj>er in the New Covenant, and the Marriage Sup-
per of the Lamb in the new world.
5. The distinction between the laughing of Abra-
ham and .Sarah (see above). In ch. xxi. 6 there
ajijiears still another, a third laugh, in order to deter-
mine the n.ame Isaac (comp. v. 9). The laughter
of a .joyful faith, liie laughter of" a doubting little
faith, an<l the laughter of astonishment or eve of
the animo.sity of the world, appear and parlicipat>; in
the name of the son of promise, as mdeed at that of
every child of the promise.
6. The initiation of Abraham into ihe pur|io8e»
of (iod. In ch. xviii. 17, "the Septna. has the ad
dition of rov ttoiSos /xov (^"1-") to ano 'A/3/»aa^, f04
which I'hilo reads tov ci>i\uu m'"' (comp. James, ii.
23). There is scarcely any passage in which this
^•nns or ^zrik (Isa. xli. 8 ; 2 Chron. xx, 7), would be
more litthig than in this. Abralmm is the friend i<
Jehovah (among the Moslems it has become a sur
name; chalil Allah, or merely cl-chalil, from whicik
CHAP. XVIII— XIX. l-8\
44
ilebroD 5 also called Beit-el-clialil, or simply EI-
tnalil), and we have no secrets from a friend." De-
litzscli (comp. John XV. 15 if). The first reason is,
that God has chosen .\braham, and that he, as the
chosen, has the di'stinaiion to found in his race for
all time, a tradition and school of the revelation of
God, of righteousness and judgment. The doctrine
of the election first appears here in its more definite
form. [God says, I know him, but also that he will
command, &c. We oughi- not to overlooli how early
family relations, instructions and discipline, assume
an important place in the progress of the kingdom
of God ; and what a blessing descends upon those
who are faithful as parents. "Family religion is
God's method for propagating hi.« church. Tliis
would lead him to exercise a careful parental au-
thority for controlling his house in the name of God."
Jacobus. — A. G.]
7. A further and more peculiar reason, why God
reveals to Abraham the impending judgment upon
Sodom, lies in this, that not only the history of So-
dom, but also the Dead Sea, should be for all time a
constituent part of the sacred history, a solemn warn-
ing for the people of God, and for all the world. At
the same time this history should make illustrious
the justice of God, according to which a people are
ripe for judgment, when a cry of its iniquity ascends
to heaven.
8. Abraham's intercession, in its strength and in
its self-Umiiation, is an eternal example of the true
position of the believer to the corruption of the
world. Upon the self-limitation of intercession see
1 John V. 16. Intercession even falls away from
faith and becomes mere fanaticism or frenzy, when it
oversteps the limits of truth. Abraham's excuses in
his intercession, his prudent progress in his petitions,
his final silence, prove that even the boldest inter-
cession is morally conditioned. On the other hand, the
whole power of intercession and the full certainty that
prayer will be answered, appear here most clearly.
[See the 29th verse, which makes it clear that Ara-
ham's intercession was not fruitless. — A. G.]
9. It is evident from the intercession of Abraham,
that the father of the faithful had a very different
idea of righteousness from that which regards it as
consisting only in the non plus ultra of punishment.
• See upon the idea of SiKaios, Matt. i. 19. Moreover,
in the reflection, the prudence, and the constancy of
the intercession, the Abrahamie or even the Israel-
itish character appears here in its true worth and in
its sanctified form, as it enters afterward in the life
of Jacob at first less sanctified, but at the same fitted
for sanctification. But in regard to the thought of
Abraham's intercession, we would make the follow-
ing remarks: 1. His intercession takes more and
more the form of a question. 2. He does not pray
that the godless should be freed from punishment,
but for the sparing of the righteous, and the turning
away of the destructive judgment from all, in case
there should be found a sufficient salt of the right-
eous among them. 3. His prayer includes the thought
that God would not destroy any single righteous one
with the wicked, although the number of the right-
eous should be too small to preserve the whole. [The
righteous, of course, are not destroyed, although they
«re often involved m the punishment of the wicked.
—A. G.]
10. This history makes the truth conspicuous for
jJl time, that the whole depraved world is preserved
through a seed of believing and pious men, and that
indeed, not acci rding to a numerical, but according
to their dynamic majority. Ten righteous wouli
have saved Sodom. But when even the salt of th«
earth (Matt. v. 13) does not avail to save a people oi
a community, then stiU God cares for the sah ation
of his chosen, as is seen in the history of Noah, ths
history of Lot, and the history of the destruction ol
Jerusalem. But the relative mediators who ar«
given to the world in the " salt of the earth," poini
to the absolute mediator, Christ, who is the centra
saving point in the history of the world. [We stand
here on the verge of a mo.st striking type of the judg-
ment. We know that the storm is gathering and
ready to burst, but in the awful silence which pre-
cedes it we hear the voice of the intercessor. Thus
while the final judgment is preparing, the voice of
the true intercessor is heard. — A. G.]
11. The Angels in Sodom. In all such cases
there must come a last final decision. See above.
12. The manifestation which was given to Lot,
corresponds with that which was given to Abraham, in
a way similar to that in which the vision of the cen-
turion, Cornelius, at Ccesarea, corresponds to the vision
of Peter, at Joppa (Acts x.). The precondition for
this connection of the revelations was, doubtless, in
both cases, the mysterious bond of a common premo-
nition or presentiment of great events.
13. The sin of Sodom runs, as a general charac-
teristic, through the heathen world (see Rom. i. 24);
still, in this aspect some nations are far more inno-
cent or guilty than others. Church history also, it
this connection, preserves sad remembrances. Among
the causes of the ruin of the Osmanic kingdom, this
sin stands prominent whose analogue is found in
the sin of Onan (ch. xxxviii. 8.).
14. The description ol the night scene in Sodom
is a night piece of terrible aspect and impressiveness.
It is plain (from the little prospect of the mass for
the gratification of personal lusts, and from the prob-
ability that the inhabitants of the city only knew
indirectly of Lot's mysterious guests), that the uproar
of the .Sodomites was more than half an uprising
against the judgment of Lot which they had already
experienced, and a tumultuous manifestation that
their abominable immorality must be held as a public
custom, of which we have a purely analogous event
in the uproar of the heathen at Ephesus (Acts xix.
2S ff). All the spirits of villainy, wantonness, and
scoffing unbelief are to be regarded as nnfettered.
The ripeness of the city for destruction, however, ia
not to be viewed directly as a ripeness of the Sodon.
ites for damnation (see Matt. xi. 23).
15. The demonic and bestial nature of sin ap-
pears in this history in frightful, full hfe, or rather
death size. [So, also, its corrupting power. Lot fell
its influence, even though he resisted and condemned
their (ile practices. The oifer which he makes to
save his guests, although made under great confusion,
anxiety and terror, shows its influence. — A. G.]
16. Lot's salvation is an image of salvation with
the utmost difliculty. But the delay of his fiiint
heartedness is raised to its highest power of double
heartedness in the history of his wife. She is thf
example of a worldly mind, which turns back frora
the way of salvation, and through its seeking • ftei
the world falls into the fire of juugr-iUt.* In this
sense the Lord has set Lot's wife as a warning example
* [The lookinff back shows, on the one hand, her doubl
and unbelief of the divine warning, and on the other, thai
her heart was still cliaging to the lusts of Sodom, and tha
she was an unwilling follower of the rwouing angt^s
KuKTZ, p. 195. — A, G.*
44^
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSEi?.
(Luke rrii. 22). We may perceive that even Lot was
sensibly depressed as to tbe earnestness of liis faitli,
through the ridicule of his sons-in-law, who regarded
him as a jester.
17. The Dead Sea serves to complete the sym-
bolic meaning which is peculiar to the whole land of
Canaan. The whole land is an illustration of the
divine word, and of sacred iiistory, and thus the Dead
Sea in particular, i< tlie gla*s of the divine judgment.
As a monument of the miraculous judgment it stands
opposed to the Red Sea, which is the monument of
the miraculous deliverance. So, likewise, as tbe sea
of the old covenant, it stands opposed to Geuessaret,
the sea of the new covenant. In the description of
the Dead Sea, however, we must guard against those
ancient assumptions, of tbe apples of Sodom, etc., al-
though some one-sided apologies for these traditions
of the Dead Sea have appeared again in recent times.
[It is interesting to note how olten this event is
referred to in the Xew Testament, not only directly
but incidentally. The phrases flee from the wrath to
come, unquencliable tire, the description of the sud-
denness and completeness of the judgment, and its
eternal duration in tlie smoke of their torment, which
ascendeth for ever and ever, all have a more or
less direct reference to this event. — A. G.]
18. Tbe early rising of Abraham, bis hastening to
the place where he stood before Jehovah, and his silent
look to tbe smoking vale of Siddim, is a sublime and
impressive picture. There stands the mourning priest,
lonely and silent in the morning light, as Jeremiah
sat upon the ruins of Jerusalem. Now be saw that
there were not ten righteous in Sodom, but knew
from tbe rescue of Noah from the flood, and felt con-
fident indeed that bis intercession had not been in
vain.
19. In the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, as
in the punitive miracles in Egypt, and in the biblical
miracles generally, tbe correspondence between the
miraculous divine providence and tbe intellectual and
natural conditions upon the earth must not be mis-
taken.
20. Lot and his daughters. It is a psychological
fact that, in human nature, especially in beginners in
the age of faith or those whose sensuous nature is
Btrong, after a great tension of the life of faith, of
spiritual elevation, great and dangerous reactions oc-
cur, during which temptation may easily prove cor-
rupting to the man.
21. Moah and Aminon. See the Bible Dictiona-
ries. "De Wette, Tuch, Knobel, explain the narra-
tive as a fiction of Israelitish national animosity, &c.
(See above.) When, however, laterdeljauchery (Num.
ii. 25) and impiety (e. p. 2 Kings iii. '.iii tf ) .'ipiiear as
fundatiM'tital traits in the character and cnltus ot hotli
people, we can at least bold with etjual justice, that
these inherited sins came with tliem from tlnur origin,
as that the tradition oi their origin has moidded their
character."
22. Lofs disappearance. The chastising Itand
of God is seen in the gravest form, in tbe fact that
Lot is lo.st in the darkness of the mountains of Moab,
AS a dweller in the caves. But it may l>e (juestionid
irbether one is justified by this, in saying that he came
to a bad end, aji Dklitzsch does in a detailed descrip-
jon, alter a characteristic outline by F. C. V. Moskiis
'^p. 4(>ii, coiiip. Kiel, p. 167). Uis not returning
poor and shipwrecked can be explained upon belter
grounds. In iiny iimc the testimony for him, 2 I'et.
ii. 7, b, must not be overlooked. There remains one
Jghl point in bis life, since be sustained tbe assaults
of all Sodom upon his house, in the most extreiiM
danger of his life. [It may be said, moreover, that hii
leaving home and property at the divine warning,
and when there were yet no visible signs of the judg-
ment, and bis flight without looking back, indicate
tlie reality and genuineness of his faith. — A. G.]
His two-fold intoxication certainly has greater guilt
than tbe one intoxication of Noah. His two-fold sin
with his daughters may involve greater dilficnlty than
tbe act of Judab. Both analogies show, however
that in judging so ancient a character we may easi'.j
place them too strictly in modern points of view.
True, be appears, in comparison with .\brahain, with
whom he once entered upon tbe path of the faith of
the promise, in a light similar to that in which Esau
appears in relation to Jacob. He might have suffi-
cient piety to save his soul, but he was no man of the
future, who coiold found a line of blessing ; he wag
too much like the mass, too much under tbe senses,
and too much involved in respect to worldly things
for such a calling. " With tbe history of Lot," De-
LiTzscH remarks, " the side line from Haran is com-
pleted, and tbe origin of two people who are inter-
woven in the history of Israel is related."
23. Tbe destruction of Sodora an example of tbe
later destruction of tbe Canaanites.
24. The prudence which, in the life of Abraham, ap
pears as a sinful prudence, and yet susceptible of heinj,
sanctified, appears in the lives of his kindred as a fimily
trait of the children of Therah, in Lot and his daugh-
ters, as well as in Laban. But it takes on in them
the expression of refined cimning, and thus becomes
manifoldly and positively ungodly. Thus Lot himself
chose the region of Sodom ; thus he flatteringly ad-
dressed the Sodomites as brethren; thus he offers
them bis daughters as a substitute, probably from an
ironical expression of a prudent foresight that they,
controlled by their demonic and unnatural lusts,
would reject bis proposal : but his daughters us(
criminal cunning to obtain offspring. This ince.st-
however, appears in a milder light when set in con
trast with the sin of Sodom.
2.5. Passavant. These cities are representej
throughout the old covenant as types of the most
severe judgments of God (Jer. xli. 11 ; 1. 4i), etc.)
And there is again another word in the old cove-
nant, a wonderful, mysterious promise, spoken con-
cerning these places, which, at the very least, alle-
viates the eternity of tbe pain, and for tbe sakt
of Jesus Christ, the only redeemer of all mankind,
abbreviates the endurance of the Iteavy judgments
of the poor heathen (see Ezek. xxxix. 25 ; Jer. xxix.
14; .\lviii. 47 ; Ezek. xvi.). [The passages quoted
by no tueaiis sustain the inference which is here
drawn from them ; and the inference lies in the
face of tbe general and constant testimony of tbe
Scriptures. The words of our Lori.1, Matt. xi. 24,
place the destiny of these places and of the heathen
in its true light. — A. G.] That farther prophetic
vision of the seer appears to cast new light upon the
f irther fate of Sodom, when be says : This water
flows otit towards the ea-st and down into the plain,
and goes into the sea (salt .sea), and when it comes
into the sea its waters shall become healthful (ch.
xlvii. 8 ff. ; 1 Pet. iii. 19 f ; iv. 6). [Tbe following
learned and itnpressive note on tlie destruction of
Sodom, kindly furnished me by its author, "rill bs
read with tbe deepest interest. — A. G.]
Note on thk Destuuction of Sodom — Irs Sen
DENNV.B8 — The Dekp Impression it hadx on niE A>
CHAP. XVIIl.— XIX. 1-88.
44:i
ciENT MisD — Its Frequent Mention in the Scrip-
cCKES — ^TAriTDS — The Arabian Tradition. — "As
the subversion by God of Sodom and Gomorrah."
Such is the constant style of reference in the Hible.
See Ueut. xxix. 22; Is. xiii. 19; Jer. xli.x. 18 ; Jer. 1.
40; Lam. iv. 6; Amos iv. U. Its ctei cceurriug in
t'le same Ibrm of words, shows that it was a prover-
bial or traditional saying ; and this reveals to us liow
vividly the awful event had stamped itself upon the
human memory. It is always described in language
of its own. The peculiar Hebrew word is used in
the same way of no other catastrophe. 'I'he « ord
nsBna denotes utter subversion or reversal, — the
bringing ji a thing, and all that belongs to it, in the
direct opposite of its former condition. Land has
become water, fertility barrenness and salt, beanty
deformity, fragrance and freshness a vile and loath-
Bome putridity. It is not simply decay and ruin,
but an overthrow total and remediless.
These cities are thus referred to as a standing warn-
ing— a judgment of God visible from generation to
generation. It is a region cursed by the Almighty, —
doomed ever to bear the marks of its dreadful visita-
tion, to which Peter refers, 2 Pot. ii. 6, xaX -irnKas Suiiii-
fjiwv nai Vofioppas Tiippaiaai KATA2TP0*I>H KareKpi-
yev^ vnoSitjfxa Tedfmuis: "the cities of So<lom and
Gomorrah he condemned with an overthrow, when he
reduced them to ashes and set them forth as an ex-
ample." The Greek word katasirophe is the exact
counterpart of the Hebrew HDsn^, having tlie same
peculiar intensity of meaning as used in this connec-
tion. In Juile 7. the language is still stronger —
TrpoKiip-rai Sf'iyi^a Trupbs aiwfiovi "they are set forth
as an example, undergoing (yTrexoixrai) the sentence
of eternal fire." This eternal fire does not moan the
punishment of the inhabitants in another world (though
the event itself may be regarded as the first type of
Hell, the first suggestive glimpse to the human mind
of that awful doctrine), but has primary reference to
their long earthly desolation. The language most
graphically expresses the condition of those doomed
plains, as showing the signs of their fearful burning,
age after age, a7r' alctifos els aiui'a*
The.se regions were very near to Jerusalem, al-
most if not quite visible from the highest jdaces ; and
• this accounts for the prophet's frequent appeal to
them, eis Of7yna, et in Urrorem. How fearful is the
allusion to it made by Ezekiel, xvi. 4(1 ; where the
adulterous Judah is told to remember the startling
proximity of this her younger or smaller sister, so early
buried in volcanic fires : " Thine elder sister, Samaria,
that dwoUeth on thy left (the N. W.), and thy smaller'
sister, Sodom, and her daughters (the other cities of
the plain), that lie upon thy right." How awful the
reminiscence of this lost sister Sodom lying for so
many ages under the sulphurous waters of the Dead
Sea, with all the burnt district a short distance to the
right of Jerusalem, and ever presenting that terrific
warning, the SeTyjia irup6s aiuviov, to the oft rebel-
lious city.
We find elsewhere evidence of the deep impression
this early divine judgment made upon the ancient
mind. The language of Tacitus, Hist. v. 7, could
only have come from some vivid tradition prevailing
in the East and brought thunce to Rome : Haud pru-
Cfil inde campi, guos feruni olmi uberes, magiiU que
• njtspn "inns. The term generally denotes
juniority, and it may be so literally taken here, mnce the
arigin of .Jerusalem may have been historically older than
Ihai; ot Sodom.— T. U)
urhibxti hahitatos, fulmincm jactd arsisse, et maven
vestigia ierraynque ipsam specie torridam vim frugi'
feram perdidisve ; nam cuncta atra et inanin »eltd ir
cinkrkm vanescunt. Ego, ucvt incliia^ qitoruiir.n urhea
IGNE ctELESTi Jlagrassc conceiyserim,, etc. The"*"' if
something it (Vi= language strikingly reiie'vV ling that
of Peter and .lude. Compare TacitaB'/u/tniiimnJactu
arsisse — igne aelesti flagrasse — manere vestigia, with
the Seiy/xa Trvph% aliut^iuu, and in ci/terem with r^rtppil
aai. They appear to be the set terms in all descrip
ti(ms. Nothing but an early, most vivid impression
could have proiluced such fi.\edness and vividness in
the language of the tradition.
The same feature of constancy in terms for which
no others could be an adequate substitute, appears
remarkably in the notices of the Koran, which strong
internal evidence shows must have come from tradi-
tion independent of the 0. T. scriptures. It mani-
fests itself especially in one word ever found in con
nection. It is the Arabic ^yUCfiJk*)!, which is
etymolo^cally, the same with the Hebrew nSEflO ,
and used in a similar manner as a participial noun.
The peculiarity, however, is, that in the Arabic the
primary sense which belongs to it in this connection
had long ceased, so that no traces of it are anywhere
else found, even in the remains w hich we have of
ante-Mohamniedau writing. Both the form and tha
peculiar sense have become obsolete in all other ap-
plications of the root. In this recurring phrase, aa
used of these ancient cities, it has acquired something
like the force of a proper name as a well known ap-
pellative, taking its place along with Midian, Egypt,
Hud, Thamud, and other names of places tliat tra-
dition gives as having been specially visited with the
divine vengeance. Thus Sodom and Gomorrah are
ever called Al-movj-ta-fe-kai, " the overturned." Aa
in Koran Surat, hii. 51-5.5, where it occurs with
others given as proper names: "And that he de-
stroyed Ad, and Thanmd, and left no remainder;
and also the people of Xoah before them, and the
Mow'ta-fe-kai (the overturned) he cast down, and
that which covered them covered them." The last
clause of this passage is meant to be intense in its
repetition : that is, there is no conceiving the horrora
under which they lay ; " that which covered them
covered them," — no tongue can tell it. So, also,
Koran Ixix. 9: "thus went on Phnroah and those
who were before him, the Mow-ta-fe-kat (the over-
turned), in their sin." Thamud ami Ad, as usual, had
been mentioned just before. The constant introduc-
ing of the .Mow-ta-fe-kat along with these, «'hich are
peculiar Arabic traditions, shows that the story of the
" overturned " cities had a common origin with them,
and was not derived from the Hebrew scriptures.
The usage appears still more clearly, Koran ix.
71, where the term in question occurs in connection
with the people of Ad, and the wicked in the days
of Abraham, who is the peculiar Mohammedan patri-
arch : " Did there not come to them the story of
those who were before them — the people of Noah
and of Ad, and of the people of Abraham, and of
the inhabitants of Midian, and of ' the Overturned
(the Mow-ta-fe-kat), whose messengers came unto
them with iheir prophecies?" Now what makes
this the more striking is the fact (as before indicated)
that although the Arabic root, »»5ii( , or i^5>AJ8,
is, in all other cases (and these are quite frequent),
used solely in its secondary meaning of falsehood
icoudng from the primary sense of subversion, turn
444
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES
ing wpsile down, tbrouL'h the intermediate ideas of
contrariness or opposition, ab inverfendo, perverten-
do), in these speci:il usages from the Koran, and
oiliers like them, the word ever goes baclc to its
primitive Hebrew sense, being taken precisely as
"]En and nrsma in the Bible. If the Hebrew verb
had had a hoth-pa-hel form, its participle, "EHr'''? •
molh-hap-pek = motaffek, would be almost identical
with the Arabic word so constantly used for this
purpose (in this sense) and lor no other. Evidently
it was an archaism in the days of Mohammed, and
this accounts for its being used as a projier name, in
which form it had become fixed against change and
8ub.stitution. The root is used in the same maimer
throughout the Syriac version, but in this branch of
the Shemitic it had, in all its apphcations, kept
bearer to its old primary sense preserved in the
Hebrew.
What shows that it was an antique phrase in
Arabic, or that i^\ (or "En) had lost the sense
of subversion in all other appUcations, and that its
employment as a proper name in this particular con-
nection came from tradiiional preservation, is the fact
that even in translating the Old Testament, the Jew-
ish Arabic interpreters never use it, — not even in
those places whcie the Hebrew -|Bn and nssna
would have immediately suggested it as the more
fitting word ; and this, too, notwithstanding that
they fretiuently give to an Arabic term a rarer He-
brew sense, thus Rabbi Saad does not employ it
in this very passage, Isaiah xiii. 19, but uses, instead,
the more common Arabic verb, ,_>Jji , to express
'ie sense of overturning which is given by nssnia ;
Araljic verb ^iJol , ^^^ letter n (or iC) of the He-
orew has been softened into X , but there can be no
doubt of the two words being etymologically identi-
eal. So, too, in the Koran, sometimes, the Hebrew
sense of the antique Arabic sSJiiy^' -, is clearly
given in different and more common .\rabic words.
As in Surat xv. 73, 74, where, speaking aguin of
this very judgment, and the manner of it, it says :
"And a sudden, storm took them at sunrise, and
toe made the luifhesi parts of it to be the lowest,
I gl ;1 ... Iff ^11 & 1,_; 1 » -g* (that is, we turned it
apside down), tmd we rained upon them stones of
ouming marl " — a volcanic earthquake and a lava
shower.
This standing epithet occurs, Lam. iv. fi, in the
same cOTUiection and in the same way ; that is, in
the nature of a proper name, though there it has
the form of tlie participle perfect of "En. It is
ns^snn ="ID , "Sodom the overturned." Uur
English translation of the whole passage is far from
being clear : " (jreater than the punishment of the
sin of Sodom which was overthrown as in a rnipnieni,
BDd no hands alai/ed on her": cn^ n3 ibn xb .
In this passage there is an imcertainty as to the ety-
mology and meaning of the word ilbn, but that
interpretation is to be preferred which i.s most in
keeping with the ideas ol' suddenness, or quick
»lami, tlwt maliC B4 graphic a feature in all idhi.sions
to the event, wliellier Hebrew or Arabic (ieseuius
inaki-B "in from i"n (torqucre), and gives it the
lense : Jion iminima aunt mamui, " no hands were
sent upon, or against her" — meadng, hands of ttj
enemy. Rabbi Tanehum's Arabic commentaiy is to
the same efl'ect : ''Of Sodom it is said hert, tha
there did not come upon her the hand of man, bui
she w^as overturved, at one bloii; by the divine com-
mand ; the word being the same as that in Jer. xxiii.
19, ' on the head of the wicked shall rush (^psin^)
a rushing tempest, bbinrB ^sp (a whirlwind ,s?«n^
or hurled), and also as found Eccles. v. 12, 15
nbin nj'H V", there is a sore evil (an impend-
ing or threatening evil) that I have seen under the
sun."
It may be a question here, however, whether
C"'T' refers to the hands of the enemy, or to the
hands of the inhabitants of the doomed city. If we
place the accent on the ultimate, ihn may be from
nbn , and this would give us the rendering, " when
no hands were weak in her" — that is, suddenly,
when they were in their full strength and security.
Or the same general idea mav he obtained from
bin , if we advert to its primary sense, which wo
find very clearly in the Arabic Jl -^ . It is a curv-
ing motion combined with the spiral or oblique
Hence the sense of pain as expressed by twisting,
wriiiffiiiif (torquere). It is used to denote the most
intense anguish, the wringing of the hands in de-
spair; which is the language "^niDloyed by the
Peschito Syriac version to render knopia (distress or
perplexity), Luke xxi. 25. No hniids were wrung
in her. So sudden was the storm that there was no
time for lamenting over their doom.
All this, too, is expressed by the way in which
^ I* ^
the frequent Koranic word, ^^^^.yi , is used when
sudden judgments are described, and especially this
particular event. It is rendered sometimes, punixh-
vient, or pain. It is also used of tli- crasli of the
thunder, fragor tonitru ; but in its most literal
sense it denotes one sliarp cry or shriek. Or it may
be rendered, a shock. Thus in the passage before
quoted, Surat xv. 73 : "a sudden storm or shock
took them at sunrise" (comp. Gen. xix. 23). The
same, verse 83 of the same Surat, "took tlitni early
in the morning." Though literally (lei}cifing one
suilden scream of terror, it is taken for the eause,
the thunderstorm or earthquake that produces it.
Thus is it most impressively employed to re|ireseiit the
suddenness and surprise of the judgment that came
upon those people of Lot, as the Sodomites arc styled,
"only one .shock; there was in it no waiting," no
recovery. Or it may be rendered. " only one cry,
and all was over." The remedilessness, as well as
the suddenness, is still more graphically .set forth in
the use of similar langiuige, Surat x.xxvi. 25 : "Lo,
one cry, and they are all still "' — literally, bicr/it out,
.l«t\^L&., extinguished, dead. So, again, Surat
liv. 31 : " Lo, we sent upon them one sliock (one
shriek) and they are all burnt stubble." In the snme
manner is it used of the day of judgment, xxrvi.
r)3 : "One shock, or one cry, and they (the risen
dead) are all before us." For other similar passages
with similar applications, see Koran, xi. 70, 97 ;
xxiii. 43 ; .xxix. 39; 1. 41 ; xv. 73, S3 ; hiii. 3.
In llie most express terms <lo the Scri|itures
assign this catastrophe of Sodom au<l (iomorruh to
the judicial action of God, the Lord of nature. Nf
CHAP. XVni.— XIX. 1-38.
MS
language can be clearer : " Jehovah rained upon
them fire from Jehovah out of heaven,'' Gen. xix. 24.
And vet, in perfect consistency with this, may we
regard it as broiiglit about by natural causes, tliough
belonging to those great movements in nature which
marked the primitive period of our present earth,
or before its constitution became settled in that
comparative calm which leads the scoffer to say that
"all things continue as they were from the begin-
ning." Tills fearful nssnis , or overthrow, has im-
pressed indeUble " vestigia " (to use the language
of Tacitus) on the region in which it took place ; but
DO less sharp and incisive are the marks it has left
in the Oriental traditions, ami the peculiar language
to which it has given rise in them all. It sent one
Hharp cry through the ancient Eastern world, and
that cry has echoed down to us through other chan-
nels than the Hebrew Scriptures. Ou tliis account
has the peculiar language employed been so minutely
traced, as furnishing evidence of the i linute credi-
bility of ail event so ancient, and of the strong
impression it must have made at the time. It was a
divine judgment, a divine revelation in the earth,
too awlul and too unmistakable to allow much
diversity of language in describing it, and it is this
constant manner of telling the fearful story which
separates it widely from the shadowy and changing
mythical, with which some would compare it. —
T. L.]
HOMXLETICAX AND PEACTTCAi.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs.
The xviiith ch. Abraham, the xixth Lot. Promi-
nent points in Abraham's life: 1. the great vision;
2. the feast of the angels ; S- the faith in the promise ;
4. the intercession for Sodom. Prominent points in
the life of Lot : 1. the entertaining of the angels ; 2.
the moral resistance of the assault of the whole city
of Sodom; 3. his faith, and his mission to his two
sons-in-law ; 4. his emigration with his family in dis-
tress, before the judgment. The revelation of grace
and of wrath. — The connection of the announcement
of salvation with the announcement of judgment. —
The oak grove of Mamre, and the burning Sodom. —
• As Abraham saved Lot the first time through war,
BO the second time through his intercessory prayer. —
Abraham and Lot in their different positions. — In
their last position with respect to each otlier (Aljia-
ham the friend of God, Lot the fugitive from Sodom,
etc.). — The connection of the manifestation to Abra-
ham and Lot. — The great manifestation of God, in the
life of Abraham, in its great significance : 1. A reve-
lation of the incarnation of God, of the future Christ,
and at the same time of the angehc world ; 2. a reve-
lation of the great sign of the coming redemption,
and of the coming judgment.
1. Section. The appearance of Jehovah in the
oak grove of Mamre, aiid the promise of the birth of
Isaac (ch. xviii. 1-15). The great manifestation of
God, in the life of Abraham, is the most striking sign
m the old covenant of the mcamation of God. — The
feast in the oak grove of Mamre; a sign of the incar-
nation of God. — Abraham in the oak grove of Mamre ;
great in his power of intuition, and great in his activ-
ity — Herein, also, a type of Christ. — As in all great
characters, the contrasts of nature are here reconciled
and removed. — Abraham's hospitality as to its pecu-
liar traits. — The real method and spirit of hospitality
■onsists alonp in this, that in or with the stranger we
receive the Lord himself. — How well love and hu'
mility qualify Abraham to be the giver of the feast,
the one who makes i-eady the mt-al and then stands
and serves. — Sarah as the iiousewife. — Sarah's doubt-
ing laughter, and believing astonishment. — Ver. 1"
The promise of l.saac : 1. apromise; 2. an endless lu!
ness and succession of promises. — Sacred oak grove :
sign of the sacred temples, especially of tlie Gothic
Cathedral, — the sacred feast, sign of the most sacred
meals. — Abraham's friendship with God as hospital-
ity : 1. God as the guest of Abraham in this world ; 2.
Abraham as the guest of God in the other world (to sit
down with Abraham, Abniham'a bosom). — Starkk:
Ver. 1 (The manifestation of the Son ol God, at first,
is not through a natural nor even through a personal
union, but through a voluntary and casual union,
since he took from his free love a body, or rather the
tbrm of a body, for a time). — To this person are
ascribed divine works, omnipotence (vers. 10, 14),
omniscience (ver. 13), the power to execute judg-
ment (ver. 25). — The virtue of hospitality is becoming
to Christians, and should be practised especially by
believers and the pious (Heb. xiii. 2 ; Is. Iviii. 7 ; 1
Pet. iv. 9 ; Job xxxi. 32 ; Rom. xii. 13 ; Gal. vi. 10);
but still they must use circumspection here also. — We
should not permit strangers to rest in the streets, but
receive them and show them kindness and help (Rom.
xii. 13), to which now imikeepers are in a pecuUar
seuse obliged (Luke x. 34, 35). — Ver. 15. From the
fact that Sarah makes no further reply, but receives
her rebuke patiently, we may see that she recognizes
her fault, and that God had rebuked it, hence she
also is graciously preserved, that she should be at
the same time the type of the free New Testament
Church (Gal. iv. 22, 27, 31) and the mother of believers
(1 Pet. iii. t>). How severely, on the other hand, Zach-
arias was chastised for his unbelief (see Luke i. 20.) —
A Christian must never measure the promises of God
by what seems good to him, but give to the powei
of God the preference over his reason (Zech. viii. 6 ;
Luke i. 37 ; 1 Pet. iii. 6). — Gerlach : In regard to
Sarah. Even her unbelief which lay concealed within
her, must be brought out into the light, since it was
now designed to confirm her confidence in the prom-
ise, which should not be fulfilled without her faith. —
Schroder, (Luther): Now there is hospitahty in all
places where the church is. She has always a com-
mon purse and storehouse, according to Matt. v. 42,
and we should all so serve her, and furnish her, not
only with doctrine but also with kindness, so that
the sjiirit and the flesh may here at the same time find
refreshment and consolation (Matt. xxv. 35, 40). —
Kambach: Ver. 8. As Abraham's tent is here the
house in which the Son of God and his angels are
entertained, so is his bosom the common place of
rest for the blessed in the other world (Luke xvi. 22).
— The power and susceptibility for intuition, and
the absorbing and even careful attention to busi-
ness, which were separated in Mary and Martha (Luke
X. 39), are here seen united in the same person. —
That they jnust necessarili/ eat, would be in opposition
to their spiritual nature, but the power to eat was given
with the human form. — Ver. 9. Now follows, at
LuTHKR says, the table talk, that nothing might be
wanting in this description, and that the whole world
might know that this feast was not so passed as
among the monks, who must keep silence at th»
table.
2. Section. The revelation of God coneeTing
Sodom, and Abraham!'^ hiferce.-inort/ prai/er (vers. 16-
33). — 1 The communing of God with himself befor*
44b
GEXESIS, OB THE FIKST BOOK OF MOSES.
the revelation (ver. 18), or the revelation of God
throughout the truit of the highest divine purpose, as
tlie creation of man ; 2. the reason for this revela-
tion (ver. lii); 3. its oontents (vers. 20, 21); 4. its
results : a. the departure of the men to the judgment
(ver. 22) ; b. the intercession of Abraham (vers. 23-
SO).— .\bi-alKim the friend of God (child of God, ser-
vant of God, the intiuiaie confidant of God). — The cry
of the sin of Sodom. — Tlie intercession of Abraham for
Bodoin as the first long prayer and intercession com-
municated to us : 1. awaliened or animated by the
consciousness of salvation which was given to him ;
2, as a pattern for all intercessory prayers, — The
great importance of intercession. — Its features: 1.
The boldness of faith ; 2. caution m the fear of God ; 3.
truthfulness of love. — Even the apparently unavailing
intercessions are not in vain. — Starke: Ver. 20.
They (the Sodomites) went so far that the greatness
of tlieir sin had become a proverb (Is. i. 9 fi'.), and
therefore they were destroyed 4ti0 years earlier than
the Canaanites. — The sins crying to heaven are espe-
cially, in the Holy Scriptures: 1. the shedding of
innocent blood (ch. iv. 10 ; Job xvi. 18) ; 2. the
sin of Sodom ; 3. the oppression of the people of
God (Ex. iii. 7), especially of widows and orphans.
(Ex. XX. 22, 27; Sirach. xsxv. 19); 4. the withhold-
ing of the hire of the laborer (James v. 4). — There-
fore he could not umlerstand by the righteous little
ehildren; for, although they are not righteous in
their natural state, they could not have committed
sins crying to the heavens. — They were, however,
included with those destroyed, without, it may be
hoped, any injury to their blessedness, or (so will it
be added by some in an uncertain way) because Gud
saw that they would tread in the Ibotpaths of their
fathers. [But the Scriptures never allude to this
knowledge of God as the ground of his acts, either
saving or destructive. — The same event bears a very
different aspect and meaning as sent to the wicked
and the good, e. g., death. So with these judgments.
— A. G.] The nearer Abraham comes to God in
his prayers and intercession, the more clearly he
recognizes his nothingness and entire unworthi-
ness. A glorious fruit of faith. — The people of So-
dom, indeed, could not think what was determined
in the purpose of the watchers concerning them, and
how Abraham stood in the breach. — Ver. 32. This
I will is here repeated six times, to intimate the truth
of God, his earnest will, that he does not will the
death of the sinner, hut rather tliat he should turn
unto him and Uve (Ezek. xviii. 11, 32). — Bib. Tub. :
Intercession for a brother believer, even for the god-
less, a Christian duty. — Mark this, ye godless, that ye
and the world stand only for the sake of the righteous.
— We must come before God with the greatest rever-
ence, and in the deepest humility of heart bow our-
selves before his sacred majesty. — The righteous are
highly esteemed In the sight of God. — (Jerlach:
Ver. 19. Abraham, I have known him, t. e., chosen
in my love. As Amos iii. 2 ; John -wii. 3. Ver. 23.
The righteous who dwell together with the godless
in any place, restrain the judgments of God. — Zi.n-
ZENnoRK : I catmot tell in terms strong enough the
blessed privilege of speaking with our Lord. — Cai.-
WKK IIaniibui n : Hut in this prayer lie concealed
deep mysteries, which render conspicuous to us the
worth and importance, in the sight of (Jod, of the
righteous in the worlil, and on the oilier hand helps
to explain tin* woiidcri'iil jiatience and long suffering
of God towards the evil, aud even towards lieaven
OTini; siunprB. — Schroder: Calvin: If, therefore,
oftentimes temptations contend in our hearts, snA
things meet us, in the providence of God, which seem
to involve a contradiction, let the conviction 9f his
righteousness still be unshaken in us. We musl
pour into his bosom the cares which give us pain
and anxiety, that he miy solve for us the difficultiei
which we cannoi 'k:)lve. — Passava.nt: When I othe*
wise can ilo nothing, when I am without any iuflu
ence, and free access, without any means or anj
power, then still I may do something through the in
tercessory prayer.
3. Section. The entrance and ■•<njourn of the
a7i(/els in SoJoiii, and the final manifestation of its
depraviti/^ in contrast with the better conduct of l/oi
(ch. lix. 1-11). There are parts of this section
which do not seem fitted for public reading and
homdetical treatment. But the examination of the
whole history may be joined, by practical and homi-
letical wisdom, to the section, vers. 1-3. — How sin
is radically a beginning of the most extreme corrup-
tion : 1. it is against nature, and tends to the most
unnatural abominations ; 2. a delusion, which tends
to fury and madness ; 3. an act of disobedience,
which issues in rebellion against God ; 4. an impu-
dence and falsehood, tending even to blasphemy. —
Hellish night-scenes in the earliest antiquity. — The
blinding of the godless that they could not find what
they sought. — Starke: (It is incredible that Lot, as
the Rabbins think, sat in the gate to judge (Deut.
,\vi. 18) and had been a judge in Sodom.) — A Chris-
tian must behave towards every one, especially
towards the pious, with humility and reverence
(Rom. xii. 10). — The holy angels dwell cheerfully
with the pious. — Ver. 5. (Lev. xviii. 22, 24; xx. 13.)
Has not experience shown, that if here and there
songs and prayers have been offered in a home at
evening by devout persons, there have been those
who have run together before the windows and
made them the matter of sport and ridicule, while
on the other hand, in other homes every kind of
night revel has been endured and approved. — Ver.
8. The offer of Lot did not spring from evil, but
from the greatest confusion and alarm ; still he did
wrong (Rom. iii, 8 ft'.). We see from this: 1. that
Lot is not to be praised as some have thought (Am-
brose, Chrysostom) ; 2. that he was not guilty of a
sin which removes him beyond the grace of God. —
Ver. 9. An unreasonable reproach. Had there
been now ten such strangers in Sodom, they woidd
not yet have been destroyed. — The gracious requital.
Lot ventured all to preserve his guests ; now he ex-
periences how he is saved by them.* It belongs to
no man to prevent a greater sin by a lesser. —
Whoever will judge and punish the rough world,
must be a disturber and excite an uproar. — (Todlesfl
people are only hardened the more, tlirough kind and
gracious warnings. — Woe to him whom (iod strikes
with spiritual blindness.f — Gerlacii : The very na-
ture of the trial which God adopts consists in this,
that he honors to the very last the liberty lent by
him to the creature, and does not punish to destruc-
tion until the most extreme abuse of freedom haa
been made evident. — Cai.wek Uanobuch : Sins and
shameful vices a|ipear in their fullest disgracefulnest
in the night. — Lot appears, also, to have before
rebuked their sinful movements, wherefore they
reinouch him, the stranger, with a lust of power —
• [Ood's ponple aro aaie when angels stanc seniriaaal
tho (loorn. Bush — A. G.]
t [It is tlie use of God, to blind and besot the«e xhom ii-
mcaus to destroy. Bp. Hall : Bush. — A. G.l
CHAP. NVill.— XIX. 1-38.
441
T.ie nearer the judgmema of God, the greater the
security ol' sinners. [The scriptural signs that the
judgment is near are: 1. that God abandons men or
communities to out-breaking and presumptuous
"ina ; 2. that warnings and chastisements tail to
produce their effect, and especially when the person
growa harder under them ; 3. that God removes the
good from any community — so before the flood, so
before the destruction of Jerusalem ; ami, 4. the
deep, undisturbed aecurity of thoae over whom it is
suspended. — A. G.]
4. SecHoit . LoCs salvation. Sodom^s destruction
(vers. 12-29). Lot's rescue from Sodom: 1. his
obedience. The first message of deliverance (vers.
12-14). 2. Then, even, scarcely saved, on account
of his delay and fears (vers. 15-22). — The test of
Lot in the judgment of Sodom: 1. Saved, indeed,
but, 2. scarcely saved, and that with ditficulty.
Urged, importuned by the angels. Paralyzed by
his terror in the way. His wife lost. [Almost saved,
and yet lost. — A. G.] His daughters. — In the his-
tory of Lot, also, the unity of the family is again
illustrated : 1. In its great importance ; 2. in its final
extent. — Ver. 15. The danger in delaying the flight
out of Sodom, t. «., of conversion, or also of separa-
tion from the society of the wicked. — Starke: (Vei-.
12. It may be what belongs to thee, and could there-
fore relate to his possessions, especially his herds.
Still, some doubt, and think that he bore away as a
gain or spoil only his own life and the lives of his
family, while he must have left the herds behind in
his haste.) — Ver. 14. Acts xvii. 18. — Sodom a type
of the spiritual Babylon (Rev. xi. 8). — Whoever will
Qot be borne away and crushetl with the godless, he
must early and cheerfully separate himself from
them, while he has time and leisure * (Rev. xviii. 4).
— Ver. 16. God shows his goodness not only to the
pious, but to those who belong to them. — Upon ver.
21. How God excuses the weakness of the believer,
if be walks with God in uprightness. f — As Zoar was
spared at the intercession of Lot, so afterwards the
house of Laban was blessed for Jacob's sake, and
Potiphar for the sake of Joseph, the widow's meal-
chest and cruse of oil for the sake of Elijah. — That
Zoar was made better by the recollection of the ter-
rible overthrow of the cities may be inferred from the
fact that it was still standing at the time of Isaiah (Is.
XV. 5). — (A comparison between Sodom and Rome in
eight particulars : beautiful region ; security ; iniqui-
ties crying to the heavens ; the true faith persecuted ;
announcement of its judgment (Rev.) ; the rescuing
tf the pious ; punishment by fire ; the rising of the
sun ; the enlightening of the Jews, etc. H. C. Ram-
bach.) — (The Dead Sea: Troilo and others say: I
could compare it only with the jaws of hi'll.)-^The
fearful judgment upon Lot's wife: 1. She died imme-
diately ; 2. in her sins ; 3. an unusual death ; 4.
temained unburied, an example of the vengeance
of God.— Luke vii. 32. 33; ix. 62.— Ver. 28. It is
ca.m, pleasant weather with the children of God,
when it storms with the godless (Exod. x. 22, 23;
Pa. xxxii. 1(1). — Gerlach: A living type of those
w'-iom the messenger of the Lord warns before the
fature punishment (Luke xvii. 28,29). — The word :
1<m(« and esca/.e/or thy life ; this is the deep under-
• ["The man who will not consult for his own safety, and
^•ho, even being w.amed to beware, yet exposes himself by
his sloth to ruin, deserves to perish." Calvin. — A. G.J
t [It is no new thing for the Lord to grant sometimes,
nt an indulgence, what he does not approve. Calvin. See
.Tacobus —A. G.l
tone of love, which is heard through all preaching ol
the gos|)el. — Calw. Hanh. : The mercy of the Lord
saves Lot and his family, as a brand plucked from
the burning. Until Lot is saved the Lord himself
restrains his hand. — Schwenke: Ver. 15. The ileep
imprcs.sion which the declaration of the near judg
ment made upon him was greatly weakened by the
mocking words of his sons-in-law ; he delays, waits,
|iuts off. Flesh and blood, and the clinging to the
beautiful city, struggle with oliedience to the revela-
tion from God. — Schih.dek : The entrance of Lot
into the vale of Siddim corres[)onds to his exodus
(Baui)igarten).* — How the first universal judgment
of the flood, like the partial judgment upon Sodom
and Gomorrah, serves in the Scriptures as an exam-
ple and type of all the divine judgments, and espe-
cially of the last judgment (Luke xvii. 28 ff. ; 2 Pet.
ii. li, etc.). — Heuser: Destruction of Sodom: 1. A
judgment from heaven; 2. a sign for the earth. —
Taube : The eternal righteousness of God in the
judgment upon Sodom and Lot's wife. The free
mercy of God in saving Lot and his family.
h. Section. Lots disappenrance and his descend-
anU (vers. 30-38). The Sr>th verse is alone fitted
for public use. But from this a faint light may be
thrown upon the whole night-scene Lot's disap
pearance as a dweller in caves. — Lot's history illus-
trates the truth, that whoever will build a hotise.
must count the cost: 1. His inspired exodus from
Haran with Abraham, and journey through Canaan
to Egypt, with ever-increasing wealth ; 2. his settle-
ment in the valley of Sodom ; 3. his asylum in
Zoar; 4. his disappearance from the scene in the
caves of the mountains. — How should the pious fear
temptations when the mind is unbent after extreme
spiiitual tension. — Man falls easily into the sins of
the flesh when the ideals of his intellectual life are
dissolved and lose their power. f — Ruth a Moabitesa.
— Starke : Lot's daughters. The reason which
moved them was rather a groundless prejudice thau
wantonness of the flesh. (Anxiety lest the human race
should perish. It may he, also, that they were only
Lot's step-daughters, if he had married in Sodom a
widow who was the mother of two daughters). —
Cramer : Loneliness in retired places allures not
only to good, but also, and much more, to great sins
(Eccles. iv. 10). — Whoever will avoid sin must avoid
the occasions which lead to it. — [Strong drink the
fruitful source of untold degradation and sins. — A.
G.] — Gregort I. : There was a moral sense in Lot,
but it was confused and disturbed. Intoxication de-
ceived Lot, who was not deceived in Sodom ; the
flames of lust burn him, whom the flames of sulphur
did not burn. — Lcther : Some think that Lot died
soon after, from distress and sorrow, before his
daughters were delivered, because otherwise he
woiUd not have consented that names should be given
the children constnnily reniimling him of his in
cest. — He who was not deceived in Sodom, drunken-
ness deceived ; who in .Sodom, the very school of
unchastity, had lived chastely, in the cave was guilty
of incest ; suffered shipwreck in the harbor. — Ruth
a Moabitess. We may infer from Is. xi. 14 ; Jer.
xlviii. 47 ; Dan. xi. 41, that there will be, besides,
♦ [The beauty and fruitfulness of nature attracted him,
and he chose it without thinking wliether it would work
injruy to his soul. The same power now prevf^nts bin- from
earnestly heeding the salvation of his soul. Baumoartcn,
p. 213.— A. G.l
t [ " Those who have been wondrously preserved froir
temporal destruction, may shamefully fall into sin.'* Ja
eobus. — A. G '
44S GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
some conversions from the Moabites to Christ. — The
children of Ammon were characterized by similar
sins with timse of their brother Moab, and therefore
have a similar future. — Drunkenness is the way to
all bestial lusts and acts. — (Holy descendants from
polluted beds. Judg. xi. 1 ; Heb. xi. 32.)— Sihroder :
The thought tliat they sliould remain alone in case
of their father's early death was one to them very
hard to bear. Then, indeed, tliey would be entirely
helpless and without protection in the wide world.
If no husband was granted to them, they would at
least have children, sons, who could give protection
and help. — {Berl. Bibel. : The following riddle has
been constructed from the history: My father, thy
father, our children's grandfather; my husband, tlj
husband, the husband of our mother, and yet
one and the same man.) — Baumgakten : This is lua
crime of Lot's daughters, that to secure descend-
ants, and those of pure blood, they thought incest a
small otfen'"e. — Herbergeb • For one evil hour, one
must bea: the sword at his side a whole year. —
The same: Still even such children (illegitimate and
spri ging from incest) should not despair, (iod can
do great things even through the illegitimate Jephtha
(Judg. xi, 1 fl'.). True repentance makes all well
[But true repentance is never separated from triu
faith. Faith in Christ and repentance make all well.
— A.G.]
EIGHTH SECTION.
Abraham and Abimeleeh of Oerar. Jiu and Sara/i's renewed exposure throxtgh his human, eaUu-
lating prudence^ «s formerly in Egypt before Pharaoh. The Divint preservation,
Abraham's intercession for Abimeleeh,
Chapter XX. 1-18.
1 And Abraham jotimeyed from thence toward the south' country [the mid-dayl, and
dwelled between Kadesh and Sliur, and sojourned [as a Btramger even] in Gerar [lodging-piace,
2 pilgrim's rest]. And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my sister; and Abimeleeh
3 [father of the king, or father-king] king of Gerar sent and took Sarah. But God [Eiohim] came
to Abimeleeh in a dream by night, and said to him, Behold, thou art but a dead man
[thou diesi, art dead], for the woman which thou hast taken ; for she is a man's wile
4 [is married]. But Abimeleeh had not come near her : and he said, Lord, wilt thou slay
5 also a righteous nation? Said he not 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
6 hands have I done this. And God said unto him in a dream, Yea, I know that thou didst
this in the integrity of thy heart ; for I also witliheld thee from sinning against me :
7 therefore suflfered I thee not to touch her. Now therefore restore the man his wife ;
for he is a prophet,'' and he shall pray for thee, and thou shalt live : and if thou restore
8 her not, know thou that thou shalt surely die, thou and all that are thine. Therefore
Abimeleeh rose early in the morning, and called all his servants, and told all these
9 things in their ears : and tlie men were sore afraid. Then Abimeleeh called Abraham,
and said unto him. What hast thou done imto tis? and what liave I ofTended thee, that
thou hast brought on me and on my kingdom a great sin ? thou hast done deeds unto
10 me that ought not to be done. And Abimeleeh said unto Abraham, What sawe.st thou
11 [evil], that thou hast done this thing? And Abraham said. Because I thought [said],
Surely the fear of God [Eiohim] is not in this place ; and they will slay me for my wife a
12 sake. And yet indeed she is my sister; slie is the daughter of my father, but not the
13 daughter of my mother; and she became mj wife. And it came to pass when God
rElohim] caused me to wander [to go on pilgrimages; a striking plural.' The manifestations of God here and
there, caused me to go here and there, pilgrimages] from my father's house, that I said untO her,
This is thy kindness which thou .'ihalt show unto me; at every place whither we shall
14 come, say of nie. He is my brotiier. And Abimeleeh took slieep and oxen [smaU and
large cattle], and menservants, and womenservants, and gave them to Abraham, an 1 re-
15 stored him Sarah his wife. And Abimeleeh said, Behold, my land is before tlie«=
!6 [stand* open to theo] : dwell where it pleasetli thee [is good in thine eyes]. And unto Sarah he
said. Behold, I have given thy brother a thousand pieces of silver : behold he is to thee
CHAP. XX. 1-18.
t49
[for] a covering of the eyes unto all that are with thee, and with all other : ".bus she
was reproved * fset right, proved to be a wife, not unm:irriedl.
17 So Abraham prayed unto God [Elohim] : and God [Eiohim] healed Abinielech, and
18 his wife, and his maidservants; and tiiey bare children. For the Lord' had fast closed
up all the wombs of the house of Abimelech, because of Sarah, Abraham's, wife.
t' Ver. 1. — SSiH . The region south of what was afterwards called Judah. — A. G.l
[* Ver. 7.— X^nS , from X33 , to cause to bubble up as a fountain. Keil, Delitzsch, and others derive it from A root
t<3 and XD, to breathe, and thus make uabi to mean one inspired — who speaks that which is inbreathed of God. — A. Q.
(^ Ver. 13 — ^ypn is plural in punctuation, agreeing grammafically with D^n,X. Vav, however, may be regaided
u the third radical, and the verb may then really be singular. Mdrpht, p. 325. — A. G.]
[* Ver. 16.— nnD3, 2 pers. fem. sing. Niphal, an unusual form. See the Exegetical note.— A. G.]
I' Ver. 18.— Jelio'vah.— A G.l
GENERAL PRELIMINARY REMARKS.
1. The present chapter and the following ap-
pear to favor strongly the documentary hypothesis.
The cases in which the name Jehovah appear.-s (chap.
XX. 18 and xxi. 1), have, according to Delitzsch, all
the traits of explanatory additions of the complett-r.
But Knobel accepts, aside from the text of the origuial
writing (chap. xxi. 2-5), a twofold enlargement,
which should be ascribed to the Jehovistic writer,
but which he must have derived in great part from
Elohistic records designed to complete the original
record, and only in part from a completing Jeho-
vistic record (p. 180, 181). We leave the hypothesis
of different records to rest upon its own basis, but
shall enquire how far the choice in the names of God
may be explained from the text itself, and this with-
otit regara to the hypothesis in question.
2. The repetition of the fact that Abraham pro-
claims his wife to be his sister has been noticed
already. In Knobel's view, the Jehovistic writer has
recorded tlie occurrence with Sarah already (ch. lii.
11-20), because he was there an independent narra-
tor, which is not the case here. " This conjecture,"
remarks Delitzsch, " is certainly plausible if one
ascribes the Elohistic portions to a peculiar source,
but it is equally probable that the same eveut might
occur twice in the life of Abraham." Keil, on the
other hand, justly brings into prominence the great
distinction between the two histories. The tirst dif-
ficulty, viz. that Abraham, after having experienced in
Egypt tlie reproach of this deed, should here repeat
it once more, caunot be removed, if, as Delitzsch
holds, Abraham in Egypt had condemned himself to
penitence after the reproof of Pharoali ; if even he
walked under a general sense that he had done wrong,
as Delitzsch and Bauingarten state the case. [It is
not insupposible, surely, in the light of experience,
that even such a believer as Abraham should have
fallen again into the same sin: that he should have
repeated the act even when he was walking under the
sense of his wrong-doing in the first instance. — A. G.]
Our history gives us the key (v. 13) why this act was
repeated. Abraham could not make an explanation
to Pharoah, concerning the determination to pro-
Claim his wife his sister while among strangers, but
Abimelech has instilled the necessary confidence in
aim, for this confidential explanation. But if this
is the case once with the ma\im, the event might,
under possible circumstances, have often occurred
unless Jehovah had interfered to prevent this ven-
ture of an unfounded and exaggerated confidence ;
which we have already above distinguisheii from a
mere exposure of Sarah. It must be taken into
29
account, moreover, that Abraham had recently r».
ceivttd fearful impressions of the wickedness in the
world, which naturally filled him with suspicion.
The second difficulty consists in this : that Abimelech
should have found delight in taking Sarah, who was
ninety years old, into his harem. According to
Kurtz, the motive lay in her still blooming or now re-
juvenated beauty ; according to Delitzsch, he would
relate himself by marriage with the rich nomadic
prince, Abraham. Beauty and the consideration of
rank do not exclude each other; spiritual excellence
and greatness have often an almost magical effect.
But it is to be observed that here it is not said that
the beauty of Sarah was reported to Abimilech. He
knew only, it may be, that there was a sister of
Abraham in his tent, and brought her to himself.
3. We are here told again that Abraham broke
up his tent, and journeyed thence towards the south —
the land towards the mid-day (ch. xii. 9 ; xiii. 1).
According to ch. xiii. 18, he had a permanent abode
at Hebron ; but here he removes from Hebron to the
south. This is to be explained upon the ground that,
for the northern parts of Canaan, the south designates
prei-'minently the land of Judah; but for the land of
.ludah, thus for Hebron itself, it denotes the parts
towards Arabia Petrea, Egypt, and the western shore
upon the Mediterranean. The southern section of
Canaan (which was assigned to the tribes of Judah,
Simeon, and Benjamin) falls into four distinct parts,
through the character of the couutry. The mountains
(inn) or highlands form the central part, upon
whose westerly slopes lies a hilly country which
gradually sinks to the plain (nbsil"), while towards
the east the desert (i2"7^) falls ofl' into the valley
of the Jordan and the Dead Sea, but towards the
south, the mid-day land (a;3.. Josh. xy. 21 ; com-
pare above ch. xii. 9 ; xiii. 1 ) tonus, in several distinctly
marked teri-aces, a kind of first step to the mountains,
from the Petrean peninsula. (See Geioss, in Stud,
und Krit. 1848, p. 1080.) Here Abraham descends to
the stretch of country between Kadesh and Shur,
and remained a long time about Gerar, whose ruina
have been recently discovered by Rowland, under tlie
name Khirbet-el-Gerar, about three hours south-
easterly from Gaza, in the neighborhood of a deep
and broad wady, which takes the name D.-churf-cI-
Gerar." Delitzsch. Robinson sought Gerar in vain,
see ScHRooER, p. 382. " Eusebius and Jerome loc.ite
the place about twenty-five Roman miles south from
Kleutheropolis, and Sozomen relates that there stood
here, very near by a winter stream, a great and re-
nowned convent. The name of Marcian, bishop of
(ierai (pi'rha|is in the conveut), appears among tb«
150
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Bubscribers in the Council of Chalcedon in the year
451." "Gerar, upon the way from Gaza to Elusa,
removed aljout three hours from the tirst-nauied
place." BuD.'^eii. The mo3t southerly of the five
cities of the Philistines was not far from Beersheba.
The king of Gerar, Abimelech, had his territory in
the lands of the Philistines, according to ch. xxi. 33.
In ch. xxvi. 1, he is named directly as a king of the
Philistines. According to Bertheau, the reference to
the Philistines ia an anticipation, and Delitzsch also
finds in ch. xxvi. traces of a later hand, though not
recognizing therein an actual anticipation. If n'i|3B
denotes the land of wanderers, or of strangers (Ge-
seniusl, the name denotes those who came from the
coasts into the interior, in distinction from the earlier
Canaanites, and the mquiry whether the later PhiMs-
tines, of the times of the Judges and Kings, are here
meant, is a matter by itself; in any case, the text
here intimates that the later confederate cities of the
Philistines did not yet exist. Hitzig and Ewald also
concede Philistine emigrations into Canaan, or tradi-
tions of them, before Moses. Kuobel's view, that
Abraham may have left Hebron from a similar
anxiety with that which led Lot (to leave Zoar), is
arbitrary in the highest degree, since Abraham was
in covenant with tlie mightier men in Hebron. Ac-
cording to Keil, he went probably to find better
pastures. In any case the pasture-ground must be
changed from time to time, but this could be done
through a ivider range, as we learn from the history
of Joseph and Moses. The neighborhood of the
scene of the terrible judgment upon Sodom, in con-
nection with other unknown motives, may have
determined him to change his residence. The birth
of Isaac (ch. xxi.) and the offering of Isaac (ch. xxii.)
occur during his residence in the further soutli : but
then he dwelt (ch. xxiii. 1) again in Hebron, although
his return thither from Beersheba, where he had last
dwelt (cli. xxi. 33), is not recorded.
4. l^nce, from the promise which was given to
Abraham in the oak-grove of Mamre, to the birth of
Isaac, we must reckon, according to ch. xviii,, about
a year, Abraham must have drawn southwards very
soon after the overthrow of Sodom, and the meeting
with Abimelech must also have taken place at an
early date. But if vers. 17, 18 seem to point tg a
louger time, this creates no real difficulty, since the
sickness of the house of Abimelech may have
lasted a long time after Sarah was restored. More-
over, our history illustrates, in two respects, what
may introduce the further history of the birth
of Isaac. First, we see that Sarah was not faded in
her appearance, although according to the usual sup-
position her body was dead. Tlien we see how her
usual relation to Abraham could be aniirmted and
Btrengthened by a new affection resulting directly
through the exposure and disturbance to which it
had been subjected.
EXEGETICAi AND CRITICAL.
1 Abraliam'9 settlement in the Souths ejtpecialti/
tk Oerar. AhimelechU error, uiiaI the eidmoitUioti
0/ Ood (vers. 1-7). — Beti^een Kadesh and Shiir.
— Kadesh, sec ch. xiv. 7 ; Slmr, ch. xvi. 7. We
must distinguish between this dwelling-place and the
peculiar sojovim in Gerar. Schkuder: *' Leaving his
herds and servants behind him in this region, he
bimself repairs to Gerar." — Abimelech (Father
King, or my Father King). A standing title for tin
kings of Gerar, as Pharoah was in Egypt and Mel
chizedec, or .\donizedec, in Salem (see Ps. xxxiv. \ )
the king the father of the land. — God (Elohiml
came to Abimelech. — Itis presupposed that Abime
lech had the knowledge of the true God ; he could not
have known him as Jehovah. — In a dream by
eight. — Knobel finds in this feature, as in similar
cases, that these communications are not in accord
'ance with the Elohistic writer. But the supposition
is entirely arbitrary. The prophetic dream of the
night is generally closely connected with the moral
reflections and longings of the day. It is in full
agreement with the nature of dreams, that the com-
munication should be made in several, not in one
single act (see Gen. xxxvii. and xli. ; Matt, ii).—
She is a man's wife (married). — Literally, ruled
by a ruler, or her lord. His sin was thus marked as
an infringement of the married rights of a stranger.
The anxious dream appears to have been introduced
through the sickness impending over him (see v. ]7).*
— Wilt thou slay also a righteous nation? —
Delitzsch refers the C5 directly to the adjective right-
eous. A nation liowever righteous, i.e., although it
is righteous. But why then does he use the term
people or nation ? Knobel thinks that the fate of the
Sodomites was floating in his mind. In this way tlu.'t
chapter is, through a delicate psychological feature,
connected with the preceding. Abimelech is conscious
of iimocence as to his subjective state. He assumes
the right to possess a harem or to live in polygamy,
and the right of princes to bring into their harem
any unmarried persons of their territory. He is con-
scious of a pure heart, and asserts that liis hands aie
pure, since Abraham and Sarah, through their own
declarations, had rendered it impossible that he should
have any intention to interfere with the rights of
another. She is my sister. [These incident.s show
the truth and the need of Scripture ; — its truth, be
cause it does not represent the patriarchs as exempt
from human infirmities ; the need of it, because the
best of men were not able to make for themselves
even a correct standard of moral duty (and how
much less of faith) without Scripture. Wordsworth,
p. 91. — A. G.] — And God said unto him in a
dream. — The transaction contiimes in a new and
more quiet dream. God recognizes tlie apology as
essentially vaUd, and reveals to him how and why he
had kept him from touching the wife of a prophet.
With this he points out to him the cause of his sick-
ness. The command to restore the woman was en-
forced by a threatening. Although he was guiltless
as to his subjective state, it is a reproach to him that
he acted blindly, and betrayed himsell' into the danger,
either of depriving a prophet of his wife, or rather
ol' being punished by God with death. [That Abim-
elech thought himself innocent, did this, as he says,
in the ^aS'-P integrity of his heart, may be ex-
plained from his moral and religious standpoint
But that God recognizes his deed as .sucli, and stil
says to him tliat he can only live throMah the inter-
ces.sion of Abraham, thus that his sin was one woilhy
of death, proves that God regards him as one who
was fitted to have, and ought to have, deeper moral
views and piety. This is intimated in the change of
the names of tiod in the narrative, and noticed in th«
• (The term, however, may mean, dead a«t« urigrenv
which is rendered probable by ver. 17. God healea Abim»
lech. Jacobus.— A. G.l
CHAP. XX. 1-18.
15;
text Keil, p. lt>8. — A.G.] That is to aay, the
spirit of ■■<. higher moral stamlpoiut comes to him iii
his dream, and opens to him not only the cause of
his sickness, but also that divine preservation secured
by the sickness, as well as his duty and the d^inger
of death in wliich he was still moving. With this he
receives au enlargement of his religious knowledge.
" At tirst c-'nbs (without the article) the Godhead in
a general sense appears to him (ver. 3) : but Abime-
lech recognizes in the appearance the Lord "'J"'!?.,
upon which tlie narrator introduces OTl'bsn the
personal and true God, as speaking to him (ver. 6.)
— For he is a prophet. — The spirit of prophecy
had been present from the beginning in the Scripture,
but here the name prophet occuis for the tirst time.
How could this aggravate the error of Abimelech,
that Abraham, whose rights he ignorautly had vio-
lated, was a prophet ? Knobel explains that the sin
of violating the rights of the chosen of God, which
he had in idea committed, was a sin against God
liimself. Since every sin is a sin against God himself,
it must still be asked, how far this shows the danger
of greater guilt y for the text cannot be explained
under the idea of a partiality ot God for Abraham.
But Abimelech held Abraham and Sarah as the ordi-
nary nomads of his time, and thought theretore that
he could blindly lay his liands upon them ; he thus
resisted the dim impression, which they must have
made upon him, of a higher calling and aim. A
prophet should be received m the name of a prophet ;
the sin against the divine in the prophet was a sin
igainst the divine in his own conscience, and thus in
I special sense a sin against tiod. — And he shall
pray for thee. — Abraham had already appeared as
I royal warlike hero, in his conflict with the Eastern
iings. We have learned to recogiuze him as a priest,
especially in his intercessory prayer for Sodom :
here he appears preeminently as a prophet. But
here intercession appears as the most obvious func-
tion ol the prophet.* The attributes of the prophet
and the priest are thus still inwardly united in one,
as this mdeed is evident from the altars he erected.
2. jf7ie atonement uf Abiinelceli (vers. S-Itj). —
And called all his servants (courtiers). — It
marks the frank, open character of this God-fearing
king, that lie humbles himsell by communicating the
events of the night, before his courtiers. It was
humbling in the lirst place to confess tliat, in spirit-
ual blindness, he had made a dangerous mistake,
and secotidly that he must restore to the stranger his
wite. It speaks well also for his household and his
court, that the effect of his reverence communicates
itself to his servants. — Then Abimelech called
Abraham. — He addresses him before his people, for
Abraham had not only brought him into danger, but
also his household and kmgdoui. He had reason to
complain of the conduct of Abraham, as I'haraoh
before hun (ch. xii.;. He \i thus also evidently a
bold, heioic character, who does not shrink Iroiii
declaring against Abraham his injured sense of truth
and justice, although he must have regarded him
as under the special protection of God. lie does
not belong to tiie kmgs who oppose the priests in
slavish bigotry. — What hast thou done to us ? —
Done til us. Thus he values the unity in which he
feels tirat he is bound with his liouseliold and jieople.
But he reproaches him especially with this : that he
aid brought him into danger c f bringing gnit
* iSee Jer. xxvii. 18, referred to by Bujsh.— A. G.]
upon himself and his ptople. This, he sa\ !, is iic
moial. But since he takes up again the words
What have I offended thee? and ask.s. What
hast tliou seen? he utters in a discreet 'orin,
which concedes the possibility that lie might hav«
ignorantly occasioned the wrong of Abraham, liii
consciousness that he had himself indeed given no
occasion for this deceitful course. Keil atid Knobel
explain the words what hast thou seen ? what
hast thou in thy eye, what purpose ? DKt.iTZSCH
(with a reference to Fs. xxxvii. 37 : Ixvi. l^): **It
is preferable to take the word in its usual sense
through all time : what evil hast thou seen in me
or in us, that thou believest us capable of greater
evil '!'' — Abraham said, because I thought (said).
— He assumes the antecedent ; I acted thus, becauae
he is ashamed. The two grounds of apology Ibllow.
The first runs : Because I spake (thought or con-
sidered it with myself and with Sarah). [This use of
the word Tniss is fully illustrated by Bush, who
refers to E.\. ii. 14 ; 1 Kings v. 5 ; I's. xiv. 1. — A. G.]
— Surely the fear of God is not in this place. —
This S|)ecial motive has its explanation in tlie fact
that he had so recently seen the destruction of
Sodom. The fear of men which had determined him
so to act in Egypt, was awakened afresh by this de-
struction. But he palliates the offence of this declara-
tion by his second excuse. He explains at first that
what he had said was not untrue, since Sarah, as his
half-sister, was his sister; and then why, in his mi-
gration li-om Haran, he had arranged with Sarah that
she should journey with liim from place to place under
the name of his sister. [Some suppose that Saiah is
the saiLie with Iscah, xi. 2;). Bush holds that Terah
had two wives: the one the mother of Uarau, the
father of Sarah .and Lot; the other the mother of
Abraham. — A. G.] The suppi essed feehng of an end-
less, difficult pilgrimage, and of a very dangerous'
situation, reveals itself clearly in the expressions of
vers. 13, 14. He cannot yet speak to Abimelech of
Jehovah, his covenant God. Still less was it neces-
sary that he shotdd reveal to him that Jehovah had
promised Canaan to him. Thus he says : at the
command of God I entered upon my wamJerings.
He speaks of his theocratic journeys as wanderings,
says Elohitn instead of Haelohim, uses this noun
with the plural of the verbs, that he may make him-
self understood by Abimelech. " This use of the
substantive with the plural verbs is found tin the
Pentateuch only in this author, ch. xxxv. 7 ; Ex. xxiL
8; XXX. 4,8; Josh. xxiv. 19. Gksenius, § MB, 2;
EwALii, g 318 a,)" Knobel. Keil finds in the words
of Abraham, especially in the plural of tlie verb, a
certain accommodation to the polytheistic standpoint
of the Pliilistine king. Delitzsch, on the other hand,
remarks, that the plural connection of Elohim is
found in passages which exclude any idea of accommo-
dation, 01- of any polytheistic reference ; by which
he refutes ^it the same time the explanation of Schel-
ling, that the GoAs of the house of Terah are to
be understood by Elohim. Under the expression
'[Sm C'n'SX [The verb here is not necessarily
plural. But if it be, it is only an instance of the
literal meaning of Elohim, the eternal, .supernatural
powers, coming into view. Mcrpht, p. 328. — A. G.j
we understand the fact, expressed with some reser
vation, that Hai lohim, through a pluraHty of special
niaiiifestations of God, which he received here and
there, had caused him to move from place to plac''
and thus, although in the extremest danger which hit
152
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
wanderings could occasion, extended hia providence
over him still. When, on the contrary, Abimelech
(ch. xxvi. 28) calls God Jehovah, Delitzsch supposes
{p. 103), but without certainty, that it is the same
person, and besides overloolvS the diS'erence of time,
in which a longer intercourse may have made the
Philistines laniiliar with tlie -\brahamic ideas. — And
Abimelech took sheep and oxen. — He is satis-
fied, and acts analogously to the conduct of Pliaraoh
(ch. xii.), iti that he makes Abraham rich presents
of the ancient nomadic goods. The departure of
"Abraham fiom Egypt also seems to find its echo
. here. He appears to utter a modest wislt that Abra-
ham would leave Gerar. [This seems a forced inter-
pretation of the words. — .\.G.J Still he may dwell
in his territory where it pleases him. — And to Sarah
he said. — " The thousand pieces of silver, i. e., tlie
thousand shekels of silver, are not a peculiar present
made to Sarah, but the estimated worth of the pres-
ent (ver, 14), and designate it as something impor-
tant." Knobel. So also Keil. Delitzsch, with others,
distinguishes a special present in money, " a truly
royal present, since thirty shekels was the piice of a
slave (Ex. xxi. 32)." (A thousand shekels of silver
after the sliekel of the sanctuary would be about 550
dollars ; according to the ordinary shekel, less. It
is not certain which is intended here.) The first
interpretation is preferable, as otherwise the second
present must have been made to Sarah. — Behold,
be is to thee (or that shall be to thee) a cover-
ing of the eyes. — This difficult place admits of
different explanations. Vitringa ; "If the words are
referred to Abraham, the idea seems to be : .\braham,
if he professes to be the husband of Sarah, would be in-
stead of a veil to those who, looking upon Sarah more
mtensely, may be inflamed with love for her. (Thus
Ewald; so Delitzsch, p. 404.) We prefer, however,
to refer the words to the money received by Abra-
ham. As if he says, let this money, paid as a fiue
to Abraham, prevent any from desiring thee as I
have done. He alludes to the veil usually worn by
women. See ch. xxiv. 65." Gesenjus: "This is
an expiatory present to thee, for all that has happened
to thee, and to .\bram, and she was convinced (of
her fault)." Knobel similarly, but still with less fit-
ness, and at the conclusion, " thou ait adjudged, i. e.,
justice is done to thee." Delitzsch and Keil : " This
is to thee an atoning present, lor all who are with
thee (since the whole family is disgraced in the mis-
tress, etc.)" "It is to be explained," says Knobel,
"after "'JB "53 to cover one's face, so that he may
forget the wrong done (ch. xxxii. 21), D^asuj iJS nS3
to cover the face of the judge, so that he shall not
see the right." ilichaelis, Baumgarten, and others,
explain the word> to mean a present for the purchase
of a veil which she sliould wear in the future.
[.VIURi'HT urgis against this that the proper word tor
ved ia "■'rs. "the covering of the eyes is a figura-
tive phrase for- a recompense or pacificatory offering,
in consideration of which an oft'ence is overlooked."
And so also .Jacobus. — \. G.] Since Sarah wore no
veil in Egypt, but the custom of veiling the face
quickly with the mantle soon alter appears in the
history of Kebekah (ch. x.\iv. i;.=i), tins thonglit seems
qnite probable. But one would then expect a special
present to Sarah, besides the one to Abraham. De-
litzsch remarks, "this would be bitter imny." lint
the irony in tin' expression, I have given (lii/ hrtillier.
cannot, however, be denied. The b3-p:<" al.so
•grees well with this tlioucht. Besides, it must be
considered th.it Abimelech had to relieve himself ol
his displeasure as well against Sarah as againsi
Abraham. And what then could this mean, "tha'
shall be to thee an atoning present, and foi- all witk
thee," leaving out of view that here the conjunctiv«
T is wanting '! As a covering of the eyes, designed
to make good his error in her eyes, the great prescnJ
would excite rather only contempt. The atonement
belongs truly to the violai ed rights of the husband ;
Sarah, who had constantly declared that he was her
brother, even when prudent calculation became impru-
dent temerity, had well deserved that she also should
siifler a reproof Still Abimelech appears to define
it as a covering of the eyes only in a figurative sense ;
in the sense of the Vulgate ; hoc erii tibi in velamcA
oculoruni ad omnen qui tecum sinty et guocungue perp'
exeris; vumenioque te deprehensam." Since Sarah
wore no veil, which designated her as the wile of a
husband (see ch. xxiv. 6; 1 Cor. xi. 10), so the pres-
ent of Abimelech, wherewith he expiates his lault,
has the eflect of such a veil ; it should for all, and
everywhere, be a testimony that she is a married
woman. As such shoiUd she now be held every-
where, in consequence of his present. With Clericus,
therefore, we find here a designed double sense or
meaning ; a covering of the eyes as an atonenieTii^
which should^ at the same time, have the effect of a
veil. " nnDiai can only be the second person
feminine perf. Niph., although the daghesh lene is
wanting in n (Gesenihs, § 28, 4, and g 65, 2), for to
hold this form for a participle is scarcely possible."
etc.f Keil : Since this word may be rendered ad-
judged as well asjuMfied, we take it in a nuddle sense,
and as designedly having a twofold meaning : con-
vinced, placed right. This last word does not belong
to the writer, but to Abimelech himself. With the
pride of injured magnanimity, he declares that he,
through his atoidng present, would provide her with
a veil, and designate her as a married woman. For
the veil, see Winer.
3. Abraham'' s intercession {^ev^.\'J,\^). "After
this compensation Abraham intercedes (ver. 17), and
God removes the sickness from Abimelech and hia
women. The author does not define the sickness
more closely (as in ch. xii. 17 ) ; according to ver. 6 it
was such a sickness as suppressed desire Compare
the plague of the Plnlistines ( i Sam. v. 6-9 ; xii. 6, 4,
etc.)" Knobel. — And God healed Abimelech,
and his wife, and his maidservants Thus
Abimelech was not only afHicted with some sexual
disease, but indirectly, through his inability, his wife
also, i. e., his wile in a peculiar sense, the queen ; and
his maid-servants, that is, his concubines (see Keil).
Yl'hey bare means that they were again capable of
procreating children. The verb is mascuhne, because
both males and females were involved in this judicial
malady. MtTRPHY, p. 320. — A. G.] [This is clear also,
siuce the malady was sent to preserve the purity of
Sarah. Abimelech was not suH'cred to touch Ler,
see ver. 6. — A. G.J Ver. 18 contains the explana-
tion -For the Lord (Jehovah) had fast closed
up. — [It is .lehovah who delivers Abraham, and pre-
* [Wordswortli sup^ONtB all three senses— that of -» t**
puiatiun ; of a provision ff r tlic purcljase of a veil ; and ol
an ullutiion to the usage of covering a bride with a veil, p
9i.-A. U.|
t [If, witli Baumgarten, and according to the aceeiit£,w«
coniieet the b3"nX^ with the iaf<t word, the ?onse can oulj
lie: and nil this has bi en done or given that thou mayeu
he liuliled or ledresstd. l). 220. So also Mui-phy.— A. G.l
CHAP. XX. 1-18
45:^
•erves the purity of Sarah, the mother of Isaac the
promised seed. Wordswoeth, p. 93. Who urges
also the use of the uamcs of God in the chapter,
against the fragmentary h\-j)othesi3, with great foi ce.
— A. G.] Here the providence of Elohim is traced to
the motives of Jehovah, the Covenant God of Abra-
ham, who would protect his chosen. They were
closed up ; i. e., not as Knobel thinlcs, they could
could not bring to the birth, but the whole house-
hold of Abimelech was unfruitful in consequence of
his sickness. [The term here used for maid-servants,
niriBX, denotes those held as concubines, and is to
be distinguished from pinBlSJ, servants. See 1 .Sam.
xsv. 41. Keil, p. 170.— A.'g.] This fearful fact for
an ancient household was remarkable here, because
the state remained after the free return of Sarah, until
Abraham enters with his intercession. But this in-
troduces the circumstance that he had interceded for
Sarah also.
DOCTKHf Al AND ETHICAI,.
1. See the preUminary remarks and the exi-
gctical paragraphs. The preceding history is the
history of sins " crying to heaven." The history
of Abraham in Gerar is a history of unconscious sins,
concealed faults in the life of most excellent men, of
the father of the faithful, and of a noble heathen kmg.
2. The first meeting between the house of Abra-
ham and the PhiUstines. It serves to illustrate the
fact, that the knowledge of God among the Philis-
tines has sunken lower and lower in the lapse of time,
while it has been more and more completely developed
among the theocratic people.
3. Abraham in Gerar, in a certain measure, a
coimterpart to Lot in the caves. Lot fears the pres-
ence of men ; Abraham appears to have sought a
wider mtercourse. Both fall into folly and sin, after
the experience of the great judgment upon Sodom.
The reaction from a state of great spiritual excite-
ment reveals itself even in Abraham.
4. The repetition of the old saying of Abraham,
is a proof that he, in his faith, thought himself justi-
fied in using it. We must take into account also,
that Sarah also was his sister in the faith, and that
she had accustomed herself, m her painful sense of
her unfruitfulness, to style themselves brother and
sister.
5. Abimelech's dream. In the night sleep, the
spirit of revelation comes nearer to the heathen, as is
shown also in the dreams of Pharaoh and .Nebuchad-
nezzar. It is a medium of revelation also for children
(Joseph, in the old covenant), and for laboreis with
the hand (Joseph, in the new covenant); and the
prophetic disposition, enduring into the night or
extending itself through its hours (Isaac, Jacob,
Pan]}, lloreover, Pharaoh's butler and baker (eh.
xL 8); the Midianites (Judges vii. 13-15); the wife
of Pilate (Matt, xxvii. 19, compare Wisdom xviii. 17
-19), had significant dreams.
6. Abimelech's innocence and guilt. The moral
itandpoint of tradition, in its relation to the higher
Btandpoint. Traditional morality and the morality of
conscience. The rehgious susceptibility of Abimelech.
7. Abrahau) a prophet. There are different views
^ to the derivation of this word. A derivation from
(he Arabic, analogous form, explams the word to
Uean the bringer of knowledge, the foreteller or pre-
iiftor (see Delitzsch, p. 634 ; a communication of
Fleischer). The derivation from the Uebiew!<33,
ebullire, appears to us nearer at hand, and corr&
spouds better with the idea of the prophet In th»
reference of the word to the Niph., Redslob explaiug
it in a passive sense, what is poured forth ; W. New.
nianu and Holemann, actively pouring forth, speaking.
If we regard the Niph. as both pa-ssive and refiexive,
then the prophet is a man who, because he has received
communications poured into himself, pours forth
One who is a fountain. But the pouiing forth desig
nates more than the simple speaking. It is the
utterance of that which is new, in the inspired, out-
pouring form ; analogous to the out-pouring of a
fountain, which is ever pouring out new, fiesh water.
The prophet pours forth that wliich is new, both in
words and deeds ; the miraculous words of prophecy
and the miraculous deeds of tyiiical import. The de-
rivation which DeUtzsch proposes from s: = HE , riB ,
to breathe, the inspired, appears to be sought from
dogmatic motives. Abraham was a prophet in the
most general sense ; the organ of the divine revela-
tion, seer of the future. He was a propliet, priest,
and king in one person, but preeminently a prophet.
And here God brings out distinctly his prophetic
dignity, because he is in this especially commended
as the friend of God, the object of his protecting care,
with whose injuryAbimelech's sickness was connected,
and by whose intercession he could be healed. The
peculiar order of the prophets, introduced through
the prophetic schools of Samuel, was formed after
the order of priests, and then the order of kings were
severed from tlie general class or order of prophets.
8. Abimelech's character and his atonement.
Thiough his noble and pious conduct he wins a
friend in Abraham (ch. xxi. 22 ff.)
9. Abraham's intercession, a claim of his faith in
the promise. His intercession for Abimelech and
Gerar, a counterpart to his intercession for Sodom.
The intercession of Abraham for Abimelech, his
house, and kingdom, in comparison with his inter-
cession for Sodom.
10 Abraham has, through his fear, and the pru-
dential means which his fear bade him to use, twice
directly brought about the very thing which he feared,
the taking away of his wife, and perhaps would have
incurred his death, either the first or second time,
if God had not interfered. How fear first truly makes
that actual which it seeks to hinder in ungodly ways,
the history of Joseph's brethren, who sold him that
he might not rise above them ; the conduct of Pha-
raoh towards Israel, which brings him and his hosts
to destruction in the Red .Sea; Saul's determination
against David ; but above all, the history of the
crucifixion of Christ on the part of the Jewish San-
hedrim prove still more perfectly. How this same
fact appears In proverbs, under various forms, e. g.,
in the saving of (Edipus, is well known.
1 1 . The Philistines (see the Bible Dictionaries).
Their first appearance in sacred history makes a
favourable impression ; Abimelech knows, or learns
to know, the only true God. Later, the Philistine*
appear sunken in idolatry.
HOMTLETICAI, ANT PRACTIOAIi.
Any homiletic use of this chapter presuppose!
horailetic wisdom. Themes : Abraham in the repe-
tition of his fall. — Abraham and .\bimelech.— Abra-
ham's character : reverent humility, moral pride.—
454
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Abraham, the believer, in his weakness, exalted
ibove the man of the world, in his strength. [The
exaltation, however, a matter of pure grace. — A.G.]
First Section. — Abraham's and Abimelech's error
(vers. 1-7) Abraham's reaction after his high spiritual
experiences. — The repetition of his old fault. 1.
'auses : Recent experience of the corruption of the
world, false prudence, exaggerated confidence, the
brotherly relation to Sarah, the tolerable issue of the
case ill Egypt. 2. Natural results : Anxiety and
danger, shame before a heathen's princely court.
3. Gracious issue through the interference of God.'—
How self-will rushes into the danger which, with false
plans, it seeks to avoid. — How the behever endangers
the promise ot God, and how it is wonderfully guard-
ed through the grace of God. — Abimelech's integrity
the point of union for the gracious providence of God.
— The author of sacred marriage is also its protector.
—The care of God for Sarah a care for the world.
Starke : Now Abraham, in his human weakness,
tempts God in his providence anew. — (Ver. 4.
The Holy Spirit marks this doubtless, lest any one
should say that Isaac was the son of Abimelech.)
(Although God is a lover of life, yet still, according
to his punitive righteousness, there may be ascribed
to him, as here, a destruction, consumption, etc.) —
God suffers his saints to fall into folly and sin, that
it may be clear how little they are able to do right
by themselves. — Cramer ; God preserves the sacred
marriage state. — Osiander : Subjects are often pun-
ished on account of the trans;;ressions of their rulers.
— Ver. 6. A simple and not evilly intended plan, even
in a bad cause, il it proceeds from inconsideration,
or from ignorant zeal, is described by this word
simplicity, in Holy Scripture (2 Sam. xv. 11, etc.)^
Ver. 6. God hinders men from committing sin in
many ways. — God searches the heart, and knows
what is done in integrity and what in pretence. — •
Calwer, Handbuch : Ver. 2. As there (in Egypt)
80 here, Abraham reaches the directly opposite
point from that which he intended. Sarah was
taken away, just because he said, she is my sister. —
ScHRcinER: (V. Herbehger.) Ver. 1. Abraham will
avoid the cross, (?) but he passes from the smoke
into the flame, from the mud into the mire. There
are in foreign lands misfortunes and adversities as
well as where he has lived hitherto. Ah ! Lord, help
us, tliat we may sit quietly in our little space ; the
dear cross dwells yet nowhere, as everywhere, i. e.,
wherever we are. — His sin appears greater here
than at the first offence ; he stands no loijger as then
(In Egypt), at the beginning of the divine leadings.
After so many and such great experiences of God's
faithfulness, stiU such unfaithfulness to him. (?) —
(Galvin.) All those who will not, as is becoming,
trust themselve'* to the providence of God, shall win
like fruits of unbelief — Ver. 2. It is to be considered
that an extraordinary beauty is ascribed to Sarah ;
then also, that notwithstanding her ninety years, she
is in the first half of human life at that period of the
world. — Luthkr: Ver. 3. It is impossible that a
man wlio believi's in the promises of God, should be
forsaken. — God would suffer the heavens to fall,
rather than forsake his believing people. — Thus God
ihowB how displeasing adultery is to him. — Ver. 6.
Abimelech has sinneil nevertheless, tlicrefore God
by no meam* concedes to him " purity of hands," as
the " integrity of heart." — Passavant : An old oak
which loses a bough or twig, has not, therefore,
• [How thankful fbr the Intarferenoe of Ood,— A. 0.)
lost its ciuwu. — Pharaoh and Abimele<.'j. Ver. 4
Many a king who is called christian, has done wha'
these two kings did, and even worse, and his peoplt
have necessarily suffered for it in various ways befora
his crumbling throne ; in a thousand offences, sins,
sorrows, etc. Kings may learn what the sins of
princes are before God, and the people also may learn
to hate and deplore the evil which descends from the
upper ranks. — The prosperity of the family depends
upon the marriage state, and the welfare of society
upon that of the family, and upon the society turnt
the good of the state. — Ver. 6. It is a great grace
when God guards any one from sinning, either agninsi
their fellows or against God. — Thou knowestnothow
often God has kept thee and me (Ps. cv. 14, 15 •
Zach. ii. 8 1. — Schwexke : The Scriptures do not de-
scribe a saint in Abraham, but a man, who, although
so good, is yet a sinner like ourselves, but who through
faith was justified before God, and what he did as he
went from step to step in the narrow path of faith
stands recorded, that we with him might enter the
school of faith.
Second Section. — Abraham's confusion and shame,
and Abimelech's atonement. — (Vers. 8-16). The
castigatory speech of the heathen to the father of
the faithful. — Ver. 11. The judgment of faith con-
cerning the world ought not to be a prejudice. — The
danger of life in Abraham's pilgrimage an apology
for his swerving to his own way. — Ver. 8. The zeal
of Abimelech in the removing and expiating of his
fault. — His noble and pious integrity : 1. In the ex-
pression of his fear of God ; 2. of his injured moral
feeling ; 3. his readiness to make his error good. —
Ver. 9. Abimelech knew that his royal sins fell upon
his household and kingdom, as a burden and as guilt.
Starke : ver. 9. It is to the praise of this heathen
king, who, however, was not without some fear and
knowledge of God, that he held a breach of the mar-
riage law to be so great a sin that the whole land
could be punished. — Ver. 10. Osi.\NnF.R : It is well
with a pious ruler and a pious father of the household,
since they warn and keep their own in the fear of
God. — The praise of niildness and gentleness. —
Lutber: The saints were gently punished and for
their good. — Bibl. Tiib. Ver. 9. We should amend
our past faults without delay. — ScHRonER: (Ldther)
He who was before a king (Abimelech) is now a
bishop who spreads among his subjects the fear and
knowledge of God, so that they also should learn to
fear God and honor his word. Here indeed the
Sodomites, and those who dwelt in Gerar, are held
inbroadcontrast.— Ver. 12. (Musculus: Concerning
Sarah as the sister of Abraham : recognize here the
type of Christ and the Church. The Church is the
sister and the bride of Christ; sister through God
the Father, bride through the mystery of the incar-
nation, and the truth of his espousal, etc.) — Ver. 15.
While the Egyptian invites Abraham in a compliment-
ary way out of his land, the Plulisline says. Behold
my land is before thee.--(CALViN): This distinction ii
due to the fact that the severely punished Pharoah
experienced only fear, so that the presence of Abra-
ham was intolerable. Abimelech, on tlie other band,
was, with the terror, at the same time comforted.—
Passatant: Ver. U. Christians' excuses are often-
times worse than their faults. — But Abraham is the
father of the faithful ; God sees in liim Isaac, the son
of promise, conceived, bom, reared in faith, etc. ; he
sees in him Jacob his servant, etc., Moses, Aaron,
Joshuii, but above all that one of the seed of David,
Gal. ill 16.— The forefather bore already in hiinsel/
CHAP. XXI. 1-34.
45!
that seed of faith upon the Son of God from which
should bloom the new hosts of saints and righteous
of the old and new covenant, as tlie dew drops from
the womb of the morning (Ps. ex.). — Schwenke:
Thus the Lord knows how to make good what has
been complicated, and ^adange.'cd through human
prudence.
Third Section. — A^ranam's intercession, the
healing of Abimelech and his household. (Vers. 17,
18). Abraham beheves still in the efficacy of inter-
cession, although Sodom was destroyed notwith-
standing his intercessory prayer. — The connection
of intercession, with the receptivity of those to whom
it relates. — Abraham as an intercessor for Sodom and
for Gerar. — The heaUng of Abimelech an illustration
of salvation, and leading to it. — Starke: A beautiful
exchange between the worldly and spiritual state.
That bestows gold and possessions, this recompensef
with the knowledge of God and prayer. — Osianher
If God punishes this king with such serious earnest
ness and severity, who ignorantly had taken anothe*
man's wife, how will tliey escape who knowingly and
deliberately defame and dishonor other men's wivej
and daughters? — Schroder: (Calvin.) Abrahai7>
arms and disarms the hand of God at the same tinoe
— (Roos): Thus God does not forsake his own in
their need, although there are not wanting faults OD
their side. — (Val. Hebberger: We know how to
make what is good evil, since we are masters there,
but how to make good again what is evil, that is the
work of God.) — Because Abraham and Sarah should
laugh, they must first weep sound repentance. The
martyr-week ever precedes the Easter-week with
Christians.
NINTH SECTION.
The birth of Itaae. IshmaePa expulsion. The Covenant of peace with Abimelech at Beer-tluba.
Chapter XXI. 1-34.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
B
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
And the Lord visited Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did unto Sarah as he
had spoken. For Sarah conceived, and bare Abraham a son in his old age, at the set
time of which God [Eiohim] had spoken to him. And Abraham called the name of his
son that was born unto him, whom Sarah bare to him, Isaac [jitzhak; hcoronewill laugh].
And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac, being eight days old [at the eighth day], as God
[Eiohim] had commanded him. And Abraham was an hundred years old when his son
Isaac was born unto him.
And Sarah said, God [Eiohim] hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh
with me. And she said. Who would have said unto Abraham, that Sarah should have
given children suck? for I have borne him a son in his old age. And the child grew
and was weaned : and Abraham made a great feast the same day that Isaac was weaned.
And Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Eg_yptian, which she had borne unto Abraham,
mocking. Wherefore she said unto Abraham, Cast out this bondwoman and her son .
for the son of this bondwoman shall not be heir with my son, even with Isaac. And
the thing was very grievous in Abraham's sight, because of his son.
And God said unto Abraham, Let it not be grievous in thy sight, because of the
lad, and becaiise of thy bondwoman ; in all that Sarah hath said unto thee, hearken
unto her voice; for in Isaac shall thy seed [thy descendants] be called.' And also of the
son of the bondwoman will I make a nation, because he is thy seed. And Abraham
rose up early in the morning, and took bread, and a bottle of water, and gave it unto
Hagar, putting it on her shoulder, and [took with her] the child, and sent her away : and
she departed, and wandered in the wilderness of Beer-sheba [seven wells; weU of the oath].
And the water was spent in the bottle, and she cast the child under one of the shrubs.
And she went, and sat her down over against him a good way oSJ as it ivere a bow-
shot [distant] : for she said. Let me not see the death of the child. And she sat over
against him, and lifted up her voice and wept. And God [Eiohim] heard the voice of
the lad; and the angel of God" [Eiohim] called to Hagar out of heaven, and said unto
her, What aileth thee, Hagar? fear not; for God [Eiohim] hath heard the voice of the
lad where he is. Arise, lift up the lad, and hold iiim in thine hand ; for I will make
him a great nation. And God opened lier eyes, and she saw a well of water ; and she
went, and filled the bottle with water, and gave the lad drink. And God was with the
lad ; and he grew, and dwelt in the wilderness, and became an [mighty] archer. And
456
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
he dwelt in the wilderness of Paran [Oesenius : prob. a region abounding in caTeniB] : and hii
mother tooi\ hiui a wife out of the land of Egypt.
22 And it came to pass at that time, that Abimelech and Pbichol [moutbofaii; i.e., oom-
mimding all] the cliief Captain of his host [general] spake unto Abraham, saying, God
23 [EloMm] is with thee in all that thou doest : Now therefore swear unto me here by Goo
[Eiohim] that thou wilt not deal falsely [injure deceitfully] with me, nor with my son, nor
with ray son's son : but [rather] according to the kindness [truth] that I have done untd
24 thee, thou shalt do unto me, and to the land wherein thou hast sojourned. And Abraham
25 said, I will swear. And Abraham reproved Abimelech [brought a charge against him] bi-
cause [inthecaee] of a well of water, which Abimelech's servants had violently taken
26 away. And Abimelech said, I wot not [have not known] who hath done this thing ;
27 neither didst thou tell me, neither yet heard I of it but to-day. And Abraham took
sheep and oxen, and gave them unto Abimelech ; and both of them made a covenant
28 29 And Abraham set [still] seven ewe-lambs of the flock by themselves. And Abime
lech said unto Abraham, What 7nean tliese seven ewe-lambs, which thou hast set by
30 themselves? And he said, For these seven ewe-lambs shalt thou take of my hand,
31 that they may be a witness unto me that I have digged tliis well. Wherefore he
32 called that place Beer-sheba ; because there they sware both of them. Thus they made
a covenant at Beer-sheba : then Abimelech rose up, and Phichol the chief captain of hia
host, and they returned into the land of the Philistines.
33 And Abraham planted a grove [Tamarisk, tree] in Beer-sheba, and called there on the
34 name of the Lord, the everlasting God. And Abraham sojourned in the Philistines'
land many days.
[' Ver. 12.— In Isaac shall seed be called to thee.— A* G.]
I* Ver. 17.— Not mn-i "sblS , as in ch. xvi. 7.— A. G.]
GENERAL PRELIMrNAET REMARKS.
1. Delitzsch holds (" not led astray by ch. xxi. 1 ")
that ch. xxi. 1-21, forms the fourth Elohistic
part of the third section of the life of Abraham.
The first part (vers. 1-8, of ch. xxi.) goes back to ch.
xvii., unfolds itself with a clear reference to it, and
forms one whole with it. The second verse here refers
toch. xvii. 21. According to Knobel on the contrary,
only ch. xxi. 2-5, belong to the original writing ; tlie
rest consistsofJehovistic enlargements, out of records
which, at the m»st, may possibly be Elohistic. Since
Delitzsch describes ch. xx. also as Elohistic, It is
plain that he must assume diflerent Elohistic sources.
But out of this assumption the whole arbitrary
and artificial hypothesis may be developed. There
mtist certainly be some internal reason for the change
of the names in the first and second verses. That
the name Elohim should be used in the history of
the expulsion of Ishmael, and of the covenant of
Abraham with Abimelech requires no explanation ;
Abimelech does not know Jehovah ; Ishmael walks
undei- the general providence of God. The reason
lies in the fact that in ver. 2 there is a reference
to ch. xvii. 21, while ver. 1 refers to ch. xviii.
14. So likewise it is with the circumcision of Isaac,
which Elohim commanded (ver. 4); it embraces
in Isaac both Esau and Jacob. Sarali also (ver. 6 ),
refers the name of I.saac to the arrangement of
Elohim ; since every one in the world (existing imder
Elohim), would recognize Is^iac as a miraculously
g T2n child — awakening laughter and joy.*
* [" 'I'he birth of Isaac is the first result of the covenant,
tnd trie first Btep toward itw goal. As itu the germ of the
future devflopmi-ii*, and looks to the greater than Isaac — the
New Testjtmerit 8oii of Tromise- so it is the practical and
personal pledge on God's part, that the salvation of the world
•linll be acooiDplUhed." Jaoobus.— A. G.]
2. It is questionable whether we should refer ver.
8 to what precedes, or what follows. Delitzsch fa-
vors the first connection, Knobel and Keil the last.
They suppose that the feast at the weaning of Isaac
gave occasion for the expulsion of Ishmael. But
this is not certain, and were it even certain, ver. 8
could, notwithstanding, belong to the conclusion of
the historv of the childhood of Isaac.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL.
1. haac's birth, circumcision, and the feaU at hit
weaning. — (Vers. 1-S). — And the Lord (Jehovah)
visited ["The Sept. has tVeo-xEiJ/aTo, a word
adopted by St. Luke in two places in the song of
Zacharias (Luke i. 68-78), who thus intimates the
coimection between the birth of Isaac and the birth
of the promised seed." Wordsworth p. 93. He
refers also to the connection of the song of the bles
sed virgin with these exultant and thankful woids of
Sarah. See also(ien. xvii. 17-10 ; I.ukeii,21; John
viii. 66 ; and Luke i. 44—17. — A. G.] Sarah. — ipB
to come to, to visit, to visit with the purpose of aiding,
of saving, or with the design to punish, marking the
great tran.sititms in the providence of God ; an idea
ruiming thronijhout the Scriptures (ch. 1. 24 ; Ex. iii.
10), to express which, according to Knobel, the
Elohist uses "3T (ch. viii. 1 ; xix. 29 ; xxx. 20) ;
where, however, in the two first cases, the ideas are
widely different. The pregnancy of Sarah is traced
back to .lehovah, since the conception of Isaac is a
fiuit of faith, i. c, of that c<innection of the sexes,
on the pan of both parents, animated and sanctified
thrnugli Ikitli. — As he had said (ch. xviii. 14). — As
God had said to him (eh. xvii. 21). — [These e.\.
pressions have an exegctical value, not only ai
CHAP. XXI. 1-84.
451
showing the divine faithfulness, and the develop-
ment of his plan, but as showing also how the
different parts of this book are inwoven together,
and thus prove its unity. — A. G.] — As God had
commanded him (ch. xvii. 12). — It is assumed,
according to the announcements previously made,
that the son should here receive the name Isaac.
God had given him this name already, before liis
birth (ch. xvii. 19 ; comp. .Ki.'i. 11). The special cause
of this name lies in the laughing of Aljraham (cb.
ivii.) whose darker echo is heard in the laugh of
Sarah (ch. xviii.), and the laughter of the people at
this singular birth, of which Sarah speaks further
here. The one thread running through all these
various laughs is the apparently incredible nature
of the event. Knobel, therefore, holds, without suf-
ficient ground, that these are " different attempts to
exjjlain the origin of the name." — An hundred
years old (see ch. xvii. 24). — And Sarah said,
God hath made me to laugh, — Delitzsch signal-
izes the poetical form of the two sentences of Sarah.
" They are joyful cries, tlie first a distich, the second
in three lines. Hence also the term b^^ instead of
la'n. Sarah, without doubt, goes back to the divine
giving of the name, which the laughing of Abraham
had occasioned. But tlien also, she glances at her
own laughing, which is now followed by another and
better laugh, even the joyful cry of a thankful faith.
That laugh arose from her unbelief, this Jehovah has
givcL to her as the fruit of her faith. But she rjmst
explain still further, and that not without a certain
feehng of shame." (Delitzsch, comp. ch. xviii. 12.)
— All that hear will laugh with me. — [■'O with
the perfect has the sense of the conjunctive. Keil,
p. 172. — A. G.] — i.e., with astonishment at the mi-
raculously given child. — A great feast Starke :
"The Hebrews, and other eastern nations, named
their feasts from the drinks (nnCB), as if more
regard was paid to the drinks than to the food."
But as the joy over Isaac, in respect to the promise
given in him, was directed more to the spiritual than
the bodily, so also without doubt this feast was
arranged with reference to the same thing. — And
the child grew. — Knobel and Keil refer the eighth
verse to the following section. " Ishmael," Keil
remarks, '' mocked at the feast held at the weaning
of Isaac."* Knobel; he had made sport. But it
is hardly probable that Ishmael had thus made sport
Dr mocked on one occasion only. " The weaning of
the child was often delayed, sometimes after three
(2 Macc.vii. 27; Mcnqo Park's " Travels," p. 237), and
even after four years, (Kussel : "Natural History of
Aleppo," I. p. 427). [" The weaning from the mother's
breast was the first step to the indepemlent existence
of the child" (Baumgarten), and hence gave occasion
for the profane wit and mocking of Ishmael, in wtiich
there was. as Keil remarks, ■uiiu'lif!. envy, and
pride. — A. G.] It was observed in Abraham, as
also to day in the lands of the east, .is ■< family feast.
Schroder ; " The Koran fixes iwi vears, at least,
as the period of nursing children.'
2. The expulsion of hhtnael (vert,, y-21), — And
Sarah saw the son of Hagar — It is not said that
this happened at tlie feast upon the weaning of Isaac.
The dift'erent explanations of pnso . The first ex-
planation : The word describes one making sport, as
* 'Kurtz s:iys that Ishmael laughed at the contrast be-
tween the promises and corresponding hopes ceutricg in
tiaac aud the weak nunling, p. 201 — A O. ]
ch. xix. 14; Ishmael appears as a plavful lad, leap
ing and dancing around, who thus excited the envj
of Sarah. Thus Knobel, after Aben Ezra, Ilgen
Gesenius, Tuch. The Septuagint and Vulgate iutro
duce so much into the text : " playing with Isaac."
Since Ishmael was fourteen years of age at the birth
of Isaac, and now about sixteen to seventeen, Sarah
must certainly have seen him playing with Isaai
much earlier, with jealousy, if his playfulness genei
ally could indeed have excited her jealousy. But if
Ishmael, at the feast-day of Isaac, was extravagantly
joyful, he thus gave an assurance of his good-will
towards her son, the heir of the house. Hence the
second explanation ; The word describes the act of
scoffing, mockery. Keil and others, after Kimchi,
Vatabl, Piscat, Grot, against which Knobel objects
that the word in question was never used of mock-
ing. " Still less," he adds, " are we to think of '
persecution of Isaac (Gal. iv. 29 ; Rosenm. ; Del.)
or of a controversy about the inheritance (the ok
Jewish interpret.), or of an idolatrous service (Jona-
than, Jarchi)." Delitzsch explains ; " Ishmael, at
the feast of the weaning of the child, made sport of
the son of his father instead of sharing the joy of
the household." But the text certainly says only
that Sarah made the observation that he was a jest-
ing, mocking youth. But since the pn^O follows ac
directly upon pns"; , so we may certainly conjecture
that the word is here uged to denote that he mim-
icked Isaac, jeered at him, or he ridiculed Isaac
[He does not laugh, but makes himself sportive
derides. This little feeble Isaac a father of nations !
Hengstenberg : Beitrage, ii. p. 276. Kurtz urges
well in favor of the stronger meaning of the word,
the force of the Pihel and the fact that the conduct
of Ishmael so described was made the reason by
Sarah for her demand that the son of the bondwoman
should be driven out, p. 202. — A. G.] Leaving this
out of view, the observation of Sarah was certainly
the observation of a development of character. Ish-
mael developed a characteristic trait of jealousy, and
such persons pass easily, even without any inclina-
tion, to mockery. It is probable that this reviling
conduct appeared in some striking way at the feast
of the weaning of Isaac, although this cannot be in-
ferred with certainty from the text. "The Rabbins
feign here a controversy between the children, about
the descent of Isaac from Abimelech, about the inher-
itance, and the like." Schroder. Sarah does not regard
him directly as a pretender, claiming the rights of
primogeniture, but as one unworthy tj be heir with
her son. Even later, the moral earnestness and the
sense and love of truth in the heir of the promise,
are wanting in the talking and fiction-loving .Arab.
But tradition has added to this feature, his hand is
against every man, and thus has formed the explana-
tion, that he persecuted Isaac with his jests and
Scott's, a tradition which Paul could use in his alle-
gorical explanation. [The apostle does far more
than merely use a Jewish tradition. He appears to
allude to the use made of this history by the prophet
Isaiah (ch. liv.), and in his explanation of the alle
gory states that the conduct of Ishmael towards
Isaac was a type of the conduct of the self-righteous
Jews towards those who were trusting in Clhrist alont
for righteousness, or who were believers. This
mocking, therefore, was the persecution of him who
was born Kara adpna. against him who was bom Kard
iriivuia. In this view, the word can only mean the
UD relieving, envious sport and derision of this youth,
458
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
proud of his more fleshly preeminence, as Keil and
Heiigstenberg hold. He was thus, obviously, in
heart separated from the household of faith. — A G.]
The passages, liowever, which Delitzsch quotes (ch.
xxxix. 14 and Ezek. xxiii. 32) for the meaning of
^ns , to scoff, must not be overlooked. In her es-
timate of character, Sarah was far superior to Abra-
ham, as Kcliekah was also superior to Isaac in judg-
ment in reference to her two sons. — Cast out * this
bondwoman and her son. — Knobel thinks that
according to ch. xxv. 6 the Elohist has not admitted
into tlie record any such expulsion. The unmerciful
severity towards his own son and his mother, docs
not agree well with the character of Abraham, and
it is doubtful, therefore, whether we are dealing here
with a Uteral fact. But this is a mere human arbi-
trariness, in which the lofty, piu'e motive, remains
unappreciated. [There is underlying all these ob-
jections of Knobel and others who sympathize with
him, a false hermeneutical principle, viz., that we
must interpret and explain the word by what we
conceive to have been the moral state and feelings
of these historical personages. — A. G ] The word
of Sarah was displeasing to Abraham also. It is
not the Angel of the Lord, but God as Elohim, who
confirms the judgment of Sarah. For the exclusion
of Ishmael was requisite not only to the prosperity
of I.saac and the line of the promise, but to the wel-
fare of Ishmael himself. — For in Isaac shall thy
seed be called (see ch. xvii. 19). — There are three
explanations of these words : 1. After Isaac shall thy
seed be named (Hofmaim). But Delitzsch reminds
us that the people of the promise are only once called
Isaac (Amos vii. 9). 2. In Isaac shall thy seed be
called into existence (Drechsler) ; better, 3. In Isaac
shall the people which is, and is called (Is. xli. 8)
the pecuUar seed of Abraham, have its point of de-
parture (Bleek, Delitzsch). — And eilso of the son
of the bondTVomau (comp. ch. xvii. 20; xvi. 12).
— And Abraham rose up early in the morning.
— He did not yield to the will of Sarah, but indeed
to the command of God which, as it seems, came to
him in a revelation by night. This decided, perfect,
prompt cheerfulness, proves that he would, at the
coninjand of God, sacrifice Isaac also (ch. xxii. 3). —
And took bread and a bottle of water. — The
narrative passes over the provision of Hagar with
the simple requisites for her journey ; with the bread
it may be thought (ch. xxv. 6) that there was in-
cluded a provision with money for a longer time.
lie had doulitless made known to his household the
revelation of the night, so that Sarah might not Ijc
elated nor Hagar dei)ressed. — And the child. — •
[He was now about sixteen or seventeen — a youth.
"Boys were often married at this age." Ishjuael
was soon after married. This must be borne in mind
in our estimate of" the command given to Abraham.
— A. 'i.] According to the .Septuagint, Tuch, and
others, the author places the burden upon the hoy
»lso ; [The i conjunctive makes it necessary that tlic
"■^^n '^'5" should be connected with the principal
Tcrb np'^. Kkil, p. 172. — A. G.] but this does not
follow fioni the text. Knobel correctly recalls to
view that Islunacl was at this time at least sixteen
Tears oid. Delitzsch, on the contrary, understands
the passage in the first instance thus : Abraham
* iBuBh miggestB that it is uomo legal divoroe which iB
Dtended. The Iteb. word has that moaning, Beu livv.jLxi.
t, 11 ; xiil 13 J I». Ivii. 20,— A. O.]
placed Isaac [Ishmael ? — A. G.] al lo upon the bad
of Hagar ; and speaks of inconsisteicics and contra,
dictions in the context ; but then, he himself destroy!
this interpretation in a casual side remaik. The
Vulgate also here corrects the Septuagint. — She de-
parted and wandered. — In the first case she found
the way easily, for her fiiglit was voluntary, but iu
this case she is quickly lost, no doubt because of the
extreme agitation of her mind on account of li«r
sudden dismissal. Luther has admirably shown
these inward causes for her wandering. — In the wil«
demess of Beersheba. — Southerly from Beersheba
(see vcr. 33), bordering upon the desert El Tih. —
And the water \raa spent in the bottle. — This
was the special necessary of life for those passing
through the desert. The boy began to faint from
thirst. — And she cast the child. — The words here
have certainly the appearance as if spoken of a little
child. But a wearied boy of sixteen years, unac-
quainted with the straits of the desert, would natu
rally be to the anxious mother like a little child.
The expression, she cast liim, is an expression that,
with a feeling of despair, or of renunciation, she
suddenly laid down the wearied one, whom she had
suppoi-ted and drawn along with her, as if she had
prayed that he might die, and then hastened away
with the feeling that she had sacrificed her child.
A whole group of the beautiful traits of a mother's
love appear here ; she lays her child under the pro-
tecting shadow of a bush ; she hastens away ; she
seats herself over against him at the distance of a
bowshot, because she will not see him die, and yet
cannot leave him, and there weeps aloud. Thus also
Ishmael must be offered up, as Isaac was somewhat
later But through this necessity he was conse-
crated, with his future race, to be the son and king
of the desert. And now Hagar must discover the
oasis, which is also a condition of" life ("or the sons
of the desert. — As it ■were a bowshot. — Just as
the stone's throw in Luke xxi. 41. — And God
heard the voice of the lad. — The weeping of the
mother and the child forms one voice, which thb
narrative assumes. It is a groundless particularism
when it is said Ishmael was heard becavise he was
the son of .\braham. — And the Angel of God.*—
As Jehovah himself is Elohim for Ishmai'l, so thf
jVngcl of the Lord (Jehovah) also is for him the
Augcl of (lod. There is no word here of a peculiai
angelic appearance, f,ji' Hagar only /miirx the call of
t/ie Anyel from heaven. But the call of the Ang'j
was then completed by the work of God when h;
opened her eyes. Since she suffei'S on account of
the p ople of revelation, the angel of revelation here
also, as in her flight, ch. xvi., prolects and resc'^e^-
her. — "What aileth thee, Hagar ? Fear not -
Her heart grows firm and strong again under the
revelation from above. — And hold him in t'.an«
hand. — Jerome infers admirably from this cxpres
sion as to the sense of the former passage, " from
which it is manifest that he who is held could not
have been a burden upon his mother, but he' coni-
paidon." — For I will make him a grnat nation.
— A repetition of" the earlier promise in cb xvi. He
thcielore caiuiot die. — I will make ;Jin. — It is
only the Angd of Elohim, who is Eloh'/a, who can
thus speak. — And she saw a well of water. — A
* [Tlic angel of lillohim, not Jehovah, bf jauso lehioapl,
since the divinely ordained removal from thw house of Al)ra-'
ham, pttsHes fi-om tinder the protection of the covenant Ood^
to that of tho leading and providence of God, the ru'dr of al
nutiona. Kejl, p. 173.— A. G.]
CHAP. XXI. 1-34.
45S
living fountain, not merely a cistern. The cisterns
were covered, and only discoverable by signs which
were known only to tho.-e who were entrusted with
the secret. Some have conjectured that Ilagar now
discovered these marks of a cistern. But it is a
well in the peculiar sense which is here spoken of. —
And gave the lad drink Ishniael is saved, and
now grows up as the consecrated son of the desert.
— And became an archer. — The how was the
means of his livelihood in the desmt. " Some of the
lahmaelitish tribes, e. g., the Kedai'cnes and Itureans
(ch. XXV. 13-15), distinguish themselves through this
weapon." Kuobel. For the twofold signification
naS, see Delitzsch, p. 410.* — And he dwelt in
the ■wilderness of Parzin. — Ishinaid is already in
the way from Palestine to Arabia. The wilderness
of Paran is the present great desert El Tib. It runs
from tlie southern border of Palestitie, especially
from the desert of Beersheba, begmning witli the
desert of Sin, between Palestine and Egypt, south-
easterly down to the northern part of the Sinaitic
peninsula, where it is limited by the mountains of
Paran [Robinson and Coleman think it embraces the
whole great desert, and this supposition best meets
the various notices of this desert in the Scriptures. —
A. G.] (See the article in the "Bible Dictionary for
Christian People.") — A wife out of the land of
Egypt. — Hagar takes a wife for her son from her
own home. Thus the heathen element at once re-
ceives additional strength. The Ishmaelite Arabs
are thus, as to their natural origin, sprung from a
twofold mingling of Hebrew and Egyptian blood ; of
an ideal and contented disposition, inwoven with a
recluse, dream-like, and gloomy view of the world.
3. 77ie coveiia7it between Abraham and Abiinelech
(vers. 22-34). — And Abimelech spake unto Abra-
ham.— Abimelech, i. e., father of the king, or father-
.iing, the king my father, the title of the kings at
Geiar; Phiohol, i. e., the mouth of all, probably
also a title of the highest oBicer of the kings at
Gerar. The proposition of Abimelech to Abraham
to make a covenant with him rests upon a deep feel-
ing of the blessing which Abraham had in commun-
ion with God, and upon a strong presentiment that
ill the future he would be a dangerous power to the
inhabitants of Canaan. It is to this man's praise
« that he does not seek in a criminal way to free him-
self from his anxiety, as Pharaoh in his hostility to
the Israelites in Egypt, or as Saul in his hostility lo
David, but in the direct, frank, honest way of a cove-
nant. Abimelech has indeed no presentiment how
far the hopes of Abraham for the future go beyond
his anxieties. The willingness, however, of Abra-
ham to enter into the covenant, is a proof that he
had no hopes for the personal possession of Canaan.
As a prudent prmce, Abimelech meets hiin in the
company of his ciiiet" captain, who might make an
impression of his power upon Abraham, although he
addresses his appeal chiefly to his generosity and
gratitude. He appeals to the faithfulness whicli he
had shown him, and desires only that he should not
be injured by Abraham either in his person or in his
descendants. But Abraham distinguishes clearly
between political and private rights, and now it is for
aim to administer rebukes.f — And he reproved
• [Baiimgarten renders a hero an archer ; and refers for
va analogy to the phrase nbara rriSJ , p. 223.— A. G.l
t [Murphy renders Kin and 'Kith to represent ilie He-
<r*m "ns; ':*'3 , p. 334.— a. g 1
Abimelech because of a well of vrater (see ch
xiii. 7 ; xxvi. 15 ; the great value of wells in Canaan)
— But the ingenuous prince in part throws back tht
reproach upon him : Abraham had not spoken of th«
matter until to-day, and he had known nothing of it
He is ready, therefore, to make restitution, and now
(bllows the making of the covenant. — Sheep and
oxen. — The usual covenant presents (Is. xxx. 6;
xxxix. 1 ; 1 Kings xv. 19). — Seven ewe lambs Ol
the flock AUIiough the well belonged to him, he
secures again in the most solemn way its possession,
through the execution of the covenant, since a gift
which one of the contracting parlies receives from
the other binds him more strictly to its stipnlatsone
(Ewald: " Antiquities," p. 18). — Beersheba It i9
a question, in the first place, how the name is to be
explained, and then, what relation this well, in its
derivation, sustains to the wells of Beersheba (ch.
xxvi. 32). Knobel asserts that the author explains
Beersheba through oath of the wells, since he takea
sat" for nsna'C) , oath ; but literally the word can
only signify seven wells. Keil, on the other hand,
asserts that the sense of the passage is this : that the
wells take their name from the seven Iambs with
whose gift Abraham sealed his possession. When
we recollect that in the name of Isaac differently
related titles were united, we shall not press the an-
tithesis between the seven wells and the wells of the
oath. The form designates it as the seven wells, but
the seven really marks it as the well of the oath.
'■saiD5,they sware, literally they confirmed by
seven, not because three, the number of the deity,
is united in the oath with four, the number of the
world (Leopold Schmidt, and this expo.'-ition is un-
deniably suggestive), but on account of the sacied-
ness of the number seven, which has its ground and
origin in the number seven of the creation (which,
however, may be divided into the three and the
four) ; they chose seven things for the confirmation
of the oath, as Herodotus, among others, testifies of
the Arabians (ch. iii. 8)." Keil. According to Kno-
hel, the narrative of tlie name Beersheba (ch. xxvi.
30) is only another tradition concerning the origin of
the same name. " But Kobinson," Delitzsch replies,
" after a Ions time the first explorer of the southern
region of Palestine, found upon tlie borders of the
desert two deep wells, with clear, excellent water."*
These wells are called £ir ea Seba^ seven wells ; after
the erroneous explanation of the Bedouins, the well
of the lion. According to Robinson, Beersheba
lay near by the bed of a wide watercourse running
towards the coast, called Wadv cs Scba (Rob. " Pal."
i. p. 300). — And he planted a grove (tamarisk),
— " Probably the Tamarix Africaria^ common in
Egypt, Petrea, and Palestine ; not a collection (com-
pare with this tamarisk of Abraham, that in Gibeah,
1 Sam. xxii. 6, and that in Jabesh, 1 Sam. xxxi. 13)."
Delitzsch. "They were accustomed to plant the
tamarisks as garden trees, which grew to a remark-
able height and furnished a wide shade." [Calvin
remarks that the planting of the trees indicates thai
Abraham enjoyed more of quiet and rest after the
covenant was made than he had done before. — A. G.\
Michaelis. The tamarisli, with its la-'ting wood ana
evergreen foliage, was an emblem of the eternity of
God, whom he declared, or as Keil expresses it, of
* [There are thus, in fact, two wells, from which the dtj
might have been named, and from which it was named, ao»
cording to the two accounts or testimc'ios in Genesis. D*
UTZBCH, p. 296.— A. G 1
160
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
the eternally enduring grace of the true God of the
Covenant. But it is questionable whether Abraham,
the great antagonist of all that is traditional in
mythology, overthrowing the symbolism of nature,
would make such an exception here. We must then
«lso suppose that his preaching of Jehoviih, the eter-
nal God, Ijoth preceded and followed the planting of
the tamarisk. Knobel thinks it is clear that a remark-
ible tamarisk stood there, which one then traced back
to Abraham. As a planter of the tamarisk, .\braham
appears a prophet of civilization, as in his proclaim-
ing of the eternal God (the STJ3 with beih is always
more definite than simply to call upon ; it designates
also the act of proclaiming) he is the prophet of the
faith (the cultus). — The name cbis 5X appears to be
used here as a peculiar explanation of mn"', and
thus to justify the translation of this name by the
words, the eternal. But Abraham had earlier (ch.
xiv. 2-_') designated Jeliovah as El Eljon, then recog-
nized him (ch. xvii. 1) as El Shaddai. It follows
from this that Jehovah revealed himself to him under
various aspects, whose defiuitious form a parallel to
the universal name Elohim. The God of the highest
majesty who gave him victory over the kings of the
East, the God of miraculous power who bestows
upon him his son Isaac, now reveals himself in his
divine covenant-truth, over against his temporary
covenant with Abimelech, as the eternal God. And
the tamarisk might well signify this also, that the
hope of his seed for Canaan should remain green until
the most distant future, uninjured by his temporary
covenant with Abimelech, which he will hold sacred.
— Abraham sojourned in the land of the Phil-
istines.— .Vbraham evidently remained a longer time
at Beershcba, and thi.^, togethei- with his residence at
Gerar, is described as a sojourn in the land of the
Philistines. But how then could it be said before,
that Abimelech and his chief captain turned back
from Beershcba to the land of the Pliilistines ? Keil
solves the apparent difficulty with the remark, the
land of the Philistines had at that time no fixed
bounds towards the wilderness ; Beersheba did not
belong to Gerar, the kingdom of Abimelech in the
narrower sense. — Many days. — These many days
during which he sojourned in the land of the Philis-
tines, form a contrast to the name of the eternal
God, who had promised Canaan to him
DOCTEINAI, AND ETHICAL.
1. Sarah's \isitation a type of the visitation of
Mary, notwithstanding the great distinction between
them. The visitation lies in the extraordinary and
wonderful personal grace, to which an immeasurable
general human salvation is closely joined. But with
Sarah this visitaticm occurs very late in life, and after
long waiting ; with Mary it was entirely unexpected.
Sarah's body is dead ; Mary had not known a hus-
band. The son of Sarah is himself only a typo of
the son of Mary. But with both women the richest
promise of heaven is limited through one particular
woman on the earth, a conception in faiih, an ap-
parently imp<iHsible, but yet actual human birth;
both arc illustrious instances of the destination of
tbe female race, (jf the imporlanee of the wife, the
mother, for the kingdom of <>od. Both become il-
ustrious since they freely subjected themselves to
this destination, since they yielded their sons in the
futr.re, th» sons of promise, or in the son of proir-
ise ; for Isaac has all his importance as a type of
Christ, and Christ the son of man is the manifesta
tion of the eternal Son. — The visitation of J^arah wai
that which Jehovah h»d promised a year belbre. He
visits the believer with the word of promise, and
visits hiiu again with the word of fulfihnent, Abra-
ham must have waited five and twenty years for the
promise, Sarah only one year.
2. Isaac: he will laugh, or one will laugh (se
ch. xvii. 19). The believer laughs at the last.
3. The sons of old age and miraculously-give»
children : the sons of Noah, Isaac, Joseph (ch. xxxvii.
■i), Benjamin (ch. xliv. 20), Samuel, John the Bap
tist, and Christ.
4. The little song of Sarah, the sacred joyful
word of the mother over Isaac. The first cradle
hymn.
5. The feast of the weaning of Isaac. " The
announcement, the birth, the weaning of the child. —
All this furnishes matter for manifold joy and laugh-
ter ; pn2£" , i. e., the laugher, the fulness of joy in
his name. Our Lord reveals the profoundest source
of this joy when he says (John viii. 5(i), Abraham
your father rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it,
and was glad. Since Sarah, the wife of one, became
the mother of Isaac, she became the mother of Is-
rael (Is. li. 2; Mai. ii. 16; Ezek. xxxiii. 24), and
since she is the mother of Israel, the ancestress, and,
in some sense, the mother of Jesus Christ, who de-
rives his flesh and l)lood from Isaac, out of Israel,
and in whom Abraham is a blessmg to all the na-
tions, the birthday of Isaac, spiritually viewed, thus
becomes the door or entrance of the day of Christ,
and the day of Christ the background of the birth-
day of ls.aac." Delitzsch. Calvin dwells especially
upon the circumstance that Sarah nursed her child.
" Whom he counts worthy of the honor of being
a mother he at the same time makes nurse; and
those who feel themselves burdened tiirough the
nursing of their chihlren, rend, as far as in them lies,
the sacred bonds of nature, unless weakness, or
some intii'miiies, form their excuse." It is remark-
able that a century after the Genevan Calvin, the
Genevan Rousseau should again hold up the sacred-
ness of this law of nature, that mothers should nurse
their own children, against the unnatural custom at
his time of using wet-nurses, although, indeed, he
hiniself had fundamentally no right to plead it.
6. The whole context confirms the Hebrew tradi-
tion, which finds in the jests of Ishmael the kindred
idea of mockery, and upon this rests the confirma-
tion of the allegorical explanation of Paul (Gal. iv. ;
comp. " Biblework " on G.al. iv. 22-30). [The apos-
tle, however, does not say that the history was designed
to be typical, but had been used and may be used to
illustiate the truth he was discussing. — A. G.] [Ish-
mael mocked the child of piomise, the faith of his
parents, and therefore the word and puriiose ol' God.
His mocking was the outward expression of his un-
belief, as the joy of his parents, which gave rise to
the feast, was of their faith. It thus reveals his
character as unworthy and incapable of sharing in
the blessing, which then, as now, was secured only
by fdth. Hence, like Esau, Saul, the carnal Juda-
izera of the apostle's day, all who trust in them-
selves rather than in the promise, he was cast out.-
A. G.]
7. Female tact and accuracy in the estimate ol
youthful character. Sarah. Ucbekah. Sarah's in
tcrfcrence with the order of Abraham's houseliol'
CHAP. XXI. 1-34.
16
jannot be without sin, but in this case she meets and
responds to the theocratic thought. This fact is re-
peated in a stronger form in the position of Rebt'kah
over against tliat of Isaac, since she secures to .lacob
the right of the first-born. Both fathers must have
their prejudices in I'avor of the rights of the natural
first-born corrected by the presaging, far-seeing
mothers.
8. Abraham rose up early in the morning, espe-
cially wlien a command of the Lord is to be fulfilled
or a sacrifice is to be l)rought (ch. xxii).
9. Tlie exnul-ion of Hagar. Since Ishmael had
grown to nearly sixteen years of age in the house
of Sarah, her proposal cannot be explained upon
motives of human jealousy. The text shows how
painful the n)easure was to Abraham. But the man
of faith who should later offer up Isaac, must now
be able to ofler Ishmael also. He dismisses hirn,
however, in the light of the promise, that his expul-
sion confirmed his promotion to be the head of a
great nation, and because the purpose of God in
reference to Isaac could only become actual through
this separation. The separation of Lot from .\hra-
ham, of Ishmael from Isaac, of Esau from Jacob,
proceeds later in the separation of the ten tribes
from Judah, and finally in the excision of the unbe-
lieving Jewish population from the election (Rom.
X. ; Gal. iv.). These separations are continued even
in the Christian Church. In the New-Covenant,
moreover, the Jews for the most part have been ex-
cluded as Ishmael, while many Ishmaelites on the
contrary have been made heirs of the faith of Abra-
ham. The Queen of Sheba perhaps adheres more
faithfully to wisdom than Solomon.
10. The moral beauty of Hagar in the desert, in
her mother-love and in her confidence in God. Ha-
gar in the desert an impetishable pattern of true
maternal love.
11. The straits of the desert the consecration of
the sons of the desert. The terrible desert, through
the wonderful help of God, the wells, and oases of
God, became a dear home to him. There is no
doubt, also, that after he had learned thoroughly by
experience that he was not a fellow-heir with Isaac,
be was richly endowed by Abraham (ch. xxv. 6),
and also remained in friendly relations with Isaac
• (ch. xxv. 9).
12. .^bimelech's presentiment of Abraham's fu-
ture greatness, and his prudent care for the security
of his kingdom in his own person and in his descend-
ants. The cliildren of Israel did not attack the land
of the Philistines until the Philistines had destroyed
every recollection of the old covenant relations.
Abmielech ever prudent, honest, and noble. The
significance of the covenant of peace between the
father of the faithful and a heathen prince (comp.
" Covenant of Abraham," ch. xiv.).
13. Abraham gives to Abimelech upon his de-
sire the oath of the covenant, as he had earlier
sworn to the king of Sodom. " I will swear," the
eign of the condescension of the believer, in the re-
lations and necessities of human society. Beaiing
Mnon the doctrine of the oath.
14. Abraham learns the character of Jehovah in
% living experience of faith, according to his varied
tevelations, and with this experience the knowledge
of the attributes of God rises into prominence. As
Elohim proves himself to be Jehovah to him. so Je-
hovah again proves himself to be Elohim in a higher
tense. God the Exalted is the Coven.ant God for
him; God the Almif^^ty performs wonciers fo: him ;
God the Eternal busies himself for him in the eterna
truth of the Covenant.
1 5. Abraham calls upon and proclaims the nam<
of tlie Lord. The one is in truth not to be sepa-
rated from the other. The living prayer must vield
its fruit in the declaration, the living declaration must
have its root in prayer. The faith of Abraham in
Jehovah develops itself into a faith in the eternal
truth of his covenant, and in the ever green ana
vigorous life of the promise. f"He calls upon th«
name of the Lord with the significant .surname of the
God of perpetuity, the eternal, unchangeable God.
This marks him as the mre uml able performer of
his promise, as the everlasting vindicator of the faith
of treaties, and as the infallible source of the believ-
er's rest and peace." Murphy. — A. G.] For th«
tamarisk (see Dictionaries of the Bible) and for th«
meaning of the desert of Beersheba and the city of
tbe same name (see Concordances).
16. Abraham, Samson, and David, in the land of
the Philistines. Alternate friendships and hostilitiea
Abraham at first gains in South-Canaan a well, then
a grave (ch. xxiii.). Both were signs of his inherit
ing the land at some future time.
17. Beersheba, honored and sanctified through
the long residence of Abraham and Isaac. This city
marking the southern limits of Israel in contrast
witli the city of Dan as a northern limit was, later,
also profaned through an idolatrous service (.\mo?
V. 6 ; viii. 14).
18. Passavant dwells upon the glory of the Ara
bians in Spain for seven centuries. " Indeed, they
still, to-day, from the wide and broad desert, ever
weep over the forsaken, crushed clods of that heroic
land." But what has Roman fanaticism made of the
land of Spain ? He says again: "Arabia has also
its treasures, its spice.s, and ointments, herds of noble
animals, sweet, noble fruits, but it is not a Canaan,
and its sons, coursing, racing, plundering, find in its
wild freedom an uncertain inheritance." " Gal. iv. 29
is fulfilled especially in the history of Mohammed."
19. Upon the covenant of Abraham and Abime-
lech, Passavant quotes the words. Blessed aie the
peace-makers. Sehwenke represents Abimelech as
a self-righteous person, but without sufficient reason
HOMILETICAI, AND PRACTICAi.
See the doctrinal paragraphs. — The connection
between Isaac's birth and Ishmael's expulsion. — The
joyful feast in Abraham's house. — Haear's necessity ;
Hagar's purification and glorification. — Abraham'c
second meeting with Abimelech. — .\braham at Beer
sheba, or the connection between civilization and the
cultus in Abraham's Ufe. An example for Christian
missions.
1. Ig^iac's birth {vev. 1-8). Ver. 1. In the prov-
idence of God we first experience that he himself
visits us. that he gives us hiin.self; then that he
visits us with his deeds of salvation " Noble natures
regard what they are as one with what they do." It
is true of God above all others, that we come to
know him in his gifts, and his gifts in his visitation.
— The section affords appropriate texts for baptismal
discourses. Starke: tbe repeiiuon {as he had spoken,
of which /le had spoken) lias the utmost emphasis.
The promises of God must at last pass into fitlfil-
ment, even when all hope has been lost by men. Hi«
proniLses are yea and amen. — Luther: " Mosei
abounds in words, and repeats his words twice, ii
102
GENESIS, OR TUE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
irder to bring before our minds the unutterable joy
of the patriarch. Tliis joy would be increased also
(if it is true, as some say, that the Son of God in
iuiman form appeared to Sarah in the sixth week,
and wished her joy of her young son, eh. xviii. 10).
— H. C. Rambach : Isaac's birth in many respects
re.«emhles greatly the birtli of Christ ; 1. Both births
were announced long before; 2. both occur at the
time fixed by God; 3. both persons were named
before they were born ; 4. both were supernaturally
(miraculously) conceived ; 5. both births occasioned
great joy ; 6. the law of circumcision begins (as to
its principle) with Isaac, and ceases in (througli)
Christ, Ver. 7. In her joy Sarah speaks of many
liseveral) children, when she had borne only one son,
who, honover, was better to her than ten sons. — She
will say : Not only ha? my dead body received
strength from God, to bring a child into the world,
but I am conscious of such strength that I can
supply its food which sometimes fails much younger
and more vigorous mothers. — Sarah did this (nursed
her child) although she was a princess (ch. xxiii. 6)
and of noble blood, for the law of nature itsell
requires this from all, since, with this very end in
view, God has given breasts to all and filled them
with milk. The Scriptures united these two functions,
the bearing of children and nursing them, as belong-
ing tu the mother (Luke xi. 27 : xxiii. 29 ; Ps. xxii.
111). Thus tliese two things were reckoned among
the blessings and kindness of the Great God (ch. xlix.
25), while an unfruitful body and dry breasts are a
punishment from him (Hoseii ix. 11-14). — Ver. 8.
(Whether, as the Jews say, Shem, Melchizedec and
Selah were present at this feast, cannot be said with
certainty.) — Abiaham doubtless had his servants to
gbare in tlie feast, and held instructive conversation
with them, exhorting them to confidence in God, to
the praise of his name. It is a peculiarly spiritual,
joyful, and th.iiikrul legist. — Xa enumeration of bib-
lical feasts (2 Cor- i. 20). — The blessing of children.
Ingratitude, in regarding many such gifts (cliildren) as
t punishment. — Feasts after baptism are not opposed
;o the will of God, but they should still be observed
;o Ills honor, with pious people, without luxury, and
other poor women in childbed should not be for-
gotten.— ScnRiJnER: Ver. 1. He is faithful (Num.
ixhi. 19). — Since every birth tlows from (is a gift from)
God (Ps. cxxvii. 3), so we may rightly say, that the
Lord visits those to whom he sends children. — Ver.
8. Isaac was the son of the free-woman, born through
the promise of God (Gal. iv. 22, 23), consequently a
type of every child of (ioil, who through the stiength
of the promise, or of the gospel, is born to freedom
and of a free-woman. (Roos.)— What strange dis-
appointments ! The son, who receives from (iod
who hears the cries and wishes of men, his name
Ishmael (tJod hears) is not the promised one, but
the (iromise was fulfilled in the otlier, Isaac, wlio was
Darned according to a more common human custom !
[The laughing of Abraham (ch. xvii. 17) lias how-
ever a greater spiritual wortli than tlie cry of llagar
for help (ch. xvi. 11).J — Passava.nt: Behold, two
children of one father and In the same house, reared un-
der one discipline, consecrated before the same allar, of
like he-arts, borne before God upon the same prayer
and thus olfcred lo him, and still so unlike in their
minds and ways, in their conduct and aims, etc. ; the
dark mvBtcries of nature and grace. — Taube: The
birth of Isaac and expulsion of Ishmael an example
of what occurred at the Reromiation, and of what
must take liluce in us all.
2. IshmaePs removal (ver. 9-21). The th ic Tatit
sepnra/io7i.v in their import ; a. Judgment in respect
to th^ Jiiii^^x for theocratic purposc^^ but not, li. it
respect to a destination to blesftcdncss. — [So Henry,
We are not sure that it was his eternal niiu ; it it
presumption to say that all those who are left oui of
the external dispensation of God's covenant, an
therefore excluded from all his meicies. — .\. G.] —
The providence of God over Ishmael. — The .\rabiana.
— The Mohammedan world. — Mission Sermons. — The
external separation presupposes an inward estrange-
ment.
Starke : Ver. 9. A laughing, jesting, gay, and
playlul youth. It may be that Ishmael had reviled
Isaac because of his name which he h;id received
from a laugh, and had treated him with scorn. —
Lasge : Ver. 10. Sarah could not have been without
human weakness in this harsh demand ; but the
hand of God was in it. — Cramer : The faults and
defects of parents usually cleave to their chihlren,
hence parents, especially mothers during pregnancy,
should guard themselves lest they stain themselves
with a grave fault which shall cleave to their children
during their lives. — Bib/. Tiib. : The mocking spirit
is the sign of an evil, proud, jealous, envious heart ;
take heed that thou dost not sit with the scorner (Ps.
i. 1) — Bibl. Wirt. : Cases often occur in a family in
which the wife is mucli wiser than her husband,
hence their advice and counsel ought not to be
refused (1 Sam. xxv. S, 17). Polygamy produces
great unhappiness. — Cra.mer : There will arise some-
times disputes between married persons, even be-
tween those who are usually peaceful and friendly.
Still one should not give loose reins to his passion,
or allow the diflerence to go too far. — Ver. 12.
Lange: Here we see that the seed of the bond-
woman shall be distinguished from Isaac. — The
general rule is, that the wife shall be subject to her
husband, and in all reasonable things obey him, but
here God makes an exception. ^Since Abraham in
the former case had followed his wife without consult-
ing God, when she gave him Hagar to wife, so he
must now also fitlfil her will. — The comparison of
Ishmael with the unbelieving Jews at the time of the
New Testament : the haughty, perverse, scoffing
spirit of persecution ; the sympathy of Abraham
with Ishmael, the compassion of Jesus towards the
Jews ; the expulsion and wandering in the wilder-
ness, but still under the Divine providence ; the hope
that they shall finally attam favor and grace. —
Cuamer ; The recollection of his former sins should
be a cross to the Christian. — One misfortune seldom
comes alone. — £ibl. WtrJ. : There is nothing which
makes a man so tender and humlile as the cross,
alHidion, and distress. — Gerlach : The great truth
that natural claims avail nothing before God, reveals
itself clearly in this history. — Isaac receives his name
from a holy laughing ; Ishmael was also a lauglier,
liut at the same lime a profane scoffer. — Calwer,
Hari'l/'iii-h : What we often receive as a reproach,
and listen to with reluctance, may contain under the
rough, hard shell a noble kernel of truth, which iu
deed agrees with the will of God. — ScnHnnKR;
(Luther supposes .\braham to invite to the feast all
the patriarchs then living; with Melchizedec and the
King of the Philistines. ) — Isaac, the subject of the
holy laugh, seiTcs also as a laughing-stock of profane
wit. — Ishmael is the representjitive of that world in
the church yet scoffing at the church. (In the letter tc
the (ialulians of the bond-church, in opposition to thi
free. — Both, if I may say so, are the sons of laughter
CHAP. XXII. 1-19.
46d
but in how different a sense. Sarah does not call
Ishiaael by his name (a clear sign of her indignation),
and shows her contempt by caUing him the sou of
this bond-woman. (LnTiiKR : ch. iii. 24 ; Prov. xxii.
10; John viii. 35.)— Ver. 13 Ishmael remained his
aon, and indeed his first-born, whom he had long
held for the heir of the blessing. It is never easy
to rend from our heart? the objects of our dear affec-
tions, liut he who must soon offer Isaac ako is here
put into the school for preparation. .Micliaclis sees
in this removal the evidence that God was displeased
with polygamy. — A^er. 14. In many points surely the
men of God seem somewhat cold and hard-hearted (Ex.
xxxii. 27; Deut. xiii. 6 ff. ; ixxiii. 9 ; Malt. x. 37 ; Luiie
xiv. 26). After this distinction was clearly made, Ish-
mael himself might draw near again (ch. xxv. 9) and
indeed share in the possessions of his rich father.
Baumgarten. — The expulsion of Ishmael was a
warning for Israel, so far as it constantly relied upon
its natural sonship from Abraham. — Thus the Papists
today, when they parade their long succession,
say nothing mon: than if they also called Ishmael the
first-born. — Ver 17. We see moreover here that if
father and mother forsake us, then the Lord himself
will take us up. (!alvin. — Thksame : Ver. 19. If God
withdraw from us the grace of his providence we are
as surely deprived of all means of help, even of those
which lie near at hand, as if they were far removed
from us. We pray him, therefore, not only that he
would supply us with what we need, but give us pru-
dence to make a right use of it ; otherwise it will
hippen that, witli closed eyes, we shall lie in the
(nidst of our supplies and perish.* — Passavant :
Eagar's marriage was Sarah's own deed, not the
ffork of God, and this also made her fearful. Men
easily become anxious about their own, self-chosen
ways. — Abraham obeys. — The obedience of the pious
• [So we do not see the fountain opened for sinners in
ibis uorld'i wUdemess until God opens oar eyes. Ja<jobns.
-A. G.) I
blessed in its results in all cases. — God knows how
to find us, even in the wilderness.
3. Abraham?s covenant with Abimelech (vera.
22-34). — Traits of noble minds in the heathec
world. — The Hebrews and the Philistines — Whj
they attract and why repel. — Starick: Bibl. Tub..
Even the world wonders at the blessedness of th«
pious. — Bibl. Wirt. It is allowed the Christian truly
to enter into covenant with strange, foreign, and,
to a certain extent, with unbelieving people. — A
pious tnan ought to complain to the rulers of the
reproach and injustice he suffers. — Rulers should
themselves take the care of the land, since cour
tiers often do what they wish. — The Rabbins (ver.
33) think that Abraham planted a garden of fruit-
trees, in which he received and entertained the stran-
gers, from which he did not suffer them to depart
until they became proselytes. — It is probable that
Abraham had pitched near a grove or wood, from
which he might have wood for his sacrifices, and in
which he might perhaps hold his worship, and also
that he might have more shade in this hot Eastern
land. — I am also a stranger here upon the earth. —
Gerlach : Ver. 22. The blessing of God which rest-
ed upon Abraham awakened reverence even in these
heathen, who served still the true God ; a type of the
blessing which, even in Old-Testament times, passed
over from the covenant people upon the heathen. —
Schroder: A consolation follows upon the great
sorrow (Calvin). — The oath was an act of condescen-
sion to the evident mistrust of the Princes ; in the
other aspect an act of worship. — The Holy Scrip-
tures regard the oath as if a peculiar sacrament ;
there is the name of God, and the hearts of the peo-
ple are reconciled, and mistrust and strifes destroyed.
(Luther). — Nature fixes itself firmly when all goeii
well. But faith knows here no continuing city {Ber-
lenburger Bibel). — Moses reports three sacred works
of Abraham: 1. He labored; 2. he preached, 3.
he bore patiently his long sojourn in a strange land.
TENTH SECTION.
Tilt taerifice of Itaae. The sealing of the faith of Abraham. The completion and sealing of tht
Divine Promise.
Chapter XXH. 1-19.
1 Aud it came to pass after these things [preparatory thereto], that God [Eiohim] did
2 tempt' Abraham, and said unto him, Abraham : and he said. Behold, here I am. And
he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, wliom thou lovest, and get thee into
the land of Moriah [shown or provided of Jehovah] ;' and offer him there for a burnt offering'
upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.
3 And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two of
his young men [servants] with him, and Isaac his son, and clave the wood for the burnt
1 offering, and rose up, and went unto the place of which God had told him. Then on
5 the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place afar off. And Abrah.ain
said unto his young men. Abide ye here with the ass ; and I and the lad will go yonder
6 and worship, and come [may come] again to you (naii'i's). And Abraham took the woot?
of the burnt offering, and laid it upon Isaac his son ; and he took the fire in hia hand.
464
GE!^SIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSEM.
7 and a knife : and they went both of them together. And Isaac spake unto Abraliatu
lis fatlier, and said, My father: and he said, Here am I [ihear], my son. And h«
8 said, Behold the fire and the wood, but wliere is the lamb for a burnt offering ? Aiid
Abraham said, My son, God will provide* himself a lamb 'or a burnt offering: so they
9 went [further] both of tliem together. And they came to he place which God had tola
him of; and Abraham built an altar there, and laid [upon it] the wood in order; and
10 bound Isaac his sou, and laid him on the altar upon the wood. And Abraham stretched
1 1 forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son. And the angel of the Lord called
12 unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham : and he said, Here am I. And
he said, Lay not thiue hand upon the lad, neither do thou any thing unto lura : foi
now I know [l have perceived] that thou fearest God [literally : a God-fearer art thou], seeing
13 thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me. And Abraham lifted up his
eyes, and looked [spied, descried], and behold, behind him a ram caught in a thicket by
his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him for a burnt offering
14 in the stead of his son. And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovah-jireh'
[jehovah will see] : as it is said to this day, In the mount of the Lord it shall be seen.
15 And the angel of the Lord called unto Abraham out of heaven the second time,
16 And said. By myself have I sworn, saitii the Lord, for because thou hast done this
17 thing, and hast not withiield tliy son, thine only son.- 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
18 which is upon the sea shore ; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies. And
in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed [shall bless themselves ; Hithpael] ;
19 because thou hast obeyed my voice. So Abraham returned unto his young men; and
they rose up, and went together to Beer-sheba ; and Abraham dwelt [still longer] at
Beer-sheba.
[ ^ Ver. 1.— nD3 , to try, to prove, to put to the test. And, since men are tested only as they are placed in circunietancei
of temptation, to tempt.— A. G.]
[^ Ver. 2.— Or where Jehovah is seen, appears, is manifested. — A. G.)
[3 Ver. 2.^Heb., Make him ascend for a burnt offering. — A. G.]
[« Ver. i.— WiU see/or himself a lamb.— A. G.]
[* Ver. 14.— Lit., Jehovah shall be seen— or appear — or be manifested. Most of the early versions render Jehovah in
the nominative. — A. G.]
GENERAL PRELIMINABY REMARKS.
1. The documentary hypothesis [which implies
sot only that historical documenta may have come
down to Moses, and were used by him, but also
that the t)00k is compacted from distinct and still
distingui-shable compositions. — A. G] meets in this
section a very significant rebuke, whose import has
not been sutiiciently estimated either by Knobel or
Delitzsch. " Leaving out of view the term Elohim,
nothing reminds us," says Knobel, " oi ilie Elohistlc,
but ratlier, everything is in favor of the Jehovistic
autlior, e. g., in the main point, its wlinle tendency
as thus stated (tlie knowledge of the unlawfulness
of human sacrifices in Israel), tlie human way in
which (iod is spoken of, etc. We must, therefore,
hold that the Jeliovist uses Eloliim liere, so long as
he treats of Imman sacrifices, and then first, after
this sacrifice, so foreign to the rehgion of Jeliovah
ver. 1 ). has been rebuked, uses Jehovah." The real
distJLCtion of the names of fiod is tima recognized
without considering its consequences. Dehtzsch
lays, **the enlarger generally uses tlie name ni,T
less exclusively than the author of the original writing
the C''nbx{ n |. This change of the names of God
is, at all L'vents, significant, as is every change of the
names of (iod in tlie original dependence and con-
nection of one of the two narrators." This conces-
eiOD does not agree with his introduction, when he
wra. " u comprehensible distinction between the two
names of God, Elohim and Jehovah, is not always
to be received ; the author has often merely found a
pleasure in ornamenting his work with the alternation
of these two names " (p. 3'i, 33). The change in
the names in this section is explained by the fact,
that the revelation of God, which the patriarch re-
ceived at the beginning of the liistory, mingled itself
in his consciousness with traditional Elohistic ideas
or prejudices, while in the sequel, the second revela-
tion of Jehovah makes a clear and lasting distinction
between the pure word of Jehovah, and the tradi-
tional Elohistic, or general religious apprehension
of it.
2. We have already discussed, in the introduc-
tion (p. Ixxiv. flF.), the peculiar idea in the history of
the sacrifice of Isaac, which the traditional theologi-
cal misunderstanding has transformed into a dark
t-nigina. which lies as a grave ditficulty or stumbling
block in till- history. In his " History of (he Old
Covenant " r^d ed. p. :inr)), KriiTz resumes with great
zeal the discussion, witli reference to HKNCSTENBHiG'a
Beitvdyt. lii p. 145; Lange: Lebeii Jesu., i. p. 120;
" Positive Dogmatics," p. 81H, and other works, and
asserts directly that iJod demanded (rt>m .\braham
the aciual xlai/inif of Is;iac. It is no difficulty, in bia
view, that God, the true one, who is truth, rontntandM
at the beginning of the nairative, what he forbid*
at the close, as it was not dillicult to hini to iiold that
the a.S6umed angels (ch. vi.) were created sexless, but
had in some magical way tf.emselves created tor them-
selves the sexual tjower. ( I'liis is the difiicully whinli
CHAP. XXII. 1-19.
40S
Kurtz overlooks. It is not the difficult}' in reconciling
this command with the prohibition of human sacrifices
in the Mosaic law, but in reconcilini; the comniami
with the prohibition in this history, if the killin<; of
Isaac is referred to in both, HengstenbiTg and those
who argue with him, urge in favor of their view : 1.
That the command relates only to the spiritual sacri-
fice of Isaac, here termed a burnt-offering because
of the entire renunciation of Isaac as a son by na-
ture, which he was to make, so that Isaac was to be
deul to him, and then received back again from the
dead, no longer in any sense a son of the flesh, but
the son of promise and of grace ; and then, 2. the
numerous places in the Scripture in which these sac-
rificial terms are used in a spiritual sense (e. g., Hos.
xiv. 3 ; Ps. xl. 7-9 ; where the same term, burnt-
offering, is used, and the Psalmist describes the en-
tire yielding of his personality as the sacrifice which
God required; Ps. li. 19; cxix. 1()8; Rom. xii, 1 ;
PhiL iv. 18 ; Heb. xiii. 16, etc See also the passage
1 Sam. i. 24, 25) ; and finally 3. the force and usage of
the word here rendered to tempt. But on the other
hand it is urged with great force : 1. That the terms
here used are such as to justify, if not re<iuire, the
interpretation which Abraham put upon the com-
mand, i. e., that he was required literally to slay his
son as a sacrifice ; 2. that it is only as thus under-
stood that we see the force of the temptation to
which Abraham was subjected. It is obviously the
design of the writer to present this temptation as the
most severe and conclusive test. He was tried in
the command to leave his home, in his long waiting
for the promised seed, in the command to expel Ish-
mael. In all these his faith and obedience stood the
test. It remained to be seen whether it would yield
the son of promise also. This test, therefore, was
applied. The temptation was not merely to part
(rith his son, the only son of his love, but it was in
the command to put him to death, of whom it was
said, "in Isaac shall thy seed be called." The com-
mand and the promise were apparently in direct cou-
fiict. If he obeys the command he would seem to
frustrate the promise ; if he held fast to the promise
and saved his son he would disobey the command.
3. That this interpretation best explains the whole
transaction, as it related to Isaac as the channel of
blessing to the world, and the type of Christ, who
was the true human sacrifice — the man for men.
4. That there is no real moral difficulty, since God,
who is the giver of life, has a right to require it, and
since his command clearly expressed, both justified
Abraham in this painful deed and made it binding
upon him. 5, That this seems to be required by the
words of the apostle, Heb. xi. 19, " accounting that
God was able to raise him from the dead." The
weight of authority is greatly in favor of the latter
nterpretation, even among recent commentators,
and it is clearly to be preferred. In regard to the
difficulty which Hengstenberg aud Lange urge, it
may be said that the command of God is not always
a revelation of his secret will. He did not intend
that Abraham should actually slay his son, and there
is therefore no change in his purpose or will. He
did intend that Abraham should understand that he
was to do this. It was his purpose now to apply the
final test of his faith (a test needful to the patriarch
himself, and to all believers), which could only be
the surrender to the will of God of that which he
held most dear ; in this case his son, the son of
promi.-e, in whom his seed should be called. To ap-
ply the test, he commands the patriarch, as he had a
30
perfect right to do, to go and offer his son a l)urnt/
ofterirtg. When the act was jierfnnued in hear\, and
was about to be actually completed, the test wa"
clear, the obedience of faith was manifest, the wholt
condition of tldngs was changed, and there was
therefore a corresponding change in the formal com-
mand, though no change in the divine purpose. —
A. G.] The actual divine restraint, which even
restrained the sacrifice of Isaac in the very aci
(p. 207), forms the ri'concUinr/ middle-term be-
tween the command to .\braham and the pro-
hibition to Abraham's descendants. We cannot
truly yield our assent to such reconciling middle-
terms between the commands and prohibitions of
God. The question, how could the assumed posi-
tive command, "Thou shalt sliy Isaac," become a
ground of the certain faith of Abraham ? which is
the main difficulty in the ordin;iry view of the pas-
sage, Dehtzsch dismisses with the remark (3d ed. p.
418), "'the subjective criterion of a fact of revela-
tion is not its agreement with the utterances of the
so-called pious consciotisness which exalts itself
above the Scripture, etc., but it is the experiencG of
the new-birth." This accords entirely with the ex-
planation of the Tridentine theologians. The sub-
jective criterion of a fact of revelation is rather that
clear, i. e., calm, because free from doubt, firm cer-
tainty of faith produced directly by the fact of reve-
lation itself And this is truly a consciousness of the
pious, which does not indeed set itself above the
Scripture, but with which, also, the difterent acts,
words, and commands of Jehovah, who ever remains
the same in his truth and veracity, cannot be in con-
flict. The agreement between the declarations of
the eternal revelation, and the eternal declarations
of the religious consciousness, is so far wanting here,
that Delitzach says : " Israel knew that God had
once required from Abraham (the human sacrifice)
in order to fix for it a prohibition for all time. The
law therefore recoginzes the human sacrifice only as
an abomination of the Moloch-worship (Lev. xviii
21 ; XX. 1-.5), and the case of Jephthah belongs to a
time when the Israelitish and Canaanitish popular
spirit and views were peculiarly intermingled." Then
the abomination of the Moloch-service in Israel rests
purely upon the positive ground of the example in
this history, an example which with the same extreme
positiveness, nnght be understood to have just the
contrary force, if it signifies, perhaps ; we may
omit the human sacrifice in all such ca.ses, when Je-
hovah makes the same wonderful prohibition. As
to the sacrifice of Jephthah, Delitzsch regards it as a
sort of reconciling middle-term between the Moloch-
worship of the Canaanites and the prohibition of a
Moloch-worship in Israel, that a hero of the time of
the Judges should have acted in a heathen (even
Canaanitish !) rather than in an Israelitish mannei.
Jephthah, who with the most definite aud triumphant
consciousness distinguishes between the MoabitisL
and Ammonite God, Chemosh, to whom, probably,
human sacrifices were offered (2 Kings iii. 27), and
the God of Israel, Jehovah (Judg. xi. 24) ; Jephthah,
who made his vow of a sacrifice to Jehovah, after
the spirit of Jehovah came upon hun (ver. 29), a vow
which was connected with a prayer for victory ovei
a Moloch-serving people ; Jephthah, who was clearly
conscious that he had made ids vow to Jehovah that
through him he might overcome the children of Am
mon under their God Chemosh ; offered indeed an
abomination to Jehovah; and it is obvious what is
I meant when it is said, the daughters upon the mnuu
466
GEXESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
tains bewailed her virginity (not the lost, but the
illegally lixed) and not he: Lfe, although the matter
concerned her life; hut it is not so evident when it
fe said that she never knew a man, after her father
had put her to de;ith (ver. 39), and it must not sur-
prise us, trulv, that it became a custom for the daugh-
ters of Israel to spend four d;iys yearly to commemo-
rate and praise a vir^rin who was entirely in accord-
ance with her father in ihe most hurtful and godless
misunderstanding, and in the most abominable sacri-
fice." We have to observe three oppositions in this
history : first, that between iBX'l ns: and S';)]'^]
^""I'i'n— ;o ^ second, that between c^n'sxn and
Pf-n" , and third, that between nb"n of verse second
and -na of verse tenth. — The key to the explana-
tion of the whole history lies in the expression nB; .
It denotes not simply to prove, or to put to the test
(Knobel, Delitzsch), but to prove under circumstances
which have originated from sin, and which increase
tjie severity of the proof, and make it a temptation,
ind in so far as the union of the elements of the
testing and of the tempting, i. e., the soliciting to
evil, is under the providence of Jehovah, it denotes,
he temptx. in much the same sense that he also pun-
ishes sin with sin. It is defined more closely tlius :
he leads or can lead into temptation (to do wrong)
(Matt. vi. IH). But the closest analysis is this : the
proving is from God, the temptation is from sin
James i. 13). Thus the promise at Marah (Exod.
XT. 25, '2ti) was in so far a temptation of the people
as it had the inclination to misinterpret the same in
a fleshly sense ; the giving of the manna was a temp-
tation so far as it was connected with the ordinance
that the manna should not be gathered upon the
Sabbath (Exod. xvi. 4); the terrible revelation of
God from Sinai (Exod. xx. 20) was a temptation of
the people, since it could be the occasion for their
falling into slavish fear, and flight from the presence
of God (Exod. XX. 19); eomp. Deut. viii. 2 ; ver. 16 ;
especially ch. xiii. 4 ; Judg. ii. 22. The demand of
God from Abraham that he should sacrifice his son,
became, through the remaining and overwhelming
prejudices of the heathen, to whom to sacrifice was
identical with to slay, a temptation to Abraham ac-
tually " to lay his hand< upon the lad." The com-
mand of God stands sure, but he did not understand
its import hdly, viz., that he should, in and under the
completion of an animal saciifice, consecrate and in-
wardly yield his son to Jehovah, and thus purify his
heart from all mere fleshly and slavish attachment to
him. But it was the ordination of God, that in his
conflict with the elements of the temptation, he
should come to the point, when he could reveal to
him the pure and full sen.se of his command. Ilence
also the first revelation was darker than the second.
This fact is distotlcd when Schelling finds here in
the Elohim the ungodly principle, which appears in
opposition to the .Maleach Jehovah as the true G'hI
(Dki.itzscii, p. 417). Even the distinction between
B night and dream-voice, iind a clear and lou i tone
at the perfect day (Ewald), decides nothing, althougli
g-merally the dream-vision is the more Imperfect form.
* Wo cotf;ratul!ito ourselves upon pecunnR Dr. ruulua
C»8sol to iirrpare tho Uihehverk upon tho I'ook of Jiidce.s,
who hriM slmwn in his condensed article, ".Jephtliah," in
IfKU/.co'fi Jtnil Ericyd"pfdi(t. tliat he will not ^uffc•r himself
to tie impowfd upontiy the mtuwive tntditionnl miKintfMpro-
tation of tliie paiiwiKe (for wlione cxemMical restituliou
Heiifcsteiioerp; has rendered im(jortant servu-e), to the injury
tf a free ilidiivinf; interpretation of it.
But the distinction between an imperfect, Tague, and
general, and the perfect, definite revelation, is here
truly of decisive importance. The history of the
prophets (as of Jonah) and of the apostles (as ol
Peter) confirms abundantly that a true divine reve-
lation can be obscured through an erroneous under-
standing of the revelation (as indeed the unerring
voice of coBscience may be obscured through an er-
roneous judgment of the conscience). This same
tact appears and continues in the development (if
faith. " The flame purifies itself from the smoke."
We thus hold here, as earlier, with Hengstenberg
and Bertheau, that the divine command to Abraham
was subject to a misunderstanding in him, through
the inner Asiatic sinful tradition of human sacrifice,
but a misunderstanding providentially appointed to
be finally salutary to Abraham. With this contrast
betneeu the imperfect and perfect revelation now
referred to, corresponds fully the contrast between
Hffilohiin, Elohim on the one side, and Maleach-Jeho
vah, and Jehovah on the other side. God, as the God
of all Gods, wliose name breaks through all the im-
pure conceptions of him, gave the first command,
which Abraham, in his traditional and Elohistic ideas,
with an admixture of some misconception, has yet
correctly but vaguely understood, but the (iod of
revelation corrects his 7H/suuderstauding, when he
seals and confirms his understanding, that he should
sacrifice his son to God in his heart. But the third
oppo.sition, betw&n the expression to sacrifice and to
slay (n'ssn and ;:nc), is very important. It is a
fact that the Israelitish consciousness from the begin-
ning has distinguished between the spiritual yielding,
consecration (especially of the first-born), ami the
external symbolical slaving of a saciificial animal for
the representation and confirmation of that inwaid
consecration; and thus also between the sacrifice
and the killing in a literal sense. This fact was also
divinely grounded, thiough the saciitice of Isaac.
It served, Mirough the divine providence, for the
rejection of all heathenish abominations, and for the
foundmg of the consecrated typical nature ul' the
sacrifices of the Israelites.
3. According to De Wette, Schumann, von Boh-
len and others, this narrative is a pure myth. Kno-
bel is doubtful whether there is not a fact lying at
its basis, but which he explains in a rationalistic
manner (p. 189). He gives correctly the ideas of the
history, the removing of human sacrifice, and the
sanctifying of a place for sacrifice at Jerusalem.
But the main idea, the spiritual sacrilice of tlie son,
as well as the unity of the idea and the historical
fact escapes him. For the utitenableuess of myth-
ical interpretations in the Old Testament, see the In
troduction.
EXEaETICAL AND CRITICAL.
1. The command of God to Abraham, and hit
journey to Moriah (vers. 1-3). — God did tempt
Abraham. — For the meaning of the word see above.
It is in the hi<rhcst degree probable that the form of
the revelation was a dream-vision of the night, a;
this was the form of the revealed comin.md to re-
move I-hmael. — Abraham! Behold, here ami.
— Similarly : Mil fatlirr ! Here niii I, m;i non
(ver. 7). Abraham, Abraham ! Here am I (ver.
11). These brief introductions of the couver.sation
express the great tension and application of tli#
human mind in those moments, in a striking way
CHAP. XXII. 1-la.
461
ind serve at the same time to prepare U3 for the im-
portance of the conversation. The call ; Abraham !
the announcement of a revelation, of a command.
Her; am 1 1 the expression of hearing and olieflienee.
—Take now thy son. — S<3"ni5. The X5 modifies
the command ; it seems to express that Elohinj
wished to receive the sacrifice from him as a fret-
will offering. — Thine only. — [Reminding us, as was
intended, of the only begotten of the Father.
A. G.] The Sept. has liyairr)T6ii, the Vul. unigcnituin.
The T^n^ is more significant ; it renders emphatic
the incoraparableness; this term and the two follow-
ing express the greatness of the sacrifice, but also
the thought that God knew well what he demanded
from him. — Get thee into the land of Moriah.
— i. e., into the region of the mnuntamof Moriuli, or
of Jerusalem. The name Moriah was anticipated ;
according to ver. 14, it was occasioned through the
events here recorded.* Michaelis, Bleek and Tuch
understand the word to refer not to Jerusalem, but to
Moreh in Sichem. See the counter-reasons in Kno-
bel. One main reason among others, is that the way
from Beer-sheba, where Abraham still dwelt, by
Hebron and Jerusalem to Sichem, according to
Robinson, required about 36 hours, a distance which
the old man Abraham and the youth Isaac could not
well have accompli.shed in three days (ver. 4). The
distance from Beer-sheba to Jerusalem is, according
to Robinson, -*H hours. For the meaning of Moriah
see below. [Hknostenberg (5«<. ii. p. 2i'>3) derives
the name from nxi, to see. It is the Hoph. part,
with the abbreviated name of Jehovah, or n^, and
signifies the shown or pointed out of Jehovah. The
nx^S, 2 Chron. iii. 1, has no decisive weight against
this since it may be rendered : " which was pointed
out, shown to David," as well as " where Jehovah
appeared to David." — A. G.] ITie Samaritans hold
Gerizim to have been the place of the sacrifice, but
have not altered the text. — And oflfer him there. —
For a bnrnt offering may mean as a burnt offering,
or, also, with a burnt offering, in and under the sym-
bolical presenting of it. — Upon one of the moun-
tains.— A clear intimation of the region of Jeru-
salem.— Which I will tell thee of. — It is not said
when this more distinct designation of the place of
' the sacrifice should be given. The designation is,
however, already, by anticipation, contained in
Moriah. — And Abraham rose up early in the
morning. (See Chap. xxi. 24.) — And saddled
his ass. — Girded, not saddled him. The ass wa^
destined to bear the wood upon his covering. Abra-
ham sets out with the bleeding heart of the father,
ind the three days' journey are, no doubt, designed
to give him time for the great conflict within him,
and for the religious process of development (see
Acts ix. 9). [As far as the matter of obedience was
concerned, the conflict was over. His purpose was
fixed. He did not consult with flesh and blood,
but instantly obeyed.— A. G.]
2. Th-'' mountain and plai;e of the sacrijicr.
Vers. 4-10.)— Then on the third day.— He had
aow entire certainty as to the place. It is barely
intimated how significant, sacred and fearful the
place of sacrifice was to him. — Abide ye here
irith the ass. — The yonng men or sei-vants, or
young slaves, destined to this service, must not go
* [Comp. with this history the revelation of God in the
mount, recorded in 2 Sam. xsiv. 25 ; 2 Chron. vii. 1-3, and
Lnke ii. 22-28.— A. Q.l
with him to the sacred mountain, nor be present at
the fearful sacrifice. — And I and the lad. — They
could easily see from the wood of the burnt-offering,
and the fire, and the knife, that he went not merely
to worship, but to sacrifice ; but to him the sacrifice
was the main thing. — And 'Will worship, and
come again to you.— Knohd renjaiks: "The
author appears not to have believed that Abni ham
would be presented in a bad light, througli such false
utterances (comp. ch. xii. 13; xx. 12)." We have
already seen what are the elements of truth, in the
places referred to, here the sense of the word of
Abraham is determined through the utterance of the
wish in a'fS, which, according to the form nsiaJSI,
might be translated : and may we return again —
would that we might. It is the design of the am-
biguous term to assure them as to his intention or
purpose. [It is rather the utterance of his faith
that God was able to raise him finm the dead. See
Heb. xi. 19. — A. G.] — And laid it upon Isaac. —
From the three days' journey of Isaac, and the service
which he here performs, we may conclude that he
had grown to a strong youth, like Ishmael, perhaps,
at the time of his expulsion (the age at which we
confirm). — The fire. — "A glimmering ember or tin-
der wood." Knobel.^But where is the lamb? *
— Isaac knew that a sacrificial animal belonged to
the sacrifice. The evasive answer of the fatlier,
trembling anew at the question of his beloved child,
appears to intimate that he held the entrance of a
new revelation at the decisive moment to be possible.
Until this occurs he must truly obey according to his
previous view and purpose. — The terms of the ad-
dress : My father ! my son ! — The few weighty
and richly significant words mark the difficulty of the
whole course for Abraham, and present in so much
clearer a light, the unwavering steadfastness of his
readiness to make the offering. — And took the
knife. — The very highest expression of his readi-
ness. •)• Nothing is said of any agitation, of any re-
sistance, or complaint on the part of Isaac. It is
clear that he is thus described as the willing sacri-
ficial lamb.:):
3. The iirst call from heai'en (vers. 11-14). —
Abraham, Abraham ! — As the call of the Angel of
Jehovah stands in contrast with that of Elohim, so,
also, the repetition of the name here, to its single
use (ver. 1). A clearer, wider, more definite, and
further leading revelation is thus described. The
repeated call : Abraham ! designates also the ur-
gency of the interruption, the decided rejection of
tlie human sacrifice. For the Angel of the Lord, see
ch. xii. — No^w I know that thou fearest God.^
Abraham has stood the test. The knowledge of God
reflects itself as a new experimental knowledge in
the consciousness of Abraham. [I know, in the
sense of use, declare my knowledge — have made it
manifest by evident proof Wordswokth, p. 100
"An eventual knowing, a discovering by actual ex-
perinieni." Mcrpht, p. 341. — A. G.'] — Behind
him a ram. — ^nx for "tins behind, backwards,
is not used elsewhere in the Old Testament, ana
from this has ariseL the conjectural reading ^nx,
and also numerous constructions (see Knobel, p. 175).
* f God ipill provide himse^, "Anotherpropheticspeecli;"
and how significant ! — A. G.]
t [.\11 the commentators dwell upon the tendemes-i and
beauty of the ecene here described. But no words can make
it more impressive. — A. G.]
1 r How it ^r'"- g° before ns the Lamb -vho was led to tbi
slaughter.— .\^ G.l
468
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Geseniis explains the word iu the b;icU?round;
but we should observe well that it is said that Abra-
ham looked around him, and thus perceived the ram
behind his back. Unseen. God mysteriously pre-
pares his gifts for his own. He does not receive a
positive command to sacrifice the ram instead of his
Bcn, altliough he recognizes in the fact that the ram
with his long, crooked horns was caught in the thick-
et, the divine suggestion. Knobel : " In a like
way, through a divine providence, a goat is presented
as a sacriticial animal for Iphigenia, whom her father,
Agamemnon, would sacritice to Venus at Aulis
(EuRip. Iphift. Aiilid. 1.591 fif.)."— In the stead of
hil son. * — This expression is of deciding import-
ance for the whole theory of sacrifice. The sacri-
ficial animal designates the symbolical representation
of the person who presents the sacrifice; but this
representation in the later ritual of the sacrifices,
must be interpreted differently, according to the dif-
ferent sacrifices. — And Abraham called the name
of that place. — Delitzsch and Keil explain the word
nsf", Jehovah observes, or takes care, but reject
the explanation of the Niphal, nj<"i^ etc., upon the
mount of the Lord it shall be seen, chosen, i. e., be
provided, or cared for. They lay aside this signifi-
cation of the Niphal, and Delitzsch translates : he
appears upon the mount of Jehovah. But the
Niphal must here certainly correspond with the Kal,
although we could point to no other proof for it.
The explanation also, upon the mount where Jehovah
appears, is far too general, since Jehovah does not
appear only upon Moriah. The expression : " it
will be chosen, provided," does not mean he nill
care for, but he will himself choose, and hence the
Niph*!! ilso must be : The mount of Jehovih is the
mc.fitain wliere he himself selects arnl provides his
srji-ijice. Moriah is, therefore, indeed, not the mount
of the becoming visible, of the revelation of God
(Delitzsch), but the mount of being seen, the mount
of selection, the mount of the choice of the sacrifice
of God — inclusive of the sacrifices of God. [.-Vud
thus of Hie KKriJici: — A. G.] For Moriah and Zion,
compare the Bible Dictionaries and the topography
ol Jerusalem.
4. The second call from heaven (vers. 15-19).
The subject of the first call was preeminently nega-
tive, a prohibition of the human sacrifice, connected
with a recognition of the spiritual sacrifice, ascer-
tained, and confirmed through this suggestion of the
typical nature of the sacrifice. The second call of
tiiu Maleacli Jehovah is throughout positive. — By
myself have I sworn. — The oath of Jehovah t
(ch. sxiv. 7 ; xxvi. 3 ; I. 24 ; Ex. xiii. 6 ; xi. 33)
is described here as a swearing by himself, also,
Ex. xxxii. 13; Isa. xlv. 23; Heb. vi. 13 ff.
The swearing of Gov by himself, is an anthro-
pomorphic expression, for the irrevocable, cer-
tain promise of .Ichovah, for which he, so to speak,
pledges the consciousness of his own personality,
as it imprinlB this promise itself in the perfect seal-
ing ot the assurance of the faith of the believing
patriarchs. Abraham can only be certain of the
oath of God, through its eternal echo in his own
heart. Hence this oath is supposed also where the
perfeciion of the assurance of the faith is supposed.
• [Atiraham offers the ram as a substitute for Isaac. He
withholds not his onlv hod in intent, and yet in fact he oflers
«»ulwiltulo forhis son. Moepht, p. Ml.— A. G.)
♦ [This is ihe only inntancc of God's sweurinR by himself
lit his intercourse with the patriarchs—a proof of the unique
Importance of thl» event Wordbwobth, p. 101.— A. U.l
Hence, also, Jehovah declares that h« i.ad swon
unto Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and it is not alio
gether correct, although Keil yields liis assent, when
Luther says with reference to Ps. Ixxxix. 36 ; ex. 4,
and cxsxii. 11, '*As the promise of tlie seed o.
Abraham descends in the seed of David, so the sa-
cred scriptuies transfer the oath given to Abraham,
to the person of David." Although " there if
nothing said in the promise, 2 Sam. vii., and 1 Chron.
xvii. upon which these psalms rest, of an oath of
God." Knobel. The oath of God revenls itself
even in the sealing of the faith, leaving out of view
the fact that the promise given to David was much
more particular and definite than that which .Abra-
ham received. — Saith the Lord (the saying of
Jehovah). — [Compare the rendering of the Sept.,
thou ha4 noi withheld thj son, with the terms of the
apostle, Rom. viii. 32. The resemblance is striking,
and is one of the ca'ch-icords of which Wordsworth
speaks. — A. ti.] A solemn statement of the prom-
ise, pointing down to the time of the prophets,
nin* cs;, saying of the Lord, occurs elsewhere in
the Pentateuch only (Num. xiv. 28) and without
Jehovah in the words of Balaam (Num. xxiv. 3-15).
In addition to the comparison of the number of the
stars of heaven (ch. xv. 5), we have that of the sand
upon the sea-shore, the strong figure for an innumer-
able mass (ch. xxxii, 13 ; Josh. xi. 4). — Shall pos-
sess the gate of his enemies. — The most obvious
sense Is this: Israel should overcome his enemies,
and capture their cities, since he should seize and
occupy their gates. But the (/ate here points to a
deeper meaning. The hostile world has a gate or
gates in its susceptibilities, through which the be-
lieving Israel should enter it (Ps. xxiv. 7-9 1. The
following words prove that this is the sense of the
words here. — And shall be blessed (shall bless
themselves). — The blessing of the nations (ch. xii.)
in which they appear still in a passive attitude, be-
comes, in its result, the cause of their freely blessing
themselves in the seed of Abraham, i. e., wishing
blessedness, and calling themselves blessed. — Be-
cause thou hast obeyed my voice (comp. ver.
16). — The great promise o.' Jehovah is no blind,
arbitrary good, but stands in relation to the tried
and believing obedience of Abraham (see James
ii. 23). [The closing remarks of Keil on this pas-
sage, are as follows : This glorious issue of the
temptation so triumphantly endured by Abraham,
not only authenticates the historical character of
this event, but shows, in the clearest manner, that
the temptation was necessary to the faith of the
patriarch, and of fundamental importance to his
position in the history of salvation. The doubt wbeth.
er the true God could demand a human sacrifice, is
removed by the fact that God himself prevents the
completion of the sacrifice, and the opinion
that God, at least apparently, comes into conflict
with himself, when he demands a sacrifice, and then
actually forbids and prevents its completion, is met
by the very significant change in the names of God
since God who commands Abraham to offer Isaacs
is called Cin'ViKn, but the actual completion of the
sacrifice is prevented by rTr\'<, who is identical with
the nin-' ■«'?>?• Neither mn"', the God of sal-
vation, or the God of the covenant, who gave to
Abraham the only son as the heir of the promise,
demands the sacrifice of the promised and givei
heir, nor a'^nbx, God the creator, who has tie pow
CHAP. XXU. i-19.
■m
er to give and take away life, but C^n^stn, the true
Rod, wliotn Abraliaiu knew ;inil worshipped as his
personal God, with whom he had entered into a per-
sonal relation. The command (coming from the true
God, whom Abraham served) to Weld up his only
and beloved son, could have no other object than
to purify and sanctify the state of the heart of the
patriarch towards his son, and towards his God ;
an object corresponding to the very goal of his call-
ing. It was to purify his love to the son of his
body from all the dross of fleshly self-love, and nat-
ural self-seeking which still clave to it, aiid so to
glorify it through love to God, who hail given liim
his sou, that he should no more love his beloved son
as his flesh and blood, but solely and only as the
gracious gift and possession of God, as a good en-
trusted to him by God, and which he was to be ready
to render back to him at any and every moment.
As Abraham had left his country, kindred, father's
house, at the call of God, so he must, in hi.'j walk
before God, willingly bring his only son, the goal of
his desires, the hope of his life, the joy of his old
age, an offering. And more tlian this even. He
had not oidy loved Isaac as the heir of his posses-
sions (xv. 2,) but upon Isaac rested all the promises
of God, in Isaac should his seed be cafled (xxi. 12).
The command to offer to God this only son of his
wife Sanih, in whom his seed should become a mul-
titude of nations (xvii. 4, 6, 16), appeared to destroy
the divine promise itself; to frustrate not only llie
wish of his heart, but even the repeated promises of
his God. At this command should his faith pei I'ect
itself to unconditional confidence upon God, to the
firm assurance that God could reawaken him from
the dead. But this temptation lias not only the im-
port for Abraham, that he should, through the over-
ooming of flesh and blood, be fitted to be the father of
believers, the ancestor of the Christ of God ; through
it, also, Isaac must be prepared and consecrated for
his calling iu the history of salvation. .\s he suf-
fered himself, without resistance, to be bound and
laid upon the altar, he gave his natural life to death,
that he might, through the grace of God, rise to
newness of life. Upon the altar he was sanctified
to God, consecrated to be the beginner of the holy
Church of God, and thus " the later legal consecra-
tion of the first-born was completed in him " (De-
litzsch). As the dirine command, therefore, shows
in all its weight and earnestness the claim of God
upon his own, to sacrifice all to him, even the most
dear (comp. Matt. x. .37, and Luke xiv. 26), pene-
trating even to the very heart, so the i^sue of the
temptation teaches that the tme God does not de-
mand from his worshippers a bodily human sacrifice,
but the spiritual sacrifice, the unconditional yielding
up of the natural life, even unto death. Since
through the divine providence Abraham offered a
i«m for a burnt-offering, instead of his son, the ani-
tnal sacrifice was not only offered as a substitute for
ihe human sacrifice, and sanctioned as a svmbol of
the spiritual sacritice of the person himself, well
pleasing to God. but the offering of human sacrifices
by the heathen, is marked as an ungodly t^eAodpTj^-
Keia, judged and condemned. And this comes to
pass through Jehovah, the God of salvation, who
restrains the completion of the external sacrifice.
Hence, this event, viewed with respect to the divine
preparation of salvation, wins for the church of the
Lord |)rophetic significance, which is pointed out
witli p culiar distinctness in the place of this sacri-
fice, the mount Moriah, upon which, under the lega
economy, all the typical sacrifices were brought to
Jehovah, upon which, also, in the fulness of time,
God the Father, gave his only-begotten Son an
atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world, in order,
through this one true sacrifice, to raise the shadow-
ing image of the typical animal sacrifice to its truth
and real nature. If, therefore, the destination ol
Moriah, as the place for the offering of Isaac, with
the actual offering of the ram in his stead, should be
only at first typical, with reference to the signifi-
cance and oljject of tlie Old Testament sacrifice,
still this type already, also, points down to that in
the future appearing antitype, when the eternal love
of the Heavenly Father, itself, did what it demanded
here from Abraham, namely, spared not his only-be-
gotten son, but gave him, for us all, up to that death ac-
tually, which Isaac only endured in spirit, that we
might die with Christ spiritually, and with him rise
to eternal life (Rom. viii. 32; vi. 5, etc.), pp. \11-
179.— A. G.]
DOCTEINAI, AND ETHICAL.
1. The ruling thought in this whole narrative, is
the perfection of the obedience of faith of Abraham,
not merely, however, in the sacrifice of his son, but
also in his readiness to perceive tlie revelation of
Jehovah, which forbids the killing of his son, and
causes the symbolic killing of the sacrifice p.oviiled
as the seal and confirmation of the sjtiritual sacrifice.
Faith must prove itself in the inward hearty conces-
sion of the dearest objects of life, even of all our
own thoughts, as to the realization of salvation, pres-
ent and future, to the providence of the grace of
God. But it cannot complete itself with reference
to this salvation, without purifying itself, or allowing
itself to be purified from all traditional, fanatical
ideas, or misconceptions of faith. In the completion
of faith, the highest divinity coincides with the
purest humanity. The sacrifice of I.s.aac is, therefore,
the real separation of the sacred Israelitish sacrifice
from the abominations of human sacrifices. " These
sacrifices, especially of children, were customary
among the pre-Hebraic nations of Palestine (2 Kin.
xvi. 3 ; Ps. cvi. 38), among the kindred Phoenicians
(PoRPHTR. de abslin. ii. 56 ; ErsEB. Procpar. ev.
i. 10, and Laodd. Const, xiii. 4), among their de-
scendants, the Carthaginiaus (Dion. XX. 14, Plctarch,
etc.), among the Egyptians (Dion. i. Ss, etc.), among
the tribes related with Israel, the Moabites ami Am-
monites (2 Kin. iii. 27) who honored Moloch with
them (Lev. xviii. 21 ; xx. 2), appear also in the Ar-
amaic and Arabian tribes (2 Kings vii. 31 ff ), as well
as in Ahaz among the Israelites (2 Kings xvi. 3 ff.),
hut were forbidden by the law (Dent. xii. 31), and
opposed by the prophets (Jer. vii. 31 ff.). They
were thus generally spread througli the eidfns: of the
nations in contact with Israel, but were eniiieiy for-
eign to its legally established religion." Kuobel.
According to Hengstenberg, the human sacrifice
does not belong to heathenism in general, but to the
darkest aspect of heathenism {Beitrage iii. p. 144).
KfKTZ believes that he gives the correction (p. 210)
The fact that the spirit of humanity among thf
Greeks and Romans opposed the human sacrifice
(see Lanqe : Positive D ^ginatik, p. S62), loses its fore«
with him, since he ascribes this opposition to the ro
ligious and rationalistic superficialty of their times ;
the human sacrifices are, indeed, a fearful madness,
but a m idness of doubt as to the true sacrifice, tV
470
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MObES.
hopelessness as to finding the true atonement. But
the true atonement is even in the death of Christ,
the obedient concession of Christ to the judgment of
God ; and the crucitixion of Christ analogous to
ihe Moloch-sacrifice, must be distinguished from it
both on the side of Juduism and of the world. The
entire perversion of the lact that the religion of
Jehovah abhors and rejects the human sacrifice, as it
has been introduced by Vatke and Von Bohlen (the
religion of Jehovah stood originally upon the same
plane with the Moloch service), and has been com-
pleted by Baumer, Kurtz has examined and exposed
in a most satisfactory way (p. 204 ff.). [The arbi-
trariness and blasphemy of Daumer, and the boldness
with which he makes his assertions in the face of
all history, render his work unworthy of any serious
refutation. And Kurtz justly treats it with ridicule.
— A. G.] Ghillany's essay : " The Human Sacri-
fice of the Old Hebrews," may be, also, consulted
here, but is essentially one with Daumer.
2. The sacrifice of Isaac has an inward connection
with the expulsion of Ishmael, which will appear
more clearly if we recollect that the age of both at
the time of these events must have been nearly the
same. Thus must Abraham expiate in the history of
Isaac, the human guilt which lay in his relation to
Ishmael. But as he had surely doubted a long time
as to the choice of Ishmael, so also a doubt intrudes
itself as to the literal external sense of the divine
command in regard to Isaac ; a doubt which can no
more prejudice or limit the divine revelation than
perhaps the doubting thought of Paul upon the way
to Damascus, but rather serves to introdvice the new
revelatio:<. [The narrative of Paul's conversion will
not bear oct th's comparison. He does not seem to
have been in any 'lo.'bt. but was, ae he himself says,
conscientious. He 'e.My thought that he ought to
persecute the "^i'-'uvh i,'' God. — A. G.]
3. The ditJ'iircl'o.- between the divine — -uiled
command and Ab.'il-aui's misconception of .t is
similar to the distin.'tioL bt'ween the infallible con-
science* and the falliblt mistaken judgement of
conscience, which has not been sufficiently noticed
in tlieology. Thus also Peter, on his way from
Joppa to Csesarea, with the divine commission
to convert Cornelius, might ha^-'e connected with it
the misconception that he must first circumcise him,
but the further revelation tears away the misoonce|i-
tion. The stripping away of the erroneous and
unessential idea.< of the time, belongs also to a sound
development of faith.
4. The b'lrnt-oft'ericg of Abraham appears here
.kS the foundi'tion and central point of all the typical
Kacrificcs in Is.-ao'. Its fundamental thought is tlie
spiritual yieldiu',- cf the lifr, not the taking of ihe
bodih life. It recei"e:: its wider form in the Passover
lamb, in which the dis-ision of the offerings is already
intimated, viz., the thauk or peace-offcrir.g and the
consecrated killing on the one hand, and the sin-
and guilt- (trespass) offering and the imprecatory
offering on the other. The peculiar atonement oH'cr-
Ing is a higliur centralization and completion, in which
the whole system of ofl'erings points to tljat which is
beyond and above itself.
6. The mountain of Jerusalem receives, tht^^gh
llie offering of Abraham, its preconsecration to its
* [This asBumoB what, to Bav the \enet, is a matter of
loutit, !iiul M (l|(aiiiKt Iho general faith of the Churrh, that
the coniii:ica''c itttelf hu8 not uuflcT* d in tho ruins of tlio tall.
Ther«* 18 ^oul d for the distinction, but wo cannot hold [hut
tile conf«iimc»» is infalhb'^,— A. O 1
future destination as the later mount Movlab upot
which the temple stood, the preconsecration of thi
historical faith in God, which transcends the urt
historical faith in God of Melchizedec.
6. The Angel of the Lord gives the more accu
rate and particular definition of that which Elohin
has pointed out in the more general way.
T. The obedience of faith which Abraham rea-
ders in the sacrifice of Isaac, marks the historical
perfection of his faith, in a decisive test. It marks the
stage of the New Testament Soxi/i-fi, or sealing (se*
the Bibleivork upon James).
8. The typical significance of the sacrifice ol
Isaac is so comprehensive that we may view it, in som«
measure, as embracing all Old Testament types, jusi
as the sacrifice of Abraham itself may be regarded aa
including the whole Mosaic system of sacrifices. The
sacrifice itself is the type of the sacrificial death of
Christ, and indeed, ju<t as truly, in reference to the
interest of God, as to the interest of the world in this
fact. The self-denial of Abraham is a copy, a sym
bol (not perhaps a type) of the love of God, whc
gave his only-begotten Son for the salvation of the
world (John iii. 16; Rom. viii. 32). The sacrificial
act of Abraham, as also the enduring silence of Isaac,
is typical in reference to the two sides of the suffering
obedience of Christ, as he is priest and sacrifice at the
same time. Isaac received again from the altar is now,
in reference to Abraham, a God-given, consecrated
child of the Spirit and of promise : in reference tc
Christ, a type of the resurrection, and therefor^
also a type of the new resurrection life of believers.
9. Since Abraham must have reconciled the prom-
ise, earUer connected with the person of I^aac
with the command to offer Isaac as he understood
the command, he was necessarily driven to the hope
of a new awakening, as this is admirably expressed
in the Epistle to the Hebrews (xi. 19). Luther re
marked upon the obedience of faith : " Faith recon
ciles things which are contrary." [Abraham's fain
rested not upon the conclusions of his understand'ag,
but upon the word of God. The nature and strength
of his faith appear in that he held to the promise
while he went promptly to do what, to human view,
seemed to prevent its fulfilment. He set to his seal
that God was true. He believed that God would ful-
fil aU that he had promised. How he did not stay
to question. This is true faitli. It takes the word of
God as it is, in the face of all diflSculties, and acts
upon it. — A. G.] But this reconciliation of appar-
ent contradictions does not happen in this method,
that faith in blind passivity receives and holils the
contradictions, or rather, suffers them to remain
(as, e. g., univer.sal grace and particular election),
but that faith itself is brought, through tlie spirit of
revelation, to a higher standpoint. [But is not
this standpoint just that from which faith receives
truths apparently contradictory, upon their own evi-
dence in the word of God, and holds them, though it
is not seen how they can be reconciled? — .\.G.J — In
the anticipating activity of his faith, Ahraliam gained
the- idea of the resurrection, but in the .aciual issue
of the history of iIh' saciifice he gained the idea of
the true sacrifice (Ps. li. 18, 19: Heb. x. 19 ff.), as
aiao the fundamentnl form of the Old TcBi.nnent
sacrifice, [In Ihe staul nj liu aoii. " The woiiilerful
substitution in which God set forth, as in a liguro.
the plan of the Mos:uc economy, for the otl'cring of
animal victims instead of human sacrifices — pointing
forward to the ordy accrptaMe snlistituic whom thej
f(>ro>lia lowed, who is (iod's Lamb and not man's—
CHAP. XXII. I-I9.
the Lamb of God's providing and from his own
bosom. His only-begotten and well-beloved Son,
the man — the God-man." Jacobus. And this great
doctrine, running through the whole system of sac-
rifice, culminates in the sacrifice of Christ — the
imiocent in the stead of the guilty. — A. G.]
10. Delitzsch ; " The concession unto death at
the threshold of the preliminary history of the new-
humanity is not completed, but merely a prefiguration,
for Isaac's death would have been useless, but the
concession unto death at the threshold of the history
itself is completed, because the fulfilling and per-
fection of the death of Christ is the passing of
himself, and with him of humanity, into life. Judaism
believes diflFerently. It sees ui the sacrifice or bind-
ing of Isaac an act serviceable for all time, and
bringing Israel into favour with God. Where the
Church prays for the sake of the suti'ering and death
of Jesus Christ, the Synagogue prays for the sake
of the binding of Isaac " (p. 418).
11. T/u oath of Jehovah. It is not merely the
basis for the oaths of men, but: 1. The expression
of the absolute sell-determination, consciousness,
and faithfulness of the personal God ;* 2. The ex-
pression of a corresponding unshaken certainly of
faith in the hearts of believers ; 3. The expression
of the indissoluljle union between the divine promise
and the human assurance.
12. The n^ime Moriah')' points out that as God
himself perceives (selects) his sacrifice in the readi-
ness ot an obedient heart to make the sacrifice, man
should wait in expectation, and not make an arbitrary
and abominable sacrifice.
13. W. HoFF.MANN: " Until now we hear only of
the bruiser of the serpent, of a conqueror, of a bless-
ing of the nations, of a dominion ; in short only the
image of a great king and dominion, could present
itself to human thought as the form in which the
divine salvation should reach perfection. But now
sorrow, concession, death, the rendering of self
OS a sacrifice, enter into the circle of the hope of
nalvation, and indeed so enter that the hope of sal-
vation and the sacrifice belong together and are
inseparable."
14. The completion of the promise.^ As the
whole history of the sacrifice of Isaac is typical, so
,also is the expression of the completed promise. It
refers beyond Israel, to the innumerable children of
Abraham by faith, and the conquest of the world,
promised to them, appears both in the aspect of a
contest, as in that of the solemn feasts of victory
and blessing.
15. We cannot say directly that Abraham sacri-
ficed Isaac as a natural son, that he might receive
liim again sanctified and as a spiritual son. For
Isaac was given to him as the sou of the promise
from his birth. But lie aacrificed him in his present
corporeal nature, that h'S might receive him again as
the type of a second, new, and higher life. Thus
Israel must sacrifice its ideas of the present kingdom
of God in order to gain the true kingdom of God
• [An oath with God is a solemn pledring of himse'f in
»I1 the unchantreableness of his faithfulness and truth to
ti>; fulfilment of the promise. Murphy, p. 311. — A. G.l
The Mount of the Lord here means the very height
ftf the trial into which he bringa his saints. There "he
will certainly appear in due time for their deliverance.
MTmvHT, p. 341.— A. G.)
t (In this transfendent blessing, repeated on this mo-
no?ntous occasion, Abraham truly saw the day of the seed
at the woman, the seed of Abraham, the Son of man.
MOKPHY, p. 342.- A G.l
which is not of this world. The want of this idef
of sacrifice betrays the most of them into unbelief
through Chiliastic dreams. It happens similarly to
all who, in the sacrificial hour appointed by God
will not sacrifice their inherited ideas that they maj
gain a glorified form of faith. On the other hand
every arbitrary external sacrifice i? regarded and
judged as a self-chosen service of God.
16. The meaning of the ram in the sacrifice of
Abraham is not to be lightly estimated. It deeig
nates figuratively the fact, that Chiist also, in hi«
sacrificial death, has not lost his own peculiar life,
but, a.v t/ie hadlnc/ shepherd of /tin fork, has only
sacrificed his old temporal form of a servant, in order
that through his death he might redeem them from
death, the fear of death, the bondage of sin and
Satan, and introduce them into a higher, deathless life.
[In the person of Abraham is unfolded that
spiritual process by which the soul is drawn to God
He hears the call of God, and comes to the decisive
act of trusting in the revealed God of mercy aiic
truth, on the ground of which act he is accounted as
righteous. He then rises to the successive acts of
walking with God, covenanting with him, communing
and interceding with him, and at length withliolding
nothing that he has or holds dear from him. In all
this we discern certain primary and essential charac-
teristics of the man who is saved through acceptance
of the mercy of God proclaimed to him in a prime-
val gospel. Faith in God (eh. xv.), repentance
towards him (ch xvi.), and I'ellowship with him (ch.
xviii.), lire the three great Itirning-points of the
soul's returning life. 'They are built upon the effec-
tual call of God (ch. xii.), and culminate in unre-
served resignation to him (ch. xxii.). With wonder-
ful facility has the sacred record descended in this
pattern of spiritual biography, from the rational and
accountable race to the inchvidual and immortal soul,
and traced the footsteps of its path to God. Mer-
PHY p. 342.— A. G.]
HOMILETICAl AUD PRACTICAIj.
Through the traditional exegetical interpretation
the sacrifice of Isaac has often been used homileti-
cally without due caution. What Kurtz in his worit
asserts with confidence we often hear also from the
pul])it — God commanded Abraham to kill his son
Isaac. Thus a gross sensuous interpretation in fact
transforms a history which is the key to the nature
of the whole Old-Testament sacrificial system, which
presents in a striking light the humane aspect of the
theocracy in contrast with heathenism, into an of-
fence to the human and Christian feeling, i. e., an
offence which is burdensome and injurious to a lim-
ited and contracted theology, but must be carefully
distinguished from the ofieuces or ditliculties of un-
belief. We make this remark notwithstanding Kurtz
thinks that he nmst administer to us a rebuke for
similar utterances (p. 206). Luther also has already
spoken of the difficulty in treating this passage cor-
rectly.— Ver. 1. The testing or trying of Abraham,
as lull of temptation : 1. As a temptation ; 2. as a
testing. Or : 1. The sacrifice of God ; 2. Abraham's
oliedience of faith. — Ver. 2. Abraham's sacrifice : 1.
The command of God; 2. the leading of God; 3.
the decision of God ; 4. the judgment of God. — Ver
:i. Abraham's obedience of faith: 1. Faith as the
soul of obedience : 2. obedience as the full preser-
vation of laiili. — Abraham's sealing. — Ver. 16. Th«
«72
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
oath of God: 1. What it means; 2. as it perpetu-
ates and generaUzes itself in the sacraments ; S. to
whose advantage it will be. — The silence of Isaac. —
Ver. 4. .Abraham's journey to Moriah an image of
the way to all true saerifiee; 1. The journey thither;
2. the journey home. — Moriah, or tlie meeting of
God with the sacrificing belicTer: 1. God sees; 2.
he if seen, appears ; 3. he cares for, provides ; 4.
he himself selects his sacrifice ; 6. he gives to man
in an eternal form what he has taken from him in a
temporal form.
St ARK k: (Moses does not relate the peculiar time
of tliis svvere test of Abraham's faith. Some place
it in I lie thirteenth, others in the fifteenth, and still
others in the thirty-fifth or thirty-seventh year of
Isaac. Because iu this whole transaction Isaac was
a type of Christ, and he finished the work of redemp-
tion, through his death, in the thirty-third, or accord-
ing to others th" thirty-fourth, year of his age, it may
well be thought that in this year also Isa;ic was led
out as a sacrifice. — The existing incorrect use of the
typology still runs through the misconceptions of
Passavant and Schwenke. He is three and thirty
years old, says Schwenke; and Passavant says lie
was grown up to be a mature man.) — Some reckon
ten temptations wlierein Abraham's faith was put to
the test, among which this was the last and most se-
vere : 1. When he must leave his fatherland at the
call of God (ch. xii. 1), etc.— Ver. 2. (Of<r him
there^ put him to death with thine own hand, tlien
burn the dead body to ashes, thus make him a tiurut-
offering. — Luther and others think that Adam, Cain
and Abel, Noah also when he came from the ark,
held their worship of God and sacrificed upon this
mountain. Hence the Arabic and both the Chaldaic
interpreters name it the land of the worship and
service of God. — Various ancient utterances as to
the mountain of Moriah and its meaning follow.) —
Ver. 4. God reveals the place where our Saviour
should suffer and die, earlier than the city in wliich
he should be born (we must distinguish, however,
between verbal and typical prophecy). — The two ser-
vants of Abraham. It is scarcely, at least not seri-
ously, to be conjectured even, as the Chaldaic inter-
preters suppose, that they were Ishmael and ElieziT.
— Neither Sarah nor Isaac knew at the time the
special object of the journey. Undoubtedly the
mother would have placed many hindrances in the
way, and would have sought to dissuade Abraham
for entering it. — When it is said (Heb. xi. ID) that
he had received him as a figure, we discern what
Abraham knew through the illumination of the Holy
Spirit.' (At all events .\brahani knew that the sac-
rifice of the first-born should hencei'ortli lie an ordi-
nance of God, and that this should culminate in a
closing sacrifice bringing salvation). — The three days
of the Journey. — Abraham must in his heart hold his
eon as dead, as long as Christ should lie in the
grave. — Hut one must above all else guard against a
self-chosen service of (iod. — Upon ver. 8. He stood
at the time in the midst of the controversy between
natural love and faith. — (The altar upon Moriah.
The .Jews think that il was the altar wliicli Noah had
bnili u|ic>ri this mountain alter the flood, wldeh time
had thrown into ruins, but was again rebuilt by
Abralmm.) — Upon ver. IS. The LXX render, in the
thicket, Subek. They regarded it as a proper name,
Wiiich bIiuwb the ignorance of the Heljrew language
• flsaoc'fl dolivoranfifi woa a p:irublo or figure, viz., of
GhriiirH I isurrection. WuRDSwoaTn, p. 101.— A. U.]
in the Greek commentators, after the Babyloniaj
captivity. Starke records the fact, that some " Pa
pists" refer the expression of Christ upon the cross
lama sabacthnni, to this tiush .^abek, and that Athft
nasius says, Plaiita Sabek tst veneraitda <"/*«./•.— Com
parisiin of the sacrifice of Isaac with the death and
resurrection of Jesus (1 I'or. x. 13). Ver. 10.
Lange: God knows the right liour, indeed, the right
moment, to give his help. — Bi.bl Wirt, : If our obe
dience shall please God, it must be not merely ac-
cording to examples without command, but in accord
ance with the express word of God. — HM. Tub. .
Ver. II. When we cannot see on any side a way of
escape, then God comes and often shows us a won-
derful deliverance. — Hall : The true Christian motto
through the whole of life is : The Lord sees me. —
Ver. 15. The last manifestation of God with which
Abraham was directly honored, which appears in the
Holy Scriptures. — The oath of God : just as if ha
had sworn by his name, or by his life. In place of
this form of speech Christ uses very often the
Verily. — John xvi. 20. — What one gives for God,
and to him, is never lost. [Not only not lost, but
received back again in its higher form and use. Even
so every child of Abraham must hold all that is most
precious to him as the gift of God's grace; must
first yield to God the blessings which seem to come
to him as to others, as mere natural blessings, and
then receive them back as coming purely from his
grace. — A. G.]
I.isco: What could better teach the Jews the
true idea and aim of the whole sacrificial service (the
perfect yielding to God) than the history of Abra-
ham ? Ver. 6. Thus Jesus bare his cross. Ver. 18.
The great blessing is Christ who brings blessings to
all nations (Acts ill. 25 ; Gal. iii. 8). — When God
brings a dear child near to death, or indeed calls it
a" ay, he thus proves us iu a like way. — Gerlach .
The name Moriah signifies, shown, pointed out. by
Jehovah, and refers especially to the wonderful
pointing to the ram, through wliich Isaac was saved,
since this was for Abraham the turning-point of tlip
liistory, through which God confirmed his promisa
and crowned the faith of Abraham. — Ver. 12. God
hwioa : he knows from experience, from the testing,
that the man remains faithful to him, since without
the test his faithfulness is uncertain. He foreknew
it, in so far as he foreknew the result of the trial. —
Calw. Hand.: God naturally lays such severe trials
not upon children, but upon men. — Abraham kept
his faith in God, as Jehovah through his act ; now
also God will approve himself to Abraham, as Jeho-
vah.— This same promise appears lieie for tlie third
time (ch. xii. 3 ; xviii. 18) as a reward for Abraham's
obedience and triumph of faitli. — Each new well-
endured trial of faith leads to greater slrenffth of
faith; the fruitoi faith yields iiouri-shnient again to
faith itself. — The act of faith on the part of Abra-
lmm hire described, is held, not ojily by Jews and
Christians, but even by Mohammedans, as the very
acme of all his testing, and as the most complete
oliedicnce of his faith. — .SiHRiiDKit; Ver. 1. He ia
constantly ieailing us into situations in which what
lies concealed in the heai-t must be I'cvealed. — The
devil tempts that he may destroy ; (iod tempts that
he may crown (.\rabrose). — The tcTiiptation has as a
presupposition, that (lod has not yet been perfect!)'
foriiied In us (Uengstenberg). — The idea of the sac-
rifice (1 Sam. i. 25). And they .slew the bullock and
briinght the child to Eli (comp. Hos. xiv. 2 ; Micah
vi. 7 ; Ps. xl. 7-9 ; li. 19). — Eor this wljole his*i)iy, sei
CHAP. XXII. 1-19
478
the similar history (Judg. xi.). That Abraham him-
self is the priest, and his own heart, his own deepest
loTe, and all his blessing, is the sacrifice, this consti-
tutes the severity of the test (Krummacher).* — Ver.
5. We cannot regard these words as mere empty
words ; it is rather the word of hope which had not
forsaken Abraham (Baumgarten; also Gerlach). —
According to the Epistle to the Hebrews, an intima-
tion of the hope of the reawakening of Isaac. " But
then, indeed, some one objects, the very severe and
weighty thing in the sacrifice is taken away." Strauss
repUes to this by an allusion to the painfulness of
the death-beds of children to their parents, even
when they are assured of their resurrection. — It is a
more wonderful faith which supports itself even to
the issue which he did not see, as if he saw it
.(Strauss). — Ver. 9. The son is silent before the father,
as the father before God, and the child obeys the
parents as the parents obey the Lord (Strauss). — A
sacred contention finds place here. One elevates
himsrlf above human nature ; to the other to resist
the father seems more terrible than death (Gregory
Nyssa). Ver. 1 2. The apostle (Rom. viii. 32) takes
up again the last words of the Angel, and thus indi-
cates the typical relations of the event. — Ver. 13.
The entire Levitical system of sacrifices is only an
extension of this sacrifice of the ram (Richter). — It
is remarkable that the ram is destined among the
Greeks and Rom^ins as the substitutionary sacrifice
in the gravest cases (Baumgarten). It happens at
first according to the ordinance, that God by virtue
of his concealed providence places and controls what
may serve us, but it follows upon this that he stretches
out his hand to us, and reveals himself in an actual
experience (Calvin).— Ver. 18. The blessing given to
the nations in the seed of Abraham, they shall them-
selves come to desire and wish (Baumgarten). Abra-
ham's obedience is named here as a reason of the
promise. This is, too, a new reason (Baumgarten).
■ — (Abraham's obedience is, however, not so much a
reason of tlie promise as of the sealing of the prom-
ise through an oath.) — The promise is the promise
of the covenant. On the one h;ind it rests funda-
mentally upon the grace of God, on the other it is
introduced for Abraham through the obedience of
faith. — Abraham receives the name of the father of
• behevers through this completion of his faith (Baum-
garten). ((Certainly also through the whole develop-
ment of his faith.) — Ver. 16. There is a constant ref-
erence to this passage, as to the solemn, great, and
final explanation. Thus in ch. xxiv. 7 ; xxvi. 3 ;
Exod. xxxiii. ! ; Numb, xxxii. 11 ; Deut. xxix. 13 ;
xrx. 20 ; xxxiv. 4 ; Luke i. 73 ; Acts vii. 17 ; Heb.
* I What God required of .\braham was not the Bacrifiee
i( laaao, hot the mcr\/la o/ himte{f. Wobdbwobib, p. 97.
-A. a.)
vi. 13 (Drechsler). — It claims our notice still, thai
the Jews hold the binding of Isaac (vir. 9) a,'» a eat
isfaclion, and use in prayer the words. Consider th«
binding of thine only one (see above). " Indeed,
one hundred and sixty millions of Mohammedanf
also read in their Koran to-day. This truly was i
manifest testing " (Zahn). — Robiuson's description of
Beersheba. — Schwenke: The Lord knows how tt
reward his own. — Passavant : Abraham journeyi
the first, the second, the third day in silence. — Pre-
cious school of faith, the highest, the most sacred
school, how art thou now so greatly deserted ? —
Abraham has become the father of Christians. — Ver.
14. God sees, he will see, choose. — Reflection upon
the children of Abraham. — The future of Israel, of
behevers, etc. — (Passavant closes his work with these
reflections.) — W. Hoffmann: The consecration of
the promise through sacrifice : 1. The concession of
the promised son ; 2. the new reception of the prom-
ised son. — According to this history God tempted
Abraham. There the key is placed in your hand.
It was said indeed before, that the purpose of God
was not to secure an external offering, but an inward
sacrifice, etc. In this inbeing of the internal and
external, in this interworking of the divine and hu-
man, of the eternal and the earthly, there lay a severe
temptation, a constant inducement, to the believers
of the Old Tesiament, to rest satisfied with the mere
external, the mere shell, the sweet kernel, the fruit
of life itself being forfeited, to go on in security
indeed oftentimes to grow proud of their possession.
— Ver. 1. In how many ways he enters the family and
calls to the fatlier Abraham ! and when you know the
voice of the Lord, thus answer : Here am I. — Upon
Isaac. Almost entirely a feeble repetition of what
has appeared in the lite of Abraham. Ver. 9. But
he lay upon the altar in full consciousness and in si-
lence. There he lay himself, as a dumb sacrificial
lamb, at the feet of God. This is sufficient for a
lifetune of more than a century, and imparts to it, con-
tents, and a character, which admit of no exchange
for the better. — He gives Isaac to him in another
way than that in which he had called him his own
at first. The whole glory of a wonderful future sur-
rounds the head of Isaac— Taube : The obedience
of faith, or how first in the yielding of that whicli ia
most precious faith is tested : 1. God brings us to
this proof at the right time ; place yourselves there-
fore in his hands, as Abraliam ; 2. these tests are
very severe, and will ever grow more severe in their
progress, for they demand the death of self ; 3. these
tests have a blessed end for the tried and approved
believer; therefore let us follow the footsteps of
Abraham. — Heuser: The way of Abraham to thi
sacrifice. — The offeiing up of Isaac: 1. In its his-
torical detail ; 2. ir. its inward typical meanin^f.
474 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
ELEVENTH SECTION.
l%t gorrowt and joys of Abraham's domestic life. 7%« account and genealogy of those at homft,
Sarah's death. Her burial-place at Hebron ; the seed of the future inheritance of Canaan.
The theocratic foundation of the consecrated burial.
Chapter XXII. 20— XXIII. 20.
20 And it came to pass after these things that it was told Abraham, saying [what follows]
21 Behold, Milcah, she hath also borne children unto thy brother Nahor ; Huz [see oh. x. 23;
i light sandy land, in northern Arabia] his first-born, and BuZ [a people and region in western Arabia]
■^2 his brother, and Kemuel [the congregation of Gild] the father of Aram. And Chesed
[the name of a Chaldaio tribe], and HaZO [an Aramaic and Chaldaic tribe ; Gesenius ■ perhaps for min , vision]
and Pildash [Furst: aJX nis , flame of fire], and Jidlaph [Oesenlus: tearful; Furst : melting away
23 pining], and Bethuel [Gesenius : man of God. Fiirst : dwelling-place or people of God]. And Bethnel
begat Rebekah [Eibkah, captivating, ensnaring ; riirst : through beauty] : these eight Milcah did
24 bear to Nahor, Abraham's brother. And his concubine, whose name was Reumah
[Gesenius: raised, elevated; Furst: pearl or coral], she bare also Tebah [Ffirst : extension, brtadth ; a
locality in Mesopotamia], and Gaham [Gesenius : having flaming eyes ; Fflrst : the black ; an Aramaic, dark-
colored tribe], and Thahash [thenameof an uuknowu animal : badger, marten, seal?], and Maachab
[low-lands ; a locality at the foot of Hermon ; used besides as a female name].
Ch. XXIII. 1. And Sarah was an hundred and twenty and seven years old : these were
2 the years of the life of Sarah. And Sarah died in Kirjath-arba [city of Arba] ; the same
is Hebron in the land of Canaan : and Abraham came to mourn for Sarah, and to weep
for her.
3 And Abraliain stood up from before his dead, and spake unto the sons of Heth,
4 saying, I am a stranger and a sojourner [not a citizen] with you: give me a possession of
5 a burying-place with you, that I may bury my dead out of my sight. And the children
6 of Heth answered Abraham, saying unto iiim. Hear us, my lord : thou art a mighty
prince [a prince of God] among us: in the choice [most excellent] of our sepulchres bury thy
dead : none of us shall withhold from thee his sepulchre, but that thoii mayest bury
7 ihy dead. And Abraham stood up, and bowed himself to the people of the land, even
8 to the children of Heth. And he communed with them, saying, If it be your mind
[soul, soul-desire] that I should bury my dead out of my sight, hear me, and entreat for
9 me to Ephron [Fflrst: mon- powerful, stronger] the SOU of Zohar [splendor, noble]. That he
may give me the cave of Machpelah [Gesenius: doubling; Fflrst: winding, serpentine], which he
hath, which is in the end of his field ; for as much money as it is worth [full money] he
10 shall give it me for a possession of a burying-place [hereditary sepulchre] among you. And
Ephron dwelt [sat] among the children of Helh. And Ephron the Hittite answered
Abraham in the audience [ears] of the children of Heth, even of all that went in at the
11 gate of his city, saying. 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 :
12 bury thy dead. And Abraham bowed down himself Ijefore the people of the land.
13 And he spake unto Ephron in the audience of the people of the "and, saying. But if
thou wilt ijive it, I pray thee, hear me [give me hearing] : I will give thee money for the
14 field; lake it from me, and I will bury my dead there. And Ephron answered Abra^
16 ham, saying unto him. My lord, hearken unto me : the land is worth four hundred
'6 shekels of silver; what is that betwixt me and thee? bury therefore thy dead. And
Abraham hearkened [followed] unto Ephron; and Abraham weighed to Ephron the
silver which he had named in the audience of the sons of Heth, four hundred shekels of
silver, current money with the merchant.
17 And the field of Ephron, whicli was in Mnchpelah, which was before Manire, thu
field, and th*? cave which was therein, and all the trees which were in the field, that wen
18 in all the borders round about, were m.ade sure fstoud] Unto Abra'.am for a possession
CHAP. XXII. 20— XXin. 20.
475
m tlie presence of the children of Heth, before all that went In at the gate of his city.
19 And after this Abraham buried Sarah liis wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah
20 before Mamre : the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan. And the field, and the
cave that is therein, were made sure unto Abraham for a possession of a burying-place
bj the sons of Heth.
KXEOETICAIi A>T) CRITICAL.
1. Survey. The two sections wliich we have here
placed tog*i>er, with the following and the last sec-
tions of the life of Abraham, Ibrm a contrast with his
previous history. The revelations from God, the
wonderful events of his life, cease, tor Abraham's
life of faith is completed with the sacrifice of Isaac.
To tlie wonderful completion of the faith of Abraham
there is now added the purely natural and human per-
fection of Abraham. Its history is certainly much
shorter, but it is at the same time a proof that the
miraculous in the Old Testament does not stand in
anv exclusive relation to the natural and human. .\
mytholop;y seeking to produce effect, would have
closed the life of the father of the faithful with
some splendid supernatural or heroic events. It is,
on the other hand, a trait of the true historical charac-
ter of the tradition here, that it closes the life of
Abraham in the way already stated. But at the
same time the true christological character of the
Old Testament history, wherein it forms ihe intro-
duction to the New Testament manifestation of the
God-man, discovers itself therein, that the history
of the life of Abraham does not close abruptly with
uis greatest act of faith, but that from and out of
this act of faith there proceeds a natural and human
progress of a consecrated and sanctified life, a course
jf Ufe into which even the second marriage of Abra-
ham does cot enter as a disturbing element. A ter-
mination of this kind has already appeared in the life
of Noah, appears later in the life of Jacob ; and has
its New Testament coiraterpart in the history of the
forty days of tli'- risen Christ. But as in the Ufe of
Jesus, so in the lil'e of Abraham, the events after the
great contests of faith are not without importance.
The two sections which we have combined under
this point of view, the family sorrows and family joys
of Abraham point downwards to the history ol Isaac
' and Israel. From the son of Abraham there must
now be a family of Abiaham, and to this the family
genealogy nf the house of Nahor serves as an intro-
duction. This genealogical register first names Re-
bekah, and thus lays the ground for the mission and
the wooing of the bride by Eliezer (ch. xxiv.\ a
history iu which also the wooing of his bride by
Jacob is introduced through the mention of Laban.
But as the history of the family of Abraham is intro-
duced through the record of the house of Nahor, so
also is the first possession of Abraham and his
descendants in Canaan introduced by the narrative
of the death of Sarah. The burial-place in the cave
and field of Machpelah, are made a point of union for
the later appropriation of Canaan by the people of
God, just as in the new covenant, the grave of Christ
has introduced for Christians the future possession
of the earth ; a method of conquest which unfolds
itself through the graves of the martyrs and the
5rypts of Christian churches throughout the whole
world. "The testing of the faith of Abraham is
completed with the sacrifice of Isaac, the end of his
divine calling ia fulfilled, and henceforward the his-
tory of his life hastens to its conclusion. It is alto-
gether fiiting that there should follow now, after thu
event, a communication to him concerning the family
of his brother Nahor (ch. xL 27 ff.), which is joined
with so much appropriateness to the sacrifice o(
Isaac, since it leads on to the history of the marriaga
of the heir of the promise. The KTi ~5 (comp.
ch. ii. 29) also points to this actual connection. As
Sarah had borne a son to Abraham, Milcah also bare
sons to Nahor. X^n C5 of ver. 24 refers back to
ver. 20." Keil. — Schroder: "This paragraph is
merely a continuation of ch. xi. 27 ff. As ch. xix.
37, 38, brought the side line of Haran to its goal and
end, so here the side fine of Nahor is continued still
further, a testimony, moreover, that Moses never
loses tlie genealogical thread of the history."
2. Ch. xxii. 20-24. Kriobel holds the number
twelve of the sons of Nahor, as also of the sons of
Ishmael (ch. xxv. 13 ff.) for an imitation of the
twelve tribes of Israel. It is unjustifiable to infer
from such accidental, or even important resemblances,
without further grounds, that the record is fiction.
It is certainly true also, that of the sons of Nahor, as
also of the sons of Jacob, four are the sons of a con-
cubine. StiU, as Keil observes in the history of the
sons of Jacob, there are two mothers as also two con-
cubines. Keil also opposes, upon valid grounds, the
view of Knobel, that the twelve sons of Nahor must
signify twelve tribes of his descendants ; thus, e. g.,
Bethuel does not appear as the founder of a tribe.
" It is probably true only of some of the names, that
those who bore them were ancestors of tribes of the
same name." Keil. — Huz his first-bom. — He
must be distinguished from the son of Aram (ch. x.
23), and from the Edomite (ch. xixvi. 2S). Knobtl
holds that he must be sought in the neighborhood ot
the Edomitcs. — And Buz " also, since this trilie i<;
mentioned (Jer. xxv. 23) in connection with Dedan,
and Thema, and since Elihu, the fourth opponent of
Job, belonged to it (Job xxxii. 2)." Knobel. —
Kemuel — " Is not the ancestor or founder of the
Aramaic people, but an ancestor of the family oi
R;im, to which the Buzite, Elihu, also belonged,
since C-i!< stands for en." Keil. — Ohesed. — The
chief tribe of the Chaldees appears to have been older
than Chesed, but he seems to have been the tbunder
of a younger branch of the Chaldees who plundered
Job (Job i. 17). — Bethuel, the father of Rebekah
(see ch. xxv. 20). — Maacha. — Deut. iii. 14 ; Josh, xii
5, allude to the Maachathites. At the time of David
the land Maacha was a small Aramaic kingdom (2 Sam.
X. 6 -8 ; 1 Chron. xix. 6). " The others never appear
again." Keih For conjectures in regard to them, see
Knobel, p. 194. For the difference in the names
Aram, Uz, Cbasdim, see Delitzsch, p. 42'J.
3. Gerljch: " The German word ' A''^sw«6 ' sig-
nifies a woman taken out of the condition of service, or
bondage, and this is the meaning of the Hebrew term.
Besides one or more legal wives, a man might take,
according to the custom of the ancients, one from
the rank of slaves, whose children, not by Abraham,
but by Jacob, were made sharers alike with the le-
gally bom (naturally, since, they were held for th»
4r^
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
■doj-ted children of Rachel ami Leah). It was a
kind of lower marriage, as with us the lunrriage ' on
the left,' * tor the concubine was bound to remain
faithful (Judg. six. 2 ; 2 fam. iii. 7), and any otlior
man wlio went in unto her, must bring his trespass
oflering (Lev. six. 20); the father must treat tlie
eoncniiine of his son as his child, and the son
also, after the contraction of a marriage witli one of
W^ial rank, must still treat her as his concubine (Ex.
«ii. 9-10)."
4 Cli. 23. Sarah^s death and buHal in the cavf
vf Machpelak, purchased with the adjoining fieldy bi/
Abraham , from the children of Heth as a possession
of a b'lryinff-place. Knobel and Delitzsch find in
the anti(|ue and detailed method of statement, and
snnilar traits, the stamp of the characteristics of the
fundamental Elohistic writing. The more truly the
human side of the theocratic history comes into re-
lief, this peculiar, pleasant, picturesque tone of the
narrative appears, as, e. g., in the next so-called Je-
hovistic chapter. The division of this section into
two parts, the one of which should embrace only the
two first verses, Sarah's death (Delitzsch) is not in
accordance with the unique, pervading method of
statement throughout the whole. Sarah's grave was
the cradle of the Abrahamic kingdom in Canaan.
The scene of the narration is in Hebron (now El
Chalil). When Isaac was born, and also at the time
of his sacrifice, Abraham dwelt at Beersheba (ch.
xxii. 19). At Isaac's birth Sarah was ninety years
old (ch. xvii. 17), now she has reached 127 years,
and Isaac is thus in his 37th year (see ch. xxv. 20).
"Between the jouraey to Moriah, and Sarali's death,
there is tiius an interval of at least 20 years." De-
litzsch. During tliis interval Abraham must have
changed his dwelling place to Hebron again. The
mention of this change of residenee may have ap-
peared, therelbre, superfluous to the writer, and fur-
ther, it may be that even during his abode at Beer-
sheba, Hebron was his principal residence, as Knobel
conjectures. — The years of the life of Sarah. —
The age of Sarah was impressed on the memory of
the Israelites through this repetition, as a number
which should not be forgotten. Keil ; " Sarah is
the only woman whose age is recorded in the Bil}le,
because, as the mother of the seed of promise, she
became the mother of all believers (1 Pet. iii. 6)."
— Kirjath-Arba, the same is Kebron (see ch. xiii.
18)— The name Kiijath-Aiba, i. e., city of Arba, is
marked by Keil after Hengstenberg as the later
name (coming after Hebron), since the Anakim had
jot ilwrli there at tlie time of the patriarchs, but
Delitzsch. on the contrary, according to Josh. xiv.
15, and Judg. i. 10, views it as the earlier name.
Since, however. Num. xiii. 22, the city at the very
blooming periled of the Anakim, was called Ilebrnn,
»nd, indeeil, witli reference to its being fduniled
ueven years before Zoan (Tanis) in Egypt, it seinis
clear that while the time mentioned in the books of
Joshua and .luilgcs, was an earlier time, it was not
the carliist, and the succession in the natnes is this :
Hebron, Kirjath-.\rba, Hebron, El Chalil (the friend
of God, viz., Abraham). It Is still, however, a (pies-
tion whether Hebron may not designate specially a
• [Tho alltuion is to a Geilnan law or cui-fom, In rcpird
u> mflrriiiBTC Itctwprn persons of unoquiil niiik, and tlie ofl-
iprint? of hUch a inamiit'e. — A. O.]
['I'he r,/)nrutiiiii' wiu* a secor.rlaiT or lialf-wife, and iimnnir
the Hebrews tier i)OMitlon was welf definpd, and was not re-
eardtd as illr>j^ilininte. Her po-ition was not that of ii niis-
tresi, as we use tlic ttirro concubine.— A. G.)
valley city of this loc;ility, which belonged to tht
Hittites (see ch. xxxvii. 14, where Hebron is de^ertljeii
as a valley), the name Kirjath-.\rba, on the contrary,
the mouutain and mountain city, belonging to the
Anakim. The Incality seems to favor the supposi-
tion of two neighboring cities, of which one could
now use the valley city as the abode of Abraham for
the whole locality, and now the mountain city. W«
have coufe.'isedly to accept such a relation beiween
Sichem and the neighl)ormg town Sichar, in order to
meet the difficulty in John iv. 5. Delitzsch explains
the change of names through a change of owners.
E\en now Hebron is a celebrated city, at the sami
time a hill and valley city, although no longer, great
and populous, situated upon the way from Beer-
sheba to Jerusalem, and about midway between them
(7-8 hours from Jerusalem), surrounded by beautiful
vineyards, olive trees and orchards ; comp. the arti-
cles in Winer's "Dictionary," Vo.s Raumer, and
the various descriptions of travellers. [Robi.nson's
description (ii. 431-462) is full and accurate, and
leaves little to be desired. — A. G.] — In the land
of Canaan. — This circumstance appears here con-
spicuously in honor of Sarah, and Irom the import-
ance of her burial-place. — And Abraham came. —
The shepherd prince was busy in his calling in the
field, or in the environs. It is not said that he was
absent at the death of Sarah, but only that he now
sat down by the corpse at Hebron, to complete the
usages of mourning (to mourn for Sarah, and to weep
for her), and to provide for her burial. — From be-
fore his dead (corpse). — From before his dead. *
He had mourned in the presence of the dead , now
he goes to the gate of the city, where the people
assembled, where the business was transacted, and
where he could thus purchase a grave. — To the
sons of Heth. — The name, according to Knobel,
appears only in the Elohistic writings. [This at-
tempt to define and characterize particulai- points of
the liook by the use of special names, lu'caks down
so often that it may be regarded as no longer of any
serious importance — .\. G.] — A possess'ou of a
burying-place with you. — It is, as V. C. V. Moser
remarks, a beautifnl scene of politeness, simplicity,
kindness, frankness, humility, modesty, not un-
mingled with some shades of avarice, and of a kind
of expectation when one in effecting a sale, ihrowi
himself upon the generosity of the purchaser." De-
litzsch. The delicate affair is introduced by the
modest request of Abraham. As a stranger and a
sojourner f he had no possession, thus even no Ijiiry-
ing-plaee among them. He therefore asks thnt they
would .sell him a piece of ground for the purpose of
a burial-place. — Thou art a mighty prince (»
prince of God). — That is, a man td whom Hod ha.<i
given a princely aspect, in consequrnee of eom-
innnion with him. \\ man whom God lias f ivoi ed
and made great — A. G.] They offer hiru a sepul-
chre, among the most select of their sepulchres (upon
the exchange of 1^ for ^5 see Knobel and the op-
posing remarks by Keil). [~Hsb is generally used
absf)lutely, but the peculiarity here is not withoul
analogy (see Lev. xi. 1), and does not justify tho
change to IS nor that adopted by the Sept. N5. —
• f Sarah, thouph dead, wnsptill his. Wordswnrtli. — A.G.
t fWnidsworth heie calls attention to the fact that the
Apostlr Peter (1 Pet. ii. 11) quotes these words nB found in
the Scfitua^nnt, when he ndtlresses he)icv(rs as **Btranger»
iind jjluTnins." Thev were, like Abraham, the father oi th*
liiithlul.-A, G.'
CHAP. XXII. 20— XXIII. 20.
4-j-
A. G.] But Abi :iham cannot consent thus to mingle
timself with them. He has a separate l)urving-
p;ace in his eye. — And Abraham stood up. — The
referential bowing is an expression of his gratitude
and of his declining the offer. In the oriental bow-
ing the person touches the earth with his brow.
Luther often translates the word in question by " to
worship," in relation to men, wliere it is ol)viously
uiisuited to the sense. — If it be your mind. — Abra-
ham introduces, in a very courtly and prudent way,
his purpose to secure the oave of Ephron. It marks
Ephnin as a man of prominence and rank, tliat he
avails himself of their mti-rcession ; Keil infers from
the words his cil,i (ver. 10), that he was then lord of
the city. This is doubtful. — The cave of Mach-
pelah. — " The name is rendered in the Septuagint :
Ti. aiTvKmov ri Snr\ovi', according to the meaning of
n5B3T3. But it is a propernaine, which is also true
of' tlie field (eh. xlLt. 30; 1. 13), al'.hough it was
originally derived from the form of the cave." Keil.
Caves were often used for sepulchres in Palestine
(see Winer, sepulchres). — And Ephron, the Hit-
tite, ansivered. — " When now Ephron offered to
give the cave to Abraham — this is a mode of expres-
sion still in use in the East, by which, so far as it is
seriously intended, leaving out of view any regard to
a counterpresent, richly compensating the v;ilue of
the present, for the most part it is designed to pre-
vent any abatement from the price desired. [See
' The Land and the Book,' by Tho,\ipso.n, ii. 381-
388. — A. G.] (Comp. Dieterici and descriptions of
the Eastern lands, ii. p. lt;8 f.)." Keil. It is not
certain that we should identify so directly the orig-
inal utterance of true generosity with the like sound-
ing form of a later custom. It must be observed,
still, that Abraham modestly desired only to gain the
cave, a place which was at the end of the field, and
fc] this no one objected ; on the contrary, Ephron
offered him at the same time, the adjoining field.
And this is in favor of the good intention of Ephron,
since he could have sold to him the cave alone at a cost-
ly price. — And Abraham bowed dovrn Iiimself
(again). — An expression, again, of esteem, thank-
fulness, and at the same time, of a declinature, but,
also, an introduction to what follows. He presses,
repeatedly, for a definite purchase. The answer oi'
'Ephron: "The field, four hundred shekels," etc.,
announces again the price in courtly terms. Kiiobel
explains: "A piece of land of so little value could
not be the matter of a long transaction between
two rich men." But it is the more distinct echo of
the offer of the present, and with this utters an ex-
cuse or apology for the demand, because he (Abra-
ham) uouM insist upon having it thus. — And Abra-
ham weighed. — ".\t that time none of the states
had stamped coins which could be reckoned, but
pieces of the metals were introduced in the course of
trade, and these pieces were of definite weight, and,
indeed, also marked with designations of the weight,
but it was necessary to weigh these pieces in order
to guard against fraud " (see Winer, article Munzev).
Knobel. The use of coins for the greater con-
venience of original barter, has been regarded as
the invention of the PhoenicianH, as also the inven-
tion of letters is ascribed to them, — Current
money with the merchant. — The Hebrew term is
■^nos *:s, passing over, transitive; i. e., current,
fitted for exchange in merchandise. The idea of the
distinction between light pieces, and those of full
•reigbt, eiisled ilready. Keil ■■ ' The ihekel of sil-
ver used in trade was .about 274 Parisian grains, and
the price of the land, therefore, about 2.50 dollars, a
very considerable sura for the time." The Kabhins
ascribe the high price to the covetousnese of Ephron
Delitzsch, however, reminds us, that Jacob pureV-ased
a piece of ground for 100 na'C" (Gen. xxxiii. It),
and the ground and limits upon which Paniaria wm
built, cost two talents, i. e,, 6,ii00 heavy shekels o<
silver (1 Kings xvi. 24). For the shekel seeDELiT2SCH,
p. 42fi, [Also article in Kitto on " Weights ind
Measures," and in Smith's " Dictionary." — -A, G.]
It must be observed, too, that we cannot judge oi
the relation between the price and the field, since
we do not know its bounds. — Machpelah, vrhich
was before Mamre, — Kor these local relations
compare Delitzsch and Keil, and also v. Raumer,
p. 202. [Compare also Roiiinson : " Researches,"
vol, ii, pp. 431— }62; Stanley: " History of the Jew.
Church." This cave, so jealously guarded by thu
Mohammed.ans, has recently been entered by the
Prince of Wales with his suite. Dean Stanley, who
was permitted to enter the cave, says that the shrines
"are what the Biblical narrative would lead us to
expect, and there is evidence that the Moham-
medans have carefully guarded these sacred spots,
and they stand as the confirmation of our Christian
faith." — A. G.] The cave lay ■'3Eb (ver. 17; comp
ver. 19) before Mamre, i. e,, over against the oak
grove of Miimre; Keil and Knobel think eastward,
Delitzsch southerly. But the expression here does
not appear to refer to any quarter of the heavens.
The valley of Hebron runs from north to south, in
a southeasterly direction. Mamre and Maclipelah
must have been situated over against each other in
the two sides, or the two ends, of this valley. Since
tlie structure Harani, which the Mohammedan trad.-
tion (without doubt, a continuation of the earliei
Christian tradition,) designates as the cave of Mach-
pelah, or as AbT aham's grave, and which the Jloham-
medan power jealously guards against the entrance
of Jews or Christians, lies upon the mountain-slope
towards the east, it is clear that Mamre must be
sought upon the end of the valley, or mountain-
,'ilope tow.ird the west (the eastern side of the
same). Here lies the height Numeidi, which Ro.sen-
miillersays is the land of Mamre. We must then hoM
that the grove of Mamre descended into the valley,
and that Abraham dwelt here in the valley at the
edge of the grove. Still the opposition in locality
^the vh'ii-vis) may be defined from the high ground
which lies northerly from Heliron, and is called
Niinre or Nemreh ( = Mamre?), but even then also
.\brahara must have dwelt at the foot of this emi-
nence. However, according to the old Christian
tradition (Schubert, Robinson, Seetzeii, Ritter and
others), this Hebron of Abraham (Wady el Rame or
Ramet el Chalil, with its ruins of old walls and
foundations) lay about an hour northward from the
present city. This view is abandoned by the most
recent commentators, since this would require too
great a distance between Mamre and Hebron. So
much seems at least to be established, viz,, that the
tradition in regard to Machpelah is confirmed, then
that the tradition concerning Mamre and the loca
tion of Mamre, must be determined by the situation
of Machpelah. [In regard to the words of Bt,
Stephen, Acts. vii. 16, Wordsworth holds thai
.\braham purchased two burial-pl.ices, the first, the
cave of Machpelah, the second at Sichar or Shechem
and that it is by design that the one should be corn
478
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
municated to us bv the Holy Spirit, speaking by
Moses, the Hebrew legislator, anil tlie other by the
Hellenist Stephen, when he pleaded before the Jew-
ish Sanhedrim the cause of the faithful o/ all
nations, p. 103. See also Alexander "on the Acts."
— A. <} ] — And the field of Ephron was made
Stire, — The record of the transaction is very minute ;
first, in regard to the purchase price and the wit-
nesses (ver. 16), tlicn in regard to the piece of ground
;the cave, the field and all the trees) (ver. 17), finally,
in reference to the riglit of possession (again with
the mention of witnesses) (ver. IS); as if a legal
contract was made and executed. Even the burial
of Sarah belongs to the confiiniation of the posses-
sion, as is apparent from the forms of ver. 19, and
from the conclusion of the account in ver. 20.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
(Upon ch. xxii. 20-24.)
1. See the Exegetica! and Critical remarks.
2. Joy follows upon sorrow, comfort succeeds
the conflict. The message which Abraham received
was very providential, and comes at the right mo-
ment. Isaac was saved. Soon Abraham must think
of his marriage, and of the establishment of his
family through him. The opportune account from
Mesopotamia of tlie children of his brother Nahor
laid the foundation for the hope in him, that he
might find in his family a suitable bride for Isaac.
Rebekah also is mentioned in the report. Rebekah ap-
pears as the youngest branch of tlic children of Nahor,
his grandchild through Bethuel. She is in so far a
late-birth, as Isaac was. Her brother Laban, who,
in some respects, forms a parallel to Ishmael, the
brother of Isaac, first appears later in the history.
3. It avails not for the race to be hasty, the race
is not always to the swift. Nahor precedes Abraham
with his twelve sons, as Ishmael does Isaac. In the
line of Abraham, the twelve sons appear first in the
third generation.
4. The message from Nahor's house, the sign of
a relationship and love, sanctified through a reference
to higher ends,
5. Love excites the thoughts of the loved ones
in the distance, forms the greeting, and devises also
the messages in primitive times. Between the
earliest messengers, the angels of God, and the
latest form of human communication, the telegraph,
there is every possible form of communication and
kind of messengers ; but they all ought to serve, and
all shall, in accordance with their idea, serve the
purposes of love and the kingdom of God. — The
importance of the newspaper. — A pious man re-
marks ; I have only two nioulding books, the one is
the Bible, the other the newspaper. — We should view
all the events of the times in the light of God.
6. Nahor, the brother of Abraham, stands still
In a spiritual relationship with hini ; botJi his mes-
•agc, and the piety and nobleness of his grandchild
Rebekah, prove this. But he is clearly less refined
than Abrjtiiam. Abraham suffers the espousal of
Hagar to be pressi'd upon him, liecause he hail no
ehildren; but Nahor, who hail already eight children
by Milcah, tonk in addition to her a concubine,
Reumah. — Contrasts of this kind teach us to e.sti-
mate the higher direction of the partriarchal life,
"w e. g. alHo the history of Lot, will be estimated in
*be mirror of the history of Sodom.
(Upon ch. ixiii.;
1. See the Exegetical and Critical remarks.
2. Sarah. " It was in the land of promise tha
Sarah, the ancestress of Israel, died. The Old
Testament relates the end of no woman's lile so
particularly as the end of the life of Sarah — for she
is historically the most important woman of the old
covenant. She is the mother of the seed of promise,
and in him of all believers (1 Pet iii. 6). She is the
Mary of the old Testament. In her unshaken faiih
Mary rises still higher than Sarah, but the Scriptures
neither record tlie lengtli of her life, nor her death.
This occurs because the son whom Sarah bare was
not greater than herself, but Mary bore a son before
whose glory all her own personality fades and vun-
ishes away," etc. Delitzscli.
3. Abraham, the father of believers, also a mode!
of the customary courtliness, and a proof how tWa
courtliness is, at the same time, an expression of re-
gard, of human love and gratitude, a polished Ibrm
of human friendship, and a protection of personality
and truth. [Religion does not consist entirely in acts
of wor.ship, in great self-denials or heroic virtues,
but in all the daily concerns and acts of our lives.
It moulds and regulates our joys and sorrows; it
affects our relations ; it enters into our business.
Thus we have the faith and piety of Abraham, pre-
sented in the ordinary changes, the joys, the sorrows,
and the business transactions of his life. — A. G. ]
4. Our history is a living portraiture of the court-
Imess and urbanity general in the remote antiquity
and in the East.
6. The trafljcand purchase of Abraham, through
out, a testimony of Israelitish prudence and fore-
sight, but free from all Jewish meanness and covet-
ousness.
6. The gradual development of money, or of the
measures in value of earthly thinj;s, proceeding from
the rating of the nobler metals, especially of silver,
according to its weight. The importance of the
Phoenicians in this respect.
7. A precious gain, the gain of a burial posses-
sion for her descendants, is connected with the death
of Sarah. " The first real-estate property of the
patriarclis was a grave. This is the only good which
they buy from the world, the only enduring thing
they find here below, etc. In that sepulchre Abra-
ham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, were laid, there
Jacob laid Leah, and there Jacob himself would rest
after his death, even in death itself a confessor of his
faith in the promise. This place of the dead becomes
the jmtictum salietis of the possession of the promised
land. It was designedly thus minutely described, as
the glorious acquisition of the ancestors of Israel. It
was indeed the bond which ever hound the descend-
ants of Abraham in F.gypt to the land of pnunise,
drew with magnetic power their desire,'^ thither, and,
collected in Canaan, they should know where the
ashes of their fathers rested, and that they are called
10 inherit the promise, for which their fathers were
/icre laid in the grave." Delitz.sch. — The cave Mach-
yielah became for the Israelites the sacred grave of
the old covenant, which they won again with the
conquest of (^anaan, just as the Christians in the cru
sades reconqucreil the sacred grave of the new cove-
nant, and with it Palestine. And the Cliristiins also,
like the Jews, have lost again their s.aered grave end
thi'ir holy land, because they have not inwardlj
adhered sufficiently to the faith of tlie fathers, whc
beyond the sacred grave looked for the eternal clL'
CHAP. XXII. 20— XXIII. 1-2U.
47t
i{ God : because they have sought too much " the
•jving amoug tht dead." Even now the last desire
of the orthodox Jews is for a grave at Jt-rusalem, in
Canaan. [The transaction in securing this Ijurial-
olace was, not as some have thought, to secure a
itle to the land of promise, that was perfect and
ecure in the sovereign promise of God : but it
iraa : I . A declaration of the faith of Abraham in
the promise; 2. a pledge and memorial to. his de-
Bcendants, when in captivilv, of their interest in the
land.— A. G.l
8. Although the ancients did not easily receive
a stranger into their family tombs (among the
Greeks and Romans usage forbade it), the Hittites
are ready to receive Sarah into their best family
sepulclires, as Joseph of Arimathea took the body
of our Lord into his own tomb. This is a strong
testimony to the impression which Abraham, and
Sarah also, had made upon them, to their reverence
and attachment for the patriarchal couple. They ap-
pear also, like Abimelech at Gerar, to have had their
original monotheism awakened and strengthened by
their intercourse with Abraham, whom they honor as
a " Prince of God."
9. Hebron, the first royal city of David, is situated
five hours southerly from Bethlehem, his native city.
How deeply the present spiritual relations of Hebron
lie below the splendor of the royal city of David !
Its inhabitants cultivate the vine, cotton, have glass-
works, and hve " in constant feuds with the Bethle-
hemites." V. Raumer.
10. The custom of burial and the sanctification
of the grave, after the intimation, ch. xv. 15, appears
here in a striking and impressive manner.
1 1. In order to preserve his hope for Canaan
jure, Abraham could not entangle himself with the
Caananites, thus : 1. He could not use, in common
with the heathen, their sepulchre ; 2. lie could not
receive as a present a possession in the land. [This
otapter is interesting ^s containing the first record
of mourning for the dead, of burial, of property in
land, of purchase of land, of silver as a medium of
purchase, and of a standard of weight. Morphy, p.
847.— A. G.]
HOMILETIOAL AND PEAOTIOAI/.
(TJpon ch. xxii. 20-24.)
Human consolation follows the great conflict and
victory of faith. — The joyful message which Abraham
received: a. From his home; b. from his blood rela-
tions ; c. from his spiritual kindred. — The destination
and the blessing of the tics of relationship, in the
widest sense. — The end and the blessing of all com-
munication in the world. — All human messengers
should be messengers of love, in joy and sorrow. —
Salutations, messages, letters, journals, are all also
under the conduct of divine providence. Human
missions are accompanied by divine missions. — A
people spring from children, or how sisnificantly
liebekah here comes forward from her conceal-
ment.— The joy of a loving participation in the
happiness of companions — neighbors. Starke: (A
picture of Syria and Babylon.) Ps. cxii. 2; cxxvii. 3.
— OsiANPER : God usually refreshes and quickens
his people again, after temptation. — Calwer, Haiid-
Imcli : When Isaac was about to be offered, God
allows him to hear that his future wife was born ami
educated.
(Upon cti. xxiii.)
The richly blessed end of Sarah as it appears : i
In the quenchless memory of her age by Israel ; 2.
in the raonrning of Abraham ; 3. in his tare for hei
grave ; 4. in the esteem of the Hittites (every on«
is ready to admit her into his se|iulehre) ; 5. in th«
opportunity for the securing of the sepulchre as t
possession by Abraham. — The whole cha])ter instruo
tive on the grave, as is chapter fifth on death, the
eleventh chapter of John on the resurrection from
the grave : 1. Of death ; * 2. of mourning ; 3. of the
acquisition of sepulchres ; 4. of the burial itself; 5.
of hope over the grave. — The true mourning a sanc-
tified feeling of death : 1. A fellow-feeling of death,
with the dead ; 2. an anticipation of death, or a liv-
ing preparation for one's own death ; 3. a believing
sense of the end or destination of death, to be made
uselul to the hfe. — Sarah's grave a sign of Ufe : 1. A
monument of faith, a token of hope ; 2. an image
of the state of rest for the patriarchs ; 3. a sign of the
home and of the longing of Israel ; 4. a sign or
prognostic of the New-Testament graves. — The sol-
emn burial of the corpse: 1. An expression of the
esteem of personality even in its dead image; 2. an
expression of the hope of a new Ufe.f^Tlie sancti-
fication of the grave for a family sepulchre, fore-
shadowing the sanctification of the church-yards oi
God's-acres. — Abraham the father of believers, alsc
the founder of a believing consecration of the grave
— offers themes for funeral discourses, dedication
of church-yards, and at mourning solemnities. — The
first possession which Abraham bought was a grave
for Sarah, for his household, for himself even. —
The choice of the grave: 1. Significantly situated (a
double cave) ; 2. still more snitably (at the end of
the field). — Israel's first possession of the soil : the
grave of Sarah ; the first earthly house of the Chris-
tian ; the grave of Christ and the graves of the
martyrs. — Ver. 2. The mourning of Abraham: 1.
Its sincerity (as he left his pursuits and sat or lay
before the corpse); 2. its limit, and the preservation
of his piety (as he rose up from before the corpse,
and purchased the grave). — Abraham himself must
have had his own mortality brought to his mind by
the death of Sarah, since he cared for a common
grave. — Vers. 9, 13. Abraham's traffic ; 1. In his
transparency ; 2. his purity ; 3. his carefulness and
security. — Abraham and the Hittites a lively image
of the Eastern courthness in the early times. — The
true politeness of spirit as a cultivation of hearty
human friendliness, in its meaning : 1. Upon what
it rests (respect for our fellows and self-respect) ; 2.
what it effects (the true position toward our neigh-
bors, as an olive-branch of peace and a protection
of personal honor). — The mysterious sepulchre at
Hebron. — The Mohammedans as the intelligent pro-
tectors of the graves of the East until the time ot' its
restitution. — Starke : (There is no ground for the
saying of the Rabbins, that Sarah died from sorrow
when she learned of the sacrifice of Isaac). — The
fear of God makes no one insensible to feeling, as
the Stoics have asserted (Job xiv. 5 ; 1 Thess. iv.
13 ; Ps. xxxix. 5, 6). — Ver. 13. There is a referenfts
* [The patriarch had encountered othei' triaU. but h«
liad bitherto been spared this of death. But now death en-
ters. No health, relalions, affections, can resist the march
and power of d*-:ith. Abraham has in lieart parted with hiJ
children, now he must part actually from her who had
shared all his trials and hopes. — A. G.]
t (In that grave was implied the hope of Resurrectio*
VTORDSWOHTH, p. 104. — A. G.l
480
GENESIS, OK THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES
here to the first money transaction, for the land was
not to be received as a present, or be held without
price, by Abraham, but by his successors, hence he
must pay for what he obtains (Acts vii. 6). This
was, however, plainly the ordering of God, that
Abraham, through a purchase of a burial-place with
money, should have a foothold, and some possession
of property, as a pleilge of the fiiiure possession. —
God also shows tliat he takes the dead into his care
and protection, and he would never do this had he
not a purpose to reawaken the dead. — Cramer : We
should proceed with gentleness and modesty in our
dealings with any one. — llihl. Tub. : Purchases
should be made with prudence, that we may not give
cause for controversy (1 Cor. vi. 7). — We should veil
in a seemly way the bodies of the dead, and bear
them reverently to the grave. — Lisco : Thus Abra-
ham gained the first possession in the land of prom-
ise; here he would bury Sarah, here he himself
would be buried ; thus he testifies to his faith in tb4
certainty of the divine promise made to lura. as in a
later case the prophet Jeremiah, just before the exile,
testified his faith in tlie return ot Israel froia its ban-
ishment, by the purchase of the field of Ilanaraeei
at Anathoth (Jer. xxxii.!. — Calwer, Handhuch
The possession of a huryiug-plLce as his own, satia»
fied the pious pilgrim, and is for him a pledge of tht
full possession of thi' land by his successors. — .'^CHRo-
dkr: Ver. 1. Then also the believer mav recollect
how God has written nil his days in his book. Ps.
cxxxix. 16 i^Brrleb. Bib/.). — Ver. 2. The tear of sor-
sow has its right in the heart, because it is a human
licaKt ; but there is a despair concerning death, as
concerning sin. — It is thoughtfully tender to lay the
children of the mother earth again in her bosom (Sir.
xl. 1). — The money with which he secures the cave
is the blessing of God ; thus God procures for him
peculiarly a possession in the land of promise.
TWELFTH SECTION.
Abraham^$ care for Isaac's marriage. Eliezer's wooing of the bride for Isaac. The theocralie found-
ing of a pious bride-wooing, Isaac's marriage.
Chafter XXrV. 1-67.
1 And Abraham was old, and well stricken [advanced] in age : and the Lord had
2 blessed Abraham in all things. And Abraham said unto his eldest servant' of his house,
3 that ruled over all that he had, Put, 1 pray thee, thy hand under my thigh : And 1
will make thee swear by. the Lord, the God of heaven, and the God of the earth, that
thou shalt not take a wife unto my son, of the daughters of the Canaanites, among
4 whom I dwell : But thou shalt go unto my country, and to my kindred, and take a
5 wife unto my son Isaac. And the servant said unto him, Peradventure, the woman
will not be willing to follow me into this land ; must I needs bring thy son again into
6 the land from wlience thou earnest? And Abraham said unto him, Beware that thou
bring not my son thither again.
7 The Lord God of heaven, which took me from my father's house, and from the land
of my kindred, and which spake unto me, and that sware unto me, .saying, Unto thy
seed will I give tliis land, he shall send his angel before thee, and thou shalt take a
8 wife unto my son from thence. And if the woman will not be willing to follow thee,
then thou shalt be clear from this thine oath : only bring not my son thither again.
9 And the servant put his hand under the thigh of Abraham his master, and sware to
him concerning that matter.
10 And the servant took ten camels of the camels of his master, and departed ; for
all the goods of his master [with every kind of costly goods] were in his hand; and he arose
1 1 and went to Mesopota.niia, unto the city of Nahor. And he made his camels to kneel
down without the city by a well of water, at the time of the evening, even at the time
12 that wo nen go out to draw water. And he said, 0 Lord God of my master Abraham,
I pray tliee send me good speed ' this day, and show kindness unto my master Abra-
13 hsin. Behold I stiiud here by the well of water; and thedaughters of the men of the
14 city come out to draw water : And let it come to pass that the damsel to whom I shall
say. Let down thy pitcher, I pray thee, that 1 may drink ; and she shall say, Drink,
and I will give thy camels drink also ; let the same be she that thou hast appointed foj
thy servant Isaac ; and thereby shall I know that thou hast showed kindness unto mj
master.
CHAP. XXIV. 1-67. 48'
15 And it came to pass, before he had done speaking, that behold, Rebekah came ou^
who was born to Bethuel, son of Milcali, the wife of Nahor, Abraham's brotiier, with
16 her pitcher upon her shoulder. And tiie damsel ivas ver\' fair to look upon, a virgin;
neither had any man known her ; and she went down to the well and filled her pitcher,
17 and came up. And the servant ran to meet her, and said. Let me, I pray thee, drink
18 a little water from thy pitcher. And she said, Drink, my lurd ; and she hasted, and let
19 down her pitcher upon her liand, and gave him drink. And when she had done giviT g
him drink, she said. I will draw water for thy camels also, until they have done drin t-
20 ing. And she hasted, and emptied her pitcher into the trough, and ran again unto the
21 well to draw water, and drew for all his camels. And the man, wondering at her, held
his peace [waiting to know], to wit whether the Lord had made his journey prosperous or
22 not. And it came to pass, as the camels had done drinking, that the man took a golden
ear [nosej ring, of half a shekel weight, and two bracelets for her hands, of ten shekels
23 weight of gold, A.nd said. Whose daughter art thou ? tell me, I pray thee : is there
24 room in thy father's house for us to lodge in? And she said unto him, I am the
25 daughter of Bethuel, the son of Milcah, which she bare unto Nahor. She said, more-
26 over, unto him. We have both straw and provender enough, and room to lodge in. And
27 the man bowed down his head, and worshipped the Lord. And he said, Blessed be
the Lord God of my master Abraham, who hath not left destitute my master of his
mercy and his truth : T heing in the way, the Lord led me to the house of my
28 master's brethren. And the damsel ran and told tiiem of her mother's house these
things.
29 And Rebekah had a brother, and his name was Laban [the white] : and Laban ran
30 out unto the man, unto the well. And it came to pass, when he saw the ear [nose] ring
and 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, ana hehol
31 he stood by the camels at the well. And he said, Come in, thou blessed of the Lord
wherefore standest thou without ? for I have prepared the house, and room for th'
camels.
32 And the man came into the house : and he [Laban] ungirded his camels, and gave
straw and provender for his camels, and water to wash his feet, and the men's feet tha"
33 were with him. And there was set [as the imperf. Kai of :•:;-] ?nfa/ before him to eat : but
he said, 1 will not eat until I have told mine errand. And he [Laban] said, speak on.
34, 35 And he said, I am Abraham's servant. And the Lord hath blessed my master
greatly, and he is become great; and he hath given him flocks, and herds, and silver,
36 and gold, and men-servants, ana maid-servants, and camels, and asses. And Sarah, my
master's wife, bare a son to my master when she was old: and unto him hath he given
37 all th.at he hath. And my master made me swear, saying. Thou shalt not take a wife
'38 to my son of the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I dwell. But thou shalt '
39 go unto my father's house, and to my kindred, and take a wife unto my son. And I
40 said unto my master, Peradventure the woman will not follow me. And he said unto
me. The Lord, before, whom I walk, will send his angel with thee, and will prosper thy
way ; and thou shalt take a wife for my sou of my kindred and of my father's house.
41 Then shalt thou be clear from this mine oath [the oath given by me] when thou comest to
42 my kindred ; and if they give not thee one, thou shalt be clear from my oath. And [
came this day imto the well, and said, O Lord God of my master Abraham, if now
43 thou do prosper my way which I go : Behold, I stand by the well of water ; and it
shall come to pass, when the virgin cometh forth to draw water, and I say unto her
Give me, I pray thee, a little water of thy pitcher [ns.bucliet; a jug similar to a pail or backet,
44 of wide mouth] to diiuk : And she say to me. Both drink thou, and I will aI;io draw for
thy camels : let the same he the woman whom the Lord hath appointed out for mj
45 master's son. And before I had done speaking in my heart [in myself], behold, Rebekah
came forth with her pitcher on her shoulder ; and she went down unto the well, and
46 drew water , and I said unto her. Let me drink, I pray thee. And she made Liste,
and let down her pitcher from her shoulder, and said. Drink, and I will give thy csraela
47 drink also : so I drank, and she made the camels drink also. 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 1 put the ear Inose] ring upcn her face, and tha
31
482
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSJSS.
48 bracelets upon lier hands. And I bowed down my head and worsiiipped the Lord
and blessed the Lord God of my master Abraham, which liad led me in the right way,
49 to take my master's brother's daughter unto his son. And now if yo will [are ready to]
deal kindly and truly with my master, tell me : and if not, tell me : that I may turn !;o
50 the right hand or to the left. Then Laban and Bethuel answered and said. The thing
prcceedeth from the Lord; we cannot speak [in our own choice] unto thee bad or good.
61 Behold Rcbekah is before thee, take her, and go, and let her be thy master's son's wif^
62 as the Lc:d hath spoken. And it came to pass, that, when Abraham's servant heard
53 their words, he worshipped the Lord, bowing himself to the eartli. And the servant
brought forth jewels of silver, and jewels of gold, and raiment, and gave tlieui to
54 Rebekah : he gave also to her brother and to her mother precious things. And they
did eat and drink, he and the men that were with him, and tarried all night ; and they
55 rose up in the morning, and he said, Send me away unto my master. And her brother
and her mother said, Let the damsel abide with us a few days [a circle of days], at the least
56 ten [a decade] ; after that she shall go. And he said unto them. Hinder me not, seeing
57 the Lord hath prospered my way ; send me away, that 1 may go to my master. And
58 they said, We will call the damsel, and inquire at her mouth. And they called
Rebekah, and said unto her. Wilt thou go with this man ? And she said, I
59 will go. And they sent away Rebekah their sister, and her nurse, and Abraham's
60 servant, and his men. And they blessed Rebekah, and said unto her. Thou art our
sister ; be thou the mother of thousands of millions, and let thy seed possess the gate
of those which hate them [enemies].
61 And Rebekah arose, and her damsels, and they rode upon the camels, and followed
62 the man : and the servant took Rebekah, and went his way. And Isaac came from
th« way of [visit to] the well Lahai-roi [of the Uraig— animating, quickening-vision] ; for he dwelt
63 [had his station] in the south country. And Isaac went out [now northwards] to meditate in
the field [the northern field-region] at the eventide : and he lifted up his eyes, and saw, and,
64 behold, the camels ivere coming. And Rebekah lifted up her eyes ; and when she saw
65 Isaac, she lighted off the camel. For she had said' unto the servant. What man ia
this that walketh in the field to meet us? And the servant had said, It is my master:
66 therefore she took a veil and covered herself And the servant told Isaac all things
67 that he bad done. And Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah's tent, and took Re-
bekah, and she became his wife ; and he loved her : and Isaac was comforted after his
mother's death.
f ^ Ver. 2. — Heb. Ida ser'vavt, the elder of his house. — A. G.
I* Ver. 12. — Heb. cause it to occur. — A. G.l
(" Ver. 38.— Sb rX , if thou Shalt not.— A. G.]
[« Ver. 65.— Heb. and said.— A. Q.]
GENEEAL REMAEKS.
To the chapter upon the sepulchre and the burial
of the dead, there follows now a chapter upon the
wooing of the bride. The former has greater
strength of expression, grounded in the last need,
death and the care fur the dead ; the latter has
greater richness and life, and glows in all the fresh-
ness and fulness of a sacied, liihlical idyll, the first
pearl in that string of pearls, in the religious gloriti-
cation of the human bridal state winch runs down
through the wooing of Rachel by Jacob, the littlr
book of Ruth, to its culmination in the Siiiig of
Songs. Abriiham was warned by the death of Sarah,
to 8ct the concerns of his hnuse in order, to seek a
Inide for Isaac, and thus to provide for his descend-
ftrla. The narrative joiim one beautiful trait to
another, until the circle is complete; the spirit of his
tnaeter Abraham, who Inid instructed him, is clearly
reflected in the faithful and prudent bridal joiimey of
nis servant, and Rebekah a|)pi'ars bora the be .'ini\ing
M the glorious, lovely and boldly-determined iiiaidcn.
p«culiarly fitted for the qviiet, patient Isaac. " Hn-
maidy speaking, the following history belongs to the
most attractive portions of the first book of Moses;
we are tempted to call it a liiblical idyll. Evcrvthing
iti these verses, down to the most minute part, is
finished and elaborated with inimitable beauty."
.'^eliroder. Delitzsch refers to the excellent treat-
ment of this narrative by F. C. V. Movers. The
fundamental thought in the narrative is the provi-
dence of liod in Isaac's marriage. It appears in
Abraham's believing foresight and care for Isaac, id
the faithfulness and prudence of his servant, in the
ha|i|iy meeting of Rebekah and the servant, in the
\i\id life picture and character ot" Rebekah, in the
hospitaUty and the pious spirit of her house, even
in the self-interested conduct of Laban, in the meet-
ing of Isaac and Uebekah, in the movinicDt of her
heart, and in his love. " It is thus through the provi
dunce ol (lod that Rebekah l>ecanie the "ife ol Isaac,
and an ancestress of thi' people of tlod." Knobel.
The documentary hypothesis falls into perplexity
here, since, Bccoi ding to cb. xxiii. indch-xiv. 19, t>^»
CHAP. XXIV. 1-67.
483
(ymdamental writing must have related this mairiafie.
It relieves itself with the conjecture tliat the hrief
Elohistic narration has been displaced hy this longer
Jehovistic narrative. Knobel finds in the fact that
the mission proceeds from Abraham, and the report
'b maile to Isaac, although he has no real ground for
the conjecture, as also in similar cases, the tiaces
that the narrative is not genuine. [VVhicli is njuch
the same as if he had said, since the narrative is not
constructed as I think it should have been, it cannot
be genuine. — A. G.] It may be divided into the fol-
lowing particular portions : 1. The arrangement of
the theocratic journey for the bride, the spiritual
image and character of the bride (vers. 1-9);
2. the journey for the bride, and the choice of the
bride (vers. 10-21); 3. the entrance into the house
of the bride (vers. 22-33) ; 4. the wooing of the
bride (vers. 34—49); .5. the rewards for the bride
(vers. 50-54) ; 6. the bridal journey (vers. 64-61);
7. the meeting of the bridegroom and the bride
(vers. 62-67).
EXEGETIOAL AND CKITICAl.
1. The arrangement of the theocratic journey for
the bride (vers. 1-9). — And Abraham. — The mo-
tives for his arrangement : 1. After Sarah's death
his age warned him to provide for Isaac's marriage.
2. the blessing of Jeliovah warns him, he must now
through the marriage of his son, do his own part,
that the blessing might be preserved. His faith and
his acts of faith must correspond to the promise of
blessing of Jehovah. Isaac could not marry a
Canaanitess, but only a Shemitess, one who was of
equal birth in a theocratic point of view. It might
possibly be from his own ancestral home, and the
account which he had received of the home of
Nahor, favored his hope. He could not think of
Lot's daughters — Unto his eldest * servant. — It
IS usually inferred from ch. xv. 2, that Eliezer of
Damascus is here meant. Gerlach says it is not
probable, because he is not named. For the same
reason the Calwer Handbuch concludes that he is
intended, because otherwise the servant would be
named in so important a mission, and this inference
< is just. Eleazer was pecuharly fitted lor this nns-
sion, as an old man in the school of Abraham
(more than 60 years had elapsed since ch. xv. 2).
Eleazer thus stands for all time as the type of all
pious and prudent bride-wooers. He is a steward or
ruler of the whole hou'^e, thus a trusted servant.
[The word servant like the word elder, is an official
title. Busli refer.^ to Gen. xl. 30 ; Ex. xii. 30 ; Deut.
ixxiv. 5 ; Heb. iii. 5 ; and for elder to Gen. 1. 7 ;
Ruth iv. 2 ; Tim. v. 17.— A. G.] Still the present
mission of Abraham is so important, that he lays
him under the obligations of an oath. — Put thy
hand under my thigh. — This usage in the oath is
referred to only in one other place (ch. xlvii. •>»).
The person who took the oath, was to place his
hand under the thigh of him to whom it was given.
Some refer this rite to a heathen idea or imagina-
tion. "It points to the generating member, whicli,
ts the organ ci the generative strength of nature.
• [Here the terrn elder approaches its official sigrnitlcii-
tion. Mdrpht, p. 353. — A. G.]
[** The e/(f«r was not a title of age, but of offict. It piissed
In'o the Church, coming down to us from the Jewish
CLarch." Jacobus. — A. G.J
had a kind of sacredness among the ancients, and U
the Phallus (or Bacchus) worship, had a kiml of re-
ligious honor ( Arnob. advers, Gent. 5), e. g. : amon^
the Egyptians (Hkrod., ii. 48 ; Plitarch ; Theo-
noRET), among the Syrians (Lucian), at times even
among the Hebrews (1 Kings xv. 13 ?). It is record-
ed of the Egyptian Bedouin in modem times, that
in a solemn iisseveration or oath he |ilaces his hand
upon the generative organ (Sonnim. ; ' Travels,
ii. p. 474)." Knobel. According to the Jewish ides
(wliicli the Targums, Jonathan, Jarchi, Tuch, etc.,
follow), the rite relates to the generative member in
its relations to God, by virtue of circumcision. VoD
Bohlen, Gesenius, Knobel, bring together these two
ideas or explanations. The explanation of the an-
cients, that Abraham, with reference to the promise
of the covenant, "had in his mind the promised seed
of the covenant, the future Christ," is a mystical and
Christian idea, not improperly adduced heie, remarks
Delitzsch, although the thought is " usually regarded
as belonging to the New Testament (see Strippel-
MANN : ' The Christian Oath,' p. 22). It is doubtful
whether opKos and opm^., tesiari and tei^ticulua^ stand
m a relation referring back to this custom." Since
the hand in the oath has always the signification of
pledging oneself, we must inquire first of all, what
rite-forms of the hand in the person who takes the
oath, usually appear. But now Abraham, when he
takes the oath (ch. xiv. 22), raises his hand to hi'aven,
before those around him, when he worshipped the
El Eljon, the heavenly exalted God (comp. Rev. x.
5-6). According to Ezek. xx. 5, the object of the
hand is generally to mark the subject in respect to
which the obligation is taken. In this idea the
Christian oatli is taken upon the gospel, or even upon
a chest of relics. Wlien, therefore, Eleazer and
Joseph give the oath, in that they place their handa
upon the thigh of the one swearing them, the act
had a special meaning. The thigh is the symbol of
posterity ; in Israel the symbol of the promised pos-
terity, with the included idea of the promise. Gen.
xlvi. 26 ; Ex. i. 5. Eleazer and Joseph thus must
swear by the posterity, the promise and the hope of
Abraham and Israel.* This promise should be
changed into a curse for them if they did not regard
the oath. This oath was required in Eleazer because
he did not belong to the house of Abraham, in Jo-
seph, because, as a prince in the land of Egypt, he
might be tempted to be false to the faith of the
promise. It is sufficient to regard the thigh as the
symbol of the whole posterity, the generative organ
as svmliohcal of the immediately succeeding genera-
tion.— By Jehovah [It is not an ordinary marriage
which is here about to be made, which would fall
under the providence of Elohim ; but ;i marriage
which concerns the kingdom of God, and therefore,
Jehovah appears in the whole narrative. Keil, p.
183. — A. G.], the God of heaven. — Eleazer knowa
the God of Abraham, and the faith of the promise.
He should swear by the God of the promises, the
God of Abraham, and with this the rite of laying
ih'' hand upon the thigh corresponds. — That thou
shalt not take a iTife. — Eleazer docs not appear
as the guardian of Isaac, now forty years tdd, afttF
the death of Abraham (Knobel), but the negation in
* [Since the generative virtue in the \ (triirch waj
throueh the promise blessed an-l sanctified liv tl»rhoTab, its
seat wjis n sacred place, by cont.ict n-ith which tlie pereoa
swearing: pl.aced himself in union with Jehovib, the God
of the promise Bacmgarten, p. 241. Kurtz legarls the
thigh as the seat of strength and firmness. — A- G '
184
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSBS.
bis oa'li designates ouly the negative side of his mis-
sion. Since Abraliam had appointed him to gain a
bride for Isaac, be might easily, as an old m:in, havu
given free play to his own opinion, and viewed a
brilliant match in Canaan as advantageous for Isaac's
future. Abraham himself certainly exercises a
patriarchal and guardian-like care over the patient
and yielding Isaac, who, although forty years of age,
appears not to have thought of riairiago, but
mourned his mother in earnest, devout contemphition.
It involves also the definite patriarchal and theo-
cratic union under the providence of Jehovah. —
Peradventure the woman ■will not be willing.
— The servant has not an equal measure of faith with
Abraham. Since the journey to Mesopotamia for a
Shemitic bride is thus strongly enjoined, and Isaac
must not marry a Canaanitess, it appears to him that
it may easily happen that he must take Isaac back to
Mesopotamia, if he should indeed be married. — Be-
■warethou. — Abraliam opposes him. As the father
of faith <ipon the promise, of the people of the fu-
ture, he had the watch-word, "never backward."
To the syllogism of the reflecting and calculating
servant, he opposes the syllogism of faith. Its
major jiremise : Jehovah had brought him out of
his fatherland into a strange land ; its minor : he
had promised to his seed the land of Canaan ; its
conclusion : therefore he will crown the mission of
Eleazer, through the leading of his angel, with a suc-
cessful issue. In this assurance he can easily quiet
the sworn servant with the explanation, if the other-
wise proper wife will not follow him from Mesopo-
tamia, he should be clear from his oath.
2. The journey for the bride^ atid the choice of the
bride (ver. 10-21). — And the servant took. — The
ten camels, and the accompanying train of servants,
must, on the one hand, bear the presents and repre-
sent the riches of his master ; and on the other hand,
are already carefully prepared, and destined for the
caravan of the bride and her maidens. He provides
himself, in case of success, with every kind of jewels
from the treasures of his master, which came later
into legitimate use. He could take of every kind
which lie wished, they were all at his disposal ; Abra-
ham risking all upon the issue of this journey. — To
Mesopotamia (Aram,* of the two rivers.) —
Mesopotamia, between the Euphrates and Tigris,
Padan-Aram (ch. xxv. 20), according to Knobel, an
Elohistic expression ; upon Egyptian monnments,
Neherin = Naharaina. — To the city of Nahor —
i. e., to Ilaran (see ch. xi. SI ; xii. 4). — By a well
of w^ater at the time of the evening .Vs the
arrangement ()f the stately caravan, so also the en-
campment here reveals the master-servant. The
licms I'wul the gazelles by the springs of water. Elea-
zer would here, in a peaceful way, find the bride of
Isaac. Tlie camels lie down at the well of water
withcmt the city, at evening, not to rest for the night,
but to rest temporarily, and during the delay.
(When the camels kneel down they are unloaded,
since their burden lies upon the ground.) — Bven
the time that women go out to draw water. —
The maidens and women in the East still Ijring the
water they need from the well at. evening (Von
K(iii;BKur, ii. p. 401; Robinson, " Palestine," ii. p.
8.01). f They held their female conver.-ations al the
wells, as the men did in the gate. — O Lord God of
my master. — He had done his jiart, but knew that
• [Arain inchidotl more than Mesopotamia. — A. O.)
• iritlori'il HiUc — A. G.I
the result depended upon the blessing of God. Ii
humility he calls upon Jehovah, the God of his mas
ter Abraham, for wiiose sake he would hear hmi.-
Send me good speed (grant that it may come U.
meet, anticipate me ) i.e., what he wislied, Keil adds
The usual explanation, howc\er, seems more signifi
cint, the success appointed by God cannot be secured
by force ; Jehovah causes that it .-^hall im-et the pious
We eniphasize, the coming to inert. Now he deter-
mines the sign for the discovery of the liride dest ned
by God for I?aac. The sign consists in this, that
she should go far lieyond his rec|uest, in her fr'.end-
liness and readiness to serve him. His request
merely expresses the desire that he might sip a little
water from her pitcher ; her trial consists in this,
that she should give him to drink fully, and in
addition, with voluntary friendliness, give to his
camels also. This proof of love was, on the one
hand, certainly not usual, but on tlie other, it was
not unheard of, nor prohibited by any custom.
NiEBUHR ( " Travel.s," ii. p. 410) has still expeiienced
the same or similar volunteered service (comp. Robin-
son, " Palestine," ii. p. 361). But we should recol-
lect that many things of the kind to-day, are imita-
tions of the partriarchal tradition, as e. g. also, the
previously mentioned oath of the Bedouin, with the
hand upon the thigh. — Before he had done speak,
ing. — She came already, to the surprise of the
narrator himself.— Behold Rebekah. — She is no
other than Rebekah, the grandchild of Nahor, the
legitimate daughter born to Bethuel, son of .Milcah.
She had thus the quality of theocraiic ilescent in an
eminent degree. [On both sides, maternal as well aa
paternal. — A. G.] Then she was very beautiful, as
Sarah before, and Rachel after her, a tender maiden,
pure from contact with any man. And how politely
( " my lord," ), how graciously ( " she hiisted and let
down"), with what animation ("she hasteil, ran"),
antl how cheerfully she fulfilled all the conditions of
the sign chosen and determined. — The Kail u]ion het
shoulder is rather a bucket, or wide-mouthed jar
than a pitcher, otherwise it would not be fitted to
give the camels drink. ['I'liis jar was sometimes
borne on the head, and sometimes strapjied upon the
shoulder. The ns is the same term used lor the
vessels borne by the men of Gideon, ami which were
broken with a blow, Judg. vii. 20 ; and dittcrs from
t!ie nan , the term for bottle in the narrative of
Hagar. — A. G.]
S. T)ie sojourn nl the home of the bride (vers
21-.S3). — Wondering at her, held his peace
(waiting). — Knobel prefers the explanation of nxtll
by tiesenius : attentive look, view, following the
Septuagint and Vulgate. Delitzsch and Keil prefei
the explanation, wondered^ was astonished. The fol-
lowing phi-ase, held his peace in order to kvov\ is in
tiivor of the latter explanation.* The attentive, in-
(luiriug look was not limited through the silence, but
through the astonishment. He restrained himself in
his astonishment. She had indceil fulfilled the sign,
and as to his [)raycr all was clear, but as to hia
reflect ion the (|Ucstion now first arose, was she a
Shemitcss ? was she single V would she be willing to
go with himy — The man took a golden ear-(nose|
ring.— The pieseiit which lie now makes her could
not have been a bridal present, but simiily a friendlj
lei ognition and reward ol her friendly service (al
* ^Kcil urges also, that the Ilithp. form of the verb U
loiilt, would bo to look round here and tliero rt'StlrseU
whicli wou d not suit tbo son.so here.— A. G.l
CHAP. XXIV. 1-67.
489
thoug)i " the nose-ring is now the usual engagement
present among the Bedouins.") Delitzsch. The con-
viction that the right person was found here truly
finds expression, otlierwise he would have been re-
garding lier at too lavish an expense. At this moment
Rebekah liad even somewhat disconcerted the aged
F.liezer. 77te rim/was a golden nose-ring, worn from
the central wall of tlie nose, of about a half shekel
in weight. The two bracelets of gold, worn upon the
wrist, were each of about five shekels weight (see
WiNKR, art. Sc/imuck. Isa. iii. 18 ft' ). Eliezer's heart
kr.ew well what would rejoice the heart of even a
pious maiden, and with this present, the choice of
which expresses his assurance, introduces his ques-
tion as to her family. The question as to entertain-
ment in her house is an utterance of the full assurance
of his hope. It reveals the working of his mind, in
BO far as he asks the second question, without waiting
for tlie answer to the first. Rebekah's answer accords
entirely with his wish. She answers also his second
question, but as the jirudeut Rebekah, with the reser-
vation which became her, for it did not belong to her
expressly to iuvite the strange man in. But Eliezer
knew enough, as is evident from his profound
bowing before Jehovah, and his praise and thanks-
giving. [^On is the free grace, with which Je-
hovah had given the promise to Abraham, P'CX the
faitlifulness and truth with which he fulfils the
promise. The two words often occur in the Scrip-
tures. Baumgarten, p. 243. — A. G.] For Rehekah
the prayer is a mysterious, joyful announcement
from the home of Abraham, and beautiful is the
contrast that she thereupon hastens away, while the
Bervant completes his prayer. Of her mother's
house. — Bethuel was living, and therefore the
maiden-like presentiment of a love-suit reveals itself
as she hastens to her mother's confidence. — And
Iiaban ran. — As the first mention of Rebekah (ch.
xxii. 23) prepares the way for this narrative, so here
we make beforehand the acquaintance of Laban, who
later exerts so important an influence upon the history
of Jacob. Still the narrator has motives also for this
allusion in the present lustory. His invitation of his
own accord to Eliezer, to come into the house of his
father, and the prominence which he has in the en-
gagement of Rebekah, with and before his father,
prove the great influence which he liad in his parental
home. His sister Rebekah appears also with similar
energy in comparison with Isaac. There was, doubt-
less in the very arrangement of the patriarchal home,
special room for the dynamic efficiency of a strong
personality, in contrast with the retiring nature of
the more receptive character. Laban appears always
to have led Ids father Bethuel, as Abraham led his
son Isaac: and Rebekah exercises a stronger influence
upon the history of her house than Sarah or Rachel
upon theirs. The sacred writer now appears to go
back and bring up tlie narrative. — And it came to
pass, when he sa^^ — but purposely, to bring into
prominence this motive with Laban, since he places
the gold ornaments m the first rank, and the words
of Eliezer, which Rebekah reports, in the second.
We have here evidently a trait of that covetousness
*hich appears so prominently in the later history of
Laban. There may be also a characteristic of the
courtly accommodation and exaggeration in the re-
ligious expression he uses, when he invites Eliezer, as
"the blessed of Jehovah," i. e., in a name of God
which was not usual with him, and which he probably
earu-'d from the form of exnre-ssion which the servant
had used (although this cannot be asserted with cer
tainty, since the calling upon Jehovah had alreadj
its beginnings in the house of Tlierah). But there il
no more necessit\', on account of these featnies, of mis-
understanding the real central thing in Laban's statt
of mind, than, on account of sinjilar traits, of misun-
derstanding the character of Lot * (see ch. xxxi. 2 1 ).
His words of invitation have been made the founda-
tion of an Advent song : Wherefore wilt thou stand
without, etc. — And the men's feet. — The servants
who accom])anied Eliezer are here mentioned for the
first time. That Laban took care for them also com-
pletes the expression of his polite hospitality. — I
will not eat.—" No one had asked him a.s to the
object of his journey, for that would have been a
violatiou of the Eastern usages of hospitality, which
places these and similar questions after the meal.
But the servant of Abraham unburdens himself."
Delitzsch. A new mark of his faithful service, of
his prudence and full assurance of hope.
4. The suit for the bride (vers. .34^9). The
speech of Eliezer. The first speech in the Bible. A
simple historical account of his journey, and still at
the same time an example of a wise speech, which
weaves skilfully the motives he would present with
the account he gives. The motives from kindred
are fiist urged : the mission is from Abraham. He
is proud of being Abraham's servant. Then the hw-
man interests, Abraham has grown very rich and
great, and has one only legitimate son and heir. But
even the human motive is religiously sanctified. His
wealth and his son are peculiar blessings of God.
A^dw follows the religious motive. Especially the
oatli to take no Canaanitess, but a Shemitess of his
own race. This concern must have awakened in
Nahor's and Bethuel's house not only kindred feel-
ings, but also laid its claims upon the conscience.
That arrested migration of Therah rested as a silent
reproach upon the conscience of the family ; the
house of Bethuel might now enter again into direct
and blessed fellowship, through tlie granting of Re-
bekah. This religious motive was strengthened
through the statement of the trustful hope of Abra^
ham, for a successful issue of the mission. Then,
again, in the highest measure, through the recital
of his prayer, and how the sign determined upon
had been fulfilled. And here, as a result of thiii
recital, the human motive is urged again — the indirect
praise of Rehekah; she had proved herself uncon-
sciously a moral ideal of a maiden worthy of love.
But finally, with the pride of a free, God-entrusted
suitor, he presses his suit, upon them and demands
an instant (ieoision. He urges his opinion, that they
wotdd be refusing kindness and truth (rx:!<^ "^Pl)
towards his master, if they should give him a denial,
because, indeed, they were not only his blood-rela-
tions, but also his theocratic spiritu.al kindred, never^
theless he would not beg of them a bride for the son
of .Abraham. If they would not deal thus kindly
and truly, he would go into the same city, into the
same land, to the right or to the left, especially to
the other sons of Nahor, as he had already intimated
in his previous words that he should be freed from
his oath when he had used all possible efforts. — My
master's brother's daughter, i. e., in the widei
sense. His granddaughter, or the datighter of the
son of his br ither.
* [There if a striking contrast between Jacob and La«
t'an ; starting from points in many respects alike, the on"
graduallv becomes bett<l, the ither worse. See WoB©*
WOBTH, p, 107.— A. G-1
f86
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES
9. Tht betrothal of the bride (vers. BO-54). La-
ian and Beihuel. Tie decision. " Rebekah's brother
joins in the decision. The custom, according to
which the brother must interest himself for the sister
(ch. xxxiv. S ; XL 26 ; Judg. xxi. 22 ; 1 Sam. xiii.
22), justified him in so doing." Knobel. Keil, with
otheis, remarks, this usage grows out of polygamy,
through which the father might easily come to have
less concern tor the children (daughters) of the less
beloved wife. They recognize in the whole affair
the will of Jehovah ; they have neither good nor evil,
i. e , indeed, nothing to speak (Numb. xxiv. 13, etc.).
The consent of Rebekah was not sought in the be-
trothal itself, but in the far less important point of
the immediate departure. From this it follows that
they were sure of her consent to the union, although
the authoritative powers of the house must decide
upon it. — Worshipped the Lord, bowing do^n
to the earth. — A mute attestation of thankfulness,
a sign of a mind moved with astonishment and joy.
But notice here also the haste ; his official zeal cuts
short his prayer. [Baumgarten calls attention to
this prayer of the servant, in his present circum-
stances, and surrounded by those who did not honor
Jehovah, as a proof how well Abraham had instruct-
ed and trained his household. — A. G,] At first the
bridal-presents for the bride must be produced, then
the betrothal-presents for the family, especially for
Laban and his mother. With respect to the last-
named presents, they are an honorable form of the
later, at least, usual purchase of the bride (see Winer :
" Marriage "). The first were given to the bride, in
the name of the bridegroom, after the existing cus-
tom, according to which the bridegroom sent to the
bride presents, before the marriage, which should
have the effect to cement the union — a custom still
prevalent in the East (see Knobel, p. 204 •). A
shepherd prince in Canaan might purchase the ne-
cessary articles of this kind Irom Phoenician and Ara-
maic caravans. — And they did eat and drink. —
Now first they could enjoy their food and dricik,
which would naturally constitute an evening feast.
6. T/ie bridal Juurneii (vers. 54-61). — Send me
away, that I may go to my master. — If it was
bold in Eliezer to insist upon an immediate decision,
the successful issue makes him now, in his official
zeal, still bolder. His earnestness assumes the ap-
pearance of harshness, and it can be excused only by
his great joy, and his great anxiety to bring the affair
to a happy issue, before anything should occur to
make a disturbance. A few days, or a tenth of days,
i. e., not as Keil thinks, a few or 7nuch more ten days,
but at leant ten days. An indefinite number of days
is an indefinite period, which might easily be pro-
tracted into a long period. But since Eliezer will not
consent to ten days, Rebekah must decide, and her
declaration is cliaiacteristic again of her vigorous,
determined, bold mind. She is eciually ready for a
depaiture. She says with modest but decided
brevity, ~bs . The sudden departure could hardly
have occuiTed on the next day ; it is sufficient that it
was immediately prepared. — Rebekah their sister.
— This ia literally true oidy of Laban. Rebekah
truly became alto through her betrothal, the niece
of her parents. — And her nurse. — Deborah (ch.
XXXV. 8). The nurse in noble families usually re-
mained (2 Kings xi. 2j a permanent and valued uoin-
panion of lier foster-child. — And they blessed
Rebekah. — The words of blessing form a little
* (Alao Pictorial Bible, and the books of traTcl^.— A. Q.J
song. They emphasize it that Rebekah is their sistej
for they are proud of her dim but great hopes. — Bt
thou the mother of (grow^ to) thousands of mil-
lions.— This wish of a countleiss host of dcscendanta
(not of children aloue, that would be senseless) is an
far not hyperbolical, as in the origin and growth of
the people of Israel, saying nothing of the church
of believers, it has been richly fulfilled. The blesft
ing of children was the highest happiness of the
Hebrew woman. " It is still thus in the East (Vol-
net: "Travels," ii. p. 359)." Knobel.— Let thy
seed possess (see ch. xxii. 17). The house of Na-
lior itself formed a certain opposition to the heatheOy
and well knew also that Abraham and the childrer
of Abraham should complete the opposition. Thes«
intuitions were doubtless refreshed through the com
munication of the servaut. We ought not, however,
to be surprised that the two clauses of this versa
represent Abraham's hope, rather in respect to the
number than the character of his seed. — And her
damsels. — The stately company of damsels corres-
ponded not only to the stately equipage and approach
of the suitor, but was an actual necessity, since she
was going into a strange land, under the leading of
strange men. '' Laban gave, however, only one maid-
en to each of his daughters at her marriage (ch.
xxix. 24, 29)." Knobel.
7. The meeting of the bridegroom and the bride
(vers. 62-67). — And Isaac came. — The apparently
confused narrative here is found to be a clear one,
upon the supposition of a clear view of the land.
The wells of Hagar alluded to, lay still southerly
from Beer-sheba. If Eliezer journeyed home from
Mesopotamia, or the northeast, he must have come
to Hebron to Abraham, before he could have been
visible to Isaac, in the way to these wells, or gen-
erally in his stations iu the farther south. But if
he was earlier visible to the yoimg bridegroom, it
follows, that he must now have gone from Hebron
northwards into the field. The allusion to the wells
as to his residence in the south region, is made with
the purpose of bringing into prominence again, how
it occurred, through a happy providence, that he
went so far to meet the bride.* He had returned in
a happier frame from his visit to these wells, which
were of greater importarjce to him, since he usually
had his outposts in the south. But now he went out
from Hebron (for Sarah's tent was certainly si ill at
Hebron, ver. 67) into the peculiar field, or cultivated
region, without any intimation that Rebekah would
meet him from that side, on the way down from
Bethlehem. Delitzsch : " He came from his arrival
at the wells, not as Hupfeld and Ewald explain; be
had even reached the wells." Delitzsch, however,
thinks the meeting took place in the re;;ion of the
wells of Hagar, and that Isaac had for the sake of
meditation removed his residence from Hebron into
the south. The oak-grove of Mamre must certainly
have been large enough to give opportunity for medi-
tation. Isaac doubtless went into the south region,
not to lead any technically hermit hfe, but to over-
see the flocks of his father. Delitzsch also conjec-
tures that he was laying the affair of his marriage
before the Lord, at these wells. But the author
rather points to the fact, that he was still clinging t«
his grief over his mother Sarah. [If, however,
Abraham was now residing at Beei^sheba, then Isaac
• [The " South Country." The 3J3 includes more tha»
the country enuth of Palestine. The south country maj
have embraced Hebron. Comp. ch. xiii. 3. — A. G.]
CHAP. XXrV. 1-67.
ttt
may have met the caravan to the northward of this
place. Sarah's tent would of course be taken with
Abraham in his removals. — A. G.] — At the even-
tide.— " As the evening turned itself hither — drew
on." Delitzsch. — Went out to mourn (meditate).
— niiab . Explanations : 1 . For the purpose of think-
ing. Septuagirit, Vulgate, Baumgarten, Delitzsch.
2. In order to praii. Targums, Arabic version, Lu-
ther, and others. 3. For deliberation. Aquila and
others. 4. For the purpose of walking, exercise.
Syriac, Aben Ezra, Kinchi. 5. To bring the trav-
eler ( / ) Bottcher. 6. For lamentation. Kuobel.
In order to give himself alone, and undisturbed,
to mourning the death of his mother. [The first
three explanations may well be thrown together,
since thought, prayer, and deliberation, or medita-
tion, are seldom separated in the experience of the
pious. — A. G.] Knobel correctly quotes, in favor of
this, the frequent signification of n^IIJ and ver. 67.
One might almost think it was in the field of Ephron,
but then we should have to seek the cave of Mach-
pelah northerly from Hebron. But the remark of
Knobel '' that Isaac first after the death of Abraham,
according to the Elohist (ch. xxv, 11), removed into
the southern country," is of no moment, since we
must distinguish between the mere resting-place of a
subordinate, and the chief abode of a shepherd-
prince. — She lighted oflf the camel. — Another in-
stance of the rapid, energetic Rebekah. " Fell from
the camel, i. e., threw herself off from the animal
she rode, sprang quickly down, and indeed as a mark
of her reverence for Isaac, for she recognized him
as a man of rank. This custom is frequently men-
tioned in the Old Testament (1 Sam. xxv. 23; 2
Kingsv. 21), even by this same writer(Josh. xv. 18);
it appears also, elsewhere among the ancients, e. g.,
among the Romans (Liv. xxiv. 44). In the East, to-
day, tlie rider descends from the animal he rides
when he meets a distiguished person (Niebuhr :
'Arabia,' p. 50, and the 'Description of his Trav-
els,' i. p. 239 ; JoLiFFE : ' Travels,' p. 274), and it
is required of Jews and Christians when they meet
a Mohammedan of rank (Niebuhr, etc.)." Knobel.
— What man is this. — She thus assumes that Elie-
zer knew hira. A womanly presentiment. — There-
fore she took a veil. — Keil: "The mantle-hke
' Arabian veil for the head." " The bride appears
before the bridegroom veiled, hence the nubere riro.
Plin. H. N., 21, 22. When the two came together
the veil was removed. The custom still exists m the
F'st (Russel, etc.)." Knobel.— All things that he
had done. — Meeting his young master, the self-im-
portance of the old servant appears more freely in
his words. — Into his mother Sarah's tent. — The
tent of Sarah was reserved for the new mistress, al-
though Abraham was again married. It lay in He-
bron, and there is no reason for the inference of
Knobel, from ver. 62, that it must be sought in Beer-
eheba (conip. ch. xxxi. 33). The wives also of the Be-
douin chiefs have their own tents. — And he loved
her. — She became the object of his pecuUar bridal
love. — And Isaao ■was comforted. — [The word
death is not in the original. It seems as if the Holy
Spirit would not conclude this beautiful and joyful
nanrative with a word of sorrow — death. — Words-
worth., p. 109. — A. G.] Until this occurred he had
mourned the death of his mother, from three to four
years. Since the great mournings lasted from thirty
to seventy days (ch. 1. 8 ; Numb. xx. 29 ; Deut. xxxiv.
8), Knobel cannot fir.d anything here of the three or
four years' mourning of Isaac. But there is a plaii
distinction between the customary mournings ant'
the weight of sadness in the life of a retiring am
elegiac nature. Lsaac appears to have clung to his
mother Sarah, much as Jacob did afterwards to bij
mother Rebekah.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. See the Critical and Exegetieal remarks. TaJi
chapter evidently presents a picture for all time, of
a sacred bride-wooing. Abraham designates as th«
chief requisite of a blessed theocratic marriage,
spiritual kindred and equality of birth. The Shem-
iles of his father's house did not indeed stand upon
the same line of theocratic hopes with himself, but
they were still acquainted with his hopes and recog-
nized them ; they were free from the tendency of the
grosser heathenism, and the result shows that Re-
bekah, the daughter from the home of Nahor, had a
clearer insight into theocratic things than Isaac him-
self. And although, on the other hand, the Canaan-
ites, at the time of Abraham, were not so sunken in
corruption as the Canaanitish generations at the time
of Joshua ; although there were a Melchizedec, an
Abimelech, and similar characters, and around them
circles who feared God, among the people ; still all
this was a waning blessing, which the curse gradu-
ally overwhelms, as the history of Sodom shows,
and Abraham, who knew the end of the Canaanites
because Canaan was promised to him, could not
mingle the future of his race with the race of the
Canaanites. The TiKrai' eV t£ Ka\ai is according to
Plato's Si/mposio7i, or the instruction of Diotima, a
peculiar spiritual impulse of Eros, after the Greek
ideal ; but Abraham iu the theocratic history has
realized this fundamental principle in a far higher
sense (see John i. 13).
2. The oath upon the loins of Abraham (see
the exegetieal notes under the first paragraph). It
should be observed that Abraham himself here
causes the oath t't be taken.
3. The Angel of the Lord, who, as the Angel of
the covenant, promised Isaac the heir of the cove-
nant to Abraham, will, according to the assurance of
Abraham, mediate and secure a marriage suited to
the covenant.
4. The journey and position of Eliezer at the
well in Haran, his aim and his prayer, prove that two
things belong to a happy marriage : human foresight
and wisdom, and the blessing of Jehovah ; i. e., not
merely the general blessing of God, but the blessing
of the God of the covenant.
5. The mark which Eliezer fixed upon as the sign
by which he should recognize the bride selected by
Jehovah for Isaac, shows what an important estimate
was placed upon genuine good works in the house of
the fatlier of the faithful, especially upon human
friendliness, hospitality, kindness to animals and
men. The cheerful service which Reljekah gives to
the aged EUezer, shows a love of men free from any
sensual interest. But that on his side, Eliezer placet
a high estimate upon her beauty, and in his conduct
treats her in a youthful and complimentary way
shows the glorious power and effect of her beauty.
6. The scripture has throughout a free estimate
of the importance of beauty. It places the beau-
tiful with the good, in the praise of the creation, as
the Greeks place the good with the beautiful Bu'
in the beauty of the ancestresses of Israel (Sara!
48S
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Rebekah. Rachel,) it sees the symbolical manifesta-
tion of a consecrated, beautiful life of the souL We
must distinguish clearly in reference to the estimate
ef the beautiful, the purely Christian stand|K)int,
from the ecclesiastical and monkish. This last has
drawn from the words, '* he was without form or
comeliness " (Is. liii. 2), the infeT-ence, that the most
beautiful among the children of men (Ps. xlv. 3)
was of an extraordinarily disagreeable appearance.
The moral idea, and the moral estimate of the lux-
ury, in the presents of Eliezer.
7. The expression rBXl lOPl, which runs through
the wliole Old Testament as a description of the di-
vine grace and truth (see Micah vii. 20), and even in
the New Testament (John i. 17), appears here in a
remarkable manner for the first time, in reference to
the conduct of man with man. " Thus also," says
Delitzsch, " mutual proofs of love between men are
ion, and the mutual truly intended, faithful acts be-
tween men are ni2K." We must, however, hold,
mdi-ed, that these ideas even in reference to the re-
lations of man to man, have a theocratic definiteness
and peculiarity. The house of Nahor must prove,
through its love to Abraham, that it went with him
m spirit, and through its truth preserves its connec-
tion with him. Under these circumstances, the re-
fusal of their daughter would have been theocratic
felony.
8. The importance of pious mothers for the king-
dom of God.
9. The elevated distinction of the wife, in the
history, and for the history of the kingdom of God.
10. Eliezer's bride-wooing, the first speech in the
Bible, a fit beginning for the whole circle of biblical
speeches.
11. Eliezer, the earthly messenger of Abraham,
In the convoy of the heavenly messengers. A pious
diplomat, accompanied by the Angel of the Lord.
The diplomats of this world are often accompanied
by demons.
12. The propensity of Isaac for retirement and
mourning, agrees with his passive individuality,
and with his fearful and affecting experiences in his
childhood upon Moriah. If, in after times, he does
not seem fully to understand the great consequence
of his father, and clings to and pines for his motlier,
this is explained by his history ; but we see also how
very greatly the hopes of Abraliam were endangered
through this retiring and melancholy propensity.
But Abraham saw the right way to relief Reliekah
was a consoling providential gift from Jehovah for
I.saac, and lie was rescued from the lonely way of the
recluse, since he now entered fully upon the way of
the future of Israel.
HOMTLETIOAL AND PRACTICAL.
Abraham's marriage-suit for his son Isaac. — Tlie
•anctification of the bride-wooing. — The qualifica-
tions of a blessed bride. — The life pictures in tliis
history : Abraham, EMezer, Rebekah, Laban, Is:mc.
— The motlier in the history of the founding .if ilic
kingdom of God. — The tworeniarkalili' meetings (that
of Eliezer and Rebekah, and that of Rebekah ai.d
Ipaac), a lesiitnony for the old proverb that "mar-
riages are ni.ide in heaven." — How this proverb has
it!) Bignilicaiice : a. In the narrower sense, in the
ti.arriage of the pious; b. in the wider sense, in the
Diarriage of the ungodly (the providence of judg-
ment' , c. in the sense of a divine discipline and in
struetion, leading from the way of evil to .ne way of
virtue and salvation. — Rebekah as a maiden, virgin,
bride, wife, mother. — (The heroine at last acted too
purely as a heroine. She must repent. Shesawhei
Jacob no more after their separation). — The coopera-
tion of parents in the marriage of their children .
a. Its justice or propriety ; b. its limits. — Eliezer in
his fiithtiilness, prudence and piety. — Eliezer, an ex
ample of the way in which the blessing of the Lord,
and the faithfulness of men, meet together in one. —
EUezer's petition and tliauksgiving. — The import ot
beauty in the kingdom of God. — Rebekah's charming
service, the peculiar, fundamental trait of a noble,
pious womanliness. — The blessing of an unfeigned
human friendliness.^Esiiecially in the female sex. —
EUezer's speech the first in the Bible : a. As the
speech of a servant; b. of a master; c. which turns
the heart to the master. — The love and truth of God,
as a foundation for love and truth among men. — The
bridal feast at Haran. — Ditain me not, or the imre-
strained eagerness to reach the goal. — The caravan
of Rebekah, or the kingdom of God under the
figure of a journeying pilgrim and wanderer.* —
Isaac's and Rebekah's meeting. — Isaac's transforma-
tion.—The blessing of pious love. — Rebekah in the
tent of Sarah, or the joining of a new blessing to
the old.
1. Vers. 1-9. Starke: Certainly it was no small
thing, since Abraham is represented as a prince,
that Eliezer, next to his master, should have supreme
command in all the house. The word "servimt,"
therefore, is not a term of contempt here, but a
truly marked name of honor, as the word T3S
is elsewhere used also (Ex. v. 21, etc.). Joseph was
such a servant afterward in the house of Pliaraoh
the king (ch. xxxix. 4). — Luther : It is truly in the
arrangement of a household a great, valuable gift, to
have a faithful servant or maiden, since the dishon-
esty and wickedness of servants is a common com-
plaint the world over. — Ckasikr: Tlie blessing of
God makes lich without toil (Frov. x. 22 ; Ps.
cxxviii. 4). When one has something important be-
fore liim, let him attend to it with pruilence and un-
der good advice. (There follow here .■several remarks
upon the true marriage, and u|ion the duties of
parents and cinldren in contracting marriage.) (Jer.
xxix. 6; 1 Kings xi. 4.) Langk: Ver. 5. Whoever
allows himsell' to be used in important concerns, does
well to seek beforehand full instructions. — The Angel
(Hcb. L 14: Ps. xxxiv. 8). — Cramer: Homes and
goods are inherited from parents, but a prudent wife
comes from the Lord (Prov. xix. 14). — ScuRonKR:
The hoary head should impel us to set our household
in order (Calvin). — The last Labor of each of the
pati iarchs, is to attend to the necessary dispositions
and arrangements with respect to their successors
(Drechsler). — What .\brahamiii his faith here avoids,
was expressly forfiidden to the pi'ople of Abraham
in the law (ch. xviii. 19; Ex. xxxiv. 16; Hcut. vii.
1-3). Natural prudence would have led Abraham to
coutract an alliance with one of the Canaanitish fam
dies through the marriage of I.saac, to have thus se
cured lor himself support and protccticm, and indeed
thus to have taken the first step toward the posses
sion of the land of Canaan ; but he had le;irnea
• [Tlioso wlio would see tlio rosombliij.ee lierj alliidol to
elevated into ii typo, and drawn out at Icnptli, may co .sull
WoitDswoRTn, II. 107, who is rioli In tlicsc— at times fancies
and at limes very etrilong suggestionK.— A. rt i
CHAP. XXIV. 1-67.
48S
already that God directed his way, etc. (Roos). — It
occurs even to-day, in the East, that the marriage of
children is arranged Ijy the parents, before the young
persons liave seen each other. Similar occurrence,
ch. xxi. 21 — The doctrine we draw from tliis pas-
sage, is this, that parents should take care for tlieir
sons and daugliter^-, that they may be advanced to
an honorable marriage state, although parents at
times misuse their power and right, and constrain
children to take those in marriage whom they have
not loved, Such parents should be punished, for
they have no parental heart or disposition, but are as
blocks or stones, etc. (Luther). — Here the angels are
the serviints of the sacred marriage (Lcthkr
against "The Romish Celibacy "). [Parents in dis-
po.sing of their childi-en, should carefully consult the
welfare of their souls, and their furtherance in the
way to heaven. Henry.- — A. G.]
"2. Vers. 10-21. St.irke: (.\11 the goods of his
master were in his hand. The Jews infer from this
that Eliezer had taken an inventory of his mastei's
goods with him to Haran, that he might persuade
more readily the bride of Isaac to go with him !)
Ver. 14. Upon the desire of Eliezer to recognize
the bride through a sign. We see that God himself
was not displeased with it. But it does not follnw,
therefore, that we should follow this example, since
that would be to tempt God. (But the general truth
that the cheerful readiness to render service to the
aged and helpless, and au affable demeanor, are to
be viewed as qualities in maidens which render them
worthy of love, and desirable in marriage, is, how-
ever, truly contained in this example.) — Cramer :
Ver. 11. A reminding us of our duty, to relieve the
animals from their toil, and to feed and water them
at the proper time. — Ver. 17. A Christian must be-
gin his bride-wooing with prayer. — Mdsculus : To
be a creature of God, is common to all ; to be beau-
tiful is the mark of special favor.— (Upon ver. 19.
This was a great offer surely, since it is well known
that when camels have had nothing to drink for sev-
eral days, they drink for a long time after one
another before tliey are satisfied). — Christian parents
should train their children, especially their daughters,
not to idleness and pride, but to household duties and
work. — Ver. 21. A man often does something in the
simplicity of his heart, and knows not what end God
will make it serve. — We may serve our neighbors in
a greater measure than they desire. — Lisco : The
ring. Either a semicircular ring, as a diadem for
the brow, pendent above the nose, or the customary
nose-ring of the East (Isa. iii. 21 ; Ezek. xvi. 12 ;
Prov. xi. 22). — Calwer Handbuch : A remarkable
hearing of prayer. — Schroder : The Arabians still
call Mesopotamia El Dschesireh, i. e., the island. —
At one sign from the camel's driver the camel kneels
down ; at another he rises up. — The Arabian ge-
ographers still recognize the fountains without the
city, which provide the needy inhabitants with water.
— Vaxerids Herberger : A yovmg person, also,
ehould not, as dazzled and blinded, cling to one only,
and think that if he could not obtain that one, he
must go out from the world, but should ever look to
the Lord, and see whither he will lead him. What
God gives prospers well, but what men and the lust
ftf the eye gives, that becomes a pure purgatory.
(But although the understanding, and, indeed, the
Bpiritual understanding, should direct the affair, still
the choice itself remains a matter of the heart).
[We hero learn to be particular in commending our
jffiirs to the conduct and care of divine providence
It is our wisdom to follow providence, but folly u
force it. Henry. — A. G.]
3. Vers. 22-33. Starke: (Upon ver. 22 Is
not in opposition with 1 Tim. ii. 9, 10 ; 2 Tim. iii
4,5, to put on these ornaments? We answer:
1. Rebekah had no conceit of herself in connection
with them ; 2, as Sarah was a princess, so Rebekah
became the daughter of a prince, and we cannot re-
fuse to distinguished persons a certain preomineno*
in clothing and ornaments ; 3. the great abundance
of gold, precious stones and jewels in the Levitical
cultus, was not to contribute to pride.) — Cramer ;
Ver. 27. If God has heard us, we should thank him.
— Ver. 31. Blessed of the Lord. An honorable
title of the believer in the Old Testament (Ps. xxxvii.
22, etc.). — To be obliging, mild, hospitable, is a
Christian virtue. — Calwer Handbuch: (The brace-
lets were 42 ducats, the ring 2 ducats),* — Schroder :
One Tiiay hold this before the sour liypocrites, who
hold it a part of spirituality and peculiar s.inctity
not to wear gold or silver. God permits the pomp,
splendor and ornaments at a marriage fea.<t. Even
the dance cannot be condemned, if it is carried on
in a chaste, moral and honorable way. Luther.
[The hypothetical " if" shows the doubtfulness of
this aimouncement even in Luther's mind, and in
the circumstances by which he was surrounded.
— A. G.] — Ver. 31. Upon Laban's sonorous words.
As soon as a living consciousness of God springs up
in any one, there enters, as its consequence, a sacred
horror of going beyond one's own stand-point (Heng-
stenberg). (But although Laban speaks here beyond
his own proper measure, still we are not justified in
denying his piety).
4. Vers. 34-49. Starke : Upon ver. 35. Herein
Eliezer shows his prudence. He knew well that a
mother would never give her daughter to a man who
lived more than a hundred miles away, in scanty,
perhaps needy circumstances. He thus also, when
he says, " The Lord hath blessed my master," turns
away from his master every suspicion that he had
gained such great wealth in any wrong way. — Upon
ver. 37. Hence they could not entertain the thought,
if Abraham is so rich why so great and expensive a
journey ? (he could indeed have easily taken a Ca-
naanitess). — Upon ver. 47. In verses 22, 23, it is said,
the servant had given her the presents before he had
asked after her relationship, here the reverse seema
to be true ; but the two are easily reconciled upon
the supposition that he brought out the presents be-
fore the question, but after it, laid them upon her.f
(They are rather reconciled upon the theory, that he
here gives the order of tilings as he would have acted,
while he himself above, in tlie joy of his heart, a little
too hastily, or in the strong assurance of a prosperous
issue, had actually done both things at the same time,
leaving out of view, thiit by the presupposition and
statement of the question here, he declares the friend-
hness of the family of Beihuel ) — To the rifjht hnnn
or to the left. Nahor left se\ eral sons, and Eliezer
was not therefore confined to one line of Nahor's
descendants. — The Christian suitor must not seek to
constrain by power the consent of the bride, of her
parents and friends, but leave all to the providence
of God. — Schroder : The fulness and particularity
with which the servant makes his narrative, igreea
• [The bracelets w^-re from four to five ounces in weigh
— their value would depend upon the precious stones con*
nected with them. Bush, ii. p. 43. — A. Gl
t (This is clearly the proper way of reconciling the twr
statements. — A. G.J
t»0
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
perfectly with the character of the affectionate, in-
telhgent, ai'd aged parents. He knows how to put
every lever into play ; he uses every possible means.
— While in verse 14 he had used the common term
maiden, he uses here with great dihgence, in his cir-
cumstantial speech, the more elevated term virgin.
[The distinction referred to is that between Betkulah
and Almah. The latter appears in Is. vii. 14. See
Wordsworth. — A. G.] — The nose-ring, the golden
ring, which penetrated the middle wall of the nose,
hung down over the mouth, was a female ornament
of the ancient East (Ezek. xvi. 12), and remains so
still, according to Niebuhr and Arvieux. About the
size of a dollir, it frequently surrounded the whole
mouth. It is at present also used among the Ara-
bians as an engagement present
5. Vers. 60-64. Starke : Upon ver. 50. The
received conjecture that Bethuel stands in the back-
ground because he was old or sick. Otherwise it
appears as if the brother had somewhat to say m the
marriage of his sister. — Upon ver. 52. Eliezer must
have been a most devout worshipper (vers. 12, 26,
27). — Christian (pious) marriages are not by chance,
but made by God. — Bibl. Wirt. : When parents see
that God deals with their children in a favorable way,
they should not have too much unseasonable consid-
eration or hesitancy. — Schrodkr : Of a so-called
purchase-price (for the wife) (ch. xxix. ; Exod. xxii.
16, 17), which was usually analogous to the price of
a slave, — as the Arab of to-day purchases his bride
perhaps for from three to five camels — and of our
word marriage,* from to buy, or to hire, there is
nothing said here, since the suitor divided richly his
jewels between Laban and the mother.
6. Vers. 54-61. Starke: Upon ver. 55. Be-
cause she must go with him to about 1 24, or, accord-
ing to another reckoning, 128 miles. The Jews have
received it as a rule that there should be at least ten
months between the engagement and the home-
bringing of the bride. (The Jews understand CO^
to mean a year, and under the tenth, ten months.) —
Lanqe : Although Eliezer would not be detained seve-
ral days, it is not necessary to conclude that the de-
parture took place on the very next day. (He reminds
* (Geiman : heirathtn from Aetren, i. e., miethen kauft-n^}
us, with good reason, that Rebekah had her things 3«
arrange and pack for the departure, etc. It is c(!P
tain that they hasted, and did not remain more than
ten days). Upon ver. 56. A Christian must guard
his time carefully. — Pious parents should not eon-
strain their children to a marriage to which they
have no inclination. — 0 ye maidens, see that th«
pious Rebekah has found her bridegroom, not as she
gave way to idleness, or entered the unseemly dances,
but as she discharged her duty. Follow her example,
fear God and labor diligently, God will bring you to
the one for whom he has assigned you. — Osiander:
The desire of pious people for a blessing upon others
are mighty prayers before God, and therefore ara
never in vain.
7. Vers. 62-67. Starkk: Nothing is said here of
Abraham, but he will doubtless receive his daughter-
in-law in the most friendly manner and with many ben-
edictions, and the account given hereof by Eliezer must
have afforded much satisfaction, and furnished mat-
ter for praise to God. (An allegorical explanation
of the marriage of Isaac, in reference to the marriage
of Christ with his Church, is here introduced). — Upon
ver. 62. Whoever will be free must know how he
is to support and care for his wife. — (Osia.ndek :
Married men must love, not hate or strike their
wives.) — A happy and well-sustained marriage, miti-
gates greatly the adversities of this life. (Sir. xxxvi,
24.) — ScHRiJDER ; The twilight resting upon the field
is, in nature, what the vesper-bell is in the Church.
— Rebekah throws herself from the animal she rode,
immediately, in an impulsive, hasty manner. — The
Arabian woman still comes down from her camel
when she meets a man of the same or higher rank
than herself. Niebuhr was a witness of such a meetr
ing (1 Sam. xxv. 23; Ps. xlv. 12). — The bride was
constantly led veiled to the bridegroom. After the
completed marriage, he could first see her with her
face unveiled. — In ver. 16 above, as also Rachel, ch.
xxix. 9, Rebekah was engaged in her duties, and
therefore, as was customary, without the veil. — (The
above-quoted allegory of Rambach : As that (mar-
riage of Isaac) happened according to the appoint-
ment of his father Abraham, so this (espousal of
Christ) is according to the good pleasure of tha
Father, etc.)
THIRTEENTH SECTION.
AbrahanC» second Marriage. Keturah and her Som. Abraham't death and hia burial.
Chapter XXV. 1-10.
Then again Abraham took a wife, and her name was Keturah [iiworse v«pw, tr^'anoe].
And she bare him Zimran [= Simri. Celelinitod in song, renowned], and Jokslian [foirierj. and
Medan [Btrife], and Midian' [contention], and Ishbak [leaving, forsaking], and Rhuiih ) Dowod, Bad
—pit, grove]. And Jokshan begat Slieba [mim ; the Sabmans], and Dedan [Furst: ;ow country,
lowlands]. And the son.s of Dedan were Asshurim [plural of Aeshur. Parst: bcro, Btri.aBth], and
Letu.shirn [hammered, Bhorpenod], and Leunimim [people]. And the sons ot Miaian ; iHphab
[darkness, gloomy], and Epher [=opher; a young animal, calf], and Hanoch j lnitiat<«.'J, ailQ Ab.dal
OHAP. XXr. 1-10.
41»1
All tliese were the chil
S&thei of wisdom, the wise], and Eildaah [Cesenius : whom Ood has called] .
ren of Keturah.
6, 6 And Abraham gave all that he had unto Isaac. But unto the sons of the concu
bines, which Abraham had, Abraham gave gifts, and [separating] sent them away from
7 Isaac his son, while he yet lived, eastward, unto the east country. And these an
the d.ays of the years of Abraham's life which he lived, an liundred threescore and
8 fifteen years. Then Abraham gave up the ghost," and died in a good old age, an old
man, and full [satisfied with life; seech, xxxv. 29] of years ; and was gathered to his people.
9 And his sons Isaac and Ishmael buried him in the cave of Machpelah, in the field of
10 Ephron the son of Zohar the Hittite, which is before [easterly from] Mamre; The field
which Abraham purchased of the sons of Heth : there was Abraham buried, and Sarak
his wife.
[> Ver. 2.— Medan, Judgt, and Midian, one vtho meaturex. Murphy.— A. G.]
•• Ver. 8.— lat., Breathed out.-A. G.)
'GENESAl EEMAEK8.
The present section is closely connected with the
following (vers. 12-18) which treats of Ishmael, and
with the whole history of Isaac, under the common
idea of the descendarits of Abraham. It introduces
6r3t these descendants in the widest idea of the
word : the sons of Keturah. Then those in a
narrower sense : the family of Ishmael. .\nd upon
these, those iu the most restricted sense : Isaac and
his sons. The writer adheres to the same method
here which he has followed in the presentation of the
tabular view of the nations. He begins in his descrip-
tion with those most remote, then proceeds to those
nearer, and finally comes to those standing nearest
the centre. We cannot, however, make the Tholrdoth
(generations) here the place of a division in the
history, since the end of the life of Abraliam marks
distinctly a section which is closed at the beginning
of the history of Isaac ; and thus, as the genealogy
of Keturah is interwoven with the history of Abra-
ham, so the genealogy of Ishmael is connected with
the history of Isaac. Knobel holds that the section
ver. 1-18 belongs to the original writing. But it is
not Elohistic merely because it contains genealogies,
but because of the universal relation of the tribes
here referred to. Knobel remarks upon the two
genealogies of Keturah and Hagar., that the tribes
dwelt in western Arabia and Arabia Petrea, and also
in the northern half of Arabia Felix, while the
descendants of Joktan (ch. x. 26 ff.) belonged to
Bouthem Arabia, at least in the earliest time. " From
the Abrahamic horde (?) there were thus divisions
who went to the east, south-east, and south, where,
however, they found original Arabian inhaliitauts,
with whom they mingled and formed new tribes.
We are not, therefore, to understand that the tribes
here mentioned in each case were descended entirely
from Abraham. It is not intended, even, that these
tribes alone peopled the regions described ; rather they
were inhabited by other tribes also, e. g., Amalekites,
Horites, Edomites, and others. The Arabs, who are
truly »> very dependent upon the Hebrew traditions,
agree essentially with the Hebrew accounts. They
ilistinguisb : 1 . Original Arabs in dilferent parts of
Arabia; 2. Katanites in Yemen and Hhadramant,
and 3. Abrahamite' in Hedjaz, Nejd, etc., but trace
back the last-named to Ishmael, who turned his course
to Mecca, sind joined the tribe Djorhomites, with whom
Bagar herself was buried. (See Ibn Coteiba, ed. bv
W-jstonl'eld, pp 18,30 8". AsuLFEnA: Hist. Anteisl..
ed. by Fleischer, p. 190 ff.)" Knobel. [Also articta
"Arabia," in Kitto and in Smith. — A. G.]
EXEGETICAI, AND CRITICAL.
1. Vers. 1-4. Abraham and Keturah. — Then
again Abraham took a wife. — The sense of this
statement evidently is : 1. That Abraham took
Keturah first after the death of Sarah, and had six
sons by her, thus at an age of 137 years and upward
(Abraham was ten years older than Sarah, who died
aged 127 years); 2. that Keturah, although united
with Abraham according to the nature of monogamy,
enjoyed only the rights of a concubine (see ver. 6,
comp. 1 Chron. i. 32). The first point is opposed
by Keil: "It is generally held that the tnarriage
of Abraham with Keturah was concluded after the
death of Sarah, and that the power of Abraham at
so great an age, to beget still six sons, is explained
upon the ground that the Almighty God had endowed
liis body, already dead, with new life and generative
strength, for the generating of the son of promise.
This idea has, however, no sure ground upon \\ hich
it rests, since it is not said that Abraham took
Keturah to wife first after the death of Sarah, 'etc.
This supposition is precarious, and does not agree
well with the declaration that Abraham had sent
sway the sons of his concubines with presents during
his own lifetime," etc. Keil appears desirous to save
the literal expression, that Abraham's body was dead
when he was a hundred years old (Rom. iv. 19) but
in the eifort comes into direct conflict with the moral
picture of the life of Abraham, who even in hia
younger years had only taken Hagar at the sugges-
tion of Sarah, m impatience as to the faith of the
promise, and thus certainly would not iu later vears,
and when there was no such motive, have violated
the marriage rights of Sarah by taking another wife.*
He might also send the sons of Ketur.ah away from
his house before they were from thirty to forty years
of age, as he had before sent Ishmael away. The
expression as to the dead body evidently cannot be
understood in an absolute sense, otherwise the con
* [It is not unusual for the author to go back and brinft
up the narrative, especially at the close of one section, or a)
the beginning of another ; but it is not probable that thii
is the case here. We may hold to the literal sense of thi
words, that .Abraham's body was dead, i. e., dead astfl off-
spring, and yet hold that the energy miraculoui^ly given u
ir fir the conception of Isaac was continued after Sarrb'
death.— A. G.l
0)2
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
ception of Isaac even could not be spoken of. But
if, however, tlieio is a miracle in tlie conception
of Isaac, it follows only that the facts of our
history are to be viewed as extraordinary, not as
Bomeihing incredible. — And she bare him (see
1 Chron. i. 32), — 1. Keturali's sons: Zimrain.
Zo^Spuv or ZfM3()«i', etc. in the Septuagint. Kiiobel
compares it with ZaBp^i^, the royal city of Ko-aiBoK^A-
»rTai, westwards from Mecca, upon the Red Sea,
gpokeu of in PtolemjEITs, B, 7, 6, etc. Still he is in
doubt. According to Delitzsch they lie nearer the
Zemareni (Plin. vi. 32). — Jokshan. — Knobkl :
" Probably the Ka-TaavTrai (in Ptolem. vi,,7, 6) upon
the Red Sea." Keil suggests the Himjaric tribe of
Jakisch, m soutliern Arabia. — Medan and Midian.
— Knobi;l : " Without doubt Muo.di'o, upon the east-
ern coast of the Ailanitic gulf, and Mu^la^la, a tract
to the north-east of this, in Ptolem. vl. 7 ; ii. 27.
The two tribes appear to have been united. The
Arabian geographers regard a place, Madjain, iis the
residence of the father-in-law of Moses." — Ishbak.
Knobel : " Perhaps the name is still preserved in
Schobeck, a place in the land of the Edomites." —
Shuah. — Knobel : " It must be sought in or near
the Edomites, since a friend of the Edomite, Job,
belonged to this tribe (Job ii. 11)." Other explana-
tions may be seen in Delitzsch and Keil. — 2. Jok-
shan'x sons : Sbeba. — Probably the Saba;ans men-
tioned in connection with Tema (Job. vi. 19). The
plunderers of the oxen and asses of Job (Job i. 15).
— Dedan. — Named in Jer. xxv. 23, in connection
with Tema and Buz, as a commercial people. — 3.
T/ie sonx of Dedan: Ashurim, compare with the
tribe Asyr ; Letushim, with the Ba7iu Letts ; Le-
ummim, with the Banu Lam. — 4. Tlie sons of
Midian : Epha. — Named in Isa. Ix. H, in connection
with Midian, a people trading in gold and incense. —
Epher. — The Banu Ghifar in Hedjaz; Hanoch,
compare with the place Hanaki/e^ thvee days journey
northerly from Medina : Abidah and Eldaah.
"Compare with the tribes Abida and Wadaah, in
the vicinity of Asyr." Keil. For the more particular
and detailed combination of these names with Arabic
tribes, see Knobel, p. 188-190. [The attempt to
identify these tribes, and fix their locality, has not
been very successful. The more full and accurate
explorations of Arabia may shed more light upon
what is uow very obscure — although it is prob;ible
that in their eternal wars and tumults, their fixed
limits, and probably the tribes themselves, have been
lost.--A. G.j
2. Vers. 5, 6. AbrahavVs bequests. — All that
he had, — i. e., The herds and essential parts of his
possessions. Isaac was the chief heir of his legit-
imate marriage. This final distinction was previous-
ly a suljject of divine appointment, and had been
also confirmed by Abraham (cb. xxiv. 36), and finds
expression in the arrangements for Isaac's marriage.
— The sons of the concubines. — In comparison
with Sarah, the misiri'.ss, even Kcturah was a wife
of a si'condary rank. This relation of degrees is not
identical with concubina'.re, nor with a morganitic
marria;;e. It is connected, beyond doubt, with the
diversity in the riglit l^f inheritance on the part of
the chiliireiL— Gave gifts.— He doubtless established
them a.s youthful nomads, with small herds and flocks,
tnd the servants belonging with them. — Unto the
east country. — To Arabia. [In the widest sense, easl^
erly, ea,>)t, ami south-east. — A. G.J This separation
was nut occasioned merely by the necessities of
nomadic chiefs, but hlso for the free possession of
the inheritance by Isaac (see c'l. xiii. 11 ; xxxvi. 11;
Delitzsch thinks that he had al eady, during his lifo
time, passed over his possessions to Isaac. Undei
patriarchal relations, there is no true sense in which
that could be done. But when the necessities of the
other sons were satisfied, the inheritance was thereby
secured exclusively to Isaac. " The Mosaic, and in-
deed patriarchal usage recognized only a so-called
intestate inheritance, i.e., one independent of i he final
arrangement of the testator, determiued according to
law, by a lineal and graded succession. If, therefore,
Abraham would not leave the sons of his concubines
to go unprovided for, he must in his own lifetime
endow them with gifts." Delitzscli.
3. Vers. 7-10. Ahraham'*s ag'\ death^ burial., and
grave. — And these are the days. — 'Ihe import-
ance of the length of Abraham's life is here also
brought into strong relief through the expression
which is fitly chosen. Oiie hundred aiid seventy-jive
years. — An old man and full of years. — [ Of years
is not in the original. Abr^iliam w;is full., satisfied.
A. G.j According to the promise ch. xiii. 15, comp.
ch. XXXV. 29. — And was gathered. — The expression
is similar to that: come to Ids fathers (ch, xv. 15),
or shall be gathered to his fathers (Judg. ii. 10), and
presupposes continued personal existence, since it
designates especially the being gathered into Sheol,
with those who have gone before, but also points
without doubt, to a communion in a dee[>er sense
with the pious fathers on the other side of death. In
later days Abraham's bosom became the peciiliiir aim
and goal of the dying saints (Luke xvi. 22). — And
they buried him. — Ishmael * takes his part in the
burial, not as Knobel thinks, because he was first
removed after this ; but because he was not so fat
removed but that the sad and heavy tidings could
reach him, and because he was still a renowned son
of Abraham, favored with a special blessing (ch. xvii.
10. — In the cave of Machpelah. — It should be
observed with what detiniteness even the buiial of
Abraham in his hereditary sepulchre is here recorded.
DOCTRINAL AUD ETHICAL.
1. Delitzsch : " Keturah was not, like Ilagar, a
concubine during the lifetime of the bride : so far
Ahgustin : De civ. dei, xvi. 34, correctly rests upon
this fact in his controversy with the opponents of
secundce nupliw. But still she is, ver. (> (comp 1 Chron.
i. 32), 83jb"'B; she does not stand upon thi> level
with Sarah, the pcculiur, only one, the mother of the
son of promise. There is no stain, moreover, cleaving
to this second marriage. Even the relation to Ketu-
rah promotes, in its measure, the divine scheme of
blessing, for the new life which (ch. xvii.) came upon
the old, exhausted nature and strength of Alu-aham,
and the word of promise, which destimd him to be
the father of a mass of nations, autheuticaies itself
in this second marriage."
2. The second marriage of Abiaham lias also itl
special reason in the social necessities and habits of
the iiged and lonely nomad. The word (Gen. ii. 24)
holds true of Isaac.
* [Ishmael, although not the promised need, was vot th«
subject of ;i special lilOBsing. Tlie sous of Kutui.ili hud nc
particular McsRint;, Lslimael is, therefore, j.rnpeily asBO-
ciati.'d with Isaac, in paying the last otlices to tlicii Ucceaswf
father. MulirHY, p. atiO.— A. G.]
CHAP. SXT. 1-10.
493
8. Physiology speaks of a partial appearance of
a certain rejuvenation of life in those who have
reached a great age ; new teeth, etc. These piiysio-
logical phenomena appear to have reached a lull
development in the life of Abraham. We should
perhaps hold — tliat these epochs of rejm'enatiou in
the course of life appear more frequently in tlie
patriarchs, living nearer to the paradisiac time and
state. [We must not, however, overlook the fact,
that the legener.ition in Abraham's case was super-
natural.— A. G.]
4. The Abrahamites in the wider sense, who par-
tially peopled .\rabia, must form the broad basis for
the theocratic faith of Abraham, and become a
bridge between Judaism and Christianity on the one
hand, and heathenism on the other. — Gerlach : "All
these are heads of Arabian tribes, but they are in
great part unkno«Ti. Those who a.-e best known are
the (ver. 2) Midiauites, on the east of the Ailanitic
gulf A mercantile people (eh. xxxvii. 28) often
afterwards at war with Israel (especially Judg.
viii.) who in the time of the kings, have already
disappeared from the history." Bunsen : " The
Arabians are still Saracens, i. e., east-landers (comp.
ch. xxix. D."
5. The days of (he years. The life-time is spent
in the days of the years, and at its end the years ap-
pear as days. [Abraham is now in all respects com-
plete as to his life ; he has rendered the highest
obedience (eh. .xxii.), he has secured a grave in the
land of promise (ch. xxiii.), he has cared for the
marri.tge of the son of promise (ch. x.xiv.), he has
dismissed the sons of nature merely (vers. 5, 6), and
finally he has come to a good age and is satisfied
with life. Then Abraham dies. Baumgartex, p.
240.— A. G.]
6. Gathered to his people. The choice of the
expression here rests upon a good ground ; Abraham
has become a father in an eminent and peculiar sense.
Essentially, moreover, the expression is the same
with that (ch. xv. 15), cntne to his fathers, lie with
the fathers (Deut. xxxi. 16), be gathered with the
fathers (Judg. ii. 10). "These expressions do not
mean merely to die, for S15 and riTS are constantly
joined together (vers. 8, 17 ; ch. xxxv. 29, etc.), nor
to he buried in a family burial-place with relatives,
"because the burial is expressed still by n:p (vers. 9;
ch. XT. 15, etc.), and because they are used of those
who were not buried witli their fathers, but in other
places, e. g., Moses, David, etc., as well as of those
in whose tombs the tii-st one of the fathers was laid,
e. g., Solomon and Ahab (1 Kings xi. 4.3 ; xxii. 40)."
Knobel. But there is no ground for his a.ssertion,
that these expressions, however, are derived from
burials in common public grounds, and then trans-
ferred to the admission into Sheol. We should not
jonfound with this harsh assumption the fact, that
a more or less common burial represented perhaps
the reunion on the ot'aer side of the grave. But the
peculiar church-yards or large public burial-places
were unknown to the patriarchal nomads. .Jacob
did not bring the body of his Rachel to Hebron.
There must have been developed already with Enoch
a definite consciousness of the faith of immortality
(Heb. xi. 5). Delitzscm : "As the wearmess with
life <in the part of the patriarchs was not only a
tanking away from the miseries of the present state,
but a turning to that state beyond the present, free
from these miseries, so the union with the fathers is
not one ot the corpse only, but of the persons. That
death did not, as it might have appeared from Gen
iii. I'.i, put an end to the individual continued exist
ence of the man, was an idea widely spread through
the after-paradisiac humanity, which has its ulti-
mate (?) source and vindication in that grace of GotJ
testified to man at the same time with his anger,"
etc. The consciousness of immortality no more
tal<es its origin after the fall, than the conscienc*
(Rom. ii. 14, 15). The hope of Ule in the patriarch!
was surely something more (Heb. xi. 13) than a nier«
consciousness of immortality. But death and th<
state beyond it has evidently, in tlie view of the i)a-
triarchs, a foreshadowing and gleam of that New-
Testament peace, which was somewhat obscured
during the Mosaic period, under the light of the law,
and tlie more developed feeling of guilt and death
To the very rich literature upon this subject belong:
BiiTTCHER: de Inferis, etc.; (IIuler: Veteris Testa-
menii senlejitia de rrb'is post mortem futuris illus-
Irata ; the writings of Gideon Brecher, Engelbert,
Schumann ; " The presupposition of the christian
doctrine of Immortality stated," H. Schcltz. Upon
Sheol considt the Bible Dictionaries.*
7. Was pothered to his people, or those of hia
race, to his fathers — to po home to them, thus to go
home — lie or rest with them ; a symbolical, rich, glo-
rious declaration of a personal life in tlie other
world, and of a union with those of Uke mind or
character.
8. The connection of Ishmael with Isaac in the
burial of Abraham presents the former in a favor-
able aspect, as Esau appears in a favorable light in
his conduct towards Jacob at his return to Canaan.
HOMFLETICAL AND PllACTICAX.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. — How
God fulfils to Abraham all his promises : 1 . The
promise of a rich life (father of a mass of nations
of a great age) ; 2. the promise of a peaceful death
(siitisfied with life, full of days, an honorable burial)
— The Abrahamites, or children of Abraham : 1 .
Common characteristic religiousnes.s, spiritualitv,
wide-spread, ruling the world; 2. distinctions (Ara-
bian and Jew, Mohammed and Christ, Mohammedan-
ism and the Christian world). — .tbrahara's bequests,
a modification of the strictness of the right of in-
heritance.— Days of Abraham, or this full age even,
at last only a circle of days. — Abraham died in fiith
(Heb. xi. 13) — The present and future in the liurial
of Abraham: 1. On this side, the present. Ids two
sons alone in the cave of Machpelah with the corpse ;
2. on that side, the future, a community of people, the
companions of Abraham, to whose society he joins
himself. — Abraham died on the way to perfection :
1. How far perfected? 2. how far still not perfect ?
- Starke: (Upon the division of Arabia in the
wider sense.)— Cramer : The second or third mar
riage is not prohibited to widowers or widows ; stiD
all prudence and care ought to be exercised (Rom
vii. 8; 1 Cor. vii. 39; Tob. iii. 8).—£ibl. mix
Pious and prudent householders act well when to.
the sake of good order they make t!icir bequest*
among their children and heirs (Is. ixxviii. 1),—
(Since Isaac was born in the hundredth yearof Abr»
* [Al80 an Excursus of Prof. Tatleb Lewis on Gen.
xxxvii. 35, below, and tlie wide literature here open to tht
English reader ; embracing the doctrine of "the intemedi.
ate state," and the controversies upon t>a intf "-nipdiat*
DlacB. — A. G 1
194
GKNESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK Of MOSES.
ham, and Jacob and Esau in the sixtieth year of
Isaac, and in the twentieth voar of his married state,
80 Jacob must have been fifteen years old at tlie
death of Abraham.) (Sir. xiv. 16, 17.) — The pious
even are subject to death, still their death is held
precious by the Lord. — What God promises Ids chil-
dren, that he certainly keeps for them (ch. .\v, 15 ;
Ps. xxxiii. 4). — To die at a tranquil age and in a tran-
quil time, is an act of God's kindness iinil love. —
Cramer : The cross and adversity make one yielding
and willing to die. — The souls of the dead have theii
certain places ; they are in the hand of God., and no
evil befalls them (Wis. iii. 1 ; 2 Cor. v. 8).— Lisco ;
Faith in immortality is indeed never expressly assert-
ed in tlie Holy Scriptures (see however Matt. xxii.
32), but is evert/where assmned, for without this faith
the whole revelation of God would be vain and nu-
gatory ; the Scripture doctrine of the resurrection
of the body includes the doctrine of immortality ; is
impossible indeed without this. This truth is set in
its fullest and clearest Ught by Christ (2 Tim. i. 10).
— Calwer Handbuch: We see, moreover, from
these verses, how the Bible relates only the true his-
tory. Had it been a myth or poem it would have
left Abraham at the highest step of the glory of his
faith, and passed over in silence this union with
Keturah at the age of a hundred and forty years.
Abraham is presented to us as an instance and type
of faith, but not as one artistically drawn and beau-
tified, but as one taken from actual life, not even as
» (superhuman) perfect behever, but as one such.
who leaves us to find the first perfect one in hil
great descendant, and points us to him.
Schroder : The satisfaction with life well agreei
with a lieaveidy-minded man (Roos). — To his peopU.
The words sound as if Abraham went from one peo-
ple to another, and from one city to another. An
illustrious and remarkable testimony to the resurrec-
tion and the future life (Luther).— Since Abraham
himself was laid there (in the cave of Maclipelah) to
rest, he takes possession in his own person of llda
promised land (Drechsler). [And while his body
was laid there as if to take possession of the prom-
ised land, his soul has gone to his people to take
possession of that which the promised land typified,
or heaven. — A. G,] — For the character of Abraham
see ScHRiiDEK, p. 44'J, where, however, the image
and form of Sarah is thrown too much in the shade.
[In the section now completed the sacred writer
descends from the general to the special, from the
distant to the near, from the class to the individual.
He dissects the soul of man, and discloses to our
view the whole process of the spiritual life, from the
new-bom babe to the perfect man. Tlie Lord calls,
and his obedience to the call is the moment of his
new birth. The second stage of his spiritual life
presents itself to our view when Abraham believed
the promise, and the Lord counted it to him foi
righteousness, and he enters into covenant with God
The last great act of his spiritual life is the surren
der of his only son to the will of God. MnRPHi, p
362.— A. G.]
B.
ISAAC, AND HIS FAITH-ENDURANCE. Ch. XXV. 12— XXVIII. 9.
FIRST SECTION.
Isaac and Ishmael.
Chapter XXV. 11-18.
11 And it came to pass after the death of Abraham, that God blessed his son >iiiM. ,
and [but] Isaac dwelt by the well Laliai-roi [wells ofthequiokener of vision].
12 Now [and] these are the generations [genealogies, Toledoth] of I.shmael, Abraham's
13 son, whom Hagar the Egyptian, Sarah's handmaid, bare unto Abraham. And these
• are llie names of the sons of Iphmael, by their names according to their generations:
the first-born of Ishmael, Nebajoth [heights ; Nabathei, a tribe of Northern Arabia] ; and Kedar
14 [dark skin. An Arabian tribe], and Adbecl. [miracle of God], and Mibsam [sweet odor]. And
Mislirna [hearing, report, what is heard], ami Duniall | silence, solitude], and Mas.'iah [bcarinf, burden,
15 uttering what Is said], Hadar [inner apartment, tent], and Tenia desert, uncultivated region], Jetur
16 [Seven I a nomadic village], Naphish [recreation], and Kedemah eastward]; These wre the sons
of Ishmael, and these are their names, Ijy their towns [fixed abodes], and by their castles;
17 twelve princes according to t.iieir nations. And these are the years of the life uf Ish-
mael : an hundred and thirty and seven years ; and he gave up the ghost and died ;
18 and w:is gathered unto his peoirle. And they dwrdt from llavilali [arcRiouof .\rabia inhab
Itod l.y the dcscenrlants of Joctan, uiion the easlem boundary of the IshmacUtes] unt" Slllir [a place east o(
EKyi't. in the borders of the desert], that is before Kgy])l, as lllOU goest toward [in the direction of]
Assyria : and he died ' in the presence of all his brethren [he settled eastward oi an lus brethren]
• Ver. 18.— Lit., he fell down, or it fell to him.— A. 0.1
CHAP. XXV. 11-18.
495
OEKEBAIi REUABSS.
Soe the remarks upon the previous section.
KXEGETICAi AND CEITICAL.
1. Ver. 11. Isaac after the death of Abraham. —
Qod blessed Isaac. — The blessing of Abraham
continues in the blessing of Isaac ; this is manifest-
ed in his welfare and prosperity, or rather in a grate-
ful consciousness wliich refers his welfare to the
kindness of God. We read; Elohiin blessed Isaac ;
for Isaac, as future ancestor of Edom and Jacob,
sustained now a universal relation. In earthly re-
spects Edom is Isaac's heir as well as Jacob, or even
by preference. — ^By the well Ijahai.roi. — By the
well of Hagar. According to ch. sxxv. 27, Jacob
met his aged father Isaac at Hebron. Doubtless this
city bore the same relation from the time of Abra-
ham onwards ; Hebron was the principal residence,
Beer-slieba the principal station for overseeing their
flocks. At this station Isaac, as steward of his
father, had already taken up his abode, and in con-
sequence of his love of solitude and seclusion he
became so fond of it that now he dwelt here regu-
larly, without yielding up the principal residence at
Hebron ; he even moved his tent from Beer-sheba
farther into the deep solitude of Hagar's well.
2. Vers. 12-16. The Toledoth of Ishnuul.
[Upon the documentary hypothesis, each of these
phrases marks the beginning of a new document.
But if we are to regard each of these documents as
the work of a separate author, then this author con-
tributes only seven verees to the narrative. This is
obviously running the theory into the ground, and
shows how unreasonable it is to regard these phrases
as indicating any change of author. They open new
themes or sections of the history. — A. G.] Here
also it is obvious that the Toledoth of Genesis does
not begin the separate section of the history, but
frequently concludes them. In ch. iv. and v. the
first human race, together with the Toledoth of
Adam, is dismissed from history. So is it also in
ch. X., in respect to the heathen nations, descendants
of Japheth, Ham, and Shem. Ch. xl. dismisses the
les,' theocratic Shemites, together with their Tole-
4oth. In ch. xxii. 20, the Nahorites, the last of the
Shemites and nearest to .Abraham, retire from the
history, just as the Haranites, or Lot and his descend-
ants in ch. xix. 36 ; and as the Abrahamites de-
scending from Keturah, in ch. xxv. ; and in our
section the Ishmaelites. After the close of the his-
tory of Isaac the Edomites, ch. xxxvi. 1, disap-
pear. The theocfacu permits no branch of the human
race to vanish out of ils circle of vision mikout fiAng
it in its conscinusnesx. In ch. xxxvii. 2 Jacob also
retires into the background as compared with the
history of his sons. VVith the Toledoth of Ishniael
comp. 1 Chroii. i. 28-31. — Whom Hagar the
Egyptian. — Besides the names of the twelve sons
of Ishmael that here present themselves, there oc-
curs also (1 Chron. v. 10) the name of the Hagar-
ites, Ishmaelites called after the mother, whose name
is no doubt assumed in one or more of the names
befoie us. In respect to the frequent occurrence of
the name Hagar in Arabic authors, see Kxobel. p.
211. — Nebajoth and Kedar. — Delitzsch : "The
Uames of the twelve sons of Ishmael are in part
well known. Nebajoth and Kedar are not ordy
mentioned together in Is. Ix. 7, but also by Plin.":
Blsi. Nat., 6, 7 (A'a4o((E« et Cedrei ; Kaidhir and
Ndbat (Nabt) are also known to Arabian historian*
as descendants of Ishmael. In respect to the mean-
ing of the word Nabalieaiis, both in a stricter and a
more comprehensive sense, as also in regard to thei»
abodes in Arabia Petrea and beyond, see Knobel,
Delitzscli, Keil. — The Kadarenes, described Is. xxL
17 as good bowmen, lived in the desirt between
Arabia Petrea and Babylonia (Is. xlii. 11; Ps. cxx.
5). "The liabbins use their name to denote the Ara-
bians in general." Knobel. — Adbeel and Mibsam.
— In respect to these uames, as well as tt) that of
Kedma, we can only reach conjectures (see Knobel).
— Mishma (Septuagint and Vulgate : Masma). —
Connected by Knobel with yiainaixaviis of Ptol., vi.
7, 21. In Arabic authors we have beni Mismah. —
Duma. — Probably Dumath al Djendel, on the bor
der between Syria and Babylonia. — Massa. — Ap-
parently the same as Mafrai-oi, on the northeast side
of Duma according to Ptol., v. IB, 2. — Hadar (a
more correct reading, 1 Chron. i. oO, is ""n , as
compared with the maritime country Chathth. famous
among the ancient Arabians on account of its lances),
between Omam and Bahrein. For further informa-
tion see Knobel, etc. — Hadar is taken together with
Thema, which Knobel connects with Qetiui of Pto!-
emy, on the Persian Gulf, or with the Arabic banu
Teim, a celebrated tribe in Hamasa, probably differ-
ent from the Tema, Is. xxi. 14; Jer. xxv. 23 ; Job
vi. 19. — Jetur, Naphisch (see 1 Chron. v. 18). —
" Neighbors to the Israelites on the enst side of Jor
dan. Knobel refers Jetur to the Iturseans. Th«
present Druses are probably their descendants." — •
Kedma. — " As a separate Arabic tribe we can only
refer it, in its narrower sense, to CTJ? "'ZS , who in
Judg. vi. 3, 33; vii. 12, are distinguished from other
Arabians, and must have dwelt in the vicinity of the
country east of Jordan. Perhaps they are the same
with those enumerated with the Moabites and Am-
monites in Is. xi. 14 and Ezek. xxv. 4, In." Kno-
bel. The sons of the East in a more comprehensive
sense denotes the Arabians generally, the Saracens.
— By their towns, and by their castles, i. e.,
their movable and fixed habitations. — Turelve
princes according to their nations (Lange ren-
ders " to their nations "). — The translation, accord-
ing to thtir natiovs, can only mean, as moulded,
determined by their nations. We hold, therefore,
the expression to mean ; twelve princes chosen for
governmg and representing their twelve tribes.
3. Vers. 17, 18. The death of hhmael and the
expansion of the Ishmaelites. — The years of the
life of Ishmael. — Thi< hale man attained only an
age of a hundred and thirty -seven years, while on the
contrary, the more delicate appearing Isaac reaches
the age of a hundred and eighty yeais. Possibly
the natural passions of the one consumed life sooner ;
no doubt also the quiet, peaceful, believing disposi-
tion of the other, exercised a life-prolonging influ-
ence. Ishmael dies, the Ishmaelites spread them-
selves abroad. — Prom Havilah unto Shtir. —
Havilah, see ch. x. 29. Knobel : " From Chaulan
in the sfiuth to the eastern boundary of Egypt."
Schur. From Egypt to the east in the direction of
Assyria. According to Josephus : " Antiq." i. 12, 4,
the Ishmaelites dwelt from the Euphrates to the Red
Sea. — In the presence of all his brethren, i. e.,
Hebrews, Edomites, and the children of Keturah.
If we understand by Havilah the Chaulotfeans ontha
boundary of Arabia Petrea (Keil), we must assign a
diiferent meaning to these words. Keil : *' Froir
4UC
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
■outheast to southwest." Knobki, : "From south-
r.ast to northwest," Delitzsch : " The capital of
the Ishmaelitic tribes was llezaz, situated south of
Yemeu. From this they spread themselves to the
west side of the Siniaitic peninsula, and still further
in a northerly and northeasterly direction beyond
Arabia Petrea and Deserta to the couiitiies under
Assyrian sway.'' [He died. He had fallen into the
lot of his inheritance. The Heb. word includes the
idea of a deliberate settlement, and an assertion by
force of his rights and possessions. Thus the prom-
ise uttered before his birth was now fulfilled. — A. G.]
DOCTKINAl AND ETHICAL.
1. Ishmael in his development precedes Isaac, as
Esau precedes Jacob, as the world gets the start of
the kingdom of heaven. It looks well for the devel-
opment of Ishmael that he buries his father in com-
pany with his brother Isaac, though the latter had
been preferreil to him.
2. The twelve princes of Ishmael are also men-
tioned as witnesses that God has faithfully fulfilled his
promises concerning their ancestor (ch. xvi. In, 17,
20). The Arabs, too, count twelve sons of Ishmai 1.
3. The Ishmaelites, the germ of the .Arabic peo-
ple in its historic sigiuficance. The country of Ara-
bia. Its history. Mohammed. The mission of the
Mohammedans. The mission among the Moham-
medans. Since Ishmael did not subject himself to
Israel, he has become subject to the Turk.
4. Ishmael's genealogy seems to have been pre-
served in the house of Isaac, just as Therah's in the
aouse of Abraham, or as the genealogy of the na-
tions in house of Shem. The father's house does
not lose the memory or the trace of the lost son .
5. How the blessing of Abraham descends upon
Isaac. The hereditary blessing in the descendants
of Abraham, an antithesis to the hereditary curse in
the descendants of Adam generally. The inclination
to solitude in the life of Isaac. The nature, rights,
and limit of contemplation. Contemplative charac-
ters. History of a contemplative life.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
See Doctrinal and Ethical. — Isaac the blessed son
of a blessed father. The great divine miracle, that
the blessing of a saving faith was preserved in one
line (in spite of all partial obscurations) from Adam
to Christ. — Isaac's inclination to solitary contempla-
tion.— Per-haps he believed already that a special
blessing was confined to that particular plare, the
well of vision. — That Isaac selected Uagur'swell as a
favorite spot, testifies to the nobility of his soul (for
Hagar was the rival of his mother, and Ishmael was
her son). — Ishmael's death; or the robust often die
before the feeble. — From Ishmael, a child once lan-
guishing and perishing from thirst in the wilderness,
God's providence made a great (world-coii(]uering)
nation. — We may in fact best comprehend the patri-
archal triad by regarding Abraham as constituting
especially an example of faith, Isaac an example of
love, .Jacolj an example of hope. We have promi-
nently iiresented to us the still more predominaiing
features : the man of the </««<& of lailli, the man of the
tufferingx of faith, the njsn of the utruiiyles of faith.
Stikkk : The temporal blessing (of Isaac) a pre-
lude: a. As an earnest for the whole land of I'a-
naan; b. as a type and pledge cf the eternal ani.
spiritual blessing of salvation in Christ. — Misma,
Duma, Masa, From these three names, meaning :
licaring, silence, piUience, the Hebrews Ibrmed tiie
proverb: We must hear many things, keep secret
many things, and suffer many things.— (The Ishmael
ites called Ilagarites after Hagar. In later times
thev preferred to be called Saracens, after Sarah, as
if dwelling in the tents of Sarah.) — Ver. 17. Som6
cite this to prove tlie happy death of Ishmael, somt
to prove the contrary. Luther does not wish to de-
cide, but leaves it with God — Ver. 18. (Ps. exii. 2.)
— What God piomises he will surely perform. Lei
us only have faith in his promises (Gen. xvii. 20 ;
xxi. 13). — Bibl. Wirt.: People of no note maybe-
come eminent and distinguished persons if it is (jod's
will (Gen. xli. 40-43).
Lisro : Ishmael becomes the ancestor of the
Bedouins of Arabia ; these, therefore, and the Edom-
ites descending from Esau, are the nations nearest
related to the Hebrews, — Calwer Handhuch : The
father's blessing descends upon the children. — After
Abraham, that hero of faith, had gone to his rest,
Isaac appears in the foreground ol the history. In
his character love appears predominant, the less
powerful and independent love, or love itself with
its weaknesses. He appears as a gentle, pliable link
between Abraham and Jacob, possessing neither the
manly strength of the father nor of the son. Never-
theless, he wears an amiable aspect, which, when
closely viewed, immediately wins our affections. He
docs not make his appearance as a fictitious and an
artfully embellished personage, but as a historical
character ; so much so, that his faults appear in the
foreground, whilst his good qualities fall into the
background and lie concealed to the superficial o'd-
server. Isaac is of a predominantly kind nature,
and therefore appears reserved, outwardly, but in-
wardly and really, frank. — Schroder ; As to the char-
acter of Abraham and Isaac, see pp. 442 and 443.
With Abraham, who, as father of the faithful, was to
begin the long line of believing souls, and in whose
peculiar form of life their life was to have its way
prepared, everything is vigorous and peculiarly inde-
pendent. With Isaac, on the contrary, who only
continues this line, everything appeared perfectly
arranged, just as it is with Joshua in relation to
Moses, etc. — (Hengstenberg: However, we must
not mistake the peculiar characteristics of Isaac,
Joshua, Elisha.) — It seems to me, one might know
that he is the son of a dead body, but on this very
account is he eminently a gift of God (ZicglcrV —
Could the memory of the knife drawn over him by
the hand of the father ever become extinguished in
the mind of the son ? Perhaps this affords us a par-
tial solution of his life and character (Krunim.). —
Let us not overlook the fact that he was the only
monogandst among the patriarchs, rem.aining satis-
fied with his Hebekah. Abraham's piety descends
as an heritage to Isaac, therefore the grace of God
also descends upon Isa.ac (Val. Hi'rberger) — The
dwcdiing of Isiiae at a place so irapnri.ant in the life
of l>hmael (Ilagai's well), attests his friendly relation
to his slep-brolher. — GiitJiered vnio hia people. A
lieauliful and charming description of immortality
We are now living among the gross people of this
worlil, who seek but little after God, yea, in the verj
kingdom of the devil. But when we depart from this
wretched life, wc shall die peacefully, and be gath-
ered unlo our people, and there will be no distress,
no misery, no tribulation, but peace and rest. (Luther).
CHAP. XXV. 19-34.
497
SECOND SECTION,
Jacob and Esau.
Chapter XXV. 19-84.
19 And these are tbe generations' [genealogies] of Isaac, Abraham's son: Abraham
20 begat Isaac : And Isaac was forty years old when he took Rebekah to wife, tb«
daughter of Bethuel tlie Syrian of Padan-Aram [from Mesopotamia], the sister to Laban
21 the Syrian. And Isaac entreated tiie Lord [jehovah] for his wife, because she was
22 barren: and the Lord was entreated of liim, and Rebekah his wife conceived. AnQ
the ciiildren sti'tggled together [thrust, jostled each other] within her; and she said. If it be
23 so, why am I tLus?^ And she went to inquire of the Lord. And the Lord said unto
her, Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people^ shall be separated
from thy bowels ; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people ; and the
elder shall serve tiie younger [the greater shall aerve the less].
24 And when her days to be delivered were fulfilled, behold, there were twins in her
25 womb. And the first came out red, all over like an hairy garment;* and they called
26 his name Esau [covered with hair]. And after that came his brother out, and his hand
took liold on Esau's heel ; and his name was called Jacob [heel-catcher] ; and Isaac was
27 threescore years old when she bare them. And the boys grew : and Esau was a cun-
ning hunter [a man knowing the hunt], a man of the field [a wild rover, not an husbandman] ; and
28 Jacob was a plain ' [discreet, sedate] man, dwelling in tents. And Isaac loved Esau, be-
cause he did eat of his venison [game was in his month his ijsivorite food] : but Rebekah loved
Jacob.
29 And Jacob [once] sod pottage ; and Esau came from the field, and he was faint.
30 And Esau said to Jacob, Feed me, I pray thee [let me devour greedily], with that same reef
pottage [from the red— this red, here] ; for 1 am faint : therefore was his name called Edom
31, 32 [Bed]. And Jacob said, Sell me this day [first] thy birthright. And Esau said,
Behold, I am at the point to die [going to die] : and wiiat profit shall this birthright do to
33 me ? And Jacob said. Swear to me this day ; and he sware unto him : and he sold
34 his birthright unto Jacob. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and pottage of lentiles; and
he did eat and drink, and rose up, and went his way : thus Esau despised his birthright.
(* Ver 19.— The mb'in is more than genealogies. See note on ver. 4, ch. ii. — A. G.]
[» Ver. 22.— Lit., If so, for what this am I.— A. Q.]
, [' Ver. 23.— D'^"3 and D"'T36<b are here used as synonymous, although there is ground for the distinction wUok
refers the former to the nations generally, and the latter to the peculiar people of God. —A. G.]
[* Ver. 25.— [All over like a hairy garment ; Literally, the whole of >iiTn as a mantle of hair. — A. G.]
I* Ver. 27.— nri , perfect, peaceful, in his disposition, as compared with the rude, roving Esau.— A. G.]
GENERAL PEELIMINAET BEMABKS.
1. According to Knobel we have, in the present
nuration, as in ch. 26, a mixture of different records
upon an Elohistic basis by means of the Jehovistic
supplement. It is enougli to say, that in our section
the theocratic point of view prevails. [Keil remarks
that if the name of God occurs less frequently here,
it is due partly to the historic material, which gives
less occasion to use this name, since Jehovah ap-
peared more frequently to Abraham than to Isaac
and Jacob ; and partly to the fact that the previous
revelations of God formed titles or designations for
the God of the Covenant, as " God of Abraham,"
" God of my father," which are equivalent in signifi-
cance with Jehovah. — A. G.] It introduces the
election of Jacob in opposition to Esau. The order
of the Toledotli Knobel explains thus : " The author
isually arranges them, in the first place, according to
32
the individual patriarchs, after he has recorded the
death of the father. Next begins the proper history
of the patriarchs, e.g., ch. x. 1 ; xi. 27 : xxv. 13;
xxxvi. 1 ; xxxvii. 2. We have already made the re-
mark that the Toledoth frequently dispose of a more
general sequence of history, in order to pass over to
a more special one. DeUtzsch finds tliree "tran-
sitions " in the history of Jacob. The first reaching
to the departure of Jacob, ch. xxv. 19-xxviii. 9 ; the
second to Jacob's departure from Laban, ch. xxxii. 1
(a section, however, in which nothing in regard to
Isaac occurs) ; the third, from Jacob's return to the
death of Isaac, ch. xxxv. 29. But this section, too,
is merely a history of Jacob, except the three verses
in ch. xxxv. 27-29. On the other hand it is pre-
eminently the history of Joseph and of the rest of
the sons of Jacob, which begins at ch. xxxni. 2,
where, according to Knobel, the history of Jacob
should first begin. In the separate biographies we
t86
tiESESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Me to distingiiish the theocratic stages of the life of
the patriarchs, from the periods of their human
decrepitude and decease, in which the new theocratic
generation already becomes prouiiuent. This history
has four secions : Rebekah's barrenness and Isaac's
intercession ; Rebekah's pregnancy and the divine
disclosure of her condition ; the antithesis in the
nature of the sons reflecting itself in the divided love
of the parents ; and Esau's prodigality of his birth-
right, parting with it for a mess of pottage. In the
second section we have the prophetic pruface, in the
third and fourth the typical prelude to the entire fu-
ture history of the antithesis between Jacob and
Esau, Israel and Edom.
2. The points of light in the life of Isaac appear
previous to this narrative. These are his child-like
Inquiries and his patient silence upon Moriahlch. xxii.);
his love to Rebekah (ch. xjxiv.); his brotherly commu-
nion with Ishmael at the burial of Abraham, and Ids
residing at the well Lahai-Roi (ch. xxv.). Here we
now read first of his earnest intercession on account
of the barrenness of Rebekah ; then, moreover, of
his preference of Esau because he was fond of game.
Somewhat later Jehovah appeared unto him at Gerar,
preventing him from imitating his father Abraham
in going to Egypt during the famine, although he
imitates hitn in passing off Rebekah for his sister.
In this, too, he differs from Abraham, that he began
to devote himself to agriculture (ch. xxvi. 12). He
Buffers himself, however, to be supplanted by the
Philistines, and one well after another is taken away
from him, tmtil he at last retains only one, and finds
rest at Beer-sheba. In the second appearance too
(ch. xxvi. 24), his deep humility is reflected in this, that
he preserves the promise of the blessing, receiving it
as he doa^ for the sake of his father Abraham, He
now takes courage, and, as Abraham did, proclaims
the name of the Lord, and ventures to reprove the
conduct of Abimelech. His digging of wells, as well
as his tilling the soil, seems to indicate a progress
beyond Abraham. But then he is willing to trans-
mit to Esau the theocratic blessing of the birthright,
though Esau had shortly betbre sorely grieved liim
by the marriage of *wo of the daughters of the
Hittites, The marked antithesis between Isaac's
vision power, his contemplative prominence, and his
short-sightedness in respect to the present life, as
well as the weakness of his senses, appears most
strikingly in ch. xxvii. Rebekah proceeds now with
more energy, and Isaac dismisses Jacob with his
blessing, who leturns after many years to bury his
father. When Isitac blessed his sons his eyes had
already become diin, yet many years passed before
he died (from his one hundred and tiiirtieth to his
one hundred and eightieth year). Delitzsch exagger-
ates Isaac's weakness as aiilking him in everything a
mere copy of Abraham. " Even the wells he digs
are those of Abraham, destroyed by the Philistines,
and the names he gives to them are merely the •Id
ones renewed. He is the most passive of the three
patriarchs. His life flows away in a passive i)uiet-
ness, and ahuost the entire second half in senile tor-
pidity (I). So passive, 80 secondary, or, so to speak,
BO sunken or retired is tne middle period in the pa-
triarchal hi.story." We have referred to the points
in which lie does not imitate Abraham, but is himself.
Ue does not go to Egyjit during the I'amine, as Abra-
ham did ; ho begins tlie transition fr(Jm a nomadic to
and agricultural life, he digs new wells in adililion
lo the old ones, he lives in exclusive niouogamnus
wedlock, and even in his preference of Esau, the
giime, surely, is not the only motive. If the extent.
right of the firstborn impressed so deeply his passiT<
character (especially in connection with the lobust,
striking appearance of Esau, seeming to fit him par-
ticularly to be heir of Canaan) ; there can be n«
doubt, also, that he was repelled by traits in the earlj
life of Jacob. But most especially does he appeal
to have had a feeling for those sufferings of the first-
born Ishmael, which he endured on his account.
And hence he appeared willing to make amends to
Esau, his own firstborn, a fact to which, at least, liia
dwelling at Hagar's well, and his brotherly union
with Ishmael, may point. It is evident that the ar-
dent Rebekah, by her animated, energetic declara
tions (ch. xxiv. 18, 19, 25, 28, 58, li-t, 65 ; ch.
xxv. 22), formed a very significant complement to
Isaac, confiding more in the divine declarations as to
her boys than Isaac did, and therefore better able to
appreciate the deeper nature of Jacob. But when
Isaac, through his passiveness, fails in the perform-
ance of his duty, the courageous woman forgets her
vocation, and with artifice counsels Jacob to steal
the blessing from Isaac— a transgression for which
she had to atone in not seeing again her favorite son
after his migration. And even if Isaac was short-
sighted respecting his personal relations in this world,
yet the words of the blessing attest that his spiritual
sight of the divine promises had not diminished with
his blinded eyes. It had its ground, moreover, in
the very laws of the psychical antithesis that Isaac, so
feeble in will and character, was attracted by the
wild and powerful Esau; while the brave, energetic
Rebekah Ibund greater satisfaction in union with the
gentle Jacob. In the assumed zeal of her faith for
the preservation of a pure theocracy among the patri-
archs, she too excels Isaac. We should bear in mind
that they were Jews who relate so impartially the
Nalioritic Rebekah's superiority over the Abrahainic
Isaac. [" Consenting to be laid on the altar as a
sacrifice to God, Isaac had the stamp of submission
early and deeply impressed on his soul. Hence, in
'.he sj^ii'itual aspect of his chai-acter, he was the man
of patience, of acquiescence, of susceptibility, of
obedience. His qualities were those of the son. as
Abraham's were those of the fiither. He carried out,
but did not initiate ; he followed, but did not lead ;
he continued, but he did not commence. Accord-
ingly the docile and patient side of the saintly charac-
ter is now to be presented to our view." Mukpht,
p. 367 —A. G.]
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL.
1. Vers. 19-21. Rebekah's barren uens, and
Isaac's intereessian. — Fadan-Aram. — Levcd, plain
of Aram: Hosea xii. 12, it reads, field of Aram.
Ch. xlviii. 7. Padan, Mesopotamia. Keil limits
the name to the large plain of the city of Haran,
surrounded by mountains, following the conjectures
of Knobel, who, however, regards I'ailan-Aram
as a specific Elohistic expression, .\ccording to
others, Mesopotamia is divided into two jiarts, and
here the level country is distinguished from the moun-
tainous region. But this does not ap|)ly to Uaran.
To one travelling from Palestine to Mesopotamia
across the mountains, Mesopotamia 's iiu extensive
plain. According to ver. 2B, Isaac J-aited twenty
years for offspring. This was a new trial to liini,
though not to Abraham, who still lived. Sittec
the line of the blessing was to pa.s.s through Isaac, lii»
intercession was based upon a divine foundation ic
CHAP. XXV. 19-34.
4»S
Jehovah's promise. [For his wife, with reference to,
literally before ; which Luther says is to be explained
spiritually, indicating the intensity of his prayer,
the single object before his mind. — "Entreated ihe
liOrd. The seed of promise must be sought from
Jehovah, so that it should be regarded, not as the
fruit of nature, but as the gift of divine grace." Keil,
p. 191.--A. G.]
S X srs. 22, 23. RebekaKs pngnancy, and the
ihvim explanation, of her condition. — The Hebrew
exDression ISSln"' denotes a severe struggling
with each oiber. Knobel will have it that this
feature was derived from the later enmities be-
tween the Israelites and Edomites, and quotes
ch. iv. H; xvi. 12; xix. 30. "In like manner, ac-
cording to Apollod., 2, 2, 1, Acrisius and Proetus, two
brothers, had already quarrelled with each other in the
womb of their mother about the dominion." That
Buch intimations and omens can have no real existence
is regarded a.'^ a settled matter in the prejutiices of
this kind of criticism. — Why am I thus 7 — We
see again the character of Uebekah in this very ex-
pression. According to Delitzsch. she was of a san-
guine temperament: rash in her actions, and as
easily discouraged. We would rather regard her
words as an ill-humored expression of a sanguine-
choleric temperament. It does not mean : why am I
yet living? (Delitzsch, referring to ch. xxvii. 46,
Knobel, Keil), but why am I so I i. e., in this condi-
tion. [Why this sore and strange struggle within me ?
— A. G.] — To inquire of the Lord. — According to
1 certain .Jewish Midrash, she went to Salem (so
Knobel). According to Dehtzsch, she went rather
to Hagar's well ; at all events, to a place sacred on
sccount of revelations and the worship of Jehovah.
Luther thinks she went to Shem, others to Abraham
or Melchizedek, just as men inquired of the prophets
in the time of Samuel (1 Sam. ix. 9). The prophet
nearest to her, if she had wanted one, would have
been Isaac. The phrase " she trent " no doubt
means she retired to some quiet place, and there re-
ceived for herself the divine revelation. For in the
patriarchal history sacred visions determined as yet
Bacred places, nor is it different at present. [Still
the phrase seems to imply that there was some place
and mode of inquiring of the Lord. Perhaps, as
Theodoret suggests, at the family altar. — A.G.] Ac-
cording to Knobel, she received the experience indi-
cated as, in general, a .si^n of ill omen. Delitzsch
thinks she saw in it the »iiger of Jehovah. However,
we must not too sharpiy interpret her ill humor, on
account of the mysterious, painful, and uneasy con-
dition, and the alarming presentiment she may have
bad of the contentions of her posterity. That she
■"as to be a mother of twins she did not know at
t'lis time. — Two nations. — The divine answer is a
rhythmical oracle. (See Delitzsch.)
[Two nations are in thy womb ;
And two people from thy bowels shall be separated ;
And people shall he stronger than people ;
And the elder shall serve the yoimger.
Wordsworth. — A. G.]
KTith the prophetic elevation the poetic form appears
»l80. It appears very distinctly from this oracle,
that they would differ from the very womb of the
mother. Since Esiu's liberation is not predicted here,
Knobel regards this as a sign that the author lived at
a time before Edom threw off the yoke of Judah.
We know however, how the theocratic prophecies
gradually enlarge. The meaning of this cb-icurt
revelation, clothed as it was in the genuine form of
prophecy, and which so greatly calmed her, she saw
in a certain measure explained in the relations that
had existed between Isaac and Ishmael.
3. Vers. 24-28. T/ie birth of Ihe twini Th.
ayitithesis of (heir 7iature, and the divided pc. tiali/^
of the parents toitmrds their children. — Behold,
there 'were twins. — The fulfilment of the oiacle in
its personal, t'unJamental fonn. — And the first
came out red. — Of a reddish fiesh color. Hi'! licjdy,
like a garment of skins, covered with hair. (Luxuri-
ance of the growth of the hair.) In the word "'Jians
there is an allusion to cns , in the word ^SiU
there is an allusion to I'S'i) . " Arab authors deriva
also the red-haired occidentals from Esau." KnobeL
Both marks characterize his sensual, hard nature. —
And his hand took hold on Esau's heel. — De-
litzsch : " It is not said that he held it already in
the womb of his mother (a position of twins not
considered possible by those who practise obstet-
rics), but that he followed his brother with such a
movement of his hand." Knobel contends against
the probability of this statement, since, according to
a work on obstetrics by Busch, the birth of the
second child generally occurs an hour after that of
the first one, frequently later. The vcri/ least that
the expression can convey is, that .Jacob followed
Esau sooner than is generally the case; upon his
heels, and, as it were, to take hold of his hrel. Since
the fact, considered symbolically, does not speak in
his favor ; since it points out the crafty combatant
who seizes his opponent unawares by the heel, and
thus causes him to fall, there is the less ground for
unagining any forgery here. The signification of the
name " Jacob " is essentially the s.ame with " suc-
cessor," as Knobel conjectures. Jacob's cunning
seems to have been stripped from him in his life's
career, deceived as he had been by Laban, and even
by his own sons, whilst there remains his lioly pru-
dence, his deeper knowledge, and his incessant look-
ing to the divine promise. — A cunning hunter.—
Esau developed himself according to the omen. —
Because he did eat of his venison. — Literally,
" was in his mouth." — And Jacob vras a plain
man. — en ir^X. Lcther: a pious man. Kno-
bel : a blameless man, i. e., as a shepherd. " Hunt-
mg, pursued, not for the sake of self-defence or of
necessity, but for mere pleasure, as with Esau, the
author regards as something harsh and cruel, espe-
cially when compared with the shepherd-life so
highly esteemed by the Hebrews " Isaac's fond-
ness for venison, however, cannot be fully explained
by this. Gesenius emphasizes the antithesis of gentle
and wild. Delitzsch explains on , " with his whole
heart " devoted to God and the good, etc. Keil,
more happily, as " a disposition inclmed to a domes-
tic, quiet life." The most obvious explanation of
the word in this place points out a man, modest,
correct, and sedate, in contrast with the wild, un-
steady, roving, and proud manner of Esau's life.
Jacob was modest, because he adhered to the custom
of his father, and stayed near the tents. — Becauit
h- did eat of his venison, lit., was in his mouth. Thii
weakness of the patriarch was not his only motiv«
in bis preference of Esau, but it is particularly men-
tioned here on account of the following narrative.
In like manner, Haman was a melancholy, indolenf
man, fond of good living.
600
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
4. Vers. 29-34. The typical prelude of the histor-
ical antithesis between Jacob and Esau. — Jaoolj sod
pottage. — A dish of lentiles, see ver. 34. — Peed
me. — Lit., "let me swallow," .in expression lor eal-
ng greedily, usb. According to Knobel, Esau, by
reason of his greediness, was not able to thinii of
the name, " lentiles," but points them out by the
words, " that Red ! " At the most, " that Red "
might express his strong appetite, excited by the in-
viting color. The addition T^'T) o^sn is generally
interpreted: ' from that same Red." The repetition
in the original show^ that his appetite was greatly
excited : " Let me swallow, I pray tliee, some of
that Red, that Red there ! " We question, however,
whether he did not say rather: Feed wUh that Red,
me the Red one. Thus by a rude, witty play upon
words, he would have introduced the fact of his
afterward having been called " the red one." At all
events his name is not to be deduced from the red
pottage. " In the words 'JiTaTX and isa above
there is indicated a different relation of the names
C■i^X (red-brown) and T"i) (hairy), but the one re-
ferring to cins , that red, i. e., brown-yellow pot-
tage of lentiles, (poiviKiiiuv, is there predominant.
Moreover, thousands of names, e. g., among the
.irabs (comp. Abdlfeda's Hist. Antei-.tl.), have a
like fortuitous origin. But if any one should regard
it as accidental that the history of nations for several
thousand years should have been connected with a
pottage of lentiles, he will not look in vain for simi-
lar occurrences in perusing the pages of Oriental
history. [Therefore was his name called Edom.
There is no discrepancy in ascribing the name both
to his complexion and the color of the lentile broth.
The propriety of a name may surely be marked by
different cii-eumstances. Nor is it unnatural to sup-
pose that such occasions should occur in the course
of life. Jacob, too, has the name given to him from
the circumstances of his birth, here confirmed. —
A. G.] It is scarcely necessary to say here, that
lentiles (adasi are still a favorite dish in Egypt and
Syria." Delitzsch. — Sell me this day. — Knoliel,
as his manner is, regards this fact as improbable.
He thinks the object of the narrative is to answer
tlie question, how the birthriglit descended from
Esau to Jacob, and thus erroneously supposes that,
according to the Jewish view, the people of God,
from Atiam down to Isaac, had always descended
from the line of the first-born. Tlie text, however,
presents to our view the contrast between Esau's
carnal thinking and Jacob's believing sensibility, in
the measure of fanatical exaggeration, and according
to its conflict so decisive and typical for all time
The right of the first-born has its external and
inteinul aspects. The external preference consisted
in the lieadship over the brothers or the tribe (ch.
xxvii. 'JO), and later also in a double portion of the
inheritance of the lather. The internal preference
was the right of priestliood, and in the house of
Abraham, according to the supposition thus far as-
sumed, a share in the blessing of the promise (ch.
xxvii. 4, 27-29). [Which included the possession
»f Canaan and the covenant fellowship with Jeho-
vah, and still more, the progenitorship of him in
whom all the families of the earth were to be blessed.
— A. G.] To acquire a rightful claim to this, was
umloubtedly tlie principal aim in the bargaiti, as is
ticen immediiuely from the answer of Esau : " I am
it the point to d'e ; " and also from the fact that
Esau appears not to have been limited in his ex
ternal inheritance. It is to the praise of Jacob thai
he appreciated so highly a promise extending into
the far future and referring to the invisible ; the
realization of which, moreover, though he waa un-
conscious of it, was already prepared in his very
being (either in his natural disposition or in his ele^
tion). The acuteness, too, with wliich he discerned
Esau's gross bondage to appetite, deserves no cen-
sure. The selfishness of his nature by wliich he so
soon estimates his profits and takes advantage of his
brother, — this impure motive, as well as a fanatical
self-will arising from his excitement in respect to the
birthright, through which he anticipates God's provi-
dence, is all the more obvious in his cunningly avail-
ing himself of the present opportunity. [Yet it
must be borne in mind that he laid no necessity
upon Esau. He leaves him to accept or reject the
proposal. And Esau knew well, though he did not
value it, what the birthright included. His own
words, " what profit shall it do to me, seeing I am
about to die ? " show clearly that he knew that it in
eluded invisible and future things, as well as the visi-
ble and present. It was because he thus consciously
sold his birthright, and for such a consideration, that
the Apostle, Heb. xii. 16, calls him a profane person.
— A. G.] In Esau of course he was not mistaken.
— Behold I am at the point to die. — Esau, in
his carnal disposition, seems to regard only the pres-
ent and the things of this life, and of the things of
this life, the visible and the sensual only. He yields
the entire higher import of the birthright, the specific
blessing of Abraham, the inheritance of his posterity,
the right and land of the covenant, for the satisfac-
tion of a moment — and that, too, near his paternal
hearth, where he would soon have obtained a meal
He is therefore designated (Heb. xii. 16) as /Ss/StjAos
or profane. — Swear to me this day. — Jacob's de
maud of an oath in this transaction evinces a veri
ungenerous suspicion, just as the taking of the oath
on the part of Esau shows a low sense of honor.—
And rose up and went his way. — As if nothing
happeued. Repentance followed later.
DOOTErNAL AND ETHICAL.
1. Rebekah's barrenness during twenty years.
The sons of Isaac, too, were to be asked for ; they
were to be children of faith, especially Jacob. Sa-
rah's example appears to occur again. Similar ex-
amples: Rachel, Hannah, p^lizabeth. Even when
not viewed in the light of the Abrahamic promise
of the blessing, barrenness was regarded in the an-
cient Orient as a trial of special severity ; how much
more so in tliis case. Stakkk : " Barrenness among
the patriarchs (Hebrews) was a painful occurrence.
It was sometimes the fruitful source of strife (Gen.
XXX. 2); tears were shed (1 Sam. i. 7) ; it was con-
sidered a reproach (Luke i. 25) ; it was even held foi
a curse." Here, however, Abraham could from his
own experience comfort them; he Uved fifteen years
after the birth of the children.
2. Isaac's intercession. It could be based upon
God's promise and Abraham's experience. Jehovah
heard him. He giantod more than asked. Instead
of one child he received two. Undoultedly Re-
bekah sustained his intercession by her prayers.
a. Rebekah's pregnancy, her painfiil sensation,
her ill-humor and alarming presentiments. The gen-
tle story of the hopeful maternal tempeian-ent ii
CllAl'. XXT. 19-34.
501
often of the greatest significance in history. Isaac,
in acconlance witli his disposition, prays to Jehovah ;
Rcbekah, after her manner of feeling, goes and asks
Jehov.ih. Undoubtedly she lierself is tlie prophetess
to whom God reveals the manner and future of her
delivery. Jehovah speaks to her. The word of
•evclation, though dark, infuses into her an earnest
yet hopeful feeimg of joy, instead of maternal sad-
ness and despondency. Two brothers, as two na-
tions— two nations, to conteiiil and fight with each
other from the very womb of the mothor. The
larger, or elder, and externally more powerful, gov-
erned by the smaller, the younger, and apparently
the more feeble. In these three points the antithesis
between Ishmael and Isaac is reflected again. [The
Apostle, Rom. ix. 12, dwells upon this passage as
»ffording a striking illustration and proof of the
doctrine he was then teaching. Isaac was chosen
over Ishmael, but further still, Jacob was chosen
over Esau, though they were of the same covenant
mother, and prior to their birth. The clioice, elec-
tion, was of grace. — A. H.]
4. Brothers unlike, hostile; twins even at en-
mity, whose physiological unconscious antipathy
shows itself already in the womb of the mother —
dark forebodings of the yet coming life, bearing
witness, however, that the life of man already, in its
coming into being, is a germinating seed of a future
individuality. This cannot be meant to express a
mutual hatred of the embryos, .\ntipathios, how-
ever, as well as sympathies, may he manifested in
the germinating life of man as in the animal and
vegetable kingdom.
5. The relation of prophecy and poetry appears in
the rhythmical form of the divine declaration as it is
laid before us. Common to both is the elevated lyrical
temperament manifesting itself in articulate rhythm.
6. The individuality of the twins is manife.<ted
immediately by corresponding signs. Esau comes
into this world with a kind of hunter's dress cover-
ing his rough-red skin ; he is, and remains, Esau or
Edom. Jacob seems to be a combatant immediate-
ly ; an artful champion, who unawares seizes his
opponent by the heel, causing him to fall. But un-
der Jehovah's direction and training. Jacob, the heel-
, holding struggler, becomes Israel, the wrestler with
God. In the name "Jacob " there is then intimated,
not only his inherited imperfection, but at the same
time his continual struggle, i. e., there exists a germ
of Israel in Jacob. Esau, in his wild rambles, be-
comes an aftCr-play of Nimrod. Jacob is so domes-
dti and economical that he cooks the lentile broth
hi.nsell Esau appears to have inherited from Re-
bekah the rash, sanguine temperament, but without
'-")• not ility of soul ; from Isaac he derives a certain
.'•ndne is of good living — at least of game. Jacob
'nlicrHed from Isaac the quiet, contemplative man-
per from Rebekah, however, a disposition for rapid,
prudent, cunning invention. Outwardly regarded,
Jacob on the whole resembled more the father, —
Esau the mother. This, howe>er, seems to be the
lery reason why Isaae preferred Esau, and Rebekah
Jacb. The gentle Isaac, who was to transmit to
one of his children the great promise of the future,
even the hope of Canaan, might have considered
Esau, not only in his character of first-born, but also
in thnt of a courageous and strong hunter, more
suitKble to hohl and defend .\braham's prospects
ftmo ig the heathen, than Jacob, who was so similar
to himself in respect to domestic Ufe. He might,
lierefore, imderstand the oracle given to Ret>ekah
in a sense different from that received by her ; or h«
might doubt, perhaps, its objective validity, opposed
as it was to the customary right of successioti. Thai
Esau's venison exercised an influence as to his posi-
tion towards Esau, is proved from the text. It might
be to him a delusive foretaste of the futurt cotiquesti
of Canaan. Esau's frank nobility of soul is seen
also in his promptly and zealously complying with
the request. Rebekah confided in her oracle and
understood her Jacob better. But even here there
coiiperuteii that mutual power of attraction which
lay in the two antithetical temperaments. Without
doubt, Esau, the stately hunter, moved about in hia
paternal home as a youthful lord ; in whieli fact
Isaac thought that he saw a sign of future power.
7. Isaac's taste and Esau's greediness — tht t«"
prime features nf a lickerish deportment The weak-
ness of the fatner soon increases to the greediness
of the son. Isaac's contemplation and weakness as
to his senses reminds us of similar contrasts.
8. And Jacob sod potta(je. Every human weak-
ness has its hour of temptation, and if we do not
watch and pray, it will come upon us like a thief
9. To sell one's birthright for a pottage of len-
tiles: this expression has become the established ex-
pression for every exchange of eternal treasures,
honors, and hopes, for earthly, visible, and moment-
ary pleasures. No doubt the motto : Let us eat and
drink, etc., is an echo of Esau's expression. Yel
we are not at Uberty to regard this moment of aban-
donment to appetite as an instance of a frame of
mitid continual, fixed ; nor can we refer the divine
reprobation, beginning with this moment, to his
future happiness. He was rejected relatively to the
prerogatives of the Abr.ihamic birthright. Notwith-
standing his manliness and placability, he was not
a man who had longings for the future, and therefore
could not be a patriarch among the people of the
future (Mai. i. 3; Heb. xii. 17). Jacob, however,
was different ; he knew how to prize the promises,
in spite of those faults of weakness and craft, from
which God's training purified him.
10. Thus it stood with both children even before
their birth. The antithesis of their lives was
grounded in the depths of their individuality, that
is, in the religious inclination of the one, and the
spiritual superficiality of the other. But these funda-
mental traits had tlieir ground in the divine election
(Rom. ix. 11). Tne fundamental relations become
apparent, with respect to both, in a sinfid manner.
They become apparent through the sins of both, but
they would have appeared, too, without theii sinftil
actions, by tiod's providence. The question is about
a destination, who was to be the proper bearer of
the covenant, not about happiness and perdition.
11. In their next conflict Jacob's ungenerous
negotiation increases to fraud. Thence his subse-
quent great sufferings and atonement. By the de-
ception of I.aban, too, as well as by that of his sons,
must expiation be made. The bloody coat of many
colors, sent to him by his sons, retninded him of
Esau's coat, in which he approached his father. For
Jacoli's opinion concerning the sufferings of his life,
see Gen. xlvii. 9. Starke: Paul, in quoting these
words, Rom. ix. 15, does not spe.ik of an absolute
decree to eternal life or eternal damnation. Because
God was to establish his church among the posterity
of Jacob, and the Messiah was to come through them,
Esau's posterity, if desirous of salvation, must turn
to the woisiiip of Jacob's God (John iv. '22). Upon
the idea of election, see Lanoe's Positive JJo.niatic
B02
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF HOSES.
article Ordo Salutis. [Also Tholuck, Meyer, Hodge
on the passage Rom. ix. 11. It seems weU-nigh im-
possible to escape the conviction that the Apostle
here teaches the sovereign clioice of persons, not
merely to the e.'iternal blessings, but the internal
and spiritual blessings of his kingdom, i. e., to salva-
tion.—A. G.]
12. The present prophecy respecting Jacob and
Esau is fartlier developed in the blessings of Isaac
(ch. xxvii. ). Thus everything was historically ful-
filled. For Edom and Idumaea, seethe Bible Diction-
aries ; also respecting the prophetic declarations con-
cerning Edom. The prophet Obadiah represents
Edom as a type of the anti-theocratic (anti-Christian)
conduct of false and envious brothers. This typical
interpretation no more excludes the preaching of the
Gospel iu Idumfea than similar and more definite
representations of Babel exclude the preaching of
Peter at Babylon.
13. The Hebraic, i. e., the profoundest concep-
tion of history, here comes into view again. All his-
tory develops itself from personal beginnings. The
personal is predoniinaiit in history.
14. The mystery of births ; of the like relation
between male and female nature ; of the unlilie but
natural relations between the more and less gifted,
between noble and common; and of the different
d^rees of natural dispositions — a reservation of God,
in his decrees of providence.
HOMILETIOAJ,Ai!D PRACTICAX.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical. The house of a
patriarch in its light and dark aspects : a. The di-
vine blessing and human piety ; b. human weakness
and sin. — Different directions of the parents. Con-
trasts of the childreiL — The trials iu the life of
Isaac. — Children a blessing, an heritage of the Lord.
— The intercession and its answer. — Isa:ic's prayers,
Rebekah's inquiries. — Hoping mothers are to incjuire
of the Lord. — Twin brothers not always twin spirits.
— Jacob and Esau. — The sale of the birthright for a
pottage of lentiles. — Edom's character in respect to
good and evil. (Saying of Lessing : Nothing in a man
is condemned as execrable if he only lias the reputa-
tion of honor and integrity.) — Jacob's sin, to human
eyes, indissolubly connected with his higher strivings.
— It is reserved to the chemistry of God to separate
the dross of sin from the pure metal of a pious
striving (Mai. iii. 3). — The experience of the pious, a
succession of divine purifications. — Hereditary faults.
— Jacolj's ha.ste and eager grasijing, the sign of the
severe expiatory penitential sorrows of liia lite. —
He wislied to acquire externally, what (iod's grace
had put into his heart. — The first fault of J;icob a
harbingiT of the second. — Hereditary virtues and
lereditary vices. — Divine election: 1. X predestina-
tion of Jacob's and Esau's theocratic position ; 2.
no decree as lo tlieir deportment. — Esau and Jacol);
or a frank, noble disposition without subjectivcness,
without a desire, and even without a true sense of di-
vine tilings ; opposed to an cnthu.siastic feeling for t!ie
eternal, yet tainted with self-deceit and diBlioiicsty. —
Jacob, a man <jf the higher longing and hope. Esau,
a man of sensual pleasure, regardless of tlii> future.
Staukk, Cramkk: The true church is never re-
ipccted liy the world as much as tlie great mass of
the children of the flesh ; we mu.st uot, therefore,
place the bushel by the largest heap. — Bihl. Tub. :
thild'-en arc an he-ilage of the Lord (Ps. cxxvii. 3).
— Hall : Isaac asks for one son and he receives two
— Lange: Married peopla are under obligations t(
unite in prayer, especially on important occasions. —
Notwitlistanding natural causes, God, as creator, i-e^
serves to himself the closing and opening of th«
womb of mothers. This shows his sovereignty ovei
the human race (Jer. xxxi. 20). — Rebekali, in hei
impatience, may be a type of those who, having
been aroused by God, so that a struggle, necessarily
painful, takt^i place between spirit and flesh, soon
become impatient. — In an unfruitful conjugal life we
are to take comfort in this : 1. That God visited with
barrennes.s holy people in former times— Sarah,
Rachel, Hannah, Elisabeth ; 2. God best knows our
wants ; 3. we are not to render an account lor chil-
dren, etc. ; 4. to die without children takes away, in a
certain degree, the bitterness of death ; 5. the time*
are calamitous (Matt. xxiv. 19 1. In times of need
we are not to consult soothsayers, but God and his
word. — (The struggle of the flesh with the spirit iu
the new life of the new-bom ; Rom. vii. 22, 23). —
Ver. 2r>. Gen. iii. 16. — Cramkr: Within the pale of
the Christian Church we have different classes of" peo-
ple : Jews and heathen (John x. 1 6 1, true believers
and hypocrites, good and evil (Matt. xiii. 47). God
does not judge after the advantages of the flesh, of age,
of size and other things which concern the appear-
ance.— Bib!. Wirt. : Two churches are prefigured
here : one believing the promises of Christ ; the
other depending on a carnal advantage of antiquity
and extent. These two bodies will never come to an
agreement, until finally the true church, as the small-
er, will overcome the false by the victory of her
faith, and triumph over her in eterual blessedness
(1 John V. 4). — 0, children, remember what anxiety
you have cost your mothers. — Ver. 28. Langk ; The
preference of parents for one or another of their
children may have its natural cause, and be sanctified,
but seldom does it keep within proper Umits. Proba-
bly Esau was more attached to his father, and Jacob
to his mother. (Isaac, probably, prefers venison, not
as a delicacy, but to make better and economical use
of his cattle ; and because wild animals are of no use
to the husbandman, but only cause destruction to
him.) — Ver. 29. The simplicity of early time. Jacob
sitting by the hearth and cooking, which is usually
the duty ol' the females. — Ver. 31. The apology for
Jacob (Luther and Calvin, indeed, approve of his
transaction on the ground of his right to the privilege
of the first-born by the divine promise). Though the
first-born was highly esteemed among the patriarchs,
Christ wnuld not descend from one of the first-born
(indicating that he was the true first-born, who was to
jjrocure for us the right of the first-born from God).
[See, also, Rom. viii. 2fl ; Col. i. 18; Rev. I. 5; Ileb.
xii.23. — A. G.] He claims to descend, not from Cain,
but from Selh ; not from Nahor, or Ilaran, but from
.\braliam; not from Ishmacl, but from Isaac; not
from Esau, but from Jacob; not from the seven
eliler sons of Jesse, but from David, and from Solo-
mon, who was one of David's younger sons. — (Ver.
27. The pennission of hunting on certain conditions :
Fii-st, that the regular vocation be not neglected;
second, that our neighbor be not injured.) — (Cramkr :
In iducating cliihlren we are to pay particular at-
tention to their dispositions, observing in what di-
rection each one iiiclines, for not every one is qual-
ified for all things (I'rov. xx. 11 ; xxii. W). — (iodlesi
men, who, for the sake of temporary things, despise
and hazard the eternal (Phil. iii. 19).
(iKKi.ACH : The birth of many ce'.ebrateJ men ol
CHAP. XXVI. 1-22.
603
God, preceded by a long season of barrenness. —
Thereby tlie now-born babe is to become not only
more endeared to the parents, who tarn their whole
attention to it, but is especially to be regarded by
them as a supernatural gift of God, and thus become
a type of the Saviour's birth from a virgin. — Ttie iH-
••ine prophec)/ : The patriarchs come into view only
(?) in reference to their descendants, with whom
they are considered as constituting a unity. For the
prophecy has not been fulfilled in respect to the
Srothers as individuals. — Lisco ; A frivolous con-
tempt of an advantage bestowed on him by God. —
So, also, an incorsiderate oath (Heb. .\ii. 16). — An
immoderate longing after enjoyment sacrifices the
greatest for the least, the eternal for tlie temporal. —
Calwer Handbuch : Abraham too rejoiced in the
birth of these boys ; he lived yet 15 years after their
birth, and the narrative of his death and burial has
been, for historical purposes, considereii first. When
the inherited blessing of the promise is the subject
treated of, the mere course of nature cannot decide
the issues, in order that all praise may be to God. and
not to men. — Schroder: (The Rabbins e.xplain
Isaac's faithfulness to Rebekah from the fact of his
having been offered in sacrifice to God (1 Tim. Ui. 2).
Isaac, to whom the very promise was given, is placed
after Ishniael, and Ishmael, possessing a temporal
promise only, is put far before him. He is lord over
other lords, counts 12 princes in his line, while
Isaac lived alone and without any children, like a
lifeless clod (Luther). — All the works of God begin
painfully, but they issue excellently and gloriously.
Earthly undertakings progress rapidly, and blaze up
like a fire made of paper, but sudden leaps seldom
prosper (Val. Herb.).— Every mother conceals a fu-
ture ; every maternal heart is full of presagings.
Her bodily pains, she interprets as spiritual throes
that await her. — The case of Rebekah presents con-
solation to a woman with child (Val. Herb.). — Calvin:
Rebekah probably inquired of God in prayer. — Her
example should teach us not to give way too much
to sadness in distress. We are to restrain, and
struggle with, ourselves. — Prophecy (even the hea-
then oracles) always assumes a solemn and metrical
etyle, etc. The prophet is a poet, as frequently the
poet is a prophet. — Her alarming presentiment did
oot deceive Rebekah. The struggle within her indi-
cated the external and internal conflicts not only of
'er children, but even of the nations which were to
descend from them. — This ver. 23 embraco al
times ; it is the history of the world, of the church,
and of individual hearts, enigmatically expressed
(I'oats maile of red camel's hair were worn by poc!
people, also by prophets (Zach. xiii. 4 ; 2 Kings L
S).)- — The Hebrew Admoni is also connected with
Adam ; Esau is a son of Adam, predominantly iu
clined to the earth and earthly things. — (Isaac's bod-
ily nature appears feeble everywhere ; cli. xxrii
1, 19). Such persons are fond of choice and iinei
viands. Wherever Abraham has calves' flesh, buttei
and milk, on special festive occasions, Isaac dehghta
in venison and wine (ch. xxvii. 3, 4, 25). — In tha
Logos, as the first-born of all creatures, the signifi-
cation of the first-born, both animal and human, haa
its true, its ultimate, and divine foundation (Ziegler).
The father is pleased, that Esau, like Ishmai 1, ch.
xxi. 2o, is a good hunter, and he regards ii as an
ornament to the first-born, who is to have the gov-
ernment (Luther). Esau becomes Edom, and there-
fore, still the more remains Esau merely ; Jacob, on
the other hand, becomes Israel i ch. xxxii. 28). — Ja-
cob is the man of hope. The possession that ha
greatly desires is of a higher order : hopes depend-
ing on the birthright. He never strives after the
lower birthright privileges. (It is doubtful, also,
whether these were as fully developed at the time of
Abraham as at the time of Moses). — I am at the
point to die Sooner or later I will have to succumb
to the perils to which my vocation exposes me. A
tliought expressed more tlian once by Arabic heroes
(Tuch). — Esau's insight into the future extended to
his death only. — Jacob's request that Esau should
swear. He is as eager for the future as Esau is for
the present. — (LentUes, to this day, are a very fa-
vorite dish among the Arabs, being mostly eaten in
Palestine as a pottage. Robinson found them very
savory, etc.). — Want of faithful confidence in him
who had given him such a promise, it was this that
made Jacob wish to assist God with carnal subtilty,
as Abraham once with carnal wisdom. — Thou shalt
not take advantage of thy bi'other. For the present,
no doubt, Jacob obscured the confidence of his
hopes, just as Abraham, by anticipation, obscured
his prospects. — As Ishmael had no claim for the bless-
ings of tlie birthright, because begotten Kara crapKo,
so Esau forfeits the blessings of his birthright, not
because begotten Kara trdpHa^ but because inclined
KaTo. trdpKa (Delitzscb).
THIRD SECTION.
haae in the region of Abimelech at Gerar. The manifestation of God, and confirmed ptorniae. Bit
vnUation of the maxim of his father. The ezpomre of Rebekah. The living figure of a
richly blessed, patient endurance.
Chapter XXVI. 1-22.
1 And there was [again] a famine in the land, besides the first [previous] famine thai
was in the lays of Abraham. And Isaac went unto Abimelech king of iht; Pliilistinet
2 unto Gerar. And the Lord [Jehovah] appeared nnfo him, and said, Go not down into
3 Egypt; dwell in the land which I shall tell thee of: Sojourn [as a stranger] in this hvi
504
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
and I will be with thee, and will bless thee ; for unto thee, and unto thy seed, 1 wiF
give all tliese countries, and I will perform [cause to stand] the oath which I sware untc
4 Abraham thy father; And 1 will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven, and
will give to thy seed all these countries ; and in thy seed shall all the nations of the
5 earth be blessed [bless themselves] ; Because that Abraham obeyed my voice, and kepi my
oharge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.
i, 1 And Isaac dwelt in Gerar : And the men of the place asked him of his wife ; and
he said, Siie is my sister : for he feared to say, She is my wife ; lest, said he [thought 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 Abimelecli king of the
Philistines looked out at a window, and saw, aud behold, Isaac ivas sporting with
9 Rgjekah his wife. And Abimelech called Isaac, and said, Behold, of a surety [certainly]
she is thy wife: and how saidst thou, She is my sister? And Isaac said unto him,
10 Because I said [l thought]. Lest I die for her. And Abimelech said, What is this that
thou hast done unto us? one of the people might lightly' have lien with thy wife, and
11 thou shoulde.st have brought guiltiness upon us. And Abimelech charged all his people,
saying, He that toucheth [injures] this man or liis wife shall surely be put to death.
12 Then Isaac sowed in that laud, and received [found, a. a] in the same year an hundred-
13 fold : and [thus] the Lord blessed him : And the man waxed great, and went forward,
14 and grew until he becaTne very great : For he had possession of flocks, and possession
15 of herds, and great store of servants: and the Philistines envied him. For all thewella
which his father's servants had digged in the days of Abraham his father, the Philistines
16 had stopped them, and filled them with earth. And Abimelech said unto Isaac, Go
from us ; for thou art much mightier tlian we.
17 And Isaac departed thence, and pitched his tent in the valley [arook) valley— wady.— A. G.]
18 of Gerar, and dwelt there. And Isaac digged again the wells of water, which they had
digged in the days of Abraham liis father; for tlie Philistines had stopped them after
the death of Abraham : and he called their names after [like] the names b}' which hia
19 father had called them. And Isaac's servants digged in the valley [at the bottom], and
20 fomid there a well of springing [living] water. And the herdmen of Gerar did strive
with Isaac's herdmen, saying. The water is ours : and he called the name of the wel.
21 Ezek [contention] ; because tliey strove with him. And they digged another well, and
strove for that also : and he called the name of it Sltnah [enmity— adversary, Satan wells].
22 And he removed [brake up] from thence, and digged another well; and for that they
strove not: and he called the name of it Rehoboth [wide room]; and he said, For now
the Lord hath made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.
[' Ver. 8.— When the days were dr.awn out.— A. G.]
[■ Ver. 10.— l3TTD3 , within a little ; it lacks but little, £is the Chaldee renders. — A. G.]
GENEEAL PEELIMINAEY REMARKS.
1. The present chapter (xxvi.) is tlie only one
devoted exchisiv'ily to traditions coneerninj:; Isaac.
The former narratives were, on the one hand, inter-
woven with Abraham's history, and, on the other,
contained tlie be^inninj^ of the history of Esan and
Jacob The section in the fcillowinp cliaptcr, hiit
more fully givcTi in the beginning of cl)apti'i- xxviii.,
forms a eotichision, in which the history of Isaac and
that of his sons arc considered as one. This is fol-
owed by ch. xxxv. 27, like a melancholy echo ex-
tending over Isaac's long and isolated life, during
which Rebekah disappears from the scene, deejily
grieved on account of her sons. We have liere a
Tivid life-picture, taken from the ir]idst of Isaac's
oilgrimage, and representing clearly tiie fact fjta/
Tsaac'i com pnnrdTifrnt and. trnnijuiUity draw after
Ihem yire lilenititiiiK. This thought, however, per-
vades his whole history. lie submits to suffer upon
lie riah, and thus receives a nivsterious theocratic
consecration as a type of Christ. He waited for fau
bride until Abraham's and Eliezer's care procured
one for him without his co-operation, and in this he
fared well. During Reliekah's long barrenness he
seeks no remedy such as Aliiaham did in connection
witli Hagar, but finally resoits to prayer, and is
richly compensated in the bestowal of twins. During
the famine he iloos not go to Egypt, liut, according to
Jehovah's instruction, rcminns in Canaan, and here,
in the country of tlie Philistines, is most abundantly
blessed. He receives in silence the censure of
Abimelech for his deceptive statement respecting
Rebekah. He is exiled, and departs from Geiar.
He yields one well after another to the shepherds Oi
the Philistines, ever receding, further and further;
and yc't llie king of the Philistines applies to hii7i
for an alliance, as to a nnghiy prince. Finally Isaac
knows how to reeimcile himself to the strung decei>
tion prepiired for Iiini by Rebekah and tJacob, anc
even this pliancy of temper is blessed to him, in thai'
he is theieby kept in t'"<' riglit theucraiic dirtction
CUAP. XXVI. 1-22.
50f
His passive conduct, too, at the marriage of hissonsi
renders tlie difference between the true Esau and tlie
Iheocratie Jacob more distinct. His composure and
endurance seem infirmities ; these, liowevei', with all
"veakness of temperament, are evidently supported
by a power of the spirit and of faith. Tlie moral
power in it is the self-restraint whereby, in opposi-
tion to his own wishes, he gives up his ha^ty purpose
to bless Esau. Isaac learned experimentally upon
Moriah, that quietness, traaquillity, and conlideuce in
the Lord have a glorious issue. This experience is
stamped upon his whole careei. If we judge him
from the declarations concerning Rebekah at Gerar,
he appeiirs to be the timid imitator of his father ;
though the assuming of his father's maxim in this
respect m.iy be explained from his modest, suscep-
tible nature. But that he does not imitate his father
slavishly, is seen especially from the fact of his quiet
Buffering without any resistance. This is made evi-
dent, too, by the fact that he does not, like Abraham,
go to Egypt during the famine. Moreover, he does
not take a eoncubiue, as Abraham did; nor hkehim
does lie look to divine revelation for the decision re-
specting the lawful heir, but holds himself sure of it
by reason of the transmitted right of the first-born.
New and original traits appear in his transition to
agriculture, as well as in his zealous digging of wells.
The naming of the wells, taken away from him, has
something of humor, such as is peculiar to tranquil
minds. His pleasant disposition reveals itself not
only in his preference of venison, but by his peculiar
manner of preparing, for Abimelech of Gerar, and
his friends, a feast, even after the gentle reproof, and
before he made a covenant mth him on the follow-
ing day. In his vocation, however, as patriarch, he
shows himself a man of spirit by building an altar
unto the Lord, and calling upon his name (ver. 25).
And while there are but two visions mentioned defi-
nitely during his hfe (ver. 3, ver. 24), still there fol-
lows a higher spiritual life, and^ at the same time^
a further development of the Abrahamie promise
through the disposition he manifests in the blessing
of his sons. Our section may be divided as follows :
1. Isaac's sojourn in the country during the famine
in consequence of an injunction of Jehovah. Re-
newed promise (vers. 1-6); 2. Isaac's assertion that
• Rebekah was his sister (vers. 7-11) ; 3. Isaac's pros-
perity ; his exUe from tlie city of Gerar, and his set-
tlement in the valley of Gerar (vers. 12-17); 4.
Isaac's patience in what he endured from the Phihs-
tiues, and its blessing (vers. 18-22). Knobel regai ds
the present chapter as a Jehovistic supplement,
mingled with Elohistic elements. [In regard to the
numerous points of resemblance between Isaac and
Abraham, Kurtz has shown (Gesch., p. 226) that
these resemblances are not slavish imitations, but
are marked by distinct peculiarities, and moreover,
that these similar experiences are not accidental, but
on the one hand, as the result of the divine provi-
dence, they flow from the same purpose and disci-
pUne with the father and the son, and on the other
hand, ?.s far as they are the result of human choices,
they arise from an actual resemblance in their condi-
tion and hopes. Thus all believers in their expe-
riences are EiUke and yet tmlike. — A. G.]
EXEGETICAL AND CKITICAi.
1. Vers. 1-6. Isaac's abode in the countri/. — A
funine. — It is distinguished from the famine in the
history of Abraham. Isaac, folloning the exampU
of his father, was on the point of going to Egvpt
but is arrested by divine interposition. " Isaac'«
history commences with the same trial as the liistor)
of Abraham " (Delitzsch). This frequent calamifi
of antiquity occurs once more in the history of Ja
cob. — Isaac went vinto Abimelech. — Xot the on«
mentioned ch. xx. 21 (Kimehi, Schum, etc., Del.),
but his successor (Knobel). The same may be said
of Phichol (ch. xxi. 22). There is here, very proba-
bly, a different Abimelech, and with hiin anuthei
Phichol. The former is expressly called king. Upon
this name Abimelech, as a standing title of the kings,
compare the title to the xxxivth Ps. with I Sam. xxi
11. — Gerar. — "The ruins of which, under the name
of Kirbet-el-Gerar, have been again discovered by
Rowiand, three leagues in a southeasterly direction
from Gaza." Del. Isaac mtends to go to Egypt,
but according to God's instruction, he is to remain
in Palestine as a stranger. — Go not down, — It is
characteristic that Abraham received the first divine
instruction to depart^ Isaac to remain. God leads
every one according to his peculiar necessities. Even
in Canaan nothing shall be wanting to him. — All
these countries. — Extending the promise beyond
Canaan [or rather all the lands of the different Ca-
naanitish tribes. — A. G.] — I will be with thee. —
A piomise of help, blessing, and protection, especial-
ly needed by Isaac. — I will perform the oath.—
As for God, the divine oath was absolutely firm,
though, on the part of Abraham, it might have been
obscured. But since Abraham, on his part, remained
true to the covenant, it is renewed to the son by
virtue of an oath, whilst in regard to the contents of
the promise, it is even eidarged. The one land of
Canaan is changed into many countries, the seed
multipUed as the stars of heaven, and as the sand
which is upon the sea-shore, becomes stars only ; and
the blessing of the nations (ch. xxii. 18) becomes in
his seed a voluntary blessing of the nations among
tliemselves. — Because that Abraham Literally,
for that. Abraham's obedience is brought out conspic-
uously through the use of the richest deuteronomic
terms. To the commendation of obedience in general,
follows in strict derivation: 1. the charge; 2. the
commandments ; 3. the institutions ; 4. the germ of
the Thorah in the plural, r"nn\ [He kept the
cliarge of God, the special commission he had given
him ; his commandments, his express or occasional
orders; his statutes, his stated prescriptions graven
on stone ; his law, the great doctiine of moral obli-
gations. Murphy, p. 874. His obedience was not
perfect, as we know, but it was umeserved, and
as it flows from a living faith, is thus honored of
God. — A. G.] The motive of the promise empha-
sizes the humility and low position of Isaac. He
must also, however, render the obedience of faith,
if Jehovah's blessing is to rest upon him, and, in-
deed, first of all, by remaining in the country.
Abraham had to go to Egypt, Jacob must go to
Egypt to die there, Isaac, the second patriarch, is
not to go to Egypt at all. Notwithstanding the re-
semblance to the promise, ch. xxii., the new here is
unmistakable.
2. Vers. 7-11. Isaac's assertion respecting Hi-
bekah. In the declaraticm of Isaac the event hert
resembles Abraham's experience, both in Egypt .and
at Gerar, but as to all else, it differs entirely. With
regard to the declaration itself it is true that Re-
bekah was also related to Isaac, but more distantly
than Sarah to Abraham. It is evident from the nar
aU6
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
radve itself that Isaac is not so seriously threatened
18 Abraham, although the inquiries of the people at
Gerar might liave alarmed him. It is not by a
punishment inflicted upon a heatlieu prince, who
perhaps might have abducted the wile, but through
the intercourse of Isaac with Rebekah that the true
relation became known. That the Abimeleoh men-
'joned in this narrative is the same person wlio,
eighty years before, received Sarah into his harem,
ippeare plausible to Kurtz and Delitzsch, since it
may be talsen for granted that as a man gray with
age he did not send for Rebeliah and talie her into
his harem. We reject these as superficial grounds.
The main point is, that Isaac appears in this narra-
tive as a very cautious man, while the severe edict
of Abimelech seems to suppose a solemn remem-
brance in the king's house of the former experience
with Abraham. The oath that follows seems also to
show that tlie new Abimelech avails himself of the
policy of his father, as well as Isaac. The windows
in old times were latticed openings for the light to
enter, as found in tlie East at the present day.
3. Vers. 12-17. Imac's prosperity and exile. —
Then Isaac sowed. — Besides planting trees, Abra-
ham was yet a mere noraad. Isaac begins to pursue
agriculture along with his nomadic life ; and Jacob
seems to liave continued it in a larger measui'e (ch,
xxxvii. 7). " Many nomads of Arabia connect agricul-
ture with a nomadic life (see Borkhardt : St/rim,
p. 43(1, etc.)." Knobel. This account agrees well
with the locality at Gerar. The soil of Gaza is very
rich, and in Nuttar Abu Sumar, a tract northwest
of Elysa, the Arabs possess now storehouses for
their grain (.see Robinson, i. p. "291, 292). Even at
the present time, in those countries (e. g., Hauran),
the soil yields a very rich produce (Bitrkhardt:
"Syria," "p. 463). Knobel. [The hundred-fold is
a large and very rivre product, and yet Babylonia is
said to have yielded two hundred and even three
hundred fold. IIkrod., i. p. 193; Murphy, p. 375.
— A. G.] " The exigency of the famine induced
Isa^ic to undertake agriculture, and in the very first
year his crops yielded a hundred-fold (C^Tl'lS). The
agriculture of Isaac indicates already a more perma-
nent settlement in Palestine; but agriculture aud the
occupation of the nomadic life were first engaged in
equally by the Israelites in Egypt, and it was not
until their return from Egypt that agriculture became
the predominant employment." Delilzsch. — And
the Philistines envied him. — Hostilities began
in their filling with earth the wells that Abraham
dug at Gerar, and which therefore belonged to Isaac.
This very act is already an indirect cximlsion, for
without wells it is not possible that Isaac should live
a nomadic life at Gerar. [The digging of wells was
regarded as a sort of occupancy of the land, and
as conferring a kind of title to it ; and hence per-
haps the envy of the I'hilislines. — A. (i.] "This
conduct was customary during wars (2 Kings iii. 25 ;
Is. XV. 0). and the .Arabs fill vrith ear'.h the wells
along the route of the pilgrims if they lio not re-
ceive the toll a.sked by them (Troilo: Orientalixche
Ileiaebe^rhreib.. p. 682; Nikbchr: 'Arab.' p. 362)."
Knobel. — Go icora. us. — Abimelech openly vents
his displeasure against Isaac. He banishes him from
his city, Gerar, an<l from his country in the narrower
senee. — In the valley of Gerar. — The undulating
country (Jurf-el-Gerar, through which flows a wady
(Rittkr : Erdk. .tiv. [>. sii-t). Constantine erected a
monument in this valley (Sozom. 6, 32).
4. Vera 18-22. lanac's patient behavior under
the violation of his rigJUs by the Philistirui. Thi
wcl/s. — Digged again the wells. — Behind his bad
too, the Philistines fiUed the wells which AbruhaU
dug. Knobel infers from verse 29 that the hostilt
conduct of the Philistines was not mentioned in the
more ancient record ! The discoveries of the wells
(vers. 19, 21), too, must be regarded as identical with
the digging again, ver. 18 ! — The quarrels about th«
wells seem to be connected with views respecting
the boundaries of Isaac's place of exile. He is
driven further and further by them. " Quarrels
about watering-places and pastures are common
among the Bedouins (see xiii. 7 ; Exod. ii. 17 ;
BtJEKHARDT : ' Syria,' p. 628, and ' Bedouins,' p. US).
Among the ancient Arabs, also, severe contests arose
about watering-places (Hamasa, i. p. 122 f. 287).
In many regions the scarcity of water is such that
the Bedouins rather offer milk than water as a bev-
erage (.Seetzen, iii. p. 21)." Knobel. Isaac yields
without any resistance ; still he erects a monument
to the injustice he suffered. The nime of the second
well, n:::'^, from the verb 1i:!U, brings to view an
enmity maUgnant and satanic. — A weU of springing
'water. — Running water (Lev. xiv. 5, etc.). — Reho-
both (ample room ). — The third well was probably situ-
ated beyond the boundaries of Gerar ; for it is previous-
ly said that he had removed from thence, i. e., from the
valley of Gerar. The name Rehoboth indicates that
now by the guidance of .Jehovah he hiid come to u
wide, open region. Ruhaibeh, a wady, southwest
from Elusa, and discovered by Robinson (i. 291 ff.),
together with the extended ruins of the city of the
same name, situated upon the top of a mountain,
remind us of this third well (Strauss: 'Sinai and
Golgotha,' p. 149)." Delitzsch. Robinson also dis-
covered further north, in a wady, Shutein, perhaps
the Sitnah of Isaac. Ruhaibeh is situated about
three hours in a southerly direction from Elusa and
about eight and a half from Beer-sheba, where the
main roads leading to Gaza and Hebron separate
from each other.
DOCTarNAX AUD ETHICAL.
1. Delitzsch: "This chapter (xxvi.) is composed
of these seven short, special, and peculiarly colored
narratives, which the Jehovi.st arranged. One pur-
pose runs through all : to show, by a special narra-
tion of examples running through the first forty
years of Isaac's independent history, how even the
patriarch himself, though less distinguished in deeds
and sulferings, yet under Jehovah's blessing and pro-
tection comes forth out of all his fearl'ul embarrass-
ments and ascends to still greater riches and honor."
His life, however, is not 'the echo of tlie life of
.\braham;" but Isaiic's meekness and gentleness
indicate rather a decisive progress, which, hke his
pure monogamy, was a type of New Testament rela-
tions.
2. The events related in the present section
hehmg undoubtedly to a time when Esau had not
reached the development of all his powers, for other-
wise this stately and powerftd hunter would scarcely
have submitted so qnietly to the infringements of
his rights by the Philistines.
3. The two visions which mark the life of Isaac
arc entirely in accordance with his character and hi»
point of view. In the first, Jehovah adilres^es him
(Jo not diiwn into Egypt; in the seccmd: Fear not
The promises, however, which he receives, are fu»
CHAP. XXVI. \-22.
50'.
ther developments of tlie Abrahaniie promise. For
Isaac, moreover, Jehovah's promise." become a divine
ootli, i e., to the firmest contideiite of faith in hia
breast
4. The three famines occurring in the historv of
the three patriaich.i constitute the fixed niainlesia.
tions of one of the p:reat national calamities of an-
tiquity, from which tlie pious have to suiter together
with the ungodly; but in whicli tlie pious always
experience the special care of the Lord, ass\iring
them that all things work together for good to them
that love God.
5. Isaac's imitation of his father in passing his
wife for his sister, Incurs the more severe censure of
history than the same actions of Abraham, and it
has this time for its result the gradual expidsion from
Gerar. This ignominy, too, must have tlie more in-
clined him to yield patiently to the infringements
of his rights by the Philistines; and thus lie is again
blessed with the freedom of a new region, so that
the word is fulfilled in him : Blessed are the meek ;
for they shall inherit the earth.
6. Isaac and Abimelech, sons of their respective
fathers, and yet having each a peculiar character
according to their individual and finer traits.
7. Isaac, and the signs that appear of a willingness
to struggle bravely for the faith, though still suljjecL
to his natural infirmities and obscured by them.
S. Isaac's energy in his agricultural undertak-
ings and in the diligent digging of wells.
9. The filling of the wells with earth, as taken in
a spiritual sense, indicates an old hatred of the Phil-
istines towards the children of God.
10, And thou shouldst have brought guiltiness
upon us. The idea of guilt is the exten.sion of cul-
pability over the future of the sinner ; and frequently
{as e. g. in public offences) more or less even to those
around us. Participation of sin is participation in its
corrupting and ruinous results.
HOMTLETICAL AUD PRACTICAL.
To the whole chapter. How the promises of
Abraham descend upon Isaac: 1. As the same
promises ; 2. as newly shaped in their development
• and confirmation. — Incidents of a life of faithful
suffering and rich with blessings, as presented in the
history of Isaac : Isaac during the famine ; in dan-
ger at Gerar ; as exposed to the jealousy of the
Philistines ; during the exile ; in the strife about the
wells ; in the visit of Abimelech ; in the marriage
of Esau. — How Isaac gradually comes out of his dif-
ficulty: 1. From Gerar to the valley of Gerar; 2
from the valley of Gerar to Rehobotli ; 3. fiom Re-
hoboth to Beer-ahcba. — Isaac as a digger of wells, a
type also of spiritual conduct: 1. In digging again
tlie wells of the father that are filled with earih ; 2.
in digging new wells. — Isaac and Abimelech, or thi'
lions in relation to their fathers ; 1. Resemblance;
2. difference. — The blessing of Isaac in his crops (at
the harvest-festival). — Malignant joy, a joy most (ie-
itructive to the malignant man himself. [Words-
worth, who finds types everywhere, says ; " Here
«lso we have a type of what Christ, the pure Isaac, is
ioing in the church. The wella of ancient truth bad
been choked up by error, but Christ reopened then
and restored them to their primitive state and callet*
them by their old names," etc., p. 115. — A. G.]
Starke: (What Moses narrates in this chaptei
appears to ha-e happened before Bsau and Jacob
! were bom {sec ver. 7) [More probably when thej
were about fifteen years old, after Abraham's death.
— A. G.] Regarding the Philistines and Philistia,
see Dictionaries.) The reason why God did not per.
mit Isaac to go to Egypt is not given, yet it may
have been that Isaac might experience the wonderful
providence and paternal c;ire of God toward him.
Some (Calvin) assign the reason, that Isaac, becauss
not as far advanced in faith as his father Abraliain,
might have been easily led astray by the idolatrous
Egyptians (the result shows, however, that it was
unnecessary this time). — / will, give all the-ie coun-
tries. Tliy descendants through Esau shall receive
a great part of the southern countries, lying between
Canaan and Egypt. — Ver. 5. It does not follow from
these four terms, which were frequently used after
the law was given upon Mt. Sinai, that Abraham al-
ready possessed the law of Moses, as the Jews as-
sert. Had this been the case, no doubt he would
have transmitted it to his children. Moses, how-
ever, chooses these expressions, which were in use
in his time, in order to point out clearly to the peo-
ple of Israel how Abraham had submitted himself
entirely to the divine will and command, and ear-
nestly abstained from everything to the contrary in
his walk before God. To these four terms there are
sometimes added two more, viz., rules and testimo-
nies.— OsiANDER : There are no calamities in the
world from which even the pious do not sometimes
sufter. The best of it, however, is that God is their
protection and comfort (Pa. xci. 1). — We are to re^
member the divine promises, though ancient and
general, and apply them to ourselves. — Cramer : We
are to abide by God's command, for his word is a
light unto our path (Ps. cxix. 105). — Thus God
sometimes permits his people to stumble, that hia
care over them may become known. — To ver. 10.
From this we see that the inhabitants of Gerar, not-
withstanding their idolatry, were still so conscien-
tious that they considered adultery a crime so great
as to involve the whole land in its punishment. — -
Cramer : Comely persons should be much more
watchful of themselves than others. — The woods
have ears and the fields eyes, therefore let no one
do anything thinking that no one sees and hears him.
— Strangers are to be protected. (Since Isaac pos-
sessed no property, perhaps he cultivated with the
king's permission an unfruitful tract of land, or hired
a piece of ground.) — It is the worst kind of jealousy
if we repine at another's prosperity without any
prospect of our own advantage.
Bibl. Tub. : God blesses his people extraordinari-
ly in famine. — Cramer: Success creates jealousy;
but let us not be surprised at this ; it is the course
of the world. — Ver. 17. To suffer wrong, and therein
to exercise patience, is always better than to revenge
oneself and do wrong. — Christian, tlie Holy Scrip-
tures are also a well of living water; dig for
this inces.santlv. — Bibl. Tub.: The jealousy and
artifice of enemiea catmot prevent or restrain tlu
blessing which the Lord designs fcr the f ions.
MS
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
FOURTH SECTION.
ItacK in Beer-sheba, Treaty of Peace with Abimeleeh.
Chapter XXVI. 23-33.
23, 24 And he went up from thence to Beer-sheba. And the Lord appeared unto him the
same [first] night, and said, I ' am tlie 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 [witnessed to] the name of the Lord, and
pitched his tent' there : and there Isaac's servants digged a well.
26 Then [and] Abimeleeh went to him from Gerar, and Ahuzzath [possession, occupant ]
one of his friends, and Phichol the chief captain [see ch. xxi. 32, commander] of his army
27 And Isaac said unto them, Wherefore come ye to me, seeing ye hate me [hare treated me
28 with hatred], and have sent me away from you? And they said. We saw certainly ^ that
the Lord was with thee : and we said, Let there be now an oath betwixt us [on both sides].
29 even betwixt us and thee, and let us make a covenant with thee ; That * 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 [thus art thou] now the blessed of the
30, 31 Lord. And he mad'^ them a feast, and they did eat and drink. And they rose up
betimes in the morning, and sware one to another : and Isaac sent them away, and they
32 departed from him in peace. And it came to pass the same day, that Isaac's servants
came and told him concerning the well which they had digged, and said unto him. We
33 have found water. And he called it Shebah [seven; here in its signification : oath] : therefore
the name of the city is Beer-sheba unto this day.
(1 Ver. 24,— "^DDX . The pronoun is emphatic — I the God, eta— A. G.\
[> Ver. 25.— a" . Not the usual word for the pitching a tent, see ver. 17. The term may be chosen with referenc*
to the permanence of his abode, or the increase of his family and retinue.— A. G.]
[' ver. 28. — Lit., Seeing we have seen.— A. G.]
[• Ver. 29.— Lit., If thoushalt. The iisual Hebrew form of an imprecation or oath.— A. G.)
EXEGETICAX AKD CRITICAL.
To Beer>sheba. — The former residence of Abra-
ham (ch. xxi. a:i), and Isaac's fofmer station for his
flocks. — The appearance of Jehovah. — A niglit vis-
ion ; a form which now enters more dciiiiitely into
the history of tlie patriarchs. — Tlie God of Abra-
ham, thy father, — In this way Jehovah reminds
him of tlie coiisisteiiey of his coyenant I'aitlifiihie.ss,
but especially of his covenant witli Abraham. —
Fear not. — This encouraging e.iliortatioii no doubt
rofeis to the disposition of Isaac. Aliraham nei'deil
such an encouragement, after having exposed liimseli
to the ri'vonge of tlie Eastern kings on account of
bis victory over them. Isaac needs it because of his
modest, timid disposition, and on account of tlie en-
mity of the Philistines, by whom he was diiven from
place to place. Perhaps his heait foreliodcil that
Abimelccli would yet follow him. He consecrates
his prolongeil sojourn at Beer-sheba liy the erection
of an altar, the estabhshment of a regulated worship,
and by a fixed .settlement. — Then Abimeleeh
went to him. — Hy comparing this covenant act
with that between Abraham and Abimeleeh ol (Jirar,
the difference appears more strikingly. Abimeleeh,
in the present chaptcf, is ^iccompatiicd not only by
the chief capt.iin of his army, but also by hisftictid,
. e., Ahu/./.iih, his private counsellor. Isaac ani-
oiadverts on bis hatred, but not like Abraham, on
the wells that had been taken away from him (see
ell. xxi. 25). Even in the boasting assertion ol
Abimeleeh respecting his conduct toward Isaac —
which the facts will not sustain — we recognize, ap-
parently, another Abimeleeh, less noble than the
former. This appears also in his demand of the im-
precatory oath (^n'sxV It is also peculiar to Isaac
that he permits a banquet, a feast of peace as it
were, to precede the making of the covenant. The
same day, after the departure of Abimeleeh, the ser-
vants, who had commenced some time before to dig
a new well, found water. Their message seems to
be a new reward of blessing, immediately following
the peaceable conduct of Isaac. Isaac names this
well as Abraham had done the one betbre (ch. xxi.
31); thus the name Beer-sheba is given to it also.
[It is not sairl tliat this name was lien- given for the
fiisttime; but as the covenant concluded was the
renewal and confirmation of the covenant of Abra-
ham witli tlte previous .-Vbimelech, so the name is the
renewal and confirmation of that given liy Abraham.
The same name is api)ropriate to both occasions. —
A. (J. J The existence of both the.se wells bears wit-
ness to the crediliility of this fact. Keil Knobel,
of ctmise, regaids this as an entirely ditlerent tradi
tion. Hut Itelil/.sch remarks: To all ap]iearancc
Isaac, in the natning oi iliis well, followed ihe exam
pie of his fa-thcr in naming the wi-11 situiited near it
since in other cases he renewed the old nainea of th»
CHAP. XXVI. 23-
50?
ireUs. — BuxsEN: To swear, to the Hpbrew, signifies,
" to take sevenfold," or, " to bind oneself to seven
holy things, referring to the Aramaic idea of God as
Lord of Seven; i. e., of the seven planets (Sun,
Moon, Venus, Mercury, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn)."
The remembrance of the seven sacrifices or pledges
of the covenant, is far more probable, unless the ex-
pression is to be regarded as signifying a seven-fold
degree of ordinary certainty.
DOCTBINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. Isaac's holy elevation of soul at his retuni
from the country of the Philistines to his old home,
Beer-sheba, crowned by a promise and a glorious ap-
pearance of God.
2. The divine promise renewed ; see above.
3. Isaac at Beer-sheba. He builds an altar to the
Lord before a tent for himself In the establishment
of the worship of Jehovah, in this testimony to him,
as he calls upon his name, and in his preaching, he
is a worthy heir of his father.
4. Human covenants are well established, if a
divine covenant precedes and constitutes their basis.
6. Isaac in his yielding, his patient endurance
and concessions, a terror to the king.
6. Isaac's feast of peace with Abimelech, a sign
of his great inoffensiveness.
7. The solemnity of the well, and on the same
day with the feast of peace, or, the blessing of noble
conduct.
8. Abraham prefers to dwell in the plains (Moreh,
Mamre), and he planted trees. Isaac prefers to re-
side at wells, and he is fond of digging wells.
HOMrLETICAIi AND PRACTICAL.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. The
rich contents of the term : God of Abraham. It de-
clares : 1. That the eternal God has made a covenant
with us imperishable beings (Luke xx. 37, 38); 2.
the continuity, the unity, the unchangeableness, of
the revelation of Jehovah through all times and de-
velopments ; 3. the transmission of the hereditary
•blessing from the believing fither to the believing
children. — How the expression, in the history of the
patriarchs, fear not (ch. xv. 1 ; xxvi. 24 ; xxviii. 15),
goes through the whole scriptures until it reaches its
full development in the angelic message of the birth
of Christ (Luke ii. 10), and at the morning of his
resurrection.
Starke; Cramer: God always supports his
church, and builds it everywhere (Isa. li. 6). What-
ever a .Christian undertakes, he ought to undertake
b the name of the Lord (CoL iiL 17). When a
man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even hi;) cue
miusto be at peace with him (Prov. xvi. 7 ; Gen. xxxiii
4). — -Lawful alliances anil oaths :ire permitted (Deut.
vi. 13). — Gkrlach : At this place, remarkable, al-
ready, during the life of .Abraham, the Lord renewi
the assurance of his grace, as afterwards to Jacob
(eh. xlvi. 1) ; whilst, in the consecration of individua'
phices, he connected himself with the child-like faith
of the patriarchs, and satisfied the want to which it
gave rise.
ScHRonER ; The least thing we sacrifice for th»
sake of God, he repays, by giving us himself (Berl
Bib.). Whenever Jehovah calls himself God of
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, he shows, thereby, in
each day's revelation of himself to Israel, the ground
and occasion of the same in the revelation that
is past — thus connecting the new with the old,
while presenting the grace shown to the poster-
ity, as a necessary consequence of that which hi
had covenanted to their fathers' fathers. True re
ligion is essentially historical ; history (not fanciful
myths) is its foundation and limits. God is our God,
because he has made himself our God by repeatec
acts in history. In the kingdom of God everything
develops and progresses ; there is no past without
ii future, nor a future without a past. — Abraham re-
ceived the pronuse respecting the Messiah in the
name of all the faithful ; if, now, Isaac and every
believer be blessed for the sake of Abraham, he ia
blessed merely for the sake of the promise that was
given to Abraham, and, therefore, for the sake of
Christ (Roos). — Isaac is mindful of his sacerdotal
office, as soon as he takes up his abode (Berl. Bib.).
— The Abimelech mentioned here is more cunning
than l:is father, for he pretends to know nothing
about the taking away of Isaac's wells by his ser-
vants (Luther). — Such is the course of the world.
Now insolent, then mean. He who wishes to live in
peace with it (which is true of all believers) must bo
able to bear and suffer (Roos). — The Abimelech of
ch. xxi. uses Elohim, a word proper to him ; the one
in the present chapter, not caring much about the
affair, says Jehovah, because he constantly heard
Isaac make use of this divine name. He accommO'
dates himself to the feast of Isaac, as Laban in ch.
sxiv. (Rom. xii. 20; Jos. ix. 14; 2 Sam. iii. 20;
Isa. XXV. 6 ; Luke xiv. 17.) — The divine blessing of
this conciliatory and humble love, did not exhaust
itself in temporal things. Isaac contended and suf-
fered for the sake of wells ; as to the wells which he
digged soon after his arrival at Beer-sheba, it hap-
pened on the very day he made the covenant and
swore, etc. — The relation, of which the name Beer-
sheba was the memorial, had ceased to exist. Bu(
by the repetition of the fact, the name regamed iti
significance and power, and was the samn w d now
SJven for the first time (Henjptenberg).
61U
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
FIFTH SECTION.
Isaac's sorrow over &au's marriage vnlh the daughters oj Canaan,
Chapter XXVI. 34, 35.
34 And Esau was forty years old when he took to wife Judith [celebra.ed l] the daughtei
of Beeri ' [heroic son l Fontanus j] the Hittite, and Bashemath [lovely, Oiria , fragrance, epicy] the
36 daughter of Elon [oak-grove, strength] the Hittite: Which were a grief of mind^ [aheart-
Borrow] unto Isaac and Rebekah.
(' Ver. 34.— Beeri, of a well.— A. G.]
(* Ver. 35. — The margin, lit., bitterness of spirit. — A. G.]
KKEGETICAL AND CRITICAL.
Esau was forty years old. — Isaac, therefore,
iccording to ch. xxv. 26, was about 100 years. — Ac-
cording to ch. xxviii. 9, he took Mahalath as his
third wife, together with the two mentioned here.
These names are mostly different, as to form, from
those of eh. xxxvi. 2, etc. The points of resemblance
are, first, the number three ; secondly, the name of
Bashemath ; third, the designation of one of them as
the daughter of Elon, the other as a daughter of
Ishmael. In respect to the dissimilarities and their
solution, see Kxobel, p. 278, on ch. xxxvi. ; De-
LiTzscH, 5i)5; Keil, 229. — Which were a grief
of mind. — Lit. : " a bitterness of spirit." Tlieir
Canaanitish de.^cent, which, in itself, was mortifying
to Esau's parents, corresponds with the Canaanitish
conduct. It is characteristic of Esau, however, that,
without the counsel and consent of his parents, he
took to himself two wives at once, and these, too,
from the Canaanites. Bashemath, Ahuzzath, Maha-
lath (cli. xxviii. 9) are Arabic forms.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. Esau's ill-assorted marriage a continuance of
the prodigality in the disposal of his birthright.
2. The threefold offence: 1. Polygamy without
tny necessary inducement ; 2. women of Canaanitish
origin ; S. without the adrice, and to the displeasure
of his parents.
3. The heart-sorrow of the parents over the mis-
alliance of the son. — How it produced an effect in
the mind of Rebekah, different from that produced
in the mind of Isaac.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
See Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs.
Starke : Lange : Children ought not to marry
without the advice and consent of their parents. —
Cramer: Next to the perception of God's wrath,
there is no greater grief on earth than that caused
by children to their parents. — Gerlach : Esau may
be regarded as a heathen, already and before his ex-
pulsion from the line of blessing. — (7alwer Handb,:
Took two wives. Opposed to the beautiful example
of liis father. — In addition to the trials undergone up
to this time, domestic troubles are now added. It
is very possible that this act of disobedience toward
God and his parents, of which Esau became guilty
by his marriage, matured the resolution of Rebekah,
to act as related in ch. xxvii. — Schroder : The no-
tice respecting Esau, serves, preeminently, to prepare
for that which follows (Esau's action). A self-attest-
ation of his lawful expulsion from the cliosen gen-
eration, and, at the same time, an actual warning to
Jacob. — Lamentation and grief of mind appeared
when he was old, and had hoped that his trialJs were
at an end (Luther).
SIXTH SECTION.
Isaae't preference for the natural firstborn, and Esan. Rebekah and Jacob steal from him the
theocratic blexsing. Exau's blessing. Esau's hostility to Jacob. Rebekah's preparation for the
JliglU of Jacob, and his journey with reference to a theocratic marriage. Isaac's directions for tlu
journey of Jacob, tine counterpart to the dismissal of Ishmael. Esau's pretended correction of hii
Ul<tssorled marriages.
•
Chapters XXVII.— XXVIII. 1-9.
1 And It came to pass, that when Isaac was olil, and his eyes were dim, so that he
could not see," he called Esau his eldest son, and said unto him, My son: And he said
2 unto liim. B(::liold, here am I, .'Vud ln' said. Behold, now I am old, I know not the daj
CHAPS. XXVII.— >'..\1I1. 1-9. 511
3 of my death. Now therefore take, I pray thee, thy weapons [hunting weapons], thj
4 quiver, and thy bow, and go out to the field, and take me some venison ; And make ra«
savory meat [tasty; favorite; festive dish. De Wette : dainty dish], SUch as I love, and bring U
5 to me, that I may eat; that my soul may bless thee before I die. 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
7 unto Esau thy brother, saying. Bring me venison, and make me savory meat, that I may
8 eat, and bless thee before the Lord before my death. Now therefore, my son, obey
9 my voice [strictly], according to that which I command thee. Go now to the flock
[small oattle], and fetch me from thence two good kids of the goats ; and I will make
10 them savory meat for thy father, such as he loveth : And thou shalt bring it to thy
11 father, that he may eat, and that he may bless thee before his death. And Jacob said
to Rebekah his mother, Behold, Esau my brother is a hairy man, and I am a smooth
12 man: My father peradventure will feel me, and I shall seem to him as a deceiver;
13 and I shall bring a curse upon me, and not a blessing. And his mother said unto him,
1 4 Upon me be thy curse, my son : only obey my voice, and go fetch me them. And he
went, and fetched, and brought the7n to his mother : and his mother made savory meal
15 [dainty dish], such as his father loved. And Rebekah took goodly [costly] raiment of hei
eldest son Esau, which were with her in the house, and put I hem upon Jacob hei
16 younger son : And she put the skins of the kids of the goats upon his hands, and upon
17 the smooth [part] of his neck; And she gave tlie savory 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
19 art thou, my son. And Jacob said unto liis 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
20 thy soul may bless me. 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 brought it to me
21 And Isaac said unto Jacob, Come near, I pray thee, that I may feel thee, my son,
22 whether thou be my very son Esau, or not. And Jacob went near unto Isaac hia
father ; and he felt him, and said, The voice is Jacob's voice, but the hands are the
23 hands of Esau. And he discerned him not, because . ■? ' 'rnds were hairy, as hia
24 brother Esau's hands: so he blessed him. And he said, J,-c tiiou [thou there] my very
25 son Esau? And he said, I am. 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
26 he did eat: and he brought him wine, and he drank. And his father Isaac said unto
27 him. Come near now, and kiss me, my son. And he came near, and kissed him : and
he smelled the smell of his raiment, and blessed him, and said. See, the smell of my son
'28 is as the smell of a field which tlie Lord hath blessed: Therefore [thus] God give thee
of the dew of heaven, and the fatness of the earth and plenty [the fulness] of corn and
29 wine : Let people serve thee, and nations bow down to thee : be lord over thy brethren,
and let thy mother's sons bow down to thee [thy mother's sons shall bow] : cursed be everv
one that curseth thee, and blessed be he 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
31 came in from his hunting. And he also had made savory meat, and brought it unto his
father, and said unto his father. Let my father arise, and eat of his son's venison, that
32 thy soul may bless me. And [then] Isaac his father said unto him. Who art Oiou?
33 And he said, I am thy son, thy firstborn Esau. And Isaac trembled very exceedingly
[shuddered in great terror above measure], and said. Who? where is he [who then was he] ? that
hath taken [hunted] venison, and brought it me, and I have eaten of all before thou
34 earnest, and liave blessed him ? yea, and he shall be blessed. And when Esau heard
the words of his father, he cried with a great and exceeding bitter cry, and said unto
35 his father, Bless me, even me also, 0 my father. And he said. Thy brother came with
36 subtilty, and hath taken away thy blessing. And he said, Is he not rightly named
[heei-hoidcr, suppianter] Jacob? for he hath supplanted me these two times: he took awa\
my birthright [right of the flrstbom] ; and, behold, now he hath taken awav my blessing
37 And he said. Hast thou not reserved a blessing for /.e . And Isaac a.r.swered and said
612 GENESIS, OR lUE FIRST BUUK OF MOSES.
unto Esau, Behold, I have made him thy lord, and all his brethren have I given to hin.
for servants; and with corn and wine have I sustained him [ha\o l endowed him J : and
38 what shall I do now unlo thee, my son? And Esau said unto his father, Hast thoubul
one blessing, my father ? bless me, even me also, 0 my father. And Esau lifted up hil
39 voice and wept. And [then] Isaac his father answered, and said mlo him, Behold, ihj
dwelling shall be the fatness of the earth, and of the dew ol heaven from above
4*^ A.nd by thy sword shalt thou live, and shalt serve thy brother: and [but] it shall come
1,0 pass when thou shalt liave the dominion [in the course of thy wanderings], that thou ghalt
break 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 [formed the design], The days of mourning for my [dead] father
4'i are at hand, then will I slay my brother Jacob. And these words of Esau her elder
son were told to Rebckah : and she sent and called Jacob her younger son, and kuI-
unto him. Behold, thy brother Esau, as touching thee, doth comfort himself, purposing
43 to kill thee [goesatout with revenge to kill thee].' Now therefore, my son, obey my voice;
44 and arise, flee thou to Laban my l)rotlier, to Haran ; And tarry with him a few days
45 [some time], until thy brother's fury turn away ; Until thy brother's anger turn away
from tliee, and he forget that which thou hast done to him : then I will send, and fetch
46 thee from thence: why should I be deprived also of you both ". one day? And
Rebekah said to Isaac, I am weary of my life, because of the c aughters of Heth : if
Jacob take a wife of the daughters of Heth, such as these which are of the daiighters
of the land, what good shall my life do me [what is life to me] ?
Ch. 5XVIII. 1. And Isaac called Jacob, and blessed him, and charged him, and said imto
2 him, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan. Arise, go to Padan-aram
[Mesopotamia], to the house of Bethuel, thy mother's fatlier; and take thee a wife from
3 thence of the daughters of Laban, thy mother's brother. And God [the] Almighty
bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, that thou mayest be [become] a
4 multitude' of people; And give thee the blessing ot Abraham, to thee and to thy seed
with thee ; that thou mayest inherit the land wherein thou art a stranger [of thy pilgrimage],
5 which God gave unto Abraham. And Isaac sent away Jacob : and he went to Padan-
aram unto Laban, son of Bethuel the Syrian, the brother of Rebekah, Jacob's and
Esau's mother.
6 When Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob, and sent him away to Padan-aram.
to take him a wife from thence ; and that, as he blessed him, he gave him a charge,
7 saying, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan ; And that Jacob obeyed
8 his father and his mother, and was gone to Padan-aram ; And Esau seeing that the
9 daughters of Canaan pleased not Isaac his father ; Then went Esau imto Ishniael, and
took imto the wives which he had Mahalath [from root nbn , Cecinit. Delitisch derives it from
■'bn , to be sweet] the daughter of Ishmael, Abraham's son, the sister of Nebajoth [heights,
nabathaa], to be his wife.
[' Ch. XXVII. Ver. 1.— Lango renders " when Isaac was old, then his eyes were dim, so that he ooull not see,"
M an independent sentence, laying the basis for the following narrative. — A. G.J
|» Ver. 42.— Conifortcth, or avengeth. The thought of vengeance was his consolation.— A. G.]
(» Ch. XXVIII. Ver. 3.— bn;5 , congregation.— A. Q.)
GENERAL PRELIMINARY REMARKS.
1. Knobel, without regard to veree 4fi, and not-
withstanding tlie word Elohiin, verse 28, regards
our section as a Jehovistic iiarnitive. We have only
to refer to the prevailing Jeliovi.stic reference. Re-
speciing the origin of our narrative Knobel has given
hia opinion in a remarlialde manner, e. g., he cannot
though he did not die until forty-three years after-
wards. The correct determination of liis age, given
already by Luther, is based upon the following cal-
culation: Joseph, when he stood before Pharaoh,
was thirty years old (ch. xli. 46), and at the migra-
tion of Jacob to Egypt he had reached already the
age of thirty-nine ; for seven years of plenty and
two years of famine had passed already at that time;
conceive how an old iinin may hear well, smell well, ; nine years had elapsed since the elevation of Joseph
»nd yet be unable to see ! I ! (ch. xlv. B). But Jacob, at that time, was a hundred
2. The time. "Isaac at that time was a hundred ' and thirty years old (ch. xlvii. 9); Joseph, therefore,
and thirty-seven years oH, the age at which Ishmael, was born wlien Jacob was ninety-one years; and
his half-brother, died, about fourteen years before; since Jo.scph's birth occurred in the fourteenth year
R fact which, in con.seqnencc of the weakness of old of Jacob's sojourn in Mesopotamia (comp. ch. xxx.
»fe, may have seriously reminded him of death, 25 with ch. xxix. 18, 21, ami 27), Jacob's flight to
CHAPS. XXVII.— XXVIIl. 1-9.
5ia
Laban happened in his seventy-seventh year, and
in the hundred and thirty-seventh year of Is^iac.
•^onip. Henostenbkrg: Beitr. iii. p. 348, etc." Keil.
3. The present section contains the history of the
distinction .lud separation of Esau and Jacob ; first
introduced by enmity after the manner of man, tlien
contiimed by the divine judgment upon human .«ins,
and established by the conduct of tlie sons. This
narrative conducts us from tlie history of Isaac to
Jiat of Jacob. The separate members of this sec-
tion are the following : 1. Isaac's project ; 3. Rebe-
kah's counter-project; 3. Jacob's deed and blessing ;
4. Esau's complaint and Esau's blessing; 5. Esau's
Bcheme of revenge, and Rebekah's counter-scheme ;
6. Jacob and Esau in the antithesis of their mar-
riage, or the divine decree.
EXE0ETICAL AND CEITICAX.
1. Vers. 1-4. — And his eyes were dim.
— We construe with the Sept., since we are of the
opinion that this circumstance is noticed as an ex-
planation of the succeeding narrative. — Thy quiver.
—The oiraf \ey., ^bn (lit. hanging), has by some
been explained incorrectly as meaning sword (Onke-
los and others). — Savory meat. — S'Tas::i: , deli-
cious food. But it is rather to be taken in the sense
of a feast than of a dainty dish. It is praiseworthy
in Isaac to be mindful of his death so long before-
hand. That he anticipates his last hours in this
manner indicates not only a strong self-will, but also
a doubt and a certain apprehension, whence he makes
the special pretence, in order to conceal the blessing
from Jacob and Rebekah. [Xotwithstandiug the
divine utterance before the children were born, un-
doubtedly known to him, and the careless and almost
contemptuous disposal of his birthright by Esau, and
Esau's ungodly connection with the Canaanitish wo-
men, Isaac still gives way to his preference to Esau,
and determines to bestow upon him the blessing. — •
A. G.]
2. Vers. 5-17. Rebekah's counter-project. — Unto
Jacob her son. — Her favorite. — Two good kids
of the goats. — -The meat was to be amply provided.
•so as to represent venison. — As a deceiver (lit., as
a scoffer). — " He is afraid to be treated as a scoffer
merely, but not as an impostor, since he would liave
confessed only a mere sportive intention." Knobel.
It m.iy be assumed, however, that his conscience
really troubled him. But from respect for his motli-
cr he does not point to the wrong itself but to its
hazardous consequences. — Upon me be thy curse.
— Rebekah's boldness a.ssumes here the appearance
of the greatest rashness. This, however, vanishes
for the most part, if we consider that she is positive-
ly sure of the divine promise, with which, it is true,
she wrongfully identifies her project. — Goodly
raiment. — Even in regard to dress, Esau seems to
have taken already a higher place in the household.
Bis goodly raiment reminds us of the coat of Joseph.
—Upon his hands. — According to Tuch, tlie skins
of the Eastern camel-goat (angora-goat) are here
referred to. The black, silk-like hair of these ani-
tnalsj was also used by the Rom.ans as a substitute
for human hair (Martial., xii 46)." Keil.
3. Vers. 18-20. Jacobus act and Jacob's blesshi<r.
— Who art thou, ray son, — The secrecy with
wnich Isaac :iiTan^-eil the preparation for the hless-
'ng must have made him suspicious at the verv be-
33
ginning. The presence of Jacob, under i.iiy circum-
stances, would have been to him, at )i.e3ent, an
unpleasant interruption. But now he thinkk that ha
hears Jacob's voice. That he does not give eTect to
this impression is shown by the jjerfect success of the
deception. But perhaps an infirmity of hearing
corresponds with his blindness. — Arise, I pray
thee, sit and eat. — They ate not only in a siit!i>g
posture, but also while lying down ; but the lying
posture at a meal differed from that taken upon .
bed or couch. It is tlie solemn act of blessing,
moreover, which is here in question. — Ho'w is it
that thou hast found it so quickly It is not
only Jacob's voice, but also the quick execution of
his demand, which awakens his suspicion. — And ha
blessed him Ver. 23. This is merely the greet-
ing. Even "."ter having felt his son, he is not fully
satisfied, but once more demands the explanation
that he is indeed Esau. — Oorae near now, and
kiss me. — After his partaking of the meat, Isaao
wants still another assurance and encouragement by
the kiss of his son. — And he smelled the smeU
of his raiment. — The garments of Esau were im-
pregnated with the fragrance of the fields, over
which he roamed as a hunter. " The scent of Leba-
non was distinguished (Hos. xiv. 7 ; Song of Sol. ir.
11)." Knobel. The directness of the form of his
blessing is seen from the fact that the fundamental
thought is connected with the smell of Esau's rai
ment. The fragrance of the fields of Canaan, rich
in herbs and flowers, which were promised to the
theocratic heir, perfumed the garments of Esau, and
this circumstance confirmed the patriarch's prejudice
— And blessed him, and said. — The words of his
blessing are prophecies (ch. ix. 27 ; ch. xlix.) — utter-
ances of an inspired state looking into the future,
and therelbre poetic in form and expression. The
same may be said respecting the later blessing upon
Esau. — Of a field Tirhich the Lord hath blessed.
— Palestine, the land of Jehovah's blessing, a copy
of the old, and a prototype of the new, paradise.—
Because the country is blessed of Jehovah, he as-
sumes that the son whose garments smell of tho
fragrance of the land is also blessed. — Therefore
God give thee. — Ha-elohim. The choice of the
expression intimates a remaining doubt whether Esau
was the chosen one of Jehovah ; but it is explained
also by the universality of the succeeding blessing.
[He views Ha-elohim, the personal God, but not Je-
hovah, the God of the Covenaut, as the source and
giver of the blessing. — A. G.] — Of the dew of
heaven. — The dew in Palestine is of the greatest
importance in respect to the fruitfulness of the year
during the dry season (ch. xlix. 25 ; Deut. xxxiii. 13,
'.% ; Hosea xiv. 6 ; Sach. viii. 12). — And the fat-
ness of the earth. — Knobel : " Of the fat parts
of the earth, singly and severally." Since the land
promised to the sons was to be divided between Esan
and Jacob, the sense uo doubt is ; may he give to
thee the (■■''. part of the promised land, i. e., Canaan.
Canaan was the chosen part of the lands of the earth
belonging to the first-bom, which were blessed with
the dew of heaven and the fatness of the earth. As
to the fruitfulness of Canaan, see Exod. iii. 8. Com-
pare also the Bible Dictionaries; Winer; article
" Palestine." The antithesis of this grant to tliat
of the Edomitic country appears distinctly, ver. 39
A two-lbld contrast is therefore "o be noticed: 1.
To Edom ; 2. to the earth in general ; and so w«
hare "IS . Ihit to a blessed land belong also blessed
seasons, therefore plenty of corn and ^itie — X«el
514
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
people serve thee. — To tlie grant of the theocratic
country is aiidoj the grant of a tlieocratic, i. e., spir-
itual and political position of the world. — And
nations. — Tribes of nations. Not only nations but
tribes of nations, groups of nations, are to liow down
to him, i. e., to do homage to him submissively.
This promise was fulfilled typically in the time of
David and Solomon, ultimately and complotelv in tlie
world-sovereignty of the promise of faith. — Be Lord
over thy brethren. — This blessing was fultilleil in
the subjection of Edom (2 Sam. viii. 14 ; 1 Kings xi.
16 ; Ps. Ix. 8, 9). — Thy mother's sons. — His preju-
dice still shows itself in the choice of this expression,
according to which he thought to subject Jacob, the
"mother's" son, to Esau. — Cursed be every one
that curseth thee. — Thus Isaac bound himself
He is not able to take back the blessing he pro-
nounced on Jacob. In this sealing of the blessing
he afterwards recognizes also a divine sentence (ver.
33). His prophetic spirit has by far surpassed his
human prejudice. [This blessing includes the two
elements of the blessing of Abraham, the possession
of the land of Canaan, and a numerous oUspring,
but not distinctly the third, that all nations should
be blessed In him and his seed. Tliis may be in-
cludeil in the general phrase, let him that curseth
thee be cursed, and him that blesseth thee be lilessed.
But it is only when the conviction that he had against
his will served the purpose of God in blessing Jacob,
that the consciousness of his patriarchal calling is
awakened within hira, and he has strength to give
the blessing of Abraham to the sou whom he had
rejected but God had chosen (ch. xxviii. S, 4). See
Keil.— A, G.]
4. Vers. 30^0. Esau's lamentation and Esau's
blesdrift. — And Isaac trembled. — If Isaac himself
had not intended to deceive in the matter in winch
he was deceived, or had he been filled with divine
confidence in respect to the election of Esau, he
would have been startled only at the decepiion of
Jacoli. But it is evident that he was surprised most
at the divine decision, which thereby revealed itself,
and convinces him of the error and sin of his at-
tempt to forestall that decision, otherwise we should
hear of deep indignation rather than of an extraor-
dinary terror. What follows, too, confirms tliis in-
terpretation. He bows not so much to tlie deception
practised upon him as to the fact and to the pro-
phetic spirit wliich has found utterance through him.
AnuusTiNKi De Civitate Dei, 16, 37: " Quis non hie
tnaU'iVclioium potius expectarel irati, si hisc no7t
nipenia ivspinitinne sed terrenn more i/cnerenlur."
Who ? where is he 7 — Yet before lie has named
Jacob, he pronounces the divine sentence : the bless-
ing of the Lord remains with that man who received
it. — He cried with a great and exceeding bit-
ter cry.— Ileb. xii. 17.— Bless me, even me also.
— Esan, it is true, had a vague feeling that ilie (|nes-
tion here was about important giants, but he did not
understand their significance. He, therefore, thought
the theocratic blessing admitted of division, and was
18 dependent upou his lamentations and prayers as
upon the caprice of his father. — Thy brother came
with subtilty. — With deception. Isaac' now imli-
cates also the human error and .sin, after liaving
decided the- ilivine judgment. But at the same time
he declares that the (jueslion is only abmit one bless-
ing, and that no stranger has been the ri'cipient of
this lilessing, but Esau's brother. — Is not he rightly
oamed (";n)? — Sliall he get the advantage of me
because he was thus inadvertently named (Jacob =
heel-catcher, supplanter), and because he then acted
thus treacherously (with cunning or fiaudlshall 3
acquiesce in a blessing that was surreptitiously ot>
tained ? — He took away my birthright. — Instead
of reproaching himself with his own act, his eye is
filled with the wrone Jacoli has done him. — Hast
thou not a blessing reserved for me ? — Esau is
perplexed in the mysterious aspect of this matter
He speaks as if Isaac had pronounced an arbitrary
blessing. Isaac's answer is according to the truth.
He iulbrms him very distinctly of his future then
cratic relation to Jacob. As compai'cd with the
blessing of Jacob he had no more a blessing for
Esau, for it is fundamentally the greatest blessing
for him to serve Jacob. — Hast thou but one bless-
ing?— Esau proceeds upon the assumption that the
father could pronounce blessings at will. His tears,
however, move the father's heart, and he feels that
his favorite son can be appeased by a sentence hav-
ing the semblance of a blessing, and which in fact
contains every desire of his heart. That is, he now
understands him. — The fatness of the earth.—
The question arises whether '"0 is used here in a
partitive sense (according to Luther's translation and
the Vulgate), as in the blessing upon Jacob, ver. 28,
or in a privative sense (according to Tuch, Knobcl,
Kurtz, etc.). Delitzsch favors the last view : 1. The
mountains in the northeastern part of Idumsea (now
Gebalene), were undoubtedly fertile, and therefore
called Palastina Salwtaris in the middle ages (Von
Racmer, in his Palcestina, p. 240, considers the
prophecy, therefore, according to Luther's transla-
tion, as fulfilled). But the mountains in the western
part of Idumaja are beyond comparison the most
dreary and sterile deserts in the world, as Seetzen
expresses himself 2. It is not probable that Esau's
and Jacob's blessing would begin alike. 3. It is in
contradiction with ver. 37, etc. (p. 465) ; Mai. i. 3.
This last citation is quoted by Keil as proof of the
preceding statement. [The '^ is the same in both
cases, but in the blessisg of Jacob, " .after a verb of
giving, it had a partitive sense ; here, after a noun
of jilace, it denotes distance, or separation, e. g.,
Prov. XX. 3." Murphy. The context seems to de-
mand this interpretation, and it is confirmed by the
jiiediction, by thy sword, etc. Esau's dwelling-place
was the very opposite of the richly-blessed land of
Canaan. — A. G.] But notwithstanding all this, the
question arises, whether the ambiguity of the ex-
pression is accidental, or whether it is chosen in
relation to the excitement and weakness of Esau.
As to the country of Edom, see Delitzsch, p. 456 ;
Knobel, p. 299 ; Keil, p. 198 ; also the Dictionaries,
and journals of travellers. — And by thy sword.
— This confirms the former explanation, but at the
same time this expression corresponds with Es.au'?
character and the future of his descendants. War.
pillage, and robbery, are to support him in a barren
country. "Similar to Ishmael, ch. xvi. 12, .and the
different tribes still living to-day in the old Edomitic
country (see Bdukhardt: ' Syria,' p. 82tj ; Rittkr:
Brd'.iind , xiv. p. 966, etc.)." Knobel. SeeObadiah,
ver. 3; Jer. xlix. 16. "The land of Edom, there-
fore, according to Isaac's prophecy, will cnnstitntc a
striking antithesis to the hind of Jacob." Ivell. —
And shalt serve thy brother. — See above.—
And it shall come to pass .\s a ciinsequeme of
the riiaming about of Kchim in the temjier and pur-
' pose of a freebooter, he will ultimately shake off thd
CHAPS. XXVII— XXVIII. 1-9.
5U
Toke of Jacob from liis neck. This seems to be a
promise of greater import, but the self-lilicration of
Edom fiom Israel was not of long contiiiuano', nor
did it prove to him a true blessing. Edom was at
first strong and independent as compared to Israel,
Blower in its development (N'umb. xx. 14, etc.). Saul
first fought against it victoriously (1 Sam. xiv. 47);
David conquered it (2 Sam. viii. 14). Tlieu followed
It conspiracy under Solomon (1 Kings xi. 14), whilst
there was an actual defection under Joram. On the
other hanil, the Edomites were agaia subjected by
Amaziali (2 Kings xiv. 7; 2 Chron. xxv. 11) and
remained dependent under Uzziah and Jotham (2
Kings xiv. 22 ; 2 Chron. xxvi. 2). But under Ahaz
they liberated, themselves entirely from Judah (2
Kings xvi. 6 ; 2 Chron. xxviii. 17). Finally, however,
John Hyrcanus subdued them completely, forced
them to adopt cii-cumciaion, and incorporated them
into tiie Jewish state and people ( JosEPHts : "Antiq."
xiii. 9, 1; xv. 7, 9), whilst the Jews themselves, how-
ever, after Antipater, became subject to the domini on of
an Idiunsean dynasty, until the downfall of their state.
6. Esau\'i scheme of revtw/e, and RebeJcah's
coimler-scheine (vers. 41-46). — And Eaau said in
his heart. — Esau's good-nature still expresses itself
In his exasperation toward Jacob and in the scheme
of revenge to kill him. For he does not maliciously
execute the tlumght immediately, but betrays it in
uttered threats, and postpones it until the death of
his father. — The days of mourning . . . are at
hand. — Xot for my father, but on account of my
father; i. e., my lather, weak and trembUng with
ige, is soon to die. — Then, and not before, he will
ixecute his revenge. He does not intend to grieve
,he father, but if his motlier, his brother's protec-
tress, is grievi'd by the murder, th:it is all right, in
his view. — These words ■were told. — On account
of his frank and open disposition, Esau's thoughts
were soon revealed ; what he thought in his heart he
soon uttered in words. — And called Jacob. — From
the herds. — Plee thou to Laban. — Rebekah en-
courages him to this flight by saying that it will last
but few days, i. e., a short time. But she looked
further. She took occasion from the present danger
to carry on the thoughts of Abraham, and to unite
Jacob honorably in a iheocRitic marriage. For,
, notwithstanding all his grief of mind arising from
Esau's marriages, Isaac had not thought of this. But
still she lets Isaac firet express this thought. Xor is
Isaac to be burdened with Esau's scheme of revenge
and Jacob's danger, and therefore she leads him to
her mode of reasoning by a lamentation concerning
the daughters of Heth (ver. 46). — Deprived also
of you both. — Bunsen : " Of thy father and thy-
self." Others: "Of thyself and Esau, who is to
die by the hand of an avenger." But as soon a.s
Esau should become the murderer of his brother,
he would be already lost to Rebekah, Knobel, again,
thinks that in verse 46 the connection with the pre-
ceding is here broken and lost, but on the contrarv
sonnects the passage with eh. xxvi. 34 and ch. xxviii.
I, as found in the original text. The connection is,
nowever, obvious. If Knobel thinks that the char-
acter of Esau appears different in ch. xxviiL 6 etc.,
than in ch. xxvii. 41, that proves only tliat he does
BOt understand properly the prevaihng characteristics
>f Esau as given in Genesis.
6 Jaiof} an I Esau in the antithesis of thir mar-
riagi, or the divine dec ee (ch. xxviii. 1-9). — And
Isaac called Jacob and blessed him. — The whole
dismissal of Jacob shows that now he regards him
voluntardy as the real heir of the .\brahamic bless
ing. Knobel treats ch. xxviii. -ch. xxxiii. as one
section (the earlier history of Jacob), whose fnnd»
mental utterances form the original text, enlarged
and completed by Jehovistic supplements. There an
several places in which he says contradictions to tlw
original text are apparent One such contiadietior
he artfully frames by supposing th;it, .iccording t<i
the original text, Jacob was already sent to ilesopO'
taniia immediately after Esau's marriage, foi th*
purpose of marrying among his kindred — a supposi
tion based on mere fiction. As to other contiadio-
tions, see p. 233. etc. — Of the daughters of Ca-
naan.— Xow it is clear to him that this was a theo
cratic condition for tlie theocratic heir, — Of the
daughters of Laban. — These are first mentioned
here. — And God Almighty. — By this aii|jellation
Jeliovah called himself when he announced himself
to Abraham as the liod of miracles, who would grant
to him a son (ch. xvii. 1). By this apellation of
Jehovah, therefore, Isaac also wishes lor Jacob a
fruitful posterity. Theocratic children are to be
children of blessing and of miracles. A multitude o{
people (^np), a very significant development of the
Abrahamic blessing. [The word used to denote the
congregation or assembly of God's people, and to
which the Greek ecctesia answers. It denotes the
people of God as called out and called together.—
A. G.] — The blessing of Abraham. — He thus
seals the fact that he now recognizes Jacob as the
chosen heir — And Isaac sent away Jacob (see
Hos. xii. 13). — When Esau saw that Isaac. — Es-aa
now fii St discovers that his parents regard their son's
connection with Canaanitish women as an injudicious
and improper marriage. He had not observed their
earlier sorrow. Powerful impressions alone can
bring him to understand this matter. But even this
understanding becomes directly a raisunderstamling.
He seeks once more to gain the advantage of .Jacob,
by taking a third wife, indeed a daughter of IshmaeL
One can almost think that he perceives an air of
irony pervading this dry record. The irony, how-
ever, lies in the very efforts of a low and earthly
mind, after the glimpses of high ideals, which he
himself does not comprehend. — To Ishmael. — Ish-
mael had been already dead more than twelve years;
it is therefore the house of Ishmael which is meant
here. — Mahalath. — Ch. xxxvi. 2 called Bashemath.
— The sister of Nebajoth. — As the first-born of the
lirotliers he is named instead of all the others; just
.as Miri im is always called the sister of Aaron. The
decree of God respecting the future of the two sons,
which again rnns through the whole chapter, receives
its complete development in this, that Jacoli emi
grates in obedience of faith accompanied with the
theocratic blessing, to seek after the chosen bride,
whilst Esau, with the intention of making amends
for his neglect, betrays again his unfitness. The de-
crees of Gdd, however, develop themselves in and
through human plans.
DOCTKINAI, AND ETHICAl,.
1. The present section connects a profound tragM
family history from the midst of the patriarchal life,
with a grand and sublime history of salvation. Ir
respect to the former, it is the principal chapter ii
the Old Testament, showing the vanity of mere hu-
man plans and eflbrts ; in respect to the latter, il
holds the corresponding place in reference to tlu' ce»
S16
GENESIS, OR TOE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
tointy of the divine election and calling, holding its
calm and certain progress through all disturbances
of human infatuation, folly, and sin.
2. It is quite common, in reviewing the present
narrative, to place Rebekah and Jacob too much
ander the shadows of sin, in comparison with Isaac.
Isaac's sin does not consist alone in his arbitrary de
termination to present Esau with the blessing of the
theocratic birthright, although Rebekah received
that divine sentence respecting her children, before
their birth, and which, no doulit, she had mentioned
to him ; and although Esau had manifested already,
by his marriage with the daughteis of Heth, his
want of the theocratic faith, and by his bartering
with Jacob, his earnal disposition, and his contempt
of the birthright — thus viewed, indeed, his sin ad-
mits of palliation through several e.'LCUses. The
clear right of the first-born seemed to oppose itself
to the dark oraile of God, Jacob's prudence to Esau's
frank and generous disposition, the quiet shepherd-
life of Jacob to Esau's stateliness and power, and
on the other hand, Esau's misalliances to Jacob's
continued celibacy. And although Isaac may have
been too weak to enjoy the venison obtained for him
by Esau, yet the true-hearted care of the son for his
father's infirmity and age, is also of some import-
ance. But the manner in which Isaac intends to
bless Esau, places his offence in a clearer light. He
intends to bless him solemnly in unbecoming secrecy,
without the knowledge of Rebekah and Jacob, or
of his house. The preparation of the venison is
scarcely to be regarded as if he was to be inspired
for the blessing by the eating of this " dainty dish,"
or of this token of fiUal affection. This preparation,
at least, in its main point of view, is an excuse to
gain time and place for the secret act. In this point
of view, the act of Rebekah appears in a different
light. It is a woman's shrewdness that crosses the
shrewdly calculated project of Isaac. He is caught
in the net of his own sinful prudence. A want of
divine confidence may be recognized through all his
actions. It is no real presentiment of death that
urges him now to bless Esau. But he now antici-
pates his closing hours and Jehovah's decision, be-
cause he wi.shes to put an end to his inward uncer-
tainty which annoyed him. Just as Abraham antici-
pated the divine decision in his connection with
Hagar, so Isaac, in his eager and hearty performance
of an act belonging to his last days, while he lived
yet many years. With this, therefore, is also con-
nected the improper combination of the act of bless-
ing with the mi'al.as well as the uneasy apprehension
lest he shotdd be interrupted in his plan (seever. 18),
and a suspicious and strained expectation which was
not at first caused by the voice of Jacob. Rebekah,
however, has so far the advantage of him that she,
in her deception, has the divine assurance that Jaooli
was the heir, while Isaac, in his preceding secrecy,
has, on his side, only human descent and his human
reason without any inward, spiritu.al ci'rtainty. But
Rcbekah's sin consists in thinking that she must save
the divine election (^f Jacob by means of human de-
ception and a so-called white-lie. Isaac, at that crit-
ical moment, would have been far less ahle to pro-
nounce the l]le"sing of Aliraham upon Esau, than
afterward Balaam, standing far below him, could
have cursed the people of Israel at the critical mo-
ment of its history. For the words of the spirit and
of the prornise arc never left to hinnan ca])ric('.
Reticknh, therefore, sinned against Isaac through a
■rant of candor, just as Isaac before had sinneil
against Rebekah through a like defc<)t. The divin»
decree wonld also have been fulfilled without her as
sistance, if she had had the necessary measure of
faith. Of course, when compared with Isaac's f;itai
error, Rebekah wns right. Though she deceived
him greatly, misled her favorite son, and alienated
Esau from her, there was yet something saving in h»i
actiou according to her intentions, even for Isaac
himself and for Ijoth her sons. For to Esau the
nio^t comprehensive bl ssing might have become
oidy a curse. He was not fitted for it. Just as Re-
bekah thinks to oppose cunning to cunmng in ordei
to save the divine blessing through Isaac, ^nd thu»
secure a heavenly right, so also Jacob secures a hu-
man right in buying of Esau the right of the first-
born. But now the tragic consequences of the first
officious anticipation, which Isaac incurred, as well aa
that of the second, of which Rebekah becomes guil-
ty, were soon to appear.
3. The tragic consequences of the hasty conduct
and the mutual deceptions in the family of Isaac
Esau threatens to become a fratricide, and this threat
repeats itself in the conduct of Joseph's brothers,
who also believed that they saw in Joseph a brother
unjustly preferred, and came very near killing him.
Jacob must become a fugitive (or many a long year,
and perhaps yield up to Esau the external inheritance
for the most part or entirely. The patriarchal dig-
nity of Isaac is obscured, Rebekah is obliged to send
her favorite son abroad, and perhaps never see him
again. The bold expression : " Upon me be thy
curse," may be regarded as having a bright side ;
for she, as a protectress of Jacob's blessing, always
enjoys a share in his blessing. But the sinful ele-
ment in it was the wrong application of her assur-
ance of faith to the act of deception, which she her-
self undertook, and to which she persuaded Jacob ;
and for which she nui.st atone, perhaps, by many a
hmg year of melancholy solitude and through the
joylessness which immediatelv spread itself over the
family affairs of the household.
4. With all this, however, Isaac was kept from a
grave offence, and the true relation of things secured
liy the pretended necessity for her prevarication.
Through this catastrophe Isaac came to a full under-
standing of the divine decree, Esau attained the full-
est development of his peculiar characteristics, and
Jacob was directed to his journey of faith, and to
his marriage, without which the promise could not
even be fulfilled in him.
6. Isaac's blindness. That the eyes of this re-
cluse and contemplative man were obscured and
closed at an early age, is a fact which occurs in many
a similar character since the time of " blind Homer "
and blind Tiresias. Isaac had not exercised his ey«
in hunting as Esau. The weakness of his age first
settles in that org.an which he so constantly neglected.
Willi this was connected his weakness in judg-
ing individual and personal relations. He was con-
scious of an honest wish and will in his condnet with
Esau, and his secrecy in tlie case, as the prevari
cation at Gerar, was connected with hi.s retiiing
peace-loving disposition. Leaving this out of view,
he was an lionest, well-meaning person (sec ver. :i7,
and ch. xxvi. \11). His developed faith in the prom-
ise, however, ri'veals itself in his power or fitness
for the \-i^ion, and his words of Ijlcssiiig.
i'>. Rebekah obvionsly disapiiears from the stagi
as a grand or coitspicuons character ; grand in hei
pnidente, magnanimity, and her theocratic zeal of
iailli. Hit zi al of faith had a niixlure of fauati<
CHAPS. XXVII.— XXVIII, 1-9.
517
exaggeration, and in this view siie is the grand-
mother of Simeon and Levi (eh. xxxviii.).
1. It must be especially noticed that Jacob re-
mained single far beyond the age of I.saac. He
seems to have expected a hint from Isaac, just as
Isaac was married through the care of Abraliani.
The fact bears witness to a deep, quiet disposition,
which was only developed to a full power by extiaor-
dinary circum.^tances. He prove.-f, again, by his ac-
tions, that he is a Jacob, i. e., heel-catchor, sup-
planter. He does not refuse to comply with the |ilan
»f the mother from any conscientious scruples, but
■•om motives of fear and prudence. And how ably
Ind firmly he carries through his task, though his
felse confidence seems at last to die upon his lips
with the brief ■'3S, ver. 24! But however greatly
he erred, he held a proper estimate of the blessing,
for the security of which he thought he had a right
to make use of prevarication ; and this blessing did
not consist in earthly glory, a fact which is decisive
as to his theocratic character. Esau, on the other
hand, scarcely seems to have any conception of the
real contents of the Abrahamic blessing. The pro-
found agitation of those who surrounded him, gives
him the impression that this must be a thing of in-
estimable worth. Every one of his utterances proves a
misunderstanding. Esau's misunderstandings, how-
ever, are of a constant significance, showing in what
light mere men of the world regard the thingsol the
kingdom of God, Even his exertion to mend his im-
proper marriage relations eventuates in another error.
8. Isaac's blessing. In the solemn form of the bless-
ing, the dew of heaven is connected with the fatness
of the earth in a symbolic sense, and the idea of the
theocratic kingdom, the dominion of the seed of
blessing first appears here. In the parting blessing
upon Jacob, the term bnp indicates a great develop-
ment of the Abrahamic blessing. — Ranke : Abraham,
no doubt, saw, in the light of Jehovah's promises, on
to the goal of his own election and that of his seed,
but with regard to the chosen people, however, his
prophetic vision extended only to the exodus from
Egypt, and to the possession of Canaan. Isaac's prophe-
cy already extends farther into Israel's history, reach-
ing down to the subjugation and restoration of Edom.
• 9. The blessing pronounced upon Esau seems to
be a prophecy of his future, clothed in the form of a
blessing, in which his character is clearly announced.
It contains a recognition of bravery, of a passion for
liberty, and the courage of a hunter — The Idumseans
were a warUke people.
10. When, therefore, Isaac speaks in the spirit,
about his sons, he well knew their characters (Hel).
xi. 20). The prophetic blessing will surely be ac-
complished ; but not by the force of a magical offi-
;acy ; as Knobel says : " A divine word uttered, is a
power which infallibly and unchangeably secures
wliat the word indicates. The word of God can
never be ineffectual (comp. ch. ix. 18 ; Numb. xxii.
6 ; 2 Kings ii. 24 ; Is. ix. 7)."— The word of a pro-
phetic spirit rests upon the insight of the spirit into
tlie profound fundamental principles of the present,
in which the future, according to its main features,
reflects itself, or exhibits itself, beforehand.
11. The high-souled Esau acted dishonestly in
■Us thvt he was not mindful of the oath by which
oe had sold to Jacob the birthright ; and just as Re-
Oekah might excuse her cunning by that of Isaac,
lu Jacob might excuse his dishonest conduct by
sleading Esau's dishonesty.
I 12. The application of the proverb, " The en(f
'justifies the mean~," to Jacob's conduct, is obvious
ly not allowable. The possible mental reserva
tion in Jacob's lie, may assumn the following form
1. I am Esau, i. e., tlie (real) hairy one, and th_
(lavrful) first-born. But even in this case the mentii
reservation of Jacob is as different from that of the
Jesuits, as heaven from earth. 2, Thy God l)roughl
the venison to me ; i, e., the God who has led thcf
wills thnt I should be blessed.
13, However plausible may be the deceit, through
the divine truth some circumstance will romain
unnoticed, and become a traitor. Jacob had rol
considered that his voice was not that of Esau. It
nearly betrayed him. The expression : "The voice
is Jacob's voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau,"
has become a proverb in cases where words and
deeds do not correspond.
14, The first appearance of the kiss in this nar-
rative presents this symbol of ancient love to our view
in both its aspects. The kiss of Christian brother-
hood and the kiss of Judas are here enclosed in one.
15, Just as the starry heavens constituted the
symbol of the divine promise for Abraham, so the
blooming, fragrant, and fruitful fields are the symbol
to Isaac. In this also may be seen and employed
the antithesis between the first, who dwelt under the
rustling oaks, and of the other, who sat by the side
of springing fountains. The symbol of promise de-
scends from heaven to earth.
HOMILETICAl; AND PRACTICAl.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. Upon
the whole the present narrative is both a patriarchal
family picture and a religious picture of history
— Domestic life and domestic sorrow in Isaac's house.
— In the homes of the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac,
and Jacob. — The blind Isaac: 1. Blind in two re-
spects ; and 2. yet a clear-sighted prophet. — How
Isaac blesses his sons : 1. How he inleiuh to bless
them ; 2. how he is constrained to bless them, — Hu-
man guilt and divine grace in Isaac's house : 1. The
guilt ; Isaac and Rebekah anticipate divine provi-
dence. They deceive each other. Esau is led to
forget his bargain with Jacob ; Jacob is induced to
deceive his father. Yet the guilt of all is diminished
because they thought that they must help tlic right
with falsehood. Esau obeys the fatlier, Jacob obeys
the mother. Isaac rests upon the biithright, Re-
bekah upon the divine oracle. 2. God's grace turns
everything to the best, in conformity to divine truth,
but with the condition that all must cxpeiate theit
sins, — The image of the hereditary curse in the light
of the hereditary hle.ssing, wliich Isaac ministers : 1
How the curse obscures the blessing ; 2. how the
blessing overcomes the curse. — The characters men-
tioned in our narrative viewed as to their contrasts :
1. Isaac and Rebekah ; 2. Jacob and Esau ; 3. Isaac
and Jacob ; 4. Isaac and Esau ; 5. Rebekah aud
Esau ; 6. Rebekah and Jacob, — The cunning of a
theocratic disposition purified and raised to the pru-
dence of the ecclesiastical spirit. — God's election is
sure : 1. In the heights of heaven ; 2. in tuc deptlis
of human hearts; 3, in the providence of grace;
4. in the course of history. — The clear stream of th«
divine government runs through all human errors,
and that : 1. For salvation to believers ; 2. for judg-
ment to unbelievers.
To Section first, vers. 1-4. Isaac's infimitv 9"
518
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF UOSEb.
age, and bis faith: 1. In what manner the infirmity
of age obscured his faith ; 2 how faith breaks
through the infirmities of age. — Isaac^s blindness.
— The sufferings of old age. — The thought of death :
1. Though beneficial in itself ; 2. may yet be prema-
Jure. — The hasty making of wills. — We must not
«nticipate fiod. — Not act in uncertainty of heart. —
The preference of the parents for the children dil-
ferent in character from themselves. — The connection
of hunting and the enjoyment of its fruits, with the
divine blessing of promise : 1. Incomprehensible as
a union of the most diyerse things ; 2. comprehen-
sible as a device of human prudence ; 3. made fruit-
Ies,s by the interference of another spirit. — Isaac's
secrecy thwarted by Rebekah's cunning device. —
Human right and divine law in conflict with each
other. — Isaac's right and wrong view, and conduct.
Starke : It is a great blessing of God, if he pre-
s*ves our sight not only in youth, but also in old
age (Deut. xxxiT. 7). — Cramer : A blind man, a poor
man (Tob. v. 12). — Old age itself is a sickness (2
Sam. xix. 35). — If you are deprived of the eyes of
your body, see that you do not lose the eye of faith
(Ps. xxxix. 5, 6). — A Christian ought to do nothing
from passion, but to judge only by the word of
God. — Bibl. Tub.: Parents are to bless their children
before they die ; but the blessing must be conformed
to the divine will (ch. xlviii. 5). Doubtless Jacob,
taught by Isaac's error, learned to bless his children
better ; i. e., in a less I'estricted manner. — (The Rab-
bins assert that Isaac desired venison before his pro-
nouncing the ble.ssiTig, because it was customary that
the son about to receive the blessing should perform
some special act of love to his father.) — Osiander :
It is probable that Isaac demanded something better
than ordinary, because this was to be also a peculiar
day. To all appearance it was a divine providence
through which Jacob gains time to obtain and bear
away the blessing before him. — Schroder : Contem-
plative men like Isaac easily undermine their
health (?). — Experience teaches us that natures like
that of Isaac are more exposed to bhndness than
others. Shut in entii'ely from the external world,
their eyes are soon entirely closed to it. — The son, by
some embodiment of his tilial love, shows himself as
son, in order that the father on his part also, may,
through the act of blessing, show himself to be a
father. — Love looks for love. — Thus the blessing may
be considered not so much as belonging to the priv-
ilege of the first-born, but rather as constituting a
rightful claim to these privileges.
Section Second, vera. 16-17. Rebekah's counter-
scheme opposed to Isaac's scheme. — Rebekah's
right and wrong thought and conduct.. — Rebekah
protectress of the right of JacoI>'s election opposed
to Isaac the elect. — Jacob's persuasi(m : 1. The
iriotlier's faith and iier wrong view of it; 2. The faith
of the son and his erroneous view. — Jacob's doubt
and Rebekah's confidence. — The defect in his hesita-
tion (it was not a fear of sin, but a fear of the evil
consequences). — The defect in the confidence (not in
the certainty itself, but its application). — The cun-
ning mother and tlie cunning son. — Both too cun-
ning in this case. — ITieir sufferings lor it — (iod's
commai dment is of more weight than tlie parental
authority, than all human commands generally.
Starke : Some commentators are very severe upon
Rebekah (Sadris, />i»TOMr.< XXVIII ; others on the
contrary (Calvin and others), praise her I'aith, her
cunning, her righteousness (because Esau as a bold
icoffcr, had sold his birthright), her fear of God
(abhorrence of the Canaanitish natuie). (We must
add, however, that Calvin also marks the raeani
which Rebekah uses as evil.)- — Hebekah, truly, had
aeteil in a human way, striving by ual.iwfu mnani
to attain a good end. — £iljl. Wirt: If the Word ol
God is on our side we must not indeed depart from
it, l)ut neither must we nndejtake to bring about
what it holds before us by unlawful means, )iut look
to God, who knows what means to use, and liow
and when to fulfil his word. — Bibl. Tiib : God makei
even the eiTOrs of the pious to work good, if theii
heart is sincere and upright ; yet we are not to imi-
tate their errors.
Gerlach : Though staining greatly, as she did
the divine promise by her deception, yet at the &am
time her excellent faith shines out tljrough the his.
tory. She did not fear to arouse the brother's
deadly hatred against Jacob, to bring her favorite son
into danger of his life and to excite her husband
against her, because the inheritance promised by
God stood before her, and she knew God had
promised it to Jacob. (Calvin).- — Schroder ; (Mi-
CHAiLis: The kids of the goats can be prepared in
such a way as to taste like venison.) Isaac now abides
by the rule, but Rebekah insists upon an exception
(Luther). — The premature grasping bargain of Jacob
(ch. xxv. 29, etc.,) is the reason that God is here
anticipated again by Rebekah, and Jacob's sinfid
cunning, so that the bargain again turns out badly. —
Luther, holding that the law is annulled by God
himself, concludes : Where there is no law, there is
no transgression, therefore, shehas notsiimed (! ?) —
Both (sons) were already 77 years old. The fact,
that Jacob, at such an age, was still under maternal
control, was grounded deeply in his individuality
(ch. xxv. 27), as well as in the congeniality which
existed between Jacob and his mother. Esau, sure-
ly, was passed from under Rebekah's control aheady
at the age of ten years.
Section Third, vers. 18-29. Isaac's blessing
upon Jacob: 1. In its human aspect; 2. in its di-
vine aspect. — The divine providence controlling
Isiiac's plan : Abraham, Isaac and Esau. — Jacob, in
E.sau's garments, betrayed by his voice: 1. Almost
betrayed immediately ; 2. afterwards clearly betray-
ed.— Isaac's sohcitude, or all care in the service of
sin and error gains nothing. — Jacob's examination
— The voice is Jacob's voice, the hands are Esau's
hands. — Isaac's blessing : 1. According to its exter-
nal and its typical significance ; 2. in its relation to
Abraham's promise and the blessing of Jacob. — Its
new thoughts: the holy sovereignty, the gathering
of a holy people, the germ of the announcement oi' a
holy kingdom. Isaac's inheritance : a kingdom of na-
tioiiB, a church of nations. — The fulfihuent of the bles-
sing : 1. In an external or typical sense : David's king-
dom ; 2. in a spiritual sense : the kingdom of Christ.
Starkc : Jacob, perhaps, thought with a contrite
heart of the abase of strange raiment, when the
bloody coiit of Joseph was shown to him. To say
nothing of the cross caused ky children, which, no
ilniiht, is the most severe cross to pious parents in
this world, and with which the pious Jacob often
met (Dinah's rape, Benjamin's di6Scult birth, Sim
eon's and Levi's bloody weapons, Reuben's incest,
Joseph's history, Judah's history, ch. xxxviii., etc.)
For Jacob sinned: 1. In speaking contrary to the
truth, and twice passing himself for Esau; 2. in
really practising fraud by means of strange raiment
and false pretences ; 3. in his abuse of the name ol
God (ver. 20) ; 4. in taking advantage cf ais father'i
CHAPS. XXVII.— XXVm. 1-9.
51fi
weakuess.— Yet God bore with his errors, like
Isaac, etc.
Ver. '26 : a collection of different places in which
we read of a kiss or kisses (see Concordance). — That
this uttered blessing is to be received not only ac-
cording to the letter, but also in a deeper, secret
•onse, is apparent from Hebr. .\i. 20, where Paul
lavs : that by faith Isaac blessed his son, of which
faith the Messiah was the theme.
Gerlach: The goal and centr.al point of this
blessing is the word: be lord over thy brethren.
For this impUes that he was to be the bearer of the
olessin^, while the others should only have a
share in his enjoyment. — Lisco : Earthly blessing
(Dent, xxxiii. 28).— Cursed be, etc. He who
loves the friends of God, loves God himself; he who
hates them, hates him ; they are the apple of his
eye. — Calwer Handtiuch : The more pleasant the
fragrance of the flowers and herbs of the field, the
richer is the blessing. Earthly blessings are a sym-
bol and pledge to the father of divine grace. — Power
and sway; The people blessed of the Lord must
stand at the head of nations, in order to impart a
bler'sing to all. — Isaac, much against his will, blesses
him whom Jehovah designs to bless. — Schrodkr :
Ah, the voice, the voice (of Jacob) ! 1 should have
dropped the dish and run away (Luther). — Thus also
the servants of God sow the seed of redemption
among men, not knowing where and how it is to
bring fruits. God does not limit the authority
granted to them by their knowledge and wisdom.
The virtue and efficacy of the sacraments by no
means depend, as the Papists think, upon the inten-
tion of the person who administers them (Calvin). —
(Esau's goodly raiment : Jewish tra<Ution holds these
to be the same made by God himself for the first
parents (ch. iii. 21), and it attributes to the person
wearing them the power even of taming wUd beasts.
— The inhabitants of South Asia are accustomed
to scent iheir garmenis in different ways. By
means of fragrant oils extracted from spices, etc.
(Michaelis). — Smell of a field. Herodotus says. All
Arabia exhales fragrant odors.) — Thus he wished
that the land of Canaan shouid be to them a pattern
and pledge of the heaverJy inheritance (Calvin). —
Dew, corn, wine, are symbols of the blessings of
• the kingdom of grace and glory (Ramb.). — Tliat
curseth line. Here it is made known, that the true
churcli is to exist among the descendants of Jacob.
The three different members of the blessing contain
the three prerogatives of the first-born : 1. The
double inheritance. Canaan was twice as large and
fruitful as the country of the Edomites ; 2. the do-
minion over his brethren ; 3. the priesthood which
walks with blessings, and finally passes over to
Christ, the source of all blessing (Rambach). —
Luther calls the first part of the blessing : the food
of the body, the daily bread ; the second part : the
secular government ; the third part : the spiritual
priesthood, and places in this last part the dear and
sacred cross, and at the same time also, the victory
in and with the cross. In Christ, the true Israel of
all tiires, rules the people and nations.
Ti. Section Fourth, vers. 30-tO. Esau comes too
late : 1. Because he wished to obtain the divine
b-essiug of promise by hunting (by running and
•triving, etc.) (Rom. ix. 16) ; 2. he wished to gain it,
after he had sold it; 3. he wished to acquire it,
without comprehending its significance ; and, 4.
without its being intended for him by the divine
ierree, \nd any fituess of mind for it. — Isaac's trem-
bling and terror are an indication that his eyes ar<
opened, because he sees the finger of God and not
the hand of man, — Esau's lamentation opposed to hif
father's firmness; 1. A passion instead of godlj
sorrow ; 2. connected with the illusion that holj
things may be treated arbitrarily ; 3. referring to the
external detrunent but not to the internal loss. — ■
Esau's misunderstanding a type of the misundei^
standing of the worldly-minded in regard to divine
things : 1. That the plan of divine salvation was the
work of man ; 2. the blessing of salvation was a
matter of human caprice ; 3. that the kingdom of
God was an external affair. — Esau's blessing the
type: 1. Of his character; 2. of his choice: 3. of
his apparent satisfaction. — Here Isaac and Esau are
now for the first time opposed to each other in their
complete antithesis : Isaac in his prophetic greatness
and clearness opposed to Esau in his sad and carnal
indiscretion and passionate conduct.
Starke: Ver. SO. Divine providence is here at
work. — Ver. 33. This exceedingly great amazement
came from God. — Craxier: God rules and determines
the time ; the clockwork is in his hands, he can pro-
long it, and he can shorten it, according to his plea-
sure, and if he governs anything, he knows how to
arrange time and circumstances, and the men who
hve in that time, in such a way that they do not ap-
pear before or after he wishes them to come. Chris-
tian, commend to him, therefore, thy affairs (Ps.
xxxi. 17 ; Gal. iv. 4). — Hall ; God knows both time
and means to call back his people, to obviate their
sins, and to correct their errors (Heb. xii. 17). —
Lanoe : Isaac did not approve of the manner and
means, but the event itself he considers as irrev-
ocable, as soon as he recognizes that God, on
account of the unfitness of Esau, has so arranged it.
While, therefore, «e do not ascribe to God any active
working of evil, we concede that, by his wisdom, he
knows how to control the errors of men, especially
of beUevers, to a good purpose. — Ver. 3b. Thus in-
solent sinners roll the blame upon others. — Ver. S7.
The word " Lord " is rendered remarkably prominent,
smce it appears only here and ver. 29. Just as if,
out of Jacob's loins alone would come the mightiest
and most powerful lords, princes, and kings, espe-
cially the strong and mighty Messiah. — Hall : Tears
flowmg from revenge, jealousy, carnal appetites, and
worldly cares, cause death (2 Cor. vii. 10). God's
word remains forever, and never falls to the ground.
—Calwer Handbuch: Ver. 36. And still Esau had
sold it. — He lamented the misfortune only, not his
carelessness; he regretted only the earthly in the
blessing, but not the grace.
Schruder : Then cried he a great cry, great ana
bitter exceeding)/. This is the perfectly (?) natural,
unrestrained outbreaking of a natural man, to whom,
because he lives only for the present, every ground
gives way beneath his feet when the present is lost.
'J'u Isaac's explanation that the blessing wa^ gone.
Here also a heroic cast is given to the quiet, retiring,
and often unobserved love. — The aged, feeble, and
infirm Isaac celebrates upon his couch a similar
triumph of love, just as the faith of his father tri-
umphed upon Mt. Moriah, etc. (i. e., he sacrifices to
the Lord his preference for Esau). — The world to-
day still preserves the same mode of thinking; it
sells the blessing of the new birth, etc., and still
claims to inherit this blessing (Roos). — Esau, and
perhaps Isaac also, thought probably by the blessing
to invahdate the fatal bargain as to the birthright-
He only bewails the consequences of his sin but hi
J)20
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOiJ^ES.
has no tears for the sin itself. — The question here
was properly not about salvation and condemnation.
S.alvation was not refused to Esau, but he serves as a
warning to us all, by his cries full of anguish, not to
neglect the grace of God (Roos). — Jisau''s bl'ssiruj.
Esau appealed to the paternal heart, and with tlie
true objective character of the God of the patriarch,
Isaac neither could nor should deny his own paternal
character. — Now he has no birthright to give away,
and therefore no solemn : aud he blessed him, occurs
heie. — (Descriptions of the Idumaean country and
people follow).
SertioH Fifih. Vers. 41—46. Esau's hatred of Ja-
cob : 1. In its moral aspi'Ct ; 2. in its typical signifi-
cance.— Want of self-knowledge a cause of Esau's
enmity. — Esau inclined to fratricide : 1. Incited by
envy, animosity, and revenge ; 2. checked by piety
toward the father ; 3. prevented by his frankness
and out-spoken character, as well as by Rebekali's
sagacity. — Rebekah's repentance changed into an
atonement by the heroic valor of her faith. — Rebe-
kah's sacrifice. — How this sagacious and heroic-
mmded woman makes a virtue (Jacob's theocratic
wooing for a bride) of necessity (the peril of Jacob's
life).
Starke : Ver. 44. These few days became twenty
years.— Ver. 45. That Rebekah did this, is not men-
tioned in any place. Probably she died soon after,
and therefore did not live to see Jacob's return (ch.
xlix. 31 ; Matt. v. 22; 1 John iii. 15 ; Prov. xxvii. 4).
— Cramer; Whatever serves to increase contention
and strife, we are to conceal, to trample upon, and
to turn everything to the best (Matt. v. 9). — Ger-
LACH : Ver. 41. This trait represents to us Esau most
truthfully ; the worst thing in his conduct, however,
is not the savage desire of revenge, but the entire
unbelief in God and the reluctance to subject him-
self to him. Whilst Isaac submitted unconditionally
as soon as God decided, Esau did not care at all for
the divine decision. — Calwer Handbuch : He did
not think of the divine hand in the matter, nor of
his own guilt, sell-knowledge, or repentance. —
ScHKfiDER : God never punishes his people without
correcting grace is made also purifying grace at the
same time (Roos). — As Esau had only cries and tears
at first, he now has only anger ami indignation. —
Ver. 41. " Repentance and its fruits correspond "
(Luther). — All revenge is self-consolation. True
' consolation under injustice comes from God (Rom
xii. 19). — And he forgets what thou hast done to him
With this she both acknowledges Jacob's guilt and
betrays a precise knowledge of Ksau's character.—
Let us not despair too soon of men. Are there no)
twelve hours during the day? The gieat fury and
fiery indignation pass away with time (Luther).—
How sagacious this pious woman : she conceals to hei
husband the great misfortune and affliciion existing
in the house so as not to bring sorrow upon Isaac in
his old age (Luther).
Section Sixth, ch. xxviii. 1-8. Jacob's mission to
Mesopotamia compared with that of EUezer : ' Its
agreement ; 2. its difteronce. — Isaac now voluntarily
blesses Jacob. — The necessity of this pious house
becomes the source of new blessings: 1. The feeble
Isaac becomes a hero ; 2. the plain and quiet Jacob
becomes a courageous pilgrim and soldier ; 3. the
strong-minded Rebekah becomes a person that sac-
rifices her most dearly loved. — How late the full
sel f-developnient of both Jacob's and Esaa's charac-
ter appears. — Jacob's prompt obedience and Esau's
fooli.-^h correction of his errors. — The church is a
comnmnity of nations, typified already by the theo-
cracy.
Starke : Concerning the duties of parents and
children as to the marriage of their children. — The
dangers of injudicious marriages. — Parents can give
to their children no better provision on their way
than a Chris ian blessing (Tob. v. 21 ). — Bibl. Tu'i. :
The blessing of ancestors, resting upon the descend-
ants is a great treasure, and to be preserved as the
true and the best dowry. — dhyf er Handbuch: He
goes out of spite (or at least in his folly and self-
will) to the daughters of Ishuiael, and takes a third
wife as near of kin to his father as the one Jacob
takes was to his mother. (But the distinction was
that Ishraael was separated from the theocratic line,
while the house in Mesopotamia belonged to the old
stock.) — Schroder : Rebekah. who in her want of
faith could not wait for divine guidance, has now to
exercise her faith for long years, and learn to wait.
— Isaac appears fully reconciled to Jacob. — In the
eyes of Isaac Ais father. He does not care about
the mother. — Thus natural men never find the right
way to please God and tlicir fellow-men whom thej
have offended, nor the true way of reconciliation
with them {Berl. BibeL).
c.
JACOB.-ISRAEL, THE WRESTLER WITH GOD, AND HIS WANDERINGa
FIRST SECTION.
Jacob's journey to Mesopotamia, and the heavenly Ladder at Bethel.
Chapteh XXVIII. 10-22.
Ifl, i 1 Anii Jacob went out from Beer-slieba, and went toward Haran. And he lighted
upon a certain place, and tarriod ihere all nigiit, because the sun was set; and he took
of tlie .stones [one of the stones] of tliat plate, and put them [it] for his pillowis, and laj
12 dcWD in that, place to slecji And |tii.ii] he dreamed, and lichuid a ladder set up on thr
CHAP. XXVIII. 10-22.
521
parlh, and the top of it reached [was reaching] to heaven : and oehold, the angels of Got
■3 [were] ascending and descending on it. And behold, the Lord stood [was standini;] above
it: and said, I am the Lord God [jeUovah, the God] of Abraham thy fatlier, and the God
14 of Isaac: the land whereon thou best, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed; And thy
seed shall be as the dust of the earth, and thou shall spread abroad to tlie west [evening],
and to the east [morning], and to the nortli [midnight], and to the south [midday] : and in
16 thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. And behold, I am
with thee, and will keep thee in all places [everywhere] whither thou goest, and will biing
thee again into this land ; for I will not leave thee, luitil I have done that which I have
spoken to thee of [promised thee].
16 And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely the Lord is in this place,
17 and I knew it not. And he was afraid, and said. How dreadful [awful] is this place!
18 this is none other but the house of God, and this [here] is the gate of heaven. And
Jacob rose i.p early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put for his pillows,
19 and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it. And he called the name
of that place Bethel [house of Ood] ; but the name of that city was called [earlier] Luz at
20 the first. And Jacob vowed a vow, saying, If God [Elohim] will be with me, and wil
keep me in this way that I go, and will give ine bread to eat, and raiment to put on,
21 So that I come again to my father's house in peace [in prosperity] ; then shall the Lord
22 [Jehovah] be my God : And this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God'a
house : and of all that thou shalt give me, I will surely give the tenth unto thee.
PKELIMINABY REMARK.
Jacob's divine election, aa well as the spirit of
■lis inward life and the working of his faith, first ap-
pear in a bright light in his emigration, his dream,
»nd his vow.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL.
1. Jacobus emigraflm^ his night-quarters^ and
dream (vera. 10-15). — Went out &om Beer-sheba.
— The journey from Beer-sheba to Haran leads the
pilgrim through a great part of Canaan, in a direc-
tion from south to north, then crossing the Jordan,
and passing through Gilead, Bashan, and Damascus,
he comes to Mesopotamia. It was the same journey
fhat Abraham, and afterwards Eliezer, had already
made, well known to the patriarchal family. — And
he lighted upon a certain place. — Xot after the
first day's journey, but after several days' journey
(see ch. xxii. 4). Bethel (see ver. 19), or originally
Luz, hovaa, was situated In the mountain of Ephraim,
on the way from Jerusalem to Shechem, probably
the present Beitin ; more than three hours north of
Jerusidem (see Dictionaries, especially Winer, and
books of travels, particularly Robinson, ii. pp. 123-
130).- -He lighted upon. — By. this expression the
place in which he took up his night-quarters, in the
open air, is distinguished from the city already exist-
ing.— And tarried there all night. — After tlie sun
went down, indicating an active journey. Even at
the present date it frequently occurs that pilgrims in
those countries, wrapped in their cloaks, spend the
night in the open air, during the more favorable
seasons of the year. — He took of the stones. —
" One of the stones." A stone becomi'S his pillow.
Thus he rests upon the solitary mountain, with no
covering but the siiy.— And he dreamed In his
Iream a strange night-vision comes to him, and it
-"longs f) his peculiar character that in this condi-
tion he is susceptible of this dream. " Here he
sleeps upoi\ a hard pillow, exiled from his father's
house, with deep anxiety approaching an imcertain
future, and intentionally avoiding intercourse with
his fellow-men ; a stranger, in solitude and without
shelter." Delitzsch. The dream-vision is so glori-
ous, that the narrator represents it by a threefold
nsri . The participles, too, serve to give a mora
vivid representation. The connection between
heaven and earth, and now especially between
heaven and the place where the poor fugitive sleeps,
is represented in three different forms, increasing in
fulness and strength ; the ladder, not too short, but
resting firmly on the earth below and extending up to
heaven ; the angels of God, appearing in great num-
bers, passing up and down the ladder as the messen-
gers of God ; ascending as the invisible companions
of the wanderer, to report about liim, and as medi-
ators of his prayers ; descending as lieavenly guar-
dians and mediators of the blessing ; finally, Jehovah
himself standing above the ladder, henceforth the
covenant God of Jacob, just as he had hitherto been
the covenant God of Abraham and Isaac. [It is a
beautiful and striking image of the reconciliation and
mediation effected by the Angel of the Covenant.
See John i. 51. — A. G.]— Jehovah, the God of
Abraham. — According to Knobel, this is an addi-
tion of the Jehovistic enlargement, which does not
fit the connection here, where the question is simply
about Jacob's protection and guidance. Just as if
this could be detached from his theocratic position
and importance ! First of all, Jacob must row
know that Jehovah is with him as his God ; that the
God of Abraham — his ancestor in faith — and thj
God of Isaac, will henceforth also prove himself U
be the God of Jacob. — The land -whereon thoi:
liest. — The ground on which he sleeps as a fugitive
is to be his possession, to its widest limits. Canaan,
from the heights of Bethel, extends in all lireciions
far and wide. His couch upon the bare ground il
changed into an ideal possession of the country.-—
As the dust of the earth (see ch. xxii. 17; xxv*
6«2
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
4). — To one sleeping upon the liare ground, this new
siTTnliol of the old promise was peculiarly striking. —
Thou Shalt spread abroad. — The wide, indefinite
extension to all quarters of the heavens, introduces
the thought, that all the nations of the earth are to
be hlessed in him. [That which is here promised
traiiscends the destiny of the natural seed of Abra-
ham. MuRi'HT, p. 386.— A. G,] In the light of
*ii\9 promise, the personal protection and guidance
ACT' promised to him has its full significance and
'trtainty. Jehovah guarantees the security of his
journey, of the end souglit, of his return, and finally,
of the divine promises given to him. But the secu-
rity against Esau is not yet clearly given to him ;
stll the expression: / will nol leave thee, until — •
does not mean, that he would at one time forsake
him, but indicates the infallible fulfilment of all the
promises. [The dream-vision is a comprehensive
summary of the history of the Old Covenant. As
Jacob is now at the starting-point of his independent
development, Jehovah now standing above the lad-
der, appears in the beginning of his descent, and
since the end of the ladder is by Jacob, it is clear
that Jehovah descends to him, the ancestor and rep-
resentative of tlie chosen people. But the whole
history of the Old Covenant is nothing else than, on
one side, the history of the successive descending
of God, to the incarnation in the seed of Jacob, and,
on the other, the successive steps of piogress in
Jacob and his seed towards the preparation to receive
the personal fulness of the divine naturg into itself.
The vision reaches its fulfilment and goal in the
sinking of the pei'sonal fulness of God into the help-
less and weak human nature in the incarnation of
Christ. Knrtz.— A. G.]
2. Jacob^ii awakingy hit ^norning solemnitii, and
tyio (vers. 16-22).— Surely the Lord.— The belief
Sj the omnipresence of God was a pait of the faith
of Abraham's house. And that God was even pres-
pnt here, he did not first learn on this occasion (as
Knoliel seems to think), but it is new to him that
Jehovah, .as the covenant God, revealed himself not
only at the consecrated altars of his fathers, but even
.oere. Jacob (who was not to take, and did not
desire to take, any of the Canaanitish women), prob-
ably from religious zeal, avoided taking up his abode
for the night in the heathen city, Luz. Generally,
indeed, he would feel ill at case in a profane and
heathenish country. The greater, therefore, is his
surprise, that Elohim here reveals himself to him,
and that as Jehovah. — How dreadful (see Exod.
iii. 5) — House of God. — The dread fulness of the
place results from the awe-inspiring presence of the
God of revelation. The jilace. therefore, is to him a
hou.se of God, a Bethel, and the Bethel is U> him at
the same time the door of heaven. Ue feels as a
sinner rebuked and punished at this sacred place ;
he trembles and is filled with holy awe, but not dis-
heartened. Ue did not tremble before men nor wild
beasts, but now he trembles before Jehovah in his
Banctuary, but it is the trembling of a pious confi-
dence.— And he set it up for a pillar. — Calvin :
".\ striking rnonuTnent of the vision." We must
here distingui.fh between the stone lor a pillar, as a
memorial of divine help, as Joshua and Samuel
'.reefed pillars (ch. xxxi. 45; xxxv. 14; Josh. iv. 9,
TO; xxiv 20; 1 Sam. vii. 12); and the anointing
of the stone with oil, which conseci'aied it to Jeho-
vah's sanctuary (Exod. xx. 30). In the same manner,
we must distinguish, on the one hand, between the
'longeerated stone of Jacob, which marked the place
as an idea! house of God and a future place for sao
rifice (see ch. xxxv. 15 ; ch. xxxv. 7), and in an u&
conscious typical prophecy the place of the futuM
tabernacle, and, on the other hand, the .anointed
stones worshipped with religious veneration (whence
the expression : "Oelgotze," idols of oil), and espe-
cially the stones supposed in the heathen world to
have fallen from heaven, by whose names we are
reminded of Bethel, but whose worship, however,
is not to be deiived from Jacob's conduct at Bethel
(see Keil, p. 302; Knoekl, p. 239; Delitzsch, p.
460 ; Wi.\ER, " Stones "). — Called the name. —
Knobei, : " Aecoi'ding to the Elohist, he assigns the
name at his return (xxxv. 15)." The naming at the
last-quoted place, however, clearly expresses the
execution of his purpose to sacrifice upon the stone,
and thus to change it from an ideal to an actual
Bethel, a place for the worship of God. It is evident
that this naming of Luz, or the place near by, was
of importance only to Jacob and his house, and that
the Canaanites called the city Luz now as before,
until it became a Hebrew city. According to Keil,
Jacob himself called the city Luz by the name of
Bethel, but not the place where the pillar was erect-
ed. This would be very strange, and it is not proved
by ch. xlviii. 3, where Jacob in Egypt characterizes
in general the region of this divine revelation. From
Josh. xvi. 2 ; xviii. 13, too, we receive the impression
that Luz and Bethel, strictly taken, were two sepa^
rate places ; for Jacob had not passed the night in
the city of Luz, but in the fields or upon the moun-
tain, in the open air. Generally, the whole region
was called Luz, in the time of the Canaanites, but
Bethel at the time of the Israelites. — Vowed a
vow. — The vow seems to unite the faith in Jehovah
with external and personal interests. But the fol-
lowing points should be considered : First, the vow
is only an explanation and appropriation of the
promise immediately preceding; second, t is a very
modest appropriation of it (meat and druik and rai-
ment) ; thirdly, Jacob emphasizes espe ;ially that
point which the promise had left dark for his further
trial (ch. xxxii. 7), viz., the desire to ret irn to hia
paterual home in peace, i. e., especially, free from
Esau's avenging threats. — The vow too: 'Then shall
the Lord be my God, is emphatical, and explains
itself by the following promises. Jacob fulfilled the
first after his return (ch. xxxv. 7 ; vcr. 16), and Israel
fulfilled it more completely. The tithe.'', that first
appeal' in Abraham's history (ch. xiv. 20), were no
doubt employed by Jacob, at his return, for burnt-
offerings and thank-offerings and charitable gifts (see
below) (ch. x.xxi. 54 ; xlvi. 1). [Murphy says, the
vow of Jacob is a step in advance of his predeces-
sors. It is the spirit of adoptioii working in him.
It is the grand and solemn expiession of the soul's
free, full, and perpetual acceptance of the Lord to
be its own (iod. The words. If God will be with
me, do not express the condition on which Jacob
will acce])t God, but are the echo and thankful ac-
knowledgment of the divine .-issurance, I am with
thee. The stone shall be God's house, a monument
of the presence and dwelling of (!od wilh his people.
Here it signalizes the grateful and loving welcome
which (lod receivi'S from his saints. The tenth is
the share of all given to God, as rcpri'senting the full
share, the whole wliich belongs to him. Thus Jacob
opens his heart, his home, and his treiisure, to God.
As the Father is prominently manifested in Abra^
ham, and the Son in Isaac, so also the Spirit ii
Jacob. — A. G.]
CHAP. XXVIII. 10-22.
525
DOCTRINAl AND ETHICAL.
1. Jacob's pilgrimage. The patriarchs pilgrims
of God (Heb. xi.).
2. From Isaac onward the night dream-vision ig
the fundamental form of revelation in the history of
the patriarchs.— Consecrated night-life: 1. As to the
occasion : In the most helpiess situation, tlie most
solemn and glorious dream. 2. As to the form : A
divine revelation in the dream-vision : a. miracles of
Bight, symbols of salvation ; b. miracles of the ear,
promise of salvation. 3. As to its contents ; The
images of the vision : a. the ladder ; b. angels, as-
cending and descending; c. .Tehovah standing above
the ladder and speaking. — The words of the vision,
or the centre f'f the whole vision (Calov. : Verbwn
dei quasi aithna vinioniii). General promise ; indi-
vidual promise.
8. The rainbow in the brightness of its colors,
though soon vanishing away, proclaims the mercy of
God, descending from heaven, and ruling over the
earth ; but Jacob's ladder expresses more definitely
the connecting and living intercourse between heaven
and earth. The ladder reaching down from heaven
to earth, designates the revelations, the words, and
promises of God ; the ladder reaching upwards from
earth to heaven, indicates faith, sighs, confession,
and prayer. The angels ascending and descending,
are messengers and the symbols of the reality of
a personal intercourse between Jehovah and his
people.
4. The angelic world develops itself gradually.
Here they appear in great numbers, after having been
preceded by the symboUc cherubim and the two an-
gels, in company wiih the Angel of the Lord : I.
These hosts, however, appear in the vision of a dream ;
2. they ascend and descend on tlie ladder; it does
not appear, therefore, that they flew. They do not
speak, but Jehovah speaks above them. Nevertlie-
less, they indicate the living communion between
heaven and earth, the longing for another world,
well known to the Lord in the heavens ; the help
and salvation which comes from above, and with
which believing hearts are well acquainted, and the
ascending and descending signifies that personal life
•3 only mediated and introduced tli rough personal
life. They carry on this mediation, bearing upwards
from earth reports and prayers, and from heaven to
earth protection and blessings.
5. In this vision and guidance of Jacob the
Angel of the Lord unfolds and reveals his peculiar
nature in a marked antithesis. Jehovah is the one
peculiar personality who, exalted above the multi-
tude of angels, begins to speak, receives and gives
the word.
6. Christ brings out the complete fulfilment of
Jacob's vision, John i. 52. From this exegesis of the
Lord it follows that Jacob, now already as Israel
(see John i. 47 ; ver. 49), not only beheld a constant
intercourse between heaven and earth, but foresaw
tlso, in an unconscious, typical representation, the
gradual incarnation of God. BitTMGARTEN : " The
MJ ."athers, and even Luther and Calvin, are loo rash
31 regarding the ladder, directly and by itself, as the
s'^iabol cf the mystery of the incarnation. The lad-
o '.- ts6if cannot be compared with Christ, but Jacob,
who beholds the ladder," etc. No doubt, Jacob, in
his vision, is a type of Christ, and Baumgarten cor-
rectly says : " As far as a dream (it is, the nighf-
•ision of a believer) stands below the reahty, and
things that happen but once below tliose that con
tinually occur, so far Jacob stands below Christ.'
Yet the mutual relatiou and intercourse betweet
God and the elect, which is the result of t-e ad
vent of Christ, was doubtless typified by this lad
der.
7. From Jacob's ladder we receive the first defi-
nite intimation that beyond Sheol, heaven is the home
of man.
8. Just as Jacob established his Bethel at hil
lonely lodging-place, so Christians have founded theij
churches upon Golgothas, over the tombs of martyrs,
and over crypts; and this all in a symbolic sense.
The church, as well as Christians, has come out of
great tribulations. — But every true house of God ia
also, as such, a gate of heaven.
9. The application of oil also, which afterwards,
in a religious sense, as a a symbol of the spirit, runs
through the entire Scriptures, we find here first men-
tioned.
10. Jacob's vow is to be understood from the
preceding promise of the Lord. It was to be uttered,
according to the human nature, in his waking state,
and is the answer to the divine promise.
11. As to the tithes and vows, see Dictionaries.
Gi':rlach : " The number ' ten ' being the one that
concludes the prime numbers, expresses the idea of
completion, of some whole thing. Almost all na-
tions, in paying tithes of all their income, and fre-
quently, indeed, as a sacred revenue, thus wished to
testify that their whole property belonged to God,
and thus to have a sanctified use and enjoyment of
what was left.
12. The idea of Jacob's ladder, of the protecting
hosts of angels, of the house of (Jod aad its sublirse
terrors, of the gate of heaven, of the symbolical
significance of the oil, of the vow, and of the tithes ,
— all these constitute a blessing of this consecrated
night of Jacob's life.
13. Jacob does not think that Jehovah's revela-
tion to him was confined to this place of Bethel. He
does not interpret the sacredness of the place in a
heathen way, as an external thing, but theocratically
and symbolically. Through Jehovah's revelation,
this place, which is viewed as a heathen waste, be-
comes to him a house of God, and therefore he con-
secrates it to a permanent sanctuary.
U. Vers. 20, 21. Briefly: If God is to me Je-
hovah, then Jehovah shall be to me God. If the
Lord of the angels and the world proves himself to
me a covenant God, then 1 mil glorify in my cove-
nant God, the Lord of the whole world. [There is
clear evidence that Jacob was now a child of God.
He takes God to be bis God in covenant, with whom
he will live. He goes out in reliance uptra the divine
promise, and yields himself to the divine control,
rendering to God the homage of a loving ^nd grate-
ful heart. But what a progress there is between
Bethel and Peniel. Grace reigns within him, but not
without a conflict. The powers and tendencies of
evil are still at work. He yields too readily to their
urgent solicitations. Still grace and the principles
of the renewed man, gain a stronger hold, and be-
come more and more controlling. Under the loving
but faithful discipline of God, he is gaining in hia
taith, until, in the great crisis of his life, Maiianaim
and Peniel, and the new revelations thei: given to
him, it receives a large and sudden increase. He
is thenceforward trusting, serene, and established,
strengthened and settled, and passes into the quie*
life of the triumphant believer. — X. G.]
b«4
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
See Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. — Jacob,
the third patriarch. How he inherited from his
grandfather: 1. Tlie active deeds of faith, and from
his father ; 2. the endurance of faith, and tlierefore
even he apptars ; o. as the wrestler of faith. — Or the
petriarch of hope in a special sense. — Jacob's pilgrim-
age.— His couch upon the stony pillow becomes his
Bethel. — The night-vision of Jacob at Bethel becomes
more and more glorious : 1. The ladder ; 2. the angels
ascending and descending ; 3. Jehovah and his prom-
ise.— -The ladder : a. From heaven to earth : the word
of God ; b. from earth to heaven : prayer (cries and
tears, prayer, intercession, thanks, praise). — The An-
gel of God over our life. — Jehovah speaking above
the silent angels, or the peculiar irlory of the word
of God, especially of the gospel. — Jacob's nolile
fearlessness, and his holy fear. — Bethel, or the sacred
places and names upon this earth. — Jacob's vow, the
answer to Jehovah's promise. — How the God of
Abraham and Isaac becomes also the God of Jacob,
or, Jehovah always the same in the kingdom of
God : 1. The living results ; 2. the Hving nature of
the results.
Section First, vers. 10-15. Starke : Jacob left
his home secretly and alone, with all possible speed,
before his brother Esau was aware of it. He took
nothing with him but his staff (ch. xxxii. 10). — (Jo-
SEPHOS : Unfavorable opinion of the people at Luz.)
— Jacob, in this wretched condition upon his journey,
i symbol of the Messiah. (Explained allegorically
by R.iMBAcn : 1. Wooing a wife in a strange coun-
try ; 2. the true heir appearing in poverty ; 3. the
sojourn at Bethel. Christ had not where to lay his
head.) — This ladder, a symbol of God's paternal care,
by which, as by a heavenly ladder, heaven and earth
are connected. — But that this ladder was to typify
something far higher, we learn from Christ himself.
The mystery of Christ's incarnation, and of his me-
diatorial office, was typified by this. — Freiberger
Bibel: In this ladder we see the sti'ps and degrees:
1. Of the state of Christ's humiliation ; 2. of the
state of his exaltation. — Chrtsostom : " Faith is the
ladder of Jacob reaching from earth to heaven. —
Bersh. : The ladder of Jacob is the church, as yet
partly militant upon the earth, and partly triumphant
in heaven. — Tlie Lord (Jehovah). Chaldee: The
glory of the Lord. Arab. : The light of the Lord.
— (Freiberger Bibel : Grotius and Clericus are wrong
in not being willing to give the name, the Angel of
the Lord, to Christ, but to one of the highest angiLs,
to wlioni they attribute the name of Jehovah, con-
trary to the sense and usage of the Holy Spirit. ) —
Ver. LI. God, in comforting him, proceede gradually:
1. He himself is with him, not a mere angel ; 2. he
will bring him back again ; 3. he will never leave
him (Rom. viii. 28). — Parents ought not to bring up
their children too delicately, for they never know in
what circumstances they may be placed. — Hall :
God is generally nearest to us when we are the moat
bumble. — Bibt. Tub. : Even in his sleep Jacob had
intercourse with the Lord ; in a like manner our
eleip should be consecrated to the Lord. — Clirist,
the true Jacob's ladder (I's. xci. 2; Isa. xxxiii. 2).
Gerlach: That the angels here neither hover nor
fly, is owing to the representation and typical signifi-
cance of the vision. By this very tivct .Jacob was as-
sured that the [liace where his head lies, is the i)nint
to which God sends his angels, in order to execute
hie commands concerning him, and to receive com-
munications from him ; a symbol of the loving ant
uninterrupted care for his servants, extending to in-
dividu:ds and minute events. — Dreadful. The olo
church called the Lord's supper a drewlful mystery
[Kacraiiiejitum tretnenduw ) . — Lisco : Now Jacob,
like Abraham and Isaac, stands as the elect of Jeh >
vah. This is of greater importance, since Jaeoli is
the ancestor of the Israelites only. The promises
of Jehovah, therefore, th^it were given to him, must
have appeared as the dearest treasure to his descend'
ants. — Schroder: Ver. 10. Because the sun uas set
A symbol corresponding with his inward feeling
The paternal home with the revelations and the wor
ship of the only true God, is fir behind him, ?
strange solitude around him, and a position lull of
temptation before him. — The living stone, the rock
of salvation, is the antitvpe of that typical stone in
the wilderness ; do with it what the patriarch did
with his (F. W. Krummacher), Heb. i. 14. — In the
symbol of the ladder lies the prediction of the special
providence of God. — Earth is a court of paradise ;
life, here below, is a short pilgrimage; our home is
above, and the hght of a blessed eternity illuminates
our path (F. W. Krummacher).
Section Second, vers. 16-22. Starke: Swell,
the Lord. Chald. : The glory of the Lord. — Ver.
17. His feeble nature trembled before this heavenly
manifestation, because he was well aware of his un-
worthiness, and the sublimity of God's majesty con-
sidere<i in the light of the Spirit. — Where God's word
is found, there is a house of God. There heaven
stands open. — (The ancients believed that the divin-
ity, after having forsaken the greater part of the earth
(as to his gracious presence), could be found at that
place, whither they would be called alter their depart-
ure from Chaldaea (Cyiill Alex.) — Ver. 18. .\s Jacob
was not induced to set up this stone and worship at
it by any superstition or idolatry, so the papists gahi
nothing in deriving their image-worship from this
act ; although we read in Lev. xxvi. 1 ; Deut. vii. 5
xii. 3. that God has expressly prohibited these things
— (The Orientals, in their journeys, use oil for food,
for anointing, and for healing.) — Cramer : Although
the Lord God is everywhere present (Jer. xxiii. 24),
he is yet especially near to his church with his grace,
his spirit, and his blessing (John xiv. 18; Matt, xviii.
20). — Bibl. Wirt.: Wherever the Lord God shows
himself in his word, or by deeds of his grace, there
is his house, and the gate of heaven, there heaveu
with its treasures is open. — A Christian walks with
great reverence and fear before God, and bows in
humble subndssion before his most sacred majesty
— (Christ, the comer-stone, anointed with the oil ol
gladness.) — Freiberger Bibel ; A church, thougl
built of wood and stones, nevertheless bears ihif
beautiful title, and is CiUled God's house, or houst
of the Lord. So frequently were named : a. the
tabernacle (Exod. xxiii. 19; xxxiv. 26); b the first
and second temple at Jerusalem, etc.^Vers. 2(i, 21
Vows must be regarded as holy. — The duty of gr»t
itude. — Whatever a Christian gives to the establish-
ment of divine service, and to the support of pious
teachers, he gives to God. — Lisco : How (iod reveals
himself through facts and the experiences of lile, by
means of which he enlarges the store of our know}
edge (still, not here the knowledge of Ids omnipres
ence). — Geklach : The vow, which .lacob here took,
was based entirely ufon the jtromise given to him,
and served as an encour.agenient to gratitude, t<i
i'aiih, and to obedienci', just as afterwards, in tin
law, in a similar way, sacildces were vowed and of
CHAP. XXIX. 1— XXX. 24.
52t
fered. It belonged to the time of childhood under
tutors and governors (Gal. iv. 1). — The stone is to
become a place of sacrifice. — Calwkr Hamlbuch:
Perhaps Jacob accomplished the vow concerning the
tithes in a similar sense, as at the foast of tithes :ind
lacrifices (Deut. xiv. 28, *J9), which afteiwards oc-
curred every three years, and at wliicli tlie Levites,
the stranger, widows, and orphans should lie invited,
and at which they sliould eat and be satisfied. This
feast may, perhaps, have existed voluntarily, before it
became legal and was introduced as a fixed usage. —
ScHRoDEt!: Generally, the outward connection with
the chosen generation, the residence at a place point-
ed out to them by God, constituted tlie condition of
a participation in Jehovah. Ishmael, leaving the
paternal home and Canaan, immediately passed over
to Elohim*s dominion. By this manifestation the
fear (?) that he, like Ishmael, might be cut off as a
branch from its vine, which soon withereth, is taken
away from Jacob, and the blessing spoken over him
by Isaac at his departure, receives its sanction
(Hengstenberg). (The circumstances were mor«
personal and intense ; holy persons constituted sa
cred places, not vice versa ; nor did the promise
he in Isaac's individuality, but in the house of Isaat
and Rebekah, and Jacob was conscious that be wai
j the heir of blessing. The place of God's speeiaJ
1 care, the ideal church of Jehovah now, is also fran»
I ferred in a certain sense, from Beer-sheba to Haran.)
— Here God himself erected a pulpit, and preached,
I that his church shall stand forever and ever. Bui
I Jacob and the angels of heaven are his hearers
But you nmst not run to St. Jacob, etc, but in faith
look at the place where the word and the sacramenti
are, for there is the house of God, anil the gate of
heaven (Luther). — The oil, which, from without, pen
etrates objects gently but deeply, symbolizes holinesi
which is to be imparted to common things and per-
sons as a permanent character (Baumgarten). — Aa
God has become ours by faith, so we must cheerfuUv
yield ourselves to our neighbor by love (Berleb
Bibel).
SECOND SECTION,
Jaccb^s wives and children. Jacob and Rachel^ Laban^s youngesi daughter. J^rst and seco7id treaty vntk
Laban. His involuntary consummation of marriage with Leah. The double marriage. Zeah's sotu
RachePs dissatisfaction. The strife of the two women. The concubines. Jacobus blessing q,
children.
Chapter XXIX. 1— XXX. 24.
1 Then Jacob went on his journey [lifted np his feet] anti came [fled] into the land of
2 the people [children] of the east [morning]. And he looked, and behold a well in the
field, and, lo, there were three flocks of sheep lying by it [before Mm] ; for out of that
3 well they watered the flocks : and a great stone was upon the well's month. And
thither were all the flocks gathered : and [then] they rolled the stone from the well's
• mouth, and watered the sheep, and put the stone again upon the well's mouth in his
4 place. And Jacob said unto them, My brethren, whence be ye ? And they said, Of
5 Haran are we. And he said unto thetn, Know ye Laban the son of Nahor? And
6 they said. We know him. And he said unto them, Is he well? And they said, He is
7 well: and behold, Rachel [iamb, ewe-i.imb] his daughter cometh with the sheep. And
[But] he said, Lo, it is yet iiigh day, neither i,sii time that the cattle sliould be gathered
8 together : water ye the sheep, and go and feed them. And they said. We cannot, un-
til all the flocks be gathered together, and till [then] they roll the stone from the well'a
mouth ; then [and] we water the sheep.
9 And while he yet spake with them, Rachel came with her father's sheep : for she
10 kept them. And it came to pass, when Jacob saw Rachel the daughter of Laban hia
mother's brother, and the sheep of Laban his mother's brother, that Jacob went near,
and rolled the stone from the well's mouth, and watered the flock of Laban his mother's
II, 12 brother. And Jacob kissed Rachel, and lifted up his voice, and wept. And Jacob
told Rachel that he was her father's brother [nephew]. And that he was Rebekah's
13 son ; and she ran and told her father. And it came to pass, when Laban hoard ;he
tidings of Jacob his sister's son, that he ran to meet him, and embraced him and kissed
14 him, and brought him to his house. And [Then] he told Laban all these things. And
Laban said to him. Surely thou art my bone and my flesh. And he abode with him
the space of a month.
526 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
15 And Laban said unto Jacob, liecause thou art my brother [relative], shouidest thot
16 therefore ser^'e me for nought? tell me, what shall thy wages he. And Laban had
two daugiiters: the name of the elder leas Leah [scarcely, the wearied ; still less, the dull, stupid,
17 as Fnrst, rather : the pining, yearning, desiring], and the name of the younger ItJns Rachel. Leah
was tender eyed; but Rachel was beautiful [as to form] and well favored [as to countenance].
18 And Jacob loved Rachel: and said. I will serve thee seven years for Rachel thy
19 younger daughter. And Laban said, It is better that I give her to thee than that 1
'IQ shovild give lier to another man : abide with me. And [thus] Jacob served seven years
for Racliel ; and they seemed unto him [were in his eyes] hut a few days, for the love h€
had to her.
21 And Jacob said unto Laban, Give me my wife, for my days are fulfilled, that I may
22 go in unto her. And Laban gathered together all the men of the place, and made a
23 feast [wedding feast]. And it came to pass in the eveniiig, that he took Leah his daugh-
24 ter, and brought her to him ; and he went in unto her. And Laban gave unto his
daughter Leah, Zilpah [ilaurer: the dewy— from the trickling, dropping ; First : myrrh-juice] his maid,
25 for an handmaid. And it came to pass, that in tlie morning, behold, it was Leah : and
he said to Laban, What is this thou hast done unto me ? did [have] not I serve with
26 thee for Rachel ? wherefore then hast thou beguiled me? And Laban said, It nuist
not be so done [it is not the custom] in our country, to give the yotmger before the firstborn.
27 Fulfil her [wedding] week [the week of tUs one— fulfil, Ptc.— is too strong], and we will give thee
28 this also, for the service which thou shall, serve with me yet seven other years. And Jacob
did so, and fulfilled her week : and [then] he gave him Rachel his daughter to wif; also.
29 And Laban gave to Rachel his daughter Bilhah [Maurer, Furst : tender. Gesenius: bashful,
30 modest] his handmaid to be her maid. And he went in also unto Rachel, and he loved
also Rachel more than Leah, and served with him yet seven other years.
31 And when the Lord saw that Leah was hated [displeasing] he opened her womb :
32 but Rachel was barren. And Leah conceived, and bare a son ; and she called his
name Reuben [see there, a son] : for she said, Surely the Ijord hath looked upon my afflic-
33 tion ; now therefore my husband will love me. And she conceived again, and bare a
son ; and said. Because the Lord hath heard that I was hated, he hath therefore given
34 me this son also : and she called his name Simeon [schimeon, hearing]. And she conceived
again, and bare a son; and said, Now this time [at last] will my husband be joined unto
me, because I have borne him three sons : therefore was his name called Levi
35 [joining, cleaving]. And she conceived again, and bare a son ; and she said, Now will I
praise the Lord: therefore she called his name Judah [praiseofQod, literaUy, praised, viz., he
Jehovah] ; and left bearing.
Ch. XXX. 1. And when Rachel saw that she bare Jacob no children, Rachel envied
2 her sister; and said unto Jacob, Give me children, or else I die. And Jacob's anger
was kindled against Rachel ; and he said, Am I [then] in God's stead, who hath with-
3 held from thee the fruit of the womb ? And she said. Behold my maid Bilhah, go in
unto her, and she shall bear upon my knees, that I may [and I shall] also have children
4 [bo built] bv her. And she gave him Bilhah her handmaid to wife. And Jacob went
5, 6 in unto" her. And Bilhah conceived, and bare Jacob a son. And Rachel said,
God hath judged me [decreed mo my right], and hath also heard my voice, and
hath given me a son: therefore called she his name Dan [Judgo; vindicator].
7 And Bilhali, Rachel's maid, conceived again, and bare Jacob a second son. And
8 Rachel said. With great wrestlings [wrcstiinesofaod, Eioiiim] have I wrestled with my
sister, and I have prevailed: and she called his name Naphtali [my conflict or wrestler].
9 [And] Wiien Leah saw that she had left bearing, she took Zilpah, her maid, and gave
10, 1 1 her Jacob to wife. And Zilpah, Leah's maid, bare J.acob a son. And Leah said, A
12 troop Cometh ['with felicity, good fortune] : and she called his name Gad [fortune]. Ami Zil-
13 pah, Leah's maid, bare Jacob a second .son. And Leah said, Happy am I [for my happiness],
for the daughters will call me blessed: and she called his name Asher [blessedness ].
li And Reuben went in the days of wheat harvest, and found mandrakes [.ovc-npplos]
in the field, and brought them unto his mother Leah. Then Rachel said to Leah, Give
16 me, I pray thee, of thy son's mandrakes. And she said unto her, Is it a small mattei
that thou hast taken my husband ? and wouldesl thou take away my son's mandrakes
a" so? A^rl Rachel said. Therefore he shall lie with thee to-night for thy son's map
CHAP. XXIX. 1— XXX. 24.
^2."
16 drakes. And [as] Jacob came out of the field in the evening, and Leah went out t(
meet him, and said, Tliou must come in unto me; for surely I have hired thee wi'h m}
17 son's mandrakes. And he lay with her that night. And God [EioUmJ hearkenjd un
18 to Leah, and she conceived, and bare Jacob the fifth son. And Leah said, God halb
given me my hire [wages, rowaid], because 1 have given my maiden to my husband: and
19 she called liis name Issacliar [Yisaehcar,^ it is the reward]. And Leah conceived again, and
20 bare Jacob the sixth son. And Leah said, God hath endued me with a good dowry
[presented me with a beautiful present] ; now will my husband dwell with me, because I havp
21 borne him six sons : and she called his name Zebulun [dwelling, dweUing tugothor]. And
afterwards she bare a daughter, and called her name Dinah [judged, justiBed, judgment].
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 [may he add] ; and said, The Lord shall add to me
another [a second] son.
[* Ch. XXX. ver. 11. Lit. with a troop or band. — Lange follows the .Sept., Vulg., and the most of the early verslonSi
But whether we follow the Ked, or the Chethib, as in our version, it is better to adhere to the signification, a troop of
band. For while Leah uses hereafter the name C^nbx instead of nirT indicating the lower religious state into wbieQ
she has fallen, through the use of these mere human expedients, we can hardly suppose that she would thus name her
child In recognition of the power of a fictitious deity, or avow her faith that her children were the result of mere fortune.
A^ide from this, Cxen. xlix. 19, is decisive. — A. G.J
[5 Ver. 18. Heb. tD'iJ C^, there is a reward — or ID IT Xt^"*, he brings reward. A. G.]
GENERAL PRELIMnrABT REMARKS.
1. The first half of the history of Jacob's sojourn
in Mesopotamia is a history of his love, his marriages,
and liis children. Bridal love, in its peculiar splendor
of heart and emotion, never appeared so definitely in
Genesis, after Adam's salutation to Eve, as in the
present case. With respect to the moral motives,
by means of which Jacob became involved in poly-
gamy, notwithstanding his exclusive bridal love, com-
pare the preface p. Ixxvi. We may divide the his-
tory into the following stages : 1. Jacob's arrival at
the shepherds' well in Haran (vers. 1-8) ; 2. Jacob's
salutation to Rachel and his reception into Laban's
house (vers. 9-14) ; ;i. Jacob's covenant and service
for Rachel and the deception befalling him (vers.
15-25). How Jacob, under the divine providence,
through the deception practised upon him, became
very rich, both in sons and with respect to the future.
(GOthe : It has always been proved true, That he
whom God deceives, is deceived to his advantage.)
4. His renewed service for Rachel (vers. 26-30) ;
5. Thefirst-bornsonsof Leah (vers. 31-35) ; 6. Ra-
chel's d'jection and the concubinage of Bilhah, her
handmaid (xxx. vers. 1-8); 7. Leah's emulation,
and her handmaid Zilpah (vers, 9-13 ; 8. Leali's last
children (vers. 14-21) ; 9. Rachel, Joseph's mother
(vers. 22-24).
2. Knobel finds here a mixture of Jehovistic re-
presentation with the original text. He knows so
little what to make of the ancient mode of writing
narratives that he remarks upon vers. 16 and 17:
" More'/ver the same writer who has spoken of Ra-
chel already (vers. 9-12), could not properly intro-
duce the two daughters of Laban, as is done in the
present instance."
EXliQETlCAl, AITD CKITICAL.
1. Vers. 1-S. Jncoh^s arrival at the xhephrrfrs
well in Haran. — ^Then Jacob went on his jour-
ney.— This consoling and refreshing manifestation
reanimated him, so that he goes cheerfully on his jour-
ney. Of course, he must use his feet, hia biidal ton
differs from that of EUezer, altliough he himself is tke
wooer. — Into the land of the people of the East.
— The choice of this expression, no doubt, indicates
that from Bethel he gradually turned eastward, and
crossing the Jordan and passing through the north-
em part of Arabia Deserta, he came to .Mesopotamia,
which is also included here. — He looked, and be-
hold.— He looks around to find out where he is.
Wells, however, are not only waymarks in nomadic
districts, but also places of gathering for the shep-
herds.— -It was not a well of living water, — at least
not Eliezer's well near Haran, — but a cistern, as is
proved from the stone covering it. It seems to have
been in the midst of the plain of Haran, and tlie city it-
self was not yet in sight. — There were three flock*
of sheep lying by it. — Scenes of this description
were frequently seen in the ancient Orient, (ch. xxiv, .
11, etc.; Ex. ii. 16, etc.,) and may still be seen to-
day (Robinson : " Researches," ii. pp. 180, 357, 371 ;
iii. 27, 250;. Watering troughs of stone are placed
around the well, and the rule is, that he who comea
first, waters his flocks first (V. Schubert : " Travels,"
ii. p.453 ; Borkhardt : "Syria,"p. 128,etc.). Among
the Arabian Bedouins the wells belong to separate
tribes and families, and strangers are not permitted
to use them without presents, i. e. pay (BuRKHAitni :
" Bedouins," p. 185 ; Robinson, iii. p. 7 ; comp.
Numb. XX. 17,19; xxi. 22). They are, therefore,
often the cause of strifes (ch. xxvi. 19, etc.). The
Arabians cover them very skilfully, so that they re-
main concealed from strangers (Diod. Sic, ii. 48,
19, 94). Even now they are covered with a large
stone(3ee Robinson, ii. p. 180). Knoiiel. Robinson:
'* Most of the cisterns are covereri with a large, thick
flat stone, in the centre of which a round hole is cut,
which forms the mouth of the cistern. This hole,
in many instances, we found coverrd with a heavy
stone, to the removal of which two or tliree men
were requisite." As to the cisterns (see also Keil,
p. 2ii3). — And a great stone. — This does not mean
that all the shepherds were to come together, that
by their united strength they might roll it away. The
shepherds of these three herds must wait for t*"
s^
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
rest of the shepherds with their herds, because the
watering of the herds was common and must take
place in due order. Tlie remark, no doubt, indicates,
however, that the stone was too heavy to be removed
by on^.' of the shepherds. The shepherds also appear
to have made tlie removal of the stone as easy as
possible to them. — My Brethren. — A friendly
salutation between the shepherds. — Of Haran. —
[Haraa lay about four hundred and fifty miles north-
east Irom Beer-sheba. It would, therefore, be a
journey of fifteen days, if Jacob walked at the rate
3f tliirty miles a day. Murphy. — A. G.] From this
it dues not follow certainly that the ciiy was far off,
still Laban might have had tents on the plains for
his shepherds — Laban, the son of Nahor. — Nalior
was his grandfather. Betliuel, his lather, here retires
into the background, just as in Rebekah's history. —
It is yet high day. — According to Starke, Jacob,
as a shepherd, wislied to remind the.se shepherds of
their duty. It is obviously the prudent Jacob who
acts here. He wishes to remove the shepherds, in
order to meet his cousin Rachel, who is approaching,
alone (see Keil). He thus assumes that they could
water their flocks separately, and afterwards drive
again to the pasture.
2. Vers. 8-14. — Jacob's salutation to Rachel,
and his reception into Labaiis house. — For she
kept them. — It is customary among the Arabians
of Sinai, that the virgin daughters drive the herds to
the pasture (see BcKKHiRDT : " Bedouins," p. 283).
Knobel, Ex. ii. 16. — And rolled the stone. — The
strong impression that the beautiful Rachel made
npon her cousin Jacob is manifested in two ways.
He thinks himself powerful enough to roll the stone
from the mouth of the cistern out of love to her, and
disregards the possibility that the trial miglit fail. At
the same time, too, he boldly disregards the common
rule of the shepherds present. Rachel's appearance
made him eager, as formerly Rebekah's appearance
even the old Eliezer, when he took out the bracelets
before he knew her. The power of beauty is also
recognized here upon sacred ground. Tuch thinks
that the united exertion of the sliepherds woidd have
jeen necessary, and the narrative, therefore, boasts
"of a Samson-like strength in Jacob. But there is
a difference between Samaon-like strength and the
heroic power inspired by love. [Perhaps, however,
there was mingling with this feeling the joy which
naturally springs from finding himself among his
kindred, after the long, lonely and dangerous jour-
ney through the desert. — A. G.] — Jacob kissed
Rachel.— "The three-fold 'r.X ""n!* shows that he
acted thus as cou.sin (rolling the stone from the widl's
mouth, etc ). As such he was allowed to kiss Rachel
openly, as a brother his sister (Song of Sol. viii. 1)."
Knohei.. — Yet his excitement betrays him even liere,
since he did not make known his relationship with
her until afterwards. — And wept.— Tears of joy, of
rcanhnation after a long oppression and sorrow (eli.
xlv. l.'i; xlvi. 2'J). He wept .aloud, with uplifteil
voice. Brother here equivalent to nephew (eh. xiv.
16 ; xxiv. 48). — When Laban heard the tidings. —
That Jacob made the whole journey on foot miglit
have caused suspicion in the mind of Laban. But
he is susi'e]itible of nobler feelings, as is seen from
the subsetinent narrition (ch. xxxi. 24), altlioiigh he
is gcniTally govenied by selfish motives. — And he
told Laban. — Surely, the whole cause of his jour-
ney, Uy which he also ex[»lained his poor ai)[>earanee
■S the son of the rich Isaac. In the view of Ki'il,
he relates only the circumstances mentioned fron
ver. 2-12. — Surely thou art my flesh and my
bone. — He recognizes him fully from his appearance
and his comniuniealion, as his near relative. — The
space of a month. — Literally, during some, an in-
definite number of days. It was yet uncertain, from
day to day, how they would arrange matters.
3. Vers. 15-25. Jacob's xiiit ami Sfrvice for
Rachel, and the decepton prttrti.-<ed upon hijn,
— Tell me what shall thy wages be. — This ex-
pression is regarded by Keil already as a mark of
Laban's selfishness, but there is no ground lor this
view. It is rather to be supposed that Lab;in wish-
ed to open the way for his love suit, which, on ac-
count of his poor condition he had not yet ventuied
to press. We see afterwards, indeed, that Laban
willingly gives both his daughters to him. We
do not, however, wish to exclude the thought, that
in the meantime he may have recognized a skilful
and useful shepherd in Jacob, and besides acted
from regard to his own interest, especially since he
knew that Jacob possessed a great inheritance at
home. — The name of the elder -was Leah. — It is
remarkable, that in the explanation of this name we
are mostly inclined to follow deiived sifinificationa
of the word nxb (see Fiirst upon this verb). — The
word Tp used to describe the eyes of Leah, means
simply : weak or dull, whence the Arabians have
made, moist or blear-eyed. Leah's eyes were not in
keeping with the Oriental idea of beauty, though
otherwise she might be a woman greatly blessed.
" Eyes which are not clear and lustrous. To tha
Oriental, but especially to the Arabian, black eyes,
full of life and fire, clear and expressive, dark eyes,
are considered the principal part of female beauty.
Such eyes he loves to compare with those of the
Gazelle, (Hamasa, i. p. 657, etc." Knobel. — Rachel,
the third renowned beauty in the patriarchal family.
If authentic history was not in the way, Leah, as the
mother of Judah, and of the Davidic Messianic line,
ought to have carried off the ])rize of beauty after
Sarah and Rebekah. — And well favored. — " Beau-
tiful as to her form and beautiful as to her counte-
nance." Beside the more general designation :
beautifid as to her form, the second : beautiful
ns^O must surely have a more definite significa-
tion: beautiful as t> her countenance, and, indeed,
with a reference to her beautiful eyes, which were
wanting to Leah. Thus the passage indirectly says
that Leah's form was beautiful.— Serve thee seven
years for Rachel. — Instead of wages he desires
the daughter, and instead of a service of an indefinite
number of days he promises a service of seven years.
" Jacob's service represents the price which, among
the Orientals, was usually paid tor tlie wife which
was to be won (see WiNEit, Rrulw., under marriage).
The custom still exists. In Kerek, a man without
means, renders service for five or six years (Riitkr,
Krdkwide, XV. p. 674), and in Ilauran, Burkhardt
("Syria," p. 464), met a young man who had served
eight years for his hare support, and then received
for a wife the daughter of his master, but mnsi ren-
der service still." Knoukl. On the contrary, Keil dis.
jiutes the certainty of the assumption that the cus-
tom of selling their daughters to men was g.-neral
at that time. And we should certainly be nearer the
truth in explaining many usages of the present bor-
der Asia from patriarchal relations, than to invert
everything aceonling to Knohel's view. Keil holds
that Jacob's seven years of servioe takes the plaor
CHAP. XXIX.— XXX. 1-24.
529
of the customary dowry and the presents given to
the relatives ; but lie overlooks the fact that the
'.de-is of buifin'i dind presenting (And barter) are not
is far apart in the East as with us. Nor can we di-
rectly infer the covetousness of Laban from Jacob's .ac-
ceptance of the offer, although his ignoble, selfish, nar-
row-minded conduct, as it 15 seen afterwards, throws
jome light also en these earlier transactions. — It is
better that I give her to thee. — " Among all
Bedouin Arabians the cousiu has the preference to
strangers (Bl'RKHakot, "Bedouin," p. 219), and the
Druses in SjTia always prefer a relative to a rich
stranger (Vol.s'ky, "Travels," ii. p. 62). It is gene-
rally customary throughout the East, that a man
marries his next cousin ; he is not compelled to do
it, but the right belongs to him exclusively, and
•he is not allowed to marry any other without his
consent. Both relatives, even after their marriage,
call each other cousin (Burkhardt, " Bedouins," p.
91, and "Arabian Proverbs," p. 274, etc.; Layard,
"Nineveh and Babylon," p. 222; Lase, "Manners
and Customs," i. p. 167). Knobkl. — They seemed
unto him but a few days. — So far, namely, as
that his great love for Rachel made his long service
a delight to him ; but, on the other hand, it is not
said that he did not long for the end of these seven
years. Yet he was cheerful and joyful in hope,
which is in perfect keeping with Jacob's charac-
ter.— A Feast. — Probably Laban intended, by the
great nuptial feast which he prepared, to facilitate
Jacob's deception by the great bustle and noise,
but then also to arrange things so, that after seven
days the wedding might be considered a double wed-
ding. For it is evident that he wishes to bind Jacob
as firmly and as long as possible to himself (see ch.
XXX. 27). — Leah, his daughter. — The deception
was possible, through the custom, that the bride was
led veiled to the bridegroom and the bridal chamber.
Laban probably believed, as to the base deception,
that he would be excused, because he had already in
view the concession of the second daughter to Jacob.
— And Laban gave unto her Zilpah We can-
not certainly infer that he was parsimonious, because
he gave but one handmaid to Leah, since be un-
doubtedly thought already of the dowry of Rachel
with a second handmaid. The number of Rebekah's
Imndmaids is not mentioned (ch. xxiv. 61). — Behold,
it vras Leah. — [" This is the first retribution Jacob
experiences for the deceitful practises of his former
days." He had, through fraud and cunning, secured
the place and blessing of Esau, — he, the younger,
in the place of the elder ; now, by the same deceit,
the elder is put upon him in the place of the younger.
What a man sows that shall he also reap. Sin is
often punished with sin. — A. G.] See Doctrinal and
Ethical paragraphs.
4. Vers. 26-30. Sis renewed service for Rachel.
— It must not be so done. — " The same custom
exists among the East Indians (see Ma.vu. ; " Stat-
utes," ill. 160; RosENM., A. u. "Mod. Orient," and
Von Bohlen, upon this place). Even in the Egypt
of to-day, the father sometimes refuses also to give
in marriage a younger daughter before an older one
'Lane : " Customs and Manners," i. p. 169)." Kno-
bel. Delitzsch adds the custom in old imperial
Germany. This excuse does not justify in the least
Laban's deception, but there was, however, a sting
for Jacob in this reply, viz., in the emphasis of the
right of the first-born. But Laban's offer that fol-
lowed, and in which now truly his ignoble selfishness
• manifest, calmed Jacob's mind. — Fulfil her
34
week. — Lit., mnJce full iht weik with this one^ i. e^
the first week after the marriage, which is due to hei,
since the wedding generally lasted one week ^•Iudi,.
xiv. 12; Tob. xi. 19). [Her week — the week of
Leah, to confirm the marriage with her by keeping
the usual wedding-feast of seven days. But if Leah
was put upon him at the close of the feast of seven
days, then it is Rachel's week, the second feast of
seven days which is meant. The marriage with
Rachel w.as only a week after that with Leah. The
seven years' service for her was rendered afterwards.
—A. G.]— And we will.— Ch. xxxi. 1; ver. 23;
probably Laban and his sons. Laban also, as Rebe-
kah's brother, took part in her marriage arrange-
ments.— Rachel his daughter. — Within eight days
Jacob therefore held a second wedding, but he ful-
filled the service for her afterwards. Laban, there-
fore, not only deceived Jacob by Leah's interposition,
as Jacob tells him to his face, but he overreached
him also in charging him with seven years of service
for Leah. Thus Jacob becomes entangled in polyg-
amy, ill the theocratic house which he had sought
in order to close a theocratic marriage, first by the
faier and afterwards by the daughters.
5. Vers. 31-35. 77ie first four sons of Leah. —
When the Lord saw. — The birth of Leah's first
four sons is specifically referred to Jehovah's grace ;
first, because Jehovah works above all human
thoughts, and regards that which is despised and
of little account (Leah was the despised one, the one
loved less, comparatively the hated one, Deut. xxi.
15) ; secondly, because among her first four sons
were found the natural first-born (Reuben), the legal
first-born (Levi), and the Messianic fir.st-born ( Judah) ;
even Simeon, like the others, is given by Jehovah
in answer to prayer. Jacob's other sons are referred
to Elohim not only by Jacob and Rachel (ch. xxx.
2, 6, 8), but also by Leah (vers. 18, 20), and by the
narrator himself (ver. 17), for Jacob's sons in their
totality sustain not only a theocratic but also a
universal destination. — He opened her womb. — ■
He made her fruitful in children, which should attach
her husband to her. But theocratic husbands did
not esteem their wives only according to their fruit-
fulness (see 1 Sam. i.) It is a one-sided view Keil
takes when he says: "Jacob's sinful weakness ap-
pears also in his marriage state, because he loved
Rachel more than Leah, and the divine reproof
appears, because the hated one was blessed with
children but Rachel remained barren for a long
time." All we can say is, it was God's pleasure to
show in this way the movements of his providence
over the thoughts of men, and to etiualize the incon-
gruity between these women. — Beuben. — Lit., Beu
Ben : Behold., a son. Joyful surprise at Jehovah's
compassion. From the inference she makes : now
therefore, my husband will love me, her deep,
strong love for Jacob, becomes apparent, which had
no doubt, also, induced her to consent to Laban's
deception. — Simeon, her second son, receives his
name from her faith in God as a prayer-answering
God. — Levi. — The names of the sons are an expres-
sion of her enduring powerful experience, as well as
of her gradual resignation. After the birth of the
first one, she hopes to win, tlrodgii he*, son, Jacob's
love in the strictest sense A'tertue birth of the
second she hoped to be put on a footing of equality
with Rachel, and to be delivf red from her disregard
After the birth of the third one she hoped at leaai
for a constant affection. At the birth of the fourth
she looks entirely away from herself to Jehovah.-
530
GENESLS, UK THii i'lKST BOOK OF MOSES.
Tudah. — Praised. A verbal noun of the future
Hoplial from nT' . The literal meaning of the name,
therefore, is : " shall be praised," and may thug be
referred to Judah as the one " that is to be praised,"
but it may also mean that Jehovah is to be praised
on account of him (see Delitzsch, p. 465). [See
Rom. ii. 29. He is a Jew inwardly, whose praise is
of God. 'fl jrdsworth refers here to the analogies
between the patriarchs and apostles. — A, (i.] — She
left bearing. — Not altogether (see ch. xxx. Iti, etc.),
but for a tinje.
(">. Raelisfs dejection, and tlie co7tnecHon with
Bilhah, her maid (oh. xxx. 1-8). — And when Ra-
chel saw. — We have no right to conclude, with
Kcil, from Rachel's assertion, that she and Jacob
were wanting in prayer for children, and thus had
not followed Isaac's example. Even in prayer, pa-
tience may be finally shaken in the human sinful
heart, if God intends to humble it. — Give me
children or else I die, i. e., from dejection ; not :
my remembrance will be extinguished (Tremell) ;
much less does it mean : I shall commit suicide
Chrysost.). Her vivid language sounds not only
irrational but even impious, and therefore she rouses
also the anger of Jacob. — Am I in God's stead. —
Lit., instead of God. God alone is the lord over
life and death (Deut. xxxii. 39; 1 Sam. ii, 6). Ra-
chel's sad utterance, accompanied b.v the threat : or
else I die, serves for an introduction as well as an
excuse of her desperate proposition. — My maid,
Bilhah The bad example of Hagar coniiimes to
operate here, leading into error. Tiie question here
was not about an heir of Jacob, but the proud Ra-
chel desired children as her own, at any cost, lest ."he
should stand beside her sister childless. Her jealous
love for Jacob is to some extent overbalanced by her
jealous pride or envy of her sister, so that she gives
to Jacob her maid. — Upon my knees. — Ancient
interpreters have explained this in an absuidly literal
way. From the fact that children were taken upon
the knees, they were recognized either as adopted
children (1. 23), or as the fruit of their own bodies
(Job iii. 12). — That I may also have children
by her. — See ch. xvi. 2. — Dan (judge, one decree-
ing justice, vindex). — She considered the disgrace
of her barrenness by the side of Leah an injustice.
— Naphtali. — According to Knobel : wrestler ; ac-
cording to others: viy wrestling, or even, the one for
whom I miesiled. Delitzsch : the one obtained by
wrestling. The LXX place it in the plural : Napli-
lalim, wrestlings. Ffirst regards it as the abbrevi-
ated i'orrn of Naphtalijah, the wrestling of Jehovah.
Against tlu^ two last explanations may be urged the
deviation fi'om the form NaphtaUm, wrestlings ; and
according to the analogy of Dan, vindicator, the most
ptt''alile explanation is, ray wrestler. As hiving the
foundation for the name, Rachel says : With great
Wrestlings have I wrestled with my sister
The wrestlings of God could only be in the wrest-
lings ol' prayer, as we afterwards si^e from Jacob's
wrestlings, through which he becomes Israel. De-
litzsch, too, exjdains: These are the wrestlings of
prayer, in the assaults and temptations of I'aith.
IIkngstI'.niikko: Struggles whose issue bears tint
character of a divine judgment, hut through which
the struggle itself is not clearly understood. Kno-
tiKL: "She waM not willing to leave the founding of
a people of (iod to her sister only, but wished also to
becoi e an ancestress, as well as Leah." Hut how
can Rachel speak of a victory over her sister rich in
ohildren ? Leah has left bearing, while liilhah. her
maid, begins to bear ; at the same time, Rachel in
eludes as much as possible in her words in ordei
to overpersuade herself [She believes that she bai
overcome. — A. G.] Hence, still, at Joseph's birth
she could say : Now (not before) God has taken
away my reproach.
7. Vers. 9-13. Leah's emulation, and Zilpah, hef
maid. — Took Zilpah, her maid Leah is still less
excusable than Rachel, since she could oppose her
own four sons to the two adopted sons of Rachel
But the proud and challetiging assertions of Rachel,
however, seem to have determined her to a renewed
emulation ; and Jacob thought that it was due to the
eijual rights of both to consent to the fourth mui'
riage. That Leah now acts no longer as before, m a
pious and humble disposition, the names by which
she calls her adopted sons clearly prove. — A troop
cometh. — Good fortune. An unnecessary conjec-
ture of the Slasorites renders it ^3 xa "Ibrtune
victory cometh." — Asher. — The happy one, or the
blessed one.
8. Vers. 14-21. Leah's last births. — CaU me
blessed. — An ancient mode of expression used by
ha|>py women fiom Leah to Mary (Luke i. ■ts). The
preterite expresses the certain future. — And Reuben
went. — Reuben, when a little boy (according to De-
litzsch Hve years old ; according to Keil only four),
brought unto his mother a plant found in the fields,
and called O^Nl'1^, a name which has been rendered
in various ways. "The LXX correctly translates,
D"'5<'m=/i7)Aa ^ai'SpayopoJi'; ^"m (and the kindred
■'bib) is the Mandragora vernalis (high-German:
alrihia, alrun, mandrake; Grimm., ' Mythol.' ii. p.
1153, edit, iii.), out of whose small, white and-green
flowers, which, according to the Song vii. 14, are
harbingers of Spring, there grows in May, or what
is equivalent, at the time ot' the wheat-harvest, yel-
low, strong, but sweet-smeUing apples, of the size of
a nutmeg (.^lab. tuj^'ah ex Saltan, i. c, pontuni Sa.-
tuiKi'], wliich in antiquity as well as during the middle
ages (sec Guaesse: 'Contributions to the literature
and traditions of the Middle Ages,' IS.'iU) were thought
to promote fruitfulness and were generally viewed as
Aphrodisiacum." Delitzsch, Hence tlie fruit was
called Dudaitn amatoria, Love-apple. Theophrastus
tells us that love-potions were prepared i'rom its
roots. It was held in such high esteem by them
that the goddess of love was called Mandragoritis.
All the (lifiFerent travellers to Palestine speak about
it (see KNOBEt., p. 224; Delitzsch, p. 4B7 ; Keil, p.
211';; Winer: Alrai'U, Mandrake). — Give me of
those mandrakes. — Love-apples. In the transac-
tion Ijctween Rachel and Leah concerning the man-
drakes, her excited emulation cuhninateil, not, how-
ever, as Keil says, as a mutual jealousy as to the
allection of their husband, but a jealou.sy as to the
births, otherwise Rachel would not have been obliged
to yield, anil actually have yielded to Leah the rigiil
in question, — And God hearkened unto Leah.
— Knobel thinks that the Jehovislic and Elohistio
views are here mingled in conlusion. The Elohist
records of Leah after the ninth verse, that she prayed,
and considers her pregnancy an answer to her prayer ;
the Jchovist, on the contrary, ascribes it to the ert'ect
|)roduccd by the mandiakes, of which Leah retained
a part. Here, therefore, the critical assumption ot
a biblical book-making culminates. It is obviously
the design to bring out into prominence the fact that
Leah hecame pregnant again without mandrakes, and
that they were of no avail .o Rachel, a fact whicb
CHAP. XXIX.— XXX, 1-24.
53
"'oil renders prominent. Moreover, it could not be
the intention of Rachel to prepare from these man-
drakes a .so-called love-potion for Jacob, but only to
attain fruitfulness by their effects upon herself. .Just
as now, for the same purpose perhaps, unfruitful
women visit or are sent to certain watering-p'aces.
From this standpoint, truly, the assumed remedy of
nature may appear as a premature, eager self-help.
— Issachar. — According to the Chethib, ^SUJ V .
there is reward; according to Keri, "IDID Sia^ , it
brings reward, which is less fitting here. Leah,
according to ver. 18, looked upon Issachar as a re-
ward for her self-denial in allowing her maid to take
her place. By this act, also, her strong affection for
Jacob seems to betray itself again. But no such
struggle is mcntitmed of Rachel in the interposition
of her maid. — Zebulun. — That the children here
are altogether named by the mothers, is Jehovistic,
as Knoliel thinks : " The Elohist assigns the names
to the children through the father, and is not fond
of etymologies ! " It is just as great violence to the
words : God hath endued me, etc., to say the
nauie signifies a present, while, according to the
words following, it signifies dwelUr, The name of
Zebulun is first formed after the inference which
Leah drew from the divine gift or present. baT , to
dwell, alludes to the preceding T3T , to make a pres-
ent ; both verbs are awa^ Key. — Dinah, is mentioned
on account of the history, ch. xxxiv. Ch. xx.tvii. .35
and cli. xxxvi. 7 seem to intimate that he had other
daughters, but they are not mentioned further.
Dinah is the female Dan. Leah retains her supe-
riority. Hence there is no fuller explanation of
the name after the deed of Dinah's brothers, ch.
zsxlv.
9. Vers. 22-24. Rachel the mother of Joseph. —
And God remembered Rachel. — The expression :
he remembered, here also denotes a turning-point
after a long trial, as usually, e. g., ch. viii. 1. In
relation to the removing of unfrultfulness, see 1 Sam.
i. 19. — And God hearkened to her. — She there-
fore obtained fruitfulness by prayer also. — Joseph.
— This name, in the earlier document, as Knobel
expresses himself, is called "Dsi"' , one that takes
away, 1. e., takes away the leproach, from CDX ; and
then, in the second document, he shall add, from Tp'^.
Delitzsch also explains : one that takes aieai/. Keil
adopts both derivations. The text only allows the
latter derivation : he >na>/ add. To take away and
to add are too strongly opposed to be traced back
to one etymological source. Rachel, it is true, might
have revealed the sentiments of her heart bv the
expression : God hath taken away my reproach ; but
she was not able to give to her own sons names that
would have neutralized the significance and force
of thi names of her adopted sons Dan and Naphtali
That she is indebted to God's kmdness for Joseph,
while at the same time she asks Jehovah for another
son, and thereupon names Joseph, does not furnish
any sufficient occasion for the admission of an addi-
tion to the sources of scripture, as Delitzsch assmnes.
The number of Jacob's sons, who began with Jeho-
vtl, was also closed by Jehovah. For, according to
'be number of twelve tribes, Israel is Jehovah's
oovenant people.
In regard to the fact, however, that Jacob's
ehildren were not bom chronologically in the pre-
ceding order, compare Delitzsch with reference to
EushiBiDS: Prreviiratio Evang., ix. 21,and Astruc. :
" Conjectures," p. 396, and Keil. The first-born
Reuben, was born probably during the first year of
the second seven years, and Joseph at the close of
the same. All the sons, therefore, were born during
the second heptade. Dinah's birth, no doubt, occuri
also during this period, though Keil supposes, from
the expression ",ns, that she may have been bor/i
later. But if we now adopt the chronological sue
cession, Leah would have given birth to seven chL
dren in seven years, and even then there was a pause
for some time between two of them. The imperfect,
with the T consecutive, however, does not express
always a succession of time, but sometimes also it
expresses a train of thought. We may suppo.se,
therelbi'e, that Leah gave birth to the first four son«
during the first four years. In the meanwhile, how
ever (not after the expiration of the four years)
Rachel effected the birth of Dan and Naphtali bj
Jacob's connection with Bilhali. This probably in
dueed Leah, perhaps in the fifth year, to emulate hef
example by means of her handmaid, who in a quick
succession gave birth to two sons in the course of
the fifth and sixth years. During the sixth and sev-
enili years Leah again became a mother, and a short
time after Zebulun, Joseph was born also. Accord-
ing to Delitzsch, Joseph's birth would occur between
that of Issachar and Zebulun. But then the expres-
sion ver. 2.T would not be exact, and the naming of
Zebulun by his mother would be without foundation.
The last remark also bears against Keil's view, that
Joseph probably was born at the same time with
Zebulun, though he also considers it probable that
he mav have been born later.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. The divine revelation, its consolations and
its promises, revive the believer, so that he can pro-
ceed on his pilgrimage with renewed vigor. An ex-
perience similar to that at Bethel Jacob afterwards
met with at Peniel (ch. xxxii. 30).
2. Eliezer, acting for Isaac, Jacob, and Moses,
found their future brides by the side of wells. These
charming descriptions of the East resemble each
other, and yet greatly differ in their details. On ac-
count of their significance and beauty, they were
applied to spiritual relations by the fathers. [See
also Wordsworth, who goes fully into all the details
of these analogies. — A. G.]
3. Jacob experienced the gracious providence of
Jehovah here at the well, through one act after
another: Shepherds from Ilaran ; acquaintances of
Laban ; Rachel's appearance ; the occasion and call
to assist her at the moment.
■4. Is he well? lb cibcji. Happiness and wel-
fare, according to the oriental, but particularly accord-
ing to the biblical, view, consists especially in peace,
inviolability, both as to outward and inward life.
5. Tin: eharaclirs. Zahan's charaeter. That
Laban was really a sharer m the theocratic faith, and
susceptible of noble and generous sentiment, is evi-
dent not only from the manner in which he receives
Jacob, but also from the way in which he dismisses
him (eh. xxxi. 24 ; 54 fif.). But we also see, how, un-
der the influence surrounding him at home (ch. xxxi.
1 ), the selfishness in him gradually increased, until it
cuhninated in the base use which he made of hii
nephew's necessity and love, and thus, at last, pro-
ceeds to practise the grossest deception. Eren u
t>32
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSER.
this deception, however, we must not overlook the
fact tliat. .villi a friendly interest in Jacob, he con-
sidered it as a pious fraud. He was \villing to give
'>otli his daughters to Jacob ; perhaps, too, he had in
his eye Leah's quiet but vehement affection for Jacol).
He so far lestrained his selfishness, also, that he per-
mits Jacob to return home with the large possessions
that he had acquired while with him. Moieover, he
had to overcome the excited spirit of his sons and
brethren. The lower standpoint which be occupies
is e^ident from the fact that he himself leads his
nephew into a theocratic double-marriage, but per-
haps also with the intention of securing to his house,
with greater certainty, a full share in the mysterious
blessing expected by Abraham, and because he qui-
etly consented that the strife of his daughters should
involve Jacob still farther in polygamy. — As to Leah,
the narrator has no fault to find, except that lier
eyes were not as beautiful as those of her sister, but
were tender. The vehement, though quiet love for
Jacob, as seen on every occasion, no doubt made her
also willing to enter into the deception of Jacob by
Laban. Besides, she regarded herself certainly as
excusable upon higher grounds and motives, just as
Thamar, who fanatically married into the house of
promise, and that by a guilty course (ch. xxxviii).
Her increasing humility (see Exegesis) causes her to
be an object of Jehovah's peculiar regard, or rather,
by this humility, her especial election as ancestress
of David and tlie Messiah becomes evident, and even
in her over-zealous strife with her sister, in which
the question is about the increase of the patriarchal
family, her ,'^elf-denial is proven by the struggle with
whicli she gives her maid to Jacob, and the kindness
with which she gave the mandrakes to her sister.
Rachel, on the other hand, possessed not only bright
eyes, but also ardent affections. In the fiery and
glowing nature of her affection (ch. xxx. 1), as well
as in her cunning (ch. xxxi. 34, 35) Rachel is the
image of Rebekah, but with these features of char-
acter more strongly marked. So also at the end, in
the tragical issue of her life. For as Rebekah did
not reach the goal and see Jacob again, so Rachel
did not attain her aim in sharing witli him peacefully
anil honorably his paternal heritage. In Rachel's
sinful impatience too, there was not wanting also a
moral element, for " the pure desire of parents for
offspring is the highest degree of virtuous matri-
mony." Delitzsch (see p. 4H5, and the words of
Luther there c|uoted). Keil, without any sufficient
reason, places Rachel (p. 206), in leligious respects,
below Liah. nistinctions of election are not always
contrasts of light and darki»ess. Finally, Jacob here
appears clearly as the man of the wrestlings of
faith, and as tlie patriarch of hope. However pru-
dent, it happens to liim as to the (Edipus in the Greek
tragedy. (Kdipus solved the riddle of the sphinx,
yet is Mind, and remains blind in relation to the
riddle of his own life. Lab^in cheated him, as his
sons did afterwards, and he is punished through the
same transgression of whicli be himself was guilty.
Jacob is to struggle for everything — for his birth-
right, his Rachel, his herds, the .security of his lih',
the rest of his old age, and for hia grave. But in
[lie.se stru^'glcs he does not come off without many
tiansgres.sioiiB, from which, however, as God's elect,
he is liberated by severe discipline. He, therefore,
j( .stamped as a man of hope by the divine provi-
dence. As a fugitive he goes to Ilaran, as ii fugitive
tie retuinH home. Seven years he hopes for Rachel,
twenty years he hopes for a return home ; to the
very evening of his life he is hoping for the recot
cry of Joseph, his lost son in Sheol ; even whilst ht
is dying upon Egyptian soil, he hopes for a grave in
his native country. His Messianic hope, however,
in its full development, rises above all these instaa
ces, as is evident in the three chiof stages in his hfa
of f;iith : Bethel, Feniel, and the blessing of his son!
upon his death-bed. His life differs from that of hil
father Isaac in this : that with Isaac the quickening
experiences fall more in the earlier part of his life,
but with Jacob they occur in the latter half; and
that Isaac's life passes on quietly, whilst storms and
trials overshadow, in a great measure, the pilgrimage
of Jacob. The Messianic suffering, in its typica*
features, is already seen more plainly in him than in
Isaac and Abraham ; but the glorious exaltation
corresponds also to the deeper humiUation.
6. Jacob's service for Rachel presents us a pic-
ture of bridal love equalled only m the same devel-
opment and its poetic beauty in the Song of Solo-
mon. It is particularly to be noticed that Jacol^
however, was not indifferent to Rachel's infirmities
(ch. xxx. 2), and even treated Leah with patience and
indulgence, though having suffered from her the
most mortifying deception.
1. The deception practised by Laban upon Jacob
was perfectly fitted, viewed as a divine punishment
tlirough human sin, to bring his own sin before hia
eyes. As he introduced himself as the first-born, by
the instigation of his mother, so Leah, the first-bom,
is introduced to him by his mother's brother, under
the pretence of the appearance of his own Rachel.
And this deception Laban even excuses in a sarcastio
way, with the custom as to the birthright of the
daughters at Haran. Thus Jacob atones for his cun-
ning, and Laban truly must atone for his deception.
8. Leah's election is founded upon Jehovah's
grace. Without any doubt, however, she was fitted
to become the ancestress of the Messianic line, not
only by her apparent humility, but also by her in
nate powers of blessing, as well as by her quiet and
true love for Jacob. The fulness of her life be-
comes apparent in the number and the power of lier
children ; and with these, therefore, a greater strength
of the mere natural life predominates. Joseph, on
the cimtrary, the favorite son of the wife loved with
a bridal love, is distinguished from his brethren, aa
the separated (ch. xlix.) among them, as a child of a
nobler spirit, whilst the import of his life is not aa
ricli for the future as that of Judah.
9 If we woidd regard the deception and impo-
sition practised upon Jacob as at all endurable, we
must assume, on the one hand, Leah's fanatic and
vehement love ; on the other, his own perfect illu-
sion. This unconscious error and confusion of na-
ture, seems almost to have been transmitted to Reu-
ben, the first-born (ch, xxxv. 2'i ; xlix. 21); and
therefore, in consequence of his offence, he also lost
the birthright. We cannot, however, entirely con-
cur in Luther's view, which Delitzsch approves, that
while there was nothing adulterous In the connectioij
of .lacob and Leah, it was still extra-natural, and ic
that sense, monstrous. There was undoubti'dly an
impure and unnatural element in it. But we must
bear in mind, as was remarked above, not only
Leah's love, but also Jacob's self-oblivion, in which
the fi'ce choice is gi/nerally limited and restrained by
the blind forces of the night-life, through and in
which God works with creative energy. It is tha
moment in which the man falls back into the hand
of God as the creator.
eUAF. XXIX. 1— XXX. 24.
5Sh
10. The difference between the hou.'ie at Haran
and Isaac's house at Beer-sheba, appears from this,
that Laban entangled Jacob in polygamy. And
even in this case the evil consetiuences of polygamy
jppear : envy, jealousy, contention, and an increased
j/cnsuality. Nevertheless Jacob's case is not to be
judged according to the later Mosaic law, which
prohibited the marrying of two sisters at the .same
time (Lev. xviii. 18). Calvin, in his decision, makes
no distinction between the times and the economies,
a fact which Keil justly appeals to, and insists upon
as bearing against his harsh judgment (that it was a
case of incest) (p. 205).
1 1. In our narrative we first read of a great and
splendid wedding-feast, lasting for seven days. It is
therefore not by chance that this splendid wedding-
feast was followed by a painful illusion. And, leav-
ing out of view grosser deceptions, how often may
Rachel's image have been changed afterwards into
Leah's form.
12. While the sisterly emulation to surpass each
other in obtaining children is tainted with sin, there
is yet at the bottom a holy motive for it, faith in the
Abrahamie promise consisting in the blessing of
theocratic births. Thus al-^o we can explain how the
fulness of the twelve tribes proceeded from this
emulation.
13. Isaac's prejudice, that Esau was the chosen
•ne, seems to renew itself somewhat in Jacob's
prejudice that he must gain by Rachel the lawful
heir. The more reverent he appears therefore, in
•jeing led by the spirit of God, who taught him, not-
withstanding all his preference for Joseph, to recog-
nize in Judah the real line of the promise.
14. That the respective moi hers themselves here
issign the names, is determined by the circumstances.
The entire history of the birth of these sons, too, is
reflected in their names. Of similar signification are
Ihe names : Gad and Asher ; Levi and Zebuhui ;
Biraeon and Naphtali ; Judah and Joseph ; Reuben
and Benjamin born afterwards; Issachar, Dan and
1 )inah.
15. The progress of life equalizes and adjusts,
LO a great extent, the opposition between J^icob's
love for Rachel and his disregard toward Leah, espe-
cially by means of the children. At the same time
(in which he recognizes Leah's resignation, Rachel's
passionate ill-humor incites him to anger.
16. Me shall add; he shall give to me another
ton. This wish was fulfilled, and was the cause of
her death. She died at Benjamin's birth, llow
dangerous, destructive, and fatal, the fulBhnent of
a man's wishes may be to him, is illustrated by fre-
quent examples in the Scriptures. Sarah wished for
a son from Hagar, a source of great grief to her.
The desire of Judas to be received among the dis-
ciples of Jesus was granted, but just in this position
he fell into the deepest corruption. Peter wished
to be as near as possible to the Lord in the house of
the high priest, but hence his fall. The sons of
Zebedee wished for places at the right and left hand
of Jesus, — had their wish been fulhlled they wouUi
have filled the places of the malefactors on the cross,
\{ the right and left of the Crucified. Rachel's wish,
it is true, was not the only cause of her death, but
with a certain triumph the once barren one died in
t'iuiJbirth, just as she was completing the num!>er
twelve of Israel's sons.
1 7. How important Joseph's birth was to Jacob
1b seen from this : that henceforth he thinks of his
journey home, although the report looked for from
Rebekah tarried 1 ing. He was urged to venture
journey home.
18. This histoiy of Jacob's and Leah's unioi
sheds a softening light upon even the less happj
marriages, which may reconcile us to them, for thii
unpleasant marriage was the cause of his becoming
the lather of a numerous posterity ; from it, indeed,
proceeded the Messianic fine; leaving out of view the
fact that Leah's love and humility could not remain
without a blessing upon Jacob. The fundamental
condition of a normal marriage is doubtless bridd
love. We notice in our narrative, however, how
wonderfully divine grace may change misfortune,
even in such instances, into rea; good. God is esp^
cially interested in marriage connections, because hi
is thus interested in the coming generations.
HOMTLETICAX. AND PaACTICAi.
See Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. Jacob't
wrestlings of faith. — The patriarch of hope. — Jacob's
double fiight, from Esau and from Laban. — Rich in
fortune and rich in misfortune, in both respects rich
in blessing. — Jacob and Rachel, or the consecration
of bridal love.' — The shepherd and the shepherdess :
the same condition. — Jacob's service for his bride a
type of the same service of Christ for the church,
his bride. — Rachel and Leah, or God makes a great
diS'erence between his children, and yet esteems them
alike according to his justice. — The three marriage
connections at wells : that of Isaac, of Jacob, and
of Moses, — The names of Jacob's sons, a type of
human weakness and divine salvation in his house.
(Texts for marriage occasions.)
To Section First, veti. 1-S. Starke: Cramer ; If
God's command and promise are before us, we can
proceed in our undertakings vrith joy and confidence.
— Places where weUs are mentioned (see Concord-
ances^.^(Jesus, the well of life. The stone, the
impotence of human nature, to be removed by faith.
Since, according to ch. xxxi. 47, the Chaldffian.s spoke
a difierent language from that of the inhabitants of
Canaan, Jacob probably made himself understood to
the people of Haran, because he had learned the
Chaldee from his mother (Clericns). — The changing
of the language of the patriarchs into the later He-
brew of the Jews.) [There is every reason to believe
that these dialects were then so nearly alike that
there was no difficulty in passing from one to the
other. — A. G.] — Because the word peace embracea
both spiritual and natural well-being, the Hebrews
used it as a common salutation.
Section Second, vers. 9-14. Divine providence
was here at work. — (Allegory of the well. How
Christ has removed the heavy stone of sin and death.
The three herds referred to the three days in which
Christ was in the grave! etc. Burmann.) — Ver. 13.
This was necessary in order to remove all suspicion
from the mind of Laba:i, since he still remembered
what a numerous retinue had accompanied Eliezer.
— .\s three distinguished patriarchs found theii
brides at wells ^Moses and his Zipporah), just so the
Lord Christ presents to himself the cliurch, his spir-
itual bride, through holy baptism, as the laver in tho
word. — Schroder : Their first meeting a prophecy
of their whole future united life. — Ver. 11 ^Calviu),
In a chaste and modest Ufe greater liberties were
allowed. — (If any one turn to the true source of wis
dora, to the word of God, and to the Saviour revealee
d31
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
therein, be will receive celestial wisdom for his bride.
Berl. Bibel.)
Section Third, yets. 15-25. Ver. 20. As a regular
servant. A tvpical intimation of the Messiah, who
in the form of a servant, with great and severe toil,
obtained his bride. — (Reward of Jacob's patient
waiting, of his faith and his chastity. — Ver. 18. Vir-
tuous maidens do not attend large, exciting assem-
blies, to get a husband, but remain at their vocation,
and trust in Goa, who is able to give to them a pious,
honorable, and upright husband. — Lange: If tlie
whole difficult service became easy to Jacob from
the love he had to Rachel, why should it not be said
of God's children, that it is from love to God that
we keep his commandments, etc. (1 John v. 3). —
Bibl. Wirt. : A chn-tc love is a beautiful thing, by
which conjugal low- is afterwards more and more
Btrengthened and coiiHrmed. — Ver. 2.^. Here Jacob
might have understood how it grieved Esau when, for
the sake of his birthright, he hud practised upon him
such cimning and deceit. As he had done unto oth-
ers, God permitted that he should receive from others.
— The crafty Laban wears the image of the world;
whoever serves it never receives what he expects ;
he looks for Rachel, and behold it is Leah (Olear).
Gerlach : From this instance onward (especially)
God speaks to Jacob by every occurrence. Laban
deceives him, because he thinks that Laban's (Ja-
cob's ?) service will be profitable to him, and thus
he (Laban) lo.^es not only a great part (?) of his herds,
but is also obUged lo part from his children. — The
misery of bigamy : it was therefore expressly forbid-
den in the law (Lev. xviii. 18) that any one should
marry two sisters at the same time, or to favor one
wife before the other (Deut. xxi. 17). The seven
years of service reminds us perhaps of the later
statute among the IsraeUtes, according to which ser-
vants were to obtain their freedom during the sev-
enth year (Exod. xxi. 2) ; Jacob, theretbre. as a
compensation for the daughters, took upon himself
a seven years' service (slavery). — (The danger of
exciting Esau prevented hiui from bringing tlie price
from his liome, even had he entrusted his affair to
God.) — Schroder: Space is no obstacle to faith, nor
time to hope. — An engagement of long standing, if
decreed by God, may become a Siilutary and bene-
ficial school for a Christian marriage. — Comparisons
between the deception prMctised by Laban upon
Jacob, and that which Jacob practisrd upon Esau :
1. One brother upon another, 2. There the younger
instead of the older ; here the older, etc. a. (Roos)
He did not know Leah when he was married lo her,
just as his father knew him not when he blessed
him. 4. Leah at the instigation of her father, Jacob
at tlie instigation of his mother. — But he received,
notwithstanding his ignorance as to Leah, the wife
designed lor him by God, who was to become the
mother cif the Mes.«iah, Just as Isaac blessed him
unwittingly as the rightful heir of tlie promise. Ah,
in how many errors and follies of men, here and
everywhere, do we find (iod's inevitable grace and
faithfulness inti-rtwined (Koos).
Section J<'ourt/i, vers. 26-30. Starke : Ver. 27.
It is remarkable that the ancient Jews, at births,
marriages, and deaths, observed the seventh day as
an holy clay (Gen. xxi. 4 ; Luke ii. 21 ; Gen. 1. lU;
Hir. xxii. 13). From this fact we may conclude that
Ihi' ancient llelirews already considered the day of
birth and circumcision, the day of marriage, and the
day of death, as the thr. e most important ones in
Efe — (Ver. aS. Jacob might have asked for a &
vorce.) — Jacob's polygamy not caused by sensnality
but did not remain unpunished. — (BuKMAX^: Com
paiison between *he two wives and the Old and New
Testament, the tivo churches to whom the Lord ii
betrothed. The Old Testament Leah, the wearied,
the tender eyed.) — Hall: God often afflicts ui
through our own friendship (relatives). He often
punishes our own sins by the sins of others, before
we are aware of it (2 Sam. xvi. 22).- — Osiasder : Oh,
what is avarice not capable of? — Hall : God's chil-
dren do not easily obtain what they wish for, but
must toil hard for it ; (German) work for it, tooth
and nail. — Schroder: Jacob's history, in its turning-
points, meets with personages who serve to bring
out his character more clearly in contrast with
theirs; their thoughts bound in the present, — his
looking on into the future. Thus Esau and Laban.
Section Fifth, vers. S\-&5. Starke: Osiander:
It is still customary with God t^ take care of the
distressed. — Cr.imer: God distributes his gifts by
parts. Do not despise any one. — Hall: God kiiowi
how to weigh to us in similar ways both our gifts of
grace and our crosses. — Bibl. Wirt. : There is nothing
so bad or so compUcated but that God can bring good
out of it. — (Signification of the word from which
" Judah" is derived: 1. To thank; 2. to commend;
3. to praise; 4. to confess.) From this Judah al
Jews received their beautiful name. — Gerlach
Reuben : see a son ; in allusion to Raah-Be-Onyi,
i. e., he (Jehovah) hath looked upon my affliction. —
Schroder : The mother gives tlie names, as she does
also in Homer.
Sectio)i Sij-th, ch. xxx. 1-8. Starke: Bibl. Wirt.:
Impatience is the mother of many sins. — Even to the
pious in their married life the sun of peace and har-
mony does not always shine ; at times dark clouds of
dissension and strife arise. But we must guard in
time against .such clouds and storms. — We must not
try to obtain the divine blessing by unrighteona
means. — .Schroder : Children are God's gift. All
parents should consider this, and take such care of
these divine gifts that when God calls those whom
he has entrusted to them, they may render a good
account (Vuler. Herb.). — In Rachel we meet with
envy and jealousy, while in Jehovah there is com-
passion and grace.
Section Seventh, vers. 9-13. Schroder: For all
times Israel is warned by the jiatriarch's culpable
weakness and pliancy in relation to his wives, as well
as by the frightful picture of his polygamy. (Israel,
it is true, should even in this way learn to distinguish
the times, to recognize the workings of divine grace
iu and over the errors of men, and to rejoice at the
progress in his law.)
Si ction Eighth, vers. 14—21. Starke: (Do you
ask as to the nature of the Dudaim ? some think they
are lilies, others that they are berries, but no one
knows what they are. Some call them " winter
clierric's." Luther.) — The rivalry of the sisters.
Thus God punished him because je had taken two
wives, even two sisters. Even tlie holy women were
not purely and entirely spiritual. — Sciiuuder: In
reference to the maid's children, God*s name is nei-
ther mentioned by Leah nor by tlie narrator. They
were in the strictest sense begotten in a natural way
(Hciigstenbcrg). (This is wrong, for in the first
place Jacob had nothing to do with the maids in the
natural way of mere hi.st ; 2. in that case they
would not have been numbered among the Idessed
seed of Israel. 'I'lie principal tribes, nidaed, did no/
spring from them.)
CHAP. XXX. 26— XXXI. 1-3. 53,"
Section Ninth, vera. 22-24. Starkb : Why bar-
renoess was considered by Abraham's descendants
u a sij;n of the divine curse: 1. It appeared as if
they were excluded from the promise of the enlarge-
ment of Abraham's seed ; 2. They were without the
hope of giving birth to the Messiah ; 3. They had
f-0 share in God's universal command : be fruitful
and multiply. — Osiander : Our prayers are not to bf
considered as in vain, if we receive no answer im
mediately. If we are humbled sufficiently below th«
cross, then we will be exalted. — Schroder : Luthei
says respecting Jacob's wives that they were nol
moved by mere carnal desire, but looked at the bles*
ing of children with reference to the promised seed
THIRD SECTION.
JaeoVa thought of returning home. New treaty mith Laban. His closely calculated propositum
(Prelude to the method of acquiring possession of the Egyptian vessels). Laban's dis-
pleasure, God^s command to return.
Chapter XXX. 25— XXXI. 1-3.
25 And it came to pass, when Rachel had borne Joseph, that Jacob said unto Laoan,
Send me away [let me go], that I may go unto mine own place, and to my country.
26 Give me my wives and ray children, for whom I have served thee, and let me go: foi
27 thou knowest my service which I liave done thee. And Laban said unto him, I pray
thee, if I have foimd favour in thine eyes, tarry; for I have learned by experience'
28 that the Lord hath blessed me for thy sake. And he said, [farther], Appoint me thy
29 wages, and I will give it. And [But] he said unto him, Thou knowest how I have
'iO served thee, and how thy cattle was with me [what thy herds have become under me]. For it wax
little which thou hadst before I came, and it is noiv increased unto a multitude; and the
Lord hath blessed thee, since my coming' [after me] : and now when sliall I provide
31 for mine own house also? And he said. What shall I give thee? And Jacob said,
Thou shalt not give me anything [anything peculiar]. If thou wilt do this thing for me, I
32 will again feed and keep thy flock [small cattle] : I will pass through all thy flock to-day,
removing from thence all the speckled and spotted [dappled] cattle [lambs], and all the
brown [dark-colored] cattle among the sheep, and the spotted and speckled among the
33 goats: and of such shall be my hire. So shall my righteousness [rectitude] answer for
me in time to come,' when it shall come for my hire ; before thy face : every one that
• is not speckled and spotted among the goats, and brown among the sheep, that shall be
34 counted stolen with me. And Laban said, Behold, I would it might be according to
35 thy word. And he removed that day the he-goats that were ringstreaked [striped] and
spotted, and all the she-goats that were speckled and spotted, and every one that had
some white in it, and all the brown among the sheep, and gave them into the hands
36 of his sons. And he set three days' journey betwixt himself [the shepherds and flocks of Laban]
and Jacob [the flocks ofjacob under his sons] : and Jacob fed the rest [the sifted] of Laban'a
flocks.
37 And Jacob took him rods of green poplar, [gum] and of the hazel [almond] and chest-
nut-tree [maple] * ; and pilled white streaks in them, and made the wliite appear which
38 was in the rods. And he laid the rods which he had [striped] pilled before the flocks
in the gutters in the watering-troughs' when the flocks came [to which the flocks must come]
39 to drink, that they should conceive when they came to drink. And the flocKs con-
ceived before the rods, and brought forth [threw, oast] ringstreaked, speckled and spotted.
10 And Jacob did separate the lambs, and set the faces of the flocks toward the ring-
straked, and all the brown in the flock of Laban ; and he put his own flocks by them-
41 selves, and. put them not unto Laban's cattle. And it came to pass, whensoever the
stronger cattle did conceive, that Jacob laid the rods before the eves of the cattle in th«
42 gutter.s, that they might conceive among the rods. But when the cattle were feeble,
43 he put ihem not in: so the feebler were Laban's. and the stronsrer Jacob's. And the
630
GENESIS, OK TUE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
man increased exceedingly, and had much [small] cattle, and maid-servants, and met)
servants, and camels and asses.
Cu. XXXI. 1 And he heard the words of Laban's sons, saying, Jacob hath taken
away all that was our father's ; and of that which ivas our father's hath he gotten all
2 this glory [riches]." And Jacob beheld the countenance of Laban, and, behold, it wa>
3 not toward him as before ' [formerly]. And [Then] the Lord said imto Jacob, Return
unto the land of thy fathers, and to thy kindred [thy home] ; and I will be with thee.
[' Ver. 27.--Lit., I have augured, "^nuins ; Sept., oluvi^otian ; not that Lahan was a serpent-woishipper, but that b<
ased di\ination as the heathen ; and thus drew his inferences and auguries.— A. G.J
l' Ver. 311. -Lit., at my foot.— A. GJ
[3 Ver. 33. — Lit., in day tO'Viorrow — the future— at all times, when, etc. Lange renders " when thou shalt come npo
M to my wages ; i. e., to examine. — A. G.]
[< Ver. 37.— Heb., ^liaiS . plane-ti-ee ; so Sept.. Vulg. and Syriac.— A.G.]
I' nsaW, an unusual archaic form foi nj'i"'?^. Keil.— A. G.]
(• Oh. XXXI. Ver. 2.— Lit., weight.— A. G.J
]} Ver. 2.— Lit., as yesterday, the day before.— A. G.)
GENERAL PRELIMIKARy REMARKS.
1. The term iibjS , ver. 27 (conip. ch. xii. 13),
shows that this section, according to Knobel, is Je-
hoyistic.
2. In consequence of Laban's deception, Jacob
must serve fourteen years for his Rachel. According
to ch. xxxi. 41 he served him six years longer,
agreeably to the terms of the contract that he had
just now concluded with him.
3. The doubtful way in which he now secured his
reward leads us to conjecture that he was conscious
that he had been defrauded by Laban, and that he
was deahiig with a selfish man, whose selfishness and
power, he tliought. could only be countervailed by
cunning. Nor is it to be denied that wisdom's
weapon Is given to the feeble to protect himself
against the harsh and cruel power of the strong.
Our narrative comes under the same category with
the surreptitious obtaining of the blessing of the
first-born by Jacob, and the acquisition of the gold
and silver vessels of the Egyptians by the Israelites.
The ]irudence manifested in these cases is the same ;
but still tliere was a real deception in the first case
(one deception, however, against another); in the
present case it was simply an overreaching, while in
the third they were only availing themselves of the
situation of the Egyptians, i. e., their disposition.
In all three cases, however, the artlul, or at least
wisely-calculated, project, was provoked l>y a great
and gross wrong. Esau proposes to take hack the
birthright which he had sold to Jacob, Laban
caused him to perform a service of foui teen years,
and intends to make him still further a jtri-y to his
avarice. The Egyptians have indeed consumed the
very strengtli of Israel by their bondage. And if
the scale here tiu'ns against Jacob because he thus
cunningly overreached his father-in-law, it is bal-
anced by Laban's pressing him again into his ser-
vice, that he might misuse him anew ; nor is the
marvellous chariu to be lel't out of view, which lay
in bis ancient, nomadic science and art. Superior
Biirjds were never inclined to let their arts and sciences
ie donnant.
EXEOETICAL AND ORITICAI,.
1. Vers. 25-34. The tirm ontnirl. — When Ra-
ohel. — At Joseph's birth [which theref'orc could not
hive occurred until the lifteenth year ol his residence
with Laban. — A. G.] a strong feeling comes ovei
Jacob, which leads him to believe that he is to re
turn iiome without having received a call from
thence or a divine command here. It is apparent
from what follows that he first of all wished to be-
come independent of Laban, in order to provide for
his own. He is, therefore, soon hampered again,
since a fair prospect opened to hiiii now and here.
Laban's character now comes into view in every
utterance. — May I still grace, etc., lit.. If I have
found favor, etc. If this expression may be called
an aposiopesis, we must still bear in mind that this
was a standing form of expression even in the oath.
Keil supplies " slay yet." The optative form already
expresses all that is possible. If Tens is, accord-
ing to Delitzsch, a lieathen expression, then the
phraseology in Laban's mouth appears more striking
still, through the eoimection of this expression with
Jehovah's name. — Appoint me. — He not only
recognizes, almost fawningly, Jacob's worth to his
house, but is even willing to yield unconditionally to
his determination — a proof that he did not expec'
of Jacob too great a demand. But Jacob is not ii
clined to trust himself to his generosity, and hence
his cunningly calculated though seemingly trifling
demanil, Laban's consent to his demand, however,
breathes in the very expression the joy of selfishness ;
and it is scarcely sufficient to translate : Behold, I
would it might be according to thy word. But
Jacob's proposition seems to point to a very trifling
reward, since the sheep in the East are nearly all
white, while the goats are generally ot a dark color
or speckled. For he only demands of Laban's herds
those sheep that have dark spots or specks, or that
are entirely black, ami those only of the goats that
were white-spotted or striped. But he does not only
ilemand the speckled laini)s brought forth hi'realtcr,
after the |)rescnt immber of such are set aside for
Laban (Tueh, Jianmg., Kurtz), but tiie piesent iu-
speetion is to lorni the first stock of his herds (Kno-
bel, Dehtzseh). [The words, "thou shalt not give
me anytliing," seem to indicate that Jacob had no
stock from Laban to begin with, and did not intend
to be de|iendent upnn him for any part of his po.^ses-
sions. Tho-se of this de.-criplion which should ap-
pear amiiiig the (locks should i>c his hire, lie would
depend upon the divine providence and his own skill
lie would be no moie indebted to Laban tJian .\l)ra
ham to the king of Sodom. — A, (i.J Altcrwards,
also, the speckled ones brought forth among Laban't
CHAP. XXX. 25— XXXI. I-s.
53".
lleM'j! are to be added to his, as is evident from his
following arts. Michaelis and Bohlen miss the pur-
port, but it lies in verse 33. For when he invites
Latiunto muster his herds iu time tocotre, lira CT':,
it surely does not mean literally the next day, as
Delitzsch supposes, but iu time to come (see Gesenius,
ims). As often as Laban came to Jacob's herds in
the future he must regard all the increase in speckled
«nd ringstreaked lambs as .Jacob's property, but if
he found a purely white sheep or an entirely black
goat, then, and only then, he might regard it as
stolen. (As to the sheep and goats of the East, see
Bible Dictionaries, the Natural History of the Bible,
and Knobkl, p. 246.) Moreover, this tr.msaction
is not conducted wholly " in the conventional forms
of oriental politeness, as in ch. xxiii., between Abra-
ham and the Hittites " (Del.). Laban's language is
submissive, while that of Jacob is very frank and
bold, as became liis invigorated courage and the
sense of the injustice which he had suffered.
2. Vers. 35, 3ii. The separation of the herdx. —
And he removed It surely is not correct, as
RosenmiiUer, Maurer, Del. and Keil suppose, that
Laban is here referred to ; that Laban, " to be more
certain." had removed the speckled ones himself and
put them under the care of his own sons. In this
view everything becomes confused, and Bohlen justly
remarks : " The reference here is to Jacob, because
he intended to separate the animals (ver. 32), as cer-
tainly it was proper for the head servant to do, and be-
cause there is no mention of Laban's sons until ch.
xxxi. 1, while Jacob's older children were certainly
able to t.ikecare of the sheep." Reuben, at the clo.'ie
of this new term of six years, had probably reached his
thirteenth year, Simeon his eleventh. But even if they
had not reacheii tliese years, the expression he gave
them, T'33'T'a, could mean: he formed a new family
state, or herds, as a possession of his sons, although
they were assisted in the man.^gement by the mothers,
maids, and servants, since he himself had anew become
Laban's servant. Hence it is also possible (ver. 36)
for him to make a distinction between himself as La-
ban's servant, and Jacob as an independent owner, now
represented by his sons. It is altogether improbable
that Jacob would entrust his herds to Laban's sons.
But it is entirely incomprehensible that Jacob, with
'his herds, could have taken flight nithout Laban's
knowledge, and gained three days the start, unless
his herds were under the care of his own sons. [This
ia of course well put and unanswerable on tlie suppo-
sition that the sheep and goats which were removed
from the flocks were Jacob's stock to begin with,
but it has no force if we regard these .as Laban's,
and put therefore under the care of his own sons,
while Jacob was left to manage the flocks from
which the separated were taken. — A. G.] — Three
days' journey betwixt Lit., "a space of three
days between." Certainly days' journeys here are
those of the herils and are not to be estimated ac-
cording to the journeys of men. Again, Jacob is
ahead of Laban three days, and yet Laban can over-
take him We may conceive, therefore, of a dis-
tance of about twelve hours, or perhaps eighteen
miles. By means of this sejiaration Jacob not only
gained Laban's confidence but also his property.
3. Vers. 37—13. Jacobus nianagenunt of Laban^s
\erih. — Took him rods. — De Wettk : Storax, al-
mond-tree, maple. BtrssE.s : " Gum-tree. The Alex-
andrians here translate, styrax-tree, but Hos. iv. 13
poplars. If we look at the Arabic, in which our
Hebrew word has been preserved, the explanation
of styrax-tree is to be preferred. It is similar to thi
quince, grows in Syria, Arabia, and Asia Minor,
reaches the height of about twelve feet, and tur-
nishes, if incisions are made in the bark, a sweet,
fragrant-smelling, md transparent gum, of a light-
red color, called styrax. Almond-tree. This signifi.
cation is uncertain, since the hazelnut-tree may a!?c
be referred to. Plane-tree. A splendid tree, fre-
quent even in South Europe, having large boughs,
extending to a great distance (hence the Greek name,
Platane), and bearing some resemlilaiice to the maple
tree." Jacob of course must select rods from such
trees, whose dark external bark produced the great-
est contrast with the white one below it. In this
respect gum-tree might be better adapted than white
poplars, almond-tree or walnut better than hazel-
nut, and maple better than plane-tree. Keil : Storax,
walnut, and maple trees, which all have below their
bark a white, dazzhiig wood. Thus he procured rods
of different kinds and pilled white streaks in them. —
And he set the rods. — Knobel thinks, he placed tnt
staffs on the watering-troughs, but did not put them ii
the gutters. But this does not agree with the choice
of the verb, nor the fact itself: the animals, by looking
into the water for some time, were to receive, as it
were, into themselves, the appearance of the rods lying
near. They, in a technical sense, "were frightened"
at them. The wells were surrounded with water-
ing-troughs, used for the watering of the cattle. —
And they conceived. — For the change of the
forms here, see Keil, p. 2li). — And brought forth
cattle. — " This crafty trick was based upon the
common experience of tlie so-called fright of ani-
mals, especially of sheep, namely, that the represen-
tations of the senses during coition are stamped
upon the form of the fcetus (see Boon., Hieroz., i.
618, and Frieoreich upon the Bible, i. 37, etc.)."
Keil. For details see Knobel, p. 247, and Delitzsch,
p. 472. — And set the faces of the flock. — Jacob's
second artifice. The speckled animals, it is true,
were removed, from time to time, from Laban's herds,
and added to Jacob's flock, but in the meantime
Jacob put the speckled animals in front of the others,
so that Laban's herds had always these spotted or
variegated animals before them, and in this manner
another impression was produced upon the she-goats
and sheep. Bohlen opposes this second aitifice,
against RosenmiiUer, Maurer, and others. The clause
in question should be : he sent them to the speckled
ones that already belonged to him ('3S in the sepse
of veritus). But the general term TSSn is against
this. The separation of the new-born lambs and
goats from the old herds could only be gradual. —
The stronger cattle. — The third artifice. He so
arranged the thing that the stronger cattle fell tc
him, the feebler to Laban. His first artifice, there-
fore, produced fully the desired effect. It was owing
partly, perhaps, to his sense of equity toward Laban,
and partly to his prudence, that he set these limita
to his gain ; but he still, however, takes the advan-
tage, since he seeks to gain the stronger cattle for
himself. Bohlen : " Literally, t/ie bound ones, firmly
set, i. e., the strong, just as the covered ones, i. e., tha
feeble, languid, faint ; for the transi ' ion is easy from
the idea of binding, firmness, to that of strength,
and from that of covering, to languishing, or faint,
ness. Some of the old translators refer them to ver
ual and autumnal lambs (comp. Plin. 8, 47, Cold
mella, De re rust., 8, 3), because the sheep in Pale*
hSH
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
tine and similar climates bear twice in a year ( Aris-
roT., Mist. Aiiim., 6, 18, 19; 'Problems,' 10, 46;
BoCHART, Htei'oz., i. p. 512), and because those con-
leivetl in the Spring or Summer and born in the
Autumn are stroufrer than those conceived in Au-
tumn and born in Spring. But the text does not
draw this precise distinction." The Septuagint only
distinguishes between iiriuriua and fitrTjuo. Luther
renders '• late" and " early born." — And the man
increased. — With the rich incre^ise in cattle, care
was taken at the same time to secure an increase in
men-servants and maid-servants, as well as camels
and asses. Knobel finds a contradiction in the fact
that this rich increase is here ascribed to .Jacob's
artifice, whilst it is attributed to the divine blessing
in ch. xxxi. 9. But so much only is evident, tliat
Jacob dill not act against his conscience, but thought
that he might anticipate and assist by human means
the fulfilment of those visions in which the rewards
of this kind were promised to him. — And he heard.
The complete success that Jacob met with excited
the envy and jealousy of Laban's sons, whose exist-
ence is indicated first in the plural (ch. xxix. 27),
but whose definite appearance here shows that the
selfish disposition peculiar to this family was more
fully developed in them than in Laban himself. —
The words of Laban's sons. — According to De-
liizsch, they were ((uile small, not yet foui-teen years
of age — an assertion, however, which has no suffi-
cient ground.
4. Ch. xxxi. 1-3. Jacobus reftolution to return
home. — All that was our father's. — They evident-
ly exaggerate in their hatred, and even accuse him
of dishonesty by the use of the expression : of that
which was our farhe/s. But Labaii shares in the
threatening disposition ; his countenance had changed
remarkably toward Jacob, a fact all the more
striking, since he had formerly been extraordinarily
friendly. Trouble and dangers similar to those at
home now develop themselves here ; then comes, at
the critical jimcture, Jehovah's command : Return.
DOCTRINAL AUD ETHICAL.
1. Jacob's resolution to return home at his own
risk, is to be explained from his excessive joy at
Joseph's birth, and from his longing for home and
for deliverance from the oppression of Laban. More-
over, he seems to have considered Rachel's son as
the principal Messianic heir, and therefore must
hasten to conduct him to the promised land, even at
the peril of his life. Besides, he now feels that he
must jirovhie for his own house, and with Laban's
Belfishnesa there is very Utile prospect of his attain-
ing this in Laban's housft. These two circumstances
show clearly why he allows himself to be retained
by Laban (for he has no assurance of faith that he is
now to return i, and in the second place, the maimer
and means by which he turns the contract to his own
advantage.
2. We here learn that Iisban's prosperity was
not very great before Jacob's arrival. The blessing
first returns to the house with Jacob's entrance. But
this blessing sei-med to become to Laban no lilessing
of faith. His conduct toward the son of his sister
•ind his son-in-law, becomes more and mote base.
He seizes eagerly, therefore, the terms oflurcil to him
by Jacob, because they appear to hiin most favor-
«ble, since the sheep in the Kast are generally white,
■vhile the goats are black. His intention, therefore,
is to defraud Jacob, while he is actually overreachec
by him. Besides, this avails only of the mere form
as to the thing itself, Jacob really had claims to a
fair compensation.
3. Just as Jacob's conduct at the surreptitious
obtaining the birthright was preceded by Isaac's
intended cunning, and the injustice of Esau, so also,
in many respects, here Laban's injustice and artifice
precedes Jacob's project (ch. xxxi.). In this light
Jacob's conduct is to be judged. Hence he after,
wards views his real gain as a divine blessing, al-
though he had to atone again for his selfishness and
cunning, in the form of the gain, at least, by fears
and danger. Moreover, we must still bring into
view, as to Jacob's and Laban's bargain, the follow-
ing points: 1. Jacob asks for his wages very mod
cslly and frankly ; he asks for his wives and children,
as the fruit of Ids wives, and for his discharge.
While Laban wishes to keep him for his own advan
tage. 2. Jacob speaks frankly, Laban flatters and
fawns. 3. Jacob might now expect a paternal treat-
ment and dowry on the part of Laban. Laban, on
the contrary, prolongs his servile relation, and asks
him to determine his reward, because he expected
from Jacob's modesty the announcement of very
small wages. 4. In the proposition made by Jacob,
he thought he had caught him.
4. The establishment of his own household, after
being married fourteen years, shows that Jacob, in
this respect, as well as in the conclusion of his mar-
riage, awaited his time.
5. The so-called impressions of she goats and
sheep, a very old observation, which the cooperation
of subtle impressions, images, and even imaginations
at the formation of the foetus, and, indeed, the foetus
itself among animals confirms. — The attaiimieni
of varieties and new species among animals and
plants is very ancient, and stands closely connected
with civihzation and the kingdom of God.
6. Jacob's sagacity, his weapou against the strong.
But as he stands over against God, he employed dif-
ferent means, especially prayer.
7. The want of candor in Laban's household,
corresponds with the selfishness of the household.
8. In the following chapter we find still further
details respecting Jacob's baigain. In the first place,
the selfish Laban broke, in diilerent ways, the firm
bargain made with Jacob, in order to change it to
his advantage (ch. xxxi. 7). Secondly, Jacob's mor-
bid sense of justice had been so excited that he re-
ceived explanation of the state of things in his herds
even in his night-visions.
HOMILETIOAI, AND PRACTICAL.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical paragraphs. The
jircsent section is, for the most part, fitted for re-
ligious, Ijiographical, and psychological contempla-
tions. It is to be treated carefully both with respect
to .Jacob's censure as well as his praise. — Jacob's
resolutions to return home: I. The first: why so
vividly foimed, but not accomplished ; 2. the second:
the cau.se of his assur.ance (the divine c(jniniand).
Moreover, perils e(|ual to those threatening at home,
weie now surrouniling him. — His hinging for home
during hi.s service abroad. — The hardships of a se
vere .scrvituile in Jacob's life, as well as in the historj
of his descendants: when blessed V — Laban's selfish-
ness ami Jacob's sense of right at war with eacl
other. — Prudence as a weapon in lile's batttle: t
CHAP. XXSI. 4— XXXIL 2.
53!
The authority to use this weapon when opposed to
a harsh superiority or subtlety ; 2. tlie mighty effi-
cacy of this weapon ; 3. the danger of this \vea[)on.
— Jacob's prudence in its riglit and wrong aspects
in our liistory : 1. The right hes in his just claims;
■2. the wrong, in his want of candor, liis dissimula-
tion and his self-help. — His natural science, or knowl-
edge of nature, combined witli prudence, a great
power in life. — The ditiicullies in the establishment
of an household: 1. Their general causes; 2. how
they are to be overcome. — Jacob's prosperity abroad.
— Jacob struggling with difficulties .ill his lite loug.
Section First, vers. 25-M. Starke: (As to the
different meanings of fns, ver. 27. Some com-
mentators hold that Laban had superstitiously con-
sulted his teraphim, or idols.) — Bihl. I17)-(. ; It is
customary with covetous people to deal selfislily with
their neighbors. — Ver. 30. By means of my loot.
LcTHKR : i. e., I had to hunt and run through tldck and
thin in order that you might be rich. — Ver. 34. If
Laban had been honest, he could have represented to
Jacob, tliat he would be a great loser by this bargain.
God even blesses impious masters on account of their
pious servants (1 Tim. v. S). — Calweb Handbuch :
Jacob 91 years tdd. — Thus Laban's covetnusness and
avarice is punished by tlie very bargain which he
purposed to make for his own advantage. — We are
not to apply the criterion of Christianity to Jacob's
conduct. — Schroder : Acts and course of life
among strangers. As to Laban. Courtesy to-
gether with religion are made serviceable to the at-
tainment of his ends. — Thus, also, in the future,
there is only a more definite agreement of master
and servant between Jacob and his fatherin-Iaw. —
(The period of pregnancy with sheep lasts fiv«
months ; they may thereforf lamb twice during the
year. Herds were the liveliest and strongest in au-
tumn, after having enjoyed the good pasture during
the summer, etc. On the contrary, herds are feeblt
after having just passed the winter.)
<S'cc/(ora S«co7irf, vers. 36, 36. Staeke: A Christian
is to look for pious men-servants and maid-servants
Section Third, vers. 37^3. Starke : Christian,
be warned not to misuse this example to encourage
the practice of cunning and deceit with your neigh-
bor.— Cramer : Wages that are earned, but kept
back, cry to heaven ; hence nature here servos Ja-
cob (James v. 4). — Hall : God's children, even in
extei'nal things, have evident proofs that his grace
over them is greater than over the godless. — Schro-
der: Luther and Calvin are inclined to excuse Jacob
(ch. xxxi. 12).
Section Fourth. Ch. xxxi. 1-3. Starke ; It la
a very great reproach if acquaintances and relatives
slander each other. — Hall: As the godle.-ss enjoy no
peace with God, so also the pious enjoy no peace
with godless men. — Cramer : Sin in man is so poi-
sonous that it glitters in the eye, and is sweet to the
taste, and pleasant to all the members. — Schroder :
Thus the Lord often serves his people more through
the jealousy of the godless, than if he suffered them
to grow feeble in prosperity. — Ver. 3. Luther: It
probably was an answer to Jacob's prayer. — The di-
vine command and promise compensates Jacob for the
promised message of the mother. Thus his return re-
ceives the character of an act of faith (Baumgarten).
FOURTH SECTION.
Jaeob'a Jtight. Laban'* peneeution. The covenant between the two on the mountain of OUead.
Departure.
Chapter XXXI. 4— XXXH. 2.
4, 5 And Jacob sent and called Racliel and Leah to the field unto his flock. And sam
unto them, I see [am seeing] your father'.'^ countenance, that it is not toward me as be-
6 fore : but the God [ElohimJ of my father hath been with me. And ye' know that with
7 all my power I have served your father. And your father hath deceived ' me, and
8 changed my wages ten times: but God suffered him not to hurt me. If he said thus,
The speckled shall be thy wages; then all the cattle bare speckled : and if he said thus,
The [symm.: white-foot«d] ring-Streaked shall be thy hire; then bare all the cattle ring-
streaked. Thus God hath taken away the [acquisitions] cattle of your father, and given
them to me. And it came to pass at the time that the cattle conceived, that I lifted up
mine eyes, and saw in a dream, and behold [l saw], the rams which leaped upon the
11 cattle were ring-streaked, speckled, and grizzled.' And the angel of God spake unto me
12 in a dream, saying, Jacob : And I said, Here am I. And he said. Lift up now thine
eves and see, all the rams which leap upon the cattle are ring-streaked, speckled, and
13 grizzled: for I have seen all that Laban [is doing] doeth unto thee. I am the God of
Beth-el, where thou anointedsl the pillar, and where thou vowedst a vow unto me :
now arise, get thee out from this land, and return imto the land of thy kindred [lirth]
14 And Rachel and Leah .inswei ^d. :""' -^aid unto him, Is thire vei any portion or inher
9
10
MO GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
15 tance for us in our father's house? Are we not cou.ited of him strangers? for he hatl
16 sold us, and hath quite devoured' also our nioney. For all the riches which God liatt
taken from our father, that is ours, and our cliildren's now the?i, whatsoever God iiati>
said unto thee. do.
17, 18 Then Jacob ro.se up, and set his sons and wives upon camels; And he carriec
away all his cattle, and all his goods [his mnvabie property, gain] which lie had gotten, thf
cattle of his getting, which he had gotten in Padan-aram ; for to go to Isaac his fathe.
19 in the land of Canaan. And Laban went to shear his [to the feast of sheep-shearing] sheep.
20 and Rachel had stolen the images' [Teraphim, household gods] that were her father's. And
Jacob stole away unwares [the heart of] to Laban tlie Syrian, in that he told him not
21 that he tied. So he fled witli all that he had; and he rose up, and passed over the
22 river [Euphrates], and set his face [journey] toward the mount Gilead. And it was told
23 Laban on the third da}', that Jacob was tied. And [Then] he took his brethren with
him, and pursued after him seven days' journey : and they overtook him in the mount
24 Gilead. And God came to Laban the Syrian in a dream by night, and said unto him.
Take heed that thou speak not to Jacob either good or bad.
25 Then Laban overtook Jacob. Now Jacob had pitched his tent in the mount r and
26 Laban with his brethren [tented] pitched in the mount of Gilead. And Laban said to
Jacob, What hast thou done, that thou liast stolen away unwares to me, and carried
27 away my daughters, as captives taken with the sword [the spoils of war] ? Wherefore
didst thou flee away secretly, and steal away from me, and didst not tell me, that I
might have sent thee away [given thee a convoy] with mirth, and with songs, with tabret,
28 and with harp ? And hast not suffered me to kiss my sons [grandsons], and my daughters?
29 thou hast now done foolishly in so doing. It is in the power of my hand* to do vou
hurt : but the God of j'our father spake unto me yesternight, saving. Take thou heed
30 that thou speak not to Jacob cither good or bad. And now, though thou wouldest
needs be gone, because thou sore longedst after thy father's house ; yet wherefore hast
31 thou stolen my gods? And Jacob answered and sj,id to Laban, Because I was afraid:
for I said [said to myself ], Perad venture thou wouldest take b}' force thy daughters from
32 me. With whomsoever thou findest thy gods, let him not live : before our brethren
discern thou what u thine with me, and take it to thee : for Jacob knew not that
33 Rachel had stolen them. And Laban went into Jacob's tent, and into Leah's tent, anu
into the two maid-servants' tents; but he found them not. Then went he out of Leah's
34 tent, and entered into Rachel's tent. Now Rachel had taken the images [household gods],
and put them in the camel's furniture, and sat upon them. And Laban searched all
35 the tent, but found them not. And she said to her father, Let it not displease my lord
that I cannot rise up before thee; for the custom of women [female period] is upon me.
And he searched [au], but found not, the images.
36 And Jacob was wroth, and chode with Laban : and Jacob answered, and said to La-
ban, What is my trespass? what I's my sin, that thou hast so hotly pursued [bumed] after
37 me? Whereas thou hast searched all my stuff, wliat hast thou found of all thy household-
stuff? set it here before my brethren, and thy brethren, that they may judge betwixt
38 us 'ooth. This twentv years have I been with thee ; thy ewes and tliv she-goats have
39 not cast their young, and the rams of thy flock have I not eaten. That which waa
torn of beasts, I brought not unto thee; 1 bare the loss of it [must make satisfaction for it] ;
40 of my hand didst thou require it, whether stolen by day, or stolen by night. Thus I
was; in the da}' the drought consumed nte, and the frost by night; and my sleep
41 departed from mine eyes. Thus have I been twenty years in thy house: I served thee
fourteen years for thy two datighter.s, and six years for thy cattle: and thou hast
42 changed my wages ten times. Except the God of my father, the God of Abraham, and
the fear of Isaac had been with me, surely thou hadst sent me away now empty.
God hath seen mine t ffliction, and the labor [wearisome labor] of my hands, and rebuked
[Tiigcd] thee yesternight.
13 And Laban answered, and said unto Jacob, These daughters are my daughters, and
these ciiildren are my children, and these cattle are my cattle [licrds], and all that t.iou
seest is mine ; and what can I do this day unto these my daughters, or unto theii
44 children which they have borne? Now therefore come thou, let us luake a covenan)
45 fa cnvpnant of peace I, I and thou ; and let it be for a witness betwet i me and thee. Ant'
CHAP. XXXI 4— XXXII. 2.
541
46 Jacob took a stone, and set it np for a pillar. And Jacob faid unto his bretliren.
Gather stones; and they took stones, and made an heap: and thej' did eat tl ere upon
47 the heap. And Laban called it Jegar-sahadutha [syriao: heap of witness] : but Jacob called
48 it Galeed [the same in Hebrew] : And Laban said, This lieap is a witness between me and
49 thee this day. Therefore was the name of it called Galeed: And Mizpah [watch-tower];
for he said, The Lord watch between me and thee, when we are absent cue frotu
50 another. If thou shalt afflict my daughters, or if thou shalt take other wives besides
51 my daughters, no man is with us; see, God, is witness betwixt me and thee. And
Laban said to Jacob. Behold this heap [stone heap], and behold this pillar, wliich I hav#
52 cast [erected] betwixt me and thee ; This heap he witness, and this pillar he witness, that 1
will not pass over this heap to thee, and that thou shalt not pass over this heap and thi?
53 pillar unto me, for harm. The God of Abraham, and the God of Nahor, the God ol
their father, judge [plural] betwixt us. And [But] Jacob sware by the fear of his father
54 Isaac. Then Jacob offered sacrifice upon the mount, and called his brethren to eat
55 bread : and they did eat bread, and tarried all night in the mount. And early in the
morning Laban rose up, and kissed his sons and his daughters, and blessed them : and
Laban departed, and returned unto his place.
Ch. XXXn. \. And Jacob went on his way, and the angels of God met him. And
2 when Jacob saw them, lie said, This is God's host : and he called the name of that
place Mahanaim [two camps: double camp].
[I Ch. xxxi ver. 6.— The full form of the pronoun, see Green's Grammar, 71, (2.)— A. G.)
[» Ver. 7.— brn , Hiphil from bbn ; see Green's Grammar, 142, (3.)— A. G.]
[3 Ver. 10.— Heb., Beriiddim, spotted with hail. Our word, grizzled, is from the French, grSle, ftaiY, andthns a literal
translation of the Hebrew. — A. G.]
[* Ver. 15. — The Hebrew form, the absolute infinitive after the finite verb, denotes continuance of the action. — Ha
has constantly devoured, — A. G.]
[^ Ver. 19. — O^S^n . The word occurs fifteen times in the Old Testament ; three times in this chapter, and nowherf
else in the Pentateuch. It is always in the plural. It means, perhaps, to live well, or to nourish. In two passapjes (Jndg,
xvii. and xviii., and Hosea iii. 4), they are six times aspociated with the ephod. The use of them in the worship of God
is denounced as idolatry CI Sam. xv. 23), and hence they are classed with the idols put away by Josiah, 2 Kings xxiii
Murphy. — A. G.l
[« Ver. 29.— Heb., There is to God my hand.— A. G.]
GENERAL PRELIinNARY REMARKS.
I. Delitzsch regards the present section as
thrnughout Elohistic ; but according to Knobel, Je-
hovistic portions are inwrought into it, and hence
the narrative is here and there brolsen and discon-
nected.
• 2. The present journey of Jacob is evidently in
contrast with his previous journey to Mesopotamia ;
Mahanaim and Peniel form the contrast with Bethel.
3. We malie the foltowing division : 1. .lacoli's
■ionference with his wives, vers. 4-16 ; 2. the flight,
vera. 17-21 ; 3. Laban's pursuit, vers. 22-25 ; 4.
Laban's i-eproof, vers. 26-30 ; 5. Laban's search in
the tents of Jacob, ver. 31-35; 6. Jacob's reproof,
vers. 36-42 ; 7. the covenant of peace between the
two, vers. 43, 53 ; 8. the covenant meal and the de-
parture, ver. 54-ch. xxxii. 2.
EXEOETICAI, AND CRITICAL.
1. Vers. 4-16. Jacobus conference with his
m-es. — Unto his flock. — Under some prete.'st Jacob
had left the fJocliS of Laban, although it was then
the feast of sheep-shearing, and gone to his own
floclis (a three days' journey, and probably in a di-
rection favoring his flight). Hither, to the field, he
calls his wives, and Rachel, as the favorite, is called
first. — Changed my wages ten times. — The
expression ten times is used for frequently, in Xuinb.
uv. 22 and in other passages. [Keil holds that the
ten, as the number of completeness, here denotes as of
ten as he could, or as he had opportunity. It is proba-
bly the definite for an indefinite. — A. G.] — If he said
thus. The ring-streaked As Laban deceived Ja-
cob in the matter of Rachel, so now in the arrange
ment for the last six years, he had in various ways
dealt selfishly and unjustly, partly in dividing
equally the spotted lambs, according to his own
term*, and partly in always assigning to Jacob
that particular kind of spotted lambs which
bad previously been the least fruitful. — And the
Angel of God. — Jacob here evidently Joins togeth-
er a circle of nicrht-visions, which he traces up to the
Aneel of the Lord, as the angel of Elohim, and
which run through the whole six years to their close.
If Laban imposed a new and unfavorable condition,
he saw in a dream that now the flocks should bring
forth lambs of that particular color agreed upon,
now ring-streaked, now speckled, and now spotted.
But the vision was given to comfort him, and indeed,
under the image of the variegated rams which served
the flocks. This angel of Elohim declares himself
lube identical with the God of Bethel, i. «.. with Je-
hocth. who reveals himself at Bethel as exalted abovt
the anaels. It is thus his covenant God who baa
guarded his rights against the injustice of Lab&n, and
]irepares this wonderful blessing for him ; a fact
which does not militate against his use of skill and
craft, but places those in a modified and milder light.
The conclusion of these visions is. that Jacob must
return. [The difference between this narrative nml
that given in ch. xxx., is a differeice having 't*
642
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
grtund and explanation in tlie facts of the case.
For obvious reasons Jacob cliose here to pass over
his own strategy and craft in silence, and brings out
into prominence the divine providence and aid to
which his prosperity was due. That Jacob resorted
to the means he did, is not inconsistent with the ob-
ject!'e r5ality of the dream-vision, but ratlier con-
firms i'. If he regarded the vision as prophetic of
the issue, as he must have done, the means which he
osed, the arts and cunning, are characteristic of the
man, who was not yet weaned from confidence in
himself, was not entirely the man of fniih. If we
regard this vision as occurring at the beginning of
the six years' service, it is entirely natural that Jacob
should now connect it so closely with the voice of
<he same angel commanding him to return to the
land of his birth. — A. G.] — Are 'we not counted
of him strangers ? — Laban takes the same posi-
tion towards his daughters as towards Jacob himself
Hence they have nothing more to hope for from him.
He had sold them as strangers, i. e., really, as slaves,
for the service of Jacob. But this very price, i. e.,
the blessing resulting from Jacob's service, he had
entirely cc"sumed, i. e., the daughters had received
no share of it. Hence it is evident that tliey s])eak
with an inward alienation from him, although not
calling him by name, and that they desired the
flight.
2. Vers. 17-21. The flight.— The oivcnmslAnQe
that Jacob, with his wives, was already at the station
of his herds, while Laban remained at his own sta-
tion, three days' journey distant, keeping the feast of
sheep-shearing, favored the flight. Either Laban
had not invited Jacob to this feast, which is scarce-
ly probable, since he was usually at this station, or
Jacob took the opportunity of leaving, in order to
visit his own flocks. As the sheep-shearing lasted
several days (1 Sam. xxv.) the opportunity was a very
favorable one. — And Rachel had stolen. — This
feature, however, as also the following, when she de-
nied the theft to her father, reveals a cunning
which is far more befitting the daughter of Laban,
than the wife ofthe prudent Jacob. — The images. —
Literally Teraphim(see Dklitzsch, p. 410, Note 73),
Penates, small figures, probably resembling the
human form, which were honored as guardians of
the household prosperity, and as oiacles. But as
we must distinguish the symbolic adoration of re-
ligious images (statuettes) among ancients, from the
true and proper mythological worship, so we must
distinguish between a gentler and severe censure of
the use of such images upon Shemitic ground.
Doul)tlcss the symb(jlic usage prevailed in the house
of Laban and Nahor. It is hardly probable that
Rachel ii)teiided, by a pious and fanatical theft, to
free her father from idolatry (Greg. Naz., Basil), for
then she would have thrown the images away. She
appears to have stolen them with the superstitious
idea that she would prevent her father from consult-
ing them as oracle^, and under their guidance, as the
pursuer of Jacob, from overtaking and destroying
him ( \hen Ezra). The supposition of a condition
of wai, Willi its necessity and strategy, enters here
with apologetic force. This, however, does not ex-
clude the idea, that she attributed to the itnages a
certain magical, thougli not religious, power (perhaps,
i8 oracles. Chrysostom). The very lowest and most
degrading supposition, is that she took the images,
often ^tverlaid with silver, or precious metals, fi-iun
mercenary motives (Peircrius). Jacob himself had
«l first a lax rather than a strict conscience in regard
to these images (see ch. xxxv. 2), but the stncte*
view prevails since the time of Moses (Ex. xx.; Josh
xxiv. 2, 14 f ) [The derivation of the Ueb. wore
teraphim, always used in the plural, is doubtful
Some derive it from iaraph, to rejoice — thus dispen
sersofgood; others from a Mke root, to inquire —
thus tliey are oracles ; and others, as Kurtz and
llofmann, make it another form of SfrajoAim. Thej
were regarded and used as oracles (Juiig. xrii. 6-6
Ezek. xxi. 21 ; Zech. x. 2). They were not idols ia
the worst sense of the word ; and were sometimes
used by those who professed the worship of the true
God (1 Sam. xix. 13). The tendency was always
hurtful, and they were ultimately rooted out from Is-
rael. Laban had lapsed into a more corrupt form ot
religion, and his daughters had not esca])pd the in-
fection. We may modify our views of Rachel's
sin, hut it cannot be excused or justified (see Keil,
"Arch.," p. 90; Wordsworth, p. 132; Hesgstenberg,
" Christology ; " H.weeick's " Ezek." xiii. 47). — A.G.]
— And Jacob stole away unawares to Laban. —
The explan:Uion KKf-mftv voov in the sense of " to de-
ceive " (Del., Keil), appears to us incorrect. The ex-
pression indeed does not bear the sense which we
moderns associate with the words " steal the heart,"
and ver. 26 seems to indicate that the heart of Laban
is the love which this hard-hearted father bears
towards his daughters. Rachel, however, seems tc
have been his favorite. He regarded and treatec
her not only as a wise but cunning child, and
hence, while he searched carefully everything in all
the tents, he did not venture to compel her to
arise. The last clause of ver. 20, further cannot
possibly mean " in that he told him not that he fled."
For who would betray his own flight? We interpret
T'Sn impersonally, it was not told him. — The
Syrian. — " Moses gives this title to Laban because
the Syrians were more crafty than other nations."
Jacob, however, surpassed hini (rh'ric). Over the
river. — The Euphrates. — Toward the mount
Gilead. — For the mountains of (iilead see (ieogra-
phies of Palestine, Bible Dictionaries, Books of Travels,
etc. " Knobel understands "isbs ^fi to be the
mountain range now known as Gebel Gilad, or Gebel
es-Ssalt, and combines riESO with the present Ssalt
But this assumption leads to the improb:ible resulti
that Mahauaim, south of Jabbok and Succoth (prob
ably the one on the otiier side), lay north from Jab
bok, and thus Jacob's line of march would be back
wards in a north-westerly direction." Delitzsch.
Delitzsch understatuls correctly, that it is the north-
ern side of the mountains of Gilead, abo\e the Jab-
bok, which lay nearest to those coming from Meso-
])otamia.
3. Vers. 22-25. Labaii'a pursuit. — On the
third day. — This is partially explained by the
long distance between the two staticms. — His
brethren with him. — Of the same tribe, kinsmen.
— Seven days' journey. — As Jacob, with liis herds,
moved slower titan Laban, he lost his start of three
days in llie course of .seven d.ays. — And God came
to Laban. — A proof that he had still sonic nobler
traits of charactei. — Either good or bad. — the
translation )iCJ(/i(T .i/oorf ?(or A«(/ i'i not fitting bore.
Literally from good to bad (Knobel). It presupposes
that he was inclined to jmss from a hasty greeting
of bis daughters and their children, to re|jr"achea
and invectives. — Now Jacob had pitched his
tent. — As soon as he iciiched the licigiits of the
mountain range, the mount Gilead, he pitched hv
CHAP. XXXI. 4— XXXII. !4.
543
tent but here Laban with lii.s retinue overtoolc him,
and tented near by him. Tlic text assumes : 1. That
a ctiilain mountain, nortli of Jabbolv, gave its
name to the whole range of mountains (just as
Galilee, originally designating a small mountain re-
gion, gradually extended its significance). 2. That
thus we must distinguish between this first moun-
tain in the range of Gilead, and the principal
mountain mentioned later.
4. Vers. 26-30, The words of Laban are charae-
tcristic, passionate, idiomatic, exaggerated even to
falsehood »nd hypocrisy, and still at the end theie
in a word whicii betrays the man — shows his hu-
man nature and kindness. He calls his daughters
his heart; their voluntary flight (although he had
sold them) an abduction, as if they were captives.
He asserts that he had not given any occasion to
Jacob to flee, on the contrary, that he would have
Bent him away with music and mirth. He
had not, however, even suffered him to take leave
of his daughters and grandsons. The^e tender ut-
terances are followed at once by haughty threats
(ver. 29). From his own point of view it seems im-
prudent to relate the ni|-ht warning, but his pride
and animosity lead him t" do it. Jacob should not
think that he willingly lev him go unpunished, but
"the God of you- tathei," he says, with a bitter
heart, has forbidden me. He finally (ver. 30) ac-
knowledges in a sarcastic way that Jacob might go,
but only to crush him with the burden of his ac-
cusation, in which, however, there was a two-fold
exaggeration ; first, in calling the leraphiin his
gods, and then, second, in makuig Jacob the thief.
The true sentiment for his children, the fear of
,iod, and, finally, a real indignation at the secrecy of
Jacob's departure, form the core of the speech, which
assumes at last the shape of a pointed accusation.
Thefe is no trace of self-knowledge or humility. —
With mirth.— (See 1 Sam. xviii. 6 ; 2 Sam. vi. 5.)
The worii nn^tU is indeed a collective for all that
follows, and DeUtzsch thinks it probably meaxis dance.
-With tabret. — See Winek : " Musical Instru-
ments." [.\l.so KiTTO and Smith. — A. G.].- — Thou
hast done foolishly Thou who art usually so pru-
dent hast here acted fooUshly. The reproach of folly
carries with it that of immorality. — It is in the
power of my hand. — Knobel and Keil [and Jaco
bus. — A.G.] translate "There is to God my hand," with
reference to Job, xii. 6 ; Hab. i. 11. Others translate
bs power (so Rosen., viesnn.), [Wordsworth, Bush,
A. G.] and this seems aere «o be preferable, notwith-
standing Knobel's objection since Laban immediately
says it is Elohim who restrains his hand.
5. Vers. 31-35. Laban^s search. — Laban's rash
accusation gives Jacob, who knew nothing of the
theft of the terapUim, great boldness. — Let him not
live. — We must emphasize the Jindinc/, otherwise
Jacob condemned Rachel to death. " The cunriin"
of Rachel was well planned, for even if Laban had
not regarded it as impure and wrong to touch the
seat of a woman in this state (see Lev. xv. 22), how
could he have thought it possible that one in this
state would sit upon his God." — Delitzsch. But
Keil calls attention to the fact that the view upon
which the law (Lev. xv.) was based, is much older
than that statute, and exists among other people.
[See also Kurtz : Geich.,voli. p. 252; Baehr's ".Sym.
of the Mosaic Cultus," vol. ii. p. 466. — A. G.] For
the CHuiel's furniture or saddle, see Knobel, p. 2.51.
6. Vera. 36-42. Jacob's rtproof. He connects
it with Laban's furious pursuit and searcj. Then
he reminds him generally of his harsb treatment, ai
opposed to his own faithful and sell-sacrificing shep-
herd service for more than twenty years. "The
strong feeUng and the lofty self-consciousness whicl
utier themselves in his speech, impart to it a rhytli
mical movement and poetic forms (■'")ni< ~b^ t<
pursue ardently ; elsewhere only 1 Sam. xvii. 53.")
Delitzsch. — And the frost by night. — The cold
ofthe nights corresponds with the heat of the dayio
the East (Jer. xxxvi. 30; Psalms, cxxi. 6). — My
sleep. — Which I needed and which belonged to me.
He had taithfully guarded the flocks by night. Sot-
withstanding all this Laban had left him unrewarded,
but the God of his fathers had been with him and
secured his rights. Both the name of his God, and
of his venerable father, must touch the conscience oJ
Laban. — The fear of Isaac. — [Heb: he whon
Isaac feared.] The object of his religious fear, and
venerati(m ; of his religion, ff4$as^ o-cSao-uu. — Re.
buked thee yesternight. — This circumstance,
which is only incidentally alluded to in the course of
Lab.an's speech, forms the emphatic close to that of
Jacob. Jacob understands the dream-revelation of
Laban better than Laban himself.
7. The corejiaiii of peace between the tico. Labau
is overcome. He alludes boastfully indeed once
more to his superior power, but acknowledges that
any injury inflicted upon Jacob, the husband and
father, would be visited upon his own daughters and
their children. — What can I do unto thee. — i. e.,
in a bad sense. The fact that his daughters and
grandsons were henceforth dependent upon Jacob,
fills his selfish and ignoble mind with care and solici-
tude about them ; indeed, reminded of the promises
to Abraham and Isaac, he is apprehensive that Jacob
might some time return from Canaan to Haran a» a
mighty prince and avenge his wrong. In this view,
anticipating some such event, he proposes a covenant
of peace, which would have required merely a feast of
reconciliation. But the covenant of peace involved
not only a cold reconciliation, liut a theocratic sepa-
ration.— Let us make a covenant. — Laban makes
the proposal, Jacob assents by entering at once upon
its execution. The pillar which Jacob erected, marks
the settlement, the peaceful sejiaration; the stones
heaped together by his brethren (Laban and his reti-
nue, his kindred) designate the tricndly communion,
the covenant table. The preliminary eating (ver. 46)
appears to be distinct from the covenant meal (ver.
54), for this common meal continued throughout the
day. The Aramaic designation of the stone heap
used by Labau, and the Hebraic by Jacob, are ex-
plainable on the supposition " that in the fatherland
ofthe patriarchs, Mesopot,aniia, the .VramaicorOhal-
dee was used, but in the fatherland of Jacob, Canaan,
the Hebrew was spoken, whence it may be inferred
that the family of Abraham had acquired the Hebrew
tongue from the Canaanites (Phoenicians)." — Keil.
[But this is a slender foundation upon which to base
such a theory. The whole history implies that the
two families of Abraham and Nahor down to this time
and even later found no liifliculty in holdinc inter,
course. They both used the same language, 'hough
with some growing dialectic differences. It is jusl
as easy to prove that Lahan deviated from the
mother tongue as that Jacob did. — A. G.] Knobel
regards it an error to derive the name Gilead, which
means hard, firm, stony, Iroro the Gal-Ed here used
But proper names are constantly modified as to theii
significance iu popular use, from the original or mot*
M4
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
lemote, to that which is proximate. — And Mizpah,
for he said. — Keil concedes th;\t vers. 49 and 50
have the apjiearance of an interpolation, but not
such as to justify any resort to the theory of combina-
uon from difterent sources. But since Laban's prin-
cipal concern was for the future of his daughters, we
might at least regard the words. And Mkpah,for he
aatd, as a later explanatory interpolation. But there
is not sufficient ground even for this, since Galeed and
Mizpah are here identical in fact, both referring to
the SI one heap as well as to the pillar, Laban prays
specifically to Jehovah, to watch that Jacob should
not afflict his daughters ; especially that he should not
deprive them of their acquired rights, of being the an-
cestress of Jehovah's covenant people. From this
hour Jehovah, according to his prayer, looks down
from the heights of Gilead, as the representative of
his rights, and watches that Jacob jhould keep his
word to his daughters, even when across the Jordan.
But now, as the name Gilead has its origin in some
old sacred tradition, so has tlie name Mizpah, also.
It is not to be identified with the later cities bearing
that name, with the Mizpah of Jephthah (Judg. xi.
11, 34), or the Mizpah of Gilead (Judg. xi. 29), or
Ramoth-Mizpah (Josh. xiii. 26), but must be viewed
as the family name which has spread itself through
many daughters all over Canaan (Keil, 216). — No
man is with us. — i. c., no one but God only can be
judge and witness between us, since we ai-e to he
30 widely separated. — Which I have cast. — He
views himself as the originator, and of the highest
authority in this covenant. — That I will not pass
over. — Here this covenant thought is purely nega-
tive, growing out of a suspicious nature, and securing
a safeguard against mutual injuries ; properly a
theocratic separation. — The God of Abraham and
the God of Nahor. — The moniitlieism of Laban
seems gliding into dualism ; they may judge, or
"judge." He corrects himself by adding the name
of the God of their common father, i. e., Terah.
From his alien and wavering point of view he seeks
for sacrednesa in the abundance of words. But
Jacob swears simply and distinctly by the God whom
Isaac feared, and whom even his father-in-law, Laban,
should reverence and lear. Laban, indeeti, also ad-
heres to the communion with Jacob in his monothe-
ism, and intimates that ihe God of Abraham and the
God of N'ahor designate two different religious direc-
tions from a common source or ground.
8. Ver. 54-ch. xxxii. 2. llip fotuinnif meal, and
the departure. — Then Jacob offered sacrifice. —
As Isaac prepared a meal for the envious and ill-
disposed Abimelcch, .so Jacob for Laban, whom even
this generosity should now have led to shame and re-
pentance. The following morning tliey Bcparate from
each other. The genial blood-tenderness of Laban,
which leads him to kiss Ijoth at meeting and parting
should not pass unnoticed (see ver. 28; ch. xxix. 13,
and the Piel forms). It is a pleasant thing that as a
grandfather he first kissed his grandsons. Blessing,
betakes his departure. — Met him. — Lit., came, drew
near to liim, not precisely that they came from an op-
posite direction. This vi.sion does not relate primarily
to the approaching njeeting with Esau (Peniel relates
to this), but to tiie dangerous nieeling with Laban.
As the Angel of (iod had disclosed to him in vision
the divine a>^sistanee against his unjust sufferings in
Mesopotamit, so now he enjoys a revelation of the
protection Mnich God had prepared for him upon
Mount Gilead, through his angels (comp 2. Kings vi.
17). In this jcns" he well calls the angels, "God's
host," and the place in which they met him, doubU
catnp. By the side of the visible camp, which hC;
with Laban and his I'etainers, had made, (!od hat
prepared another, invisible camp, for his protection.
It served also to encourage him, in a general way
for the approaching meeting with Esau. — Maha-
naim. — Later a city on the north of Jabbok [ive V
Radmek's "Palestine," p. 253; Robinson: "Re
searches," vol. iii. 2 app. 166), probably the one noil
called Mahneh, [For the more distinct reference of
this vision to the meeting with Esau, see Kcrtz
Ge.ichirhte, p. 254, who draws an instructive and
beautiful parallel between this vision and that at
Bethel.— A. G.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. Jacob a fugitive even in his journey homa
But the God of Bethel protects him now as the God
of Mahanaim ; and the angels who, as heavenly mes-
sengers, moved up and down the ladder at Bethel,
now appear, as became the situation, a warlike host,
or the army of God. Keil holds that he saw th«
angels in a waking state, " not inwardly, but with-
out and above himself; but whether with the eye
of the body or of the spirit (2 Kings vi, 17) cannot
be decided." At all events, in the first place he saw
an objective revelation of God, with which was con-
nected, in the second place, the vision-power [i. e.,
eine visionare stimmwng, a power or disposition cor-
responding to the vision and enabling him to perceive
it.— A. G.].
2. The want of candor between Laban and Ja
cob at Haran leads finally to the violent and passion
ate outbreak on Mount Gilead. But such outbreak,
have ever been the punishment for the want of
frankness and candor. The fearful public terrors
of war, correspond to the secrecies and blandish-
ments of diplomacy. — The blessing of a genuine
and thorough frankness. Moral storms, their dan-
ger, and their salutary results.
3. The visions in which Jacob saw how God se-
cured his rights against Laban's injustice, prove that
from his own point of view he saw nothing wrong in
the transaction with the parii-colored rods. But
thos ! rods are thus seen to be merely a subordinate
means. There is no sufficient ground for the conjec-
ture of Keil, that it may be suspected that the
dream-vision of Jacob (of the spotted rams) was a
mere natural dream (see p. 212). It is evident that
the vision-disposition jiervades the night-life of Ja
cob, growing out of his oppressed condition and hiu
unjust sufferings. — Sc'iiRi>DER: "But Jacob's crafty
course (eh. xxx. 37) is not therefore commended by
(!od, as Luther and Calvin have taught. Jacob was
still striving to bring about the fulfilment ol' the di-
vine pronii.se by his own efforts."
4 The alienation of the daughters of Laban from
their father is not commendable, but is expl.iined bj
his severity. On the other hand, ihey are bound t(<
their husliand in a close and lovely union. For tba
tlieft ol' the teraphim, see the Exegetical notes.
5. It is not a chance that we meet here in tlj
idols of Laban the earliest traces of idolatry in the
Old World, although the / had doubtless existed else-
where much earlier and in a gro.sser form. We cas
thus sec h(j\v Polytlicism gradually developed itself
out of tlie symbolic image-wor.sliip of Monotheism
(Rom. i. 23). Moreover, the teraphim fire estiniatii,
entirely from a theocratic point of view Tlici
CHAP. XXXI. 4— XXXII. 2,
51!
cou-d te stoleu as other household furniture (have
«ye8 bi t sec uot). They could be hiddeu under a
camel's saddle. They are a contemptible nonentity,
which can render no assistance— Ver. 23. The zeal
for god.i and idols is always fanatical.
6. The speech of Laban, and Jacob's answer, give
us a repre-ientation of the original art of spealiing
among men, just as the speech of Eliezer did. They
form at the same time an aniitliesis bet«een a pas-
sionate and exaggerated rhetoric and pliraseology on
tile one hand, aud an earnest, grave, reUgious, and
moral oratory on the other hand, exemplified in his-
tory in the antithesis of the heathen (not strictly
classic) to the theocratic and religious oratory. The
contri.it between tne speeches of Tertullus and Paul
Acts xiiv. 2) is noticeable here. Laban's eloquence
agrees with his sanguine temperament. It is pas-
sionate, exaggerated in its terms, untrue in its exag-
geration, and yet not without a germ of true and
affectionate sentiment. Analysis of diffuse and
wordy sjieeches a difficult but necessary task of the
Christian spirit.
7. Prov. XX. 22, Rom. xii. 17, come to us in the
place of the example of Jacob ; still we are not jus-
tified in judging the conduct of Jacob by those ut-
terances of a more developed economy (as Kcil does).
[This is true in a qualified sense only. The light
whiclr men have is of course an important element
in our judgment of the character of their acts. But
Jacob had, or might have had, light sufficient to
know that his conduct was wrong. He nught have
knoivu certainly that it wiis his duty, as the heir of
faith, to commit his cause unto the Lord. — A. G.]
8. The establishment of peace between Laban
and Jacob has evidently, on the part of Laban, the
significance and force, that he breaks off the theo-
cratic communion between the descendants of Nahor
and Abraham, just as the line of Haran, earlier, was
separated in Lot.
9. At all events, the covenant-meal forms a thor-
ough and final conciliation. Laban's reverence for
the God of his fathers, and his love for his daughters
and grandsons, present him once more in the most
favorable aspect of his character, and thus we take
our leave of him. We must notice, however, that
before the entrance of Jacob he had made Uttle
pfogress in his business. Close, narrow-hearted
views, are as really the cause of the curse, as its
fruits.
10. The elevated state and feeling of Jacob, after
this departure of Laban, reveals itself in the vision
of the hosts of God. Heaven is not merely coti-
nected with the saint on the e;irth (through the lad-
de. , , its hosts are warlike hosts, wlio invisibly guard
the saints aud defend them, even while upon the
earth. Here is the very germ and source of the
designation of God as the God of hosts (Zebaoth).
11. There are still, as it appears to us, two strik-
mg relations btitween this narrative and that which
follows. Jacob here (ver. 32) pronounces judgment
of death upon any one of his family who had stoleu
the images. But now his own Rachel, over whom
he had unconsciously pronounced this sentence, dies
soon after tlie images were buried in the earth (see
XXXV. -1, 18). But when we read afterwards, that
Joseph, the wise son of the wise Rachel, describes
his cup as his oracle (although only as a pretext), the
tonjecture is easy, tliat the mother also valued the
images as a means of securing her desires and long-
ings. She even ascribes marvellous powers to the
nandrakes.
35
12. The Moimt of Gilead a monument and wit
ness of the former connection between MesODOtamit
and Canaan.
HOMILETICAL AND PEACTICAL.
Contrasts : Jacob's emigration and return, oi the
two-fold flight, under the protection of the God of
Bethel, and of Mahanaim. — Laban the persecutor :
a. of his own ; b. of the heir of the promise. — The
persecutor : 1. His malicious companions ; 2. thosa
who flee from him ; 3. his motives. — -The word of
God to Laban : " Take heed," etc., in its typical and
lasting significance. — The punishments of the want
of candor : strife and war. — The two speeches and
speakers. — The peaceful departure: 1. Its light side,
reconciliation; 2. its dark aspect, separation.
First Section, vers. 4-16. Starkk : Cramer: The
husband should not always take hU own way, but
sometimes consult with his wife (Sir. iv. 35). — It is a
grievous thing when chddren complain before God
of the injustice of their parents. — Chddren should
conceal, as far as possible, the faults of their parents.
— Lisco : The human means which he used are not
commanded by God, but are his own. — Gerlach:
Jacob's conduct, the impatient weakness of faith ;
still a case of self-defence, not of injustice. — Schro-
der : A contrast : the face of your father, the God
of mi/ father.
Second Section, vers. 17-21. Starke: Although
Jacob actually begins his journey to the land of Ca-
naan, some suppose that ten years elapse before he
comes to Isaac, since he remained some time at
Succoth, Sichem, and Bethel (comp. ch. xxxiii. 17 ;
XXXV. 6). — The shearing of the sheep was in the East
a true feast for the shepherds — an occasion of great
joy (see ch. xxxviii. 12; 1 Sam. xxv. 2, 8, 36).
Section Third, vers. 22-2.5. Starke : Josephus.
The intervention of the night, and the warning by
God in his sleep, kept him from injuring Jacob. —
Bibl. Tub. : God sometimes so influences and directs
the hearts of enemies that they shall be favorably
inclined towards the saints, althougli they are really
embittered against them. — Hall : God makes fool-
ish the enemies of his church, etc. — Whoever is in
covenant with God need have no fear of men. —
ScHRiiiiER: Jacob moves under the instant and
pressing danger of being plundered, or slain, or of
being made a slave with his family and taken to Meso-
potamia. Stdl the promiser (ch. xxviii. 1.5) fulfils the
promise to him. Thus, whatever may oppress us for
a time, must at last turn to our salvathm (Calvin).
Section Fourth, vets. 26-30. Starke: ^It is the
way of hypocrites when their acts do not prosper, t"
speak in other tones.) — Vers. 29. He does not say
that he has the right and authority, but that he has
the fower (comp. John xix. 10). In this, however,
he reliites liinjself For if he possessed the power
why does he suffer himself to be terrified ami de
terred by the warning of (jod in the dream ? — Cal
WKK Handhuch : He cannot cease to threaten. — Ht
looiild have injured him but dared not. — Schroder
The images are his highest happiness, since to hin.
the presence of the Deity is bound and confined tc
its symbol.
Section Fifth, vers. 31-35. Starke: Cramer:
Ver. 32. A Christian should not be rash and pa*
sionate in his answer. Ver. 35. The woman's cun-
ning IS preeminent (Sir. xxv. 17 ; Judg. xiv. 16).—
Calwek Handhuch: Ver. 38. The ewes and the
540
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
goats in their state were the objects of his special
care. — Falsehood follows theft. — Man's cunning is
ready ; woman's inexhaustible and endless (Val.
Berberger).
Section Sixth, Ters. 36.^2. Starke : What is in-
cluded in a shepherd's faithfulness (ver. 38). — Bibl.
Wirt. : When one can show that he has been faith-
ful, upright, and diligent, in his office, he can stand
up with a clear conscience, and assert his innocence.
Cramer : A good conscience and a gracious God give
one boldness and consolation. — Schrodek : The per-
secution of Jacob by Laban ends at last in peace,
iove and blessing. — -Thus the brother line in Meso-
potamia is excluded after it has reached its destina-
tion.
Section Seveiith, vers. 43-53. Starke : (Differ-
ent conjectures as to what Laban understood by the
God of Nahor, whether the true God or idols). — •
Cramer : When a man's ways please the Lord, he
maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him
(ProT. xvi. 7). — Calwer Handbuch: Laban now
turns again and gives way to the natural affections of
a father. The circumstances which tended to calm
liifl mind : 1. The seven days' journey ; 2. the divine
warning; 3. the mortification resulting from his
fruitless search ; 4. Jacolj's self-defence and the
truth of his reproaches. — His courage and anger
gradually give way to fear and anxiety. — Schrodkr :
In the Hebrew, the word " if " occurs twice, pointing.
as we may suppose, to the idea, may God so punisl
thee. — (Li'THER : How can this fellow i Laban i iir.
name the thing?)
Eic/Iuh Section, ver. 55-ch. xxxii. 2. Starke
Jacob has just escaped the persecutions of his unjust
father-in-law, when he began to fear that he should
meet a fiercer enemy in his brother Esau. Hence
God confirms him in his faith, opens his eyes,
etc. — It is the office of the angels to guard the sauits.
(Two conjectures as to the double camp : one that
some of the angels went before Jacob, others fol-
lowed him ; the other that it is the angel camp and
the encampment of Jacob.) — (Why the angels are
called hosts: 1. From their multitude; 2. their or-
der ; 3. their power for the protection of the saints,
and the resistance and punishment of the wicked ;
4. from their rendering a cheerful obedience as be-
came a warlike host. — Calwer Handbuch : The
same as ch. xxviii. Probably here as there an
inward vision (Ps. xxxiv. 7). — Schroder: Jacob's
hard service, his departure with wealth, and the per-
secution of Laban, prefigure the future of Israel in
Egypt. — (Val. Herberger.) Whosoever walks in hia
way, diligent in his pursuits, may at all times say
with St. Paul : " He shall never be forsaken." — The
invisible world was disclosed to him, because anxiety
and fear fill the visible world. — Ldthkr: The angels.
In heaven their office is to sing Glory to God in tb«
Highest ; on the earth, to watch, to guide, to war.
FIFTH SECTION.
jseob^t return. Bu fear of Esau. Hit night wrestlings mth God. Peniel. The name Israel.
Meeting and recondliaiion with Esau.
Chapter XXXH. 3— XXXIII. 1-16.
3 And Jacob sent messengers before him to Esau his brother, unto the land of Seir,
4 the country of Edora. And he commanded them, saying, Thus shall ye speak unto
my lord Esau; Thy servant Jacob saith thus, I have sojourned [have been a stranger] with
5 Laban, and stayed there until now : And I have oxen, and asses, flocks, and men-
servants, and women-servants: and I have sent [and now I must send, the n paragogic] to tell
my lord, that I may find grace in thy sight.
6 And the messengers returned tc Jacob, saying, We came to thy brother Esau, and
7 also he cometh to meet thee, and four hiuidred men with him. Then Jacob was greatly
afraid, and distressed : and he divided the people that was witli iiim, and the flock.s, and
8 lierd-s, and the camels into two bands: And said [thougbt], If Esau couie to the one
company, and smite it, then tiie other company which is left shall escape.
9 And Jacob said, O God of my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac, ti.ri
L>nl which saidst [artsayingj unto me, Return unto tliy country, and to thy kindred [birth-
lO i\.ice], and I will deal well willi thee: I am not worthy [too littlo for] of the least of all tha
mercies, and of all the truth, which thou hast shewed unto ihy servant : for with my staff
I ] [alone] I passed over liiis Jordan, and now I am become two ljan<ls [camiv]. Deliver me, I
pray thee, froiu the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau : for I fear him, lest he
12 will come and smite me, and the mother with [upon, over] the cliildren. And thou
CHAP. xxxn. s— xxxm. i-ie. 54
saidsf, I will siireW do thee good, and make [establish] thy seed as the sand of tne sea,
which cannot be numbered for multitude.
13 And he lodged there that same night,' and took of that which came to his hand )
14 present for Esau his brother ; Two hundred she-goats and twenty he-goats, two hundred
15 ewes and twent}- rams, Thirty milch camels with thpir colts, forty kine and ten bulla,
16 twenty she-asses and ten foals. And he delivered thc-n into the hand of his scrvauta,
every drove by themselves; and said unto his servants, Pass over before me, and put
17 a space betwixt drove and drove. And he commanded the foremost, saying, When
Esau mv brother meeteth thee, and asketh thee, saying, Whose art thou ? and whithe
18 goest thou? and wiiose are these before thee [what he drives before him]. Then thou shall
say. They be thy servant Jacob's : it is a present sent unto my lord Esau : and behold,
19 also, he is behind us. And so commanded he the second, and the third, and all that
followed the droves, saying. On this manner shall ye speak unto Esau, when ye find
20 him. And say ye moreover, Behold, thy servant Jacob is behind us. For he said
[thought], I will appease^ him with the present that goeth before me, and af.erward I
21 will see his face; peradventure he will accept [make cheerful my face] of me. S' went the
22 present over before him ; and himself lodged that night in the company. A.id he rose
up that night, and took his two wives, and his two women-servants, and liis eleven sons,
23 and passed over the ford Jabbok. And he took them, and sent them over the brook,
and [then] sent over that he had [his herds].
24 And Jacob was left alone ; and there wrestled ' a man with him, until the breaking
25 of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he touched the
hollow of his thigh [hip-joint or socket] : and the hollow of Jacob's thigh was out of joint,
26 as he wrestled with him. And he said. Let me go, for the day breaketh : and he said,
27 I will not let thee go, except thou bless me. And he said unto him, What is thy
28 name? And he said, Jacob. And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob,
but Israt-l [Yisraei] : tor as a prince hast thoi; power ['hou hast contested] with God, and with
29 men, and hast prevailed. And Jacob asked him, and said, Tell me, I pray thee, thy
name: and he said, Wherefore is it that iXxon dost ask after ni_y name? And he
30 blessed him there. And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel [face of God] : for I
31 have seen God face to face, and my life [soul] is preserved. And as he passed over
32 Penuel [Peniei], the sun rose upon him, and he halted [was lame] upon his thigh. There-
fore the children of Israel eat not q/" the sinew [sciatic nerve], which shrank, which is
upon the hollow of the thigh, unto this day ; because he touched the hollow of Jacob's
thigh in the sinew that shrank.
Ch. 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
, 2 Rachel, and unto the two handmaids. And he put the handmaids and their children
foremost, and Leah and her children after, and Rachel and Joseph hindermost [at the last].
3 And he passed over before them, and bowed himself to the ground seven times, until
4 he came near to his brother. And Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him, and fell
5 on his neck, and kissed him : and they wept. And he lifted up his eyes, and saw [now]
the women and the children, and said, Who are those with thee* [whom hast thou there] ?
6 And he said. The children which God hath graciously given thy servant. Then the
7 handmaidens came near, they and their children, and they bowed themselves. And
Leah also with her children came near, and bowed themselves; and after came Joseph
8 near and Rachel, and they bowed themselves. And he said. What meanest thou by
all this drove [camp] which I met?' And he said. These are to find grace in the sight
9 of my lord. And Esau said, I have enouglj, my brother; keep that thou hast unto
10 thyself. And Jacob said. Nay, I pray thee, if now I have found grace in thy sight,
then receive my present at my hand: for therefore [now] I have seen thy face, as
11 though I had seen the face of God, and thou wast pleased with me. Take, I pray
thee, mv blessing that is brought to thee; because God hath dealt graciously with me,
12 End because I have enough : and he urged iiim, and he took it. And he said. Let us
13 lake our journey, and let us go, and I will go before thee. And [But] he said untc him,
Mv lord knoweth that the children are tender, and the flocks and herds with young " are
14 with me, and if men should over-drive them one day, all the flock will lie. Let my
lord, I pray thee, pass over before his servant : and I will lead on .softly, according' a»
&48
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
the cattle that goeth before me and the children be able to enduve ; until 1 come untc
15 my lord unto Seir. And Esau said, Let me now ii'av" with thee some of the folk thai
are with me: And he said, What needeth it? Let me find gra'je in the sight of ni»
lord.
16 So Esau returned that day on his way unto Seir
\\ 9'-^™'\T'=!;-l'-~''^<=. °\o''*»'*«'^ tli^ return of the messengers, and his arrangement of hjjoompaDT.— A G 1
[' Ver. 20.— lleb., cover his lace ; and so, m the last clause : he will lilt up my faee.— A. G.) f 3 -^ "-j
1= Ver. 24.-F5X: , an antique form, only used here and t. 25, 26, from p3N , to struggle with, or the kindred row
pSn, to limit, enclose, as one member the other. Keil, p. 219.— A, G.) '
[' Ch. ixxiii ver. 5.— Lit., Who these to thee.— A. G.]
[» Ver. 8.— Whatto thee all this train. -A. G.]
[• Ver. 13.— Heb., which are milking.— A. Q.]
P Ver. 14. — According to the foot, or pac*^— A. G.]
pbelimhtaey remaeks.
Knobel supposes here an artificial mingling of
heterogeneous and even contradictory parts, taken
from different sources, a supposition resting, as is
often the case, upon a want of insight as to the con-
nection, which is the great lever in that kind of crit-
icism. The sending of messengers by Jacob to Esau,
is regarded as a proof that he was not afraid of his
brother, while the Jehovlst represents him as being
in terror of him, etc. (p. 256). All parts of this
section turn upon .Jacob's relation to Esau : 1 . The
sending of messengers (vers. .3-6) ; 2. the fear of
Jacob, and his preliminary division of the train
into two bands (vers. 7, 8) ; 3. Jacob's prayer (vers.
9-12) ; 4. the delegation of new messengers with
his presents (vers. 13-21); 5. the night passage of
the train over Jabbok, and Jacob's wrestling ; Peniel
(vers. 21-32) ; 6. Esau's approach, the new arrange-
ments of the train, and the greetings (ch. xxxiii.
1-11); 7. Esau's offer and return (vers. 12-16).
EXEGETICAL AND CEITIOAL.
1. Tlie sending of the messetiffers (vers. 3-6). —
Sent messengers before him. — The measure was
precautionary, to inspect what the danger was, and
to conciliate his brother — Unto the land of Seir.
— The natural taste for hunting and the thirst for
power, must have led Esau, even during the lifetime
of Isaac, to think of a location moresuitauie to him,
since the thickly settled region of Hebron was not
favorable either for hunting or for the establishment
of a SI rung power. The region of Seir, or the moun-
tians of Edom (see Bible Dictionaries and geogra-
phies, and books of travels) seemed more favorable
in both respects. We thus see that Esau had already
made a decided progress in his occupation of the
new land, without having completely Iransferrod his
residi'iice (Vom Hebron to Seir, which followed after-
wards (see ch. xxxvi. fi). The same distinction be-
tween the chief residence, and an out-station or
colony, meets us in the life of I.saac. Keil says he
severed the relations which bound him to hisfaihei's
hou.se and possessions, " because lie was more and
more thoroughly convinced that the bles.sing pro-
nounced liy his father upon Jacob, and which ex-
cluded him from the inheritance of llie promise, the
future possession of flanaun, cnuld not be ehanged."
But Ihis would ascribe too nuieh to Jacob's obedience
jf faith to Esiiu. The fact takes place, doubtless,
upon natural ground.s. Esau's power did not lie in
i'v faith, but in his strong hand. This mau of miglit
had gathered his sons, servants, and confederates,
and already partially completed the conquest of the
Horites. He deems the momentary possession of
power of greater value than the promise of a relig
ions dominion, the actual possession of which lay in
the dim future. He entertains, no doubt, therefore,
that he has already surpassed his brother, and this
may, first of all, have predisposed him to peaceful
thoughts towards him, especially after Jacob's hum-
ble me.ssage, whose prominent thought was that he
now cheerfully conceded to him the external honors
of the first-born. In his present state of mind Esau
is satisfied to leave his brother to struggle a little
longer with his fear, and to harass and distress him
with a pompous show of his forces. The messen-
gers return without bringing back any fiiendly
counter-greeting. He comes as a princely sheik of
the desert, with his retainers. This is the prelim-
inary answer. The text here presupposes that Jacob
had received some notice of Esau's operations at
Seir. [There is no contradiction between tliis text
and ch, xxsvi. G. It is not said here that Esau had
any fixed abode or dwelling in Seir. The fact that
he appears with his armed band shows that he was
out upon a warlike expedition, and probably with the
design of driving the Horites from Seir. It was not
his home. His family and possessions were still in
Canaan, and were first removed to Sct (ch. xxxvi. t!)
when it had been freed from his enemies, and thus
made a safe abode for his wives and children. —
A. G.]
2. T/ie fear of Jacob, and his preUminnry di-
fi.sion if Ihe train into two bands (vers. 7, 8). —
Was greatly afraid. — Jacob's fear was not ground-
less, liebi'kah h.ad not called him back. Esau has
not intimated that he was reconciled ir ivouM be
easily appeased. The messengers had not brought
back any counter-greeting. Esau was coming with
his four hundred men. The promise at Bethel, too, re-
lates definitely only to the journey and the return, and
the vision at Mahanaim was a disclosure as to his tie-
livcratice from the hand of Laban, hut not accompa-
nied wiih new promi.ses. The main thing, however,
was this, he is ill at eas<' in his conscience, with regard
to his ofl'ence against Esau. His fear, therefore, as
well as his prudence, appears in the division of his
train into two bands. This measure precedes hi*
prayer, as the last act of his overhastyand impatient
cunning, which does not apjiear to have bi'cn exer-
cised after his prayer and struggle. The measure
itself" has Utile to do with the name Mahanaim, to
which Knobel riders it. It may serve to explain the
lact tliat the Bedouins usually march in divisions
;;. 'J'/ir firaijir of ./dcuA ( vers. 9-121. .lacob ii
CHAP. XXXII. 3— XXXIII. 1-16
.OIS-
lonBcious now that all liis cunning cannot give his
heart rest. — Which saidst unto me. — Here begins
the third link in the chain ; God of Abraham and God
of Isaac. He appeals to the repeated promise of the
;ovenant God of his fathers, given to him in the di- 1
rine intimation and warning to return. — I 'wiU deal
well with thee. — He strives to draw from this
rag".ie expression a promise of protection against
Eaau. On the other hand, lie cannot appeal with
iny confiilenee to the blessing of his father Isaac,
wliich he had stiilen. — I am not worthy of the
least Literally, am less than. Humiliation and
gratitude underlie the joyful confidence in asking
lor deliverance. — This Jordan. — We must conceive
of the ford of Jabbok, as lyint; in the neighborhood
of ths Jordan. — The mother with the children.
— Literally, upon the children, since she protects the
children against the raging foe. Used proverbially
(see Dent, x.-iii. 6 ; Hosea x. 14). Knobel, Keil,
Dclitzscli, reject the rendering, upon the children. —
As the sand of the Sea. — This is the sense to him
of the promise ch. xxviii, 14, as the dust of the eartk ;
and thus he changes the imagery of the Abrahamic
promise, ch. xxii. 17. Such a destructive attack as
now threatens him, would oppose and defeat the di-
vine promise. Faith clings to the promise, and is
chus developed. [The objection that it is unbecom-
ing in Jacob to remind God of his promise, shows
an utter misconception of true prayer, which pre-
supposes the promise of God just as truly as it im-
plies tlie consciousness of wants. Faith, which is
'.he life of prayer, clings to the divine promises, and
pleads them. — A. G.]
4. The delegation of mw messene/ers with his
oresents (vers. 13-21). — And took of that, etc. —
His prayer led bun to better means of help than the
division of his train in fear, and for a flight near at
hand. He passes from the defensive to the offensive.
He will not flee from Esau, but go to meet him, and
overcome him with deeds of love. Delitzsch thinks
he did not select the present until the next morning.
Keil, however, says, correctly, tliat the piayer, the
delegation with the present, the transfer across the
Jabbok, and Jacob's struggle, all took place on the
same night (ver. 14). Delitzsch, indeed, admits that
the crossing of the Jabbok, and Jacob's struggle,
qccur in the same night. The present wliich Jacob
chose for an immediate departure during the night,
was a great propitiatory sacrifice to the injured
brother, and an humble homage to the mighty prince
of the desert, consisting of five hundred and fifty
head of cattle. And thus, while making an atone-
ment to Esau, he actually atones also for his cunning
course towards Laban. The selections corresponded
with the possession of the Xomadic chiefs, as to the
kinds of animals (comp. Job i. 3 ; xlii. 12), and as
to the proportion between the males and females to
the rule of larro, De re rustica. Keil. The present
is broken up into divisions with intervening spaces
[lit., breathing places. — A. G.], and thus approaches
Esau, that by the regular appearance of these differ-
ent droves, he might, by one degree after .another,
soften the fierce disposition of his brother. Observe :
1. The climax; goats, sheep, camels, cattle, asses.
2. The spaces between the droves. Each impression
must be made, and its ioree felt by Esau, before the
next comes on. 3. The ever repeated form of hom-
ige : Thy servant, Jacob. A present. My lord
Ssau. 4. The final aim : friendly treatment : Thy
servant, Jacob himself, is behind us. Knobel sup-
poses that he finds here even, a difference between
the interpretation of the Jehovist, and the design of
his predecessor to describe the procession according
to oriental custom (p. 230).— For he said.— W«
meet here, for the first time, the later important "S2
(comp. XX. 111). Esau's face is to be covered bv
atoning presents, so that he should not see, any mora
the offence which Jacob had committcil against him.
Jacob had, in an ideal sense, deprived him of prince-
ly honor; he now recognizes, in a true and real
sense (and one entirely suited to Esau's thought and
disposition), hrs princely honor, and thus atones, in
fact, for his fault, since Esau cared nothing for the
ideal element in and by itself. ^Q3 here, at its first
occurrence, refers to the reconciling of one who is
angry, and to the atonement for guilt. .Since the of-
fence is covered for Esau's lace, so even Esau's face
is covered as to the ollence. It is very remarkable,
moreover, that the word " face '' here occurs three
times. E.-^au's face is covered towards Jacob's obliga-
tion and guilt. Then Jacob beholds the face of Esau,
and is comforted, and Esau lilts up Jacob's face, i. e.,
cheers, enlightens it, since he receives him kindly.
5. The night-crossing of the train oi'er J<ibbok
and Jacob's lerestimg (vers." 21-32). — And he rose
up that night. — The confidence of Jacob, rising
out of his prayer and the sending of his present, is
so strong that he does not defer the crossing of hia
train over the ford of Jabbok until the morning.
Jabbok is now called the Zeika, i. e., the blue, from
its deep-blue mountain water. " It rises near the car-
avan 1 onte at Castell Zerka ; its deep mountain valley
then forms the boundary between Moered on the
north and Belka on the south. It empties into the
Jordan about midway between the Sea of Tiberias
and the Dead Sea, and about an hour and a half
from the point at which it breaks through the moun-
tain." Vox Racmee : " Palestine," p. 74. The
Jabbok comes from the east nearly opposite to Si-
chem. It was at oue time the boundary between the
tribes of Gad and Manasseh. For further details,
see the Bible Dictionaries. — Although it is quite cus-
tomary in the East to travel during the night (see
KxoBEL, p. 258), yet still the crossing of his train
over a rapid mountain stream would be difficult
The ford which Jacob used was not that upon it(
upper course, upon the route of the Syrian caravans,
at Ki'ila't Zerka, " but the one farther to the west,
through which Buckingham, Burkhardt (' Syria,' p.
597), and Seetzen ('Travels,' i. p. 392) passed, be-
tween Jebel Adsehlun and Jebel Jelaad, and at which
are still to be seen traces of walls, buildings, and the
signs of an older civilization (Rittkk, ed. xv. p.
11140)." Keil.— And he was left alone. — It la
generally supposed that Jacob remained on the north
side of "the Jabbok. Kkil, p. 218; Delitzsch, p.
334. [Jacobus ; Wordsworth, p. 136. — A. G.] Ro-
senraiiUer and Knobel reject the idea that Jacob re-
crossed the stream, although nothing there claimed
his attention, the latter indeed, on the incorrect as-
sumption that Jacob crossed the Jabbok going from
the south, northwards. In ver. 23 it is, he passed
over, i. e., he himself, without mentioning that he
took his family, which is specially related elsewhere.
[It seems probable that he first went over himself,
and then, finding the crossing safe, he returned and
i sent over his herds and his family. — A. (J.] Then,
too, it is not necessary that "irj^^ should be under-
stood in a local sense (see Ges. under ir"'). More-
over, we fin 1 him (ver. 32), when lea\nng the placj
of his wrestling, Peniel, ready to proceed on hii
^6o
GENESlej, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
joumey. Lastly, it would seem an act of cowardice
f Jacob liad sent his wives and children across the
brook, which was a protection against the danger,
while he himself remained behind. [Still, the narra-
tive plainly implies that Jacob remained on the north
of the Jabbok. And whatever courage may have
prompteJ to do, as to protect his own with his life,
Jaaob was dimly conscious that the crisis of his life
•vas now upon him, and that he must be alone with
Tod. It was not the want of courage, but the sense
that help nmst come from God, and the working of
his f lith which led him to cUng to the arm of God,
which kept him here for the prayer and struggle and
rictory. — A. G.] — And there wrestled a man
with him. — Now, when he supposed everything ar-
ranged, the greatest difficulty meets him. The un-
measured homage, with which he thought to recon-
cile Esau, touches the violation or at least puts in
peril the promise which was given to him. More-
over, he has not only injured Esau, but offended God
(Elohim), who is the God of Ksau, and will not suffer
him to be injured with impuniiy. — There wrestled
a man. — This archaic form occurs only here and in
vers. 25 and 26. Dietrich traces it to the idea of
"struggling or freeing oneself from; " Delitzsch to
p:n , to limit, to touch each other closely, member to
member. We prefer the reference to the kindred form,
PES , to hold fast, to adhere firmly, etc. Hithpacl,
to restrain oneself. There seems to be an allusion in
the word to the name Jabbok (Knobel), or rather,
the brook derives its name from this struggle, p3^
instead of p3!<^ (Keil). An older derivation traces
the word, " to dust," to raise dust in the struggle.
The question ari.-es whether the sense of the word
here is, that the nameless man came upon Jacob, as
if he had been his enemy, or that Jacob seized the
man, as he appeared to him, and held him fast,
while he strives to free himself from the gi'asp. Ac-
cording to ver. 27, the last sense is the true one.
If we take the other supposition, we must conceive
that Jacob, during the night-wreslling, recognized as
a friend the man who came upon hini as an enemy.
Still there is no intimation of a hostile attack. Tlie
passage in Hosea xii. 4, also supports the idea that
Jacob held fast the mysterious man, and not vice
verxd. '' He took his brother by the heel in the
womb — and by his strength he had power with God
— he had power over the angel and prevailed — he
wept and made supplication \into him — he found
him in Bethel." — And when he saw that he pre-
vailed not against him. — That is, ver. 27, he
coulil not compel liim to let him go. — For the day
breaketh, — In regard to this, and to the circum-
stance that Jacob remained alone, Knobel remarks,
" that the acts of God are not spectacles for the eyes
of impious mortals (see ch. xix. 17 ; ixii. IS; Exod.
xii. 29)." There is, however, a broad distinction
between the heathen and theocratic interpietaiion
of this event. There is no reference here to any
fear or (head of the day-light on the part of spirits.
—The hoUow of his thigh. — Lit., the socket of
the hlf. It ha not .said that he struck it a blow
'Knobel); the finger of God (for it is God who is
ipoken of ) needs but to touch iis object, and the full
result is scciireil.— And the hollow of Jacob's
thigh vras out of joint. — This is explained more
fully in the thirty-fourth verse. The sinews of his
thigh (nervui itchiadinui) were paralyzed through
the extreme teneion ami distortion. But this bodily
Daralyais does not paralyze the persevering Jacob. —
I Will not let thee go.— Now the blessing whicli
he obtained from his father by cunting and deceit,
must be sought with tears from this mysterious di
vine man. .\nd then he blesses him when he give(
liim the name Israel, i. e., the God-wrestler or fight-
er (from mi and bs). [The captain and prince
of God, from sarah. to marshal in battle, to lead, t»
C07nmand, to Jight, and hast prevailed, ri-iio, as I
prince. Wordsworth, p. 13S. — A. G.] Instead ot
a siipplanter, he has now become the holy wrestlei
with God, hence his name is no longer Jacob, bu'
Israel. There is no trace in his after-history of the
application of his wisdom to mere selfish and cun-
ning purposes. But the new name confirms to him
in a word the theocratic promise, as the name Abra-
ham confirmed it to Abram. For the connection of
this pa.ssage with ch. xxxv. 10, see the Exegetical
note upon that passage. — And hast prevailed. —
Has he overcome in his wrestling with God, he need
have no further fears as to his meeting with Esau. —
Wherefore is it, that thou dost ask after my
name? — The asking after his name in this particu
lar way, not the general inquiry, is the point which
occasions this answer. The believer is not to learn
all the names of the Lord in this theoretic manner,
but through the experience of faith ; thus even the
name Immanuel. Indeed, he had already learned
his name substantially. — Thou hast wrestled
vrith God and men. — It does not rest upon " the
view which the Jews have when they regard the
name Jehovah as apjiriTof," as Knobel asserts. —
And he blessed him. — The bles.<ing contained al-
ready in the name Israel, is now definitely completed.
— Peniel, or Penuel with the 1 conj., face of Ood.
The locality of this place has not been definitely
fixed (V. Eaumer, p. 256), but if it could be identi-
fied it would be idle to look for it upon the north
of the Jabljok. Knobel refers for an analogy to the
Phtpuician promontory Oeoi" Ttpocromov. [Keil thinks
Peniel was upon the north of the Jabbok, though
he does not regard it as certain. Kiepert locates it
on the Jabbok. It was certainly east of Succoth
(see Judg. viii. S, 9), and was most probably on the
north of the Jabbok. — A. G.]— Face to face. — With
his lace he had seen the face of (!od (Exod. xxxiii. ;
Deut. xxxiv. 10). Exod. xxxiii. 20 is not in contra-
diction to this, since that passage speaks of the see-
ing of (iod beyond and above the form of his reve-
lation in its legal development. — And my life ia
preserved. — Luther's translation and my soul is
healed, saved, is equally beautiful and correct. For
it is impossible that the idea here is that of the later
popular notion : he rejoices that he had seen the face
of God and did not die. — The sun rose upon him.
— The sun not only rose, but rose especially upon
him ; and with a joyful mind he begins « ith the sun
rise his journey to meet Esau. — And he halted
upon his thigh. — He appears not to have noticed
this liclbre. In the effort of the wrestling it had es-
caped him, just as the wounded soldier oftentimes
first becomes aware that he is wounded by the blood
and gash, long after the wound was received. —
Therefore the children of Israel eat not. —
"The author exjilams the custom of the Ismelites,
in not e:iting of the sinew of the thigh, by a refer-
ence to this touch of the hip of their ancestor hj
God Through this divine touch, this sinew, lik«
the blood (ch. ix. 4) was con8ccr.il ed and sanctifiec
to God. This custom is not mcniioned elsewhere ir
the Old Testament; the Talinudittt,s, however (Tract
CHAP. XXXII. 3.— XXXm. .-16.
55 1
Cholin, Mischna, 7), regard it as a law, whose trans-
gression was to be punished with several stripes."
inobel. Delitzsehadds: "This exemption exists still,
Diit since tlie ancients did not distinguish clearly in
1^5 (rifsn T'5, the large, strong cord of the sinew
of the thigh), between muscle, vein, and nerve, the
einew is now generally understood, i. e., the interior
cord and nerve of the so-called hind-quarter, includ-
lEg the exterior also, and the ramifications of both."
6. Enaiis approach, the new arranijement of the
train, and the <)reitin(/ (ch. xxsiii. 1-11). — And Ja-
cob lifted up Ilia eyes. — In contrast to his previous
inward contemplation, and in confident expectation.
—And he divided the children. — We read no
more of the two l)ands or trains. He now separates
his family into three divisions. He himself, as the
head of the family, as its protector and representa-
tive, takes the lead ; then follow the handmaids with
their chddreu ; then Leah with hers ; and at last,
Kachel with Joseph. This inverted order, by which
the most loved came last, is not merely chosen from
a careful and wise prudence, but at tlie same time
the free expression of the place which they occupied
in his aflections. — To the ground seven times. —
Not that he cast himself seven times to the ground,
which would have been expressed by nsiX Q'SX,
but he bowed himself seven times with the low in-
clination of the head [the low oriental bow, in which
one bends the head nearly to the ground without
touching it. Keil. — A. G.]. But even this couitesy
far excels the usual degree in oriental greetings, and
finds its explanation in the number seven. The bow-
ing itself expresses the recognition of an external
princely prerogative, from which Esau believed that
he had robbed him ; the seven-fold utterance of this
recognition stamjis it with the mimic (Ger., mimische)
seal of the certainty which belongs to the covenant.
Thus Jacob atones for his offence against Esku.
The manifestation of this courtesy is at the same
time, however, a barrier which in the most favorable
issue protects him, before mingling with the spirit
and temper of the Edomitic army. — And Esau ran
to meet him. — He is overcome ; his anger and
threats are forgotten; the brother's heart speaks.
Jacob's heart, too, now released from fear, is filled
jvith like atfection, and in their common weeping
these gray-headed men are twins once more. " The
unusual pointing of inpiS'^ probably indicates a
doubt as to the sincerity of this kiss. But the doubt
is groundless. The Scriptures never authorize us to
regard Esati as itdmman. He is susceptible of noble
desires and feelings. The grace of God which ruled
in his paternal home has not left him without its in-
fluence." Delitzsch. The assertion of Knobel, " that
the author of ch. xxvii. 1 ff. and xxxii. 8 tf. could
not thus write if he wrote propria tiiarte," is critically
on the same level with the remark of Tueh upon
Jacob's prayer, ch. xxxii. 9 — " it is unseemly in the
narrator that he allows Jacob to remind Goij of his
promises." The old Jewish exegesis has indeed
outbid tti« modem zeal in effacing this great and
beautiful moral feature in the narrative. " The
Breschitl. Rabba and Kimchi inform us that some in
the earlier time held that ^inpB'^ meant here that he
Ut hiri\. The Targum of Jonath. says that Jacob's
weeping sprung from a pain in his neck, and Esau's
from a toothache." Knobel. — The children which
Ood — The name Elohim, out of regard to Esau's
ticint of view [and, as DeUtzsch and Keil suggest, in
oriier not to remind Esau of the blessing of Jehovah
of which he was now deprived. — A. G.] — Josepk
and Rachel. — It is a fine trait in the picture thai
the order is here reversed, so that Joseph comes be-
fore his mother. The six-year-old lad seems to break
through all the cumbrous ceremonial, and to rush
confidently into the arms of his uncle. — By all thii
drove (camp or train). — Knobel thinks that he her*
discovers a third explanation of the name Mahanaim,
and finds in the answer of Jacob, these are to find
grace, etc., an offensive fawning, or cringing humil-
ity. But in fact, it is not a mere present which ia
here in question, but a voluntary atonement — an in-
direct confession that he needed forgiveness. We
find this same thought also in Esau's refusal. — I
have enough. — Esau had a two-told reason for hia
refusal, for he doubtless possessed a large share of
the paternal estate, while Jacob had earned all that
he had by the labor of his hands. It is nevertheleaa
a noble strife, when Esau says, keep that thou
hast, / have enough, and Jacob overcomes him,
take, I pray thee, my blessing, / have enougli of
all, or briejiji all. — For therefore I have seen.
— 'This cannot mean, I have gained the friendly as-
pect of thy face by my present, but therefore, for
this purpose, is it. As things now stand, the present
is an offering of gratitude. — As though I had seen
the face of God. — The words sound like flattery,
but they bear a good sense, since in the fi iendly faca
of his brother he sees again in full manifestation the
friendliness of God watching over his Ufe's path
(Job xxxiii. 26 ; Ps. xi. 7). [He refers either to hia
wrestling with the angel, in which he had " learned
that his real enemy was God and not Esau, or in th«
fact that the friendly face of his brother was th»
pledge to him that God was reconciled. " In the
surprising, unexpected change in his brother's dispo-
sition, lie recognizes the work of God, and in hit
brother's friendliness, the reflection of the divine.'
Delitzsch. — A. G.] The words, take, I pray thee,
my blessing, are just as select and forcible. It is aa
if, in allusion to the blessing he had taken away, ha
would say, in so far as that blessing embraced pres-
ent and earthly things, and is of value to you, I give
it back. Knobel explains the choice of the expres-
sion from the benedictions which accompanied the
present. " The presents to the clergy in the middle
ages werp called benedictions." But the idea of
homage Ues nearer here. In the reception of hia
present he has the assurance that Esau is completely
reconciled to him. The friendliness in Esau's coun-
tenance is a confirmation to him of the friendlinesi
of the divine countenance, a seal of the grace of
God, which he saw in his face at Peniel
7. Esauh offer and return (vers. 12-16). — I will
go before thee. — The kindness of Esau assumes a
confidential and officious character. He will take
the lead in the way, go before as the protector of hia
caravan. But that could have happened only at the
expense of Jacob's freedom. Besides this, the car-
avan, with tender children, and sucklings among the
cattle, could not keep pace with a train of Bedouin.
Jacob urges this strenuously, in order to effect » sep-
aration. It is no pretence on his part, but it is the
only reason he ventures to oft'er to the powerful Esau,
whose superficial nature unfitted him to appreciate
the other reasons. He reveals to him also, in a
striking way, his purpose to come to him at Seir. li
this the new Israel or the old Jacob who speaka?
The words are ambiguous, even if he actually visitea
him in after years at Seir, as some have urged as w
GENESIS, OB THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
jxcHse. There is, indeed, a peculiar empliasis upon
tlie word '3x1?, in connection witli tiie verb, which
excludes any obligation to hasten there. He declines,
also, the ofl'er of a protecting band. — What need-
eth it? — He is conscious of a higher protector. He
Jesires nothing from Esau but a peaceful and friend-
ly deportment. [Jacob's promise of a visit was
honestly made. His course led him to Canaan, prob-
ibly to Hebron, and from thence he contemplated a
'isit to Esau at Seir. Whether it was ever made, or
not, we do not know. The narrative does not record
all the events of Jacob's Ufe, and this may well have
been one of those less important, which it passes
over in silence. There is no ground, in auy case, to
question his sincerity, or to think that it is the old
Jacob who speaks. — A. G.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. This section belongs to the more important
parts of Genesis, especially of the patriarciial his-
tory, holding in the lil'e of Jacob a position Uke ch.
XV., xvii., xviii., and xxii., in the life of Abraham,
ch. xxvii. in the life of Isaac, and ch. xU. and xlv.
in the life of Josepli. We have here, indeed, the
full develoinneut of patriarchalism, the Jjud which
shall open into its most perfect flower, and which
unfolds fully in the blessing of Jacob (ch. xlix).
As the institution of a sacred sacrifice reached its
full development in the offering of Abraham (ch.
xxii.), and the mysterious fact of election comes into
prominence in the blessing of Isaac (ch. xxvii.), so
this narrative brings out in a clear, distinct form ; 1.
The prayer of faith, based upon the promise and the
clear consciousness of the contrast between human
unworthiuess and divine grace ; 2. the actual occur-
rence of a believing wrestling with God, and its re-
sult, the prelude to the theanthropic life ; 3. the con-
trast between the old and new man, between Jacob
and Israel, the token of the new birth growing out
of the circumcision of the heart ; heuei', also, 4.
the dawn of the love of one's enemies, and of the
triumph of that affection over the hatred of our en-
emies, through confidence in God and the proofs of
ois reconciliation ; and 5. lastly, that divine law,
according towliich beUevers inwardly and ^ruly over-
come the world, by their outward subjection to the
demands of its power. In the struggle with Jacob,
moreover, the form of the Angel of tlie Lord passes
already into the form of the angel of his face, which
afterwards, in the book of Exodus, develops itself
more comi)letely. Thus, also, we find here already
clearly intimated tlie germ of the distinction between
the external aspect of the kingdom of God (the
blessing of Isaac), and iis inward essence, a distinc-
tion whicli was not fully comprehended by Israel at
the time of Christ, and over which, even in our own
day, many toil and labor without clear cimce|itions.
This .section contains also a representation of the
oightly and sacred birth hour of Israel, and in a
foniial point of view is well fitted to introduce a
true insight into the fundamental form of revelation.
2. The intellectual movement and progress in the
I'^rrati.e. corr(;spond to the most subtle laws of the
ILiritual anil inttlioctna! life of tlu; soul. Alter .la-
cob had Been the divine messengers, the angels, in liis
journey, he takes lieart, and sends a human endjassy
to greet Esau. The contents of their message is de-
teruiiiic<l ny his prudence. He greets his lord Esau,
as Jacob his servant. The unpleasant and djugeroui
recollections of the events which had occasioned hie
long absence, are passed over ; on the contrary, he
speaks of his rich possessions in herds and flocks,
which he had acquired while with Laban, lest Esau
should think that he was now retnrning. longing for
the paternal goods. He wishes only to find favor ip
tlie eves of Esau. In thus rendering homage to him,
he recognizes the eartlily iind temporal prerogatives
of the first-horn, and at the same time makes indi
rectly a confession of his guilt. When the messen
gers return without any counter-greeting, and an-
nouncing that Esau was drawing near, the mere
human jirudence of Jacob .again suggests his course.
As he apprehends a hostile attack from Esau, so he
thinks of resisting force with force, but with the
pi'ospect of being vanquished. Hence the division
of his caravan into two bands. But this measure
gives him no rest. His pressing wants drove him to
faith and prayer, a prayer which marks already a
great development of the patriarchal life and faith.
His soul was thus so sustained and comforted, that he
can no moie rest or sleep during the night. He now
boldly crosses the Jabbok (his Rubicon, or better,
his Kedron) with his whole train. .Vnd then, in the
lonehness and solitmie, he meets with the decisive
struggle of his life. After the victory of his faith
in this struggle, he is, as Jacob, lame in his thigh ;
he no longer expects salvation from his natural
struggles with Esau, but has found, in the grace of
Jehovah, the source of his world subduing humility
and love. He thinks no longer of the two bands foi
mutual self-defence or flight, but on the contrary, he
sends his five bands to the attack, five different acts
of homage embodied in presents, which, as a contin-
uous train, has the most impressive aspect, and gives
the highest saiisfaetion to Esau in the presence of
his four hundred men. The closing word of the
messengers was that .lacob was coming after them ;
he himself, and thus the strongest expres.^ion of his
ctonfidence toward his brother. Upon the five droves
which designate the completed act of homage, as an
actual ouhiHird ocrnyreuce (since five is the number
of free choice), there follows now the seven-fold
bowing of Jacob himself, as a sacred assurance of
his iiitelUclual , r al homage, as to the prerogatives
of the first-born which belonged to Esau. Hence
his family also, in three intervals and acts, which
follow the salutation, must render the same homage.
Jacob, in offering so large a portion of his herds,
had made a great sacrifice ; so that probably it may
be literally true that his children, who at first rode
upon camels, now that so few of the camels were
left, were obliged to walk. But it was both noble
and wise not to take advantage of Esau's magnani-
mous feelings, as he had formerly done of his nat-
ural and sensual infirmity in the matter of the lentile
l)ottage. And now lie lias completely overcome him,
and even more than tliis. As he had at first to guard
against his former threats, and his alarming appear-
ance, so now against his amiable iinportimity, which
migiit liavc led him into the danger of mingling and
developing his cause and future history with those
of Esau. Esau actually yields to his recpiest, and
returns. He overcomes him in this, too, but not aa
Jacob the supplantcr, but as Israel the warrior ,,f
Got! [the prince with God. — A. G.].
;i. Jacob's prayer. The great development ol
fiith which niarUed this j)rayer : 1. Tile resting o(
the prayer upon the divine promises, and the mort
definite development of prayer in its general idea
CHAP. XXXU.
-XXXIIl. 1-16.
2. the contrast : I am not wortliy, etc. [literaUv, I
am too littlo for, less than. — A. G.], an ancient denial
of nny righteousness of worlis, a watchword of liii-
mility for all time ; 3. the connection of the divine
goodness and grace (here in the plural) and truth, or
faithfulness, which henceforth rnns through the
■acred scriptures ; 4. the beautiful description of
the divine blessing, for with my staff I passed over
this Jordan, etc. [Jacob's faith appears in the very
terms by which he addresses God, 'n his confidence
in the divine promise and command, the two pillars
of his hope, in his expectation of dehverancr, not-
withstanding his deep sense of his personal unwor-
thiness, and in the clear, sharp contrast which he
makes between the destruction he feareil and the
divine promise. How could the promise : I will
make thy seed as tlie sand of the sea, be saved, if
the mother was to be slain with the children ? As
Luther has said, this is a beautiful specimen of all
hearty prayer, and has all the attributes of real pray-
er.— A. (i.j
4. The prayer of Jacob precedes his choice of
his presents for Esau. We must first deal with God,
be reconciled with him, then with men. First faitli,
then works.
6. Jacob's present. A great sacrifice of peni-
tence and restitution, of large value in itself, but far
more glorious in its spiritual form and import.
6. Jacob's wrestling. We must distinguish: 1.
The motive of the struggle; 2. its elements; 3. its
greatness ; 4. the fruits of victory. Its motive can-
not lie in Jacob's fear of Esau, although he was not
yet free Irom all fear. For as to the main thing, his
fears have been removed by the foregoing prayer
and the sending of the present, with which, indeed,
is connected also the announcement that -Jacob him-
eelf was coming to meet Esau. The motive arises
from the fact, that a new, and indeed the final and
greatest necessity, sprang frora this act of homage
which Jacob had just performed. He had restored
to Esau in spirit as well as in his outward arrangi--
ments the honor of the first-born, as to its eartldii
aspects. But had he not thus resigned also his theo-
cratic birthright, the Abrahamic blessing ? This
question rested upon his mind witli great weight,
since the external aspect of the blessing was appar-
ently inseparably connected with tlie inward. To
tow many of his descendants has the external tlioo-
cracy occupied the place of the inward and real king-
dom of God ! Abraham must distinguish the pres-
ent from the future, Isaac between patient endurance
and dominion, but Jacob must now learn to distin-
guish between the externaJ attributes and the internal
and real possession of the birthright and the bless-
ing. And since these things have hitherto been in-
separably blended in his mind, there must now be,
48 it were, a rent in his very soul ; it is oidy through
;he sorest birth-throes that he can attain a faith in
the blessing, stripped of its outward and temporal
glory. If he will retain the real blessing, then ap-
parently he must recall the messengers who have
gone to render homage to Esau. If he suffers these
to go on, then all his hopes for the future seem to
ranish. And still this is impossible, since his hope
'm inscribed, as a destination, in his innermost being,
uis election. Like Abraham upon Moriah, he must
also, through his readiness to make the sacrifice,
attain the lull assurance in its great gain, the new
life springing out froiu this sacrifice. Hence his
wrestling. According to Hosea, it consisted essen-
tially and fundamentally in weeping and tei^is; a
weeping and tears that he might secure theassuranci
of the blessing hi his very sacrifice of the blessing.
His saciifice must be completed in his heart, for it U
the genuineiiesa of his repentance, but he must alsc
have the certainty of his blessing, for it is the genu
iiienessand certainty of his faith. And all that he
can present to the God of revelation, for redemption
and deliverance from this fearful appearance of op-
position in his inward life, is his sighs and tears,
Tliere his prayer becomes a vision of the mosl
intensive form and nature. Jehovah appears to him
in his Angel, the Angel appears to hini in human
form, in the form, indeed, of some individual man.
The man in a certain measure is his alter ego in an
olijeetive form, in so far as he is the image of his
innermost individuality in its communion with Jeho-
vah, or the type of the Son of Man, the God-man.
But the man meets him as a stranger. He must in
lum become certain of his own inward election, as
Moses was made certain of the law in his own heart,
in the law of the two tables of stone. At first he
meets him as a mighty wrestler, who will cast him
to the groimd, and then proceed on his wsiy. That
is, the Angel of his election will cast him down and
then leave him lying in his repentance in bitter an-
guish over his Ut'e lost through his sin and guilt.
But Jacob wrestles with him, although unable, and
even not choosing, to make use of his strivings as
Jacob, of his supplanting and crafty efforts. His
human prudence discerns no way of escape from
this fearful inward sorrow, nor does it seek any.
But what was the very core and centre of his nature
as Jacob, his adherence to his faith in the future,
that is preserved, even now ; he does not yield in
his wrestling. The day dawns upon the struggle,
and now the strange man seems to get the upper
hand ; he puts Jacob's thigh out, of joint. The
human strength and elasticity of the patriarch were
gone. And now the trial culminates, when the man
says : Let me go. But now also the precise thought
of Jacob, and the purpose of his heart, comes out
in the words : I will not let thee go except ihou bless
me. He struggles no more, but throws his arms
around the neck of the divine man and cHngs to
him. This is the fuU renunciation, and the full and
determined embracing of faith, both in one act, and
theie Ues his victory. The mysterious stranger asks
after his name and his name is now as an acknowl-
edgment, a confession, Jacob. His new name, Israel^
which is now given to him. on the other hand, im-
ports not only his absolution, but also his restitution,
indeed, his exaltation above his previous blessed
condition. From this time onwards he is the war-
rior of God. He not only overcomes Esau, but God
suffers him to prevail over him in that specific way
of wrestling which he has just learned. Jacob now
asks after his name. He must not seek this name,
however, prematurely, but learn it in his actual ex-
perience. The names Peniel, Shiloh, Immanuel, are
for him to be developed from the name Israel. Bui
when the parting one gives him a special blessing,
that is the assurance, that in bringing the offering of
the external qualities of the blessing to Esau, he hat
perfectly and fully gained the essential blessing of
Abraham. As in the very begirming of his new
birth he had learned to distinguish between the old
and new life, between Jacob and Israel, between the
wrestlings of Jacob and the strength of Israel, so
also he has now been taught to distinguish betweec
the rights of the natural human birth, and the rightj
of the new divine birth. [There is another view of
od4
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
this wrestling, which bases it upon the character and
previous history of Jacob. He was not, indeed, des-
titute of faith and reliance upon God, but the promi-
nent feature of Ids character was a strong reliance
upon his own resources and strength. He had thus
fallen into doubtful and censurable courses. In this
confidence he had wrestled with Esau for the birth-
right, and with Laban for the reward of his wages
and ids present possessions. God had dealt with
him by chastisements. He had been involved in
difficulties and trials which he could not well have
failed to connect with his sins. Still his fault was
not corrected. And now, on his return to the land
of promise, and his paternal home, to inherit the
blessing lie had so striven to secure, he is met by
Ksau with his four hundred men. Conscious of his
weakness, and reminded of his sins, feeling as he
doubtless did that Esau's anger was not unprovoked,
he flies to God for help (vers. 10-13). His prayer
gives him relief from his fears. But it does not
necessardy wean him from his self-reliance. He
must feel that his crimes against men are at the same
time sins against God. And to teach him this, and
at the same time bring him to unreserved reliance
upon God, is tlie purpose with which God meets him
here. The progress of the struggle and its issue
show this. He struggles with this new combatant
to the very end, or as long as he had any strength,
but when his thigh was thrown out of joint, then he
saw how vain the struggle in this form was. In his
disabled state he merely hangs upon the conqueror,
and thus overcomes hira. He is no longer strong in
himself, but in the Lord. It is his faith, the divine
principle planted in him, in one sense " the divine
energy " workhig in him, which secures the victory.
The lesson wldch Jacob here learned reveals its
power in his wl^ole after-hfe. He is no longer the
supplaiiter. His life is not marked by his own striv-
oigs, but by his reliance upon God. And this is in
accordance with the prophet Hosea (xii. 4 If.), who
not only teaches that the sighs and tears were promi-
nent features in the struggle, but that in his wrest-
ling with GoS in this way, Jacob has completely
secured what he had been striving for from his birth,
the inheritance of the first-bom, the promise and
blessing of the covenant; secured it, however, not
by his own strength, but by casting himself upon
God.— A. G.]
7. With regard to the form of the struggle, it
cannot on the one hand be a dream-vision which is
spoken of (Rosenra. and others), nor on the other
hand an external event (Koitrz: "History of the
Old Covenant," i. p. 260 ; Al'bkrlen, in the article
"Jacob," in Hkkzog's E/icyclopwdic.) [Jaoobus :
"Notes," ii. p. 131 ; MnKpnv, p. 414; Wordswokth,
p. 137. — A. G.] ; for the mythical explanation may
be entirely left out of view. For moral struggles
and decisions are not wrought in dreams or in dream-
yisions. Against an external boddy wrestling,
Hengstenbcrg reirdnds us forcilily that an outward
wrestling docs not occur in the form of weeping and
Bupplicaiion. Kurtz attempts to evade thi^ difficully
by a.'isuming two acts in the struggle, in wliich tlic
external bodily wrei^tling precedes the sjiiritiial wrest-
ling with tears and prayers. He thus seeks to ex-
clude the vision and the ecstasy (conditions which
in our view are only two aspects of one and the
name state). Kcil rejects the idea of a natural cor-
poreal wrestling, but thinks that an ecstasy, of a
like or rclatcil condition of the bo<ly and soul, must
be received Wc have often seen already that the
condition of vision or ecstasy does not exclude th«
objective manifestation. We now see, also, that the
soul-struggles in vision, might present themselves
under the form of bodily labor, an 1 wrestlings of th«
soul, since in the vision the whole spiritual procesj
is represented in pictures ; and further, that such a
struggle may even produce bodily effects, as here the
laiueness of Jacob's thigh. Kurtz replies, on the
contrary, that such effects of the inwaid life upon
the body are not certainly ascertained ; that, indeed,
the reverse is for the most part true in such cases,
the gerrainant bodily complaint giving its peculiai
form to the dream. But how can one confound
these mere natural dreams with the very highest re-
ligious events in the world of mind ? .Should we
suppose that the whole history of the despised one
rested upon a mere illusion, still the history of Geth-
semane would not stand there in vain with reference
to the event here before us. It ha.s been denied that
such a lameness as that described here, could result
from any corporeal wrestUng. [It may be said, how-
ever, that there is no necessity here for departing
from the obvious and literal sense of the passage.
The idea of close personal corporeal conflict seems
to be suggested in the very terms which the sacred
writer has chosen to describe this wrestling. It is
certainly implied in the crippling of the thigh. And
if God walked in the garden with Adam, and partook
of the feast which Abraham prepared, there is no
reason why he should not enter into bodily conflict
with Jacob. The other events in the narrative, the
crossing of the Jabbok, the rising of the sun, seem
also to require that we should understand this wres-
tling as real, objective, corporeal, without any at-
tempt, however, to define too closely its precise
mode. — A. G.]
8. The man who wrestled with Jacob. "Some
have absurdly held that he was an assassin sent by
Esau. Origen : The night-wrestler was an evil spirit
(Eph. vi. 12). Other fathers held that he was a good
angel. The correct view is that he was the constant
revealer of God, the Angel of the Lord." Schroder.
Delitzsch holds " that it was a manifestation of God,
who through the angel was represented and visible
as a man." The well-known refuge from the recep
tion of the Angel of the Incarnation ! In his view,
earlier explained and refuted, Jacob could not be
called the captain, prince of God, but merely the
captain, prince of tlie Angeh "No other writer in
the Pentateuch," Knobel says, " so represents God
under the human form of things as this one." Jacob
surely, with his prayers and tears, has brought God,
or the Angel of the Lord, more conqjletely into the
human form and likeness than had ever occurred be-
fore. The man with whom he wrestles is obviously
not only the angel, but the type also of the future
incarnation of God. As the angel of his face, how-
ever, be marks a development of the form of the
angel of revelation which is taken up and carried on
in Kxodus.
9. The angel and type of the incarnation, is at
the same time an angel and type of atonement.
When Kurtz (p. 257) says "that God here meets
Jacob as an enemy, that he makes an iiostile at-
tack," ihe expressions are too str(uig. There is an
obvious distinction between a wrestler and one wlio
attacks as an enemy, leaving out of view the fact,
that there is nothing said here as to which pa-tj
makes the assault. After the revelations which Ja
cob received at Bethel, Uaran, and Mahanaim, f
peculiar hostile relation to God is out of the ques
CHAP. XXXII.— 3.— XXXIII. 1-16.
55f
lion. So much, certainly, is tiue, that Jacob, to
whom no mortal sins are imputed for whicli he
mu^t oYercome the wrath of God (Kortz, p. liSS,
the dirine wrath is not overcome but atoned), must
now be brought to feel that in all his sms against
men he has striven and sinned against God, and that
he must first of all be reconciled to him, for all tlie
hitherto unrecognized sins of his life.
10. The wT-estling of Jacob ha3 many points of
resemblance to tiie restoratio'i of Peter (Jolm xxi.).
As this history of Peter does not treat of the recon-
stituting of his general relation to Jesus, but rather
of the perfecting of that relation, and with this of
the restitution of his apostolic calling and office, so
here the struggle of Jacob does not concern so much
the question of his fundamental reconciUation with
Jehovah, but the completion of that reconciUation
and the assurance of his faith in his patriarchal
calUng. And if Christ then spake to Peter, when
thou wast young thou girdedst thyself, etc., in order
that he might know that henceforth an entire reli-
ance upon the leading and protection of God must
take the place of his sinful feeling of his own
strengtli and his attachment to his own way, so,
doubtless, the lameness of Jacob's thigh has the
same significance, with this difference, that as Peter
must be cured of the self-will of his rash, fiery tem-
perami nt, so Jacob from his selfish prudence, tend-
ing to mere cunning.
11. A like relation holds between their old and
Dew names. The name Simon, in the narrative of
Peter's restoration, points to his old nature, just as
here the name Jacob to the old nature of Israel.
Simon's nature, however, was not purely evil, but
tainted witli evil. This is true also of Jacob. He
must be purified and freed from his sinful cunning,
but not from his prudence and constant perseverance.
Into these latter features of his character he was
consecrated as Israel. The name Abram passes over
into the name Abraham, and is si ill ever included in
it; the name Lsaac has in itself a two-fold signifi-
cance, which intimates the laughter of doubt, and
that of a joyful faith ; but the name Jacob goes
along with that of Israel, not merely because the
latter was preeminently the name of the people, nor
because in the new-birth the old life continues side
by side, and only gradually disappears, but also be-
cause it designates an element of lasting worth, and
etiU further, because Israel must be continually re-
minded of the contrast between its merely natural
and its sacred destination.
12. The sacred and honored name of the Israelit-
ish people, descends from this night-wrestling of
Israel, just as the name Christian comes from the
birth and naiue of Christ. The peculiar destination
of the Old-Testament children of the covenant is
ihat they should be warriors, princes of God, men
of player, who carry on the conflicts of faith to vic-
tory. Hence the name IsraeUtes attains complete-
ness in that of Christians, those who are divinely
blessed, the anointed of God. The name Jews, in
its derivation from Judah, in their Messianic des-
tination, forms the transition between these names.
They are those who are praised, who are a praise
and glory to God. But the contrast between the
ounning, running into deceit, which characterized
the old nature of Jacob, and the persevering struggle
01 faith and prayer of Israel, pervades the whole
oistory of the Jewisli people, and hence Hosea, ch.
lii. 1 ff., applies it to the Jewish people (see Kcrtz,
p. 259, with reference to the "Practical Com.' of
Umbreit, iv. p. 82). The force of this contrast
Ues ill this, that in the true Israelite there is no guile
since he is purified from guile (John i. 47), and thai
Christ, the king of Israel (ver. 4-1), is without guile,
while the deceit of the Jacob nature reaches it#
most terrible and atrocious perfection in the kiss of
Judas.
13. The natural night, through which Jacob car
ried on his long wrestling, not oijy figures sym'.)oli-
cally the inner night which brooded over his soul,
but also the mystery of his new-birth, determined of
course by its (JId-Testament Umits. Hence the dawn
and sunri.<e indicate not only the blessed state of
faith which he had now gained, but also the fact that
he, as the halting and lame, now appeared as a new
man in the light of the breaking day.
14. When it is said of Israel that he had prevailed
with God, we must not forget that he prevailed with
him because God permitted him to do so. The idea
that God permits himself to be overcome, assumes
a gross and dangerous form if we should apply it
to our selfish prayers according to our own selfish
thoughts. In the entire concession to the grace of
God, the believer first reaches that turning-point in
his life where the will of God becomes even his own
will, where God can yield and confide himself to the
will of his faith.
15. In the apparent rejection of Jacob's question.
Tell me, I pray thee, thy name ? the angel proceeds
in the same way with Christ in his pubhc ministra-
tions. He does not immediately call himself Christ.
Believers must attain the true idea of his name from
the experience of its efi'ects.
16. The growth in Jacob's life of faith is marked
by the names Bethel, Mahanaim, Peniel. But it is
surely an entirely unallowable explanation of the
words " I have seen God face to face, and my life is
preserved," when they are explained upon the preva-
lent Jewish notion, that whoever has seen Jehovah
must die. Leaving out of view the essential germ
of that notion, that the sight of the glory of God
terrifies sinful men and mortifies sin within them,
which takes place in this case also, it might be held
more plausibly that this very notion grew out of a
misunderstanding of these words (comp. the similar
expression of Hagar, ch. xvi. 13). Dklitzsch : "The
sun which rose upon Jacob at Peniel has its antitype
in the sun of the resurrection morning."
17. The glorious reconciUation between Jacob and
Esau is based upon the perfect reconciliation of Jacob
with God. For the old way in which he hoped to
overcome Esau, he now makes amends in tiie new
method by which he actually overcomes him. We
shall do injustice to the history if we do not distin-
guish here the elements of humility, satisfaction,
reconciling love, and confidence. Jacob's humilia-
tion before Esau implies his humiliation before God ,
his satisfaction to Esau, his reconciUation with God ;
and the strength of his love and confidence by which
he overcomes Esau, comes from Jehovah's grace and
truth.
18. The fact that Jacob after his reconciliation
with Esau, could not be prevailed upon by any con-
sideration whatever, either of fear or favor, to mingli
with him, is the clearest proof of the strength of til
patriarchal consciousness.
19. For the mythical traditions which resemblt
this wTestling of Jacob with God, see DeUtascl'
Bimsen, Schroder, upon the passage.
D5e
OENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES
IIOMIIETIOAL AND PRACTICAL.
See the Doctrinal paragraphs. — Jacob between
Laban and Esau on his homeward journey. — Jacob's
progress from struggle to struggle. — His conflict with
Laban compared wiih that with Esau. — Uis struggle
with men, in comparison with that with God. — How
the sins of youth are punished after a long period of
years. How Jacob, through his prayer, passes from
the plan of flight from Esau, suggested by his human
I'ears, to the method of attacking him witli the
weapons of humility and love ; from a mere human
defensiTe, to a divine offensive. — The prayer of Ja-
cob.— The distinction between his prayer and his
wrestling. — Jacob's act of faith in crossing the Jab-
boli. — Jacob's struggle and victory, or how from
Jacob he became Israel. — The features of the devel-
opment of revealed faith In Jacob's wrestling : 1.
The germ of the incarnation (Godhead and humanity
wre.<tling with each other ; the Godhead in the form
of a man) ; i. the germ of the atonement (sacrifice
of the human will); R. the germ of justification by
faith ( 1 will not let thee go, etc.) ; 4. the gei-m of the
new-birth (Jacob, Israel); 5. the germ of the prin-
ciple of love to one's enemies (the reconciliation
with God, reconciliation with the world). — Jacob's
night and Israel's dawn. — The sacrifice of human
prudence upon the altar of God, one of the most
diSicult sacrifices (more so than that of human
strength). — Bethel, Mahanaim, Peniel, divine stations
in the journey of the pilgrim of faith. — The shep-
herd train of Jacob, and the warlike procession of
Esau. — Civility a barrier against injury, and a source
of security and protection. — In their tears Jacob and
Esau are twins once more. — Thus the nobler life of
the world and the life of faith have twin elements
and moments. — The permanent friendship I etween
Jacob and Esau (persons so in antipathy with each
other, the children of God and men of the world, the
church and the state), under proper conditions and
at proper distances. — The triumph of departing Esau,
and Jacob (the future Bedouin sheik and the ances-
tor of Israel). — Jacob between the Jabbok and the
Jordan. — The return of the banished to his father-
land. — The native country. — The bloom of patri-
archal ism.
Fii-st Section, vers. 4-7. Starke : Christians
must be open to reconciliation with their enemies
(Rom. xii. 18). ^Schroder : If his mother had sent
him the message, as was agreed upon : Thy brother
has now laid aside his anger, then Jacob would have
had an easier journey than now, when he returns
leaning upon the hand of the invisible God (Bauni-
gat ten). — The little ship nears the haven, all de|ieiius
on this last moment. — Esau a-s prince in Mount Seir.
— Thus he cliooses with perfect freedom what God
has Irom the beginning determined (Baum. and
t'alvin).
■Second Section, vers. 8, 9. Schroder : We must
not overlook the nanre of Jehovah in his prayer. The
•Janger ia so great that a mere general belief in a gen-.
£:ai providence will not sustain him (Hengstenbeig).
Third Section, vers. 10-13. .St.xkke ; Nothing is
more humbling tlian the grace of God. — Cramer:
There i^ no better way to avoid danger than by be-
'Uving prayer (I's. xxvii. 8). — Sohhodkr : His humil-
ity does not blush at the recolleciion : for with ray
Jtafi', etc. — 'J'lie mother with the children. The words
describe the most relenth'ss cruelty. — The death of
a mother, over and with her children, is the most
cruel way of taking life imaginable (Baumgarten). —
God saved his promise in having Jacob. — Tadbe
The school of the cross is the most glorious school,
for: 1. It reveals his God to the Chri^'ian ; 2. it
reveals also the Christian heart before God and th(
world.
Fourth Section, vers. 14-22. Starke: If we ma.'
infer from his presents, as to the size of his flock»
of dift'ereut kinds, we shall easily see how abundantly
God has bltssed Jacob, and fulfilh-d to him his prom-
ise of prosperity. — Schroder : He chooses milch-
c:miels because they are more valuable for their milk,
which is u.-ed by the Arabians as a drink. The
camel's milk becomes intoxicating when it has stood
a few hours, but when I'rcsh has no such projferty
(Michaelis).
Fi/th S,etio)i, vers. 23-33. Starke: Cramer:
When a Christian has prayed, he is not to sit down
in idleness and security, but should consider wel
how he may best accomplish his end. — There is nt
better way to win the heart of an enemy than b)
good deeds (1 Sam. xxv. 18 1. — Bibl. Tub. : There is
no conflict more blessed and glorious tlian when we
wrestle with God in (aith and prayer, and tlms take
heaven by violence. — Osiasder : God is often accus-
tomed thus to try his saints, and prove their faith;
he sends upon them many atSictions at the same
time, but still sustains his saints so that they shall
not sink (Exod. iv. 24 ; Ps. xxxviii. 0 ff.). — We bear
about with us the marks of our sin, our misery, and
our mortality, that we may not become proud (2 Cor.
xii. 7). — (Ver. 26. The Jews, who hold this man to
have been an angel, suppo-^e that in thus addressmg
Jacob he wished to remind him that it was time tor
him to sing his morning song. For the Jews be-
lieved that at the dawn the angels raised their
hymns of praise to God. — Ver. 28 (no more ; No,
here, is equivalent with not alone). — Luther : Here
the temptation lo despair often enters, a temptation
by which the greatest saints are wont to be tried.
Whoever stands the test, he comes to the perlect
knowledge of the will of God, so that he can say, I
have seen God face to face. — Hall : When tlie angel
of the covenant has once blessed, no trial can make
us miserable (John x. 28). — (Ver. 32. The Jews
think that Jacob was healed at Sichem, and hence
the city was called Shalem.) — Conjpare the conflict
of Jacob after he had crossed tlie Jabbok, with the
conflict of Jesus in Gethscmane, after he had crossed
the Kedron. [Wordsworth also has a long and sug-
gestive note, in which Jacob is held up as a type of
Christ, and this comparison is carried out into vari-
ous minute points. — A. G.] — Jacob a type of the
New-Testament church. — Hil/t. Tub. : They are
blessed who see the face of God in faith, for thua
tlieir souls are healed. — Cramer : To see God is the
best Ibod for souls, their strength and courage (1
Cor. xiii. 12). — Geulacii, upon the 28th ver,se : In
the words, with men, God reminds him of the more
consolatory aspect of the events of his forme:- life,
of the opposition which first Esau, then lsa:ic, etc
(We must remember, however, that in the previous
struggles he was victorious as Jacob merely.)— Calw,
Httnd.: Although all human power is weakness com-
pared with God, yet he sutlers himself to be over-
come by faith and prayer. — His name truly was a
confession of his sin, — Schroder: Quotations Irom
G. D. Krl'mmachi:k's "Contest and Victory of Ja-
colj." — The thigh is the very basis of the body ; when
it is put out of joint the body falls (KiiiJM.MAi'iiKK ■
Jacob, liowever, did not fall). — 'fhere was noiliiii ;
left lor him but to hang upo:i ins ueek if he woul
CHAP. XXXJII. 17— XXXV. 1-15.
.55-
BOt fall. — Hope maketh not ashamed —The wrestler
first for himself and with men, then with G(id and
with men, lastly for God and for men. — The name of
Christian is the completion of the name Israel. —
Taube : Jacob's conflict and victory: 1. The con-
test ; 2. the victory.
Shei/i Sec/ion, ch. xxxiii. 1-11. Starke: In ttiis
manner we Christians are in the eyes of the world
the most miserable, subject to every one, but in truth
we are and remain the heirs of heaven and earth. —
Ver. 7. The wives of Jacob. N'ow when they tlioufrlit
to reach his father's house and their kindred, they
are in fear of death. This was certainly a severe
test. — How beautiful when contending parties come
together ; but then previous difficulties must not be
called up (Rom. xii. 10). — In the world, among all
outward means there are none more effectual than
presents and gifts (Prov. xvii. 8). — Gerlacu : An
atoning present is indeed blessing (1 Sam. xxv. 27).
— Lisco : His victory of faith is typical for all the
children of God.
Seventh Section, ver. 12-16. Starke: (Ver. 14.
Some are offended at Jacob and have charged hio
with deceit (Calvin). But it rather seems that ai
the first he was willing to go thither. Perhaps GoC
had warned him, as he did the wise men (Matt. ii.
12). — Ver. 15. Osiander: All official persons ii
ecclesiastical or worldly positions should use wig*
precaution, that they may direct affairs accord'mg to
the power of those who arc entrusted to them, legt
they should be rather injured than helped. — Schro-
per: Luther: Note, the justifi-'d and those resting
ill tlieir good works cannot walk together. — Calw.
Hand. : Persons so widely different as Esau and Ja.
cob are the best friends when they do not come into
too close relations. — Schroder: The sacred Scrip-
tures are indeed sacnd. As the dark side of the elect
is revealed without any attempt at concealment, so
they do not pass without notice the brighter features
of those who are without. We find traces of the
divine image in every one, and it is too frequently
true that the world teaches morality to the believei
SIXTH SECTION
Jaeoi' s settlement in Canaan. At Succoth. At Shechem. Dinah. Simeon and Levi. The fint mani-
festation of Jetcish fanaticism. Jacobus rebuke, and removal to Bethel.
Chapter XXXIII. 17— XXXV. 1-15.
17 And Jacob journeyed to Succoth [booths], and built him an house, and made booths
for his cattle : therefore the name of the place is called Succoth.
18 And Jacob came to Shalem ' [in peace], a city of Shechem, which is in the land of
Canaan, when he came from Padan-aram [Mesopotamia] ; and pitched his tent before the
19 city. And he bought a [the] parcel of a field, where he had spread his tent, at the
hand of the children of Hamor [ass ; peaceful bearer of public burdens], Shechem's father, for
20 an hundred pieces " of money. And he erected there an altar, and called it El-Elohe-
• Israel [strength of God, the God of Israel]
Ch. XXXIV. 1. And Dinah the daughter of Leah, which she bare unto Jacob, went out
2 to see the daughters of the land. And when Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite,
prince of the country [rerion], saw htr, he took her, and lay with her, and defiled her.
3 And his soid clave unto Dinah tlie daughter of Jacob, and he loved the damsel, and
4 spake ' kindly unto the damsel. And Shechem spake unto his father Hamor, saying,
5 -Get me this damsel [from .Jacob] to wife. And Jacob heard that he had defiled Dinah
his daughter: (now his sons were with his cattle ''■ ''-e field : and Jacob held his peace
[held in, or to himself] until thev were come).
6 And Hamor the father of Shechem went out unto Jacob to commune with him.
7 And the sons of Jacob came out of the field when they heard it : and the men were
grieved, and they were very wroth^ because he had wrought folly in Israel, in lying
8 with Jacob's daughter; wliich thing ought not to be done [and remain]. And Hamor
communed with them, saying. The soul of my son Shechem longeth for your daughter :
9 I pray you give her him to wife. And make ye marriages with us, and give your
10 daughters unto us, and take our daughters unto you. And ye shall dwell with us: and
the land shall be before you ; dwell and trade ye therein, and get you possessions there-
11 in. And Shechem said unto her father, and unto her brethren. Let me find grace ic
12 your eyes, and what ye shall say unto me, I will give. Ask me never so much dowry
and gift [price of the bride], and I will give according as ye shall say unto me : but give
558 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
13 me the damsel to wife. And the sons of Jacob answered Shecheni and Ilamor hii
father deceitfully [under mere pretence], and said, Because lie liad defiled Dinah tlieir sist*"-:
14 And they said unto tlieni, We cannot do this thing, to give our sister to one tiiat is
15 uncircuiucised : for that were a reproach unto us: But in this [condition] will we consent
1 3 unto 3-0U : If ye will be as we he, that every male of you be circumcised ; Then will
we give our daughters unto you, and we will take your daughters to us, and we wiL
17 dwell with you, and we will become one people. But if ye will not hearken unto ua,
18 to be circumcised; then will we take our daughter, and we will be gone. And theif
19 words pleased Hamor, and Shecliem, Hamor's .son. And the young man deferred not
to do the thing, because he had deUght in Jacob's daughter : and he loas more honor
able than all the house of his father.
20 And Hamor and Shecliem his son came unto the gate of their city, and communed
21 with the men of their cit}', saying. These men are peaceable with us, therefore let them
dwell in the land, and trade therein : for the land, behold, it is large enough for them ;
22 let us take their daughters to us for wives, and let us give them our daughters. Only
herein [on this condition] will the men consent unto us for to dwell with us, to be one
23 people, if every male among us be circumcised, as they are circimicised. Shall not their
cattle, and their substance, and every beast of theirs be ours ? only let us consent unto
24 them, and they will dwell with us. And unto Hamor, and imto 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 son3
of Jacob, Simeon and Levi, Dinah's brethren, took each man his sword, and came upon
26 the city boldly, and slew all the males. And they slew Hamor and Shechem his son
with the edge of the sword, and took Dinah out of Sliechem's house, and went out.
27 The sons of Jacob came [now] upon the slain and spoiled tlie city; because they
28 [its inhabitants] had defiled their sister. They took their sheep, and their oxen, and their
29 asses, and that which was in the city, and that which was in the field. And all their
wealth and all their little ones, and their wives took they captive, and spoiled even all
30 that was in the house. And Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, Ye have troubled me
[so greatly] to make me to stink among the inhabitants of the land, among the Cnnaan-
ites, and the Perizzites : and I being few in number [of a small household ; easily numbered],
they shall gatlier themselves together against me, and slay me, and I shall be de-
31 stroyed, I and my house. And they said. Should he deal with our sister as with an
harlot ?
Ch. XXXV. 1. And God said unto Jacob, Arise, go up to Bethel, and dwell there : and
make there an altar unto God [ei] that appeared unto thee when tliou fleddest from the
2 face of Esau thy brother. Then Jacob said unto his household and to all that were
with him. Put away the strange gods that are among you, and be clean, and change
3 your garments: And let us arise, and go up to Bethel; and I will make there an altar
unto God, who answered me in the day [at the time] of my distress, and was with me in
4 the way which I went. And they gave unto Jacob all the strange gods which loere in
their hand [possession], and all their ear-rings which were in their ears ; and Jacob hid
6 them imder the oak [terebinth] which was by Shechem. And they journeyed : and the
terri-r of God 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, whicli is in the land of Canaan (tliat is Bethel), he and all
7 the people that were witli him. And he built there an altar, and called the place El-
beth-el ; l)ecause there God appeared unto him, when he fied from the face of his
8 brother. But Deborah ['*<■], Uebekah's nurse, died, and she was buried beneath Beth-
el, under an oak: and the name of it was called AUon-bachuth.
9 And God appeared unto Jacob again, when he came out of Padan-arain [Mesopoiamia] ;
ift and blessed him. And God said unto him, Thy name is Jacob : thy name shall not
be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall l)e thy name : and he called his name Israel.
tl And God said unto him, 1 am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply; a nation and
a company [^^^P] of nations shall be of thee, and kings shall come out of thy loins.
12 And the land which I gave Abraham and Isaac, to thee I will give il, and to thy seed
13 after thee will I give the land. And God went up from him, in the place where he
CHAP. XXXIII. 17.— XXXV. 1-16.
oai)
14 talked with him. And Jacob set up a pillar in the place where he talked with him
tven a pillar of stone : and he poured a drink-offering thereon, and he poured oil there
15 on. And Jacob called the name of the place where God spake with him Bethel
(* Ver. 18. — Shalem is not a proper noun, but must be rendered in peace^ as in Jacob's vow (xxviii. 21). to whick
•Tldtntly refers.— A. G.l
(' Ver. 19.— Quesilah— weighed or measured. Sept., Vul., OnJi., have /a/n6, as if stamped upon the coin ; but cc3«d
■lODey was not in use among the patriarchs. — A. G.]
'' Ch. xxxiv. 3. — Lit., spake to her heart. — A. G.
•■]
PRELIMINABY EEMAEKS.
The section now before us, whose unity consists
III the remarkable sojouni of Jacob at the different
stations, on his homeward journey to Hebron, may
be divided as follows : 1. The settlement at Suecoth ;
2. the settlement at Shechem ; 8. Dinah : a. The
rape of Dinah; b. Shechem's offer of marriage; c.
the fanatical revenge of the sons of Jacob, or the
bloody wedding ; the plot, the massacre, the sacking
of the city, the judgment of Jacob upon the crime ;
4. the departure tor Bethel ; 5. the sealing of the
covenant between God and the patriarcli at Bethel.
Knobel, as usual, finds here a commingling of Jeho-
visiic and Elohistic elements, since the internal rela-
tions are brought iTito view as little as possible,
while names and words are emphasized.
EXEGETICAL AND CBITICAL.
1. Ver. 17.— To Suecoth. — The name Suecoth,
booths, tents, might have been of frequent occur-
rence in Palestine, but the locality here spol;en of
is generally regarded as the same with the later well-
known city of Suecoth, which lies east of the Jor-
dan. It was situated within the limits of the tribe
of Gad (Jos. xiii. 27 ; Judg. viii. 5-14 ; Ps. bt. 6).
Josephus speaks of it under its Greek name 'S,Kr)vai,
and Jerome says Suecoth is to day a city across the
Jordan, in the neighborhood of Scythopolis, Rob-
inson (later " Resear.," pp. SlO-31-2) identities Sue-
coth with Sakut, lying west of the Jordan, and
southerly from Beisan. The fact that the traditional
Suecoth lies too far to the north, and that it is not
aasy to see how Jacob, after crossing the Jabbok,
should come hither again, is in favor of this sug-
gestion. Xor is it probable that, having so nearly
reached the Jordan, he would have settled in the
east-Jordan region (comp. ch. xxxii. 10). Knobel
thinks that the writer wished to show that the patri-
arch had now fixed his abode in tlie trans->Tordan re-
gion. That Suecoth belonged to the tribe of Gad,
does not disprove Robinson's conjectures, since there
may have been more than one Suecoth. Compare,
further, as to the traditional Suecoth, Vox Raumer
p. 256 ; Knobel, p. 204 [also Keil, Murphy, Words- i
worth, Jacobus, Smith's "Bib. Die.,'' all of whom
decide against Robinson. — A G ] — And he built. — ,'
He piepares here lor a longer residence, since he [
builds himself a house instead of tents, and booths
for liij flocks, i. e., inelosures made of shrubs or
etakes wattled together. Knobel thinks " that tliis
Is very improbable, since Jacob would naturally wish
to go to Canaan and Isaac" (ch. xxii. 8). But if
we bear in mind that Jacob, exhausted by a twenty-
years' servitude and oppression, and a flight of more
than seven days, shattered by his spiritual conflicts,
«nd lame bodily, now, first, after he had crossed the
Tordan. and upon the spiritual and home land, came
to the full sense of his need of repose and quiet,
we shall then understand why he here pauses and
rests. As the hunted hart at last sink? to the ground,
so he settles down and rests here for a time. Ha
seems to have hoped, too, that he would be healed at
Suecoth, and it is probably with a special reference
to this that it is said, ver. 18, that Jacob came " in
peace or in health " to Shechem. Jacob, too, after
his experienceof his brother Esau's importuiuty, had
good reason tor inquiring into the coniiition of things
at Hebron, before he brought his family thither.
[The fact that he built a house for himself, and
permanent booths for his flock, indicates his contin-
ued residence at Suecoth for some years ; and the
age of Dinah at his flight from Laban makes it ne-
cessary to suppose either that he dwelt here or at
Shechem six or more years before the sad events nar-
rated in the following chapter. — A. G.] And it ap-
pears, indeed, that, either from Suecoth or Shechetn,
he made a visit to his father Isaac at Hebron, and
brought from thence his mother's nurse, Deborah,
.since Rebekah was dead, and since she, as the confi-
deiuial friend of his mother, could relate to him the
history of her life and sufferings, and since, more-
over, she stood in closer rel.ation to him than any one
else. Nor could Jacob, as Keil justly remarks, now
an independent patriarch, any longer subordinate
his household to that of Isaac.
2. Tlie sojourn at Shechem (vers. 18-20). —
And Jacob came (to Shalem) in good health.—
The word cVr is taken by the Sept., Vul, and
Luther [and by the translators of the Eng. Bib. —
A. G.], as a proper noun, to Shalem, which soma
have regarded as another name for Shechem, and
others as designating an entirely different place, and
the more so, since the \'illage of Salim is still found
in the neighborhood of Shechem (Robinson: "Re-
searches," vol. iii. p. 114 ft'.). But it is never men-
tioned elsewhere in the Old Testament, and abttj
as an adjective, refers to the Dli'ia. ch. xxviii. 21.
Jehovah has fulfilled his promise. — A city of She-
chem.— Or, to the city. Lit., of Shechetn. The
city was not in existence when Abraham sojourned
in this region (ch. xii. 6). The Hivite prince Ha-
mor had built it and called it after the name of his
SOIL For the old name ilamorthi of Pliny, sea
Keil, p. 224 [who holds that it may be a corruption
from Hamor; but see also Robinson, vol. iii. p. 119.
— A. G.]. — In the land of Canaan. — Keil infers
from these words that Suecoth could not have been
in the land of Canaan, i. e., on the west of the .Tor-
dan. But the words here, indeed, refer to the im-
mediately following Hebraic acquisition of a pieca
of ground, just as in the purchase of the cave at
Hebron by Abraham it is added, " in the land of
Canaan" (ch. xxiii. 19). — Padan-aram (see ch.
XXV. 20)— before the city. — [See the Bible Diction-
aries, especially upon the situation of Jacob's well,
and Robinson,' vol. Mi. pp. 113-1?6. — A. G.]. r?e»
560
GENESIS. OR THE flKST BOOK OF MOSES.
after his return to Hebron Jacob kept a pasture sta-
tion at Shei-hfin (ch. xssvii. 12). — A parcel of a
field (Josh. xxiv. 32). — .Abraham purchased for
himself a [lossession for a burial place at Hebron.
Jacob goes further, and buys a possession for him
self during hfe. " This purchase shows that Jacob,
in liis faith in the divine promise, viewed Canaan as
his own home, and the home of his seed. Tradition
fixes this parcel of land, which, at the comiuest of
t'anaan, fell as an heritage to the sons of Joseph,
and in which Joseph's bones were buried (Josh.
ixiv. 32 ), as the plain lying at the southeast opening
of the valley of Shechem, where, even now, Jacob's
well (John iv. 6) is shown, and about two hundred or
three hundred paces north of it a Mohammedan
wely, as the grave of Joseph (Robinso.s ; " Re-
searches," vol iii. pp. 113-136, and the map of
Xablons, in the "German Oriental Journal," xvi. p.
634)." Keil. For the relation of this passage with
ch. xlviii. 22, see the notes upon that passage. — An
hundred pieces of money. — Onk., Sept.,Vid., and
the older commentators, regard the Quesita as a
piece of silver of the value of a lamb, or stamped
with a lamb, and which some have held as a proph-
ecy pointing to the Lamb of God. Meyer (Heb.
Diet.) estimates the Quesita as equal to a drachm, or
an Egyptian double-drachm. Delitzseh says it was
a piece of metal of an indeterminable value, but of
greater value than a shekel (see Job xlii. 11). — An
altar, and named it. — That is, he undoubtedly
named it with this name, or he dedicated it to El-
Elohe-Israel. Delitzseh views this title as a kind of
superscription. But Jacob's consecration means
more than that his God is not a mere imaginary deity ;
it mean.s, further, th.at he has proved himself actually
to be (iod (God is the God of Israel) ; God in the
clear, definite form of El, the Mighlii, is the God of
hrail. the wreitUr with God. Israel had eiprrienced
both, in the almighty protection which his God had
shown him from Bethel throughout his journeving-,
and in the wrestlings with him, and learned his
might. In the Mosaic period the expre.^sion, Jeho-
vah, the God of Israel, takes its place (Ex. xxxiv.
23). " The chosen name of God, in the book of
Joshua." Delitzseh. [The name of the altar em-
braces, and stamps upon the memory of the world,
the result of the pa.st of Jacob's life, and the expe-
riences through which Jacob had become Israel. —
A. G.J
3. /Jinah (ch. xxxiv. 1-31). — Dinah the daugh.
ter of Leah. — a. T/ie rape of Dinah (vers. 1-4).
Dinah was bom about the end of the fourteenth year
of Jacob's residence in Haran. She wa,s thus about
six yeara old at (he settlement at Suecoth. Tne
sojourn at Suecoth appears to have lasted for about
two years, .hu-ob must have spent already several
years at Shechem, since there are prominent and
definite signs of a more confidential intercourse with
the .Slieebemites. We may infer, ilierefore, iliat
Din.ah was now from twelve to sixteen yeai s of age.
Joseph was seventeen y('ars old when he was sold by
his brethren (ch. xxxvii. 2), and at that time Jacob
had returned to Hebron. There must have passed,
S.ierefore, about eleven years since thf return Iroin
Haran, at wlii.h lime Joseph was six years of age
If now we regard the residence of Jacob at Bethel
and the region of Ephrata as of brief linration, and
bear in mind that the residence at Shechem ceased
with Ihi' rape of Dinah, it follows that Dinah mu.st
have been about loiirteen or fifteen yearn of age
when she wa.'* deflowered. In the East, too, females
reach the age of puberty at twelve, and sometimei
still earlier (Delitzseh). From the same eircum
stances it is clear that Simeon and Le\i must hav^
Deen above twenty. — Went out to see Scarcely
nowever, to see the daughters of the native inhabit*
ants for the first time, nor to a fair or popular festi-
val (Josephus). Her going indicates a friendly visit
to the daughters of the land, a circumstance which
made her abduction ])ossible, for she was taken by
Shechem to his house (ver. 26). — His soul clave
unto Dinah. — This harsh act of princely insolence
and power is not an act of pure, simple lust, whicl
usually regards its subject with hatred (see the his-
tory of Tamar, 2 Sam. xiii. 15). — Spake kindly to
her. — Probably makes her the promise of an honor-
able marriage. b. Shtcheins offer of marnagi
(vers. 5-12). — And Jacob heard it — In a large
nomadic fimily the several members are doubtless
often widely dispersed. Besides, Dinah did not re-
turn home. — Held his peace until they wrero
come. — The brothers of the daughter had a voice
in all important concerns which related to her (xxiv.
50 ff.). Moreover, Jacob had to deal with tht proud
and insolent favorite son of the prince, i. e., prince
of that region, and a painful experience had made
him more cautious than he had been before.- -And
Hamor the father of Shechem As if he wished
to anticipate the indignation of Jacob's youthful
sons. — Because he had wrought folly Keil
speaks of " seduction," but this is an inadei^uate ex-
pression. Some measure of consent on the part of
Dinuh is altogether probable. In this case the dis-
honor (S53B) had a double imDurii7, since an uncir-
cumcised person had dishonored her. — And the
men viexe grieved. — Manly indigiiation rises in
these young men in all its strength, but as the wise
sons of Jacob, they know bow to control themselves.
[It was more than indignation. They were enraged ;
they burned with anger ; it was ki}tdled to them. —
A. G ]— He had wrought folly.— nbrj nrr ,
a standing expression for crimes which are irrecon-
cilable with the dignity and destination of Israel as
the people of God, but especially for gross sins of
the Besh (Deut. xxii. 21 ; Judg. xx. 10 ; 2 Sam. xiil
12 1, but also of other great crimes (Josh. vii. 15i. —
Which thing ought not to be done. — A new
and stricter morality in this respect also, enters with
the name Israel. — My son Shechem. — The hesi-
tating proposal of the father gives the impression of
(.mViairassment. The old man offers Jacob and his
suns the full rights of citizens in his little country,
and the son engages to fulfil any demand of the
brothers as to the bridal price and briiial gilts. Keil
confuses these ordinary determinations. [He holds
only with most that they were strictly presents (tind
not the price for the bride) made to the bride and to
Ikt mother and brothers. — .\. G] — c. The fanat cal
refvtii/e of the .'<oiis of .Jacoh (vers. 1:^-29). — De-
ceitfuUy. — Jacob had scarcely become Israel when
the arts and cunning of Jacob appear in his soii«,
and, indeed, in a worse form, since they glory in
bi ing Israel — And gaid('^^), we cannot do thii
thing. — Keil thinks the refusal of the proposition
lies fundamentally in the proposal itself, beeajse if
they had not refused they would have denied the
historical and saving vocation ol Israel tind his seed.
The father, Israel, appears, however, to have been
of a dilfeieiit opinion. For he doubtless knew tht
proposal of his sons in reply. He docs not condemn
their proposition, however, but the fanatical wav in
CHAP. XXXin. 17— XXXV. 1-15.
561
which they availed themselves of its consequences.
Dinah could not come into her proper relations again
but by Shccbem's passing over to Judaism. Tliis
way of passing over to Israel was always allowable,
«nd those wlio took the steps were welcomed. We
must therefore reject only : I. The extension of the
proposal, according to wliich the Israelites were to
blend themselves with the Sliechemites ; 2 the mo-
tives, which were external advantages. It was, on
the contrary, a harsh and un-sparing course in refer-
ence to Kiiiah, when Leali's two sons wi.shed her back
again ; or, indeed, would even gratify their revenge
and Israelitish pride. But their resort to subtle and
fanatical conduct merits only a hearty condemnation.
-The young man deferred not We lose the
force of the narrative if we say, with Keil, that this
is noticed here by way of anticipation ; the thing is
as good as done, since Shechem is not only ready to
do it, but will make his people ready also. The pur-
pose, indeed, could only be executed afterwards,
since Shechem could not have gone to the gate of
the city after his circumcision. — And communed
with the men of the city. — They appeal in the
sti'ongest way to tiie self-interest of the Shechem-
ites. Jacob's house was wealthy, and the Shechem-
it s, therefore, could only gain by the connection. —
nana. Beasts of burden, camels, and ai-ses. "Ac-
cording to Herodotus, circumcision was practised by
the Phffiniciaus, and probably also among the Ca-
naauites, who were of the same race and are never
referred to in the Old Testament as uncircumcised,
as e. g., it speaks of the unCanaanitiah Philistines.
It is remarkable that the Hivites, Hamor and She-
chem, are spoken of as not circumcised. Perhaps,
however, circumcision was not in general use among
the Phcenician and Canaanitish tribes, as indeed it
was not among the other people who practised the
rite, e. g., the IshmaeUtes, Edomites, and Egyptians,
among whom it was strictly observed only by those
of certain conditions or rank. Or we may suppose
that the Hivites were originally a different tribe from
the Canaanitcs, who had partly conformed to the
customs of the land, and partly not." Knobel. — On
the third day, — After the inflammation set in.
This was the critical day (see Delitzsch, p. 340).
[He says it is well known that the operation in ease
of adults was painful and dangerous. Its subjects
were confined to the bed from two to three weeks,
and the operation was attended by a violent inflam-
mation.— A. G.] " Adults were to keep quiet for
three days, and were often suffering from thirty-five
to forty days." — -Simeon and Levi. — Keuben and
Judah were also brothers of Dinah, but the first was
probably of too feeble a character, and Judah was
too frank and noble for such a deed. " Simeon and
Levi come after Reuben, who, as the first-born, had
a special responsibility towards his father (ch. xxxvii.
21 ff. ; xlii. 22), and appears, therefore, to have
withdrawn himself, and as the brothers of Dinah
next in order undertake to revenge the dishonor of
their sister. For the same reason Ammon was killed
by Absalom (2 Sam. xiii. 28). Seduction is punished
with death among the Arabians, and the brothers of
the seduced are generally active in inflicting it (Xie-
BI7HR ; Anibien, p. 39 ; Borkharot's 'Syria,' p.
361, and 'Bedouins,' p. 89)." Knobel. Keil says
that the servants of Simeon and Levi undoubtedly
tool part in the attack, but it may be a question
whether each son had servants belonging to himself.
The city lay in security, as is evident from the naab.
36
— Sons of Jacob. — With out the 1 conjunctive. The
abiupt form of the narrative does not merely indi-
cate " the excitement over the shocking crime." For
it is not definitely stated that all the sons of Jacob
took part in sackhig the city (Keil), although the
slaughter of the men by Simeon and Levi may have
kindled fanaticism in the others, and have .ed them
to view the wealth of the city as the spoils of war,
or as property without an owner. Much less can it
be said that Simeon and Levi were excluded from
these sons (as Delitzsch supposes). On the contrary,
they are charged (xlix. 6) with hamstringing th«
oxen [Eng. ver., digged through a wall. — A. G.J,
i. e., with crippling the cattle they could not take
with them. Nor are we here to bring into promi-
nence that the Jacob nature breaks out again in thi»
act, but, on the contrary, that the deed of the 3on«
of Jacob is entirely unworthy. [Kurtz urges as an
extenuation of their crime: 1. The fact that they
viewed the rape as peculiarly worthy of punishment
because they were Israel, the chosen people of God,
the bearers of the promise, etc. ; 2. their natural
character, and the strength of their pass'ons ; 3.
their youthful ardor ; 4. the absence of counsel with
their depressed and suffering father. But with every
paUiation, their treachery and bloodthirstiness, their
use of the covenant sign of circumcision as a meani
to cloak their purpose, their extension of their re-
venge to the whole city, and the pillage of the slain,
must shock every one's moral sense. — A. G.] —
d. ITie judfimejd of Jacob upon their crime (vers.
30, 31). — Ye have troubled me If we look at
the places in which the word IDS occurs (Josh. vi.
18; vii. 15), we shall see plainly that Jacob is not
speaking here of mere simple grief. The idea pro-
ceeds from the nhaking of water, to the utmost con-
fusion and consternation of spirit, or changes and
loss of life. The expression made to stiak, signi-
fies not merely to become odious, offensive, but to
make infamous, literally, to make one an abomina-
tion. When Knobel concludes from the words:
And I being few in number, that Jacob did not
censure the act ai: immoral, but only as inconsiderate,
and one which might thus cause his ruin, the infer-
ence is manifestly false and groundless. He ex-
presses his censure of the act as immoral in the
words trouble me, put him to shame, made him
blameworthy, while they thought that they were
glorifying him. — Should he deal. — Should one
then, not should he then (Knobel), for he is dead;
nor even should thei/ t'ttn. The idea is, that if they
had suffered this patiently they would thereby have
consented that their sister should generally have
been treated in this way with impunity. They thus
insist upon the guilt of Shechem, but pass over his
offer of an atonement for his crime, and their own
fearful guilt. " They have the last word (Delitzsch),
but Jacob utters the very last word upon his death-
bed." [And there, too, he makes clear and explicit
his abhorrence of their crime, as not merely dan-
gerous, but as immoral, and this in the most solemn
and emphatic way. — A. G.] Indirectly, indeed, he
even here utters the last word, in his warning call to
rise up and purify themselves by repentance. They
must now flee from their house and home, i. e., from
the land which they have so lately purchased.
4. The departure to Bethel. Ch. xxxv. 1-8.—
And God said to Jacob. — The warning to depart
comes from Elohim, and hence Knobel and Delitz?ch
regard the section in ch. xxxv. as Elohistic. *hougb
>62
GE.VESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Knobel tliinks the Jehorist l:as made additions.
(Vitlioiit regard tii this, we can easily see, that God,
who is to linld the Cauaanites under his fear, so that
they shall not take revenge on the house of Jacob,
must be culled Elohini. Although Jacob had suffer-
ed nearly ten years to elapse since his return from
Mesopotami:!, without fulfilling the vow he had made
(ch. xxviii. 20) at Bethel, when he fled from Esau
(Keil), we are not, therefore, to infer that he had
been regardless of his duty during these ten years.
r;r a perfect security against Esau was a part of
that which was to complete his happy return ; but
there arose a necessity between Peniel and Siiccoth,
that he must not only have security for himself and
his family, against the persecutions of Esau ; but
against his oflBcious importunity, before he could go
beyond Shechem with his whole train. Hence his
sojourn at Succoth and Shechem. But when he is
now reminded of a duty, too slowly fulfilled, the mo-
tive is found not merely in the vow which he has to
fulfil, but in the circumstances occasioned by his
eons, which make his longer stay at Shechem unsafe,
t9 whicli we must, doubtless, add, that in the mean-
while the relations and distinctions between his house
and that of Esau,were more securely and permanent-
ly established. Have not the sons, who formerly
were easily infatuated to render homage to their
stately uncle, now manifested in an extreme way their
Israe/iiix/i consciousness ? The recollection (ch. xxxi.
30) proves that Jacob cherished the consciousness of
his duty. He seems, indeed, to have gone too far in
his precautionary tardiness. In seeking to entirely
avoid Esau, he is entangled with the Shechemites.
The call and warning also — Make an altar at
Bethel — informs him that the time for his complete
return home has now come. — Up to Bethel. —
Betliel lay in the mountain region. — Put away the
strange gods. — Tlie shock that Jacob had expe-
rienced by tlie rape of Dinah, the crime of his sons,
the imperilled existence of his family, and the divine
warning immediately following, strengthens his sense
of the holiness of God, and of the sinfulness in him-
self and his household, and he enjoins, therefore, an
act of repentance, before he can enter upon the act
of thanksgiving. He has, moreover, to confess, in
reference to his house, the sins of a refined idolatry,
the sins of his sons at Shechem, and his own sins of
omission. His love for Rachel had, doubtless, led
him weakly to tolerate her teraphim initil now. B t
now he has grown strong and decided even in ce-
apect to Raeliel. The fanatical Israelitish zeal of his
Rons had also a better element, which may have
quickened his monotheistic feeling. Since the ma-
jority of Jacob's servants came from the circle and
inllucnce of the Nahorites, whose image-worship was
viewed ijy the stricter Israelitish thought as idola-
try (Kx. XX.; Josh. xxiv. 2), there were probably
to be found in Jacob's house other things, besides the
teraphim of Ilichel, winch were regardcil as the ob-
jects of religious veneration. But the jiurification
was necessary, not merely because they were now to
renjove to Bethel, the place of the outward revela-
tion of Jehovah (Knof)i'l), but because the spirit of
Jeliovah utters stronger demands in the conscience
of Jacob, and because the approaching tliaidisgiving
must he sanctified by a foregoing repentance, [There
la gfKid grounil fir the cotijcctnre that there was a
npucial reason for the charge now, since in the spoil
of the city there would be images of gold and silver.
— AM.] — And be clean.— The acts take place in tlie
followirij^ order : 1. The iiuttiiig away of the flt"**nge
gods ; 2. A symbolical purification, completed, with
out any doubt, through religious washings (Ex. xxii
4 ; and similar passages) ; and 3. The change of gar
ments. In some cases (Ex. xix. 20) a mere washing
of the garments was held to be sufficient, here thf
injunction is more strict, since the pollution has oeen
of longer duration. In Knobel's view they were tc
put on their best garments, but they would scarcely go
on their mountain journey in such array. Thechang
ed garments express the state of complete purification,
even externally. — Unto God wrho answ^ered mo.
— He will thus fulfil his vow, and hold a thaaksgiving
feast with them. — And all their ear-rings. — They
followed the injunction of Jacob so strictly, that they
not only gave up the religious images, but also theii
amulets (chains), for the ear-rings were eapecially so
used (see Wi.skr ; Renl Worierbiich^ Amiilds). — And
Jacob hid them. — As stripped and dead human
images they are buried as the dead (Lsa. ii. 2o). —
Under the oak (Terebinth). — Kxobel: "In the
Terebinth grove at Shechem, i. e., under one of its
trees (comp. ch, xii. 6; Judg. vi, 11). According
to ch. xii. 7, and other passages, it was a grove. We
must, therefore, read here nixn, as in Joshua, xxiv.
26, by the same author, to whom belongs also Ex.
xxxii. 2, or assume that there were both kinds of
trees in the grove." — And the terror of God was
upon. — The genuine repentance in the house of Ja-
cob was followed by the bles.sing of divine protec-
tion against the bloody revenge with which he was
threatened from those who dwelled near Shechem.
God himself, as the protecting God of Jacob, laid
this terror upon them, which may have been intro-
duced on the one hand, through the outrage of She-
chem (Knobel); and on the other, through the fear-
ful power of Jacob's sons, their lioly zeal, and that
of their God. — Luz, which is in the land of Ca-
naan.— The words appear to be .added, in order to
fix the f ict, that Jacoli had now accom]ilished his [iros-
perous return. [The name Luz, almond tree, still re-
curs, as the almond tree is still Hourishing. Morphy.
— A. G J — And all the people. — The nmnber
of Jacob s servants, both in women and children,
may have been considerably increased through the
sudden overthrow of Shechem. Although Jacob
would have restored all, as some have conjectured,
the heads of the families to whom this restitution
could be made were wanting. — That is Bethel. —
There is no contradiction, as Knobel thinks, between
this passage and ch. xxviii. 19, which is to be ex-
jilained upon the assumption of an Elohistic account,
lint as (vers. 1 5) a confirmation of the new name which
.Jacob gave the city. Luz is so called by the Canaau-
ites now, as it was before, although a solitary wander-
er had named the [ilace, where he spent the night,
more than twenty years before, Bethel. — El-Bethel.
He names the altar itself, as he had also the altar at
Shechem (ch. xxxiii. 2il). and still further the place
surrounding the altar, and thus declared its conse-
cration as a sanctuary. El, too, is here in the geni-
tive, and to be nad i>f God ; the place is not called
(iod of Bethel, but of the God of Bethel. He thus
eviilently connei'ts this consecration with the earlier
revelation of God received at Bethel. * — Then Deb-
orah died. — The nurse of Rebekah h.id gone with
her to Ilel)i'on, but how came she here? Delitzsch
conjectures that Rebekah had sent her, according
to the promise (ch. xxvii. 46), or to her daughter-
• [The vert) tlPiD, appejired, is tiore plurai — one of tb
few caseH im whicli Efohim takes the plural -flrb.— A. (1.)
CHAP. XXXIII. 17— XXXV. 1-16.
i>6S
in-law and grandchildren, for their care ; but we
hare ventured the suggestion that Jacob took her
with him upon his return from a visit to Hebron.
She found her peculiar home in Jacob's house, and
irith his children after the death of Rebekah. For
other views see Knobel, who naturally prefers to
Bud a difficulty even here. It is a well-known
method of exaggerating all the blanks in the
Bible into diversities and contradictions. ^Allon-
bachuth. — Oak of weeping. Delitzsch conjectures
that perhaps Judg. iv. 6 ; 1 Sam. xvi. 3, refer to
the same tree as a monument, a conjecture which,
however, the locality itself refutes. — And Ood ap-
peared unto Jacob.^The distinction between
God spake and Ooil appearedh iinalogous to the dis-
tinction in the mode of revelation (ch. xii. vers. 1
and 7). " He now appears to him," Keil says, " by
day in visible form : for the darkness of that form-
er time of anguish has now given way to the clear
light of salvation. The representation is incorrect,
and is based upon the assumption, that the night
revelations are confined to times of trouble. — Again.
— Now, at his return when the vow has been paid,
as before in his migration, when the vow was oc-
casioned and made. But now Jehovah appears to
him as his God, according to his vow, t/ien shall
the Lord be mi/ God. [ Wken he came out of Padan-
aram. — This explains the clause (ver. 6), which is
in the land of Canaan. Bethel was the last point
in the land of Canaan that was noticed in his flight
from Esau. His arrival at this point indicates that
he has now returned to the land of Canaan. Mokpht,
p. 427. — A. G.] — And blessed him. — So also Abra-
ham was blessed repeatedly. — Thy name is Jacob ?
— We read the phrase according to its connection
with ch. xxxii. 27, as a question. Then Jacob an-
swered to the question " what is thy name ? Jacob.
Here God resumes tlie thread again, thou art Jacob?
But if any one is not willing to read the words as a
question, it still marks a progress. The name Israel
was given to him at Peniel, here it is sealed to him.
Hence it is here connected with the Messianic prom-
ise. [Murphy suggests also that the repetition of
the name here implies a decline in his spiritual life
between Peniel and Bethel. — A. G.] — I am Ood
Almighty. — This self-applied title of God has the
lame significance here as it had in the revelation of
God for Abraham (xvii. 1) ; there he revealed him-
self as the miracle-working God, because he had
promised Abraham a son ; here, however, because he
promises to make from Jacob's family a community
[assembly. — A. G.] of nations. [The kahal is sig-
nificant as it refers to the ultimate complete fulfil-
ment of the promise in the true spiritual Israel.
— A. G.] * Knobel sees here only aci Elohistic
statement of the fact which has already appeared
of the new naming of Jacob, which, too, he re-
gards as a mere poetic fiction. According to this
supposition, Israel here cannot be warrior of God,
but, perhaps, prince with God. Even Delitzsch
wavers between the .assumption of an Elohistic redac-
tion or revision, and the apprehension and recognition
of new elements, which, of course, fiivor the idea of a
* [Murphy says, from this time the multiplicnlion of
Israel is rapid. In twenty-five ye.irs after this time he goes
iowii into Egypt with seventy sollle. and two liandred and
Sen years after that Israel goes out of Esypt numbering
ihout one million eight hundred thousand. A nation and
R ctmtjrega' ion of nations, such as loere then known in the
rorld. had at the last date come of him, and " kings" were
lO follow in due time.— 4.. G.]
new fact. To these new elements belong the libation,
the drink-offei ing (probably of wine), poured upon the
stone anointed with oil, Jacob's own reference to thii
revelation of God at Bethel fch. xlviii. 3), and the
circumstance that Hos. xii. 5, can only refer to this
revelation. Under a closer observation of the devel-
opment of Jacob's faith, tliere is no room to speak
of any confounding the thcophany at Peniel with •
second theophany at Bethel. It must be observed,
too, that henceforth the patriarch is sometimes called
Jacob, and sometimes Israel. [This is the first men-
tion of the drink-offering in the Bible. — A. G.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. We view Jacob's settlement at Succoth: a. In
the light of a building of booths and houses for re-
freshment, after a twenty years' servitude, and tiie
toils and soul-conflicts connected with his journey-
ings (comp. the station Elim, Ex. xv. 27, where Is-
rael first rested) ; b. As a station where he might
regain his health, so that he could come to .Shechem
well and in peace ; c. As a station where he could
tarry for a time on account of Esau's importunitj
(comp. Exegetical notes).
2. Jacob's places of abode in Canaan, in their
principal stations, are the same with those of his
grandfather Abraham. He settles down in the vicin-
ity of Shechem, as formerly .Abraham had done in
the oak groves of Moreh (ch. xii. 6). Then he re
moved to Bethel, just as Abraham had gone into the
same vicinity (ch. xii. 8), and after his wandering to
Egypt returned here again to Bethel. At last he
comes to Hebron, which had been consecrated by
Abraham, as the seat of the patriachal residence.
3. The importance of Shechem in the history of
the kingdom of God (see Bible Diet.) It Is: a. A
capital of the Hivites, and as such the scene of the
brutal heathenish iniquity, in relation to the rehgious
and moral dignity of Israel ; b. The birth-place of
Jewish fanaticism in the sons of Jacob ; c. A chief
city of Ephraim, and an Israelitish priestly city ;
d. The capital of the kingdom of Israel for some time ;
e. The principal seat of the Samaritan nationality
and cultus. The acquisition of a parcel of land at
Shechem by Jacob, forms a counterpart to the pur-
chase of Abraham at Hebron. But there is an evi-
dent progress here, since he made the purchase for
his own settletnent during Ufe, while Abraham barely
gained a burial place. The memory of Canaan by
Israel and the later conquest (comp. xlviii. 22), is
closely connected with this possession. In Jacob's
life, too, the desire to exchange the wandering no-
madic life for a more fixed abode, becomes more appa-
rent than in the life of Isaac. [Robinson's "History
of Shechem " is full and accurate. Wordsworth's re-
mark here, after enumerating the important events
clustering around this place from Abraham to Christ,
is suggestive. Thus the history of Shechem, combin-
ing so many associations, shows the uniformity of
the divine plan, extending through many centuries,
for the sahatian of the world by the promised seed
of .Abraham, in whom all nations are blessed ; and foi
the outpouring of the spirit on the Israel of God,
who are descended from the true Jacob; and foi
their union in the sanctuary of the Christian church ,
and for the union of all n.itions in one household it*
Christ, Luke, i. 68.^A. G.]
4. Dinah's history, a warning history for th(
daughters of Israel, and a foundation of the Old
564
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Testament limitation of the freedom of the female
3ex.
6. The collision between the sons of Jacob and
Shechem, the son of Haraor, is a vivid picture of the
collisions between the youthful forms of political
despotism and hierarchal pride. Sheciiem acts as
an insolent worldly prince, Jacob's sons as young
fanatical priests, luring him to destruction.
6. Afier- Jacob became Israel, the just conscious-
ness of his theocratic dignity appears manifestly in
Ins sons, under the deformity of fanatical zeal. \fe
may \iew this narrative as tlie history of the origin,
and fiisr original form of Jewish and Christian
fanaticism. We notice first that fanaticism does not
originate in and for itself, but clings to religious and
moral ideas as a monstrous and misshapen outgrowth,
since it changes the spiritual into a carnal motive.
The sons of Jacob were right in feeling that they
wore deeply injured in the religious and moral idea
and dignity of Israel, by Shecliem's deed. But still
they are already wrong in their judgment of She-
chem's act ; since there is surely a difference between
the brutal lust of Amnion, who after his sin pours
his hatied upon her whom he had dishonored, and
Shechem, who passionately loves and would marry
the dishonored maiden, and is ready to pay any sum
as an atonement ; a distinction which the sons of
Jacob mistook, just as those of the clergy do at this
day who throw all breaches of the seventh command-
ment into one common category and as of the same
heinous dye. Then we observe that Jacob's sons
justly shun a mixture with the Shechemites, al-
though in this case they were ndlling to be circum-
cised for worldly and selfish ends. But there is a
clear distinction between such a wholesale, mass
conversion, from improj)er motives, which would
have corrupted and oppressed the house of Israel,
and the transition of Shechem to the sons of Israel,
or the establisiinient of some neutral position for
Dinah. But leaving this out of view, if we should
prefer to maintain (what Jacob certainly did not
maintain) that an example of revenge must be made,
to intimidate the heathen, and to warn the future
Israel against the Canaanites, still the fanatical zeal
in the conduct of Jacob's sons passed over into fa-
naticism strictly so called, which developed itself
from the root of spiritual pride, according to its three
world-historical characteristics. The first was cun-
ning, the lie, and enticing deception. Thus- the Hu-
guenots were enticed into Paris on the night of St.
Bartholomew. The second was the murderous at-
tack and carnage. How often has this form shown
itself in the history of fanaticism ! Tliis protended
Siicred murder and carnage draws the third charac-
teristic sign in its train : rapine and pillage. The
possessions of the heretics, according to the laws of
the miildle ages, fell to tlie executioner of the pre-
tended justice ; and the history of the crusades
against the heretics testifies to similar horrors ami
devaxlation. Jacob, therefore, justly declares his
condemnation of the iniqidty of the brothers, Simeon
and Levi, not only at once, but upon his death-bed
(ch. xlix.), and it marks the assurance of the apocry-
phal standpoint, when the book Judith, for the pur-
pose of palliating the crime of Judith, glorifies in
a poetical stmin the like fanatical act of Simeon (ch.
ii.). Judith, indeed, in the trait of cunning, appears
fts the datigliter in spirit of her ancestor Simeon.
We must ii.;* fail to distinguish here in our liistory,
in this first vivid picture of fanaticism, the nobler
point of departure, the theocratic motive, from the
terrible counterfeit and deformity. In this relation
there seems to have been a diflFerence between th«
brothers, Simeon and Levi. While the former ap
pciirs to have played a chief part in the history of
Joseph also (ch. xlii. 24, and my article, "Simeon,"
in Herzog's " Real Encyclopedia"), and in the divi
sion of Canaan was dispersed among his brethreUi
the purified Levi came afterwards to be the repre-
sentative of pure zeal in Israel (Exod. xxxii. 28 ;
Deut. xxxiii. 8) and the admmislrator of the priest-
hood, i. e., the theocratic priestly first-born, by tho
side of Judah the theocratic political first-bom. A
living faith and a faithful zeal rarely develop them-
selves as a matter of fact without a mixture of fa-
naticism ; " the flame gradually purifies itself from
the smoke." In all actual individual cases, it is a
question « hether the flame overcomes the smoke, or
the smoke the flame. In the life of Christ, the Old-
Testament covenant faithfulness and truth bums
pure and bright, entirely free from smoke ; in the
history of the old Judaism, on the contrary, a dan-
gerous mixture of fire and smoke steams over the
land. And so in the development of individual be-
lievers we see how some purify themselves to the
purest Christian humanity, while others, over sinking
more and more into the pride, cunning, uncharitable-
ness and injustice of fanaticism, are completely
ruined. Delitzsch : " The greatest aggravation of
their sin was that they degraded the sacred sign of
the covenant into the common means of their mal-
ice. And yet it was a noble germ which exploded so
wickedly."
7. This Shechemite carnage of blind and Jewish
fanaticism, is reflected in a most remarkable way, as
to all its several parts, in the most infamous crime
of Christian fmaticisin, the Parisian St. Bartholo-
mew. [The narrative of these events at Shechem
shows how impartial the sacred writer is, bringing
out into prominence whatever traits of excellence
there were in the characters of Shechem and Hamor,
while he does not conceal the cunning, falsehood,
and cruelty of the sons of Jacob. Xor should we
fail to observe the connection of this narrative with
the later exclusion of Simeon and Levi from the
rights of the first-born, to which they would natu-
rally have acceded after the exclusion of Reuben ;
and with their future location in the land of Canaan.
The history furnishes one of the clearest proofs of
the genuineness and unity of Genesis. — A. G.]
8. Jacob felt that, as the Israel of God, he was
made offensive even to the moral sense of the sur-
rounding heathen, through the pretended holy deed
of his sons ; so far so that they had endangered the
very foundntion of the theocracy, the kingdom of
(iod, the old-covenant church. Fauiiticism always
produces the same resiUts ; either to discredit Chris-
tianity in the moral estimate of the world, and im-
peril its very existence by its unreasonable zeal, or
to expose it to the most severe persecutions.
0. The direction of Jacob to Bethel, by the com-
mand of (iod, is a proof that in divine providence
tlie true community of believers mu:<t separate itself
from the condition into which fanaticism has placed
it. By this emigration Israel hazards the possession
at Shechem which he had just acquired.
10. Divine providence knows perfectly bow to
unite in one very different aims, as this narrative
very clearly shows. They are then, indeed, subordi.
nated to the one chief end. The chiif end her«
which the providence of God has in view in the jour
ney of Jacob from Shechem to Bethel, is the dut>
CHAP. XXXIII. 17— XXXV. 1-15.
56:
>{ Jacob to fulfil the vow he had made at Bethel.
Dut with this the object of his removing from She-
?ht'ra and of his concealed flight is closely connect-
ed. So also the purpose of purifying his house from
the guilt of fanaticism, and the idolatrous image-
worship. At the same time it is thus intimated that
both these objects would have been secured already,
If Jacob had been more in earnest in the fulfilment
of his vow.
1 1. As Jacob intends holding a feast of praise and
thanksgiving at Bethel, ho enjoins upon his house-
hold first a feast of purification, i. e., a fast-day.
This preparation rests upon a fundamental law of the
inner spiritual life. We must first humble ourselves
for our own deeds, and renounce all known evil
practices, if we would celebrate with joyful praise
and thanksgiving, with pure eyes and lips, the gra-
cious deeds of God. The approach of such a feast
is a foretaste of blessedness, and hence the con-
science of the pious, warned by its approach, is
quickened and made more tender, and they feel
more deeply the necessity for a previous purification
by repentance. In the Mosaic law, therefore, the
purification precedes the sacrifices ; the solemnities
of the great day of atonement went before the joy-
ful feast of tabernacles. Hence the Christian pre-
pares himself for the holy Supper through a confes-
sion of his sins, and of his faith, and a vow of re-
formation. The grandest form in which this order
presents itself is in the conufction between Good-
Friday and Easter, both in reference to the facts
jommemorated (the atonement and the new life iu
Christ) and in reference to the import of the solemni-
ties. The Advent-season affords a similar time for
oreparation for the Christmas festival (comp. Matt.
•. 23).
12. Viewed in its outward aspect, the purification
of Jacob's house was a rigid purification from relig-
ious image-worship, and the means of superstition,
which the now awakened and enlightened conscience
of Jacob saw to be nothing but idolatry. But these
wurks of superstition and idolatry are closely con-
nected with the fanaticism for which .Jacob's house
must also repent. The common band or tie of idol-
atry and fanaticism is tlie mingling of the religious
state and disposition with mere carnal thoughts or
•Bentiments. There is, indeed, a fanaticism of icono-
clasm, but then it is the same carnal thought, which
regards the external aspect of religion as religion
itself, and through this extreme view falls into an
idolatrous fear of images, as if they were actual hos-
tile powers. The marks of a sound and healthy
treatment of images idolatrously venerated, are clear-
ly seen in this hi.<tory : 1. A cheerful putting away
of the images at the warning word of God ; but no
threats or violence against the possessors of the im-
»ges ; '1. a seemly removal, as in the burial of the
dead body. Whatever has been the object of wor-
ship should be buried tenderly, unless it was used
directly for evil and cruel purposes. The sacred
washings follow the removal of the unages, the pre-
lude to the religious washings of the Jews, and the
first preliminary token of baptism. The washing
was a symbol of the purifying from sin and guilt by
repentance ; and as such w;is connected witii the
change of garments, the new garments symbolizing
the new disposition, as with the baptismal robes.
13. The religious earnestness with which Israel
Jeparted from Shechem set the deed of the sons of
Jacob in a different light before the surrounding l"a-
naanites. They saw in the march of Israel a host
with whom the holiness and power of flod was ii
covenant, aud were restrained from pursuing them
by a holy terror of God. The terror of God her*
indicates the fact, that the small suirouuding nations
received an impression from the religious ami mora,
earnestness of the sons of Israel, far deeper and
more controlling than the thirst foi revenge. A like
religious and moral working of fear went afterwards
before the nation of Israel when it entered Canaan,
and we may even view the present march of Jacob
as foreshadowing that later march and conquest.
But the same terror of God has at various times
protected and saved the people of God, both during
the old and new covenants.
14. The fulfilment of a pious vow in the life of tho
believer, corresponds, as the human well-doing, tc
the fulfilment of the divine promise. It stands iu
the same relation as the human prayer and amen to
the word of Gi>d. The vow of baptism and con-
firmation * is fulfilled in the pious Christian life,
upon the ground of the grace and truth with which
God fulfils his promises. Jacob's vow refers to a
special promise of God, at his entrance upoL a difiB-
cult and dangerous journey, and hence the fulfilment
of the vow was the glorification of the gracious lead-
ing of God, and of the truth and faithfulness of God
to his word. It was a high point iu the life of Israel,
from which, while holding the feast, he looked back
over his whole past history, but more especially ovei
his long journey and wanderings. But for this very
reason the feast was consecrated also to an outlook
into the future. For the further history of Bethel,
see Bible Dictionaries.
15. The solemn, rev, rent burial of Deborah, and
the oak of weeping dedicated to her memory, are a
proof that old and faithful servants were esteemed
in the house of Jacob, as they were in Abraham's
household. As they had taken a deep interest and
part in the family spirit aud concerns, so they were
treated in life and death as members of the family.
The aged Deborah is the counterpart to the aged
Eliezer. The fact that we find her here dying in the
family of Jacob, opens to us a glance into the warm,
faithful attachment of this friend of Rebekah, and
at the same time enables us to conclude with the
highest certainty that Rebekah was now dead. Debo-
rah would not have parted from Rebekah wiiile she
was living. Delitzsch : " We may regard the hea-
then traditioiu, that the nurse of Dionysius (P"33,
BciKxos) Ues buried in Scythopolis (Pli.v. J{. iV. ch.
v. 15), and that the grave of Sileuos is found in the
land of the Hebrews (Pacsan. Etiaca, cap. 24),
with which F. D. Michaelis connects the passage, as
the mere distorted echoes of this narra'ive."
16. We may regard the new and closing revelatiou
and promise which Jacob received at Bethel after his
thanksgiving feast, as the confirmation and sealing
of his faith, and thus it forms a parallel to the con-
firmation and sealing of the faith of .\braham upon
Moriah (ch. xxii. 13). But it is to be observed here
that .Jacob is first sealed after having purified his
faith from any share in the guilt of fanaticism. And
the same thing precisely may be said of the sealing
of .\braham, after he had freed himself from the
fiinatical prejudice that Jehovah could in a religioiu
• [Among the coniin(nt:il churches coniirmatiun is re.
garded in much the same li'-'ht as we rejT.ird the opcD recep-
tion of ihe baptized meiabers of the church, to their firs,
communion ; when they are said to a.ssume for themse va
the vows which were made for them in their barr.s'n.— -A i.
066
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
•ense literally demand the sacrifice of a human life,
L e., the literal killing, he became certain of his life
of faith, of the promise of God, and of his future.
Thus here the flame of Israel is completely purified
from the smoke. But here, again, it lies in the very
law 01 the inward life, that God cannot seal the
faith from wliich the impure elements have not been
purged. Otherwise fanaticism, too, would be con-
firmed and sanctioned. Hence the assurance of faith
■pill always waver and fluctuate, even to its disap-
pearance in any one, in the measure in wliich he
combines impure and carnal elements with his faith,
and then holds it more and more as a confidence of
a hiirher grade. Enthusiastic moments, mighty hu-
man acts of boldness, party earnestness and temerity,
will not compensate for the profound, heavenly as-
surance of faith, an established life of faith, which
is the gift of the Holy Spirit. True it is, that the
precondition of sealing is justification, the heart ex-
perience of the peace of God, of reconciliation by
faith ; but this gift of God the Christian must keep
pure by steadfastness in the Lord, even in the midst
of temptation, which is often a temptation to fanati-
cism (see the Epistle of James), and then he is con-
firmed. In our estimate of the stages of confirma-
tion, it is not at all strange that Jacob should have
the name of Israel, first given to him at Peniel, here
confirmed to him. Henceforth he is more frequently
called Israel, for the new life in him has become a
new nature, the prominent and ruling feature of his
being.
17. The renewed Messianic promise assured to
Jacob (ch. x-ixv, 11).
18. From the fact that Jacob erected a stone pil-
lar at Bethel, on which he poured a drink-offering,
and then oil, Knobel conjectures, without the least
ground, that the Elohist here introduces the sacrifice
in this form, and knows nothing of an altar and of
animal sacrifices (p. 274). But it is eviilent that
this pillar was taken from the altar before mentioned
(ver. 7), and that this drink-offering must therefore
be distinguished from the sacrifice upon that altar.
As in the wrestling of Jacob, the distineiiijn between
the outward and inward aspects of the riglit of the
first-born, and thus also of the priesthood, first comes
into view, so here, also, we have the distinction be-
tween the peculiar sacrifice in the strict sense and
the thank-offering. The stone designates (ch. xxviii.
20) the ideal house of God, and in this significance
must be distinguished from the altar. Througli the
thank-ofiering Jacob consecrates the enjoyment of
his prosperity to the Lord ; through the oil he raises
the stone, as well as his thanksgiving, to a la.sting,
sacred remembrance. [Kurtz remarks here : " The
thirty years' journey from Bethel to Bethel is now
completed. The former residence at Bethel stands
to the present somewhat as the beginning to the end,
the prophecy to the fidfilment ; for, the unfolding of
the purpose of salvation, so far as that could Ite
done in the life of Jacob, iias now reached its acme
and relative completion. There the Lord appeared
to him in a dream, here in his waking state, and the
dream is the prophetic type of the waking reality.
There (Jod jrrondsed to protect and bless him, and
bring \i\in back to this land — a promise injw fulfilled.
Theii' Jacob made his vow, here lie pays it. There
God consecrates him to be tlie bearer- of salvation,
and makes the threefold promise of (he blessing of
Balvatioir. So fur as the promise coidd be fulfilled
In Jacob, it is now fullilleil; the land of promise is
open 'lefore him, he has already obtained possession
in part, and the promised seed reaches it-s first stagi
of completeness in the last son of Rachel, giving the
significant number twelve, and the idea of salvatioc
attains its de\'elopment, since Jacob has become Ifl
rael. Bu.t this fulfilment is only preliminary and
relative, and in its turn becomes a prophecy of the
still future fulfilment. Hence God renews the bless
ing, showing that the fulfilment lies in the futurt
still ; hence God renews his new name Israel, which
defines his peculiar position to salvation and his re-
lation to God, showing that Jacob has not yet fuUj
become Israel ; the promise and the name are cor-
relates— the one will be realized when the other is
fulfilled. Hence, too, Jacob renews the name Beth-
el, in which the peculiarity of the relation of God
to Jacob is indicated, his dwelling in and among tht
seed of Jacob, and the renewing of this name pro-
claims his consciousness that God would still become
in a far higher measure, El-beth-el." — A. G.]
HOMILETICAIi AND PEACTICAIi.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical remarks. Jacob's
settlement at Shechem: 1. The departure thithei
from Succoth ; 2. the settlement itself: 3. the new
departure to Bethel. — The settlement itself: 1. How
promising 1 happy return. Prosperous acquisition
of the parcel of land. Peaceful relations with the
Shechemites. Religious toleration. 2. How seri-
ously endangered (through Jacob's carelessness. He
does not return early enough to Bethel to fulfil his
vow. Probably he even considers the altar at She-
chem a substitute. His love for Rachel makes him
tolerant to her teraphim, and consequently to the
teraphim of his house generally. His polygamy ia
perhaps the occasion of his treating the children with
special indulgence). 3. How fearfully disturbed I
Dinah's levity and dishonor. Importunity of the
Shechemites; the carnage of his sons. Ihe exist-
ence of his house endangered. 4. The happy con-
clusion caused by Jacob's repentance and God's pro-
tection.— The first great sorrow prepared for the
patriarch by his children. — Dinah's conduct. — The
dangerous proposals of friendship by the Shechem-
ites.— The brothers, Simeon and Levi. Their right
Their wrong. — Fanaticism in its first biblical form,
and its historic mauifestations. — Its contagions pow-
er. All, or at least the majority, of Jacob's sons,
are swept along by its influence. — Jacob's repentance,
or the feast of purification of his house. — How the
union of repentance and faith is reflected in the
sacred institutions. In both sacraments, in the oele-
brutioii of the Lord's Supper, in the connection of
sacred festivals, especially in the connection between
Good-Friday and Easter. — The thanksgiving at Beth
el. — Here, too, the feast of joy is followed by deep
mourning and funer.-il obsequies. — Deborah : 1. We
know ver-y little of her; and yet, 2. we know very
much of her. — The greatness of true and unselfish
love iu the kingdom of God. — The nobility of free
service. — Jacob's confirmation — confirmed as Israel.
— The renewed promise.
First Section, 'llie settlement at Succoth. Ch.
xxxiii. 17. St.uikk: lie, no doubt, visited his father
during this hiterval, — Gmclacm: (On some accounts
we believe that Succoth was situated or the right
.side of Jor-dan, m the valley of Succoth, in which \nj
the city of Betli-Shean. Succoth are literally huig
made of boughs, here folds irirrde of bough* of treef
and bushes.)
CHAP. XXXIII. 17— XXXT. 1-15.
50'
Secon I Sectio7t. Thp settlement at Shechem. Ch.
sxxiii. 18-20. Starkk : (Shcchem, Cjuesita. The
Septuagint transl., lainbs ; Chaki., ])eai'Is. Others un-
derstand money. Epiph.^ de po7id. et »to?w.'., asserts
that Abraham introd\iced the art of coininf; money
m Canaan), Schkodek: Von Raunier consideis
Shalem as the more ancient name ofShechem. Robin-
son regards it as a proper name, and finds it now in tlie
village of Shalem, some distance east from Shechem.
Third Section. Dinah. Ch. xxxiv. 1-31.
Btakke : Dinah's walk : without doubt, taken from
motives of curiosity. — -Contrary to all his expecta-
tions (for a peaceful, quiet time of woi'ship, etc.),
Jacob's heart is most keenly mortified by Dinah's
disgrace, and the carnage committed by Simeon and
Levi. — He who wishes to shun sin, must avoid also
occasions of sin. — Curiosity is a great fault in the
female sex, and has caused many a one to tall.
ScHRiinKR : {Val. Herb.) A gadding girl, and a
lad who has never gone beyond the precincts of home,
are both good for nothing (Tit. ii. 5). a. 77ie rape.
St.\rke : (2 Sam. xiii. 12) By force (2 Sam. xiii. 12-
14). (Judging from Dinah's levity, it was not with-
out hei consent.) — Ckamkr : Rape a sin against the
sixth and seventh commandments. — What a disgrace,
that great and mighty lords, instead of being an ex-
ample to their subjects in chastity and honor, should
surpass them in a dissolute and godless deportment.
— Gerl-ich : Ver. 7. Fool and folly are terms used
frequently in the Old Testament to denote the perpe-
tration of tlie greatest crimes. The connection of
the thought is this, that godlessness and vice are
the greatest folly, etc. — Schroper : Josephus says,
Dinah went to a fair or festival at Shechem. The
person that committed the rape was the most ilistin-
gtiished (ver. 19) son (the crown-prince, so to speak)
of the ruling sovereign. — The sons of Jacob, for the
first time, transfer the spiritual name of their father
to the house of Jacob, etc. They are conscious,
therefore, of the sacredness of their families. The
sharp antithesis between Israel and Canaan enters in-
to their consciousness (Baumgarten). b. 77ie propo-
sal of marriage. Stauke : Although it is just and
proper to strive to restore fallen virgins to honor by
asking their parents or friends to give them in mar-
riage, and thus secure their legal position and rights,
^■et it is putting the cart before the horse. — Little
children bring light cares, grown children heavy
cares. (God afterwards prohibited (Dent. vii. 3) them
to enter into any friendly relations with the heathen
nations.) c. The fanatical revenge of Jacob''. s sons.
Starke : Take care that you do not indulge in wrath
and feelings of revenge. — H.ill : Smiling malace is
generally fatal. — Kven the most bloody machimitions
are frequently gilded with religion. — FreibergerBibel :
Hamor, the ruhng prince, is a sad example of an
unfaithful and interested magistracy, who, under the
pretence of the common welfare, pursues liis own ad-
vantage and interests, while he tries to deceive his
subjects. —The Sliechemites, therefore, did not adopt
the Jewish religion from motives of pure love or a
proper regard for it, but from self-interest and love
of gain. — Cramer : It is no child's play, to treat re-
Dgii-in in a thoughtless and careless way, and to
chcinge from one form to another. — One violent son
may bring destruction upon a whole city and countrv.
— Hall : The aspect of external things constrains
many more to a profession of religion, than con-
icience (John vi. 26). But how will it be with those
who do not use the sacraments from proper motives ?
—Strictures upon the apology for this deed in the
book of Judith, and by others. — Cramer : God some
times punishes one folly by another. — Hall : To
make the punishment more severe than the sin, is nfl
less unjust than to injure. — What Shechem perpe
trated alone, is charged upon all the citizens in com
mon, because it seems that they were pleased with it.
— Lange: This was a preliminary judpneiit of GoC!
upon the Shechemites, thus to testify what the Ca-
naanites in future had to expect from Jacob's dO'
seend.ants. — Osiander : When magistr.ates sin, their
subjects are generally punished with them. They
evidently do not present circumcision as an entire-
ly new divine service, as an initiation into the cove-
nant with the God of Israel, but only as an external
custom. — It is remarkable here, how adroitly Hamor
and Shechem represent to the people as pertaining
to the common advantage, what was only for their
personal interest. — We here meet the wild Eastern
vindictiveness in all its force. Moreover, tlie carnal
heathen view, that all the people share in the act of
the prince. — Schroder : We have here the same sad
mixture of flesh and spirit which we have seen at
the beginning, in Jacob. — Taobe : Sins of the world
and sins of the saints in their connection, d. .Jacob't
jutlimeni upon this crime. Stakke : (Jacob, no
doubt, sent back all the captives with their cattle.) —
(It seems that, while not altogether like Eli, he did
not have his sons under a strict discipline, since his
family was so large.) — For the wrath of man work
eth not the righteousness of God (James i. 20). — ■
Gerlach : How miraculously God protected this
poor, despised (?) company from mingling with the
heathen on the one hand, and from persecution on
the other.^ScHRoDER : Judging from this test,
what would have become of Jacob's descendants, if
divine grace had left them to themselves in such a way
(Calvin) ? It was not due to themselves, certainly, that
they were not entirely estranged from the kingdom
of God, etc.
Fourth Section. The departure to Bethel. Ch.
XXXV. 1 -8. Starke : Because the true church was
in Jacob's house, God would not permit it to be
wholly destroyed, as Jacob, perhaps, conjectured —
Chan e your garments. — Which are yet sprinkled
with the blood of the Shechemites. — Osiander : Le-
gitimate vows, when it is in our power to keep them,
must be fulfilled (Dent, xxiii. 21). — Cramer: The
Christian Church may err, and easily be led to super-
stition ; pious bishops, however, are to recognije
these errors, and to do away with them. They are
to purify churches, houses, and servants, and pouit
them to the word of God. Repentance and conver-
sion of the soul is the proper purification of sins. —
Bibl. Tub. : Is our worship to please God, then our
hearts must be cleansed, and the strange gods, our
wicked lusts, must be eradicated. — The proper refor-
matiou of a church consists, not only in the extirpa-
tion of idolatry and false doctrines, but also in the
reformation of the wrong courses of life(Xeh. x. 29).
— Ver. 8. All faithful servants, both males and fe-
males, are to be well cared for when they become
sick or feeble, and to be decently buried after their
death.— Cramer : Christ is the pillar set up, both in
the Old and New Testament ; he is anointed with
the oil of gladness, and with him only we find the
true Bethel, where God speaks «itli us.— Gerlach:
Ver. 1, His worship of God connects itself with this
critical point in his history. ,\s in the New Test.,
" The God of jieace and of comfort," etc., is frequent-
ly mentioned, so also the faith of the patriarch clings
to God in his peculiar personal revelations. It ii
iOS
GENESIS, OR TUE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
the God who revealed himself at Bethel, (Still the
name, El-Bethel, given with the first revelation at
Bethel, includes the whole journey of Jacob until his
return to Bethel.) — Schrookr : Jehovah has accom-
plished wliat he has said, — We can only approach the
house of God in faith, when we have first penitential-
ly put away fiom our houses all strange gods. (Mi- |
CHAELis finds here the first and oldest trace of the j
baptism of proselytes.) I consider that Deborah, a
irise and pious matron, was esteemed, so to speak, by
the servants ;is a grandmother, who served and con-
iolcd Jacob (Luther). — Tacbe : The house of the
patriarch Jacob as a mirror of Christian family hfe.
Fiflli Section. The sealing nf tfie covenant between
Ood and the patriarch at Bethel. Ch, x.txv. 9-15. j
Btarkd : As God appears to Abraham ten times, so i
he appears to Jacob six time; (ch. xxviiL l!J; xxii
11,13; xxxii. 1-2 ; xxxii. 24 ; xxxv. 1 ; the present
passage; and ch. xlvi. •!). — Schroder; Now thai
Jacob has become Israel in its luilest sense, the re-
newal of the promise connected with the coiifeiTing
of the name has a fir greater signifif;ition than be-
fore (Hengstenbcrg). — Yer. IS. God comes down to
us, wlienever he gives us a token of his ju'esence.
Here, therefore, we have a desiiznation of the end of
the vision (Calvin). — For tlie symbolical significaiioa
of oil, see B ihr, — As Israel, as patriarchal ances-
tor, the tbundation-stone of the spiritual tem]ile, he
lays the first (?) stone to the building which his de-
scendants are to complete, (Dreciisler: So much
is certain, that the first idea of a definite house of
God is connected with the Bethel of Jacob.)
SEVENTH SECTION.
Departure from Bethel. Benjamin's birth. RacheVs death.
Chapter XXXV. 16-20.
16 And they journeyed from Betliel ; and there was but a little' way to come tc
17 Ephrath [fruit, the fruitful] : and Rachel travailed, and she had hard labor. And it came
to pass, when she was in hard labor, that the tnidwife said unto her, Fear not ; thou
18 shalt have this son also.^ And it came to pass as her soul was in departing, (for she
died,) that she called his name Ben-oni [my son of pain or sorrow] : but his father called liim
19 Benjamin [son of the right hand]. And Rachel died, and was buried in the way to Epiiratli,
20 whicli is Beth-lehem [house of bread]. And Jacob set a pillar [monument] upon her grave:
that is the pillar of Rachel's grave unto this day.
[1 yi5<rTn"133 , a spaf^e or stretch of ground. How long is unknown ; see ch. xlviii. 7 ; 2 Kings v. 19. JosephuA
lenders a forlong ; the Sept., ** somewhat longer distance." — A. G.]
[' Lit., for this is also to thee a son. — A. G.]
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL.
And they journeyed. — The residence at Beth-
el, enjoined ujion him, had reached its end with the
founding of the altar, and the completed thanksgiv-
ing.— And there w^as but a little way. — .\n un-
known distiiiice. The Rabbinical cxphiniition, " as
far as one could plough in a day," is sensrlcsx, for in
one direction tlicy could plo\igli miles, but in plough-
ing a field, the breadth plouglied depends upon tlie
length of the field, but in any case is too small to
be the measure of distiinccs. The Sept., misunder-
Btanding the passage, makes it the name of a jjlace.
[In the l!Mh verse, however, the Sept. hits liippn-
drome. — A. G.] Delitzsch conjcctniea a distanei'
equal to a Tersian parasang, — And Rachel travail-
ed.— The wish, she had uttered at Joseph's birth, tlnii
God would give her another son, now, after a long
period, perhaps sixteen or sevcmteen years, is aljout
to be fulfilled, but it caused her death. Jacob was
now old, and Racliel erTlaiidy was no longer young ;
moreover, she had not, borne children for many
/ears. Delitzsch reckons Jacolj's age at, one Itun-
Ired and six, and Kachel's at about fifty years, —
When she was in hard labor .The Piel and fft
phil forms of nOf5 denote not merely heavy birth-
pains, but the very birth-throes and anguish. — The
midwife, i, e., a m.aid-servant skilful and trusted in
this matter. — Thou shalt have a son. — The last
consolation for Rachel, Slie dies during the final
fulfilment of the strongest wish of her life, [Ai her
soul mis departing, denotes not the annihilation of
the soul, but the ch.tnge of state and place. It pre-
supposes, of course, its perpetual existence; at least,
its existence after death, — A,G,1 In this sense we
must explain the giving of the name. The empha-
sis in the son of nuj pain, must be laid upon sort.
l'"rom lier very death-anguish, a son is bom to her
Knobel explains the name to mean son of my vanity
'IX , because his birth caused her " annihilation,'*
i, e., de.ath. In this explanation, the child becomes
the father, i, e,, originator of her '■ annihilation," but
is not tlie soti. The son of her pain, on the con-
trary, denotes the great gain of her sorrow ; she
dies, as it were, sacrificing lierseH'; and, indeed, llie
once child!e.s,s, now in chililbed, — But his fathei
called him, — Against tlie interpretation of Benja
CHAP. XXXV. 16-20.
56(
min, as the son of prosperity, m:i_v be urged the
yO'' in the Hebrew, which cannot with any certainty
be saiil to mean prosperity; and further, that this
would have been in l)arsh contrast with the dying
word of ihe motlier. Delitzsch, therefore, holds that
the sou of the right hand, may mean the son of the
Bouth, since the other sons were born in the north.
Some derive the name son of prosperity from the fact
that Jacob had now reached a happy independence, or
from the fact that Benjamin filled up the prosperous
number twelve (see Delitzsch). But Benjamin might
bt regarded as the son ol'the strong right hand, since
he fills up the quiver of the twelve mighty sons (Ps.
cxxvii. 5). We may bring into view, further, the re-
lation of the name to the state of rest which Jacob
now believed that he had attained. The tired wan-
derer now prepares himself as a patriarch to rest, and
his youngest favorite must take the place at his right
hand. Btit he is not thereby designated as his suc-
cessor. Jacob seems, in some erroneous way, for a
long time to have had Joseph in his eye for this
position ; still, not with the same self-will with which
Isaac had chosen Esau. The Samaritan explanation,
Bon of days, C^t:^. i. e., of his old days or age, we
pass with a mere allusion. Some suggest, also, that
Jacob called him Benjamin, so that he might not be
constantly reminded of his loss by the name Beu-oni.
This lays the grotmd for the change of the name, but
not for the choice of Benjamin. ^In the way to
Ephrath. — Ephrath (from n^B ) is the fruitful, a
name which corresponds with the added name Beth-
lehem (house of bread). The distance from Jerusa-
lem to Bethlehem is about two hours, in a southerly
direction, on the road to Hebron. About a half-hour
on this side of Bethlehem, some three hundred steps
to the right of the road, there lies, in a small recess,
'.he traditional grave of Rachel. This " Kubbet-Ra-
hil (Rachel's grave), is merely a Moslem wely, or
the grave of some saint, a small, square stone struc-
ture, with a dome, and within a grave of the ordinary
Mohammedan form (RoBt.\soN : '" Res." vol. i. p. 322),
which has been recently enlarged by the addition of
a square court on the east side, with high walls and
arches (later " Res." p. 3T3)." Keil. We must dis-
tinguish between the old tradition as to the locality,
<ind the present structure. Knobel infers, from ilicah
iv. 8, that Jacob's next station, the tower of the flock,
was in the vicinity of Jerusalem, In that case Ra-
chel's grave, and even Ephrath, must be sought north
of Jerusalem, according to 1 Sam. x. 2, and the ad-
dition— which is Bethlehem — must be viewed as
a later interpolation. In Micah, however, in the
passage which speaks of the tower of the tiock, or
the stronghold of the congregation, the words seem
to be used in a symbolical sense. But the passage,
1 Sam. X. 2, is of greater importance. If Rama, the
.lome of Samuel, lay to the north of Jerusalem, then
Rachel's grave must have been in that region, and
the more so, since it is said to have been within the
limits of Benjamin, whose boundaries did not run
below Jerusalem. We refer for further discussions
to Knobel, p. 275, and Delitzsch [and Mr. Grove,
in Smith's Bible Diet. — \. G.] We are inclined to
regard it as probable that the Benjamites, at the
time of the conquest of the country, brought the
Dones of Rachel from Ephrath, into their own re-
gion, and that since then, there have licen two
menu uents of Rachel, one marking the place of her
death, and her first burial ; the other, the place where
they laid her bones in the horn i of her Ben-oni.
Similar transportations of the remains of the blessed
occur in the history of Israel. In this view wt
may explain more clearly how Rachel (Jer. xl. H
bewailed her children at Rama, than it is by the
usual remark, tliat the exiled were gathered at Rama
— Unto this day. — From this notice Delitzscii in
feis that Genesis was not completed until after the
arrival of the Israelites in Canaan. Keil says thia
remark would have been in place within ten or
twenty years after the erection of the pillar. Still
he appears to have felt that a term of from ten tc
twenty years could make no distinction between old
er and nioie recent times, and hence adds in a note,
if this pillar was actually preserved until the time
of the conquest, i. e., over four hundred and fiftj
years, this remark may be viewed as an interpo-
lation of a later writer. It belongs, doubtless, to
the last redaction or revision of Genesis. Still
there are possible icays in which the Israelites even
in the desert could liave received information as to
the existence of this monument, althougli this is less
probable. [Kurtz defends the genuineness of the
passage, but locates the grave of Rachel in the vi-
cinity of Rama, on the grounds that the announce-
ment here of a stretch of land is indefinite, and fur
ther, that the designation of the place by the distant
Bethlehem, arose from the fact that the tower of the
flock in Bethlehem was the next station of Jacob,
and his residence for a considerable period ; and lastly,
that Jer. xxxi. 15 clearly points to the vicinity of
Rama. Keil urges in favor of his own view, that
the existence of a monument of this kind, in a
strange land, whose inhabitants could have had no
interest in preserving it, even for the space of ten or
twenty years, might well have appeared worthy of
notice. — A. G.]
DOCTMNAl AND ETHICAL.
1. Rachel's wish ; Rachel's death ; but her death
at the same time her last gain in tliis life.
2. Rachel's confinement at Bethlehem, viewed in
its sad and bright aspects : 1. The sad aspect ; A
confinement upon a journey ; a death in the presence
of the goal of the journey so long desired ; a part-
ing by death from the desired child. 2. The joyful
aspect : A son in whom her old wish is now fulfilled
(see ch. xxx. 21 ; also the passionate word, " Give
me children, or else I die," xxx. 1); a new enrich-
ing of Jacob, and indeed, to the completion of the
number twelve ; the trimnph that she dies as the
mother of a child.
3. Rachel's death and grave. A preliminary con-
secration of the region of Bethlehem. Through her
tragic end she becomes the ancestress of the suffei^
ing children of Israel generally, even of the chil-
dren of Leah (Jer. xxxi. 15; Matt. ii. 17). Hei
grave probably at Ephrath and Rama at the same
time. Rachel as the first example mentioned in the
Scriptures of a mother dying in travail, and a com
forter to mothers dying in similar circumstances
The solemn aspect of such a death (Gen. iii. 16)
Its beauty and transfiguration (1 Tim. ii. 15).
4. The heroic struggles, and struggling places
of travailing women. Through these painful strug-
gles they form the beautiful complement to th
manly struggles in sacred wars. While the latte.
are the causes of death, the former are the sour;ef
of life.
5. The first midwife who appears In the regijn ol
o70
GENESIS, OR THE FilitfT BOOK OF MOSi;s.
Mcred history, is a worthy counterpart to the first
nurse, Deborah. She shows the vocation of a mid-
wife, to support the laboring with sympathy, to en-
courage her, and to strengthen her by announiing
the birtli of a child, especially of a son, or the an-
nouncement of the beginning of the new hfe.
6. The name Benoni, on Rachel's lips, was not nn
ctterance of dcsp;iir, but of a deeply painful feeling of
Tictory. The desired fruit of her noTiib came out
of these death-struggles. Jacob's naming connects
itself with this also : the son of my right hand, com-
panionship of my rest, support, joy of my old age.
It is true, indeed, even in the sense of the usually
received antithesis, that every new-born child is a
Benotii, and a Benjamin; Benoni in Adam, Benja-
min in Olirist.
7. The youngest children of a family, Benjamin's
companions ; and frequently described as Benjamins,
they stand under the blessing of a ripe old age, un-
der the protection of older and stronger brothers and
Bisters ; but on the other hand, the danger that the
paternal discipline should give way to grandfather-
like indulgence, great as it may be in particular cases,
is scarcely brought into view here. They embrace,
as it were, in themselves, the whole past of the fam-
ily and the most distant future.
8. Bethlehem here enters, clouded by Jacob's
mourning ; afterwards enlightened by David, the Old-
Testament hero out of Judah, and finally glorified by
the fulfilment of Israel's hope.
9. Tlie following verse shows how Jacob, as the
Israel of God, rises from his grief over Rachel's
death.
10. As her soul was departing. As Starke sug-
gests, we have thus an indication that we are to re-
gard death as the separation of the soul and body.
For if, indeed, lUES, the soul, is hfe also, so, and
much more, is the human life, souk
HOMILETICAL AND PEACTICAL.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical remarks. It re-
qiires no special notice that this section is peculiarly
adapted for texts at the burial of women dying ii
confinement, at the transactions over consecrate*
graves, and similar occasions. — Rachel's death upot
the journey. — Rachel's joui-ney home in a two-fold
sense. — Our hfe a pilgrimage. — As we are all born
during the pilgrimage, so we must all die upon oui
pilgrimage. — We reach a fixed, permanent goal 02ly
upon the other side. Benoni and Benjamin ; 1.
The similarity of the names ; 2. the difference be-
tween them. — Jacob at Rachel's grave. — His silent
grief — His uttered faith.
Starke : An enunciation of Jacob's sorrows. \\
is connected with the names : Simeon, Levi, Dinah,
Rachel, Reuben, and Bilhah. Then follows Isaac's
death, and afterwards Joseph's disappearance ; the
famine, etc. Hence he says ; " Few and evil have
the days of the years of my life been " (ch. xlvii. 9).
(An allegorical comparison of Rachel, at this birth,
with the Jewish Church. As Rachel died at the
birth of Benjamin, so the Jewish Church at the birth
of Christ.) — Cramer : The birth-throes are a cross
and a reminder of our sins (Gen. iii. 16). God
recognizes this, and gives his aid (John xvi. 21). —
But if the divinely-blessed mother, or lier fruit, should
die, their happiness is not put in peril (1 Tim. ii. 15).
— Christian midwives should encourage women in
this fearful crisis. — Women in this state should dili-
gently prepare themselves for death. — Osiander;
The dead bodies of the pious are not to be treated
as those of irrational animals, but must be decently
buried, that we may thus testify our hope in the
resurrection from the dead (Prov. x 7). — Schroder:
Bethlehem is calKd now Beit-Lahm ; i. e., meat-
house. Benjamin a type of the Messiah, who, in
his humiliation, was a man of sorrows, and in his ex-
altation a son of the right hand of God (Drechsler).
[Wordsworth here brings out several striking analo-
gies between Benjamin and St. Paul, basing them
upon the word furpoiua, which the apostle api)lies to
himself "as one born out of due time," properly,
" the child whose birth is the cause of his mother's
dath." Paul speaks of himself as one thus bom,
and thus seems to invite us to compare him with
Benjamin. P. 145. — A. G.]
EIGHTH SECTION.
Tht ttation at the tower of Edar. Reuben's, crime. Jacob't none. His return to Itaae and Hebron
(Rebekah no Irnrjer living), ttaac's death. His burial by Esau and Jacob.
Chapter XXXV. 21-29.
21 And Israel joiimeyeti, and spread his tent beyond the tower of Edar [flockj
22 And it came to pass, when Israel (Iwelt in that land, that Reuben went and lay with
Bilhah his father's concubine: and Israel heard it.^ Now tlie sons of Jacob were
23 twelve : Tlie sons of Leah ; Reuben, Jacob's first-born, an 1 Siiueon, and Levi, tiiid
24 Judab, and Issachar, and Zebtilun : The sons of Rachel ; Josepb, and Benjamin :
25, 26 And the .sons of Bilhah, Racbel's biindniaid ; Dan, and Naphtali : And the .stjns
' of Ziipab, Lcali's haiidniaiil ; Gad, and Asber. These are the sous of Jacob, wbict
were born to liiiu in Padan-aram | Mcsoiiutamia].
CHAP. XXXV. -Jl-^iy
57
i7 And Jacob came unto Isaac his father, unto Mamre, unto the city of Arlah (wliich
28 is Hebron) where Abraham and Isaac sojourned. And the days of Isaac were an
29 hundred and fourscore years. And Isaac gave up the ghost and died, and was gathereo
unto his people, being old and full of days ; and his sons Esau and Jacob buried him.
[J Ver. 22.— The break in the MS. here, and the Masoretic note, "that there is a hiatus in the middle of the verse,'
«nits the sense better than the division into versos. It may have been, as Wordsworth suggests, designed to express thj
«]lutteiak\e feelings of Jacob when he heard of this horrible act of his eldest eon. — A. G.]
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL.
Vers. 21-26. — Beyond the tower of £dar. —
Had Rachel's original burial taken place at Rama, we
could not well have supposed that Jacob, wlio here, as
Israel, ri.ses above his grief for his loved wife, should
have made his next station at Jerusalem. Moreover,
the region immediately around Jerusalem was proba-
bly not suitable for .i nomadic station. We adhere,
however, to the tradition whicli fixes Rachel's death
north of Bethlehem, and the next station of Jacob,
below Bethlehem, at the tower of Edar. The tower
of the flock is a tower built for the protection of the
flocks, and as tlieir gathering place, in a region pecu-
liarly fitted for pasturage (2 Kings xviii. 8 ; 2 Chron.
xxvi. lO; xxvii. 4 f.). Jerome and the common tradi-
tion locate it south of Bethel, and not lar from that
place. From this tower Jacob could have easily and
frequently visited his father Isaac, without prema-
turely mingling his houseliold and possessions with
the household economy at Hebron, which it is possi-
ble may yet have stood in strict relations with Esau,
Such an absence might have favored Reuben's crim-
inal purpose and act. — Reuben went. — Bilhah was
Rachel's handmaid, not Leah's ; nevertheless, Reuben
was guilty of incest; ofa lustful deed of impiety, which
occasioned his loss of the birthright (ch. xlix. 4).
The characteristic weakness of Reubett, which ap-
pears in its praisewoi'thy aspect in other cases (see
history of Joseph), here exposes him to the force of
temptation. — And Israel heard it. — As if he was
absent. Was he at Hebron," and does Reuben, as
the temporary head of the household, assume special
privileges to himself? hrael heard it, that he
might reprove it in a suitable way, in his spiritual
.maturity, quiet, and dignity. — Now the sons of
Jacob were twelve. — Jacob's .sons must also
become sons of Israel through a divine discipline
and training They arc, however, the rich blessing
of the promise, with which he returns to his father,
and are here enumerated by name after their seve-
ral mothers, as if in presenting them to their grand-
father. As a whole, they are said to have been
born in Padau-aram ; although this w.is not strictly
true of Benjamin. We are thus prepared already,
anil introduced to Isaac's point of view, for whom, it
is true, Jacob brings all his sons from a strange land.
Thus the exile Jacob returns home to his father
Isaac, laden with the richest blessing of the promise.
The dark days of this patriarch are followed by this
joyful reappearance of the exile.
Vers. 27-29. — Unto Mamre (see history of
Abraham, above). — Isaac has thus changed his
teaidetie to Hebron during the absence of Jacob.
—An hundred and fourscore years. — With
Jhe conclusion of tlie life of Isaac, the narrative
hastens to the immediately following events (ch.
ixxvii,). Jacob was born in the sixtieth year of
Isaac's hfe (ch. xxv. 26), and was thus one himdred
«ud twenty years old w'len L~aac died. lUit when he
was presented to Pharaoh in Egypt, he was ont
hundred and thirty years old (ch. xlvii. 9), Of this
time there were seven fruitful and two unfruitful
years since Joseph's exaltation in Egypt (ch. xlv. 6),
and tliirteen years between the selling of Joseph and
his exaltation, for he was sold when seventeen (ch.
xxxvii. 2), and was thirty when he was raised to
honor and power. Hence we must take twenty-
three years from the one hundred and thirty years
of Jacob, to determine his age at tlie time Joseph
was sold; which is thus one hundred and seven.
" Isaac, therefore, shared the grief of Jacob over
the loss of his son for tliirteen years." In a similai
way, Abraham had witnessed and sympathized with
the long unfruitful marriage of Isaac. But Isaac
could see in these sorrows of Jacob the hand of God
who will not allow that any one should anticipate
him in a self-willed preference of a favorite son.—
Old and full of days. — He recognized the close of
his life-experiences and trials, and, like .\brahaTn,
departed in peace. — And Esau and Jacob buried
him. — It is a beautiful, genuine historic feature,
that Esau here precedes Jacob, while Isaac is men-
tioned before Ishmael at the burial of Abiaham.
Could we draw any inference from this, as to the
external inheritance, the assertion of Keil, that Ja-
cob hcired the earthly goods of Isaac, is far too strong
and confident. It is certain, itideed, that Esau re-
ceived a considerable portion, and in external affairs
merely he took a prominent part, to which the hom-
age Jacob rendered him had given him an indirect
claim. A certain degree of separation had already
been made between the spiritual and earthbj birthright.
Isaac was buried in the cave of Machpelah (ch. xlix. 31 ).
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. Jacob's last station at the tower of Edar l«
also marked by a new heart-sorrow.
2. Reuben's crime probably occasioned by hii
authority over the household during his father's ab-
sence with Isaac at Hebron. The cause of his foi^
feiture of the right of the first-born (ch. xlix).
3. The number, twelve, of the sons of Jacob, in
its typical significance. Twelve, the number of a lift
completed, or expanded to its full limits and devel-
opment. Thus in the house of Ishmael and of Esau,
but in a higher sense in the house of Israil. Hence
the twelve sons are the types of the twelve tribea
(ch. xlix.; Deut. xxxiii.), and the twelve tribes of
the theocracy types of the twelve apostles of Christ,
and these, again, types of the twelve fundamental
forms of the New Testament Church (Rev. xxi. !2f.).
That the number four is a factor of the mmiber
twelve, is here intimated by the four mothers ; four is
the number of the world, three the number of the sanc-
tuary and of the spirit ; and thus twelve is the num-
ber of a fulness or completeness, consecrated to God.
4. Jacob's I eturn to Isaac with his sons, *he la*
672
GEXESIS, OK THE FIKST BOOli OF MOSES.
my of sunlight for the aged and blinded patriarch.
This belonged to the complete satisfaction of the old
man's life, after which he could go to his people
" full of days," or satisfied. Thus Jacob's soul was
once more revived, when he saw the wagons sent by
Joseph.
5. The brotherly union of Jacob and Esau at the
buria. of Isaac, a beautiful token of peace and re-
conciliation at his end. ["Esau and Jacob having
shaken hands over the corpse of their father, their
paths diverpe to meet no more." DeUtzsch. — A. G.]
HOMTLETICAl AND PEACTICAl.
See Doctrinal paragraphs. Isaac's long and pa-
tient waiting for Jacob's return home, during the
night of his blindness. — Light at the evening-time. —
Isaac and Simeon (Luke ii.) — Esau and Jacob, or
the reconciling, peace-making efficacy of death and
the grave.— Starvv; : Ver. 22. (The Jewish Ralibil
make this a small ciime, and say Reuhcn overthrew
the bed, when lie saw that, after Riichel's death, it
was. not borne into his mother Leah's tent, but inf
that of Bilhah ; because he inferred that Jacob
loved Bilhah more than Leah). — OsiANHEit : In the
true Church also there arise at times great scandals. —
(iERLACH : Comp. 2 Sam. xvi. 22. Calwkr Hand-
buck: Isaac reached the greatest age among tlie
three patriarchs. — Schroder : Bilhah proved lui^faith-
fill ; Reuben committed incest. — Jacob's painful si-
lence.— Wlieu he departed, nothing; when he re-
turned, all (Drechsler). — Details as to the number
twelve, also in regard to Jacob. — [Wordswokth :
The record of these sins in the history is an evidence
of the veracity of the historian. II it liad been a
human composition, designed to do honor to the He-
brew nation, assuredly it would have said little of
these flagrant iniquities of Simeon, Levi, Dinah and
Reuben.— A. G.]
NINTH SECTION.
Esau^t Family Record and the Horiiet.
Chapter XXXVI. 1-43.
1, 2 Now these are the generations of Esau [hairy, rough], who is Edom [red]. Esau
took his wives of tlie daughters of Canaan ; Adah [ornament, grace] the daughter of Elon
[oak-grove, oak, strength] tlie Hittite, and Ahohbaniah [tent of the sacred height] the daughter
of Anah [answering
3 And Bashemath
the daughter of Zibeon [Gcsi-nius: colored; I'lirst; wild, robber] the Hivite;
pleasant fragrance] Ishniael's daugiiter, sister of Nehajolll [lofty place].
4 And Adah bare to Esau, Ehphaz [BtreogthofGod] ; and Bashemath bare Reuel [ \oy of
5 God]; And AhoHbatnah bare Jeush [or Jehus, gatherer], and Jaalam [Farst: mouEtain-climber],
and Korah ' [smooth]: these are the sons of Esau, which were born unto him in the
3 land of Canaan. And Esau took iiis wives, and liis sons, and his daughters, and all the
persons of his house, and his cattle, and all liis beasts, and all his substance which he
had got in the land of Canaan ; and went into the country from the face of his brother
7 Jacob. For I heir riches were more than that they might dwell together: and the land'
8 wherein they were strangers coidd not bear them, because of their cattle. Thus dwelt
Esau in mount Seir [rough, wild mountaui-regioD] : Esau is Edom.
9 And these are the generations of Esau the father of ^he Edomites, in mount Seir :
10 These are the names of Esau's sons; Eliphaz the son of Adah the wife of Esau;
11 Retiel the son of Bashemath the wife of Esjvu. And the sons of Eliphaz were, Teman
[right side, Bouthlander], Omar [Oesenius: eloquent; Furst : mountain-dweller], Zepho [watch], and
12 Gatam [Ocwnlus: puny, thin; Ffirst: burnt, dry valley] and KenaZ [hunter ]. AndTimna [restraint]
was concubine to Elipliaz, Esau's son; and she bare to Eliphaz, Amalek": these wcr(
13 the sons of Adah, Esau's wife. And these are the sons of Reuel ; Nrhath [going down,
evening], and Zerah [rising, morning], Shammah [wasting; Furst: report, call], atld Mizzah
[Oeseniug: fear; FOrBt : perhaps joy, rejoicing] ! these were the SOUS of Bashemath, E.sau's wife
14 And these were the sons of Aholiliamali, the daughter of Anah, the daughter ol
Zibeon, Esau's wife : and she bjire to Esau, Jeusli, and Jaalam, and Korah.
16 These were dukes [princes, heads of families, ciiicfB] of tiic SOUS of Esau: the sons of pjli
phaz, the first-born son of E.saii ; duke Teiii;iii, duke Omar, duke Zepho, duke Kenaz.
CHAP. XXXVI. 1-43.
57S
16 Duke Korah, duke Gatam, and duke Amalek : tliese are the dukes that came ol
i!;liphaz, in the land of Edom : these were tlie sons [grandsons] of Adah
17 And these are the sons of Reuel, Esau's son; duke Nahath, duk.; Zerah, duke
bhammah, duke Mizzah : these art the dukes that came of Reuel, in the land of Edom
these are the sons [grandsons] of Basliematli, Esau's wife.
18 And these are the sons of Aholiban.ah, K.au's wife ;' duke Jeush, duke Jaalam, duk»
Korah : these were the dukes thai came of Aholibaniah the daughter of Anah Esau'a
OA nM "^ T ''"" '°"* of Esau (who is [prince uf] Edom) and these are their dukes
H) Ihese are the sons of Seir the Horite [cave-dweUer, troglodyte], who inhabited [primitiv.
dweller?] the land; Lotan [= covering, veiled], and Shobal [traveller, wanderer], and Zibeon,
<51 and Anah, And Dlshon [gazelle], and Ezer [Oeseniu, : store ; Fiirst: connection], and Dishau'
[same a. Di8hon] : these are the dukes of the Horites, the children of Seirin the land ol
22 Edom. And the children of Lotan were Hori [troglodytes], and Heman [oesenius : destruo.
ii tion; Fiirst: commoHon] : and Lotan's sister was Timna. And the children of Shobal were
these; _^Alyan [Oesenius: nnjust; Ftat: lofty], and Manahath [rest], and Ebal [Fiirst • bald
a mountain], Shepho [bare, desert], and Onam [strong, robust]. And these are the children ol
7 Tl ^^^^ [screamer, hawk], and Anah [singer, answerer] : this Was that Anah that
found the mules [hot springs] in the wilderness, as he fed the asses of Zibeon hi-^ father
25 And the children of Anah were these: Dishon, and Aholibamah the daughter of Anah'
26 And these are the children of Dishon; Hemdan [pleasant], and Eshban [oesenius: insightj
"■■" '^■■"""^" "' J^i^iiuii , j-iciijuaii [pieasantj, anu i/SllDan I Oesenius : insight
Furst: thoughtful hero], and Ithran [superior = Jethro and J.thron], and Clieran [Oesenius : harp
^7 Furst: comp.-,nion]. The children of Ezer are these; Bilhan [-BUhah; Gesenius: modest
Lkan [twisting]. The children ol
, , , \ • "" L-""'^""' "' """"■"""J? '»"'-' -n-ian [oesenius: mightier]. These are.
the dukes <Ao< came of the Horites ; duke Lotan, duke Shobal, duke Zibeon, duke Anah
,™.— J. ^..v, .,..,..,1^11 ui ^iei u/e Liirae; Dunan [- BUhah ; Gesenius : modest
^s Fursi : tender], and Zaavan [Furst: unquiet, troubled], and Akan [twisting]. The children of
29.1)ishan are tiiese ; Uz [sandman, or woodman], and Aran [Oesenius : mightier] These are
on ^V""^*^", f "' °^"'® ^°'"'*''" ' '^"'^'^ L°'^"' t'"ke Shobal, duke Zibeon, duke Anah'
30 Duke Dishon, duke Ezer, duke Dishan : these are the <lukes that came of Hori, among
their dukes" in the land of Seir. ^
31 And these are the kings that reigned in the land of Edom, before there reigned any
32 kmg over the children of Israel. And Bela [comp. eh. .iv. 2] the son of Beor [oesenins
torch, lamp; First: shepherd] re.gned in Edom : and the name of his city was Dinhabah
66 [Oesenius, Furst: place of plund.r (7 F.-hmgericht) •]. And Bela died, and Jobab [shout, howl. i. e..
34 desert] the SOU of Zerah of Bozrah [fold, fort] reigned in his stead. And Jobab died, and
35 il'i^liam [= n-^"' ! -PW, haste] of the land of Temani reigned in his stead. And Husham
died, and Hadad [prince; strong, violent] the SOn of Bedad [separate, the lonely], (who smote
Midian ,n the field of Moab), reigned in his stead: and the name of his ci'tv was S
d6 [Oesenius: ruins; Fiirst: tent-village]. And Hadad died, and Samlah [covering I of Masrekah
3/ a vineyard re.gned in his stead And Samlah died, and Saul [asW,,rished] of Rehoboth
38 L"d|.-™j by the river reigned in bis stead. And Saul died, and Baal-hanan [g.acous
39 lord] the son of Achbor [= Achbar, mouse] reigned in his stead. And Baal-hanan the son
ot Achbor died, and Hadar [grace, honor] reigned in his stead : and the name of his city
[God.benefit.ng], the daughter of MatreQ [pushing], the daughter of Mezahab [water of g„,d].
40 And tiiese are the names of the dukes that came of Esau, according to their families,
after their places, by their names; duke Timnah, duke Alvah [Oesen.us : unrighteon^ess^,
J7^ ^7", exaltation], duke Jetheth [Oesenius ■ nail ; Fiirst: subjugation]. Duke Aholibamah.
19 7„^';,^ ^''n^""'^ oaks, „,,,], ,l,,ke Pinon [^Punon; Oesenius: dartaess; Furst: amine]
' °;'^^^^ ^''"='^' '^"'^e Teman duke Mibzar [fortress, strong city]. Duke Magdiel If J:
^oryofGod; Oesenius: prince of God], duke Iram [citizen, city «gion] : these be the dukes of
P Ve": l-w"?e?r''si:urS„Ts.-TG*]' ''^^«''» ""^t*. ^^S, ice.-A. G.]
«J: tlrietteTtrrva^l^fl'o.r""" °' ''-='-''-»>^"». toilers, Lange. Laboring, HcH^g „p ; Mnxphy: wh„»
[« Ver. 21.-Murphy: threshing.— A. G.)
r. Ver w~^^'°:^ 7"^ *°.'?™ f" tri'^e-princes (and tribe name«).-A. G.l
n^iLl-k^-^""' ^./-^enc.( was the secret crimmal court in WeWhalia.\omewhat akin to our .gilanc com
rhis';.o';rs\*4-iJ^onTaltafrh^fa^^'tr;;e°plrl'r'f^ -'^ their king, and prince.
574
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
PRELIMINAEY EEMABKS.
A. It is ill full accordance with the mode of
statement used in Genesis, that at this point, at
which Esau passes out from connection with ihe
theocratic history, the history of his family, as be-
longing to the genealogical tree, should be presei-vcd
in the memory of the people of God (see p. 495).
B. The toledoth of the Edomites is recorded in a
series of special genealogies : 1. The point of depar-
ture : Ksau's wives and children, and his settlement
upon the mountains of Seir (vers. 1-8) ; 2. Esau's
sons and grandsons viewed as tribe-fathers (vers. 9-
14); 3. the tribe-chiefs or princes of the house of
Esau (vers. 15-19); 4. the genealogy of the abori-
gines of the land, the Horites, with whom the Edom-
ites, as conquerors, are mingled (vers. '20-3"); 5.
the kings of the land of Edoni (vers. 31-39) ; 6. the
ruling princes, i. e., the heads of provinces, or rather
the seats of chieftains, enduring throughout the
reigns of the kings of Edom (vers. 40-43). — C. It is
clear that these tables do not Ibrm any one peculiar
chronological succession. The tables, numbor iliree of
the Edoniitic princes, and four, of the llorite princes,
form a parallel ; in point of time, indeed, the line
of Horite princes must be regarded as the older line.
So, also, table number five of the kings of Edom, is
parallel with number six of the provincial princes
or councillors of Edom. There are, therefore, but
three iundaracntal divisions: 1. The sons and grand-
sons of Edom ; 2. the old and new princes of Edom ;
3. the kingdom of Edom viewed as to its kings and
as to its provincial rulers (or dukedoms). — In Deut.
ii. 12, 22, the Edomites appear to have destroyed the
Horites, as the aboriginal dweUers in Seir. But this
must be understood in the sense of a warlike subju-
gation, which resulted partly in their absorption,
partly and mainly in placing the original dwellers in
Ihe land in a state of bondage, and that wretched
condition in which they are probably described in
the book of Job (Job xvi. 1 1 ; xvii. 6 ; xxiv. 7 ;
XXX. 1 ; see Knobkl, p. 277). Knobtl refers these
tables, as generally all the completed genealogical
tables in Genesis, to the Elohist. But this only is
established, that the genealogical tables are, in their
very nature, in great part Elohistic.
EXEGETICAL AND CKITICAL.
Esau^s wives and children^ and hi^ seUlefnent upon
the tiwuniaii'S nf Seir (vera. 1-8). — Of Esau, that
is Edom (ch. xxv. 30). — In ch. xxvi. 34 the two
first wives of Esau are called Judith, the daughter
of Been the Hittitc, and Bashemath, the daughter
of Elon the Ilittite. In ch. xxviii. 9 the tliird wife
bears the name of Mahalath, the daughter of Ish-
mael. Here the daughter of Elon the Hitlite is
called Adah, and in the place of Judith, the daugh-
ter of Beeri the Hittite, we have Aholibamah, the
daughter of Anah, the granddaughter of Zil)con the
Hivite. Hut while the daughter of Elon is named
Baflhemath above, here the daughter of Ishinael
bears that name. It is perfectly arbitrary when
Knobcl and olhers identify tlie Zibeon of ver. 2 with
the Zibeon of ver. 21, and then, instead of the addi-
tion, the Hivitc, rcarl the Horite. But Knobel re-
•narks corri'Clly : " The different accounts (all of
which he ascribes to the Elohist) agree in tills : a.
Tl it Esau ha<l three wives : b. that one ol' them is
called Bashemath ; c. that the third was a daughtei
of Ishniael and sister to Nebajoth." Keil explain!
the differences upon the a.ssumption that Moses used
genealogical records of Esau's family and descend-
ants, and left them unaltered. The statement, how
ever, presents no irreconcilable contradiction, but i-
explained by the custom of the ancient orientals,
which is still in use among the Arabians, by which
men often received surnames from some important
or remarkable event of life (as, e. g. Esau the sur-
name Edom, eh. xxv. 30). which gradually became
proper names, and by which women at their mairiage
generally assumed new first names (comp. Hengsten
bkrg's Beiircif/e, iii. pp. 273-302). We remark only
that Judith takes the name Aholibamah, her father
Beeri (for the conjecture of Hengsteuberg, which will
scarcely stand the test, in our judgment, see Keil, p.
232) ihe name Anah, while the general popular name
Hittites^Canaanites becomes specific in the name
Hivite. But now the names Aholibamah and Auab
appear to be symbolic and religious names. Bashe-
math, the daughter of Elon, now bears the name
Adah, while, on the contrary, Mahalath, the daughter
of Ishmael, is now called Bashemath. This may be
explained upon the supposition that Esau, whose
garments were fragrant with sweet odors, distin*
guished Judith [Mahalath ? — A. G.J, whom he mar-
ried twenty years later than his other wives, as his
favorite wife by the name Bashemath, the fragrant,
while as a compensation he called his former Bashe-
math, Adah, or ornament. If Beeri was a priest,
the name Anah (liearing, answering), would be ap-
propriate to him, as also Aholibamah, tent of height,
holy tabernacle, would be to his daughter. For the
different attempts at reconciling these differences,
see Knobel, p. 278. The impossibility of solving
these difficulties is emphasized and supported by a
collection of examples, which certainly shows that
there were different traditions according to different
points of view, in full accord with the living nature
and character of biblical relations. [These tables
carry the genealogy of the descendants of Esau
down to the period at which the Pentateuch closes,
since the last of the eight kmgs, whose united reigns
would probably cover this length of time, of wliom
it is not said that he died, was probably still upon
the throne at tlje time of Moses, and was the king
of Edom to whom Moses apjilicd for leave to pass
through tlie land. The statement, though very
brief, is arranged with the utmost precision. We
have first the introductory statement in regard to
Esau and his wives, and his settlement at Seir ; then
the genealogy of his sons and grandsons born in
Seir, in distinction from those born in Canaan ; then
of the tribe-princes of Edom ; then by an easy and
natural transition the genealogy of the Horite princes
and tribes who were absorbed by the Edomitic tribes;
then of the kings of Edom ; and lastly of the places
or chief seats of these tribal princes, after their
families, by their names. It is not surprising that
there should be inquiries suggested here, which can-
not be answered, or that there should be missing
links in the historical statement. The apparent dis-
cre]iancies, however, involve no contradiction. As
to the wives of Esau, the different accounts may be
reconciled in either of two ways. We ni.ay suppose
with some (Murphy, Jacobus) that Judith, during the
long jieriod between her marriage and the romoval
of Ksau to Seir, had died, without leavuig male issue,
and that Aholibamah here recorded is the lourth
wife of Esau in the order of 'Jmc, although in thii
CHAP. XXXVl. 1-13.
57£,
hhle classed with tlie daughter of Elon, because she
iras a Canaaniless also. The mere change of names
in the females occasions little difficulty, since it is so
common for persons to have two names, and since
the first name of the female was so frequently
changed at marriage. This seems a natural supposi-
tion, and will meet the neces.-sities of the case. We
■nay, however, suppose, as Hengstenberg suggests
(see also Kurtz, Keil, Baumgarten), that the names
Beeri and Anah designate the same person. In the
24th verse we meet with an Anah who is thus de-
ecribed : " This was th:it Anah that found the warm
springs (E. V. mules) in the wilderness, as he fed the
asses of Zibeon ois father." The identity in tlie
name of the fatlier, Zibeon, leads to the identifying
of Anah and Beeri. This is confirmed by the signifi-
cance of the name Beeri, man of the wells, which
would seem to refer to some such remarkable event
in the desert. He would probably be known by this
name, Beeri, among his associates, but in the gene-
alogy he appears with his own proper name, Anah.
That he is in one place called a Hittite, in another a
Hivite, in another still a Ilorite, may be easily ex-
plained on the theory that the Hittite defines the race,
the Hivite the specific tribe, and the Horite describes
him with reference to his abode. The theory of
Hengstenberg is certainly ingenious, meets essentially
the difficulties in the case, and may well be held
until a better is suggested. See Henostenberg's
Beitruge, vol. iii. pp. 273-302 ; Keil, Kurtz, Baum-
garten, in loc. — A. G.] — And Adah bare. — See the
names of the sons of Esau, 1 Chron. i. 35. [The
difference between the catalogue there and here is
due to the change in the Hebrew from one weak let-
ter to another. — A. G.] — Into the country, from
the face of his brother. — The conjecture that the
word .Seir has been left out at\er the word land or
country, is supt duous [and hence unjustifiable. —
A. G.], if we understand the words " away from his
brother" as a qualifying adjective or phrase. He
sought a country in which he should not meet with
his brother. The final emigration of Esau to Seir
after the death of his father does not exclude the
preliminary migration thither (xxxii. 3) ; neither does
the motive for the earlier removal, the securing of a
wide domain for hunting, and over which he might
j'ule, exclude the motive for the later, in the fact
that the flocks of the two brothers had grown so
large that they could not dwell together. We may
well conclude, however, from the last statement, that
Esau had at least inherited a large part of the herds
of Isaac, although Keil assumes the contrary.
Second Sectio?i, Esau^s sons and qrandsons as
the ancestors of tribes (vers. 9-14; comp. 1 Chron. i.
36, 37). — To Mount Seir The mountain-range
between the Dead Sea and the Ailaniiic Gulf. The
northern part w.as called Gebalene, and the southern
Es Sherah (see Keil, p. 233; Winer's Heal Wiirter-
bueh [Kitto, new edition. Smith, Murphy. — A. G.],
ind the Geographies of the Bible). " While the sons
of Aholibamah became directly heads of tribes, it
was only the grandsons of the other two wives, each i
of whom bare only one son, who attained this dis-
tinction. There were thus thirteen heads of tribes,
or, if we exclude Amalek, who was born of the con-
cubine Timnah, twelve, as with the Nahorites, Ish-
maelites, and Israelites." Knobel. [It is probable,
as Hengstenberg has shown, that this Amalek was
Ihc ancestor of the Amalekites who opposed the
Israelites in their march through the desert; ami
Uiat this is what Balaaip iUudes to when he says that
Amalek was tlie first of the nations, not the o.dest,
but the first who made war with the Israelites aftei
they became the covenant people of God. The ref-
erence to the field of the Amalekites, ch. xiv. 7, i»
not in opposition to this, since it is not said in tha;
passage that the Amalekites were slain, but that thej
were slain who occupied the country which after-
wards belonged to this tribe. It is not probable that
a people who played so important a part in the his
tory of Israel (see Numb. xiii. 29 ; xiv. 13 ; Judg
vi. 3; vii. 12; xii. 15; 1 Sam. xiv. 48; xv. 2 flf. ;
xxvii. 8 ; 2 Sam. viii. 12) should have been without
their genealogy in the book of Genesis. Amalek
probably separated himself early from his brethren,
perhaps from the fact of his birth not lieiiig strictly
legitimate, and grew into an independent people, who
seem to have had their main position at Kadesh, Id
the mountains south of Judah, but spread themselves
throughout the desert and even into Canaan. See
IlE.NGsrENBERG : Beitrdge, vol. iii. p. 302 8'. — A. G.]
There were three divisions from the three wives. —
The sons of Elliphaz. — For the ethnographic im-
portance of these names, compare Knobel and thfl
Bible Uicticmaries. Amalek, see above. — These
are the sons of Adah. — Since Timnah was a con-
cubine, it is assumed that Adah had adopted her.
Third Section. Tlie Edontitic tribe-princes (vers.
15-19). "n-'Slbs, probably from C^bx or a''Sb.S =
mnsiTB , families, heads of families, is the peculiar
title of Edomitic and Horitic phylarchs, only once,
Zech. ix. 7, xii. 5, applied to Jewish princes or gov-
ernors. Knobel is entirely wrong when he explains
these names geographically." Keil. But they may
have established themselves geographically within
more or less fixed limits, e. g. Teman (Edom from
Teman to Dedau, Ezek. xxv. 13).
Fourth Section. Genealogy of ihe Horites (vers.
20-30; comp. 1 Chron. i. 38-42).— Of Seir.— The
name of the ancestor of the early inhabitants of
Seir is identical with the name of the land, as is true
also with the names Asshur, Aram, Mizraini, Cauaan,
in the genealogical table. — The Horites. — "'"in .
from nin , hole, cave, cave-man, troglodyte. — Who
inhabited the land — i. e., the earlier inhabitants
in contrast with the Edomites. The land of the
Edomites is full of caves (Robinson, " Researches,"
vol. ii. p. 551 ff.). "The inhabitants of Iduma;a
use them for dwellings. Jerome, upon Obadiah, says
they had dwellings and sheeptblds in caves. This was
peculiarly true of the aboriginal Horites, who (Job
XXX. 6) are described by this peculiarity. It is re-
markable that the description of the wretched man-
ner of living and evil courses of the Horites, givcL
in the book of Job, are still accurately true to-da;
of the dwellers in the old Edomitic land." Knobel.
The Horite table first enumerates seven princes, then
their sous, among whom the name Anah occupies a
prominent place (ver. 24), who is said in Luther's
version [also in the English. — A. G.], following the
error of the Talmud, " to have found the mules in
the wilderness." He discovered rather in the desert
D^:c^n , warm springs (Vulgate), which may refei
to the warm sulphur springs of Calirrhoe, in Wady
Zerka Maein, or to those in Wady El Ahsa, south
east of tlie Dead Sea, or to those in Wady Hamad
between Kerek and the Dead Sea. For further de
tails see Knobel and Keil, the hitter of whom re-
marks that the notice of his feeding the asses maj
indicate that these animals led to the discovery of
the springs, p. 225, note. Besides the sons, then
i76
GE^'ESIS, OR TPE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
«re two daughters named in this genealogical table,
Thhnnah and Aholihamah. " Thimnah may per-
haps be the same person with the concubine of Eli-
phaz, ver. 12. Aholihamah is, however, not the
same with the wife of Esau." Keil. There may
nave been, also, more than one person of the name
of Tliimnah. For the ditferenccs between this cata-
.ogue and that in 1 Chron., comp. Keil, p. 234.
[These diversities are maiidy those which arise from
the substituting one weak letter for another. — A. O.]
The princes are still named once more, as they gave
their names to tribes or districts. Knobel attempts
to explain these names as if they were geographical
and not personal, which Keil should not so strongly
have opposed. [Keil shows, however, how vain and
groundless this attempt is, by the fact that the son
of Zibeon discovered the warm springs, which proves
i course that this is a table of the names of per-
sons, and not of tnbes or their localities. — A. G.]
Fifth Sfclion. The kings of llie land of Edom
(vers. 31-39; comp. 1 Chron. i. '43-60). Out of the
original discordant or opposing Edomile and Horite
princes there sprang one united kingdom, the Edom-
itic element being undoubtedly the predominant.
From the statement here made, it is plain that the
kings were not hereditary kings ; in no case does the
son succeed to the father's throne. Still less are we
to suppose, with Keil, Hengstenberg [also Murphy,
Jacobus, and others. — A. G.], that it was a well-
ordered elective monarchy, with chosen kings, since
in that case, at least, some of the sons would have
succeeded their fathers. (Knobel wavers between
the assumption of elections and usurpations.) It is
rather in accordance with the Edomitic character
(see the blessing of Isaac i, that a circle of usurpa-
tions should arise out of the turbulent transition
state ; dark counterparts of the way and manner in
which the judges in Israel wrought together or fol-
lowed one another at the calling of God. Thus Bela,
of Dinhaba. city of plunder, as devourer (as despotic
Balaam), might well begin the series. And the name
of Jobab, one who with the howling of the desert
breaks forth from his fa.stness, confirms the mode of
the kingdom as already intimated. Husham seems
to have gained hi-i power and position by surprise,
Hadad by violence, and Samlah by political arts and
fraud. With Saul, therefore, we first mcft with one
who was desired and chosen, and the remark that he
was succeeded by Baal-hanau, gracious lord, and he
by Hadar, rich in lionor, whose wife bears a truly
pious name, justifies the conjecture that tlie savage,
uncultivated forms of violence and cunning gradually
gave place to the more noble foi-ms. Of this eighth
king of the Edomite.'*, ii is not said here that he died.
The table closes, therefore, with the time of Hadar.
Keil justly a.ssunies that the tribe-princes or phylarchs
(who, indeed, as i)er8ons, did not tbllow each other,
hut were cotemporary, and as hereditary dignities
located and fixed themselves geographically) existed
H.s cotemporaricf with the kings (with legard to Ex.
IV. 16, comp. Ninnb. xx. 14 ff.). "While Moses
treats with the king of Edom with reference to a
Dassage through his land, in the song of Moses it is
he tribe-princes who are filled with fear at the
niraculous passage of the Israelites through the Red
Sea (comp. Exek. xxxii. 2'.t). We may urge further
that the account of the seats of these phylarchs,
vers. 40^3, follows after the catalogue of the
kings." Keil. — Before there reigned any king
over the children of Israel.— It has been inferred
from tlja statement, that Genesis, or the part of
Genesis lying before us here, was not composed unti
the time of the kings in Israel. Deliizsch repl eg t<
this, that the narrator might have inserted this clause
from the stand-point of the promise spoken, e. g. ch.
xvii. 1 and ch. xxxv. 11. Then, indeed, we should
have expected another mode of expression. But
how obvious it is to suppose that this phrase is an
interpolation by a later writer ! ["The phrase does
not imply that monarchy began in Israel immediately
after those kings ; nor does it imply that monarchy
had begun in Israel at the time of the writer ; aa
I.'iaac's saving ' that my soul may bless thee before I
die,' does not imply that he was dead at the time of
his saying so. It simply implies that Israel was ex-
pected to have kings, as Isaac was expected to die."
Murphy. The sentence is in its place, and the sun-
position of any interpolation is needless and there-
fore unwarrantable. — A. G.] But, carefully consid-
ered, this table points back to a very remote time of
the Edomitic kingdom. Leaving out of view the
fact, that usurpations follow each other far more
rapidly than hereditary sovereigns, we must ob
serve that no one of tlie-se kings ever appears else
where, or is in any way involved in the Israelitisk
history. Some have, indeed, supposed that Hadad
the son of Bedad, ver. 36, is identical with the Edom
ite king who rebelled against Solomon (1 Kings xi.
14), yet the various distinctions of the two differ
altogether (see Keil, p. 236). Hengstenberg, with
much stronger force, concludes, from the fact that he
is said to have smitten .Midian in the field of Moab,
that he must have been nearly a contemporary with
Moses, since at the time of Gideon the Midianitea
disappeai- from the history. — Bela the son of Beor.
— It is merely an accidental coincidence, that Balaam
also, whose name is related to Bela, is a son of Beor,
although even Jewish expositois have here thought
of Balaam (see K.nodkl, p. 2SG). — Of Bozrah An
important city of the Edomites (Is. xxxiv. 6 and
other passages). Knobel thinks that the name has
been preserved in the village Busaireh [see Robin-
son : "Researches," vol. ii. p. 611 B'. — A. G.]. For
Masrekah and Rehoboth, see Knobel. [Keil holds
that the allusion to the river determines the locality
to be on the Euphrates ; probably it is the Errachabi
or Rachabeh on the Euphrates near the mouth of the
Chaboras. — A. G.] We prefer, however, to seek it
at some small nahar, river, in Edom. — Hadar, 1
Chron. i. 50, erroneously Hadad. — Mezahab. —
Regarded by Knobel as masculine, by Keil as femi-
nine, but the former is more probable. [Keil makes
Matrcd the mother of his wife, and Mi'zahab her
mother. Murphy regards both as masculine nouns.
There is no general rule, other than usage, to deter
mine the gender of many Hebrew names, and the
usage is not uniform. See Green's "Grammar,"
§ l(i7. — A. G.] Keil supposes that the last-named
king, Hadar, is the same one with whom Moses
treated for a passage through his land. The theory
that the Pentateuch must be entirely referred to Mo-
ses, probaljly lies at the basis of this supposition.
The ciitical history of the Bible, however, cannot
<lepend upon such conjectures. If we take into ac-
count ihe strong desire in the Edomitic race for do
minion, we ojay well conjecture that the first usurp»
tion began soon after the death of Es.au's grandsona
"If now," Keil remarks, "we place their death
abo\it two hundred and fifty years before the exodus
of Israel from Egypt, there would be a period of
two hundred and ninety years before the arrival oi
Israel at the borders of Edom (Numb. xx. 14) ; •
CHAP. XXXVI. 1-4S.
57}
period long enough for the reigns of the eiglit kings,
even if the liingdom arose first after the death of
the phylarehs mentioned in vers. 15-18." We may
add, further, tliat the tables may possibly close with
tht beginning of Hadar's reign, and hence, perhaps,
we have a more detailed account of his family. We
should thus only have to <livide the two hundred .and
ninety years between the seven kings. An average
of forty years is certainly, however, a very long pe-
riod to assiLin to a circle of such despotic sovereigns.
[If, however, the kings co-existed with the dukos,
and were elective, chosen probably by these dukes
or phylarehs, and began soon after the death of Esau,
we shoiJd have a longer average. The length of
human life at that period would justify the assump-
tion of these longer reigns ; if there is good reason
to beUeve, as there seems to be, that their reigns
were peaceful, and not violent usurpations. All
these calculations, however, depend upon the length
of the period of the bondage. — A. G.]
Sij-th Section. The permanent iribe-princea, or
the seats of their power, in Edom (vers. 40-43 ; eomp.
1 Chron. i. 51-54). It is plain that we have here
the geographical position of the original personal
tribe-princes, recorded under the political provincial
tribe-names, i. e., we have the ethnographic and
geographical divisions of the kingdom of Edom ; and
Keil justly rejects the assertion of Bertheau, that
there follows here a second cat ilogue of the Edomitic
princes, who perhaps, after the death of Hiidar,
' restored the old tribal institution and the heredi-
t:iry aristoer.icy." — After their places, according
to their families, by their names. — After tlie
names, i. e., which they had formed for their
families and places. Hence many, perhaps the
most, of the old names of princes have passed over
into new names of tribes and localities. — 1. Thim-
nah=:Amalek (see vers. 12, 16, and 22). — 2. AI-
wah. — Here the Horitic name Alwan, ver. 23, ap-
pears to have forced its way through the Edomite
dominion. — 3. Jetheth. — 4. Aholibamah. — Per-
haps the district of tlie sons of Aholibamah, ver. 2.
Keil is inclined to refer it to the Horite Aholibamah,
ver. 25. — 5. Elah Reminds us of Elon, ver. 2,
and of Eliphaz his grandson and Esau's son, whose
sons, Omar, Zepho, and Gatam (ver. 11), may per-
,haps have gone up into the district of Kenaz. — 6.
Pinon. — -7. Kenaz. — Points back to Kenaz, the son
of Eliphaz, ver. 11. — 8. Theman. — This was the
name of the first son of Eliphaz, ver. 11. — 9. Mib-
lar. — Goes back, perhaps through Bozra, to a tribe-
prince. The signification of Zepho, ver. 11, is analo-
gous.— 10. Magdiel — Is perhaps connected with
Uanahath, ver. 23. — II. Iram. — " nl3:< is the sea-
point Aila. "iS'S is the same with Phunou, a camp-
ing place of the Israelites (Xumb. xxxiii. 43 f),
celebrated for its mines, to which many Christians
were sent by Diocletian, situated between Petra
and Zoar, northeasterly from Wady Jlusa (Ritter,
xiv. p. 12.5 ffl. "a^n, the capital, ■'3'Q^nn T^s ,
ver. 34." Keil. Mibzar might be referred to Petra,
Knotiel thinks, since it is a stronghold, but that place
is usually called Selah. — He is Esau.— The conclu-
sion of tlie narrative is entirely in accordance with
the Hebrew conception of the personal character
and relations of history. Esau is actually " the
father" and not merely the founder of Edom, as
he lives on in his toledoth. This close of the
toleiloth of Esau points forward to the toledoth of
lac >b.
BflCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. The sacred history hangs up in the .reasi re
house of the Old Testament the tables of -.he tole-
doth of Ei^au, not merely because he too ?eceivedt
blessing from God, and had the promise of a blessing
(Kein, but more especially because he now break»
the band of the theocracy, and passes out of view,
just as it had done with the tables of the nations, and all
the succeeding genealogical tables. God, indeed, per-
mits the heathen to go their own way (.\cts xiv. 16 ;
Ps. Ixxxi. 13), but is mindful of all his children (Acts
XV. 14 f ; xvii. 26), even those who are in the king,
dom of the dead [but in a different sense, surely
— A. G.] (Luke xx. 38 ; 1 Peter iv. 6), and hence
the people of God, too, preserve their memory in
hope.
2. We may suppose that Edom at first preserved
the patriarchal religion, although in a more external
form. Its vicinity to the trilie of Judah, if it made
any proper use of it, was a permanent blessing. The
idolatry of Edom is not referred to frequently even in
later history. The only allusions are 1 Kings xi. 1 ;
ix. 8 ; 2 Chron. xxv. 14. From these intimations we
may infer that Edom declined, to a certain extent,
into heathen, religious darkness, but much more in-
to moral depravity (see Ex. xv. 15, and other pas-
sages). The people of Israel are frequently remind-
ed, however, in the earlier history, to spare Esau's
people, and treat them as brethren (Deut. ii. 4, 5 ; xxiii.
7, 8). It may be remarked, by the way, that these
passages show the early age of Deuteronomy, since
Edom stands in other relations at a later period. The
refined theocratic recollection in Edom, avails so far
as to even awaken and cherish its jealousy of Israel.
And in this respect Edom stands in the relation of
an envious, malicious, .and fake brother of Israel,
and becomes a type of Antichrist (Obadiah). This,
however, does not exclude the promise of salvation
for the historic Edom, in its individual members
(Isai. xi. 14; Jer. xlix. 17 fF.). We do not read of
any special conversion of Edom to Cliristianity, per
haps (see, however, Mark iii. 8), because the violent
conversion of Edom to the Jewish faith, under John
Hyrcanus, had first occurred, by which Edom was par.
tially merged into the Jews, and partially amalga-
mated with the Bedouin Arabs. To return back to
Jacob, or to fall away to Ishmael, was the only alter-
native open to Edom.
3. In the Herodian slaughter of the children at
Bethlehem, however, the old thought of Esau, to kill
his brother Jacob, becomes actual in the assault upon
the life of Jesus.
4. The history of the Edomites falls at last mtii
the history of the Herods. For this history, as for
that of Edom, we may refer to the Bible Dictionaries,
the sources of religious history (Josephus, and
others), and books of travels. [Robinson, " Re-
searches," vol. ii. p. 551 ff. — A. G-]
5. The table here is composed of several tablej
which portray, vividly and naturally, the origin of
a kingdom: I. The period of the iribe-chiels ; 2.
the iieriod of the peculiar [lermanent tribe-princes ;
3. the period of the formation of the kingdom, and
its continued existence upon the basis of permanent
tribe principaUiies or dukedoms.
8. The subjugation of the Horites (whom ne ar»
not to regard as savages, merely because they dwell
in caves) by the Edomites, and' the fusJcn of both
oeople inderan Edomitic kingdom, represents to ui
578
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
vividly the process of the fonnation of a people, as
in a precisely similar way it has occurred a hundred
times in the history of the world. In sacred history
we may refer here especially to the rise of the Sa-
maritans, and in later history, to the formation of
the Roman people. The Franks overcame the Gauls
as the Edomltes the Horites, although under different
moulding relations. This great forming process is now
■ takins place under our very eyes in North America.
But these historical growths of a people are the sub-
ject of a special divine providence (Acts xvii. 26).
7. We are here reminded again of the prominent
personal view of all the relations of life in the sacred
Scriptures. At the close of the whole evolution of a
people it is said again : This is Esau. He lives still,
as the father, in the entire people ; stamps even the
Horitic element with his own image.
8. The discovery of the wann springs by Anah,
is an example of human discoveries in their accidental
and providential bearings and significance. [Words-
worth says : There is an important moral in these
generatioris of Ei^au. They show that the families of
the carnal race of this world develop themselves
more rapidly than the promised seed. Ishmael and
Esau come sooner to their possession *^an Isaac and
Jacob. The promised seed is of slow gr » fit. It is
like the grain of mustard-seed (Matt. xiii. 31). The
fulfilments of all God's promises, of great blessings
to his people, are always long in coming. But the
kingdoms of this world would soon fade, while the
kingdom of heaven will endure for ever (p. 147, 148).
— A.G.]
HOMTLETICAL AND PEAOTIOAl.
Meditations upon this chapter must be connected
with the general declarations as to Esau, e. g., with
Isaac's blessing upon him, with the prophetic p.is-
Bages relating to Esau, with the history of the Herods,
with Acts xvii. 26, or with other New Testament
passages. — The fulfilling of tlie blessing upon Esau.
— Esau's development. — The ancient and modern
Edom. — How Israel even in later days regarded the
fraternal relation of Edom as sacred.
Starke : This narrative of Esau has, doubtless, its
important uses, partly as it shows how richly God
fulfils his promises (ch. xxv. 23 ; xxvii. 39, 40), partly
as it sets before the descendants of Jacob, how far
the boundaries of Esau's descendants reach, and
partly as thence the Israelites are earnestly forbidden
to encroach upon them(Deut. ii. 4, 6), except in rela-
tion to the Amalekites (Ex. xvii. 14). Moreover,
there were many pious men among the descendants
of Esau, who were in covenant with God. Observe
how the patriarchal sacrificial service continued for
a long time among the Edomltes, until, after the
exodus of the Israelites from Kgyi)t, the church of
the Edomltes gradually declined, etc. (Taken in part
from Rambach'.') " Ecclesiastical History.") Ver. 3.
These names lead one to think of Jolj's friends. (He
then remarks, that .some suppose that Job's friend
Eliphaz descended from this one, while oiherB regard
tho Eliphaz of Job as still older.) View of the Edo-
milM and of the Amalekites. — (Ver. 24. Mulea, ac-
cording to Luther. The Hebrew word occurs bet
once in the sacred Scriptures, and is, therefore, more
difficult to explain. The Sept. has formed from it a
man's name; the Chaldee renders u "giants;" the
Samar. Emim, a race of giants ; in the Arabic some
understand a kind of warm bath; others, a kind ol
healing drug.) — Ver. 33. This Jobab is held by some,
though without any good reason, as the same with Job.
— OsiANDER : The kingdom of Christ alone endure
and is eternal; the other kingdoms and sovereign
ties, which are of this world, are subject to fre-
quent changes, and, indeed, decay and perish (Ps.
Ixxxix. 3, 4). Whatever rises rapidly disappears
rapidly also (Ps. xxxvii. 36 f.). Lanqe : Jacob, not
less than Abraham and Isaac, was a type of Christ:
1. According to the promise, the lord over all
Canaan, but he had nothing of his own there but
the parcel of the field which he bought at Shechem.
Thus, Christ also is the Lord of the whole world,
etc. ; 2. Jacob a great shepherd, Christ the chief
shepherd ; 3. Jacob's long service for Rachel and
Leah, Christ in the form of a servant and his ser^
vice ; 4. Jacob gained two herds, Christ the Jew*
and Gentiles ; 5. Jacob a prophet, priest, and king,
the three offices of Christ ; 6. Jacob's wrestling,
and Christ's agony and struggle ; 7 . Jacob lame
in his thigh, Christ and the prints of the nails and
spear; 8. Jacob left behind him twelve patriarchs,
Christ the twelve apostles. Geri.ach : Calvin's re-
marks. We must here remember, that those sep-
arated from God's covenant rise quickly and de-
cay rapidly, like the grass upon the house-tops,
which springs up quickly and soon withers be-
cause it has no depth of earth and roots. Both
of Isaac's sons have the glorious promise that
kings shall come from them ; now they appear first
among the Edomltes, and Israel seems to be set
aside. But the course of the history shows how
much better it is first to strike the roots deep in-
to the earth, than to receive immediately a tran-
sitory glory which vanishes away in a moment.
The believer, therefore, while he toils slowly on-
wards, must not envy ihe rapid and joyful pro-
gress of others, for the permanent prosperity and
blessedness promised to him by the Lord is of
far greater value. — Schroder: (Ranke:) The Is-
raelites also were to be encouraged in their con-
test, through the conspicuous victory which the
Edomltes la earlier times had obtained over the
numerous tribes of Seir. (Baumgarten :) This exter-
nal glory in the very beginning of Esau's history,
stands in striking contrast to the simple relations
in the family of Jacob, but corresponds jjerfectly
with the whole previous course of our history,
which, from the begiiming, assigns worldly power
and riches to the line which lies beyond the cove
nant and union with God, while it sets forth the
litnnility and retiiing nature in the race chosen by
(loil. — In later history, the kingdom among the
lidomites ilppears to have been hereditary (I Kings
xi. 14). — Ver. 43. (Baumgarten :) We may ex
plain the fact that only eleven names are found
liere, while there are fourteen above, upon th«
supposition that some of the seats of power em
braced more than one princely fimilv.
CBAP. XXXVII. 1-S8. 57*
THIRD PERIOD.
The Genesis of the People of Israel in Egypt from the Twelve Branches of Israel
or the History of Joseph and his Brethren. Joseph the Patriarch of the Faith
dispensation through Humiliation and Exaltation. — Ch. XXXVII. 1 — L.
FIRST SECTION.
Jacob's incormderate fondness for Joseph. Joseph's dreams. Hit hrothers' envy. Joseph sold
into Egypt.
Chaptkb XXXVn. 1-36.
1 And Jacob dwelt in tlie land wherein his father was a stranger, in the land of
2 Canaan. These are the generations of Jacob. Joseph being seventeen years old, waa
feeding the flock with his brethren ; and the lad was with the sons of Bilhah, and with
the sons of Zilpah, his father's wives : and Joseph brought unto his father their evil
3 report.' Now Israel loved Joseph more than all liis children, because he was the son
of his old age''; and he made him a coat of many colors' [a beautiful robe, oh. rxvii. is],
4 And wijen his brethren saw that their fatlier loved him more than all his brethren, they
5 hated him, and could not speak peaceably unto him. And Joseph dreamed a dream.
6 and he told it to his brethren : and they hated him yet the more. And he said unto
7 them. Hear, I pray you, this dream which I have dreamed : For, behold, we were
binding sheaves in the field, and, lo. my sheaf arose, and also stood upright; and,
8 behold, your sheaves stood round about, and made obeisance to my sheaf And his
brethren said unto 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 words.
' 9 And he dreamed yet another dream, and told it to his brethren, and said. Behold, I have
dreamed a dream more ; and, behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars made
10 obeisance unto me. And he told it to his father, and to his brethren; and his (inther
rebuked him, and said unto him. What is this dream that thou hast dreamed ? Shall ]
and thy mother and thy brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee to the
11 earth? And his brethren envied him; but his father observed [kept, prcserTed] the say-
12, 1.3 ing. And his brethren went to feed their father's flock in Shecliem. And Israel said
unto Joseph, Do not thy brethren feed the flock in Shecliem? come, and I will send thee
14 unto them. And he said to him. Here am I. And he said to him. Go, I pray thee,
see whether it be well with thy brethren, and well with the flocks; and bring me word
15 again. So he sent him out of the vale of Hebron, and he came to Shechem. And a
certain man found him, and, behold, he was wandering in the field : and the man asked
16 him, saying, What seekest thou? And he said, I seek my brethren: tell me, I pray
17 thee, where they feed their flocks. And the man said. They are departed hence; for I
heard them say, Let us go to Dothan [the two wells]. And Joseph went afler h;«
18 brethren, and found them in Dothan. And when they saw him afar off, even before
19 he came near unto them, they conspired against him to slay him. And they said one
20 to another. Behold, this dreamer [man ol dreams] cometh. Come now, theiefore, and lei
us slay him, and cast him into some pit ; and we will say. Some evil beast Lath de-
21 voured him : and we wi'l see what will become of his dreams. And Reuben h'lard it
s»80
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
and he delivered him [sought to deliver'] out of their hands ; and he said, Let us r it kill him
22 And Reuben said unto them, Shed no blood, hut cast him inio this pit that is in th<
wilderness, and lay no hand upon him ; that he might rid him out of their hands, tc
23 deliver him to his father again. And it came to pass, wnen Joseph was come unto his
brethren, that they stripped Joseph out of his coat, his coat of many colors that vjoi
24 on him. And they took him, and cast him into a pit: and the pit was empty, there was
25 no water in it. And they sat down to eat bread: and they lifted up tlieir eyes and
looKed, and, behold, a company of Ishmaelites [a caravan] came from Gilead. with theii
camels bearing spices [tragakanth-grum], and balm, and myrrh, going to carry it down tt
-26 Egypt. And Judah said unto his brethren. What profit is it if we slay our brother,
27 and conceal his blood ? Come, and let us sell bim to the Islimaelites, and let not our
hand be upon him ; foi he is our brother, and our flesh. And his brethren were content.
28 Then there passed by Midianites, merchantmen ; and they drew and lifted up Joseph
out of the pit, and sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver: and they
29 brought Joseph unto Egypt. And Reuben returned unto the pit; and, behold, Joseph
30 was not in the pit: and he rent his clothes. And he returned unto his brethren, and
31 said, The child is not; and I, whither shall I go? And they took Joseph's coat, and
32 killed a kid of the goats, and dipped the coat in the blood. And they sent the coat of
many colors and they brought it to their father ; and said. This have we found ; know
33 now whether it he thy son's coat or no. And hk. knew it, and said, It is my son's coat
34 an evil beast hath devoured him ; Joseph is without doubt rent in pieces. And Jacob
rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his son many days.
35 And all his sons, and all his daughters, rose up to comfort him ; but he refused to be
comforted ; and he said, For I will go down into the grave [sheol] * unto my son mourn-
36 ing. Thus his father wept for him. And the Midianites sold him into Egypt, unto
Potiphar [Septuagint: nereijipis, belonging to the buh], an officer of Pharaoh's [king; Lepsius: sun],
and captain of the guard.
1' Ver. 2.^n5"l DP3n. LXX., i|*070»' ttovt^poc ; Vulgate, more strongly, accw5atJi7/ra(re5 swos apu(fpa/rem crtmifw
pestimo. From 23T , an onomatope {dabab — dab—dabbfey^ denoting a light, oft-repeated sound (tap-tap), or motitm, like
the Arabic 1,^4^ leniter incessit, replavit. In either way the noun n3'n would come to mean a rumor whispered, or
creeping round. It does not mean that Joseph made accusations against them, as the 'v'ulgate has it, but that, in boyish
simplicity, he repeated what he had heard about them. The root D2*l occurs only Cant. ni. 10, where Gesenius gives it
the sense o\ lightty finwing, which hardly seeras consistent with the radical idea of repetition. The light motion of the
lips, like one muttering, or faintly attempting to speak in sleep, as our translators have given it, is more in accordance
with the nature of the root. — T. L.1
[* Ver. 3. — D'^3pT "iS . Rendered, son of his old age, TrjAvycros. But, as Maimonides well remarks, this could not
have been the cise with Joseph in a degree much exceeding the relation to the father of Issachar and Zebulon. Ho
thinks, therefore, that he was so called, not bec;iuse he was late bora, but because he stayed at home, and thus became his
father's principal stay and support — " as L-i the custom of old men to retain one son, in this manner, whether the younger*
or not — '^S'pTb PT^'^ ".IIUD— that is, be to him -jTipoTpo^os or yTjpo/Soo-KOv, as the Greeks called it." In this view the
plural form would be intensive, denoting extreme old age, to which the other places where the form occurs would well
agree, Gen. xsi. 2, 7 ; xliv. 20. After Joseph, lieojamin performed this duty. The Turgum of Onkelos seems to have had
something of this kind in view, when it renders it nb C'^DH "l~ , his wise son — his careful son, who provided for him. — T. L.)
[3 Vc-r. 3, — C©D rSPS, coat of many colors, — rather, coat of pieces. The context shows that it was something
beautiful and luxurious ; the other passage where it occurs, 2 Sam. xiii. 18, shows that it may denote a garment for
either sex, and the plural form indicates variety of construction or material. The primary sense of the root, DOS ,
is diminntioTi, not diffusion, as Gesenius says (see HDD). This is inferred from the use of D5X for something small, as
the end or extremity of anything, and the parallelism of the verb, Ps. xii. 2,— a garment distinguished for small spot*,
stripes, i}T fringes — 1. L.]
[* Ver. 35. — On the etymology of 31X11' see Excursus, p. 585 eqq. — T. L.]
OENEBAL PRELIMINARY REMABKS.
1. It is to be noted ber^ in the first place, that thu
history of Joseph is amplified beyond that of aiiv
»!' tin; patriarchs hitherto. This is explained liy the
contact which .Jo.seph'» transportation ^ives rise to
between the Hebrew spirit and the Egyptian cnltiire
and literature. \ trace of this may be found in
the history of Abr.'diatn ; for after .Abraham hail been
In Eu'y(it, his history be.omcs tnore full. V'th the
neuioiabilia of Joseiih connects itself tb ■ ooount
of Moses, who was educated in all the different
branches of Egyptian learning, whilst this again
)ioints to Samuel and the schools of the prophcLs.
'1. Knobel regards .loseph's liistory as having grown
out of the original Elohistic text connected with a
later revision (p. 28s). lie supposes, liowever, in
this case, two halves, wiiieh, taken sej)ara'ely, hav*
iiosignilicance. That Joset)h was sold into I'-gvpt, ac«
cording to the snjiposed original text, can iidy be
explain! d Votn the fact mentioned in the supposed
additions. Iliat ho had 'Ucurred th" hatred of hi»
UUAP. XXXVII. 1-36.
5»
brethren by reason of his aapiring dreams. Reu-
ben's proposition to cast Joseph into the pit, and
» liict aimed at his preservation, was not added until
ifterwards, it is said. Even Joseph's later declara-
tion : I was stolen from the country of the Hebrews,
18 regarded as mal;ing a difference. Dehtz.-ich, too,
^opts a combination of different elements, witliout,
however, recognizing the contradictions raised by
Knobel (p. 517). He presents, also, as a problem
difficult of solution, the usage of tlie divine names in
this last period of Genesis. In ch. xxxvii. no name
of God occurs, but in ch. xxxviii, it is Jehovah that
slays Judah's sons, as also, in cli. xxxix., it is Jeho-
vah that blesses Joseph in Potiphar's house, and in
person ; as recognized by Potiphar hicnself. Oidy
in ver. 9 we find Elohim, — the name Jehovah not
being here admissible. From ch. xl. onward, the
name Jehova': disappears. It occurs but once be-
tween ch. xl. and 1., as in ch. xlix. 18, when Jacob
uses it : "I have waited for thy salvation, Jehovah."
For different interpretations of this by Keil, Drechs-
ler, llengstenberg, Baumgarten, and Delitzsch, see
Delitzsch, p. 615. The three last agree in this, that
the author of Genesis, in the oft-repeated Elohim,
wished here to mark more emphatically, by way of
contrast, the later appearance of the Jehovah-
period, Exod. iii. 6. This would, indeed, be a very
artificial way of writing books. The riddle must
find its solution in actual relations. The simple ex-
planation is, that in the history of a Joseph, which
stands entirely upon an Elohistic foundation, this
name Elohim pTcdominantly occurs. Joseph is the
Solomon of the patriarchal times.
3. The generations of Jacob coimect themselves
irith those of Esau. Delitzsch justly remarks, p.
511, that the representation which follows (ch.
ixxvii. to ch. 1.), was intended to be, not a mere his-
tory of Joseph, but a history of Jacob in his sons.
Otherwise Judah's history, ch. xxxviii., would appear
as an interpolation. The twelve sons of Jacob con-
stitute Israel's new seed. The latter fact, of course,
has the stronger emphasis. The generations of
Jacob are the history and successions of his poster-
ity— that is, his living on in his posterity, just as
Adam's tholedoth. Gen. v. 1, represent the history of
Adam, not personally, but historically, in hi;! descend-
uits.
4. Joseph's history is considered in a triple rela-
tion : as the history of the genesis of the Israelitish
people in Egypt ; as an example of a special provi-
dence, such as often brings good out of evil, as ex-
emplified in ihe book of Job ; and as a type of the
fundamental law of God in guiding the elect from
suffering to joy, from humiliation to exaltation^a
law already indicated in the life of Noah, Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob, but which, henceforth, develops it-
self more and more (especially in the history of
David), to terminate, at last, in the life of Jesus, as
presen ting the very sublimity of the antithesis. Hence
the appearance, in our history, of individual types
represeLting the New-Testament history of Jesus,
such as the jealousy and hatred of Joseph's brethren,
the fact of his being sold, the fulfilment of Joseph's
prophetic dreams in the very efforts intended to pre-
tent his exaltation, the turning of his brothers' wick-
'A plot to the salvation of many, even of themselves,
»nd of the house of Jacob, the spiritual sentence
pronouuced on the treachery of the brethren, the
victory of pardoning love, Judah's suretyship for
Benjamin, his emulating Joseph in a spirit of re-
ieeming resignation, Jacob's joyful reviving on hear-
ing of the life and glory of his favorite son, whon
he had believed to be dead.
Concerning Israel's genesis in Egyp;, Delitzsch
remarks : " According to a law of divine providences,
to be found not only in tlie Old Testament, but also
in the New (?), not the land of the promise, but a
foreign country, is the place where the Clmrcb is
born, and comes to maturity. This foreign country,
to the Old-Testament Church, is the land of Egypt.
To go before his people, to prepare a place for them,
is Joseph's high vocation. Sold into Egypt, he opens
the way thither to the house of Jacob, and the same
country where he matures to maidiood, where he suf-
fers ill prison, and attains to glory, becomes, to his
f miily, the land where it comes to the maturity of a
nation, — the land of its servitude, and of its re-
demption. Thus far Joseph's history is the overture
of Jacob's history — a type of the way of the Church ;
not of Jehovah only, but of Christ in his progress
from humiliation to exaltation, from subjection to
freedom, from sufferings to glory." See Matt. ii. 15 ;
Hosca xi. 1. Israel's riches of election and endow-
ment are to be developed by contact with different
heathen nations, and especially with Egypt. Just as
Christianity, the completed revelation of the now
covenant, developed itself formally for the world, by
its reciprocal intercourse with a Gra;co-Komanic
culture, thus was it also with the faith of the old
covenant in its reciprocal intercourse with the old
Egyptian world-culture, as shown especially in the
history of Joseph, Moses, and Solomon who became
the son-in-law of one of the Pharaohs. More prom-
inently does this appear, again, in the history of Alex-
andrian Judaism ; in which, however, the interchange
of influence with Egypt becomes, at the same time,
one with that of the whole Orient, and of Greece.
The key of Jc«eph's history, as a history of prov-
idence, is clearly found in the declaration made by
him ch. xlv. 5-8, and ch. 1. 20. The full explanation,
however, of its significance, is found in the history
of Christ as furnishing its perfect fulfilment. Per-
mission of evil, counteraction and modification
of evil, frustration of its tendency, its conver-
sion into good, victory over evil, destruction of evil,
and reconciliation of the evil themselves, — these are
the forces of a movement here represented in its
most concrete and most powerful relations. The
evil is conspiracy, treachery, and a murderous plot
sigainst their innocent brother. The conversion of
it is of the noblest kind. The plot to destroy Jo-
seph is the occasion of his greatest glorification.
But as God's sentence against the trembling con-
scious sinner is changed into grace, so also the tri-
umph of pardoning love overcoming hatred becomes
conspicuous as a glorious omen in Joseph's lite.
" Inasmuch," says Delitzsch, " as Israel's history
is a typical history of Christ, and Christ's history the
typic;il history of the Church, so is Joseph a type of
il'hrist himself What he suffered from his brethren,
and which God's decree turned to his own and Ida
nation's salvation, is a type of Christ's suffermgs,
caused by his people, but which God's decree turned
to the salvation of the world, including, finally, the
salvation of Israel itself." Says Pascal {Pensees, ii.
St, 2): "Jesus Christ is typified in Joseph, the be-
loved of his father, sent by his father to his brethren,
the innocent one sold by his brethren for twenty pie
ces of silver, and then becoming their Lord, theii
Saviour, the saviour of those who were aliens tc
Israel, the saviour of the world, — all which would
not have been if thev had not cherished the desigf
582
GENESIS, PR THE FIRST BOOK ,F MOSES.
of destroying him — if they had not sold and rejected
him. Joseph, tlie imiocent one, in prison with two
malefactors — Jesus on the cross between two thieves;
Joseph predicts favoiably to the one, but death to
the other; Jesus saves the one, whilst he leaves the
other in condemnation. Thus has the Church ever
regarded Joseph's liistory." Already is this inti-
mated in the Gospels. What Pascal here says, and
13 is also held by the fathers, e. g,. Prosper Aqui-
tanus, (/' Promissionibut et Praedictionibus Dei, is
but a brief statement of the pious thoughts of all
believers, in the contemplation of the history. It is
this which imparts to the wonderful typical light here
presented its irresistible chann.
When, however, Joseph is made the exclusive
centre of our history, and the patriarchal type of
Christ (Kdktz, "History of the Old Testament," i.
p. 343), Kcil presents, in opposition, some most im-
portant considerations. It is, indeed, no ground of
difference (as presented by him), that Joseph became
formally naturalized in Egypt; for Christ, too, was
delivered to the heathen, and died out of the camp.
Nor does it make any important difference that Jo-
seph received no special revelations of God at the
court of Pharaoh, as Daniel did at the court of
Nebuchadnezzar ; the gift of interpreting dreams he
also, like Daniel, referred back to God. Of greater
importance is the remark that Joseph is nowhere, in
the Scriptures themselves, presented as a type of
Christ ; yet we must distinguish between verbal
references and real relations, .such as might be indi-
cated in Zach. xi. 12, and in Chiisfs declaration that
one of his disciples should betray him. There is,
however, a verbal reference in Stephen's speech.
Acts vii. 9. Tliere is no mistaking the fact that the
Messianic traces in our narrative are shared both
by Joseph and Judah. Judah appears great and no-
ble througliout the history of Joseph ; the instance,
however, in which he is wilhng to sacrifice himself
to an unhmited servitude for Benjamin, makes him
of equal dignity with Joseph. So in Abraham's sac-
rifice, the Messianic typical is distrilmted between
him and Isaac. Joseph's glory is preeminently of a
prophetic kind ; the weight of a priestly voluntary
self-sacrifice inchnes more to the side of Judah.
Benjamin, too, has his Messianic ray ; for it is espe-
cially on his account that the brethren may appear
before Joseph in a reconciling light. On Hiller's
" Typological Contemplation of Joseph," see Keil,
p. 242. MEiNEitizHAGEN, in his "Lectures on the
Christology of the Old Testament" (p. 204), treats
of the typical significance of Joseph with great ful-
ness. It is also to be noted that ever afterwards
Benjamin appears theocratically and geographically
coimected with Judah.
.'5. The disposition of Joseph's history, and the
lettlement of the Israelites in Egypt, as well as its
-elation to the Ilyksos of whom Josephus speaks
(contra A/tioii, i. 14), in an extract from Manetho's
history, presents a question of great historical inter-
est (see Delitzscii, p. 518). The extract concerning
the Hyksoa has a mythical look. Still darker are
other things which Josephus gives us from Manetho
and Chajremon (contra Ap., i. 26, 32). Different
Tiews : 1) The Ilyksos and the Israelites are iden-
tical ; 80 Manetho, Josephus, lingo (irotius, Hof-
mann, Knobel (p. 301), and, in a moiliUed form,
H'jyffarth, ridcmann. 2) The Ilyksos are distinct
from the iHraeliies; they were another Shemitic
tribe — Arabians, or Phmnicians ; so Cuiiacus, Scal-
iger, etc This view, says Delitzscb, is now the pre-
vaihng one. So also Ewald, Lepsius, Saalsch iU
but with different combinations. On these see De.
LiTzscH, p. fi21. 3) The Hyksos were Scytiians
so ChampoUiou, RosselUni. The first view is op.
posed by the fact that the IsraeUtes Ibundcd no
dynasties in Egypt, as did the Hyksos ; nor did they
exist there under shepherd-kings, as the name Hyksoj
has been interpreted. Against the second view De-
litzscb insists that the people of Egypt, into who«j
servitude Israel fell, appear as a people foreign to
them, and by no means as one connected with them.
The Shemitic idea, however, is so extended, tha*
we cannot always suppose a theocratic element along
with it. The most we can say is, t.:at the Hyksos,
who, no doubt, were a roving band of conquerors,
came from Syria, or the countries lying north and
east beyond Palestine. In the Egyptian tradition,
their memory seems to have been so mingled with
that of the Israelites, that it would seem almost im-
possible to separate the historical element from such
a mixture. Since, however, the Israelitish history
seems more obscured by that of the Hyksos than
contradicted, it may be regarded as more probable
that the latter came latest. The pressure of the
Israelites upon the Canaanites, from the east, may
have driven them in part to the south ; and the
weakening of Egypt by the destruction of Pharaoh
and his army, forty years before, might have favored
a conquest. The chronological adjustment, however,
must be left to itself. For a fuller treatment of
this subject, see E. Bohmer, " The First Book of the
Thora" (Halle, 1862); appendix, p. 205, etc. Accord-
ing to Lepsius, the appearance of the Hyksos iij
Egypt preceded the history of Joseph. At all events,
this dim tradition bears testimony to the Israelitish
history in many particulars (e. g., that they foimded
Jerusalem in Judea). On the full confirmation of
Joseph's history by Greek historians and by Egyp-
tian monuments, compare Delitzsch, p. 524, etc. ;
Hengstenberg, "The Pentateuch and Egypt," Ber-
lin, 1841.
6. The history of Israel's settlement in Egypt ex-
tends through the sections that follow : 1 ) The corrup-
tion in Jacob's house, the dispersion of his sons, the
loss of Joseph (ch. xxxviii.-xxxix.). 2) Joseph's
elevation, and the reconciliation and gathering of his
brethren (ch. xl.-l.). 3) Israel's transplantation to
Egypt (cli. xlvi.-xlvii. 26). 4) The keeping of the
divine promise, and the longing of Israel to return
home to Canaan (ch. xlvii. 27-ch. 1.).
EXEGETICAIj and CRITICAl.
Contents : The conspiracy of Jacob's sons against
their brother Joseph, considered in its awful dark-
ness, or the deep commotion and apparent destruc-
tion of Jacob's house : 1. The occasion (vers. 1-1 1);
2. the opportunity, and the plot of murder (vers.
12-20); 3. Reuben's attempt to rescue ; 4. Judah's
effort to save, unknowingly crossing that of Reuben
(vers. 26-27) ; 6. the crime, the beginning of mourn-
ing, the hiding of guilt (vers. 28-32); 6. Jacob'f
deep grief, and Joseph apparently lost (vers. 33-36),
1. T/te occasion (vers. 1-11). — In the land of
Canaan. — It seems to have been made already hit
permanent homo, but soon to assume a difl'crent ap
pearance. — The generations (see above). — Joseph
being seventeen years old. — A statement very
important in respect both to the present oc<;urrenc«
and the future history. la ch. xli. 46, be is men
CHAP. XSXVn. 1-36.
.•is;
tioned a? tlurty years old. His sufferings, tlierefore,
lasted about thirieen years. At this age of seveuteeu
he became a shepherd with his brethren. Jacob
did not send liis favorite son too early to the herds ;
yet, though the favorite, he was to begin to serve be-
low the rest, as a shepherd-boy. At tliis age, how-
ever, .Joseph had great naiveness and simplicity. He
therefore imprudently tells his dreams, lilce an inno-
cent child. On the other hand, however, he w,is
very sedate; he was not enticed, therefore, by the
evil example of some of his brethren, but considered
it his duty to inform his father. — And the lad was
with the sons of Bilhah. — For the sons of Bilhah
Rachel's servant stood nearer to him, while those of
Leah were most opposed. He brought to his father
ns"i Dr:n rs, translated by Keil, evil reports con-
cerning them. A direct statement of their offences
would doubtless have been differently expressed.
They were an offence to those living in the vicinity.
This determined him to inform his father, but it does
not exclude a conviction of his own. It is inadmis-
sible to refer this to definite sins (as, e. g., some
have thought of unnatural sins). That the sons of
the concubines surpassed the others in rude conduct,
is easily understood. Joseph's moral earnestness is,
doubtless, the first stumbling-block to his brethren,
whilst it strengthens his father in his good opinion.
The beautiful robe was the second offence. It is
called C^SD n5r3, "an outer garment of ends,"
which extends, hke a gown, to the hands and the
ancles. The Septuagint, which Luther's translation
follows, renders it " a coat of many colors." Comp.
2 Sam. xiii. IS. The common tunic extended only
to the knees, and was without arms. Already this
preference, which seemed to indicate that Jacob in-
tended to give him the i-ight of the first-born, aroused
the hatred of his brethren. One who hates cannot
greet heartily the one who is hated, nor talk with
him frankly and peaceably. In addition to this, Jo-
seph, by his dreams and presages (though not yet a
prudent interpieter), was pouring oil upon the flames.
At all events, the ^2^^ (lo), as repeated in his narra-
tion, shows that he had a presentiment of something
great. Both dreams are expressive of his future ele-
vation. In Egypt he becomes the fortunate sheaf-
, binder whose sheaf " stood up " du.ing the famine.
The second dream confirms tiie first, whilst present-
ing the further thought : even the sun and moon —
that is, according to Jacob's interpretation, even his
father and his mother — were to bow before him. Ra-
chel died some time before this. On this account
the word mother has been referred to Bilhah, or to
Benjamin as representing Rachel, or else to Leah.
The brethren now hated him the more, not merely
as recognizing in his dreams the suggestions of am-
bition, but with a mingled feeling, in which there was
not wanting a presentiment of his possible exalta-
tion— as their declaration, ver. 20, betrays. In Ja-
cob's rebuke we perceive also mingled feelings.
There is dissent from Joseph's apparently pretentious
prospects, a fatherly regard toward the mortified
brettrsn, yet, withal, a deeper presentiment, that
caused him to keep these words of Joseph in his
heart, as Mary did those of the shepherds. As the
naivete of tie shepherd-boy was evidence of the
tnth fulness oi these dreams, so the result testifies
to the higher origin of a divine communication, con-
ditioned, indeed, by the hopefully presagefiil life of
Joseph. These dreams were probably intended to
tustain Joseph during his thirteen years of wretch-
edness, and, at the same time, to prepare him to b<
an interpreter. The Zodiac, as here brought in b5
Knobel, has no significance, nor the custom of placing
a number of sheaves together.
2. llie opportunUy and tk'' plot of niitrder (vera
12-211). — In Shechem. — There is no ground foi
supposing another Shechem, as some have done, on
account of what had formerly occurred there. It it
more likely that Jacob's sons courageously returned
to the occupation of the parcel of land formerly ac-
quired by them. This very circumstance, however,
may have so excited the anxiety of the cautious
parent that he sent Joseph after them. That Joseph
could have lost his way at Shechem is easily ex-
plained, since he was so young when his father lived
there. — In Dothan, — The Septuagint has Audaciu,
.Judith iv. 6 ; vii. 3 ; viii. 3 ; AiuSaV 2 Kings vi. 13,
Dothan. It was a place above Samaria, towards the
plain of Jezreel, according to Josephus and Hierony-
mus. " Thus it was found by Robinson and Smith
:d their journey of 1S52, and also by Van de Velde,
in the southeast part of the plain of Jabud, west of
Genin. It is a beautiful green dell, always called
Dothan, at whose south foot a fountain rises." De-
litzsch. Through the plain of Tell-Dothan a high-
way passes from the northwest to Ramleh and Egypt.
— 'They conspired against him That Reuben
and Judah were not concerned in this, is plain from
what follows. — This dreamer cometh. — Spoken
contemptuously — master of dreams, dream-man.
The word nifen does not express contempt of itself,
as is seen from ch. xxiv. 65, the only other place in
which it occurs. It denotes something unexpected
and remarkable. — Into some pit. — Cisterns (se«
Winer : wells). — And wo shall see. — They
thought by their fratricide surely to frustrate his ex-
altation— a proof that his dreams alarmed them ; but
by this very deed, as controlled by God's providence,
they bring it about.
3. Reuhen's artful attempt at saviiig (vers. 21-
24). The text states directly that Reuben made his
proposition in order to save Joseph. Knobel, by a
frivolous criticism, would foist a contradiction upon
the text, namely, that Reuben made the proposition
in order to let him perish in the pit ; since a blood-
less destruction of life seems to have been regarded
as less criminal than a direct killing. But, then, the
Reviser must have imparted to Reuben's proposition
a different interpretation, by means of an addition.
Reuben, it is true, had to express himself in such a
way that the brothers might infer his intention to let
him perish in the pit ; but this was the only way to
gain their consent. — They stripped Joseph out
of his coat. — The object of their jealousy and their
wrath. — And the pit was empty So that he did
not perish. His cries for mercy they remembered
many years afterwards (ch. xli. 21).
4. JndaKs bold attempt to snve kim {vers.25-2^).
— And they sat down. — Through this apparent
insensibility their inward agony is betrayed; it ap-
pears in their agitated looking out, so that they espy
the Ishmaelites already at a great distance. — And
behold, a company of Ishmaelites. — -^ caravan,
nn~!< (Job vi. 19). " This caravan (as Robinson'j
description shows) had crossed the Jordan at Beisan,
and followed the highway that led from Beisan and
Zerin to Ramleh and Egypt, entering the plain of
Dothan west of Genin." Delitzsch. In vers. 25,
27, and 28, the merchants are called Ishmaelites.
whilst in the first part of ver. 28 they are stylef
584
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Midianites, and in ver. 36 Medanites. Knobel, of
course, regards them as different traditions (p. 29S).
Ver 28, however, would seem to tell us that the Ish-
maelites were the proprietors of the caravan, which
was made up, for the most part, of Midianitish peo-
ple. In a similar manner, probably, as Esau made
a number of the Ilorites subject to hiiu, so had the
Ishmaelites also brought under them a number of
the Midianites. One hundred and fifty years, the
time that had elapsed since Ishmacl's departure from
Abraham, would give a sufficient increase tor tliis
(see Keil, p. 2-14). As merchants, they were trans-
porting costly products of their country to Egypt.
Gum-tragacanth is found in Syria; the balm of
Gilead was especially renowned, and was sold to
Phoenicia and Egypt ; ladanum (myrrli), or the fra-
grant rose of the cistus, is found in Arabia and Syria,
as well as in Palestine (see Schdbert, iii. p. 114 and
174). Concerning the cisterns, or tlie artificially
prepared reservoirs of rain-water, see the Diction-
aries and geograi)hiial works. They might be full
of water, or have mire at the bottom, or be entirely
dry. They were frequently used as prisons (see Jer.
xxxviii. 6; xl. 15). Schrodkr: "On his way to
Damascus, Robinson found Khan Jubb Jiisuf (a kind
of inn), tlie khan of Joseph's pit, so called after a
well connected with it, and which for a long time,
both among Christians and Mohammedans, was re-
garded as the cistern into wliich Joseph was thrown."
— ^And Judah said. — " Then Juilah began to use
the language of a hypocritical self-interest," says De-
litzsch. This, however, seems to be not at all justified
by Judah's after-history. It must be presupposed
that Judah was unacquainted with Reuben's inten-
tion. The brethren were so much excited that Ju-
dah alone could not have hoped to rescue Joseph
from their hand. The ferocity, especially, of Simeon
and Levi, is known to us from former history. Ju-
dah, therefore, could think no otherwise than that
Joseph nmst die from hunger in the pit. As in op-
position to this, therefore, and not as a counteraction
of Reuben's attempt at deliverance, is his proposal
to be judged. He lived still, though a slave. There
was a possibility of his becoming free. He might
make his escape liy the caravan routes that passed
south through his liome. Reuben, in his tenderness,
had made a subtle attempt to save him. In the
bolder policy of Judah we see that subtle attempt
crossed by one more daring. No doubt both had
some ill-feeling towards Joseph, and were, therefore,
not c:ipiible of a nmtual and open undei'standing.
That both, however, pre.served a better conscience
than the rest, is evident from tlie later history. The
unity of our story is not disturbed by Knobel's re-
mark, " that a further tradition is given, EtrsEB.
Prop. Kvantf., ix. 23, to the effect that, in order to
escape the snares of his brethren, Joseph besought
Arabians, who were near, to tal<e him along witli
them to Egypt; which they did; so that, in tins
way, lire the patriarchs still more exculpated."
What .loseph says of himself afterwards, that he
was stolen out of the land of the Hebrews (cli. xl.
16), docs not contradict our narration. Was he to
<ell to the Egyptians the crime of his brethren f
5. Vers. 2H-32. Tlic crime, the beffhmhtff of
inruTid' //, and tlie cnyicealment of the f/uilt. —
Twenty pieces of silver. — Comp. ch. xx. 16.
Twenty shekels of silver was the compensation that
Moses appointed for a boy from five to twenty years
old (Lev. xxvii. 5), whilst the average price of a
dlave »a.s thirty shekels (Exod. xxi. ;i2). — And
Reuben returned unto the pit. — His absen«
may easily be accounted for : it was impossible fo>
him to eat with his brethren in his then state of
mind ; and he probably resorted to "olitude to think
out a jilan of deliverance — And he rent hi»
clothes. — The later custom (Matt. xxvi. 05) origin-
ally sprung from vivid emotions of sorrow, — the
rending as an exiiression of inward distraction. Afr
terwards came this rending of garments upon the
others (ch. xliv. 13).^And I, whither shall I go?
— Not only as the first-born was he especially re-
sponsible for the younger brother, but his tcndei
fcehngs for him, and for the unhappy fiither, made
hun the bearer of the agony of the guilty confede-
racy ; and this to such a degree that he knew not
what to do. — And they took Joseph's coat. —
One transgression gives birth to another. With the
consciousness that tried to conceal their guilt, there
mingles the old grudge concerning the coat of many
colors, which here turns itself even against the fa-
ther. Doubtle-s, iu some degree, they thought them-
selves justified in the tliought that the father had
given them cause of irritation by providing such a
coat for Joseph. Reuben and Judah are, njoreover,
burdened by the ban of silence.
6. Jaeob's deep grief, and Joseph's appnreut loss
(vers. .33-36).— It is nay son's coat. — Their decep-
tion succeeded. In his agony he does not discover
the fraud ; the sight of the blood-dyed garment led
him to conclude : Surely an evil beast hath torn Jo-
seph, and devoured him". — Sackcloth The sign of
the deepest mourning (see Wmer : Trauer-sack ).
— And mourned for his son Retaining also his
garment of mourning. — And all his sons The
criminals as comforters ! — And all Iiis daughters.
— From this there arises the probaliility that Jacob
had other daughters than Dinah, though the daugh-
ter.--in-law may be so called. — For I will go down.
— The "3 is elliptical, implying, nothing can comfort
me, for, etc. — Mourning unto my sou.— There is,
doubtless, somithing moie here than grief merely
for the loss; there is also self-reproach for having
exposed the child to such danger. — Into the grave
(sheol). — In this mournful mood of Jacob does tiiis
word sheol first occur. It was not the world bevond
the grave considered as the gathering to the fatiiers,
but the dark night of death and mourning. There
are various derivations of this word. One that easdy
suggests itself is that which marks it fiom iiSC, to
demand — that place which inexorably demands all
men back (Prov. xxx. 15; Is. v. 14; Heb. ii. 5).
[See Excursus below, especially p. 586 sq. — T. L.]
Ver. St). The word D^TD , according to its original
significance, denotes an eunuch ; its later and more
general interpretation is cour/ier. — Captain of the
guard. — Literally a slayer, that is, au executioner
(sec 2 Kings xxv. 8; Jer. xxxix. U). For purticulars,
see Dei.itzsch, p. 531. On the chronology as con-
nected with the remark that Josepli was sold when
he was seventeen years old, see .-dso Deluzsch, p.
532. Joseph's history here suffers an intei'ruption
by the in.sertion of an incident in the life of Judah.
Ch. xxxviii. Delitzsch ascribes this to literary art
on the part of the author, but of that we may doubt.
It is, of itself, just the time that we should expect to
learn something more about Judah.
[Note on Genesis xxxvii. 35. The Piumitivi
Conception of Sueoi,. — This is the first place it
which the word occurs, and it is very important li
CHAP. XXXVU. l-3o
58t
irace, as far as we can, the earliest conception, or
rather emotion, out of which it arose. "I will go
down to ray son mourning to Sheol," — towards Sheol,
or, on the way to Sheol,— the reference boiug to the
decline of life terminating in that unknown state,
place, or coudition of being, so called. One thing
is clear : it was not a state of not-being, if we niiiy
use so paradoxical an expression. Jacob was going
to his son ; he was still his son ; there is yet a tie
between him and his father ; he is still spoken of
as a personality ; he is still regarded as having a
being somehow, and somewhere. Compare 2 Sam.
lii. 23, Tibx "bh ■'3S , "/ am going to him, but
he shall not return to m«." The him and the vie in
(his case, like the / and the my son in Genesis, are
alike personal. In the earliest language, where all
is hearty, such use of the pionoun could have been
no unmeaning figure. The being of the one who
has disappeared is no less real than that of the one
who remains still seen, still found* to use the Shem-
itic term for existence, or oul-bei?ip, as a known and
visible state (see note, p. 273). The LXJ" have ren-
dered it here eWASov, into Hades; the Vulgate, ad
filium meum in infernwn. It was not to his son in
his grave, for Joseph had no grave. Ills body was
supposed to be lying somewhere in the desert, or
torn in pieces, or carried off, by the wild beasts (see
ver. 33). To resolve it all into figurative expressions
for the grave would be simply carrying our meaning-
less modern rhetoric into ancient forms of speech
employed, in their first use, not for the reflex paint-
ing, but for the very utterance of emotional concep-
■,ions. However indefinite they may be, they are too
mournfully real to admit of any such explanations.
Looking at it steadily from this primitive standpoint,
we are compelled to say, that an undoubting convic-
tion of personal extinction at death, leaving nothing
but a dismembered, decomposing boiiy, now belong-
ing to no one, would never have given rise to such
language. The mere conception of the grave, as a
place of burial, is too narrow for it. It, alone, wovdd
have destroyed the idea in its germ, rather than have
given origin and expansion to it. The fact, too, that
they had a well-known word for the grave, as a con-
fined place of deposit for the body ("i2J? riTns , a
possession, or property, of a grave, see Gen. xxiii. 9).
sfiows that this other name, and this other concep-
tion, were not dependent upon it, nor derived from it.
The older lexicographers and commentators gen-
erally derived the word biXB (Sheol) from bxiT
[Sha-al), to as/c, inquire, etc. This is a very easy
derivation, so far a* form is concerned ; and why is
it not correct ? In any way the sense deduced will
seem near, or far-fetched, according to our precon-
ceptions in respect to that earliest view of extinct or
continued being. Ge.^enius rejects it, maintaining
that bisU) is for bl'Stt," , and means cnvity ; hence a
subterranean region, etc. He refers to bsilj , hollow
of the hand, or fist. Is. xl. 12; 1 Kings xx. 10; Ezek.
xiii. 19 ; and bsili', the name for fox or jackal, who
digs holes in the earth, — this being all that ctm be
'onnd of any other use of the supposed root from
* [Compare the Hebrew N]£'23 , as used Ps. xlvi. 1, from
ivfaicli comes the frequent rabbinical use of the term for ex-
.stence as that which is somehow present Comp. also the
Arab, i^y^a and k::.j!fc^>'^« 4 M = rd oiTa, entia. Lit.,
'Jlings to be found. — T. L.]
which comes this most ancient word, so full of somii
most solemn significance. There is n reference, also
to the German hijlle, or the general term of tht
northern nations (Gothic, Scandinavian, Saxon), de
noting hole, or cavity; though this is the very ques
tion, whether the northern conception is not a sec
ondary one, connected with that later thought of
penal confinement which was never separable from
the Saxon hell, — a sense-limitation, in fact, of the
more indefinite aid more spiritual notion priniarilj
presented by the Greek Hades, and which furnishes
the true parallel to the early Hebrew Sheol. Fiirst
has the same view as Gesenius. To make bix'i' and
blSIE equivalents, etymologically, there is supposed
to be an interchange of S and S , a tiling qisite com-
mon in the later Syriae, but rare in the Hebrew,
especially the earlier writings, and whicli would be
cited as a mark recentioris Hehraismi, if the ration-
ahstic argument, at any time, required it. The S
has ever kept its place most tenaciously in the
Arabic, as shown by Robinson in the numerous
proper names of places in which it remain^ un
changed to this day. So it was, doubtless, in the
most early Shemitic, though in the Syriae it became
afterwards much weakened through the antipathetic
Greek and Koman influence upon that language, and
so, frequently passed into the more easily pronounced
X . It is improbable that this should have taken
place in the most ancient stage of the language, or
at the time of the first occurrence of this word in
the biblical writings. Gesenius would give to bx'i^
too, the supposititious primary sense of digging, to
make it the ground of the secondary idea of search
or inquiry ; but this is not tlie primary or predomi-
nant conception of bsB ; it is always that of inter-
rogation, like the Greek ipiordoo, or of demand, like
a'lTfw, ever implying speech, instead of the positive
-.ci of search, such as is denoted by the Hebrew
■^pn , to explore. Subsequent lexicographers and
commentators have generally followed (Tesenius, who
seems to pride himself upon this discovery (see
Robinson : " Lex. N. Test." on the word Hades).
Of the older mode of derivation he says : " Prior de
etijmo conjectura vix memoratu digna est." By some
it would lie regarded as betraying a deficiency in
Hebrew learning to think of supporting an etymology
so contemptuously rejected. And yet it has claims
that should not be lightly given up, especially as they
are so intimately connected with the important in-
quiry in respect to the lirs' conception of those who
first used the word. Was this, primarily, a thought
of locality, however wide or narrow it may have
been, or did the space-notion, which undoubtedly
prevailed afterwards, come from an earlier thought,
or state of soul rather, more closely allied to feeling
than to any positive idea ? This conception of lo-
cality in the earth came in very early; it grew natu-
rally from something before it ; but was it fiist of
all y Lowth, Herder, etc., are, doubtless, correct .n
the representations they give of the Hebrew Sheol,
as an imagined subterranean residence of the dead,
and this is confirmed by later expressions we find in
the Psalms and elsewhere, *uch as "going down to
the pit" (compare "lia ■''^^''■' and similar lang.iage,
Ps. xxviii. I ; xxx. 4; Ixxxviii. 5; Is. xiv. 19;
xxxviii. 10, etc.); yet still there is the best of rea.
sons for believing that what may be called th<
emotional or ejaculatory conception was earlier that
586
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
this, and that the local was the form it took when it
passed from an emotion to a speculative thought.
From what source, then, in this earlier stage, could
the name more naturally have come than from the
primitive significance of that word 5XO, which, in
the Arabic iJLw , and everywhere in the Shemitic
family, haa this one old sense of appealing interro-
gation,— first, simple inquiry, secondly, the idea of
demand ? The error of the older etymologists, then,
jonsisted, not in making it from bsffi, but in con-
necting it with this secondary idea, and so referring
it to Sheol itself as demanding, instead of the
mourning, sighing surrivors asking after the dead.
They supposed it was called Sheol from its rapacity,
or unsatiableness, ever claiming its victims, — a
thought, indeed, common in the earln language of
mourning, but having too much of tropical artifice
to be the very earliest. It belongs to that later stage
in which language is employed, retroactively, to
awaken or intensify emotion, instead of being its
gushing, irrepressible utterance. In support of this
view, the text constantly cited, as the standard one,
wasProv. xxx. 16, -jin nn^S ^''■' r-iS^":: Kb - - bisiB,
Sheol that ii nener satisfied, thu. never xat/», enough.
See the old commentary of Martin Geier on the book
of Pioverbs. Corresponding to this is the manner
in which Homer speaks of Hades, and its vast popu-
lation :
KAvTa eBvia. veKpiav.
So the dramatic poets represent it as rapacious,
carrying oif its victims like a ferocious animal {see
the "Medea" of Euripides, 1108), inexorable,
i'tjAetjs, pitiless, ever demanding, but hearing no
prayer in return. Ilenee it had settled into the clas-
sical phrase rapax Orcus (see Catcllos, ii. 28, 29).
But this, whatever form might be given to it, was
not tlie first thought that would arise in the mind
respecting the state of the departed. Instead of
such an objective attribute of Hades, or Sheol, as a
place demanding to be filled, it was rather the sub-
jective feeling of inquiring wonder at the phenome-
non of death, at the thought of th<' one who had
disappeared, and of that inexplicable stale into which
even the imaginalion failed to follow him. .Shadowy
as all such language is, it is only ilie stronger evi-
lence of that feeling of continued being which holds
on so firmly tlirougli it all, as though in spite of the
positive appearances of sense tcstifyiTig to the de-
parture, or the negative testimony arising from the
failure of the eye to pierce the darkness (wlienoe the
(jreek Hades, the nnaeai), or of the ear to gather
any report from the silence into which tlie dead had
gone. See remarks in the note before referred to,
p. 273, on the idea of deaih as a .'itale, a state of
being, (he antithesis, not of being, but of the active
life " beneath tlie sun." Now the idea of extinction,
of abscilute not-buing, of a total loss of individual
personality, would have excluded all questioning ; it
would never have made such words as Hades, or
Bheol, according to either conception, whether of
Inquiry or of locality, whether as denoting a state or
a ) 'ice, whether as demanding or as inierrogated,
whether as aildrcased to the unseen, or to the voice-
leBH and unheard. The man wa.s gone, but where ?
According to a most ancient and touching custom,
they thrice most solemnly invoked his name, but no
answer came back. Their belii'f in his continued
oeing was shown by the voice that went after liim,
though no responding voice w;i8 returned to the living
ear. bisoS (the infinitive used as a noi.i), to ask
to inquire anxiously ; he had gone to the land thni
denoted, that "undiscovered country from whosj
bomne no traveller returned." The key-text here ia
Job xiv. 10 : "Man dies, and wastes away; he givetb
up the ghost (r'lxn s'}i'' , gig/iwah ha-adam, mac
sighs, or gasps for breath), and where is he ? " "i'SS^
weai/yo, 0, where is he? See Zaoli. i. 5 : The fa'hen J
D!l'n*n , where are they ? Compare also Job vii.
21, and other places of a similar kind, all showing
how natural is the connection between the wailing,
questioning weayyo, and the word Sheol so immedi-
ately suggested by it.
The disappearance of Enoch from the earth was
stranger than that of the ordinary death, but gave
rise to the same feeling of inquiry, only in a more
intensive degree. " He was not found," oi/x €upitTK(To,
says the LXX, and this gives the real meaning of
the Hebrew 1i,3"'!< , not denoting non-existence, for
that would be directly contrary to what follows, but
that he was nowhere to be found on earth.
Thus regarded, it is easy to see how the idea of
some locality would soon attach itself to the primi-
tive emotional conception, and in time become so
predominant that the older germ of thought, that
was in the etymology, would almost wholly disap-
pear. Still the spirit of the word, its geist or ghost,
to use the more emphatic German or Saxon, long
liaunts it after the conception has changed so as to
receive into it more of the local and definite.
Trench has shown how tenacious is this root-sense
of old words, preserving them, like some guardian
genius, from misusage and misapplication, ages after
it has ceased to be directly conceptual, or to be
known at all, except to the antiquarian ])hilologist.
Thus, although the cavernous or subteT-ranean idea
had become prominent in the Psalms and elsewhere,
this old spirit of the word still hovers about it in all
such passages ; we still seem to hear the sighing
weayyo ; there yet lingers in the ear tlie plaintive
sheoiah, denoting tlie intense looking into the world
unknown, the anxious listening to which no answer-
ing voice is returned.
That Sheol, in its primary sense, did not mean
the grave, and in fact had no etymological associs
tion with it, is shown by the fact, already mentioned,
that there was a distinct word for the latter, of still
earlier occurrence in the Sciiptures, common in all
the Shemitic languages, and presenting the definite
primary conception of digging, or excavation (":p,
kbr, krb, 2'^3, 3"iJ , grb, grub, grav). There was
no room here for expansion into the greater thought.
The Egyptian embalming, too, to one who attentively
considers it, will appear still less favorable. It wai
a dry and rigid memorial of death, far less suggestive
of continued being, somehow and somewhere, than
the flowing of the body into nature througli decom-
positiim in the grave, or its dispersion by fire into
the prime elements of its organization. In the sup-
posed case, howeTer, of Jose])h's torn and dismem-
bered corpse, there was nothmg from any of theM
Bouj'ces to aid the conception. Yet Jacob held on t<
it: 1 will go mourning to my son, ■';3 bN, not bs
or bK for bl" , on account of my son, as some would
take it.* Had Joseph been lying by the side of hii
• [In proof that bx may have the sense of b;P , Roaexir
m&Uor rotors to 1 KinRs xiv. 5 ; and Rushi to 2 Sam. xxi. I
1 Sam. iv. 21. ButtboHG do notbearout thplnJcreuc«. Th.
L'HAr. XXXVIl. 1-30.
58'^
mother in the field near Bethlehem Ephratah, or
with Abraham and Sarah, i-nd Isaac and Rebekah,
in the cave ot Machpelah, or in some Egyptian sar-
cophagus, embalmed with costliest spices and
wrapped in aromatic linen, the idea of his unbroken
personality would have been no more vivid, Josepli
himseir (liis very ip«e) would have been no nearer,
or more real, to the mourning father, than as lie
thought of his bodv lying mangled in the wilderness,
or borne bv rapacious birds to the supposed four
comers of the earth. I will go to my son mourning,
theolah (niklU , with n of direction), Sheol-ward,—
on the wav to the unknown land.
This view of Sheol is strongly corroborated by
the parallel etymology, and the parallel connection
of ideas we find in the origin and use of the Greek
Hades. Some would seek its primary meaning else-
where, but it is clearly Greek, and no derivation is
more obvious than the one given long ago, and which
would make this word "AiStjs (Homeric 'Attijs, with
the mild aspirate) from a privative and iotiV to see.
We have the very word as an adjective, with this
mi'aning of invuible or unseen, Hesiod : " Shield of
Hercules," 477. It denotes, then, the unseen world,
carrying the idea of disappearance, and yet of con-
tinued being in some state unknown. The analogy
between it and the Hebrew word is perfect. So is
the parallelism, all the more striking, we may say,
from the fact that in the two languages tlie appeal is
to two diflerent senses. In the one, it is the eye
peering into the dark ; in the other, it is ihe ear in-
tently listening to the silence. Both give rise to the
same question : Where is he ? whither has he gone ?
and both seem to imply with equal emphasis that
the one unseen and unheard yet really is. Some-
times a derivative from the same root, and of the
same combination, is joined with Hades to make the
meaning intensive, as in the "Ajax" of Sophocles,
607
rbl* altoTfionov dcfiijAoc "Alfio** —
The awful, unseen Hades.
From this use has come the adjective iiSios, rendered
ettrnal, but having this meaning from the association
of ideas (the Hadean, the everlasting), since it is not
etymologically connected with aloiv (see Jude 6,
Ceofiois di'Siois, where the two conceptions seem to
unite). In truth, there is a close connection between
these two sets of words ('AtSTji and aidv, ^"S'.'J and
blKC), one ever suggesting the other, — " the things
that are seen are temporal (belong to time), the things
that are unseen are eternal." Hence we have in
Greek the same idiom, in respect to Hades, that we
have in Hebrew in relation to 01am (oil?), the
counterpart of aliii/. Thus, in the former language
we have the expressions, oUos^AiSou — 5o^os"At5ou,
etc., corresponding exactly to the Hebrew cbl'y n'^S,
the house of eternity, poorly rendered his long home,
Eccles. xii. 6. Compare the o'tKiav a'dimov, the
sense of direciion. so clear everywhere else in the hundreds
cf uases where this preposition 5X occurs, is not lost even
in these. " Gone is the glory of Israel " (the glory th:it was).
It is broken, impassioned Itinfruage, and we may suppose an
llli psis : she said thi£ (looldng) to the taking of thi- ark, eic.
':o, in the chief case citt^d, it is most vividly rendered by
iking it elliptically— ^ the house of Saul, 2 Sam. xxi 1 —
hat is. 'Mook not to me for the cause," says the oracle, but
■* to Saul and his bloody house." At the utmost, these very
tew doubtful cases cannot invalidate the clear sense that the
lonmion rei isring makes here. -T. L.l
" house eternal," 2 Cor. v. 1. Compare also XenO'
phon's Ag'Mlaiis, at the close, where it is said of tht
Spartan king, tt;;' aihiov o'iK'i^aiv KaTrjy ay €ro, " hi
was brought back, like one who had been away, tc
his eternal home." See, too, a very remarkable
pa.ssage, Diodoros Sichlus, lib. i. ch. 61, respecting
the belief of the mo.st ancient Egyptians: "The
habitations of the living they call inns, or lodging
places, KciTa.\i'iT(is, since we dwell in them so short
a time, but those of the dead they style ol«out diSious,
everlasting abodes, as residing in them forever, Tt»
&niipov iioixa." See al.so Pareac ; De Jobi Notitiia.
etc., on tlie early Arabian belief, p. 27.
Why should not Jacob have had the idea as weh
as these most ancient Egyptians ? That his thought
was more indefinite, that it had less of circumstance
and locality, less imagery every way, than the Greek
and Egyptian fanev gave ii, only proves its higher
purity as a divine hope, a sublime act of faith, rather
than a poetical picturing, or a speculative dogma.
The less it assumed to know, or even to imagine,
showed its stronger trust in the unseen world as an
assured reality, but dependent solely for its clearer
revelation on the unseen God. The faith was all the
stronger, the less the aid it received from the sense
or the imagination. It was grounded on the surer
rock of the " everlasting covenant '' made with the
fathers, though in it not a word was said directly of
a future life. " The days of the years of my pil
grimage," says Jacob. He was "a sojourner upon
earth as his fathers before him." The language has
no meaning except as pointing to a home, an ai5io»
oU-natv, an eternal habitation; whether in Sheol, or
through Sheol, was not known. It was enougli that
it was a return unto God, "his people's dweVing-
place (isb "iiss , see Ps. xc. 1 ) in all generatious."
It was, in some way, a '' Uving unto him," however
they might disappear from earth and time ; for " he
is not the God ol the dead." His covenant was an
assurance of the continued being of those with whom
it was made. '' Because he lived they should live
also." " Art thou not from everlasting, Jehovah,
my God, my Holy One? we shall not (wholly) die."
" Thou wilt lay us up in Sheol ; thou wilt call and
we will answer ; thou wilt have regard to the work
of thy hands." The pure doctrine of a personal
God, and a belief in human extinction, have never
since been found conjoined. Can we beUeve it of
the lofty theism of the patriarchal ages ?
Hades, like Sheol, had its two conceptual stages,
first of state, and afterwards of localily. To tht
Greek word, however, there was added a third idea
It came to denote, also, a power; and so was used
for the supposed king of tlie dead, 'AiStjs, 'Ais,
'AiSajrelii, — SvaJ ivipuv (Iliad, XX. 61); and this
personification appears again in the later Scripture,
1 Cor. XV. 55, 0 Hades, where is thy victory ? anf
in Rev. vi. 8, xx. 13, 14, where Hades becomes lim
!ted to Gehenna, and its general power, as keeper ol
soids, is abolished. — T. L.]
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAi.
1. Jacob's fondness for the younger son forms tlu
other extreme to Isaac's predilection for th«
first-bom. He had, it is true, better reasons than
Isaac ; for Joseph is not only the son of his beloved
Rachel, but also the Nazarite (the consecrated oi sep-
arate one) among his brethren, — a fact to which he
testifies upon his death-bed (see Get. xlix. 22). Bu»
588
GENESIS, OR THE I'IRST BOOK OF MOSES.
then he began to see clearly that Judah surpassed
Joseph in what pertained to the future. The struggle
between his predilection and his love of justice ap-
pears in more than one instance. Joseph must en-
ter service as a shepherd's boy ; nevertheless, his
father provides for him a showy garment, and keeps
him at home longer than the others. He ventures
his favorite upon a distant and dangerous mission,
and this is a reason why he refuses to be comforted
at his loss. He rebukes him for his appaiently
presumptuous dream, but feels compelled to keep the
presaging omens in his vaticinating heart.
2. The Scrii)tures make no palUation of the sins of
the twelve patriarchs — the fathers of the very people
tfl whom they are sent. This shows their super-
earthly origin.
3. By his dreams Joseph gets into misery, and by
their interpretations he is deUvered from it. Tlie
first fact would give him occasion to think closely on
the ground-laws that regulate the symbolic language
of dreams ; and both he, and the Xew-Testainent Jo-
seph, are witnesses to the fact that there is a signifi-
cance in them. Elsewhere have we shown the cir-
cumstances favorable to this that were possessed by
both.
4. The simplicity with which Joseph relates his
dreams, reminds us of Isaac's naive question on the
way to Mount Moriah : but where is the lamb ? It
stands in beautiful contrast with that moral earnest-
ness which had already, in early age, made him self-
reliant in presence of his brethren.
5. Here, too, in the history of Joseph's brethren,
ia there an example showing how envy passes over
to animosity, animosity to fixed hatred, and hatred to
a scheme of murder, just as in the history of Cain,
and in that of Christ. The allegorical significance
of our history, .is typical of that of Christ, appears in
the most diversified traits.
6. .\s the murderous scheme was prevented by
Reuben's plan of deUverance, and modified by Judah's
proposal, so, i.i the life of our Lord, the scheme of
the Sanhedrin was changed more than once by ar-
resting circumstances. Thus providence turned the
destructive plots to a beneficent end. It was the
chief tendency of these schemes to promote the high-
est glory of the hated one, whose glory they aimed to
destroy.
7. Concerning the way in which these plans of
Reuben and Judah cross each other, see the Exeget-
ical and Critical. We have no right to suppose that
Reuben behaved as he did in this case in order to
appease his father for the wrong done in the case of
Bilhah. The weakness, wliich, according to ch. xlix.
4, was the gri'at reproach of his character, had also
its good side. Equally false is the supposition that
Judah maliciously frustrated Reuben's good inten-
tions. Both remind us of Joseph of Arimathea and
Nioodemus, who did not consent to the sentence of
the Sanhedrin ; but they were less incUned to the
right, and their half-measures remind us of Pilate's
attempt to save, though they had not, like him, the
power in their hands ; since being implicated by tlieir
foimcr anirao:ity towards Joseph, they could only
weakly oppose their angry brethren.
8. The " coat of many colors " dipped in blood,
reminds us of the deception that Jacob, in Esau's
raiment, practised upon his father. Yet it must not
be overlooked, that Jacob became reconciled at
Peniel. lla<i lie been sanctified, indeed, as well aa
recoLciled, he would not, after sucii bitter experience,
havf r'peatcd lis t'lther's error of m arbitrary prefer-
ence of one son to another. And, in this respect, h<
even now atoned for a sin which had been alrei.d]
pardoned.
9. Jacob's mourning shows how deeply his peact
was shaken. The self-examination occasioned in
pious souls, in consequence of the loss or sutieringa
of dear ones, especially of children, becomes a griev-
ous self-condemnation. From this there arises a
longing after death. But here, too, there must be an
unconditional surrender to God's grace. We f-;*
here, also, how '' the congregation of the fathers "
beyond the grave becomes a Sheol to the pre-Chris-
tian consciousness through the feeUng it gives of
death, of his power, of the effect of mournrng as ex-
tending even to the other world. Luther has fre-
quently translated Sheol by Hell (we find it also thus
in Apost. Symb.) ; but a careful distinction should be
made between Sheol and Gehenna.
10. These IshraaeUtish-Midianitish merchantmen
are the first Ishmaelites with whom we become ac-
quainted. They remind us of the caravan of Mo-
hammed, that most renowned of all Ishmaelitish mer-
chants. They testify to the outward increase and spi-
ritual decrease of the descendants of Ishmael. They
are witnesses to a heart-rending scene, but coolly pay
their twenty pieces of silver, reminding us of the
thirtv paid by Judas, then go their way with the poor
lad, who passes his home without hope of deliverance,
and is for a long time, like Moses, David, and Christ,
reckoned among the lost.
11. Jacob's house shaken, burdened with a curse,
given over, apparently, to destruction, and yet won-
derfully saved by God's grace and human placability
(see eh. h).
12. Joseph's character. Presageful of the future,
like a prophet ; simple as a child ; the extraordinari-
ly prudent son of the prudent Rachel and the prudent
Jacob, yet notle-minded, and so generous that he be-
comes a type of New -Testament love for enemies, — •
God-fearing in a distant land, and yet so liberal in
Ills universalism that he can reconcile himself to
Egyptian culture, holding himself free, even to bit-
terness, in respect to home remembrances (see the
name he gave his son Manasseh (ma/re to forget, obit-
vioni tradens), and yet, at last, homesick after Ca-
naan,— renowned for chastity, and yet not without
ambition, full of high-minded and proud anticipations,
and yet jjrepareil to endure all humihations by which
Jehovah might aim to purify hini. Calumniated by
many, by others hastily canonized as a saint. A
man of spirit and a man of action in the highest
sense.
HOMXLETICAl AND PRACTICAL.
The whole chapter. Joseph sold. The sins of
men and the providence of God. The character of
our narrative. The chain of circumstances The
significance often of things apparently small. I. Of
Jacob's weakness (in the ca.se of the coat) ; 2. of
Joseph's dreams ; 3. of his thoughtlessness ; 4. ef
Reuben's absence ; 5. of the appearing of the Ish-
maelites.— Man proposes, (iod disposes. — '* My
thoughts are not your thoughts," etc. Thf sublimity
of the divine decrees as compared with human
schemes.
Section First. (Vers. 1-12.) Starkk: Althougt
Jacob had his reasons for specially loving Joseph
yet he did not act prudently in allowing it to becom*
noticed. Parents should guard against ;, Ambbosv
CHAP XXXYIl. 1-36.
5Wi
funffat lihero$ eqiialU gratia qiios jnnxit (Bqualis
natura. Knvy is a diabolical vice (Wisd. Sol. ii. 24).*
— Hall: Suffering is tlie road to honor. — Thksame:
When we are loved by our Heavenly Father, and
weep over our sins, we will be hated by our brethren
in the flesh (1 Peter iv. A).—Bibl. Tub. : Do not un-
necessarily tell your enemy what may be for your ad-
vantage.— Calwer Handhuch : Ver. 2. Xo mali-
cious iaforniation was it, but coming from an inno-
cent free-heartedness and a dutiful abhorrence of
evil. — Lisco, on the contrary : A child-like and inju-
dicious tale-telling. — Gkrlach : As a spoiled child,
he accuses his brethren to his father. [The boundary
between the malicious and the dutiful here may be
drawn with difficulty ; yet it is to be observed, that
Joseph told the tather what was already spoken of by
the people, that is, when it had already become an ill-
fame.] — Schroder: Luther says, that Joseph narrat-
ed his dreams "like a chdd," not from malice, but
in simplicity and innocence. — Richter: Mark it;
young Joseph saw in his dreams only his exaltation,
not the humiliation that preceded it. — Heim (" Bible
Studies ") : The difference between the two dreams.
• \Jb96via he Sitt^oAou 6ava.T0^ flfrT\\Bev ei? toc icotr^oc,
through envi/ of the JevH death entered intn the world. There
ie something very peculiar aliout this sin of euvy, fully just-
ifying the epithet diabolical. In the first place, it is pre-
eminently spiritual. It is a pure soul-sin, having least
connection with the mnterial or animal nature, and for
which there is the least palliation in appetite, or in any ex-
trinsic temptation. Its seat and origin is wholly superc:ir-
nal, except as the term carnal is taken, as it sometimes is by
the Apostle, for all that is evil in humanity. A man may
be most intellectual, most free from every vulgar appetite
of the tlesh ; he may he a philosopher, he may dwell specu-
latively in the rejrion of the abstract and the ideal, and yet
his soiil be full of this corroding malice, which the author
of the hook of Proverbs, describing it in its effect rather
than its origin, calls ''rottenness in the bones'* (Prov. xiv.
SO), presenting it as the opposite of that "sound heart
which is the life of theflesb." In the second place, it is the
most purely evil. Almost every other passion, even ac-
knowledged to be siutal, has in it somewhat of good, or ap-
pearance of good. Revenge assume-^ to have, at ita founda-
tion, some sense of ■wTong, that allies it to justice. Nt-mesif*
claims relationship to Themis Anger makes a similar plea,
and, with some show of reason, lays pari, at least, of the
blame upon the nervoas irritability. These, and other hu-
man passions, trace a connection, in their spiiitual Lieneal-
ogy, between themselves and pure affections that miirht
have belonged to man*s psychical or sensitive nature before
the fall. But envy, or hatred of a man for the good that is
JTi him, or in any Wiiy pertains to him, is evil unalloyed.
To ufe the imatrery of John Bun\an, its descent i^ simply
Diabolonian, without any cross or mixture with anything
that might allege a title to citizenship in Mansoul before it
revolted from king Shaddai Neither can it be laid, where
we are so fond of charging our sins, upon the poor body. It
would seem lo have no natural growth fiom Mansoiii's ma-
terial corporation, ruined as it is. It is the breath of the
old serpent. It is pure devil, as it is, also, purely spiritual.
It ne>*ds no body, no concupiscent organization, no appe-
tites or fleshly motions, no nerves even, for the exercise of
its devilish energies. It is a soul-poison, yet acting fear-
fully upon the body itself, bringing more death into it than
eeeraincly stronger and more tiunultuous passions thnt have
their nearer seat in the fleshly nature. *' It is rottenness in
the bones." We may compare this proverb of Solomon
with, a terrific description of envy by ^schtlds, Agamem.,
SS3:
TOV €VTV\OVtTa tTVV i^dof w ^AeTreii',
Sva^ptov net' 'IO'5 KapSiav jrpocr^/iei'o5,
avflos StirAoi^ei Tiu TTf7TaiJ.fj.ivut i'6a"oi' •
Tot? T ain'o<; ainov TTTjfjaTTLV ^apvt'crai,
xal TOi* Bvpaiov o^fiov elaopijv — areVet.
Envy at others' ffood is evermore
Malign:int poison sitting on the sotil ;
A liouble woe to hira infected with it.
Of inward pain the heavy load he bears,
At sight of joy wUftout, he ever mourns.
What inspired the Greek poets in such truthful description
of the most intense evils of the sou! ! All bad passions are
lain^iil, but envy has a double barb to stine itself.— T. L.]
In the first there couH be only ten sheaves besidei
Jasepli's, since Benjamin was not present, andJosepk
said to liis brethren, Your nheaves. In the second,
however, lie beliolds definitely eleven stars, there
fore himself as the twelfth included.
Sectioji Second. (Vers. 12-20.) Starke: Ver
15. Joseph enters upon his journey in the simplicit;
of his heart, expecting no evil; and thus God leti
liim run into the net against which he could hav«
easily warned him. God's ways, however, are se
cret. Whom he wishes to exalt he first tries, puri
fies, tem|its, and humbles. [The Ralibins and one of
the Targums tell us that this man, who directed Jo-
seph in the field, was the angel Gabriel in the form
of a man.] — Hall : God's decree precedes and
is fulfilled, whilst we have no thought about it,
yea, even fight against it. Though a Christian
does not always prosper, though difficulties be-
set his way, he must not be confounded, but
ever continue firm and steadfast in liis calling. Ver
18. Here Moses shows what kind of ancestors ths
Jews had (comp. Acts vli. 9, etc.). Thus they fell
from one sin into another. Perhaps Simeon was the
ringleader ; since he afterwards was bound as
hostage for his brethren. — Schroder : Joseph goes
in search of his brethren, and finds sworn enemies,
bloodthirsty murderers. — Heim ("Bible Studies"):
Shechem is about twenty-five leagues from Hebron.
Joseph's mission to this remote and dangerous coun.
try is a proof, at the same time, that Jacob did not
treat him with too much indulgence, and that he did
not );eep him home from any feelings of tenderness.
Joseph's willing obedience, too, and his going alone,
an inexperienced youth, upon such adangerous jour-
ney, is a proof that he was accustomed to obey cheer-
fully— a habit not acquired in an effeminate bringing-
up.
Section Third (vers. 21-241. Starke: So goes
the world. Pious people ponder the welfare of the
godless, whilst the latter are conspiring for their de-
struction (1 Sam. xix. 5). God can raise up, even
among enemies, helpers of the persecuted. " Woe to
those who draw iniquity with cords of vanity and
sin, as it were with a cart-rope " (Isa. v. 18).
Section Fourth (vers. 25-27). Starkk : Luther :
They take their seats as though they had well dona
their work. Conscience is secure ; sin is asleep ; yet
(iod sees all. — Schroder: [Unfavorable judgment
of Judah.] LcTHER : 0, Judah, thou art not yel
purified. In Calwer Handbuch Judah is even com-
pared to Judas, who sold the Lord. But it is alle-
gorising merely, when we are determined in our judg-
ment by mere outward resemblances. See the Exe-
getical and Critical. Judah's proposition arose from
the alternative : He must either starve lo death in
the pii, or he must be sold as a slave.
Section Fifth (vers. 28-32). Starke : No matter
what hindrances Joseph's brethren might put in the
way of the dreams' fulfilment, against their will were
they made to promote it (Ps. Iv. 10). — Bill. Tub. :
Thus, there is yet a spark of good in tiature. If
only man would not suppress this small light, ha
would be preserved from the greatest sins. — Thk
SAME : .loseph is a type of Christ in his exaltation,
in his humiliation, and especially in his being sold
for thirty [twenty] pieces of silver. Ver. 29. Jose-
phus thinks that Reuben came by night so as not to
be detected. [One of the Targums adds, that Reu-
ben, on account of the iticest committed, had been
fasting ainiuig the mountains, and. in order to find
grace before his father, had intended to bring Joseph
590
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
tgain to him.] Ver. 32. Thus Joseph's brothers
aiid sin to sin.
Section Sixth (vers. 33-36). Starke : This was
a punishment of GoJ. Jacob had deceived his fa-
ther Isaac by putting around his neck and hands the
skin of a kid ; he is himself now deceived by Jo-
seph's coat dipped in the blood of a kid. — Hall:
One sin is made to cover another; godless men, it is
true, ever try to conceal their malignity, but it comes
to light at last, and is punished. — Osia.\der : Seldom
does misfortune come alone. It is but a short time
since Jacob was deprived of Rachel ; now he has lost
Joseph. In such a concealment of guilt they pass
twenty-two years. And his father wept for him.
[Ldther : This was Isaac, Joseph's grandfather, who
uved still twelve years after this event.] He himself
(Jacob) had several things to reproach him in his
conscience : Why did he let the boy go alone oil
such a journey '! Why did he send him into a coun
try abounding in wild beasts ?- JiibL IVirt. : Ir
grief we are inclined to overdo. — Us anokr : Pio-^a
parents often blame themselves when things go bad-
ly with their children, even when ihere is the leasl
ground for it. — Calwer Handbuch After the crime
comes the lie ; after the lie, a hypocritical comforting
of the father. — Schroder: Lcthkr : During all this
time, the brethren were unable to pray to Uod with
a good conscience. — Observe, each one of the thre*
patiiaichs was to sacrifice his dearest son.
To the whale chapter. Taube : The selling of
Joseph by liis brethren : 1. From what sources this
horrible deed arose; 2. how the divine mouth re-
mains silent, whilst the divine hand so much the
more strongly holds ; 3. the types that lie concealed.
SECOND SECTION.
Judah's temporary separation {probably in sadness on account of the deed). His sons. TTiamar.
Chapter XXXVIII. 1-30.
1 Anil it came to pass at that time, that Juiiali went down from his brethren, and
2 turned in to a certain Adiillamite, whose name was Hirah [noble, free]. And Judali
saw there the daughter of a certain Canaaiiite, whose name was Shitah [cry for help] ; and
H he took her, and went in unto her. And she conceived, and bare a son ; and he called
4 his name Er [n"i watcher]. And she conceived again, and bare a son ; and she called his
5 name Ontm [rtreugth, strong one]. And she yet again conceived, and bare a son; and
called his name Shelah [peace, quietness, shiioh ?] ; and he was at Chezib [delusion], when she
6 bare him. And Judah took a wife for Er his first-born, whose name was Thaniar [palm],
7 And Er, Judah's first-born, ivas 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 marry her, and raise uj)
9 seed to thy brother. And Onan knew that the seed should not be his [of bis own name] :
and it came to pass, that when he went in unto his brother's wife, that he spilled it on
10 the ground, lest that he shoidd give seed to his brother. And the thing which he did
1 1 displeased the Lord ; wherefore he slew him also. Then said Judali to Thamar Ins daugh-
ter-in-law, Remain a widow in thy father's house, till Shelah my son be grown ; (for he
said, Lest peradventure he die also, as his brethren did) ; And Thamar went and dwelt
12 in her father's house. And in process of time the daughter of Shuah, Judah's wife, died ;
and Judah was comforted, and went up to his sheep-shearers to Timnath [possession],
13 he and his friend Hirah the Adullamiti-. And it was told Thamar, saying, Behold, thy
14 father-in-law goelli up to Timnath, to shear his sheep. And she put her widow's gar-
ments ofl' from her, and covered her with a veil, and wrapped herself, and sat in an open
place [uternlly, gate of two eyes] ' which is bv the way to Timnath: for she .«aw that Shelah
1.5 was grown, and she was not given unto him to wife. When Jiuhih .saw her, he thought
16 her to be an harlot; because she had covered her face. And he turned unto her by the
*yay, and said. Go to, I pray thee, let me come in unto thee; (for he knew not that she
was iii.s daughter-in-law) ; and she said, What wilt thou give mc, that thou niayest come
17 in unto me ? And he said, I wili send thee a kid from the tlock ; and she said, Wilt thou
18 giv^e me a |)lodge, till thou send it? And he said, What pleage shall I give thee?
And she saiil, Thy signet, and thy bracelets, and thy staff that is in thy hand. And he
19 gave it lier, and came in unto her; and she conceived by him. And she arose, and
went away, and laid by her vail from her, and put on the garments of her widowhood
CHAP. XXXVIII. 1-30.
591
20 And Judah sent the kid by the hand of his friend the Adullamite, t receive his pledge
21 from the woman's hand : but he found her not. Then he asked the men of that place
saying, Where is the harlot that was openly by the way-side? And they said There
22 was no harlot in this place. And he returned to Judah, and said, I cannot find her ;
23 and also other men of the place said, that there was no harlot in this jilace. And
Judah said. Let her take it to her, lest we be shamed ; behold, I sent this kid, and
24 thou liast not found her. And it came to pass about three months after, that it was
told to Judah, saying, Thamar thy daughter-in-law hath played the harlot ; and also,
behold, she is with child by wlioredom. And Judah said, Bring her forth, and let hei
25 be burnt. When she was brougiit 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 art
26 these, the signet, and bracelets, and staff. And Judah acknowledged them, and said,
She hath been more righteous than I • because that I gave her not to Shelah my son ;
27 and he knew her again no more. And it came to pass in the time of her travail, that
28 behold twins were in her womli. And it came to pass when she travailed, that the one
put out his hand; and the midwife took and bound upon his hand a scarlet thread, say-
29 ing. This came out first. And it came to pass, as he drew back his hand, that, behold
his brother came out ; and she said, How hast thou broketi forth ? this breach be upon
30 thee ; therefore his name was called Pharez [breach]. And afterward came out his
brother, that had the scarlet thread upon his hand ; and his name was called Zarah
[going forth, sun-rising],
[' Ver. 14. — 0*^2^3? nnS3 . Rendered, in our translation, an open place ; margin, door of eyes, more literally, wltn
reference to Prov. vii, 12, The LXX. have taken it as a proper name, rats irvAai? A'lvaf, which lias led some to regard
it as the same with Enam mentioned Joshua xv. ^4, and referred to by Hieronymus as situated in the tribe of Judah, and
called, in hifl day, Belh-enim, See Rnsenmuller. The dual form here is expressive of something peculiar in the place. It
means (ujo eyes, or two fountains, probably the former, denoting two openings, that is, two ways, a place where she was
lertain to be seen. This corresponds tn the Vulgate rendering, in 6 /t'i'o liineris. So the Syriac, |£s.m^o| a a V q»-^j
Arabs Erpenianus the same, (Sj ^.JsJt (^ "^ ° ^ . The idea of there being a city there, at that time, or of her taking
jer place by the gate of a city, is absurd. Aben Ezra says it was a place so called because there were two fountains there.
This was an early use of the Hebrew "i^!? , the eye, arising from the beautiful conception that springs, or fountains, were
fyee to the earth, as the herbs, in some places, are called n'i'l^X , lights coming from the earth. ~T, L.1
GENERAL PRELrMINABY REMAUKS,
The story here narrated is not, aa Knobel sup-
poses, ail insertion in Joseph's history, but a par-
allel to it, considered from the one common point
of view as the story of the sons of Israel. Accord-
ing to the previous chapter, Joseph (that is, Ephraini)
appeared to be lost; here Judah, afterwards the
head tribe, appears also to be lost. But as in the
history of the apparently lost Joseph there lay con-
cealed the marks of a future greatness, so must we
look for similar signs in the history of Judah's ap-
parent ruin. Parallel to Joseph's spiritual ingen-
uousness, patience, hopeful trust in the future,
appears Judah's strong and daring self-dependence,
fulness of life, sensuality combined with strong ab-
stinence, besides the sense of justice which leads
him to acknowledge his guilt. Examine it more
closely, and we cannot fail to trace a strong feature
of tlieocratic faith. It is a groundless conjecture of
Knobel, that the object of this narrative was to show
;he origin of the levirate law among the Jews, that
required the brother of a husband who died without
Issue to take the widow to wife, and that the firet-
born of this ctnnection should stand in the toledoth,
or genealogical lists, in the name of the deceased,
Deut. xxv. .5; Matt, xxii. 23: Ruth iv. See Winer
on "Levirate Marriage," The law in question is
of a later date, and needed no such illustration.
The custom here mentioned, however, might have
uie'ed before thi? time (see Delitzsch, p. 534).
But why could not the idea have originated even m
Judah's mind ? Besides this, Knobel presents chro-
nological difficulties. They consist in this, namely,
that in the period from Joseph's abduciion to Jacob's
migration into Egypt — about twenty-three years —
Judah had become not only a father, but a grand
father by his son Pharez (according to ch, xlvi, 16)
Now Judah was about three years older than Joseph,
and, consequently, not much above twenty at his niai^
riage, provided he had intended it at the time when
Joseph was carried off. On account of this difficulty,
and of one that follows, Augustine supposes ihat
Judah's removal from the parental home occurred
several years previous. But tliis is contradicted
tiy the fact of his presence at the sale of Joseph
(see Keil, p, 246); whilst the remark of Delitzsch,
that " such early marriages were not custom.iry in
the patriarchal family," is of no importance at all,
besides its leaving us in doubt whether it was made
in respect to Judah's own marriage, or the early
marriage of his nephews. " .Tacob," he says, "had
already attained to the age of seventy-seven years,'*
etc. In reply to this, it may be said, that early mar-
riages are evidently ascribed to other sons of Jacob
(ch. xlvi), though these children, it is probable, were
for the most part born in Egypt, Between the pa-
triarchs and the sons of Israel there comes a decisive
turning-point : earlier marriages — earlier deaths
(sec ch, 1, 20), Nevertheless, the twenty-three yeaii
here are not sufficient to allow of Pharez having
two sons already at their close. Even the possibilitj
5ft2
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST liOOK OF MOSES.
that Pharez and Zarah were born before the migra-
tion to Egypt, is obtained only from tlie supposition
tliat Judali must liave married his sons very early.
Supposing that they were seventeen or eighteen years
old, the reason for so early a marriage may have
been Judah's knowledge of Er's disposition. He
may have intended to prevent evil by his marriage,
but he did not attain his object. The marriage of
Onan that resulted from this was but a consequence
of the first ; and, in fact, Onan's sin seems to indi-
cate a youthful Ijaseness. Judah, however, might
have made both journeys to Egypt whilst his own
fimilv was still existing. Witli respect to Judah's
grandchildren, it is an assumption of Hengstenberg
{Atit/ienfie, p. 354), that they were born in Egypt,
and that they are considered to have come to Egypt,
as in their fathers, together with Jacob (Dei.itzsch,
p. 538). According to Keil, the aim of our narrative
is to show the three principal tribes of the future
dvnasties in Israel, and the danger there was that
the sons of Jacob, through Canaanitish marriages,
might forget the Idstoric call of their nation as the
meilium ot redemption, and so ])erish in the sins of
Canaan, had not God kept them from it by leading
them into Egypt. It must be remarked, however,
that, in this period, it was with difficulty that such
marriages with Canaanitish women could be avoided,
since the connection with their relations in Mesopota-
mia had ceased. Undoubtedly the beginning of
corruption in Judah's family, was caused by a Ca-
naanitish mode of Ufe, and thereby the race was
threatened with death in its first development ; but
we see, also, how a vigorous life struggles with, and
struggles out of, a deadly peril.
EXEGETICAl AND CRITICAL.
1. Judah's separatinri, }tix marriage, and his sons
(vers. 1-5).— And Judah went down.— He parted
from his brethren at the time they sold Joseph. It
was not, as in the case of Esau, the unbridled im-
pulse of a rude and robust nature that prompted him
prematurely to leave his paternal home, though he
showed thereby his strong self reliance. On account
of liis frank disposition, Judah could not long par-
ticipate in offering, as his brethren did, false conso-
lations to his aged lather (eh. xxxvii. 35). It weighs
upon him that he cannot tell the true nature of the
case without betraying his brethren ; and it is this
that drivL'S him off, just as his grudge against those
who liad involved him in their guilt separates him
from I heir company. Hesides, a latter .■^adness may
have come upon him on account of his own purpose,
though meant lor good. Thus he tries to find peace
n solitude, just as a noble-mimled eremite or separa-
ist, leav.s a clun-ch that has fallen into corruplion.
Like his antitype, the N ew-Te.stament Judas, hut in
a nobler S[)irit, does lie try to find peace, as he did,
after having sold his Lord. In a similar manner
did the trib.' of Judah afterwards keep its ground
against the ten tribes in their d«-cline and ruin. The
question now arises, whether Judali went down from
the Hebron heights in a westerly direction towards
the Mediterranean Sea, to the plain of Sarepta us
Delitzsch and Knohel suppose, or eastward toward the
Dead Sea, where, according to tradition, the cave of
Adulhmlav(l Sam. Xiii. 1), in which David c(m-
cealed himself fioni Saul. Chezih (ver. 5) was sit-
uated east from Hebron, if it be identical with Ziph
of the desert o( Ziph. Timnatli, according to Jose-
phus, XV. 57, was situated upon the heights of Jadah
and could be visited as wt J from the low country il
the east, as fiom that of the north. If, according tc
Eusebius and Hieronymus, AduUam lay ten E?-!!.!!;
miles, or four leagues, east of Eleutheropolis (£eil-
chchibrin), this statement again takes us to thi-
mountiuns of Judea. It is, therefore, doubtful
Still it is worthy of note that David, like his ances-
tor, once sought refuge in the solitude of Adullam.
— And turned in to, etc. — " 'J*' and he pitched
namely, ib.~X, his tent, ch. xxvi. 25, close by (IS,
a man, belonging to the small kingdom of Adul-
lam (Josh. xii. 15) in the plain of Judah
(Josh. XV. 35)." Delitzsch. This settlement indi-
cates friendly relations with Hirah. No wonder that
Hirah gradually yields liimself, as a servant, lo the
wiser Judah. Here Judah marries a i'anaanite
woman. This should be noted in respect to Judah,
who became afterwards the principal tribe, as also in
respect to Simeon (ch. xlvi. 10), because '.t would be
least expected of him, zealous as he was for the Is-
r^ielitish purity in the murder of the Shecleinites.
Without taking into view the unrestrained pesition
of Jacob's sons, this step in Judah might lie ex-
plained from a transient fit of despair respecting Is-
rael's future. In the names of his tiiree sons, how-
ever, there is an intimation of return to a more
hopeful state of mind. — Er, Onan, Shelah (see 1
Chron. ii.3). — The place of Shelah's birth is mentioned,
because there remained of him descendants who would
have an interest in knowing their native district.
2. The marriage of the sons v:ilh Thamar. It
may, at least, be said of Thamar, that she is not ex-
pressly called Canaanitish. If we could suppose a
westerly Adullam, she might have been of Philistine
descent. By the early marriage of his sons, Judah
seems to have intended to prevent in them a germ-
inating corruption. That he finds Thnmar quahHed
for such a state, that beside her Er appears as a
criminal, whose sudden death is regarded as a divine
judgment (then Onan likewise), and all this, taken
in connection with the fact that, after the death of
both sons, she hoped for the growing-up of the third,
Shelah, seems to point her out as a woman of ex-
traordinary character. — Till Shelah my son be
grown. — .According to Knohel (Delitzsch and Keil),
Judah regarded Thamar as an unlucky wife (comp.
Tobit iii. 7), and was, therefore, unwilling to give
to her the third son, but kept putting her off by
promises, thus causing her to remain a widow. This,
however, is inconsistent with Judah's character, and
is not sustained by the text. It is plainly stated that
Judah postponed Shelah's marriage to Thamar be-
caused he feared that he might die also. It was not
superstition, then, according to the analogy of later
times, but an anxiety founded on the belief that the
misfortune of both his sons might have been con-
nected with the fact of their too early marriage,
that made the reason for the postponement of hia
promise. — In her father's house. — Thither widowi
withdrew (Lev. xxii. 13).
3. Judah's crime with Thumar (vers. 12-16).—
And (when) Jjrdah was comforted. — After tin
expiration of the time of iiionrniiig, he went to the les
tival of sheep-slieariiig at Timn.ith upon tlie inoun
tiiins, in company with Ilinili. — And it was told
Thamar. — The bold thouglit «hieh now flashed
across the mind of Thamar is so monstrously enig
matical, that it takes itself out of tlie range of all
ordinary criticism. Mere lust would not manifeat
CHAP. XXXVIII. 1-30.
59V
itself in such a way. It might have been a grieved
feeling of right. She seemed to herself, by Judah's
command and her own submission to it, condemned
to eternal barrenness and mourning widowhood. To
"ireak these barriers was her intention. A thirst,
however, for right, and Ufe, was not her only motive
for assuming the appearance of a harlot, the reproach
of legal incest (for the intimation of Er's baseness
and of Onan's conduct leaves it a question whether
it was so in reality), and the danger of destruction.
Like the harlot Rahab, she seems to have had a knowl-
edge of the promises made to Israel. She even ap-
pears to cling, with a kind of fanatical enthusiasm, to
the prospect of becoming a female ancestor in Israel.
See the Introduction, p. 81. Ambrosius: "A'oh
Umporalem itsum lihidinis requisivtf, Sfid successionem
gralias concupivit." According to Keil, Judah came
tn her on his return. Since the sheep-shearing festi-
vals were of a jovial kind, this assumption might
serve for an explanation and palliation of Judah's
sin ; still it cannot be definitely determined from the
text. — And sat in an open place. — Lange trans-
lates : And sat in the gate of Ennaijim (Enam, in the
low country of Judah, Josh. xv. 34). — Which is by
the way to Timnath. — '' She puts off from her the
common garments of a widow, which were destitute
of all ornaments (Judith x. 3 ; xvi. 8), covers herself
with a veil, so as not to be recognized (comp. Job
xxiv. 15), and wraps herself in the manner customary
with harlots." Knobel. "Th.amar," .says the same,
' wishes to appear as a kedescha " (a priestess of
Astarte, the goddess of love). This, however, could
hardly have been her intention, as appearing before
Judah. The proper distinction may be thus made :
According to ver. 15, he thought her to be a zona
(n:iT), but in ver. 21 the question is asked, accord-
ing to the custom of the country : Where is the
kedescha? (nffln^n). As a son of Jacob he might
have erred with a zona, but could not have had in-
tercourse with a kedescha, as a devotee of the god-
dess of love. Still the offence is great; though there
is to be considered, on the one side, the custom of
the times, together with Judah's individual tempera-
ment, and the excitement caused by the sheep-shear-
ing, whilst, on the other, there is to be kept in mind the
enjgmatical appearance of the transaction, behind
which moral forces, and a veiled destiny, are at work.
This giving of the seal-ring, the cord, and the staff,
shows tliat Judah has fallen within the circle of a
magical influence, and that it is not fleshly lust alone
that draws him. These pledges were the badges of
his dignity. "Every Babylonian, says Herodotus,
carries a seal-ring, and a staff, on the top of which
there is some carved work, like an apple or a rose.
The same custom prevailed in Canaan, as we see
here in the case of Judah." Delitzsch. To this day
do the town Arabians wear a seal-ring fastened by a
cord aroimd the neck (Robinson: "Palestine," i.
p. 68). " The he-goat appears also as a present from
» m.in to his wife (Judg. xv. 1)." Knobel. — Lest
we be shamed. — These words characterize the
moral state of the country and the times. In his
eager search for the woman and the pledges (which
probably were of far more value than the kid), Ju-
dah shows himself by no means so much afraid of
moral condemnation, as of mocking ridicule.
4. Thamar and her sons (vers. 27-30). — And
let her be burnt. — By this sentence the energetic
Judah reminds us again of David, the great hero of
his family. With a rash and angry sense of justice
8H
he passes sentence without any thought that le is
condemning himself, just as David did when con
fronted by \athan, 2 Sam. xii. 5. There are ever it
this line two strong nature^ contending with each
other. " In his patriarchal authority, he commanded
her to be brought forth to be burned. Thamar w
regarded as betrothed, and was, therefore, to bt
punished as .i bride convicted of unchastity. But
in this case the Mosaic law imposes only the penalty
of being stoned to death (Deut. xxii. 20), whilst
burning to death was inflicted only upon the daugh
ter of a priest, and upon carnal intercourse both with
mother and daiighter(Lev. xxi. 19; xx. 14). Judah's
sentence, therefore, is more severe than that of the
future law." Keil. The severity of the decision ap-
pears tolerable only upon the supposition that he
really intended to give to Thamar his son Shelah
besides, it testifies to an arbitrary power exercised
in a strange country, and which can only be ex-
plained from his confidence in his own strength and
standing. How fairly, however, does Thamar bring
him to his senses by sending him his pledges. The
delicate yet decisive message elicits an open confes-
sion. But his sense of justice is expressed not only
in the immediate annulling of the decision, but also
in his future conduct towards Thamar. The twin-
birth of Rebecca is once more reflected. We see
how important the question of the first-born still re-
mains to the Israelirish mother and midwife. In the
case of twins there appears more manifestly the
marks of a striving for the birth-right. Pharez, how-
ever, did not obtain the birth-right, as Jacob sought
it, by holding on the heel, but by a violent breach.
In this he was to represent Judah's lion-like manner
within the milder nature of Jacob. According to
Knobel, the midwife is supposed to have said to
Pharez : A breacli upon thee, i. e., a breach happen
to thee; and this is said to have been fulfilled when
the Israelitish tribes tore themselves away from the
house of David, as a punishment, because the Da-
vidian family of the Pharezites had violently got the
supremacy over its brethren.
DOOTEINAL AUD ETHICAL.
1. Judah's beginnings as compared with those of
Joseph. — A strong sensual nature ; great advances,
great offences — strong p.issions, great self-condemna-
tion, denials, struggles, and breaches.
2. Judah as Eremite, or Separatist, in the noblest
sense ; the dangers of an isolated position.
3. Hirah, from a valuable comrade, becoming an
officious assistant, — a witness to Judah's superiority.
4. The sons of Judah. The failure of his well-
intended experiment to marry his sons early.
5. Onan's sin, a deadly wickedness, an examplf
to be held in abhorrence, as condemnatory, not oul)
of secret sins of self-pollution, l>ut also of all similar
offences in sexual relations, and even in marriage It-
self. Unchastity in general is a homicidal waste of
the generative powers, a demonic bestiality, an out.
rage to ancestors, to posterity, and to one's own life.
It is a crime against the image of God, and a degra-
dation below the animal. Onan's offence, moreover,
as committed in marriage, wa« a most unnatuat
wickedness, and a grievous wrong. The sin named
after him is destrui tive as a pestilence that walketh
in darkness, destroying directly the body and soul of
the young But common fornication is likewisp t>
unnatural "iolation of the person, a murHpr oi (« i
694
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK. OF MOSES.
tonls, and a desecration of the body as the temple of
God. There are those m our Christian communities
who are exce&lingly gross in this respect ; a proof
of the most defective development of what may be
called, the consciousness of personality, and of perso-
nal dignity.
6. The Levirate law. Its meaning and object.
The theocratic moral idea of the levirate law is as-
cribed in the Calwer Handbucli to the desire of imper-
isUableness. Gerlach remarks: "An endeavor to
preserve families, even in their separate lines, and to
retain the thereby inherited property, pervades the
laws of the Israelites, — a feeling that doubtless came
down from the patriarchs. The father still lived on
in the son ; the whole family descending from him
was, in a certain sense, himself; and, through this,
the place among the people was to be preserved.
From the remotest antiquity, so much depended upon
the preservation of tradition, upon the inheritance
of religion, education, and custom, that these things
were never regarded as the business of individuids,
but of famiUes and nations. When afterward the
house of Jacob became a people, this duty of the le-
virate law necessarily made trouble, and the brother-
in-law was no longer forced to it; but even then he
was publicly contemned for his refusal (Deut. xxv. 5 ;
Ruth iv. 7; comp. Matt. xxii. 23)l" The first mo-
tive for the patiiarchal custom, or for Judah's idea,
conies, doubtless, from a struggle of faith in tlie pro-
mise with death. As the promise is to the seed ot
Abraham, so death seems to mar the promise when
he carries away some of .Jacob's sons, especially the
first-bom, before they have had offspring. Life thus
enters into strife with death, whilst the remaining
brothers fill up the blank. The second motive, how-
ever, is connected with the fact, that the life of the
deceased is to be reflected in the future existence of
their names in this world. Israel's sous are a church
of the undying. There is a third motive ; it is to in-
troduce the idea of spiritual descent. The son of
the surviving brother answers for the legitimate son
of the dead, and thus the way is prepared for the
great extension of the adoptive relatioiiship, accord-
ing to which Jesus is called the son of Joseph, and
mention is made of the brothers of Jesus. The
institution, however, being tyjiical, it could not be
carried tlirough consistently in opposition to the
right of personality. A particular coercive marriage
would have been at war with the idea of the law itself.
7. Thamar's sin, and Thamar's faith.
8. The Hierodulai. Female servants of Astarte,
Aschera, or Mylytta (see Delitzsch, p. 536). The
he-goat sacred to Astarte.
9. Judah's self-condemnation and confession.
10. Judah's (Thamar's) twins; Isaac's (Rebecca's)
twins.
HOMILETICAIi AND PRACTICAL.
See Theological and Ethical. It is only with great
caution, and in a wise and devout spirit, that this nar-
rative should be made the ground of homiletical di.><-
coumcs. — Judah's solitude. — The apparent extinclion
of the tribe. — God's judgments on the sins of unchas-
tity. — The danger ari.sing from feasts (such as that of
the phecp-sheariiig. — The keeping of promises. — Self-
condrinnation. — The fall and the recovery in our nar-
rative.— Apparent extinction, and yet a new life,
through God's grace, in Judah's uprightness and sin-
writT
Section First. Vers. 1-5. Starkt: : Hall : God'i
election is only by grace, for otherwise Judah nevei
would have been chosen as an ancestor of Chrigt.—
£ibl. Wirt, : Pious parents can experience no great-
er cross than to have vile and godless children (Sirach
xvi. 1). — Gerlach : This marriage of Judah i» nol
censured, since it was impossible that all "''e sons of
Jacob should take wives from tlieir kindred in Meso-
potamia.— Schroder : Ver. 5. Chezit meaning de
LosiON, on account of the delusions connected wit'
this place. — Tlie false hope of Judah — afterwards of
Thamar. — Then again of Judah.
Section Second. Vers. 0-11. Starkk : This
Thamar, very generally regarded as a Canaaniie,
though by some of the Jews very improbably called
a daughter of M elchizedek, has received a place in
the Toledoth of Christ (Matt. L 3), to show that he is
also the hope of the heathen. [The Jews might, in
two ways, have suggested to them this strange hy-
pothesis of Thamar's being the daughter of Melehize-
dek : 1. Through ancestral pride ; 2. From conclu-
sions derived from the law. They reasoned thus : If
Judah intended to burn Thamar, she must have been
the daughter of a priest. If she was the daughter of
a priest, then probably the daughter of Melchizedek.]
— Hall : Remarkably wicked sinners God reserves to
himself for hisown vengeance. — Ver. 11 Judah spake
deceitfully to his daughter-in-law. Judab may also
have thought that his sons' early marriages hastened
their death, especially if they were only fourteen
years of age (?) ; and it may be that on this account
he did not wish his son Shelah to marry so young. —
Hall : Fulfilment of promises is the duty of eveiy up-
right man, nor can either fear or loss absolve him. —
ScnRoiiEK : The seed has the promise of salvation —
the prouiise on which the fathers grew. The levirate
law was but a peculiar aspect, as it were, of that
universal care for oft'spring which formed ihe Old-
Testament response to God's covenant faithfulness.
Onan's sin a murder. It is as if tlie curse of Canaan
descended upon these sons from a Canaanitish wo-
man.— ScHWK.vKE: The sin of Onau, unnatural, de-
structive of (iod's holy ordinance, is even yet so dis-
pleasing to the Lord that it gives birth to bodily and
spiritual death. — Heim ("Bible Studies"): 1 Cor. vi.
11. Why is it that the Holy (ihost meuiions first in
this chapter the sin of Onan, and then points us so
carefully to the Saviour of the world as descending
from the incest-stained Judah and Thamar V Here
only may we find salvation, forgiveness, the taking
away of all guilt, and the curse that rests upon it.
Sectifin 'I'hrd. Vers. 12-16. Hall: lunnodesty
in dress and conduct betrays evil desires. — Chamkr :
Widower and widow are to live lives of chastity.
That Thamar desired Shelah to be given to her Wiis
not unreasonable ; but her course in thus avenging
herself is by no means approved, though some of
the Christian fathers (Clirysostom, Ambrose, Theo-
doret) praise her on this very account, and ascribe
her design to a peculiar desire to become the mother
of the .Mes.siah. — Ver. 24. It is not agrecii whether
he spoke these words as judge or accuser. He was
here among a strange people ; but as he has never
subjected himself to them, he would be judge in his
own affairs. — Cai.vi.n : Severe tis Judah had been
against Thamar, he judges now indulgently in his own
case. — Lisco has a remaikable view, namely, thai
Jndah himself, after the death of his wife, was iindci
obligation to marry Thamar, if he was not willing tc
give her to his son. The same »iew is entertained'
by Gerlach, undoubtedly from a misunderslandiut; of
CHAP. XXXIX. l-2?u
59S
Che later levirate law. — Schroder: Harlots only, in
"ontrast with virtuous and domestic women, frequent
Mie streets and markets, lurking at every corner-
stone (Prov. vii. 12; Jer. iii. 2; Isaiah xvi. 25-31 ;
Jos. ii. 15).
iiection Fourth. Vers. 27-30. Starke : Ver 30.
In Christ's birth-register, too, great sinners are found.
— [Osiander: These two children signified two
people, namely, the Jews and the Gentiles. For the
Jews, though seeming to be tne first to enter eternal
life, havt become the last ; whilst tliose of the Gon-
tiles who heard the gospel of Christ have gone before
them and become the first (according to Val. Her
berger.)] — ^Schroder : Zarah, according to t-omei
means brightness, as a name given to him on accouni
of the scarlet color of the thread upon his hand. Ac
cording to others, it means the sun-rising, as indica
tive of his appearing first. — Ldther: Why did God
and the Holy Ghost permit these sliameful things to bt
written? Answer: that no one should be proud of
his own righteousness and wisdom, — and, again, tha*
no one should despair on account of his sins, etc. It
may be to remind us that by natural right, Gentiles
too, are the mother, brothers, sisters of our Loixi
THIRD SECTION.
Joteph in Potiphar's house and in prison. His sufferings on account of his virtue, and hU
apparent destruction.
Chaftee XXXrX. 1-23.
1 And Joseph was brought down to Egypt; and Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh,
captain of the guard [life-guardsmen, executioners], an Egyptian, bouglit him of the hands
2 of the Ishmaehtes, which had brought him down thither. And the Lord was with
Joseph, and he was a prosperous man ; and he was in the house of his master the
3 Egyptian. And his master saw that the Lord was with him, and that the Lord made
4 all "that he did to prosper in his hand. And Joseph found grace in his sight, and he
served him ; and he made him overseer over his house, and all that he had he put into
5 his hand. And it came to pass from the time that he had made him overseer in his
house, and over all that he had, that the Lord blessed the Egyptian's house for Joseph's
sake ; and the blessing of the Lord was upon all that he had in the house and in the
6 field. And he left all that he had in Joseph's hand; and he knew not aught he had
save the bread which he did eat. And Joseph was a goodly person, and well-favored
1 [seech-xxix. 1?]. And it came to pass, after these things, that his master's wife cast her
8 eyes upon Joseph ; and she said, Lie with me. But he refused, and said unto his
master's wife. Behold, m.j master wotteth not what is with me in the house, and he
,9 hath committed all that he hath to ray hand; There is none greater in this house than
I ; neither hath he kept back anything from me but thee, because thou art his wife :
10 how then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God? And it came to pass
as she spake to Joseph, day by day, that lie hearkened not unto her, to lie by her, or
11 to be with her. And it came to pass about this time, that Joseph went into the house
12 to do his business ; and there was none of the men of the house there within. And she
caught him by his garment, saying. Lie with me : and he left his garment in her hand,
13 and Bed, and got him out [of the house]. And it came to pass, when she saw that he had
14 left his garment in her hand, and was fled fortli, That she called unto the men of her
house, and spake tmto tliem, saying, See, he hath brought in an Hebrew unto us to
15 mock us ; he came in unto me to lie with me, and I cried with a loud voice : And it
came to pass, when he heard that I lifted up my voice and cried, that he left his gar-
16 ment with me and fled, and got him out. And she laid up his garment by hei, until
17 his lord came home. And she spake unto him according to these words, saying, The
18 Hebrew servant, which thou hast brought unto us, came in unto me to mock me ■ Anc
it came to pass, as I hfted up my voice, and cried, that he left his garment with mo.
i9 and fled out. And it came to pass, when his master heard the words of his wife, whith
she spake unto him, saying, After this manner did thy servant to me : tiiat his wrath
20 was kindled. And Joseph's master took him, and put him into the prison [stronghold]'
a place where the king's prisoners [state-prisoners] were bound : and he was there in th*
21 ^ri3on But the TiOrd was with Joaet)h. and shewed him mercv and ?ave bim favoi
596
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
22 in the sight of the keeper of the prison. And the keeper of the prison conjniit!* ] ti.
Joseph's hand all the prisoners that were in the prison ; and whatsoever they did there, he
23 was the doer of it. The keeper of tlie prison looked not to anytliing th^it was under bis
hand, because the Lord was with him, and that which he did, the Lord made it to prosr"-'
\} Ver. 20. — "^nDH r)^2 . Literally, the round house, so called from its shape, which was different from the cozomov
EgyptiaTi architecture — thus constructed, perhaps, as giving greater strength. Aben Ezra exprenses the opinion that thf
word i^ Egyptian ; but it occurs in Hebrew, as in Cant. vii. 3 {nflO), where it evidently has the sense of roundness, and
is 80 rendered in the ancient versions. This is confirmed by its near relationship to the more common "^nO , to goround^
from which the Syriac has its word |Zl-j»XO for tower or castle. Although Joseph, for policy, used an interpreter when
ipeaking with his brethren, yet there roust have been, at this time, a great affinity between the Sheraitic and the old
Egjrptian tongue. Very many of the words muet have been the same in both languages. The LXX. have rendere<1 1*
m ^x^pw/Aart, in the stronghold , Vulg., simply in carcerem,— T. L.]
QEKESAL PBELIMINARr REMAKKS.
1. The three chapters, xxxix.-xlii., form a dis-
tinct section by themselves. Joseph in Egypt — in
his misery and in his exaltation ; first, himself ap-
parently lost, afterwards a saviour of the world. Ch.
xl, presents the transition from his humiliation to his
exaltation,
2. In the section from ch. xxxix.-xlii., Knobel re-
cognizes the elements of the original text, mingled
with the additions of the Jehovist. It is a matter of
fact, that the elohistic relations predominate, but in
decisive points Jehovah appears as the ruler of Jo-
seph's destiny.
3. If the preceding chapter might be regarded as
\ counterpart to ch. xxxvii., then the present chap-
'.er forms again a eoimtorpart to the one before it.
Both chapters agree in referring especially to sexual
relations. In the former, Onan's sin, whoredom, and
incest, are spoken of; in the one before us, it is the
temptation to adultery. In the former, however,
Judah, on account of sexual sins, seems greatly m-
Tolved in guilt, though it is to be considered that he
intended to restrain the uiichastity of his sons, that
he upholds the levirate law, that he judges severely
of the supposed adultery ol one betrothed, and that he
purposely and decidedly shuns incest. Nevertheless,
ne himself does not resist the allurement to unchas-
tity, whilst Joseph persistently resists the temptation
to adultery, and shines brilliantly as an ancient ex-
ample of chastity. His first trial, when he was sold,
was his suffering innocently in respect to crime, and
yet not without some fault arising from his inconsid-
eratenesa. His second and more grievous trial was
his suffering on account of his virtue and fear of
God, and, therefore, especially typical was it in the
history of the kingdom of God.
4. Our narrative may be divided into three parts :
1) Joseph's good conduct and prosperity in Potiphar's
house (vers. l-i'i); 2) Jo.scph's temptation, constancy,
and sufferings (vers. 6-2U) ; 3) Joseph's well-being in
prison (vers. 21-23).
EXEGETIOAL AND OEITIOAI..
1, Jo!ieph'$ good behavior and prosperity in
Polipfiar's house (vers, 1-ti). — And Potiphar
bought him {nar cli. xxxvii. 311). — As captain of the
" executioners," he commanded the guard of the
palace, or I'haraoli's body-guard, who were to exe-
cute his deatli-sentences, and was named accordingly.
Concerning this office among other ancient nations,
»ec Knobki., p. 30:i The name eunuch also denotis
a courtier in general ; but Knobel, without any
ground, would regard Potiphar as really such ; though
these were frequently married. — And the Lord
was with Joseph. — Here the name Jehovah
certaiidy corresponds with the facts. Joseph was
not only saved, but it is Jehovah who saves him for
the purposes of his kingdom. His master soon
recognizes in him the talent with which he under-
takes and executes everything entrusted to him. As
by Jacob's entrance into Laban's house, so by Jo-
seph's entrance into Potiphar's, there cornea a new
prosperity, which strikes Potiphar as something re-
markable. He ascribes it to Joseph as a blessing
upon his piety, and to his God Jehovah, and raises
Joseph to the position of his overseer. In this office
he had, doubtless, the management of an extensive
land-economy; for in this respect there was, for the
military order, a rich provision. It was a good
training for the management of the trust he after-
wards received in respect to all Egypt. Upon thia
new influence of Joseph tliere follows a greater pros
perity, and therefore Potiphar commits to him his
whole house. — Save the bread which he did
eat. — Schroder : " There appears here that charac-
teristic oriental indolence, on account of which a
slave who has command of himself may easily attain
to an honorable post of influence." Save the bread,
etc. " This," according to Bohleii, " is an expression
of the highest confidence ; but the ceremonial Egyp-
tian does not easily commit to a stranger anything
that pertains to his food." Besides, the Egyptians
had their own laws concerning food, and did not eat
with Hebrews.
2. Joseph^s temptations, covsolatioJis, and suffer-
inr/s (vers. 6-20).— And Joseph was a goodly
man. — His beauty occasioned his temjrtations. — His
master's wife cast her eyes upon him — His
temptations are long continued, beginning with lust-
ful persuasions, and ending in a bold attack. Jo-
seph, on the other hand, tiies to awaken her con-
science ; he places the proposed sin in every possi-
ble light ; it would be a disgraceful abuse of the con
fidcnce reposed in him by his master ; it would be
an outrage upon his rights as a husband ; it would
be adultery, a great crime in the sight of God.
Again, he shuns every opportunity the woman would
give him, and finally takes to fliglit on a pressing
occasicm which she employs, notwith.stii riding he is
now to expect her deadly revenge. Knobel: " The
ancients describe Egypt as the home of unohastity
(Martial, iv. 42, 4 : nrguitias tellus scit dare nulla
rnajfit), and speak of the great prevalence of mar-
riage infidelity JIIerod. ii. Ill; Dion. Sin. i 59)
as well as of their great sensuality generally Foi
CHAP. XXXIX. 1-23.
5!»1
sample, the history of Cleopatra, Diod. ch. 51. 15."
For similar statements respecting the later ami mod-
ern Egypt, see Keil, p. 251, note. — To lie by her.
— An euphemistic expression. — That she called
unto the men. — Lust ch<«iges into hatred. She
intends to revenge herself for his refusal. Besides, it
■3 for her own safety ; for though Joseph himself
might not betray her, she miglit be betrayed by his
gaiment that he had left behind. Her lying story is
rharacteristic in every feature. Scornfully she calls
her husband lie (" /i« hath brought in," etc.), and
thereby betrays her hatred. Joseph she designates
as " an Hebrew," i. e., one of the nomadic people,
who was unclean according to Egyptian views (ch.
xUii. 32 ; xlvi. 34). Both expr&ssions show her
anger. She reproaches her husband with having im-
perilled her virtue, but makes a show of it, by call-
ing the pretended seductions of Joseph a wanton
mockery, as though by her outcry she would put
herself forth as the guardian of the virtue of the
females of her house. — Unto me to mock me. —
Her extreme cunning and impudence are proved by
the fact that she makes use of Joseph's garment as
the corpus delicti, and that in pretty plain terms slie
almost reproaches Potiphar with liaving purposely
endangered her chastity. — That his wrath was
kindled. — It is to be noticed that it is not exactly
said, against Joseph. He puts him into the tower,
the state-prison, surrounded by a wall, and in which
the prisoners of the king, or the state criminals, were
kept. Ver. 10. Deliizsch and Keil regard this pun-
ishment as mild ; since, according to Dion. Sic. i.
28, the Egyptian laws of marriage were severe. It
must be remembered, however, that Potiphar decreed
.hU penalty without any trial of the accused, and
fhat his confinement seems to have been unlimited.
At the same time, there is something in the opinion,
expressed by many, that he himself did not fully
believe his wife's assertion, and intended again, in
iime, to reinstate Joseph. It may, therefore, have
seemed to him most proper to pursue this course, in
order to avoid the disgrace of his house, without
sacrificing entirely this hitherto faithful servant. The
prosperous position that Joseph soon held in the
prison seems to intimate that Potiphar was punishing
him gently lor appearance sake.
* 3. Joxeph^s well-being in the prison {vers. 21-23).
— Favor in the sight of the keeper. — This was
a subordinate officer of Potiphar; and "thus van-
ishes the difficulty presented by Tuch and Knobol,
that Joseph is said to have had two masters, and that
mention is made of two captains of the body-guard."
Delitzsch. The overseer of the prison also recognizes
Joseph's worth, and makes him a sort of sub-officer ;
though he does not, by that, cease to be a prisoner.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAI,.
1. Gerlach : The important step in the develop-
ment of the divine plan is now to be made: the
house of Jacob was to remove from the land of the
promise into a foreign country, as had been an-
nounced to .\braham many yeais before (ch. xv. 13).
Jacob's numerous family could no longer remain
vnong the Canaanite=, without dispersion, loss of
unity and independence, and troublesome conflicts
•rith the inhabit;ints of the country. ''Further on
SI is said : They were 10 become a people in the most
cultivated country then known, and yet most distinct-
ty separated from the inhabitants."
2. .lehovah was with .losenh. The covenant fiod
victoriously carries forward l.in decrees thiongii a.
the need, sufferings, and ignominy of liis people
Joseph, so to say, is now the support of the future
development of the Old-Testament theocracy : and
on the thread of his severely threatened life, as oin
above whose head hangs the sword of the heathen
executioner, there is suspended, as far as the liunian
eye can see, the destiny both of Israel and the world,
God's omnipotence may, and can, make its purposes
dependent from such threads as Joseph in prison,
Moses in the ark, David in the cave of AduUam.
Providence is sure of the accomplishment of its
object.
8. Joseph suffering innocently, yet confiding in
God : a. a slave, yet still a free man ; b. unfortunate,
yet still a cliild of fortune : c. abandoned, yet still
standing firm in the severest temptations ; d. forlorn,
yet still in the presence of God ; c. an object of im-
pending wrath, yet still preserved alive ; /. a state-
prisoner, and yet himself a prison-keeper ; g. every
way subdued, yet ever again superior to his condi.
tion. In this phase of his hfe, Jo.seph is :ikin tc
Paul (2 Cor. vi. ), with whom he has this in common,
that, through tlie persecutions of his brethreti, he is
fore d to carry the light of God's kingdom into the
heatlien world, — a fact, it is true, that first appears,
in the life of Joseph, in a typical form.
4. Joseph, as an example of chastity, stands here
in the brightest light when cotnpared with the con-
duct of Judah in the previous chapter. Frotn this
we see that the divine election of the Messiatiic tribe
was not dependtmt upon the virtues of the Israelitish
patriarchs. We should be mistaken, however, in
concluding from this a groutidless arbitrariness in
the divine government. In the strong fulness of
Judah's nature there lies more that is undevelopeQ
for the future, than in the immature spirituality and
self-reliance of Joseph. It is a seal of the truth of
Holy Scripture that it admits such seeming paradoxes
as no mythology could have invented, as well as a
seal of its grandeur that it could so boldly present
such a patriarchal parallel to a people proud of its
ancestry, whose principal tribe was Judah. and in
which .ludah and Kphraim were filled with jealousy
toward each other.
5. Joseph's victory shows how a man, and espe
ciaUy a young man, is to overcome temptation. Thf
first requirement is : walk as in the all-seeing pres-
ence of God ; the second : fight with the weapons
of the word in the light of duty (taking tne olfen-
sive, which the spirit of conversion assumes accord-
ing to the measure of its strength); tlie third: avoid
the occasions of sin ; the fourth: firmness belore all
things, and, if it must be, flight with the loss of the
dress, of the good name, and even of life itself.
fi. The curse of adultery and its actual sentencf
in Joseph's speech and conduct.
7. The accusation of the woman a picture of
cabal, reflecting itself in all times, even the most
modern. The first exiuuple of gross cihimniation
in the Sacred Scripture, coming from an adulterous
woman, presenting a picture, the very opposite of
Joseph's virtue, as exhibiting the mo.st impudent and
revengeful traits of vindictive lying Thus, also,
was Christ calumniated, in a way that might be railed
tlie consummation of all calumny, the maste'-pieC€
of the prince of accusers.
8. Potiphar's wrath and irildness are indications
that he had a presentiment of what the truth really
was. It is also an example showing how the pridt
of the great easily inclines them to sacrifice to th»
wa
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF M16ES.
honor of tKeir house the right and happiness of their
depen laots.
HOMUiETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
See Doctrinal and Ethical. Joseph's destiny ac-
cording to the divine providence : 1. His mislortune
in his fortune. As Ibrmerly the preference of his
father, his variegated coat, and the splendid dreams,
prepared for him misfortunes, so now his important
fimctioii in Potiphar's house, and his goodly person.
2. His fortune in his misfortune. He was to go to
Egypt, assume the condition of a slave, enter prison,
and all this in order to become a prophetic man, an
Interpreter of dreams, an overseer of estates, lord
of Egypt, a deliverer of many from hunger, a cause
of repentance to his brethren, and of salvation to
the house of Jacob. — Taube : The promise of suf-
fering, and the blessing of godliness: 1. Its use:
"godUness is profitable unto all things ; " 2. its suf-
ferings : " all that will live godly shall suffer persecu-
tion , " 3. its blessing in its exercise : " exercise thy-
self unto godliness."
Section First. (Vers. 1-6). Starke : There is no
better companion on a journey than God. Blessed
are they who never forget to take this society with
them wherever they go. — Bibl. Tub. : God's blessing
and grace are with the pious everywhere, even in
their severest trials. — Cramer: Where God is present
with his grace, there he will be soon known through
his word, and other tokens of his presence. — Osias-
DKR : Pious servants should be made happy in their
service ; they should be loved as children, and ele-
vated to higher employments. — Lange : A beautiful
bodily form, and a disposition fundamentally enriched,
both by grace and nature ! how fitly do they corres-
pond.—-Schroder : In Egypt Jacob's family had a
rich support during the tamine ; there could it grow
up to a great and united people ; there it tbund the
best school of human culture ; there was the seat
of the greatest worldly power, and, therefore, the
best occasion in which to introduce those severe suf-
ferings that were to awaken in Israel a longing alter
redemption, and a spirit of voluntary consecration to
God (Hengstenberg). — God's being with Joseph, how-
ever, is not a presence of special i-evelations, iis with
the patriarchs, but a presence of blessing and suc-
cess in all things (Baumgarten). — Joseph happy,
though a servant. — Among the unplements of agri-
culture delineated on the Egyptian tombs, there is
often to be seen an overseer keeping the accounts
of the harvest In a tomb at Knm el Ahmar there
is to be seen the office of a household steward, with
ill its appurtenances.
Section Second. (Vers. 7-20). Starke : Luther :
Thus far Satan had tempted Joseph on his left side,
L e., by manifold and severe adversities ; now he
tempts him on the light, by sensuality. This temp-
tation is most severe and dangerous, especially to a
young man For Joseph lived now among tlie Ilea-
ilien, where such sins were frequent, and conld,
ihiTefore, more (aisily excite a disposition in any way
inclined to sensual pleasure. The more liealthy one
is in body, the more violent is this sickness of the
•oul (Sir. liv. 14). The more dangerous temptations
are, or the more difficult to be overcome, so much
the more plausible and agreeable are they. Nothing
IS more alluring than the eyes. "And if thine eye
iffend thee, pluck it out." — Ver. y. MuscuLus: In
tU cases he who sing, ^ins against God, — even then
when he is wronging his fellow-men. But he mo»
especially sins against God who injures the forsaken,
the miserable, the "' httle ones," and those who are
deficient in understanding. For God will protect
them, >ince they cannot be wronged without the
grossest wickedness. — Acgustine : Imileiiiur ado
lescentcs Joseph sanctum, pulchrum corpore, pulchri-
orein inenie. — Lange : Since by nature shame is im-
planted m women to a higher degree than in men
(in addition to the fact, that in consenting and trans*
gression she is exposed to more danger and shame),
80 much the more disgraceful is it when she so de-
generates as not only to lay snares secretly for the
other sex, but also impudently to importune them. —
The SA.ME : The fear of God is the best means of
grace tor avoiding sin and shame. — Hall : A pious
heart would rather remain humbled in the dust than
rise by sinful means. — Ver. 12. He preferred to
leave his garment behind him, rather than a good
conscience. — Lange: In a temptation to adultery
and fornication, flight becomes the most pressing ne-
cessity.— Ver. 18. Cramer: The devil will be true
to his nature ; for as he is an unclean spirit, so also
is he a liar. — Hall: Wickedness is ever artful in
getting up false charges against the virtues and good
works of others (Acts xvi. 20). We must be patient
toward the diabolical slanders of the impious ; for
God finally comes and judges them. — Beware of the
act itself; against the lie there may be found a
remedy. — Vers. 19, 20. He who beUeves easily is
easily deceived. Magistrates should neither be par-
tial, hasty, nor too passionate.
Schroder; ^^ Joseph was a goodly person." With
literal reference to ch. xxix. 17, Joseph was the re-
flected image of his mother. They in whose hearts
the Holy Spirit dwells, are wont lo have a counte-
nance frank, upright, and joyful (Luther). — The love
of Potiphar's wife was far more dangerous to Joseph
than the hatred of his brothers (Rambach). — Now a
far worse servitude threatens him, namely, that of sin
(Krummaeher). — Joseph had a chaste heart, and,
iherefore, a modest tongue (Val. Herberger). Un-
chaste expressions a mark of unchaste thoughts. On
the monuments may be seen Egyptian women who
are so drunk with wine that they cannot stand. Of
a restriction of wives, as customary afterwards in the
East, and even in Greece, we find no trace. — Joseph
lets his mantle go, but holds on to a good conscience.
Joscpli is again stripped of his garment, and again
does it serve for the deception of others. — Sensual
love changes suddenly into hatred (2 Sam. xiii. 15).
— Calwer Handbuch : Such flight is more honorable
than the most heroic deeds.
Section Tiiird. (Vers. 21-23). Starke : OsiAN-
DER : To a pious man there cannot happen a severer
misfortun than the reputation of guilt, and of de-
served punishment therefor, when he is innocent
(Rom. viii. 28). — Cramer : God sympathises with
those who suffer innocently (James i. 3). God
briiiguth his elect down to the grave, but bringeth
tliein up again (1 Sam. ii. 6). Whom God would re-
vive, can no one stifle. Whom God favors, no mis-
lortune can harm.
SciiRiiDER : Those who believe in God must
suffer on account of virtue, truth, and goodness;
not on account of sin and shame (Luther). Exalt
ation in humiliation, a sceptre in a prison, seivant
and Lor-d — even as Christ. — (iod's eyes behold
tlie prison, the fetters, and the most sliamefnl death,
as 111' beholds the fair ind shining sun. In Jo.-eph'a
condition nothing is to be seen but death, the los/
CHAP. XL. 1-23. 59S
»f his fair fame, and of all lii3 viituea. Now comes
Christ with his eyes of grace, ami throws light iuto
the grave. Joseph is to become a Lord, thougli he
had seeiiiingly entered into the prison of be\l (Luther).
Joseph's way is now for a time in the darliiiess, but
this is the very way through which God often leads
hie people. Thus Moses, David, Paul, Luther ; so
lived the Son of God to his thirtieth year in Nazareth
Nothing is more opposed to God than that impa
tience of the power of nature which would violentl;
usurp his holy government. — Stolbero justly com
mends "the inimitablesimplicity of Joseph's liistory
narrated in the most vivid manner, and bearing of
its face the most unmistal^able seal of truth."
FOURTH SECTION.
J-'ieph as interpreter of the dreams of hi» fellow-prisoneri.
Chapter XL. 1-23.
1 And it came to pass after these things that the butler of the king of Egypt, and hit
2 baker, had offended their lord the king of Egypt. And Pharaoh was wroth against
two of his officers, against the chief of the butlers, and against the chief of the
3 bakers. And he put them in ward in the house of the captain of the guard, into
4 the prison, the place where Joseph was bound. And the captain of the guard
charged Joseph with them ; and he served them ; and they continued a season
5 in ward. And they dreamed a dream, each man his dream in one night, each man
according to the interpretation of his dream, the butler and the baker of the king of
6 Egypt, which were bound in prison. And Joseph came in unto them in the morning,
7 and looked upon them, and, behold, they were sad. And he asked Pharaoh's ofScera
that were with him in the ward of his lord's house, saying, Wherefore look ye so sadly
8 to day ? And they said unto him, We have dreamed a dream, and there is no inter-
preter of it. And Joseph said unto them, Do not interpretations belong to God ? tell
9 me them, I pray you. And the chief butler told his dream to Joseph, and said to him,
10 In my dream, beliold, a vine was before me. And in the vine were three brandies :
and it was as though it budded, and her blossoms shot forth ; and the clusters thereof
1 1 brought forth ripe grapes : And Pharaoh's cup was in my hand : and I took the grapes,
12 and pressed ' them into Pharaoh's cup, and I gave the cup into Pharaoh's hand. And
Joseph said unto him, This is the interpretation of it: The three branches are three
13 days: Yet within three days shall Pliaraoh lift up thine head, and restore thee unto
thy place ; and tliou shalt deliver Pharaoh's cup into his hand, after the former manner
1^ when thou wast his butler. But think on me when it shall be well with thee, and
shew kindness, I pray thee, unto me ; and make mention of me unto Pharaoh, and bring
15 me out of this house : For indeed I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews ;
16 and here also have I done nothing that they should put me into the dungeon. When
the ciiief baker saw that the interpretation was good, he said imto Joseph, I also was
17 in my dream, and behold, I had three white baskets on my head ; And in tiie uppermost
basket there ivas of all manner of bakemeats for Pharaoh ; and the birds did eat them
18 out of the basket upon my head. And Joseph answered and said. This is the inter-
19 pretation thereof: The three baskets are three days : Yet within three days shall
Pharaoh lift up thy head from off thee, and shall hang thee on a tree; and the birds
20 shall eat thy flesh from off thee. And it came to pass the third day, which was
Pharaoh's birthda}-, that he made a feast unto all his servants ; and he lifted up the
21 head of the chief butler, and of the chief baker among his servants. And he restored
the chief butler unto his butlership again ; and lie gave the cup inti, Pharaoh's hand ;
22, 23 But he hanged ' the chief baker ; as Joseph had interpreted to them. Yet did not
the chief butler remember Joseph, but forgat him.
[^ Ver. Ll. — I3n'iJX* . J pressed. The word occurs nnly here, yet its meaning is siafBciently obvious from the context,
and from the cognate'Chaldaic I^nD . It is onomatopic, representing the emission of the juice. It is allied to nPllC
Vtth Its sense of waste and destruction, LXX., efe0Ati^a ; Vulg.. expre^si. — T. L.]
(^ Ver. 22. — n?n. It does not here denote su^pgnsimi /ram, like han^lx^ &om a ^allows. The preposition 5^
« opposed to that, and shows that it denotes crucitaxiou. — T. L. 1
AOO
GENESIS. OR THE FIKST BOOK OF MOSES.
PEELIMINAEY REMAKKS.
The contents of this chapter may be denoted,
ihe silent preparation for the great turning in Jo-
seph's destiny. In itself considered, however, our
narrative shows us how the religious capacity of suf-
fering for the Lord's sake develops itself, like a
germ, in the people of God. Joseph's spiritual life
shines resplendent in his prison. There may be dis-
tinguished the following sections : 1. The imprison-
ment of the two court-officers, and Joseph's charge
over tliem (vers. 1—1) ; 2. their dejecteilness, and
Joseph's sympathy (vera. 6-8) ; 3. the dream of the
chief butler, and its interpretation (vers. 9-15); 4.
the dream of the chief baker, and its interpretation
(vers. 16-19) ; 5. the fulfilment of both dreams.
EXEGETICAL AJ^D CRITICAIi.
1. Vers. 1-4. Tlie imprUonment of the two
eourt-o'fficers^ atid JosepJCs charge over them. — The
chief of the butlers and the chief of the ba-
kers.— .\ccording to ver. 2 they are the chiefs in
their respective departments of service. The ori-
ental kiufis, as those of the Persians (Xenoph., Hd-
lenirri, viii. i. 38), had a multitude of butlers, bakers,
and CO iks. The office of chief butler was very hon-
orable wiih the kings of Persia (HERon., iii. 34;
Xeniiph., Viiroped. i. 3, 8). It was tiuce tilled by
Nehemiali (Neh. i. 11 ; ii. 1). — In the house of the
captain of the guard — i. e., in the house of Poti-
pliar. The house of the cajitain of the guard was
connected with the state-prison, and denotes here the
prison itself. — Charged Joseph with them. —
Here Potiphar again mingles himself with Joseph's
fortune (and that by way of mitigating it) in the
recognition of his talents. By this distinguished
charge, he shows favor, at the same time, to Joseph
and to his fallen colleagues.
2. Vers. 5-8. Their dejecifylnean and Joseph^ s
tximpaihy. — According to the interpretation. —
Both had dreamed — each one a ditl'erent ilream —
each one a significant dream, according to the antici-
pated occurrence upon which it was founded, and
also according to its interpretation. Joseph's con-
versation with the sad and dejected prisoners, proves
his sagacity as well as his kindly sym|iathy. It
shows, too, how misfortune equalizes lank, and
makes the great dependent on the sympathy of those
wlio are lower in po.sition. — And there is no in-
terpreter of it. — .\n expression shoeing that
the interpretation of dreams was much in vogue,
and that it was one of the wants of persons of rank
to have their dreams interpreted. — Do not inter-
pretations belong to God ? — He admits lh:it then-
are signilicant dreanjs, and tliat (iod could be.-tuw
on men the gift of interpretation when ihey are re-
ferred l)aek to him. He rejects, indirectly, the hea-
then art of interpreting dreams, whilst, at the .same
time, giving them to understand that it was, perhaj)s,
inii)arted to himself. First, however, he is to he:ir
their dreams. Kuobcl is inexact when he speaks in
general terms of " the ancient view eoncennng
dreams.*' Doubtless the Held of revelation admits
dreams as sent bv God, but these ooincidt! with
dr Niuis in general just as little tis the piophetic niode
of interpreting them ecjincided with that of the hea-
•Jifin, though, ajcording to Egyptian views, iill i)ro-
phetic art "omes from the gods (Hkkod. ii. Mt
Knobel.
:-!. Vers. 9-16. Tlie dream of the chief bulla
and its intirpretation. — In my dream, behold a
vine. — k hvely description of a lively dream. The
first picture is the vine, and the rapid developmen?
of its branches to the miiturity of the grapes. On
the vine in Egypt, see Knobkl, p. :;il7. In the sec-
ond picture, the chief butler beholds himself in the
service of Pharaoh, preparing and presenting to him
the juice of the grapes. " The vine was referred to
Osiris, and was already well known in Egypt. See
Ps. Ixxviii. 47 ; cv. 33 ; Numb. xx. 6. The state
ment, Herod., ii. 77, is, therefore, to be taken with
limitations. Nor is it true that in the time of Psam-
meticus fresh must only was drank, while fermented
wine was prohibited. Knobel has shown that Plu-
tarch, De Iside, vi. 6, says just the contrary. The
people drank wine unrestrained; the kings, because
they were priests, only so much as was allowed by
the sacred books ; but from the time of Psannneti-
cus even this restriction was abolished. The old
monuments show great variety of wine-utensils,
wine-presses at work, topers tired of drinking, even
intoxicated women." Dehtzsch. "Wine had been
prohibited before the time of Mohammed (Sh.^ras-
TANi, ii. p. 346). The grapes he allowed (Koran, xvi.
11, 69). They evaded his prohibition by pressing
the grapes and drinking the jiuce of the berries
(ScHULTZ, Leifungen, v. p. 286). Such juice of
grapes the Egyptian king drank also in Joseph's
time. He was a ruler of the Ilyksos ('? ), who were
an Arabian tribe." Knobel. The same: The dream-
interpreter Artemidorus classes the vine with plants
that grow rapidly, and regards dreams concerning it
as having a quick fulfilment. Joseph's interpreta^
tion. — Three branches, three days. — Since Pha:-
raoh's birth-day was at hand, and was known, per-
haps, as a day of pardon, this presentiment may, to
some degree, have been affected by it. — Lift up
thine head. — To replace, again, in prosperity and
honor, especially to bring out of prison (? Kings
XXV. 27). — And show kindness, I pray thee,
unto me. — Joseph is so sine of his inlerpretatioc
that be employs the opportunity to plead ibr his owr
right and liberty. — I was stolen. — An cxpressioc
of innocence. They took him away from his father,
but how it was done, his feelings do not allow him to
relate; enough that he came to Egypt neither as a
criminal, nor as a slave, rightly solil. With the same
caution he speaks about his imprisonment without
exposing the house of Potiphar.
4. Vers. 16-19. The dream of the chief of the
bakers^ and its inhrpretation. The striking resem-
blance of his dream to the one previously interpreted,
caused the baker to overlook its ominous difference ;
he, therefore, hopes also Ibr a favorable interpreta-
tion. The interpreter, however, shows his discern-
ment in recognizing the birds that did not eat the
bakenieats out of the Ijasket upon his head, as the
main ]ioint. He differs also from the heathen inter-
preters in aimouneing tlie unfavorable meaning plain-
ly and distinctly. Knobel: "In Egyjit men were
accustomed to carry on their heads, «onien upon
their shoulders. In modern Egypt women bear bur-
dene upini their heads." " Even at this day in Egypt
kites and hawks seize ujion ariieles of fooil carried
up<m the head." The criminal to be |nit to death
was fasteueil to a stake, to increase thereby the se-
verity of the punishment (Dcut. xxi. 22 ; Josh. i.
26; 2Sani. iv. 12). This custom was also prevaletf
CHAP. XL. l-2b.
«0]
»nioug other nations, especially the Persians and
Carthag;inians.
5. Vers. 20-23. The fulfilment of both these,
dreams. The kings of antiquity were accustomed to
celebrate their birth-days. "According to Herodo-
tus, this was the only day on which the kings of the
Persians anointed themselves, and gave presents to
their subjects. In Uke manner the Hebrew kings,
on joyous occasions, exercised mercy (1 Sam. xi.
18)." Knobel. Joseph is forgotten by the butler,
apparently for ever ; God, however, has provided for
his exaltation, not only througli the destiny denoted
in the dreams, but also by the clearing up of the
truthfulness of the interpreter.
DOOTEINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. The manner in which the divine providence qui-
etly and secretly makes the most insignificant things,
apparently, the occasion and the cause of wonderful
chanf^es, appears very visible in our narrative. It
would appear simply fortuitous that Pharaoh should
have thrown into prison his two officers on account,
perhaps, of some very trifling offence ; still more ac-
cidental would it appear that Joseph should have
had charge of tliem, and that both should have had
alarming dreams, and finally, how extraordinarily
fortuitous that Joseph, on entering, should have Ob-
served their depression in their countenances ! But
all this apparent chance was made a prerequisite, in
the course of God's providence, for Joseph's exalta-
tion, and Israel's redemption. " The Lord finds a
thousand ways where reason sees not even one."
2. The occurrences of the heatlieu world, the
affairs of courts, their crimes, cabals, intrigues, are
all under the divine control. A country in which the
wisdom of the world seems to have emancipated it-
self from all regard to the government of a divine
providence, is just the one whose administration
shows the most failure, and most frequently expe-
riences an ironical disappointment of its plans.
3. Prisons, too, with their dark chambers, dun-
geons, sorrows, secrets, are under the control of God.
At all times have they enclosed not only criminals,
but the innocent, — oftentimes the best and most
i)iousofmen. Christ says : I was in prison, and >/e
came unto me ; and he speaks thus, not of faithful
martyrs only ; even among the guilty tliere is a spark
of Christ's kinsmanship, — i. e., belonging to him.
4. How mightily misfortune takes away the distinc-
tion of rank. Joseph has not only the heart's gift
of sympathy for the unhappy, but also that open-
hearted self-consciousness that fits him to associate
with the great. Even wlien a child did he run be-
fore his mother in meeting Esau.
5. The night-life with its wakefulness, as with its
dreams, enters into the web of the divine providence
jsee Book of Esther, Daniel, Matt. ii. xxvii. 19 ; Acts
rvi. 9 ; Ps. exxxii. 4). Dreams are generally so un-
meaning tliat they should never cause men to err in
obedience to the faith, in duty, or in the exercise of
a judicious understanding. Their most general sig-
nificance, however, consists in tlieir being a reflection
of th« feelings, remembrances, and anticipations of
the day life, as .also in the fact, that all perceptions
of the body give themselves buck in the mirror of
the nightly consciousness, as imaged speech or pic-
ture. The spirit of God may, therefore, employ
dreams as a medium of revelation. He can send
dream? and bestow the gift of interpretation. But,
in themselves, the most significant dreams of rere
lation never form ethical decisions, though they maj
be signs and monitors of the same. Their highei
significance, however, is sealed by their great am
world-historic consequences for the kingdom of God.
6. Josepli very definitely distinguished betweet
his own and the heathen mode of interpreting
dreams ; and tliis he owes to his Israelitish con
sciousness as opposed to the heathen. The divine
certainty of his interpretation is seen in the fact, that,
notwithstanding the greatest similarity in both
dreams, he immediately recognizes the point of dis-
similarity, and dares to make the fearful announce-
ment in the assurance that the issue of the affair
would be in correspondence. The apparent severity
of such frankness could not make him falter in the
feeling of what was due to truth. To narrate how he
may have sought to mitigate it, by expressions of
sympathy, lay not within the scope of this narration.
7. The joyous feasts of the great are sources both
of life and death.
8. A man in prosperity soon forgets the com-
panions of his former misery, just as tlie chief butler
forgot Joseph. God's memory never fails, and it is,
at the same time, the chief quickener of the memories
of men. God keeps his own time. The ray of hope
that shone for the prisoner at the release of the chief
butler went out again for two years. When all hope
seemed to have vanished, then divine help comp» in
wonderfully.
HOMLLETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
See Doct. and Eth. Joseph's disciplinary trials.
His preparation for his great calling of saviour and
ruler: .a. by sufferings; b. by works of his vocation.
— Traces of God in the prison; 1. Divine light; 2.
holy love ; 3. divine monitions ; 4. hope of deliver-
ance.— God's government in its great issues: 1. Of
the smallest things ; 2. of the proudest events ; 3
of the most fallible judgments of men ; 4. of the
darkest prisons ; 6. of the nightly life ; 6. of hopes
and fears in human need.
First Section. Vers. 1-4. Starke : Ver. 1. In
what the offence consisted is not announced. The
Rabbins, wlio pretend to know all things about which
the Scriptures are silent, say that the butler had per-
mitted a fly to drop into the king's cup, and that a
grain of sand was found in the bread of the baker.
The conjecture of Rabbi Joniitlian has more proba-
bility ; he thinks that both had conspired to poison
the king. Joseph was thirteen years in a state of
humihation, and the last three (?) in a prison.
Schroder : Information concerning the Egyptian
wine culture and representations of it upon the monU'
ments (according to Champollion and others, p. 576),
— also concerning the modes of baking, which was
quite an advanced art among the Egyptians. The
Egyptians had for their banquets many different
kinds of pastry. — The offices of chief Ijutler and
chief baker were in high honor, and sometimes that
of field-marshal was connected with them. — In th«
East the prisons are not public buildings erected for
this sole purpose, but a part of the house in which
the prison officer resided.
Second Section. Vers. 5—8. Starke : Crauek;
There are different kinds of dreams: divine dreamt
(ch. xxviii. 12; xU. 17; Daniel ii. 2Sl; diabolical
dreams (Dent. xm. 2 ; Jeremiah xxiii. 16 ; xxvii. 9) ■
natural dreams (Eccles. v. 2). We must, tberefora
002
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
distinguish between dreams, and not regard them all
alike (Sirrich xxiiT. 1). The godless and the pious
may get into the same troubles, and have similar suf-
ferings ; yet they cannot look upon them with the
like dispositions and emotions. SchriIukr : Thi'V
may have been dreams suggested by their official po-
tition. Both of them may have gone to sleep with
the number three upon their minds because of the
thought that Pharaoh was to celebrate his birth-day
within three days. No wonder that their imagination
overflowed from the abundance of their hearts ; and
who can tell how much tlieir consciences were con-
cerned in tliese dreams. The culture and the char-
acter of the Egyptians was every way mystical, or
rather symbolical ; the less they are able to account
for an occurrence the more divine it seemed. Night
they considered as source of all things, and as a
being to which they paid divine honors. The whole
anaetit history of this wonderful people has a noc-
turnal aspect about it. One might call it the land
of dreams, of presentiments, enigmas. Joseph's des-
tiny in respect to this country begins in dreams, and
is completed by them (Krummacher). It is not every
one that can read the writing of the human counte-
nance ; this power is given to love only (Baumgarten).
He preached in prison as Christ did (Richter).
Third Section. Vers. 9-15. SrARKK : Ver. 14.
The Jews charge that Joseph in thii! request demand-
ed pay for his interpretation, and allege that, on this
account, he had to remain in prison two years longer.
There is, however, no ground for such an imputation ;
but though he had the assurance of the divine pres-
ence, and that God would deliver him from the
prison, he had, nevertheless, a natural longing for
liberty. Besides, he did not ask anything unfair of
the butler (1 Cor. vii. 21). — Cramer: Ordinary
means are from God, and he who despises them
tempts God. — The same : We may assert our inno-
cency, and seek deliverance, yet still we must not,
on that account, speak ill of those who have injured
us ( Matt. V. 44).
Schroder : The dream of the chief butler, no
doubt, leans upon the business of his life and office,
but, on the other hand, it also has the imaginative
impression of " the poet concealed within every
man," as Schubert calls it. — Calwer Handhuch :
Ver. 15. Amild judgment upon the act of his breth-
ren, whom he would not unnecessarily reproach.
Fourth Section. Vers. 16-19. Starke: Bibl.
Wirt. : Whenever the word of God is to be expound-
sd, it should be done in the way the Holy Spirit pre-
>ent« it, and according to the word itself, no matter
whether the hearers are disturbed, alarmed, or com
forted. — Schroder : (Calvin :) Many desire the wore
of God because they promise themselves simply en
joymcnt in the hearing of it. — ^Calwer JIamilmch:
In Hebrew, "to lift up the head," is a play upon
words. It means to restore to honor and dignity, or
to hang upon the gallows, or decapitation (taking
off the head), or crucifixion (lifting up upon thi
cross).
Fifth Section. Vers. 20-23. Starke: Bibl.
Wirt : Godless men in adversity, when they receive
help from the pious, make the fairest of promises,
but when prosperity returns they forget them all.
Be not, therefore, too confiding. High station
changes the manners, and usually makes men arro-
gant.— Lange : How easily is a favor forgotten, and
how seductive the courtier life ! — Schroder : These
are times when men, through the prestige of birth,
or by money, or human favor, may reach the summit
of honor and wealth, without any previous schooling
of adversity ; still such men are not truly great,
whatever may be the greatness of their title and their
revenues. They are not the instruments that God
employs in the accomplishment of his great purposes.
Thus to Joseph, who was to become Lord of Egypt,
the house and prison of Potiphar, in both of wliich
he bore rule on a lesser scale, were to be his prepara-
tory school. The wisdom he was to exercise in great-
er things begins here to show itself in miniature.
Such a heart-purifying discipline is needed by all
who would see God, and who would be clothed with
authonty for the world's benefit. Without this
there is no truly righteous administration. It never
comes from passsionate overhastiness, sensual sloth,
needless fear, selfish purposes, or unreasoning obsti-
nacy. On the contrary, Joseph was purified, in
prison, by the word of God ; so was Moses in Midian,
David in exile, Daniel in Babylon. Thus became
they fit instruments in the hand of God (Roos).
Therefore is it that the pious Joseph was crucified,
dead, and buried, and descended into hell. Now
comes the Lord to deliver him, honor him, make him
great (Luther). — Heim (Bible Studies): It was Jo-
seph's single ray of hope in the prison — that which
lighted him to freedom — that he could commend
himself to the intercession of the chief butler. When
this went out, according to every probable view,
there seemed nothing else for him than to pine away
his whole life in prison ; and yet the fulfilment of the
dreams of the court officers might have strengthened
him in the hope of the fulfilment of hLs own dreams
in his native home.
FIFTH SECTION.
Joseph the interpreter of Pharaoh's dreams.
Chapter XLI. 1-57.
And it came to pass, at the end of two full years [lit., days], that Pharaoh dreamed
and, behold, he stood by the river. And, behold, there came up out of the rivev sever
well-favoured kine, and fat-fleshed; and ihey fed in a meadow' [butajshe? the giaes on thi
bankoftherivor]. And, behold, seven other kine came up after them out of me river, ill-
favoured ami lean-fl ished, and stood by the other kine upon the brink of the river. A ^i
CHAP. XLI. 1-07. 61(3
the ill-favoured and lean-fl>^shed kine did eat up the seven well-favouied and fat kine. Sc
5 Pharaoh awoke. And he slept and dreamed the second time ; and, behold, seven ?ara
6 of corn came up upon one stalk, rank and good. And, behold, seven thin ears, and
7 blasted with the east wind, sprung up [in single stacks] after them. And the seven tlun
ears devoured the seven rank and full ears. And Pharaoh awoke, and, behold, it wot
8 a dream. And it came to pass in the morning, that his spirit was troubled ; and he
s«nt and called for all the magicians' [scribes: skilled in hieroglyphics] of Egypt, and all the
wise men [magicians] thereof; and Pliaraoh told them his dreams; but there wo^ none
9 that could interpret them unto Pharaoh. Then spake the chief butler unto Pharaoh.
10 saying, I do remember my faults this day. Pharaoh was wroth with his servants, and
11 put me in ward in the captain of the guard's house, both me and the chief baker; And
we dreamed a dream in one night, 1 and he; we dreamed each man according to the
12 interpretation of his dream. And there was there with us a young man, an Hebrew,
servant to the captain of the guard ; and we told him, and he interpreted to us oui
13 dreams; to each man according to his dream he did interpret. And it came to pass, as
he interpreted to us, so it was; me he restored unto mine office, and him he hanged
14 Then Pharaoh sent and called Joseph, and they brought him hastdy out of the dungeor
[pit] ; and he shaved 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 thou canst understand a dream to inter.
1 6 pret it. And Joseph answered Pharaoh, saying. It is not in me : ' God shall give
17 Pharaoh an answer of peace. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, In my dream, behold,
18 I stood upon the hank of the river; And, behold, there came up out of the river seven
19 kine, fat-fleshed, and well-favoured; and they fed in a meadow ; And, behold, seven
other kine came up after them, poor, and very ill-favoured and lean-fleshed, such as I
20 never saw in all the land of Egypt for badness ; And the lean and the ill-favoured kine
21 did eat up the first seven fat kine; And when they had eaten them up, it could not be
known that they had eaten them; but they were still ill-favoured, as at the beginning.
22 8o I awoke. And I saw in my dream, and, behold, seven ears came up in one stalk, full
23 and good; And, behold, seven ears, withered, thin, and blasted with the east wind,
24 sprung up after them ; And the thin ears devoured the seven good ears. And I told this
25 unto the magicians ; but there was none that could declare it to me. And Joseph said
unto Pharaoh, The dream of Pharaoh is one ; God hath shewed Pharaoh what he is
26 about to do. The seven good kine are seven years; and the seven good ears are seven
27 years; the dream is one. And the seven thin and ill-favoured kine, that came up after
them, are seven years ; and the seven empty ears, blasted with the east wind sliall be
28 seven years of famine. This is the thing which I have spoken unto Pharaoh; what
2^ God is about to do, he sheweth unto Pliaraoh. Behold, there come seven years of
30 great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt ; And there shall arise after them seven
years of famine ; and all the plenty si:aH be forgotten in the land of Egypt; and the
31 famine shall consume the land; And the plenty shall not be known in the land, by
32 reason of that famine following; for it shall he very grievous. And for tbat the dream
was doubled unto Pharaoh twice ; it is because the thing is established by God, and
33 God will shortly bring it to pass. Now, therefore, let Pharaoh look out a man discreet
34 and wise, and set him over the land of Egypt. Let Pharaoh do this, and let him
35 appoint officers over tlie land, and take up the fifth part of the land of Egypt in the
seven plenteous years. And let them gather [lay in store] all the food of those good
years that come, and lay up corn under tbe hand of Pharaoh, and let them keep food
36 in the cities. And that food shall be for 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
37 famine. And the thing was good in the eyes of Pharaoh, and in the eyes of all hia
38 servants. And Pharaoh said unto his servants. Can we find such a one as this is. a
39 man in whom the Spirit of God is? And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, Forasmuch aa
40 God hath shewed thee all this, there is none so discreet and wise as thou art; Thou
shall be over my house, and according unto thy word shall all my people be ruled ;
i 1 only in the throne will I be greater than thou. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, See, I
42 have set thee over all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh took off his ring from his
band, and put it upon Joseph's hand. :nid arrayed him in vestures of fine linen, and put
«04
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST ijdOK OF MOSES.
43 a gold chain upon liis neck; And lie made him to ride in the second chariot which h<
had; and they cried before him, Pow the knee;' and he made him ruler over all the
44 land of Egypt. And Pharaoh .said unto Joseph, I am Pharaoh, and without thee shall
45 no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt. And Pharaoh called Josepli'a
uame Zaphnath-paaueail ' [gave him the title of Savior of the world ; preserver of Ufe, ic] ; and he
gave him to wile Asenath [consecrated to Neith (the Egyptian Minerva)], the dauo-hter of Poti
pherah [same as PotipLar ; near to the sun], priest of On [light ; sun ; Heliopolisl. And Joseph
46 went out over all the land of Egypt. And Joseph was thirty years old when he stood
before Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from the presence of Pharaoh,
47 and went throughout all the land of Egypt, And in the seven plenteous year.s the
48 earth brought forth by handfuls [armful upon armful]. 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 ;
49 the food of the field which was round about every city, laid he up in the same. And
Joseph gathered corn as the sand of the sea, very much, until he left numbering; for
50 it was without number. And unto Joseph were born two sons before the years of
famine came; which Asenath, the daughter of Poti-pherah, priest of On, bare unfo him
51 And Joseph called the name of the first-born Manasseh [the one that causes to forget ; viz.,
Jehovah] ; For God, said he, hath made me forget all my toil, and all my father's house
52 And the name of the second called he Ephraim [FOrBt: fruits ; Dehtzsch : double fruitfulness I
53 For God hath caused me to be fruitful in the land of my afQiction. And the seven
54 years of plenteousness that was in the land of Egypt were ended [npbsn"]. And the
seven years of dearth began [nj'fenri] to come, according as Joseph had said ; and the
bo dearth was in all lands ; but in all the land of Egypt there was bread. And when [also]
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 yon, do. And the
56 famine was over all the face of the earth ; And Joseph opened all the store-houses, and
57 sold unto the Egyptians ; and the famine waxed sore in the land ef Egypt. And all
countries came into Egypt to Joseph for to buy corn ; because that the famine was so
sore in all lands.
•' "Ver. 2. — iriX . A pure Egyptian word, say most of the commentators and lexicographers ; and yet no reason can
DC given why it is not, at the same time, Shemitio. Its occurrence. Job viii. 11. is as good proof of the latter sujiposition,
as Gen. sli. 2 is of the foi-mer. The thing signified, a reedy pasture, was more common in Egypt than in Judea or Arabia,
and, therefore, it became better known in the early Egyptian tongue. The same may be said of "^N* .— T. L.]
(2 Ver. 8.— "'lai:"!!! , Here is a word used of a thing most peculiarly Egyptian, and yet there can hardly he a doubt
of its root being Shemitic. It is from M"in , stylus, a writing or gi-aving instrument. They were the sacred scribes. See
Gesenius, and Bochakt, Hieroz. ii. p. 468. Comp. V^PI . — T. L.]
[* Ver. 11).— "'"I^ba : Beside me, or sfmie one rise than me. The T.XX have rendered it, aceu tou Oeov ovk an-ojcpi^jjcreTai
rb vutrriptov <tapau, '* as though they had read n3''^ N^ ," says Rosenmuller. But there is no need of this to explain the
interpretation. The liXX have given the general sense coiTectly, since there is a negative or excluding force in ^tZ'b^ .
Not me — no one but God can answer to Pharaoh's satisfaction. The famous Hebraico-Samantan Codes has the negative
particle, and there could not be a better proof of its having followed the LXX ; keeping its apparent enor without ita
general correctness in this passage. — T. L.J
[* Ver. 43. — ""UX . It is not easy to see why there should have been so much pains to make out this to be a pure
Egyptian word, or to deny its Shemitic origin. Some make it from OVBE PEX, iiiclivale contra. See Jablonsky as cited
hy Rosenmuller. Others would make it equivalent to A— nPE — XEK. n reije ductus. The word is almost identical with
"■^^n , the Ilipliil imperative of "J* * , and its Hebrew sense, how the l-nee or J^iiefl ( just as we make the verb from the
noun) would seem the meaning, of all others, beet adapted to the context. The slight variation confiims this. Had it
been simply dressing up a pure Egyptian word in a Hebrew form, there is no reason why the writer sliould not have
employed the proper Hebrew Hiphil. The word at this time, doubtless, belonged to both languages, but its soienm and
public pronunci.ation in the shouting procession made the narrator prefer to keep the broader Egyptian scund of K
for n .-T. L.)
(• Ver. 45.— niJD P3BS , Zophnath-paeneah. This word is doubtless Egyptian, as there can nothing ht made cf 1*
Is Hebrew. LXX, 'iov6oy.^avrix. The latter port of the comjionud is, doubtless, a Coptic word, equivalent to the Greek
tiiltv, and the whole is rendered caput secuti or muvdi. Vulg., salvatorerif mundi. It is worthy of note as showing, thai
%i this early day, and in lliis early language, a time-word (a^e, period cycle, etc.) was used for worlds like the later use
•f the Hebrew C317 , and of atui/, for mundua in the New Testament— T. L.]
PEELIMINAHY REMABKS.
Cf)nt<mtB of this section : The (Ireanis of Pha-
raoh (vets. 1-7); 2. The Ef;.vptian interpreters of
dreaniH and Joseph (vers. 8-1 B); 3. The narration
of the dreams and their interpretation (vers. 17-32);
4. Josef'h's counsel in the eniploynient of liis inter-
pretation ; 5. Pliaraoh's consent atid apjiointmont
of Josepli as overseer (veis. 37-45); 6. JosephV
man:i<,'cn)eiit during the seven years of plenty, and
CHAP. XLI. 1-67.
60f
Goii's blessing him with children (vers. 46-53) ; 7.
The seTen years of dearth, the famine, and the buy-
ing of the corn in Egypt (vers. 54-67).
EXEGETICAI, AND CRITICAI,.
1. Vers. 1-7. Tlie dreams of Phnraoh. — At the
end of two years (c-'O"'). — Tliis shows Joseph's
long imprisonment. — By the river (l.ange trans-
lates : By the Nile). — The Nile, as is well known,
is the condition on wliieh Egypt's fruitfulness de-
pends. Its overflowing fertilizes the soil, and when
it does not occur, the crops fail.— Seven ^^ell-
favored kine. — On the one hand was the male kine,
a symbol of the Nile (Dioo. Sic. 151), and especial-
ly sacred to their god Osiris, who invented agricul-
ture (DioD. i. 21). The bullock was a symbol of
Osiris, whose name was also given by the Egyptian
priesti to the Nile (Plutarch : De hide, 33, :;9, 43).
On the other hand, the female kine, in the Egyptian
symbolical language, was the symbol of the earth,
of agriculture, and of the sustenance derived from
it 'Olemk.ns Alex. Strom, v. p. 567). This agrees
with the repiesentation of Isis, who was worshipped
is the goddess of the all-nourishing earth (Macrob.
■'Saturn," i. '2(i), or of the earth fertilized by the
Nile (Plutarch : De Iside, 38). The cow was spe-
cially sacred to her, and she was pictured with horns
(llERon. ii. 41|. Her symbol was the kine. "Isis
was, at the same time, goddess of the moon which
determined the year. In hieroglyphic writing, her
picture denoted the year." Knobel. Seven well-
iavored kine rising out of the Nile were, therefore,
pictures of a seven-fold appearance of the soil made
truitlul by the Xile. — Seven other kine came up,
ill-favored. — Lit., thin (ver. 19), lank, lean-fleshed.
They follow these well-favored ones, and appear right
by their side — a typical expression of the fact that
ihe years of famine are to follow close upon the
rears of plenty — And dresimed the second time.
—" According to the ancient art of dream-interpre-
tation, dreams that are repeated within a short time
have the same meaning; the repetition was to awake
attQatiou and secure confidence (AitTEMiDor.us ;
Oneirocrit. 4, 27). Knobel. — Seven ears of com
came up upon one stalk. — According to Knobel,
the coming up upon one stalk is to denote the imme-
diate connection of the respective heptades. But
then the same thing would have been mentioned in
respect to the seven thiu ears. The plentiful branch-
ing of the principal stalk into separate spears and
ears, is, however, an immediate appearance of fer-
tility, whilst, on the contrary, the thin crop does not
spread, but comes up in separate and slender stalks.
— Blasted with the east wind With the south-
east wind coming from the desert — the wind called
chamsin. — It was a dream. — It was obvious to
Pharaoh from both dreams that there was in them
Bomething very important ; but the imagery had been
80 vivid that he awakes with conscious surprise at
finding it a dream. Knobel : " A beautilul series
of symbols: the Nile the source of fertility, cows as
representing fertility itself, and ears of corn as the
result."
2. Vers. 8-16. The Egyptian interpreters of
ireains, and Joseph. — That his spirit was troubled
(Coiiip. Dan. ii. 2). There was something painful in
the tho ght that though there was some evident mo-
nition to him as a sovereign, the interpretation was
wanting; and the pictures were the more painful
since their termination was apparently so terrible —
And called all the magicians. — The O-'CB-in
from I3^n , a writing stile, were the iepo7^awuaTti!
belonging to the order of the priests, and occupied
with the sacred sciences, such as hieroglyphical
writing, astrology, dream-interpretation, fortune-tell
ing, magic, and sorcery. They were regarded al
possessors of the secret arts (Exoil. vii. 11), or, in
other words, the philosophers, or wise men of the
nation. Keil. More particularly concerning theii
magic art, see Knobel, p. 311. As interpreters ol
dreams the Egyptian priests are also mentioned bj
Tacitos : " Hist." iv. 83. See Delitzsch, p. 544,
and Hengstenberg. — But there was no one that
could interpret them. — " Though the roots of the
dream, and of its interpretation, were given in the
religious symbolical science of Egypt," as Keil re-
marks, they failed to find its meaning ; but then he
calls to mind what Bau.mgartkn says : " It is the
doom of this world's wisdom to be dumb where iti
knowledge might avail, or dependence is placed upon
it (Job xii. 20)." This incapacity, however, must
naturally be increased in cases where the interpreta-
tion to be brought out is evidently of a fearful na-
ture ; for the heathen court-prophets were doubtless
flatterers, too, just as afterwards the false prophets
in the courts of the Jewish kings. — I do remember
my fault. — The chief butler, too, is called to the
council; for together with the magicians the wise
men generally were summoned to attend. The dec-
laration of the chief butler is referred, by Knobel
and Keil, to his offence against the king (ch. xl. 1),
and, at the same time, to his forgetfulness of Joseph
(ch. xl. 43). At all events, the unpleasant lecollec-
tion of his former purdshmeiit was the principal
cause. — And they brought him hastily. — A vivid
representation of the turning of his fortune, eauscL
by the rising court favor. — And he shaved him-
self.— Joseph met the excitement of his liberatora
with grace and dignity. " He changed his garments,
as is done by one who is to participate in some sa-
cred act (see ch. xxxv. 2). The Egyptians let the
beard and hair grow, in mourning (Herod. ii. 36).
So Joseph had done in the mournful time of his itn-
prisonment. He observes the Egyptian custom.
The Hebrews, on the other hand, cut off their hair
and beard on such occasions." Knobel. According
to Wdkinson, the Egyptian painters represented with
a beard any one whom they would designate as a
man of low caste, or life. — To interpret it. — Pha-
raoh draws bold inferences from the statement of
the chief butler, but in a manner perfectly consistent
with that of a despot who is impatient to have hia
expectations realized. Not even, however, the flat-
tering words of the king, can discompose Joseph.
He gives God the glory (as m ch. xl. 8). But he also
hopes for divine light, and courteously invites the
king to narrate his dream.
3. Vers. 17-32. JTie narration of the dream»,
and their interpretation. The narration agrees per-
fectly with the first statement, and it only brings oul
more distinctly the subjective truthfulness of the
account, that the king, in the description of the ill
favored kine, mingles something of his own reflet
lions. — What God is about to do he showeth
unto Pharaoh. — Joseph puts in the front the re
li^ious bearing of the dream, and in this most sue
cessfully attains his aim. Whilst unhesitatingly pro
fessing his belief that these dreams came from God
he at the same time keeps in view the practical as
60G
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
pect. God would inform Pharaoh, through Joseph's
mterpretation, what he iutends to do, in order that
the king may talie measures accordingly. The cer-
tainty and clearness of the interpretation are to be
60 prominently manifested as to remove it far from
comparison with any heathen oracles. Knobel will
have it that the Elohist and the Jehovist assume
here different positions in respect to dream-revela-
tions.
4. Vers. 33-36. Joseph's counsel in respect to the
practical use of tin interpretation. The candid advice
of Joseph shows tliat his hieh gift did not intoxicate
him ; but rather, that lie himself was greatly struck
by the providence revealed in the dreams. It is a
great delivery from a great and threatening destruc-
tion. The first demand is lor a skilful overseer,
witli his subordinates. Then tliere is wanted the
enactment of u law that the land shall be divided
into five parts during the seven plenteous yeare ; so
that they were to give the fifth instead of the tithe
(or tenth), as may liave been customary ; and that
the royal storehouses should be built in the cities of
the land, in order to be filled with corn. We have
no right to say that Joseph meant in this to recom-
mend himself. It would seem rather that lie is so
struck with the foresight of the great coming famine,
that he cannot think of himself. Besides, the office
which liis counsel sketches is much less important
tlian that which Pharaoh afterwards confers on him.
There is still a great difference between a cliief of
the taxgatherers and a national prime minister.
5. Vers. 37^5. PharaoKs consent and Joseph's
appointment. — And the thing was good. — The
correctness of the interpretation and the certainty
of its fulfilment are both here presupposed. By the
rules of Egyptian symbolism their correctness could
not be questioned ; their certainty, however, lay in
the belief that tlie dreams of Pliaraoh were sent by
God. The stress, therefore, lies upon the approba-
tion with which Joseph's advice was received. And
this was so conformable to the object in view, that
even had the fulfilment been doulitful, it would have
been a wise measure of political economy. But Pha-
raoh goes farther ; from the divine iUumiuation that
appears in Joseph he concludes that he is just the
man to carry out tlie plan. — Thou sheJt be over
my house. — Wliat follows is the direct conse-
quence : And according to thy word. — Knobel
explains the Hebraism in this language (T|"'D i?1
■'BS bs pii-""' , lit., upon thy mouth every one of my
people shall kiss), according to 1 Sam. x. 1 and Ps.
U. 12, as referring to the custom of expressing hom-
age by a ki.ss, or throwing the kiss with the hand.
Keil disputes this on verbal grounds ; but even if the
language admits it idiomatically, such an ait would
not be appropriate in homage paid to primes. It
would be better to give pas here its primary signifi-
cance: to attach, to unite oneself. So Joseph is
uoiuinated as I'haraoli's Grand Vizier. Knobel in-
fers from this that it is a Jehovistic insertion, and
that, according to the Elohist, Joseph was made a
Itate olficer, and not a royal minister. Does he de-
rive this from an acqiiainlance with the Egyptian
itate-calendar of those days? Before Pharaoh's
MplaLntion (ver. 41), Knoijcl's twofold distinction
of the highest dignities falls to the ground. — His
ring from his hand.— After the concession of the
dignity, he confers on hiin its insignia. The first is
the seal-ring, " which the grand vizier or jirime min-
later hvld, ii. order to allix it to the royal decrees
(Esth. iii. 10 ; viii. 2)." Keil So also was it amonj
the Turks (Knobel, p. 314). The second is the
white hyssus-robe (made out of fine linen or cotton),
worn by the priests, and by wliieh lie was elevated
to a rank corresponiling to tlie dignity of his office.
The third mark of honor was a gold chain about his
neck, to denote distinction, and as a special mark ot
the roval favor. " According to -Elian and Diodo-
rus, it was the usual mark of distinction in the per-
sonal a|ipearaiiee of the judges, like the golden col-
lar, as seen pictured upon the niomnnents." De-
litzsch. In this dignity Joseph is now to be present-
ed to the people ; the king, therefore, makes him
ride in procession througli the city, in his secoud
chariot, i. e., in the one that came immediately after
the royal chariot, and caused the customary an-
nouncement of the dignity conferred to be made by
a herald. "The exclamation: Tii^SX, i- e., how
doim, is an Egyptian word formed from "^2 by
means of Masoretic vowels which make the Hiplul
and Aphel conjugation." Keil. (;eklaoh : Out of
the ('optic word '' how the head,'' a Hebrew is made,
how the knee. — I am Pharaoh. — He again repeats
the reservation of his royal dignity, but with tlie
same definiteness he appoints him overseer of the
whole land, with the consciousness that he was com-
mitting the salvation of his people to the favorite of
Deity. Therefore he says: And without thee
shaU no man, etc. — Yet for the Egyptians' :ake lie
must be naturaUzod. Pharaoh, tlieretbre, first gives
him an Egyptian name (the Sept.: \^ovS)on(pa.viix'i
for the various interpretations of which, see Keil,
p. 266; Knobel, p. 314). Bunsen interprets it,
creator of Ife. In its Hebrew transformation the
word has been rendered reveal er of secrets ; Luther :
secret counsel. In its stateUne.ss the name i in ac-
cordance with the oriental feeling, — espec jUy the
Egyptian, — yet it simply expresses Pharaoh's feeling
acknowledgment that Joseph was a man sent by
God, and bringing salvation. In him, first of all,
was fulfilled the word of that prophecy : In thy seed
shall the nations of the earth be blest. Next, the
king gives to him an Egypti;in wife, -\senath, the
daughter of Potipheres (LXX, jrei/rei^pf), ille qui
solis est), priest at On, which was the vernacular
name lor HeliopoHs (LXX, 'H\iouiroAiv, city of the
sun). " This city of On Cp.^ , changed by Ezekiel,
XXX. 17, derisively into lis) was a chief city, devoted
to the worsiiip of Ra, the sun-god.'' Delitzsch. "Ac-
cording to Brugsch ('Travels,' etc.), its name upon
the monuments was Ta-Ra, or Pa-Ka, house of the
sun. Here, from the oldest liines, has been a cele-
brated temple of the sun, with a company ot' learned
priests, who took the first stand in the Kgyptian
colleges of priests (comp. Uerih), ii. 3 ; Hk.nostkn-
BEKO, p. 30)." Keil, The same remarks: "Such
an extraordinary promotion of a slave-prisoner is lo
be explained from the high inipoitancc which an-
tiquity, tmd especially Egyptian antiquity, ascribed
lo the interpretation of dreams, and to the occult
sciences, as al-o from the despotic form of oriental
governments." As a parallel case, he refers to
lluuoii. ii. 121. where Khampsinitus is re|ire.scnted
as promoting the son of a mason to be his snu-in-
law, because, as ''the Egy|.tians execlled all men, so
this one excelled all the Egyptians them-elve.s, it
wisdom." The priest rank was esteemed the highesi
in Kgypt, as it was the caste to which the lihig him-
self belonged. Knoiiel (p. 315) ai ten pis to dc
away the difficulty which this temple of On raakei
CHAP. XLI. 1-67.
♦lO
to the assumption that the Israelites were the same
IS the Hykso3, who are said to have destroyed the
Egyptian temples. This ancient On was situated in
lower Egypt, about two leagues northeast from tlie
present city of Cairo. The situation of Hi'liopolis
is marked by mounds of earth, now enclosing a flat
piece of land, in the centre of which stands a soli-
tary obelisk. In the vicinity is the city of Matarlch,
with the well of the sun, and a sycamore-tree, under
which, according to the tradition, the holy family is
said to have rested.
6 Vers. 46—53. Joseph'ii tn magement of the
harvest during the seven years of ptcnti/, and his liUss-
iug 0/ children. — And Joseph was thirty years
old. — The summary account, ver. 45, and Joseph
went out, is here given more specifically. Kuobel
does not seem to kLow what to make of this mode
of Biblical representation, in which it resumes a
former assertion for the purpose of making specifi-
eations. He calls upon the reader to note " that this
had been already said, ver. 45." As the dreams are
fulfilled, so Joseph fulffls his calling. His mode of
proceeding is clearly stated. In the cities of the
different districts storehouses are built, in which is
to be laid up the fifth part of the harvest. — Manas-
seh. — In this name is expressed the negative effect
of his exaltation : God has freed him from the pain-
ful remembrance of his sufl'erings, and from all an-
gry recollections of his fatlier's house. The name
Ephraim expresses, on the contrary, the positive
consequence. It is a double happiness on a dark
foil, as though he had said : In the land of my
wretchedness there is first, deliverance, second, a
•aising to honor.
7. The seven years of dearth, the famine, and the
filing of the grain. On the frequent occurrence
jf famines in Egypt and the adjacent northern coun-
tries, see Keil, p. 258. For particulars see Hengsten-
berg, and extracts by Schroder, p. 590. — And all
countries. — The countries adjacent to Egypt, and
especially Palestine. Aside from the fact that Egypt,
in early times, was a granary for the neighboring
countries, and that they, therefore, suffered also from
every famine that came upon it, it is a thing to be
noticed that the rain-season of these lands, as well
as the rising of the NUe, was conditioned on north-
ern rainy winds.
DOCTEINAl AND ETHICAL.
1. Joseph's exaltation : 1) Considered in itself.
Grounded in his destiny. Accomplished by his in-
nocent sufferings and his good conduct (Phil. ii. 6).
Carried out by God's grace and wisdom as a divine
miracle in his providentia special issima. Its princi-
pal object the preservation of Israel and of many na-
tions. Its further object, Israel's education in Egypt.
Its imperishable aim the glory of God, and the edifi-
cation of the people of God by means of the funda-
mental principle : through humiliation to exaltation.
2) This exaltation, in its tvpical significance : the
seal of Israel's guidance in Egypt, of the guidance
of all the faithful, of the guidance of Christ as the
model of our divine instruction.
2. Joseph's sufferings from his brethren so turned
by God's grace that they become sufferings for their
own good. Thus Joseph's sufferings become a turn-
ing-point between Abel's blood crying for vengeance,
and the death of Christ reconciling the world. The
contrast here is no contradiction. The blood of
Abel was crying for vengeance in no absolute oi
condemning sense, whilst, on the other hand^ Christ'ff
reconciliation is connected with an inward and spir
itual judgment. And thus, also, Joseph's brethren
were to be led through a hell of self-knowledge to
peace of conscience, just as Joseph individually it-
tained, by degrees, to a complete victory over him-
self
3. Pharaoh's dreams, like Nebuchadnezzar's, be
came, through the divine providence, factors in th»
well of the world's history. The king's heart is iit
the hand of the Lord ; as the rivers of water he tumf
cth it (Ptov. XX!. 1). As the high priests (John xL
hi) were to utter words of significance unconsciously,
and unwillingly, so kings are made to serve God in
acts having a significance beyond immediate inten-
tions. Its roots, however, extended down into the
dream of life. Gerlach calls attention to Nestor's
words concerning Agamemnon's dream (Iliad, h. 80).
Heim ("Bible Hours") is full on the same thought.
4. The memory of the chief butler. Forgetful-
ness of the small — a sharp remembrance in the ser-
vice of the great. The memory as exercised in the
service of God : forgetting all (that hinders) — re-
membering all (that promotes). The change from
darkness to light, from night to day, in the landscape
of history.
5. Joseph as opposed to the Egyptian interpreters
of dreams, Moses as opposed to the Egj'ptian sor-
cerers, Christ a-s opposed to the Scribes and Phari-
sees, Paul as opposed to heresies, etc. ; or, in other
words, the contrast between divine wisdom and the
wisdom of this world — a contrast that pervades all
history.
6. God conducts every nation by its special char-
acteristic, by its religious forms, according to the
measure of piety that is in them. Thus he ruled the
Egyptians through the night-life and the world of
dreams.
7. The Egyptian symbolism in the dreams of
Pharaoh. " 'These and similar thoughts, no doubt,
occurred also to the Egyptian scribes, but Joseph's
divinely-sealed glance was necessary in assuming the
ri'sponsibility of the fourteen years, as well as in the
interpretation of the dreams, which afterwards ap-
pear very simple and obvious." DeUtzsch. The
ethical point, that divine courage is necessary for
prophecy, is not to be overlooked. It was a perilous
undertaking to announce to the Egyptian despot a
famine of seven years. It is not correct, as Knoliel
states, that among the Hebrews, false prophets alone
referred to dreams ; and stiU more groundless his
allegation of a difference between the " Elohist " ami
the " Jehovist " in this respect. Roos speaks of the
gift of interpreting dreams which Joseph possessed,
as a gift of prophecy, inferior, however, to that
manifested by Israel and Jacob when they blessed
their sons. For the dream interpreter has a bandit
given to him by the dream ; whilst in the case of
Isaac, Jacob, and other prophets, everything is de-
pendent on direct divine inspiration. But the
prophets mentioned, even those that prophesied im-
mediately, had historic points of departure and con.
nection. We can only say, therefore, tliat there are
different foi-ms for the manifestation of the pro-
phetic spirit. Divine certainty is the common mark
of all.
8. The universalistic aspect of the Old Testamenv
appears also from the fact that our narrative, without
any reserve, informs us how pious Joseph i)ecome»
incorporated in the caste of Egyptian priests. " Je
«0S
GENESIS, OR THE FffiST BOOK OF MOSES.
hoTal.'s religion," says Delitzsch, " enters into Egyp-
tian forms, in order to rule, without becoming lost
in it. Strictly spealiing, it was the assuming of
Egyptian customs by one devoted to tlie religion of
Jeliovah. Compare the indulgence shomi by Elisha
to Xaaiiian the Syrian (2 Kings v. 17-19).
9. Delitzsch : " How, then, asks Luther — ^how
J it Christian in him to glory in having forgotten his
father and his mother ? " This, however, is not the
case ; for when Joseph speal^s of having forgotten
his father's house, he has surely some memory of
the injuries of his brethren, and the name Manasseh
£ to remind him constantly of this noble resolution
0 forgi't his wrongs. Luther thus answers his own
question : He intended to say, I now see that God
meant to take away from me the confidence which I
jad in my father ; for he is a jealous God, and is
not willing that the heart should have any other
ground of rest than himself. "It is remarkable,"
says K.NOBEL (p. liSS), " that Joseph gives no timely
information of his existence, and of his exaltation,
to a father who so loved him, and whom lie so loved
n turn, but permitted a series of years to pass, and
even then was led to it by the coming of his breth-
ren." The proper solution of this scruple, already
entertained by Tlieodoret, we find in Baiimgarten.
"With steadfast faith he renounced all self-acting in
respect to God's decree, which pointed to a further
ind more glorious aitn. The first consequence to be
traced was the verification of his prophecy, that his
power might be placed on a stable foundation." To
this there must be added the consideration that Jo-
seph could not make himself hastily known to his
father without leading to the discovery of tlie guilt
which weighed upon his brethren. A precipitate
disclosure of this dark secret might, perhaps, ruin
Jacob's house irrecoverably. And, finally, it must
be considered that Joseph, especially during the first
years, had a call to active duties of the most strin-
gent and pres.sing nature. — Schroder : Since Joseph
first mentions his adversity (in the declaration re-
specting the name Manasseh), he must have referred
to his father's house only in its mournful reminiscence
46 the scene of his misery. In view of the present
as something evidently controlled by God, his whole
past vanishes away, as comparatively of no conse-
quence. It is the confidence of rest in God's provi-
dence. Calvin, it is true, imputes it to him as a sin ;
whilst Luther calls it a wonderful declaration. Af-
terwards, at Ephruim's birth, as Schroder remarks,
Joseph held in, so to speak, his former exuberance
of joy. The words, in the lund of my sorrown
(meaning Egypt), reveal a mournful longing for
Canaan.
HOMILETICAL AND PBACTICAX.
See the Doctrinal and Ethical. Pharaoh's char-
acter. A good king a blessing to his country. Pha-
raoh's dreiim a mark of liis care for his people,
therefore, also of (Jod's care for him. Fruitful and
unfruitful years; great means in the hand of God's
proviileuce. Joseph's deliverance beyond expecta-
tion: 1. Late beyond expectation; 2. early beyond
expectation ; li. great beyond expectatinn ; 4. en-
tirely dill'erent from what he thouglit in his longing
for home. Joseuh's deliverance and exaltation a
typical order in God's kingdom : 1. Every true ei-
aJtatiim presujinoses a deliverance ; 2. every trugde-
livtrauie i» followed by exaltation. — Joseph and the
other personages in our narrative. Joseph the He-
brew slave standing in royal dignity before tic thron*
of Pharaoh : a. In his quiet preparation for audi
ence ; b. in his humiUty and his faithful confidence
c. in his fearless interpretation of the dreams ai
cording to their truth ; d. in his wise counsel. Jo-
seph, like Moses, an Egyptian prince, and yet a prino*
in the kingdom of God. — Josejjh's political economy.
— His economy on a grand scale the type of all lesser
economies. Joseph and his sons. — The years of
blessing. — God's care for men through the commer-
cial intercourse of different lands. — How sure th«
divine decrees ! (the brethren of Joseph must come)
Taube : Through humiliation to exaltation. — The
history of Joseph's exaltation: 1. When in the
deep, how confidently may we suft'er God to guide
us ; 2. when on the mount, how surely from the deep
does the blessing draw its verification.
First Section (vers. 1-7). Starke: (Plin. :
"Hist" V. 9). "There is famine in Egypt when the
Nile rises oiily twelve ells ; there is still suflering if
it does not exceed thirteen ; if it rises to fourteen,
there is great rejoicing." — Cramer: Whom God
means to raise to honor, he suffers to remain, for a
time, under the cross. — Schroder: .\t the expiration
of two years of days. — Lother : Joseph, oppressed
with cares, connted on his fingers all the hours,
(lays, months, whilst deeply sighing for deliverance.
For the anticipation of the future the soul of man
shares with that of the animal, except that in the
former, by its connection with spirit, or that higher
principle which constitutes humainty, such a faculty
becomes perceptible in dreams, whilst in the animal
it is confined to the waking state (Schubert), The
number seven represents the religious element itt the
case. The thin ears are said to be blasted with the
east-wind, which, when directly east, occurs in Egypt
as seldom as the directly west. The southeast wind,
however, is frequent (Hengstenberg).
Secoml Section (vers. S-16). Starke: The wis-
dom that God reveals excels that of the world ;
therefore the latter is to be confoumied by the for-
mer (Rom. viii. 28). — Cramer: A Christian is not to
judge the gifts according to the person, but tlie per-
sons according to the gifts, and must not be ashamea
to learn even from the lowest A Christian should
study decorum towards all, especially towards those
of high rank. Serving and suflering are the best
tutors for those maturing for the ruler's station (Ps.
cxiii. 7, 8). — Hall : How are God's children reward-
ed for their patience ! How prosperous are their
issues ! A true Christian does not boast of the tal-
ents confided to him, but ascribes everything to God.
Tliird Section (vers. 17-32). Starke: BiM.
Wirt.: Even to the heathen and to infidels, God
sometimes reveals great and seciet things, to the
end that it may become known how his divine care
and providence may be traced everywhere within
and without the Church. — Cramer : When (iod re-
peifts the same things to us, the repetition is not to
be regarded as superfluous, but as an assurance that
it will certainly come to pass. ScHRiinER : In prison
and upon tlie throne, the same humility, the sami
joyous courage in God. — Joseph marks his Go4
consciousness more distinctly liefore Pharaoh, bj
saving JJa-Jilo/iim, thus making Elohim concrete bj
means of the article.
Fourth Section (vers. 33-36). Starke : Mel
generally make a bad use of abundance. The peo
pie, doiiiitless, imitated Joseph's example, and pre
Tided for the future. Careful in earthly thiuia-
CHAP. XLII. 1-28. 605)
mach more so in heavenly things. Schroder : ! rulers fill their granaries in time of fainine, and thus
God's true prophets did not merely predict the fu- [ teach prudence to the poor. The saving hand if
'.are; thej also announced means of relief against
the approaching evil (Calvin). — He who takes coun-
sel is the one to be helped (the same).
Fifth .Sef/ioii (vers. 37-45). Starke: Cramer:
•• He that handles a matter wisely shall find good "
(Prov. xvi. 20). — [The Egyptian Imen, on account
of its snowy whiteness, and its gre.it excellence, was
•o costly that il was thought equal to its weight in
gold.]? — Schroder: The king's conclusion shows
how greatly Egypt esteemed the higher knowledge ;
since it confirms the opinion wldch made this nation
80 renowned for wisdom among the ancients. — Lib-
full and beneficent ; the stiuandering hand is not onlj
empty, but unjust. — Schroder: Information from
Hengstenberg on the monunients and tombs, serviiif
to elucidate our narrative. — ScHRttOER : Now is the
time of exaltation, when he is to become the in-
strument of God's great purposes (Kruram;icher).
SeveiUh Section (vers. 64-57). Siirke: Cra-
mer: It is in accordance with Christian charity thai
the surplus of the one shall relieve the deficiency of
the other. How gloriously does God compensate
Joseph for his former unhappines,s. (The hate of his
brothers; the favor of the king: abuse and derision.
eration was not Joseph's only wan' when in prison ; ' reverence ; imprisonment in a foreign land, exalta-
afterward, however, he received what he did not, at \ tion; the work of a slave, the seal of the king;
first, understand (Luther). i stripped of his coat of many colors, clothed in white
fSi-xtk Section (vers. 46-53). Starke: Wise vesture; iron bands, a golden chain.)
SIXTH SECTION.
hetrtbtitive Discipline. The Famine and the First Journey to Egypt. JosepKs struggles nitk
himself. The repentance of the Brethren. Joseph and Simeon.
Chapter XLII. 1-38.
I Now when Jacob saw there was corn in Egypt, Jacob said unto his sons, Why do
'2 ye look one upon another? 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
3, 4 die. And Joseph's ten brethren went down to buy corn in Egypt. But Benjamin,
.Joseph's brother, Jacob sent not with his bretliren ; for he said, Lest peradveuture
5 mischief befall him. And the sons of Israel came to buy corn among those that came
6 for the famine was in the land of Canaan. And Joseph was tlie governor over the
land, and he it was that sold to all the people of the land ; and Joseph's brethren came,
7 and bowed down themselves before him with their faces to the earth. And Joseph saw
his^brethren, and he knew them, but made himself strange unto them, and spake roughly
\into them, and he said unto them, Whence come ye? And they said. From the land
8 of Canaan, to buy food. And Joseph knew his brethren, but they knew not liim
9 And Joseph remembered the dreams which lie dreamed of them, and said unto tliem,
1 0 Ye are spies ; to see the nakedness of the land ye are come. And they said unto then?,
11 Nay, my lord, but to buy food are tliy servants come. We are all one man's sons;
12 we are true men; thy servants are no spies. And he said unto them, Nay, but to .see
13 the nakedness of the land ye are come. And they said, Thy servants are twelve
brethren, the sons of one man in the lanl of Canaan; and, behold, the youngest is this
14 day with our father, and one is not. And Joseph said unto them, That is it that I
15 spake unto you, saying, Ye are spies; Hereby ye shall be proved; By the life of
16 Pharaoh ye shall not go forth hence, except your youngest brother come hither. Send
one of you, and let him fetch your l)rother, and ye shall be kept in prison, that your
words may be proved, whether there be any truth in you ; or else, by tiie life of Pimraoh
17 18 surely ye are spies. And he put tiiera all together into ward three days. And
19 Joseph said unto them the third day. This do, and Uve ; for I fear God: If ye be true
men, let one of j'our brethren be bound in the house of your prison ; go _ve, carry corn
20 for the famine of your houses ; But bring j-our youngest brother unto me ; so shall your
21 worils be verified, and ye sliall not die. And they did so. And tliey said one to
another. We are verily guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw tlie anguish of hia
soul, when he 1 esought us, and we woidd not hear; therefore is this distress co.oe unon
S9
eiO GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES
22 us. And Reuben answered tliem, saying, Spake I nol unto you, saying, Do not sir
against the child; and ye would not hear? therefore, behold, also his blood is required
23 And they knew not that Josepli understood them ; for he spake unto them by an inter-
24 preter. And he turned himself about Irom them, and wept; and returned to them
asam, and communed with them, and took from them Simeon, and bound him before
25 their eyes. Then Joseph commanded to fill their sacks with corn, and to restore
every ndan's money into his sack, and to give them provision for the way ; and tliu»
26 did he unto them. And they laded their asses with the corn, and departed thence.
27 And as one of them opened his sack to give his ass provender in the inn, he espied his
28 nionev ; for, behold, it was in his sack's mouth. And he said unto his brethren, My
money ;s restored, and, lo, it is even in my sack; and their heart failed them,^ and tiiej
29 were afraid, saying one to another, What is this that God hath done unto us? And
they came unto Jacob their father unto the land of Canaan, and told him all that befell
£0 unto them, saying, The man, who is the Lord of the land, spake roughly to us, and
3 1 took us for spies of the country. And we said unto him, We are true men ; we are
32 no spies ; We be twelve brethren, sons of our father ; one is not, and the youngest is
33 this day with our father in the land of Canaan. And the man, the lord of the country,
said unto us, Hereby shall I know that ye are true men; leave one of your brethren
34 here with me, and take food for the famine of your households, and be gone ; And
bring your youngest brother unto me ; then shall 1 know that ye are no spies, but that
ye are true men ; so will I deliver you your brother, and ye shall traffic 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 hoth tliey and their father saw the bundles of money,
36 they were afraid. And Jacob their father said unl o tliem, Me have ye bereaved of my
childnn ; Joseph is not, and Simeon -is not, and ye will take Benjamin aivay ; all these
37 things are against me. And Reuben spake imto 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
38 again. And he said, My son shall not go down with you ; for bis brother is dead, and he
is left alone ; 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.
(• Ter. 4.— "iOS . A rare Hebrew word, occurring only here, in ver. 38, and in Exod. xxi. 22, 23. Gesenius would
oonnect the root with the Arabic [C 3 1 , others with the Arabic Lim I and the Syriac Jjof which means to heal. The
fiTit comes nearer to it in sense, but a much closer agreemont, both in form and significance, exists between it and the
Arabic ,--wxl , to be ingrufor pain, and its noun j^-"' > /"i"'". affl'clim. It occurs in the Koran, v. 39, 72; viL 91;
Ivii. 33, in the very sense here demanded by the context. — T. L.]
[' Ver. 28. — CS^ XS'1 , and 'heir heart went out. LXX. e^etm\ ij KapSia avruiy. Hence the Greek €»c(rrtMri9, ecstasy
It may denote rapture^ astonishment, oi'crwiielmtiig sorrtiw — any condition of euul in which the thoughts and atfectioL
seem to pass beyond the control of the will. The heart goes forth, the mind wanders, tlie soul loses command of itself
It is the same imagery, and nearly the same terms, in many languages. Corresponding to it are the expressions for tht
opposite state. Compare the Latin exire de riei'le, ratione, etc., to he or go out of rrne^s mirtd, and the opposite, coUigere k
to tat:e emtrage, to recover one^s self. So the English, to be collected, or composed. There is a similar usage of the Greek
tnivavaytlfit<r»ai. and i»()oif«r9ai, to collect, gather back the soul. See the Phsedo, 67 c. Vulgate, obstupe/acti sunt.—T. I»
PRELIMINARY REMARKS.
1. It appears uncertain to Knobel which narraior
Uhe Elohlst or the Jeliovist) tells the .stoiy here.
Many expressions, says he, favor tlie original Scrip-
ture, but some seem to testify for tlieJolidvist, e.g.,
land of Goshen ich. \\\-. )il),lh!/ servaat'msiead of/
(di. xiii. lo) Very singular examples truly ! Yel
the language, it is llien said, is rich in peculiarities.
This part tlic Jehovist is saiil to have made up from
his first record. A very peculiar presentation this,
of the SiraJ \(y,:u.(i'a. of flill'erent authors, as obtained
bj Buoh a combination. Th*; &ra^ Kfyi<u^va (words
or expression.-* ocfiirring but ouce) are always forth-
coming from behind the scene, .-^uch is die deid
represent \tion of that epiritlesa book-makine, or
rather that book-mangling criticism, now so much in
vogue with those who make synopses of the New
Testament.
2. Thi' history of Joseph's reconcihation to his
brethren extemls tlirough four cliMptens, from ch
xli.-xlv. It contains : 1) The history of the chas-
tisement of the brothers, whicli, at the same time is
a history of Joseph's struggles ; 2) <>{ ije repetitance
of bis brothers, marked by the antitliosis Joseph and
Simeon (ch, xUi.); 3) the trial of the brothers, iz.
which appears tbeir repentance anil .losep' 's lecoD "
ciliation, marked by the antithesis of J..-epb and
Henjamin (ch. xliii. 1 ; xliv. 17); 4) the s'ory of the
reconciliation and lecogiiition, under the aniithesit
of Judah and Josepb (cb. xliv. 18 ; xlv. 16) ; .'■) tht
account of the glad tidmgs to Jacob (veri 7-28)
CHAP. XLIl 1-38.
•JU
1. The contents of the present section: 1) The
ourney to Egypt (vers. 1-6) ; 2) the rough reception
»er9. 7-17) ; 3 the tasks imposed and the urrange-
noenta made by Joseph (vers. 18-34); 4) The volun-
tary release, the return home, the report, the dark
omen (vers. 25-35) ; 5) Jacob's lament (vers. 36-38).
EXEGETICAIi AND CRITICAL.
8. Vers. 1-6. The first juurney of JosepKs
h-ethren to Egypt. — When Jacob saw. — It is al-
ready presupposed that the famine was raffing in
Canaan. Jacob's observation was probably based
upon tlie preparations of others for buying corn in
Egypt. The word ^3B is translated corn, but more
properly means a supply of corn (frutntnii
cumulm, Gesen., Thesaur.), or vendible or mar-
ket corn. — Why do ye look one upon
another? — Their helpless and suspicious lookiug
to each other seems to be connected with iheir guilt.
The journey to Kgypt, and the very thought of Egypt
haunts them on account of Joseph's sale. — And
Joseph's ten brethren. — They thus undertake the
^urney together, because they received corn in pro-
portion to their number. For though Joseph was
humanely selling corn to foreigners, yet preference
for his own countrymen, and a regard to economy,
demanded a limitatit^n of the quantity sold to indi-
■<iduals. — But Benjamin.^Jacoli had transferred to
Benj.imin liis preference of Joseph as the son of
Racliel, and of his old age (cli. xxxvii. 3). He
guarded him, therefore, all tlie more carefully on ac-
jountofthe self-reproach he sultered from having
mce let Joseph take a dangerous journey all alone.
Besides, Benjamin h;id not yf t arrived at full man-
jood. Finally, although the facts wore not cleai'ly
finowD to him, yet there must be taken into the ac-
count the deep suspicion he must have felt when
he called to mind the strange disappearance of Joseph,
their envy of him, and all this the .-stronger bi'Cause
Benjamin, too, was his favorite — Rachel's son,
Joseph's brother. — Among those that came. —
The picture of a caravan. Jacob's sons seem willing
to los'e themselves in the multitudes, as if troubleil
by an alarming presentiment. Knobel thinks the
city to which they journeyed was Memphis. Accord-
ing to otliers it was probably Zoar or Tanais (see
Numb. xiii. 23). By the double Xin the wiiter
denotes the inevitableness of tlieir apjiearing before
Joseph. Having the general oversight of the sale,
he specially observed the selling to foreigners, and
it appears to have been the rule that they were to
present themselves before him. Such a direction,
thougli a proper caution in itself, might have been
connected in the mind of Joseph with a presentiment
of their coming He himself was the a"'fer . The
circumstance tliat this word appears otherwise only
in later writers may be partly explained from the
pecuUarity of the idea itself, .-iee Dan. v. 29. Here
Daniel is represented as the third ::^bB (shalit) of
tlie kingdom. " It seems to have been the standing
title by whidi the Shemites designated Joseph, as
one havini? despotic power in Egypt, and from wliicli
Ut-T tradition made the word Sd^aTis, tlie name of
the first Hyksos king (see Josephhs: Contra Apiou.
■ Hi." — Keil. — And bowed themselves. — Thus
Joseph's dreams were fulfilled, as there had been al-
ready fidfille 1 the dreams if Pharaoh.
2. Vers. 7-17. The harxh reception. Joseph
recognized them immediately, because, at the tim«
of his abduction, they were already grown up men
who had not changed as much as he, and because,
moreover, their being all together brought out dis-
tinctly tlieir individual characteristics. He was be
sides, famihar with their language and its idioms.
They, on the contrary, did not recognize him becaus*
he had attained Ids manhood since in Egypt, — becausfl
he appeared before tliem clad in foreign attire, and
introduced himself, moreover, as an Egyptian whc
spoke to tliera through an interpreter. Add to this,
that he iiad probable reasons for expecting his breth-
ren, whilst they could have had no thought of meeting
Joseph in the character ot the shaht. — But made
himself strange unto them. — By speaking rough-
ly unto them. It is a false ascription to Joseph of
a superhuman perfection and holiness, when, with
Lutlier, Delitzseh, Keil, and others (sre Keil, p. 2591,
we suppose that Joseph, with settled calmness, only
intended to become acquainted with the dispositioi
of their hearts, so as to lead them to a perception ot
their guUt, and to find out how they were disposec
towards his hoary sire, and their youngC'^t brother.
Kurtz is more correct in supposing it a ^truggle be-
tween angei- and gentleness. Their conduct to him-
self may have even made it a sign of suspicion to
him that Benjamin did not accompany them. True
it is, that a feeling of love predondnates ; since the
humiliation foretold in his dre.ims was already, for
the most part, fulfilled, and he might, therefore, ex-
pect the arrival of his father, and of his brother Ben
jamin, who would, at the same time, represent hii
mother. His future position towards them, however
must be governed by circumstances. The principal
aim, therefore, of his harsh address, is to sound
them in respect to their inner and outer relations.
According as things should appear were they to ex-
pect punishment or forbearance. Finding them well
disposed, self-renunciation becoiues ea.sier to him;
whilst his harsh conduct is to them oidya wholesome
discipline. — Ye are spies. — That such a danger was
cormuon, iu those ancient days of emigration and con-
quest, is clear from various instances (Numb. xsi. 32 ;
Josh. ii. 1, etc.). See also Knobkl, p. 321. More-
over, Egypt was exposed to invasion from the N'orth,
Supposing, too, that Joseph had already a presenti-
ment of how the affair would turn out, he might tern
them spies, with something of an ironical feeling, be
cause their coming was undoubtedly a preliminary t(
their settlement in Egypt. — The nakedness of the
land — its unfortified cities, unprotected boundaries,
etc. Afterwards Joseph Idmself becomes to
them the gate through which they enter Egypt.
— Nay, my Lord. — Their answer shows a feel-
ing of dignified displeasure, — We ar» al]
one man's sons, Ture are true men. — Yet
their mortified pride is restrained by fear and respect.
Joseph repeats his charge, and so gets li-oni them the
further information, that his father is still alive, and
that Benjamin was well at home. — And one is not.
— From this expression Keil concludes that tliey did
not yet feel much sorrow for their deed. But are
they to confess to the Egypthan sh.iht? If, however,
their distress alone had afterw^irds drawn from then
j a sudden repentance, it could hardly have beet
genuine. — That is it that I spake with you.—
Joseph's great excitement shows itself in his waver
ing determinations quickly succeeding and correct
ins each other. They gravitate froiu setenlv t(
6ia
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK Oi liOSES.
mildDess. In ver. 14, we have his positive decision
tliat thev are spies, and are, therefore, to expect
ieath. Ill ver. 15, it is made conditional. As a test
of thoir truth they are to be retained until the ar-
rival of their brotlJer. — By the life of Pharaoh,* —
The Egyptians, as the Hetirews afterwards, swore by
the life of their liings (see Knobel, 822). Joseph
thus swears as an Egyptian. His main sohcitude,
however, appears here already : he must know how
Benjamin does, and their disposition towards him.
In ver. i S, be expresses himself more definitely one
of them is to go and bring the brother, the others
are to remain in confinement. A change follows in
ver. 17, they are confined for three days, probably
on account of the expression of their unwillingness to
fetch Benjamin. Pit for pit {see ch. xxxvii. 24)!
These three days, however, were to Joseph a time
for reflection, and for the brothers a time of visitation.
They all seemed now to have fallen iiLto slavery in
Egypt, even if they had not incurred the death of
criminals. How this must have made them remember
Joseph's sale ! One ray of hope has he left them : on
Benjamin's appearance they could be released.
[• XLII. 15. rt'SIt ^n. Literally, by the tires of
Pharaoh ; but the primitive conception, whatever it may
have been (see note, p. 163, 2d. column), that gave rise to
the plural form of this word, had proltably become dim or
lost, and there is intended here only the one general sense
of U/e. There is, however, a remark of Maimonides on
this phrase, in this place, that is worthy of note. His criti-
cal, as well as most philosophical, eye observes a difference
in this little word ^n. and the vowel pointing it has in the
Scriptures ace rdinp as it is used of God or man. Thus in
the Hebrew oath, TWITES TTi illrT^ "^n (comp. 1 Sam. xx.
3 ; XXV. '26 ; 2 Kings ii. 2, 4, 6 ; iv. '30 ; and other places),
which is rendered, as the Lord liveth, and as ttty soul tivetb.
he notices what has escaped most critics, viz., the change of
vowel in the word Tl ; so that the rendering should be, as
Vie Lord tivelhy or t}i/ tlie tiving Jetwvali, and by ttie tife of
thy sout. The reasons of this he thus states in the Stjjher
ilamada, or Booti of Kn/iwtedge, the first part of the great
work entitled Tad Hacltasatiah^ ch. ii. sec. 14 : " In Gen.
xlii. 15, it is said, n"~S "H , by the life (lives) of Ptiaraoh ;
go in 1 Sam. i. 26, ^ll'ED "P, by tlie life of thy souU as also
in many other places. But in the r-ame connection it is not
said nln^ in (chci), but nini 'n (chai), in the absolute
form instead of the construct or genitive, because the
Creator, blessed be he, and his life are one, not separate, as
the livps of creatures i>r of angels. Therefore, he does not
know creatures by means of the creatures, as we kuow them,
but by himself (^asr nsni2), because all life leans upon
him, and by his knowing himself he knoweth all things— since
he and his knowledge also, as well as he and his life, are one.
'I'his is a matter which the tongue has not the power of ut-
tering, nor the car of hearing, nor can the mind comprehend
it ; but such is the reason of the change, and of its being
eaid n;"3 T\, by the life of Pharaoh, in the omstruct
state, si ce I'haranh and his life are two " Again, sec. si.
andxii.: " All things beside the Creator, blessed l^e he,
exist through his truth (or truthfulness) and becau.-e he
knows himself, ho knows everything. And he <loes not
know by a knowledge which is witltoiU (or outside, V'n
13*213), to himself, as we know, because we and our knowl-
edge are not one ; but as for the Creator, b'- i^^ed be he,
both his knowledge and his life are one with himself iu
every mode of unity. Hence we may say that he is, at the
Barne time, the knoioer, tlu- Icnoion, and Ihr Icmnvtedt/'' itsel^f,
mil in one." Or, .as he tells us in the hcginniuL' of ibis pro-
touDd treatise, ch. i. sec. 1 : "God's truth is no. like the
truth of thecreaturiB, and thus the prophet says ( lei em. x.
lO), Jehovah God it truth, and Ood is life ^]^hn■.^ C'T
/(».<« ; C'-mparc itarrtp ran- tftumMv, James i, 17), he isCti ""i^lS
C5"r, the king of eternity, the king of the world." Tjat is,
he iv, at the same lime, the truth, Ihi' liTe, the everlasting
law. C-omiiare, also, Maiuomdes, I'orta Mosis, Pecocke
•dilion, I). i'i6.— T. L.l
8. Vers. 18-24. Tfte hard terms imposei ; Jo
sepKs arrangement and the repentance of the brothers ,
Joseph's struggle ; Simeon in prison. — This do and
live. — Joseph now presents the charge in its condi-
tional aspect- The motive assigned ; For I feai
God. — This language is the first definite sign of
peace — the first fair self-betrayal of his heart Agi-
tated feelings lie concealed under these woidi It if
as much as to say : I ^m near to you, and to yum
faith. For them, it is true, the expression meant
that he was a religious and conscientious man, whc
would never condemn on mere suspicion. It is an
assertion, too, on which they are more to rely than
on the earlier asseveration made : by the life of Pha-
raoh.— Let one of your brethren be bound. —
Before, it was said : one shall go, but the others re-
main ; !;ow the reverse, and more mildly ; one shall
remain, but the others may go. This guarantees the
returi' wiih Benjamin, and leaves them under tha
impression that they are not yet free from suspicion.
Joseph sees the necessity of the others going, for hia
father's house must be supplied with bread. — And
they did so. — A summary expression of wliat fol-
lows, but anticipatory of their readiness to comply
with Joseph's request. — We are verily giiilty. —
Not: "we atone for our brother's death " (Delitzsch);
for thus there would be eflfaced the thought that the
guilt was still resting upon them. The expiation is
expressed in what follows. — Therefore is this dis-
tress come upon us. — Knobel translates it atoning,
anil makes the trivial remark : "All misfortune, ac-
cording to the Hebrew notion, is a punishment for
sin." Joseph's case itself directly contradicts him.
— When he besought us. — Thus vividly paints the
evil conscience. The nartator had not mentioned
this beseeching. Thus are they compelled to make
confession in Joseph's hearing, without the thought
that he understands them. But their open confes-
sion, made, as it was, before the interpreter, betrays
the pressure of their sense of guilt. — And Reuben
answered — A picture of the thoughts that " accuse
or excuse one another" (Rom. ii. 1.5). Reuben, too,
is not wholly iimocent; but, as against them, he
thought to act the censurer, and what he did to save
Joseph lie represents in the strongest light. We
may, indeed, conclude that his counsel to cast him
into the pit was preceded by unheeded entreaties for
his entire freedom. — For he spaJze Tvith them
by an interpreter. — Knobel here lias to encounter
the difficulty that Joseph, "as an officer of the
Hyksos " (to use his own language), assumes the ap-
pearance of not being able to siji-tik Hebrew. — And
he turned himself about from them. — Overcome
by his emotion, he has to turn awiiy and weep.
This is repeated more powerfully at the meeting with
Benjamin (ch. xliii. 30). and finally, in a most touch-
ing manner, after Judah's appeal (ch. xliv. 18, etc.).
The cause of this emotion, thnee repeated, aiiii each
time with increasing power, is, in every instance,
some jiropitiating appeal. In the first case, it is the
palliating thought that Reuben, the hist-born, in-
tended to s.ive liim, and yet takes to himself the ."eel-
ing of the guilt that weighed upon llieni. In tie
second case it is the appearance of the young and
innocent Benjamin, his lieloveil brother, tis Ihougb
sttindiiig belbre tlie guilty brethren. In llie third
instance, it is Judah's self-sticrifice iu behalf of Ben-
jamin and his laihei'.-* lioiL-ie. The key-note of Jo-
seph's emotion, therefore, is this perception of aton
ing love, purilyiiig the bi'ler recollection of injustici
suffered A nresentiment and a sentiment of n-con
CHAP. XUI. 1-38.
OlS
oiliatiun melt the heart which the mere seose of right
mignt harden, tud becomes even a feeUng, at the
Bame time, of divine and human recoucihation.
Onlj a8 viewed from this definite perception can we
estimate the more general feelings that flow from it :
" painful recollectiun of the past, and thankfulness
to God for his gracious guidance." — And returned
to them again. — Joseph's tirst emotion may have
tinoved his har'^h decisiveness. His feeling of jus-
rice, however, is not vet satisfied ; still less is tliere
restored Ids confidence in his brethren, especially in
reference to the future of Benjamin. But before
adoptmgany severer measures, he communed with
them, doubtless in a concihatory manner. Ttieii he
talies Simeon, binds him, or orders him to be bound,
that he might remain as a hostage for their return.
Tliat he does not order Reuben, the first-l)orn, to be
bound, explains itself from the discovery of his
guiltlessness. Thus Simeon, as standing next, is the
first-born of the guilty ones. He did not adopt
Reuben's plan of deliverance, though he did not es-
pecially distinguish himself in Joseph's persecution,
as might have been expected of him from his zealous
disposition shown in the atfair of Sheelieni, — a fact
the more easily credited since neither did Judali, the
next after him, agree with the majority.
4. Vers. '25-So. The voluntary release; the re-
turn; the report; the dark omen. — To fill their
sacks. — cn"'53 , receptacles or vessels, in tlie most
general sense.— To restore every man's money
with his sack. — Joseph would not receive pay
from his father, and yet he could not openly return
the money without betraying a particular relation to
them. Therefore the secret measure, one object of
whicli, doubtless, was to keep up the fear and excite-
ment, as it also served to give there reasons lor ex-
pecting something extraordinary. — Provisions for
the way. — To prevent the decrease of their store,
and to make unnecessary the premature opening of
their sacks. — One of them opened his sack. — At
the place of tlieir night-quarters. It could not have
been what we now call an inn. Delitzsch supposes
that, at that time, already, there were shed-like
buildings, caravanseras, existing along the route
through the desert (Exod. iv. 24). Keil doubts this.
The fact of the separate opening of his sack by one
of them, demands no explanation. He might have
made a mistake in the sack, or the money might have
Deen put in a wrong one ; but even this circumstance
is so arranged as to increase the fear of tlieir awak-
ened consciences. — What is this that God hath
done unto us 7 — They are conscious of no decep-
tion on their f»art, and they cannot understand how
the Egyptians could have done it. . Whether it were
an oversight on their side, or a cunning trick of the
Egyptians to arrest them afterwards for theft — at all
events, their aroused consciences tell them that they
nave now to contend with God. They see a dark
and threatening sign in it, now that a sense of God's
judgments is awakened in them. — And they came
unto Jacob. — The story of their strange intercourse
with the terrible man in Egypt, is confirmed by the
fearful discovery made when all the sacks are opened.
Joseph's intimatiou, which they report, that they
alight traffic again in Egypt, provided they fulfilled the
imposod condition, is a ray of Ught, which, in their
present mood, they hardly knew how to appreciate.
5. Vers. 36-38. JacoVs lamentation. — Me have
ye bereaved of my children The pain of
Simeon's apparent loss, grief for Joseph here re-
newed again, and the at.:iuish cf ncerning IteitjamiD,
move Jacob greatly, and cause him to e\ press hnn*
self, liyperbolically indeed, but still truthfully, ac-
cording to his conception, as a man overwhelmei
with misfortune, and losiug his eliildren, one atte*'
the other. So little thought the wise and pious Ja-
cob liow near was the joyful tunung-poiut in tha
destiny of his house. His reproach : me ha»e ye be-
reaved of my children, as addressed to those who
might have formally eontradic ed it, is more forcible
in its application than he could have thought. Or
had he a presentiment of something lie knew not?
In regard to Joseph he could only knowingly charge
that he had once sent him to llieni, and they liad
not brought him back. In respect to Simeon he
could only reproach them with having told too much
to the governor of Egypt respecting tlieir family
affairs (see ch. xliii.). Respecting Benjamin lie could
only complain that they should ask to take him
along. The aroused consciences of his sons, how-
ever, told them that truly all the threatening losses
of Jacob were connected with their removal of Jo-
seph ; for they themselves consiilered the present
catastrophe as a visitation on account of it. — And
Reuben spake. — With a clearer conscience, he has
also more courage ; but his offer to leave h\< sous at
hostages, so that Jacob might slay them if he did
not return with Benjamin, is more expressiie of a
rude heroism than of true understanding ; for how
could it be a satisfaction to a grandfather to slay
both his grandchildren I It can only be understood as
a tender of a double blood-vengeance, or as a strong
expression of assurance that his return without Ben-
jamin was not 10 be thought of. Knobel thinks it
strange tliat Reuben speaks of two sons, since at the
time of the emigration to Egypt, according to ch.
xlvi., he had four sons. And yet he was quite ad-
vanced in years, according to the Elohistic account !
— With sorrcw to the grave (see ch. xxxvii. 35 ;
1 Kings ii. 6, 9).
DOCTRINAl Aim ETHICAL.
1. A chapter showing the unfailing fulfilment of
the divine decrees, the power of a guilty conscience,
the righteous punishment of guilty concealers as
visited by suspicion on all sides, the certainty of
final retribution, the greatness of moral struggles,
the imaginations of an evil conscience, the present!
ments of misfortune as felt by a gray-haired sire in
a guilty house, and, with it .ill, the change from
judgment to reconciUation and salvation in the Ufe
of the now docile sons of the promise.
2. They came at last ; late indeed, but coma,
tliev must, even if it had been from the remotest
bounds of the earth. Josepli's brethren were to
come and bow themselves down before him. God's
decrees must stand. It is not because J''^ept saw
it in a dream, but because in the dreams here was
represented the realization of God's decrees as al-
ready interweaving themselves with the future of the
sons in the innermost movements of theii- most in-
terior life. So sure is the fulfilment of the divine
counsels, — so unfaiUngly grow the germs of destioy
in the deepe.st life of man.
3. Why do the sons of Jacob look so helplessly
one upon the other ? Why does it not come intc
their minds that corn is for sale in Egypt, and that f
caravan of travellers is making preparation in theii
vicinity? To their guilty conscience, Egypt is <
«14
GENESlb, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
loreboding name, threatening calamity. If they
must go, however, they would rather go all together,
that, in the multitude, they may find mutual enoour-
aeement. They have to explain why they come teu
strong, and are thus driven to speak about Joseph ;
but with what embarrassment do they pass hastily
over one who is no more ! And now, terrifieil by
ihe prospect of imprisonment, and threatened with
death, they are unable, even in Joseph's presence,
»nd within the hearing of the interpreter, to suppress
tbeir solf-accusatioii : •' We are verily guilty concern-
ing our brother." And now, again, how vividly
come to their minds the prayers of that brother, in
vain beseeching them for mercy. So truthful is the
memory of conscience. The money, too, found
again in the sack of one of them, becomes another
fearful sign that the divine judgments are at last to
descend upon them. The last discovery of it in the
sacks of all of them, fills up the measure of their
fears. All favorable signs are gone: the twofold
ioitigation of Joseph's purpose ; his assurance : I
fear God ; his explanation that Benjamin's appear-
ance would satisfy him ; the voluntary release ; the
finding again of their money. Reuben, too, though
having a better conscience, shares in their feelings ;
he sees coming down upon them tlie full visitation
of their blood-guiltiness ; even tlie pious father has
a foreboding, becoming even more distinct, that
Bomehow, through the crime of his sons, a dark
doom is impending over his house. Therefore is he
not wilUng to trust his Benjamin, for so long a jour-
ney, to these sons, who seem, for some reason, to
have a guilty conscience, — it may be in relation to
Joseph.
4. Ye are xpies. Though Joseph's suspicion was
unfouiuleii, it expresses a righteous judgment : that
guilty men who conceal a crime demanding an open
atonement, must ever encounter suspicion as the re-
flex of their evil secret. Even when trusted they
■caimot believe it, because not yet true to themselves.
To Joseph it must have appeared strangely suspicious
that they came without Benjamin.
5. By regarding Joseph as a saintly man, who,
from the very first, and nith a freely reconciled
spirit, was only imposing a divine trial upon his
brothers, and leading them to repentance through a
BOul-eulightening discipline, we raise him above the
Old-Testament stand-point ; to say nothing of the
fact that Joseph could not at first have known
whether these, his half-brothers, were not also the
persecutors of Benjamin, and with as deadly a hatred,
perha|>s. as they had shown to hirn. Neither had he
any means of knowing whether or not he could ever
be on friendly terms with them. But that he is to
pa,s3 through a great reUgious and moral struggle
with himself, is evident from his wavering decisions,
f.'om the time he takes for consideration, and espe-
cially, from the fict that he postpones the trial even
aftiu- they had brought Benjamin to him. He adopts
a course in which both his aged father and his be-
loved Benjaiijin are exposed, temporarily, to the
greatest distress. Decidedly, from the very begin-
ning, does he take a noble position, but by severe
Btruggles is he to attain to that holy stand-point of
complete forgiveness ; and for this j)urp08e his
■jrotlieis' confession of their guilt, and especially the
appearance of Reuben, Benjamin, and Judah, are
blessed to him, just as his own conduct a-ssistcd the
brothers in bringing on their struggles of repentance
ind self-Hacrificc by fiith.
6. The turning of judgment into reconciliation.
A principal point in this is the invo'untary confea
sion of the brethren in Joseph's hearir.g, the discov
ery of Reuben's attempt to save hit. the atonement
made by the proud-hearted Simeon, the melting of
the brothers' obduracy, and, through it, of Joseph'i
exasperation. Above all, the recognition that God'i
searching providence is present throughout the wholl
development. " Whatsoever maketh manifest il
light " (Eph. V. 13). Thus under the Ught ot Chriei'i
cross the entire darkness of the world's guilt wa«
uncovered, and only in such an uncovering could it
become reconciled.
1. Even now there already dawns upon Joseph
the wonderful fact that bis exaltation was owing
mediately to the eimaity of his brethren, and that
they were together both conscious and unconscious
instruments of God's mercy and of his providmtia
design to save much people alive (ch. xlv. and 1.).
8. Jacob feels the burden of his house, ami bia
alarming presentiments of evil become manifest
more and more. We must imagine this to ourselves,
if we would clearly understand his depression. He
is not strengthened by the spirit in his household,
but put under restraint and weariness. He feels
that there is something rotten in the foundation of
his house.
9. Here, too, death is not denoted as a descend,
ing into Sheol, but as the dying from the heart's sor-
row of an uncompleted life. Opposed to it is the
going home to the fathers when the soul is satisfied
with the life on ea rth, and its enigmas are all solved.
HOMILETIOAI, AND PRACTICAL.
See Doctrinal and Ethical. The brethren appear
ing before Joseph. Thus the world before Christ,
the oppressors in the forum of the oppressed, the
wicked at the judgment-seat of the pious. — Joseph
and his brethren as they stand confronting each
other : 1. He recognizes them, but they do not rec-
ognize him ; 2. the positions of the parties are
changed, but Joseph exercises mercy ; 3. the judg-
ment must precede the reconciliation ; 4. humao
and divine reconciliation go together. We are verily
guiltif concerning our brother. 1. This language
considered in their sense ; 2. according to Joseph's
understanding ; 3. in the sense of the spirit. The
guilty conscience terrified, at first, by signs that were
really favorable. Jacob's lamentation as the seem-
ing curse of his house becomes gradually known.
At the extremest need help is near. Benjamin's
dark prospects (his mother dead, his brother lost_
himself threatened with misfortune), and their favor
able issue.
Tadbe : The hours of repentance that come to
Joseph's brethren : 1. How the simier is led to re-
pentance; 2. how repentance manifests itself; S
the relation of the Lord to the penitent sinner.
First Section (vers. 1-ti). Starke: The utility
of coiumerce. The dift'erent products which God
has given to different countries, demand mutual In-
tercourse for their attainment. A believer must em-
ploy ordinarv means, and not tempt God by theil
refusal. Nothing can hinder God's decrees in behalf
of the pious. — Schrooer : The guilt of Benjamic't
brothers in respect to Joseph seems to weigh upon
the father's heart as a kind of presentiiTient. — Cai
viKK /Janilliuch: Joseph's brethren are they callet.
because Joseph stands here in the foreground of his-
tory, and the destiny of the family is co_iiected will
CHAP. XLIII. 1— XLIV. 17.
eis
him. The very ten by hqoih he was sold must bow
•hemselves before him, and receive the rigliteousand
higher requital. — Heim ; Tlie expression xoits of Is-
rael, instead of sons of Jacob, points to Israel the
man of faith, whose children they were, who accom-
panied them \rith his prayers, and for whose sake,
although he knew it not, this journey to Egypt, so
dark in its commencement, became a blesising to them
til.
Second Section {vers. 1-11). Starke: Formerly
they regarded him as a spy — now are they treated as
spies in turn. — Ver. 15. This expression is not an
oath, but only a general asseveration. The first
Christians, though making everything a matter of
conscience, did net hesitate thus to affirm by the life
of the Emperors, but they were unwillhig to swear
by their divinity. Juratmis slcut non per genios
C'cesarum, ifa per saliUem eornm qu(E est auf/itMior
omnibus geniis. Tert. Apol.— Hall : The disposi-
tion of a Chiistian is not always to be judged by his
outward acts. — Gerlach : Ver. 9. Nothing is more
common than this reproach upon travellers in the
East, especially when they would sketch any parts
of the country. — Schroper : He who was hungry
when they were eating, now holds the food for which
they hunger. To him (Joseph) there was committed, for
some time, the government of a most important part
rf the world. He was not only to bless, bu'j also to
junish and to judge ; i. e., become forgetful of all
auman relations and act divinely. [Krummachek:
Still Joseph felt as man, not as though he were Provi-
dence.] Joseph plays a wonderful part with his
brethren, but one which humbles and exercises him
greatly. A similar position God assumes towards
believers when in tribulation : let us, therefore, hold
assuredly that all our misfortunes, trials, and la-
mentations, even death itself, are nothing but a
hearty and fair display of the divine goodness
towards us (Luther). Joseph's suspicion, though
feigned in expression, has, nevertheless, a ground
of fact in the fonner conduct of his brothers towards
him.
Third Section (vers 18-24). Starke : God
knows how to keep awake the conscience. — Ver. 18.
The tp.3t of a true Christian in all his doings, is the
fear of the Lord. — Bibl. Tub, : How noble is religioi
in a judge ! — Lange : Chastisements as a means o'
self-examination. There may be times when sin3_
long since committed, may present themselves s<
vividly before the eyes as to seem but of yesterday
— The same: God's wise providence so brings it
about, that though a guilty man may escape the d&
sei'ved punishment for a time, the visitation wiL
surely come, even though it be by God's permitting
misfortunes to fall upon him through the guilt of
others, when he himself is innocent.
Fourth Section (vers. 26-35). Starke : Simeon
may now let his thoughts wander back, in repentanca
for his murderous deeds at Shechem, in weeping for
the grief he had caused to Jo.seph, and in imploring
God's forgiveiWLS. God does not bestow the bless-
ing of the gospel on the sinner in any other way
than in the order of the law, or in the knowledge of
his sins. A frightened conscience always expects the
worst (Wisd. of Sol. xvii. 11). — Schrodkr: Simeon
is bound; probably because the leader at Shechen
was also the prime mover against Joseph (Baum.
garten.
Fifth Section (vers. 36-38). Starke : He " who
wrestled with God (and man) and prevailed, shows
here great weakness of faith. Yet he recovers, and
again struggles in faith, Uke Abraham his grand-
father.— Cramer: When burdened with trials and
temptations, wo interpret everything in the worst
way, even though it may be for our peace. — Gerlach :
Jacob's declarations betray a feeling that the broth-
ers were not guiltless respecting Joseph's disappear-
ance. He knew their jealousy, and he had expe-
rienced the violent disposition of Simeon and Levi,
— Schroder : There is nothing so restless or so great
a foe to peace as a frightened heart, that turns pale
at a glance, or at the rustle of a leaf (Luther). He
had long suspected them in regard to Joseph (se«
ver. 4) ; the old wound is now opened again. Reu-
ben is once more the tenderhearted one. He offers
everything (ver. 37) that he may prevail with his
father. "But it is out of reason what he offers."
Luther. — Heim: Jacob's painful language. There
breaks forth now the hard suspicion which he had
long carried shut up in the depths of his own lieart.
SEVENTH SECTION.
Hie tecond journey. Benjamin accompanying. Joseph malceth himself known lo hia brethtm.
Their return. Jacobus joy.
Chapter XLIII— XLV.
A. The tri»l of the brethren. Their repentaiu* ».uC Joseph's reconcilableness. Joseph and Benjami*,
Chapter XLIII. 1— XLIV. 17.
1, 2 And the famine was sore in the land. And it came to pass, when they had eatei
up the corn which they had brought out of Egypt, their father said unto them, Go
3 ag.ii- buy lis a little food. And Judah spakn un^o him, saj..ig, The man did solemnh
516 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
4 protest unto us, saying, Ye shall not see my face, except your brother he with you. II
5 tho" wilt send our brother with us, we will go down and buy thee food ; But if thoi
will not send him, we will not go down ; for the man said unto us. Ye shall not see mj
6 face [again], except your brother he with you. And Israel said, Wherefore dealt ye at
7 ill with me, as to tell the man whether ye had yet a brother? And they said, Tht
man asked us straitly of our state, and of our kindred, saying, Is your father yet alive 7
have ye another brother? and we tnld him, according to the tenor of tliese words; could
8 we certainly know that he would say, Bring your brother down ? And Judab .said
unto Israel his father, Send the lad with me, and we will arise and go ; that we miy
9 hve, and not die, both we, and thou, and also our little ones. I will be surety for him ;
of my hand shalt thou require him; if I bring him not unto thee, and set him before
10 thee, then let me bear the blame for ever ; For except we had Hngered, surely now we
11 had returned this second time. And their father Israel said unto them. If I'i must he so
now, do this ; take of the best fruits in the land in your vessels, and carry down the
man a present, a little balm, and a little honey, spices, and myrrh, nuts, and almonds
i2 And take double money in your hand; and the money that was brought again in the
mouth of your sacks, carry it again in your hand; peradventure it was an oversight;
13, 14 Take also your brother, and arise, go again unto the man ; And God Almighty give
you mercy before the man, that he may send away your other brother, and Benjamin.
15 If I be bereaved of my children,, I am bereaved. And the men took that present, and
they took double money in their hand, and Benjamin, and rose up, and went down to
16 Egvpt, and stood before Joseph. And when Joseph saw Benjamin with them, he said
to the ruler of his house. Bring tliese men home, and slay, and make ready ; for thest
17 men shall dine with me at noon. And the man did as Joseph bade; and the man
18 brought the men into Joseph's house. 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,
19 and fall upon us, and take us for bondmen, and our asses. And they came near to the
steward of Joseph's house, and they communed with him at the door of the house.
20, 21 And said, 0 sir, we came indeed down at the first time to buy food ; Anr' it came
to pass, when we came to the inn, that we opened our sacks, and, behold, ^very man's
money was in the mouth of his sack, our money in full weight ; and wj have brought
22 it again in our hand. And other money have we brought down in our hands to buy
23 food; we cannot tell who put our money in our sacks. And he said. Peace he to you,
fear not; your God, and the God of your father, hath given you treasure in your sacks;
24 I had your money. And he brought Simeon out unto them. And the man brought
the men into Joseph's house, and gave them water, and they washed their feet; and he
25 gave their assas provender. And they made ready the present against Joseph came at
26 noon ; for they heard that they should eat bread there. And when Joseph came
home, they brought him the present which was in their hand into the liou;>e, and bowed
27 themselves to him to the earth. And he asked them of their welfare, and said, Is your
28 father well, the old man of whom ye spake? Is he yet alive? And they answered.
Thy servant our father is in good health, he is yet alive. And they bowed down tlfeir
29 heads, and made obeisance. And he lift up his eyes, and saw his brother Benjamin,
his mother's son, and said, Is this your younger brother, of whom ye spake unto me ?
And he said farther [without waiting for an answer] God be gracious unto thee, my son.
30 And Joseph made haste ; for his bowels did yearn upon his brother; and he sought
31 where to weep; and he entered into his chamber and wept there. And he washed hia
32 face, and went out.and refrained himself, and said. Set on bread. And they set on for
him by himself, and for them by tiiemselves, and for the Egyptians, which did eat with
him, by themselves; because the Egyptians might not eat bread with the Hebrews:
J3 for that is an aliomination unto the Egyptians. And they sat before him, the first bom
according to his birthright, and the youngest according to his youth; ami the nieli
34 marvelled one at another. And he took and sent messes unto them from before him ;
but Benjamin's mess was five times so much as any of their's. And they drank, and
were merry with him.
Cl'. XLIV. 1. And Joseph commanded the steward of his house, saying, Fill the
men's sackx with food, as much as they can carry, and put every man's money in hif
CHAP. XLIV. 18— XLV. 28. 61"
2 sink's mouth. And put my cup, the silrer cup, m the sack'.s mouth of the joimgest,
3 and his corn-money. And he did according to the word that Joseph had spoken. Aa
4 soon as the morning was Hglit, the men were sent away, they and their asses. AnA
when they were gone out of the city, and not i/et far off, Joseph said unto his steward.
Up, follow after the men; and when thou dost overtake them, say unto them. Where
5 fore have ye rewarded evil for good? Is not this it in which my lord drinketh, and
6 v/her.^by indeed he divinelh ? Ye have done evil in so doing. And he overtook them,
7 End he spake unto them these same words. And they said unto him. Wherefore saitfe
my lord these words? God forbid that thy servants should do according to this thing
8 Behold, the money which we found iu 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 oi
9 gold ? With whomsoever of thy servants it be found, both let him die, and we also
10 will be my lord's bondmen. And he said. Now also let it be according unto your words;
11 he with whom it is found shall be my servant; and ye shall be blameless. Then thej
speedily took down every man his sack to the ground, and opened every man his sajk
12 And he searched, and began at the eldest, and left at the youngest; and the cup was
13 found in Benjamin's sack. Then they rent their clothes, and laded every man his ass,
14 and returned to the city. And Judah and his brethren came to Joseph's house ; for
15 he was yet there ; and they fell before him on the ground. And Joseph said unto
them, What deed is this that ye have done? Wot ye not that such a man as I can
16 certainly divine? 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 servants, both we, and he also with whom the cup i,^
17 found. And he said, God forbid that I should do so ; but the man in whose hand the
cup is found, he shall be my servant ; and as for you, get you up in peace unto your
father.
B. The narrative of the reconciliation and the recognition. Judah and Joseph.
Chap. XLIV. 18— XLV. 28.
18 Th^n Judah c.ame near unto him, and said, 0 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
19 thou art even as Pharaoh. My lord asked his servants, saying. Have ye a father, or a
20 brother? And we said unto my lord. We have a father, an old man, and a child of his
old age, a little one ; and his brother is dead, and he alone is left of his mother, and his
21 father loveth him. And thou saidst unto thy servants. Bring him down unto me, that
22 1 may set mine eyes upon him. And we said unto my lord, The lad can not leave his
23 father; foi i/he should leave his father, Ats/a</ier would die. And thou saidst unto
thy servants, Except your youngest brother come down with you, ye shall see my face
24 no more. And it came to pass when we came up unto thy servant my father, we told
25 him the words of my lord. And our father said. Go again, and buy us a little food.
26 And we said. We can not go down ; if our yomigest 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 did not retum], and I said. Surely he is torn in pieces;
29 and I saw him not since ; And if ye take this also from me, and mischief befall him, ye
30 shall bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to the grave [sheol]. Now, therefore,
when I come to thy servant my father, and the lad be not with us, seeing that his liln
31 is boimd up in the lad's life; It shall corae to pass, when he seeth that the lad is not
loith us, that he will die ; and thy servants shall bring down the gray hairs of thj'
32 servant our father with sorrow to the grave. For thy servant became surety for the
la'' unto my father, saying, If I bring him not unto thee, then I shall bear the blame to
J3 my father for ever. Now, therefore, I pray thee, let thy servant abide instead of the
34 lad, a bondman to my lord; and let the lad go up with his brethren. For how shall I
go up to my father, and the '.ad be not with me ? lest peradventure I see the evil tha'
shail come on my father.
618 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Ch. XLV. 1 Then Joseph could not refrain himself before a".", t'lem that stood by h.iu
and he cried, Cause every man to go out from me. And there stood no man with icim,
2 while Joseph made himself known unto his brethren. And he wept aloud ; an<5 th«
3 Egvplians and the house of Pharaoh heard. And Joseph said unto his bretlsren, ! r.m
Joseph; doth my father yet live? And his brethren could not answer hira ; for -.liey
4 were troubled at his presence. And Joseph said unto his brethren, Come near to me,
I pray you. And they came near. And he said, I am Joseph your brother, whom ye
5 sold into Egypt. Now, therefore, be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, that ye
6 sold me thither; for God did send me before you to preserve hfe. For these two years
hath the famine been in the land ; and yet there are five years in the which there shall
7 neitlier be earing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity
8 in the eartli, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So now it ^vas not you
that sent me hither, but God ; and he hath made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of
9 all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt. Haste ye, and go up to
my father, and say unto him. Thus saith thy son Joseph, God hath made me lord of all
0 Egypt ; come down unto me, tarry not ; And thou shait dwell in the land of Goshen
[East district of Egypt ; the name is of Koptic origin. Uncertain : district of Hercules], and thou shalt bfl
near unto me, thou, and thy children, and thy children's children, and thy flocks, and
1 1 thy herds, and all that thou hast ; And there will I nourish thee ; for yet there are five
years of famine ; lest thou, and thy household, and all that thou hast, come to poverty.
12 And, behold, your eyes see, and the eyes of my brother Benjamin, that it is my mouth
13 that speaketh unto you. And ye shall tell my fiither of all my glory in Egypt, and of
14 all that ye have seen; and ye shall haste and bring down my father hither. And he
fell upon his brother Benjamin's neck, and wept ; and Benjamin wept upon iiis neck.
15 Moreover he kissed all his brethren, and wept upon them ; and after that his brethreu
talked with him.
C. The glad tidings to Jacob, vers. 16-28.
16 And the fame thereof was heard in Pharaoh's house, saying, Joseph's brethren are
17 come; and it pleased Pharaoh well, and his servants. And Pharaoh said unto Joseph,
Say unto thy brethren, This do ye ; lade your beasts, and go, get you unto the land of
18 Canaan; And take your father, and your households, and come unto me; and I will
19 give you the good of the land of Egypt, and ye shall eat the fat of the land. Now
thou art commanded, this do ye ; take you wagons out of the land of Egypt for your
20 little ones, and for your wives, and bring your father, and come. Also regard not your
21 stuff; for the good of all the land of Egypt is yours. And the children of Israel did
so ; and Joseph gave them wagons, according to the commandment of Piiaraoh, and
22 gave them provision for the way. To all of them he gave each man changes of rai^-
23 ment; but to Benjamin he gave three hundred pieces of silver, and five changes of
raiment. And to his father he sent after this manner ; ten asses laden with the good
24 things of Egypt, and ten she-asses laden with corn, and bread, and meat for his father
by the way. So he sent his brethren away, and tliey departed ; and he said unto them
25 See that ye fall not out by the way. And they went up out of Egypt, and came inti
26 the land of Canaan unto Jacob their father. And told him, saying, Josi!ph is yet alive,
27 and he is governor over all the land of Egypt. And Jacob's heart famted, for he be-
lieved them not. And they told him all the words of Josepii, which 1 e had said untc
them ; and when he saw the wagons which Joseph had sent to carry \ im, the spirit of
28 Jacob their father revived. And Israel said. It is enough; Joseph my son is yet alive-
I will go and see him before 1 die.
(' Oh. xliji. 14,— 'pbat" ipi^S':) ""?S<,3 ^3S 1 . Rcnderod : " If I am bereaved of my children, I am berenved.
Our tmulators, by pulting in cliildren, would seem to have regarded It a-s emphatic, thus : If I am bereaved of my chl'.
Iren, I am bereaved of all. It may be taken, however, as a declaration of submission to what appears inevitable, a» il
Brth. iv. 10, ^n"'3St 'msx "iBSiS • Or it may be regarded as a passionate exaggeration in view of Joseph's »ap-
losed death, simeon'e oonfln'ement, and the demand for Benjamin: I am bereaved of all my cbildren, one after thj
iher.-T. L.I
CHAP. XLIU. 1— XLV. 28.
Oil
I* Ver. 18.— rnf?:' , The 5 here is servile. Compare Malachi ii. 13 and Gen xxviiL 6. In Gea xrx. 15, wt han
both form? of the infinitive (nPipb and TPp) in immediate cunnection. See It explained in the Sepher flarikrta, oi
Hebrew Grammar, of Ben Gannach, p. 30, line 30. He regards both alike as infinitives. — T. L.J
(' Ver. 20. — ^31X ^3 . Gesenius regards "^S in this and some similar cases (see Josh. vii. 8), as a contraction foi
^ya , from the root n"2 , a very rare word in Hebrew, though very common in the Chaldaic and Syriac. In the sen**
•f entreaty, n"3 occurs only Is. xii. 12, and of inquiry, Obad. 6. Abbreviations are made only of words tkat ait
much used, and we cannot, therefore, regard it as a forma precalionis (^53 , my prayer), having such an origin. Th*
Targum of Onkelos interprets it in this way, but this is owing to its being written in the Chaldaic language. A muct
better view is that of Aben Ezra, who regards it as the preposition and pronoun, with an ellipsis of the word *■" , as ic
Sam. xsv. 24, ^D"1J< "^3 "im , on me my Lord he the guilt. Or it may be a sort of ejaculatory phrase, with at
ellipsis of the precatory verb,— as would seem to be confirmed by Judges vi. 13, 1)373^ nin"^ IT^T "^iTX ^3 , cotne tell
ms, my lord, if Jehovah is wth us, why, etc. See Ben Qa.nnach, Sepher Harikma, .32, 31. The \iew of Gesenius waa
•uggested, probably, by the Syriac rendering of this passage, Judg. vi. 13, ^.^^^ , t^>^ ij| | v*^ In Josh. vii. 8,
where the sajne phrase occurs, the Syriac has left it out entirely. — T. L.1
PREIiZMINAEY REMARKS.
Contents: a. The trial of the brethrea Their
repentance and Joseph's forgiveness. Joseph and
Benjamin. Ch. xliii. 1-xliv. 17 : 1. Judah as surety
for Benjamin unto his father, vers. 1-14 ; 2. Joseph
and Benjamin, vers. 1.5-30 ; 3. the feast in honor of
Benjamin, vers. 31-34; 4. the proving of the breth-
ren in respect to their disposition towards Benjamin,
especially after the great distinction shown to liim,
ch. xliv. 1-17. b. The story of the reconciUation,
and of the recognition, as presented under the an-
tithesis of Ju'Jah and Joseph, ch. xUv. 18, xlv. 13.
1. Judah as surety and substitute for Benjamin, ch.
xliv. 18-34 ; 2. Joseph's reconciliation and making
himself known to them, ch. xlv. 1-5 ; 3. Joseph's
divine peace and divine mission, vers. 5-13; 4. the
Bolemnity of the salutation, vers. 14, 16. c. The
glad tidings to Jacob, vers. 16-28. 1. Pliaraoh's
message to Jacob, vers. 16-20 ; 2. Joseph's presents
to Jacob, vers. 21-24; 3. the return of Joseph's
brethren ; Pharaoh's wagons and Jacob's revivifica-
tion, vers. 25-28.
EXEGETICAI, A:S0 CRITICAL.
u. The proving of (he brothers. Their repentance
and JoxejMs forgiveness. Joseph and Benjamin,
ch. xliii. 1 ; xliv. 17. 1. vers. 1-14 ; Judah as sure-
ty for Benjamin unto the father. — Buy us a little
bfead. — In death and famine a rich supply is but
little ; so it was especially in Jacob's numerous fam-
ily, in regard to what they had biought the first time.
— And Judah spake Judah now stands forth as
11 principal personage, appearing more and more
glorious in his dignity, his firmness, liis noble dispo-
sition, and his unselfish heroism. He, like Reuben,
could speak to his father, and with even more free-
dom, because he had a fjeer conscience than the
rest, and regarded the danger, therefore, in a milder
light. Judah does not act rashly, but as one who
has a grand and siipificant purpose. His explana-
tion to the wounded father is as forbearing as it is
firm. If they did not bring Benjamin, Simeon was
lofl and they themselves, according to Joseph's
threatening, would have no admittance to him — yea,
whey might even incur death, because they had not
removed from themselves the suspicion of their being
ipies. — Wherefore dealt ye ao ill with me ? —
Knobel : " His grief and affliction urge him on to
reproach them without reason." Unreasonable,
oowever, as it appears, it becomes significant on the
•iipposilinn that he begins to read their guil'.y con-
sciences, and, especially, when, with the one pr»
ceding, we connect the expression that follows : Ma
have ye bereaved of my children. — The mat
asked us straitly. — [Lange translates the Hebrew
C-isn bsa ilsffl literally, or nearly so : er fragU
mid fragte uns ans ; or, as it might be rendered,
still closer to the letter, he asked to as/c ; or, if we
take the infinitive in such cases as an adverb, he askea
inquisitively, and then proceeds to remark] : This
expressive connection of the infinitive with the in-
dicative in Hebrew must not he effaced by grammatr
ical rules ; we hold fast to its literalness here. They
did not speak forwardly of their family relations,
but only after the closest questioning. By this pas-
sage and Judah's speech (ch. xliv.), the account in the
preceding chapter (ver. 32) is to be supplemented.
They owed him an answer, since the question was to
remove his suspicion ; and, moreover, they had no
presentiment of what he wanted. — Send "the lad
with me. — 'FIX [with me) says the brave Judah.
He presents himself as surety ; he will take the guilt
and bear the blame forever. The strong man prom-
ises all he can. To offer to the grandfather his own
grandchildren, as Reuben offered his sons, that he
might put them to death, wa-s too unreal and hyper-
boUcal to occur to him. We become acquainted
with him here as a man full of feeUng, and of most
energetic speech, as ver. 3, and ch. xxxiii. had be-
fore exemplified. He eloquently shows how they
are all threatened with starvation. The expression,
too : Surely now^ w^e had returned the second
time, promises a happy issue. — If it must be so
now. — Jacob had once experienced, in the case of
Esau, that presents had an appeasing effect on hos-
tile dispositions. From this universal human expe-
rience there is explained the ancient custom, es-
pecially in the East, of rendering rtdeis favorably
disposed by gifts (see 1 Kings x. 25; Matt. ii. 11 ;
Prov. xviii. 16 ; xix. 6). — Of the first fruits of the
land. — (Lange translates : Of that which is most
praiseworthy.) Literally, of the song ; i. e., that
which was celebrated in song. The noblest products
of nature are, for the most part, celebrated and svm-
bolizeil in poetry. In presents to distinguished per.
sons, however, the simple money-value of the things
avails but little ; it is the peculiar quality, or some
poetic fragrance attached to them, that makes them
effective. Delitzsch doubts this explanation, but
without sufficient reason. They are especially to
take halm, the pride of Canaan, but in particular of
Gilead. Then honey. Knobel and Delitzsch su(>
pose it to be the honey of grapes, Arab., dibt
■' Grane syrup ; L e., must boiled down to one third
dW
GENESIS, OK THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
an article, o( w'jich, even at the present day, there
are sent yearly three hundred camel-loads from He-
bron's Ticinity to Egypt." Delitzseh. But this very
abundance of the syrup of grapes would lead us to
decide rather lor the honey of bees, were it not for
the consideration, that in the Egypt of to-day great
attention is given to thp raising of bees, and that it
is no wine country, although not wlioUy without the
culture of the vine (ch. si. 10). — Spices. — (Lange,
frai/acanth-r/um ) A kind of white rrfinou< inedica-
noeut (see Winer, Tragacanth). — Myrrh. — Fraiik-
hicenso, salve medicament (see Winer, Ladanum).
— Nuts. — The Hebrew word 0'^ a 3 occurs here
only, but by the Samariian translation it is interpret-
ed of the fruit of the Pistacia vera, ''a tree siuiilar
to the terebinth — oblong and angular nut- of the
size of a liazel-nut, containing an oily but very pal-
atable kernel, which do not, however, grow any more
in Palestine (as is stated in Schubert's ' Travels in
the East,' ii. p. 478; iii. 114), but are obtained from
Aleppo (comp. Rosen., in the ' German Orient. Mag-
azine,' xii. p. 502)." Keil. — Almonds. — (See Winer,
Aliiiond-tree.) On the productions of Palestine in
general, see C'alwer Bibt. " Natural History," etc. — -
And take double money. — (Lit. second money.
They are not to take advantage of the mistake, even
though no unfavorable construction should be put
upon it, or it should occasion them no harm. — And
God Almighty. — Here, wlien some stroug miracu-
lous help is needed, he is again most properly desig-
nated by the name El Shadai. — If I be bereaved
of my children. — Be it so. An expression of
resignation (Esth. iv. Iti). As his blessing here is
not a prayer full of confidence, so the resignation
has not the full expression of sacrifice ; for Jacob's
30ul is unconsciously restrained by a sense of the
ban resting upon his sons. He is bowed down by
the spiritual burden of his house.
2. Vers. 15-30. Joseph and Benjamin. — And
stood before Joseph. — Knobel justly states that
the audience they had with Joseph did not take
place until afterwards. The meaning here is that
they took their place in front of Joseph's house, to-
gether with Benjamin and the presents, and so an-
nounced to him their arrival. — Bring these men
home. — With joy had Joseph observed Benjamin
with them, and concludes from thence that they had
practised no treachery upon him, through hatred to
the children of Rachel, the darlings of their father.
Benjamin's appearance sheds a reconciling light upon
the whole group. He intends, therefore, to re-
ceive them in a friendly and hospitable manner.
His staying away, however, until noon, characterizes
not only the great and industrious statesman, but
also the man of sage discretion, who takes time to
Jonsuli with himself about his future proceeding. —
And stay. — Bohlen's assertion that the higher
-■astes in Egypt ale no meat at all, is refuted by Kxo-
BEI,, p. :!'2fi. — At noon. — The time when they i)ar-
took of their principal meal (ch. xviii. 1). — And
the men were afraid. — Judging from their for-
mer treatmeirl they know not what to make of their
being thus led into hia house. If a distinction, it is
an incomprehetisibly great one ; they, therefore, ap-
prehended a plan for tlieir destruction. Some nion-
Itrous intrigue they, perhaps, anticil>ate, having its
introduction in the reappearance of the money in
their Racks, whilst the leaiful imagination of an evil
conscience begins to paint tlie con8e(iuencc8 (see ver.
18). ' A thief, if unable to make restitution, wa.s
sold as a. slave (Exod. xxii. 3)." Therefore they in
not willing to enter until they have justified them
selves about the money returned in their >acks.
They address themselves, on this account, to Joseph'!
steward, with an explanatory vindication. — When
"we came to the inn. — In a sumujary way they
here state both fads (eh. xlii. 27 ; and xlii. 35) to-
gether. For afterwards they might have concluded
that the money fnund in the sack of one of them
was a sign that that money had been returned in all
the sacks. — In lull weight. — Tlieie was, as yet, no
coined money, only riu^s ur )iieces of metal, which
were reckoned by weight. — Peace be to you. — It
can hardly be supposed that the steward was let into
Joseph's plan. He knew, however, that Joseph him
self liadordeied the return of the money, and might
have supposed that Joseph's course toward theiu, as
his countrymen, had in view a happy issue. In this
sense it is that he encourages them.— Tour Goo
and the God of your father. — The shiewd stew-
ard is acquainted with Joseph's religiousness, and,
perhaps, has adopted it himself. He undoubtedly
regards them as confessor.- of the same laitli with
Joseph. KsoBEL : " His own good fortune each man
deduces from the God he worships (Hos. ii. 7J." — ■
Has given you treasure. — Tims intimating soma
secret means by which (jod bad given it to them
but for all this they still remain uneasy, though suf-
ficiently calmed by his verbal acknowledgment of
receipt : I had your money, but more so by tliB
releasing of Simeon. It is not until now that they
enter the house which they had before regarded as a
snare. Now follow the hospitable reception, the
disposition of the presents, Joseph's greeting, and
their obeisance. — And he asked them of their
■welfare. — This was his greeting. See the contrast,
eh. xxxvii. 4. For the Inqvury after their father's
welfare they thank him by the most respectful obei-
sance, an expression of their courtesy and of their
filial piety. They represent their father, just as Ben.
jamin represents the mother, and so it is that his
dream of the sun and moon fulfils itself (ch. xxxvii.
9). If we suppose Benjamin born about a year be-
fore Joseph's sale, he would be now twenty-threa
years of age. Knobel does not know how to under-
stand the repeated expressions of his youth ("i"3,
etc.). Hut they are explained from the tender care
exercised towards him, and from the great difl'erence
between his age and that of his brothers. — And he
said. — It is very significant that Josejih does not
wait for an answer. He recognizes him immediately,
and his heart yearns. — My son. — .\u expression of
inner tenderness, and an indication, at the same time,
of near relationship. — And Joseph made haste. —
His overwhelming emotion, the moment he saw his
brethren, like Jacob's love of Rachel, hiis a gleam
of the New-Testament life.* . It is not, however, to
♦ fA glimpse of the New-Tettnmtni life. It is very coai-
mon to represent the Old Testament as eontaining thi
harsher dispensation, and as presenting tho t*terner attari*
l)utes both of God and man. Tliis is often dune without
much thoufiht, or discrimination of the respects in vliieh it
may bt* false or true. The old Testament is, indeed, a Irse
full revi'lafion of mercy as a doctrine, or a scheme of salva*
tion, but the mercy itself is there in ovei-flowinfr measure,
ami expressed in the most pathetic lan^uape. It is peculia'--
ly the emotional part of Holy Scripture, piesentiti^' eveiy.
thintr in tho strongest manner, and in stroUMest cuiitrast,
wiiettier it be wrnth or teDdcrn'ss, indi^rnatil u aptinst
apostasy or love for the oft-times apostate and rcbellioul
peuplc. It may even be maintained that tlu' New 'i'csta-
ment, Ihoupb more didactic, is less tender in its hiDKuaKe
less uboundinL' in pictures of lueltini? cempa-ssioD D" th<
CHAP. XLIU. 1— XLV. 28.
H5i)
he regarded a8 a simple feeling ; it is also an emotion
of joy at the prospect of that reconciliation which
he had, for some time, feare<i their hatred towards
Rachel's children might prevent, and so bring ruin
upon liunjamin, upon Jacob's house, and upon them
selves. No emotions are stronger than those arising
from ti.j dissolution of a ban, with which there is,
at the 6ame time, taken away the danger of a dark
impending doom, and the old hardening of impaired
afiection.
part of Godj and of devoted affection of one human hoart
to another. What more moving, iti this respect, than the
language of the prophets (compare Isaiah xlis. 15; liv.
8-IU; Ivii. 15, 16; Ps. ciii. 13-16; Gen. viii. 21; Deut. s.
12 ; X. 19 ; xxiv. 14-22 ; Ezek xvi. 6U-63 ; Hos. xi. 8, 9 ;
Mic. VI. 8; vii. 18, 19), so full of God's pathetic yearning,
we mifiht style it, towards hxunanity ! On the otlier hand,
what more exquisite pictures can there be found of human
lenderuebs, than those of David and Jonathan, Ruth and
Naomi, the pathetic meeting of Joseph and his brethren as
here described, I>a\'id'3 forgiving tenderness towards Saul,
and even Esau's reception of -lacoh (Gen. xxxiii. 4-lo) alter
all the wrong ht had apparently, or iu reaHty, received fi-om
him. In this latter case, we may regard Esau as one who
had but little if any grace, and yet tlie feeling here, viewed
tts growin-^ out of the patriarchal life and religious ideas, may
well be Compared with any general intlufnce of our nom-
inal Christianity in arousing men to deeds of tenderness and
heroism. This iatse ^-iew of the Old Testament, which ig-
norance of the Bible is causing more and more to prevail, is
a great wrong to the ^vhole cause and doctrine of revelation.
Even the most tender dialect of the New Testament, is
drawn from the Old. Its HeViaisms are its most pathetic
parts. Of this there is a good example in the very style of
language here employed. The expression I^TSni ^1^33,
rendered, his bowels did yearn (rather, warmed)^ has been
naturalized in the New-Testament Greek, where inTK6.yxva
is used for r'^^n*^. It may be said, however, that both
the Hebrew and the Greek are marred for the English read-
er by the rendering bowels, especially if taken in the sense
of inlestina, instead of the larger meaning that belongs to
the Latin viscera. It may be doubted whether C'^'Cm
does ever, of ftself, denote any part of the body, either
more or less interior. When the singular is used for the
womb, it is rather to be retjarded as a metaphorical use of
its primiiry sense of cherishing, or as that which loves and
chi^rishes. The Greek counterpari, <r7rAdy;^i'a, denotes the
mo=t vital pai-ts, such as the h^ort, the lungs, and the bver,
the parts which, in the case of animals slain, were regarded
a^ the choicest eating, and were given as an honorary por-
tion to the guest. See Homer everywhere. They included
the Kap&ia., with the ^peve^, or prs'vordia, and the ^nap, or
liver. Another word was ^rop, which was used exactly as
C^^n H is used here, and with a similar verb signifj-ing to
be warm, or burn ; as Odyss. i. 48 :
oAAa ^tot a.fi4t , 'OSuo^i Satiftpovi AAI'ETAI ^TOp.
My heart is burning for the brave Ulysses ; with an evi-
dent paronomasia in Satt^poj-i. and Saierai. Compare Ps.
xxxix 4 ^^"ipa ""Sb Cn, my heart grows hot within me,
ttJjt "ly^n, the fire is burning ; also Luke xxiv. 32, oux'i h
«ap5to i\tikixkv Kaiofj.etr'i TfV ev ■^p.lv, " was not our hear/, bttrn'
ing within usf^ Instead of bowels, it would be more in ac-
cord ince with the spirit of the Hebrew word to render it
here, his heart yearned, or warmed. Rosenmu'ler, on this
passage, makes one of his wise remarks about " the ancient
men" (prisci homincA)^ and their great simplicity i i regard-
ing these partri of the body as the seat of the atfeclions. It
has. however, always been so, more or less, in all languages.
In the ancjent tongue^ even intellect is generally assigned
to these middle regions, and but rarely, orcomp:\ratively so,
to the head With us it seems almo^^t a matter of conscious-
ness that we think with oiu' heads, but this is an effect rath-
vt than a fause of the change of language. In the Latin,
»>r is Ua'.'d for wisdom, prudence, and cnrdatus is eciuivalent
to e^^pwi', a wise and prudent man. The (Jreek popular
language placed thought in the (/ipet-es, not in the e-y*ce'0aAo5,
or brain, although the latter is sometimes referred to in tins
light, especially by Aristotle. Demosthenes once makes a
fiopular allusion to some such notion in the oration De Ha-
oneso ; but the poetical language, the best representative
yf fhp popular feeling, is all the other way. So in the He-
3. Vers. 31-34. TTie banquet in honor of Benj<y
mbi. — And he washed his face. — A proof of thi
depth of his emotion. It was still hard for him tc
maintain a calm and composed countenance.-— And
they set on for him by himself. — Three tablea,
fiom two different causes. Joseph's caste as priest,
and in which he stood next to the king, did not allow
him to eat with laymen. And, moreover, neithe)
Joseph's domestics, nor his guests, could, as Egyp'
tiaus, eat with Hebrews. Conceruiiiir the rigidnesa
of the Egyptian seclusion, see KNOuh,^, p. 328. Be-
sides, the Hebrews were nomads (eh. xlvi. 34). On
the Egyptian castes, see Von Kaumkr, Vorlrsungen
ixbe}' die alte Gesch, i. p. 133. — And they set,—
They were surprised to see themsflves arranged ac-
cording to their age. But the enigma becomes more
and more transparent; whilst strange presentimente
are more and more excited. The transaction bttraye
the fact that they are known to the spirit of the
house, and that it can distinguish between thei
ages. The Egyptians ant at table, instead of reclin
imj; as appears from their pictures. — And he todb
and sent messes. — They were thus distinguished
by having portions sent to them ; whilst, as yet, they
were hindered by no laws from eating of Joseph's
meat. — But Benjamin's mess. — This is a point
not to be overlooked in the proving of the brethren ;
it is an imitation, so to say, of the coat of mauy
colors. It would deterndue whether Benjamin was
to become tin object of their jealousy, just as his
father's present h.id before been to him the cause of
their hatred (so also Kbil, p. 264). His mess is
five times larger than the rest. "Such abundance
was an especial proof of respect. To the guest whc
was to be distinguished there were given, at a meal,
the largest and best pieces (1 Sam. ix. 23; Hom. iZ.
vii. 321, etc.). Among the Spartans the king r©.
ceived a double portion (Herod, vi. 57, etc.) ; among
the Cretans tlie Archon received four times as nmch
{Heraclid. Po it. 3). Five was a favorite number
among the Egyptians (ch. xli. 34; xlv. 22; xlvii. 2,
24; Is. six. IS). It may be explained, perhaps,
from the supposed tive planets. — And they drank
and were merry with him. — Intoxication is not
meant here (see Uagg. i. 6), but a state of exliilara-
tion, in which they lirst lose their fear of the Egyp-
tian ruler. Benjamin was sitting as a guardian
angel between them, and it was already a favorable
sign, that the distinction showed to him did not em-
bitter their joy. Nevertheless, whether Joseph had
reached the zenith of an inexpressible rapture, as
Delitzsch says, may be questioned. In all this happy
anticipation, we may suppose him still a careful ob-
server of his brethren, according to the proverb
in vino Veritas. At all events, the effect of the pres
ent to Benjamin was to be tested, and their disposi
tion towards him was to undergo a severe probing.
brew, the seat of thought, is in the reins, PVbs, Latio
renes, Greek (with digamma) (^pevcs : '* try the hearts and
the reins,*' Ps. vii. 10; " ; h the night sen son viy rein* in-
struct me," Ps, svi. 7. Only once in the Bible is the head ac
referred to ; and that is in the Chaldaic of Daniel, iv. 7,
where Nebuchadnezzar says : " the visions of my head upon
my bed," "'CX'I ''.'^Tn. Everywhere else it is xhe heart,
3t3, or the reins nT'Pr, or the inward part -^p, or some-
times expressions denotiBg something stil rarue interior, aa
P'iniJ and cro. rendered Ihe hidden part, Ps. li. 8 : 'Wii
the hiad'^n part make me to know xoisdom." The practice of
divination, by the inspection of these parts in Eacrlfloa
shows the same mode of thinking, and a amiilar verbal oon
sciousness. — T. T.. I
022
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MUsES.
4. Ch. xliv. 1-17. Tlie trial of l/ie brother.'^' dis.
position iowarih Benjamin^ e,y>ccia/l_ij afttr his great
dUitinction. — And he commanded the steward
of his house. — The return of money does not be-
long to this trial, but only the cup in Benjamin's
BaeU. Knobel is incorrect in callitig this also a chas-
tisement. So also is Delitzsch, in holding that a
surrender of Benjamin by his brethren loses all au-
thentic support, in the fact that in all the sacks
something was Ibund that did not belong to them.
Rather is Benjamin the only one who must appear as
guilty, and as having incurred the doom of slavery
(Ter. 17). — Up, follovr after the men. — The haste
is in order that they may not anticipate him in the
discovery, and so defeat the accusation by their vol-
untary return. Tlie steward is to inquire only for
the silver cup. — And whereby indeed he divin-
eth. — "In Egypt, the country of oracles (Is. six. 3),
hydromancy also was practised, 1. e., to predict
events from appearances presented by the lif)uid
contents of a cup, either as standing or as thrown.
This mode of divination is still practised.* It was
called Cn: , lit., whispering (in magic formulas or
oracles), <ijt'/)(arc." Dehizsch. Compare also Kno-
BKL, p. 329. The indicating signs were either the
refraction of the rays of light, or tlie formation of
circles on the water, or of figures, or of small bub-
bles, whenever something was thrown in. Accord-
ing to Bunseu, however, the aim was, by fixing the
eyes of the diviner upon a particular point in the
cu]), to put Mm into a dream-like or clairvoxant
state. Concerinng this kulikomancy, or cup-divina-
tion, see Sclirodcr. The cup is, therefore, marked,
not only as a festive, but also as a most sacred, uten-
sil of Joseph; and, on this account, to take it away
was considered as a heinous crime. Knobel, in his
peculiar way, here tries to start a contradiction.
"According to the Elohist (he says), Joseph gets his
knowledge of the future from God (ch. xl. 8) ; whilst
here he derives it from hydromancy, as practised by
one received into the caste of the priests." So, too,
did he swear, in :dl eari\estness, by the life of Pha-
raoh ; and the older exegetes would relieve us from
the apprehe^ sion that in so doing he might have
taken a false oath ! In a vigorous denial, and with
eloquent speech, do the accused repel the charges of
the steward and give strong expression to the con-
eciousni'ss of their innocence. — With 'whomso-
ever it be found, let him die. — Whilst consent-
uig to their projiosal, the steward moderates it in ac-
cordance with the aiin of the prosecution. The pos-
sessor of the cup alone is demanded, and he, not to
die, but. to becoKic Joseph's slave. He presents this
forthwith, so that the discovery again of the money
may not be taken into consideration, and that "eni-
porary tear of dealh may not harm Benjamin, lien-
jamin oidy is to aiijicar as the culprit, and this i.^ in
order to find out v.'hethcr or not his brethren windd
jbandon him. For these reasons the money found
ill the sacks is not noticed at all. — And began at
Jie eldest. — 'i'nis wiw in oider to mask the decej)-
tiou. — They rent their clothes. — This was al-
ready a favorable sign ; another, that they would not
lat jieiijamin go alone, but returned with him to the
• (See in the text noten, p. 323 (6, Gen. ix. 6), anotlier
lntcr])i elutimi of this by that uuutc Jewish griimmariun,
Hen (jiinijacli. The 2 in l^-Hi'S he rendern concerning
«■', izi8t«:id of by it, — that i», iin a meanN ot (!iTin:i1ion.
'*Ooulii not 6Ui;h a mii" flail out by dlvinatiun who bad his
8DnV..x. L. 1
city ; third, that they put them.selves under the direo
tion of Judah, who had become surety for Benja
niin ; and fourth, that they, together with Benjamin
prostrated themselves as penitents before Joseph. —
Wot ye not? — Joseph's reproach was not so rau.^ij
for the vileness, as lor the imprudence, of the act.
since he intends to conduct the severe trial as spar-
ingly as possible. The Hebrew Un: , etc., denote*
here a divinely-derived or supernatural knowledge,
to which Joseph lays claim, not only as a membei
of the caste of priests, but as the well-known inter-
preter of the dreams, owing his reception into this
caste to his remarkable clear-sightedness. — That
such a man as I. — He puts on the appearance of
boasting, not to represent them as mean pei-sons, ^ul
only as inferior to himself in a contest of craftiness.
Thus he meets the supposed improbabihty that lie
could still divine although the cup was taken from
him. — And Judah said, What shall we say 7 —
Judah considers Benjamin as lost, and witliout in-
quiring how the cup came into his sack, he recog-
nizes in this dark transaction the juilgmeut of God
upon their former guilt. This ap|iears from his
declarai ion : We are my lord's servants. — Ben-
jamin, it is true, had no part in that old guilt ; nei-
ther had Reuben and Judah directly, but couceining
this no explanation could be given in the conn of
the Egyptian ruler. In a masterly manner, there-
fore, he so shapes his speech ambiguously that the
brethren are reminded of their old guilt, anil ad-
monished to resign themselves to the divine judg-
ment, whilst Joseph can understand it only that they
are all interested in the taking of the cup, and he
especially, as the one confessing for them. I, above
all, am guilty, says the innocent one, in order tliat
he might share the doom of slavery with the appar-
ent criminal. In this di.sguised speech the reservaiio
vieiitalis appears in its most favorable aspect. For
his brethren he utters a truth : Jacob's sons have
incurred the divine judgment. For Joseph his
words are a seeming suljtertuge, and yet a mos*
magnanimous one. Thus the two iiolde sons of Ja-
cob wrestle with each other in the emulation of
generosity, one in the false appearance <jf a despot
and boaster, the other forced to a falsity of self-accu-
sation that seems bordering on despair. — And h©
said, God forbid that I should do so. — Here is
the culmination of tlie trial. Benjamin is to be a
slave; the others may return home without him.
Will they not be really glad to haie got rid of the
preferred and fiivorite child of Rachel, m such an
easy way 'i But now is the time when it comes true'
" Judah, thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise"
(see xlix. 8). ■
b. History of the reconciliation, of the recogni-
tion, and of their meeting each other again uwler t)u
antithesis of Judah and Jofeph, cli. xliv. 18-xlv.
15. — 1. Vers. 18-34. Jwlah as tiiret g and substitute
fnr Benjamin before Joseph. Jnilah's sjicech is not
oidy one of the grandest and fairest to be tbund in
the Old Testament (connecting itself, as it docs, with
an increased significance, to those ol Eliezer and
Jacob), l)ut, at the same time, one of the most lofty
examples of Bclf-sacritice contained therein. — Then
Judah came near unto him and said. — Peciv*
facit disertiim, the li art nial,es eluijuenl. Necessity,
and the spirit of self-sacrilice, ;;ivc the inspiring con-
fidence {it ajijiiia ia). — In my lord's ears. — Ut
presses towards him, tlnit he may speak the uior*
1 impressively to his ear and to his hcai-t (ch, L 4 ; ;
CHAP. XLIII. 1— XI,V. 28.
a-is
Sam. Triii. 23). And yet, with all liis boldness, he
neglects not the courteous and prudent attitude. —
For thou art as Pharaoh. — In tliis Judah intends
to recognize the sovereignty which could not be af-
fronted nith impunity. For Joseph, however, there
must h.ive been in it the stinging reminder that the
acme of severity was now reached. The vivid, pas-
gionate style of narration, as the ground of treat-
ment in the cases presented, is ever the basis of all
Bible speeches. — And his brother is dead.— Jo-
seph has here a new unfolding of the destiny to
which God had appointed him ; especiidly does he
begin to perceive its meaning in relation to his father
Jacob (ver. 28). This language strengthens wliat is
Baid about Benjamin, as the one favorite child of an
aged father — doubly dear because his brother is
dead.^And we said unto my lord, The lad
cannot leave his father. — From this it appears
why Joseph confined them three days in prison.
They had refused to bring Benjamin. It appears,
too, that they had consented to bring him only be-
cause Joseph had especially desired it, and had inti-
mated a favorable reception (" that I may set mine
eyes upon him," see Jer. xxxix. 12). Judah gently
calls his attention to this as though it were a prom-
ise. And, finally, they are brought to this determi-
nation on account of the pressure of the famine. It
had cost them, too, a hard struggle with the father.
The quotation of Jacoli's words (vers. 27-29) shows
how easily they now reconcile themselves to the pre-
ference of Rachel and her sons in the heart of Jacob.
— That my 'wife. — Rachel was his wife in the
dearest sense of the word, the chosen of his heart.
Therefore, also, are her two ,<ons near to him. — And
the one went out from me. — Here Joseph learns
his father's distress on his own account. His jnourn-
ing and longing for him shows how dear Benjamin
must be, no* the only child of his old age. — When
he seeth that the lad is not w ith us. — With the
utmost tenderness Benjamin is sometimes called the
youngest child, sometimes the lad. Out of this a
frigid criticism, that has no heart to feel or under-
stand it, would make contradictions. If Joseph has
his way, Jacob will die of sorrow. .\nd now Judah
speaks the decisive word, — one which the mere
thread of the narration would not have led us to
imticipate, but which springs eloquently from the
rhetoric of the heart. — For thy servant became
surety for the lad unto my father. — Therefore
the passionate entreaty that Joseph would receive
him as a substitute of the one who had incurred the
sentence of slavery. In all this he makes no parade
of his self-sacrifice. He cannot, and will not, return
home without Benjamin. He would even regard it
as a favor that he should be received in his place.
He would rather die as a slave in Egypt, than that
his eyes sliould behold the sorrows of his father. So
stands he before us in his self-humiliation, in his self-
gaerifice, equal in both with Joseph, and of as true
nobility of soul.
2. Vers. 1-5. Jo»epKs reeonciUation and mak-
ing himself krioun. — Then Joseph could not re-
fraiin. — The brethren had not merely stood the trial ;
Judah's elo<:iuence had overpowered him. Reconcilia-
tion never measures itself by mere right ; it is not
only full but running over. Thus is it said of Israel :
" he wi estled with God and prevailed." We must
distinguish, therefore, between two elements in Jo-
seph's emotion : tirst, his satisfied reconciliation, and,
secondly, his inability to resti ain any longer, though
in presence of all the beholdi rs, the strong agitation
of his swelling heart. See a full representation ot
this as given by Delitzsch (p. 558). When, however,
he says, that Benjamin's brothers, do not press him
(Benjamin) with reproachea, notwithstanding they
had reason to regard him as guilty, and at hav'ng,
by his theft, plunged them into misfortunes, there
must be borne in mind their earlier suspicions as ex-
pressed ch. xliil. 18. Doubtless they now conjec-
tured that they were the victims of some Egyptian
intrigue ; still they recognized it as a divine judg-
ment, and this was the means of their salvation. Id
their resignation to suffering for Benjamin's sake, in
their sorrow for their father's distress, Joseph saw
fruits for repentance that satisfied him. He beheld
in them the transitiov from the terror of judgment to
a cheerful courage ol self-sacrifice, in which Judah
oS'ers hunself as a victim for him, inasmuch as he
does it for his image. This draws him as with an
irresistible power to svmpathize with their distress
and so the common lot becomes the commi>n reeon-
ciUation.— Cause every man to go out from me.
— He wished to be alone mth his brethren at the
moment when he made himself known to them. The
Egyptians must not see the emotion of their exalted
lord, the deep abasement of the brethren, and the
act of holy reconciliation which they could not un-
derstand. Neither was the theocratic conception of
the famine, and of his own mission, for Egyptian
ears. — And he wrept aloud. — With iouil cryings
he began to address them ; so that his weeping was
heard by all who were without, and even by the
people in the house of Pharaoh. It follows that Jo-
seph's dwelling must have been near the palace ;
" his residence was at Memphis." (Knobel.) — I am
Joseph. — This agitating announcement, for which,
however, their despair may have prepared them, he
knows not better how to mitigate than by the ques-
tion : Doth my father yet Uve 1 — He had already
heard this several times, yet he must ask again, not
because he doubted, but that, in the assurance of this
most joyful news he may show them his true Israelit-
ish heart, aud inspire them with courage. Nor are
we to forget that Judah's words had vividly pictured
to him the danger that the old man might die on ac-
count of Benjamin's absence, and that it now began
painfully to suggest itself to him, how much he might
have imperilled his father's life by the trial of his
brethren. — For they vrere troubled. — In their
terror they seem to draw hack. — -Come near to
me, I pray you. — I am Joseph your brother
whom ye sold into Eg3rpt. — It seems as if he had
to confess for them the thiug they most dreaded. —
NoTV therefore be not grieved. — Seeing their
sorrow and repentance, he would now raise them to
faith. The one portion of them, namely, those who
were conscious of the greater guilt, must not mar
this favorable state of soul, and render faith more
difficult by their excessive mourning, nor should the
guiltless (Reuben, Judah, Benjamin) produce the
same effect by angry recriminations. — To presarve
life. — To this they are now to direct their atten-
tion.
3. Vers. 5-13. JosepKs divine peace, and (/p'itm
mission. — To preserve life did God send me. —
What they had done for evil God had turned to good.
And now, having repented and been forgiven, as God
had shown to them in his dealings, they are now in
a state to understand his gracious purposes. A
closer explanation of these words, which would re-
quire the giving of his whole history, he, for the
present, discreetly waives. — -And yet there are
6-24
GENESIS, OR THE flKST BOOK OF MOSEi.
five years. — This shows already the point towards
which his mind is aiming — to draw them down to Egypt,
— Neither earing nor liarvest. — A vivid represen-
tation of tlic years of I'amine. — Before you to pre-
serve you. — The preservation of Jacob's house
seems now of more importance than tliat of the
Egyptians, and the surrounding peoples. — By a
great deUveranoe. — The question wus not one of
kisistance merely, however great, but of deliverance
iroiii di-ath and famine. It may, however, be so
>;al'ed in reference to the great future, and as con-
taining in it the final deliverance of the world. — So
now it was not you, — but God. — Here he makes
a [lointed contrast ; not yon; in this is contained:
first, his forgiveness ; secondly, his declaration of
the nullity of their project, and its dieappearanco be-
fore the great decree of God. Thrice does he make
these comforting declarations. But in vhat respects
was it God? He made him, first, a father unto
Pharaoh, that i:^, a paternal counsellor (2 Chron. ii.
12 ; iv, 16). " It was an honorary distinction of the
first minister, and which also existed among the Per-
sians (Appendix to Esther ii. 6; vi. 10), and the
Syrians (1 Maccab. xi. 32)." Knobel. These words
also refer to the interpretation of Pharaoli's dreams,
and the advice connected with it. The consequence
was, that he obtained this high position which he
can now use for the preservation of liis fatlier's house.
— Come down unto me. — The immediate invita-
tion given witliout any conference with Pharaoh
shows his firm position ; but it was, nevertheless, a
hazardous undertaking of his agitated, yet confident
heart. — In the land of Goshen (Ch. xlvii. 1 1). —
Raarases. — A district of Lower Egypt, north of the
Nile, and very fruitful (ch. xlvii. 6, 11), especially in
grass (ch. xJvi. 34). " Even at this day the province
of Scharkijah is considered the best part of Egypt
(Robinson : ' Falsest.,' i. 96)." Knobel. See The
SAME, p. 333, and the Biblical Dictionai ies. See also
Bunsen — And there will I nouriih thee. — The
expression CiW IS may mean, that Hum maye.it not
bec'inc a possession, that is, fall into slavery through
poverty, and thus Knobel interprets it with reference
to ch. xlvii. 19, etc. ; but it may .also mean, that thou
mayest not be deprived of thy possessions, so as to suf-
fer want, — an interpretation which is to be preferred.
— And behold your eyes. — If their father in his
disti'ur-t (see ver. 2.^) should not credit their testimony,
he will undoubtedly believe the eyes of Benjamin. —
All my glory. — He perceives that his aged father,
oppressed by sonnws, can only be revived again
through vivid representations (see ver. 27).
4. Vers. 14-15. The solemnity of the sahttati n.
■ — Ano" he fell upon his brother Benjamin's
neck. — Mcnj.Tmii! is the central jioint whence leads
out the way to reconciiialion. — Kissed all his
bretliren. — The :-eiJr;f recognition, of reennciliation,
and of saluta(i.;n. — And wept upon them. — Dk-
LiTzscii : " While he embraced them." But of Hen-
jamm It is said, he wept upon his neck. Benjamin
would seem to remain standing whilst the brothers
bow themselves ; so that .Toseph, .as he embraced,
wept u])on them. — And after that his brethren
talked with him. — Not until now can they fpeak
with him, — now that they have been called, .ind
been forgiven, in so solemn and brotherly a niftuner.
'I'he joy is gradually brouglit out by an assurance,
thrice repeated, that he did not impute their decil
to them, but reclignized in it the decree and hand
»f God.
«. 'JVie joyful tnt^iii/f lo .laroh. Vero 16-28.
— Pharaoh's eommission to Jacob. — And the faint
thereof was heard. — At the recognition JcsepL
was alone with his brethren; now that he hai
made known their arrival, he avows himself as be-
longing to them.— And it pleased Pharaoh well
— KeeogJiitions of separated members of the eime
family have an extraordinary power to mc'c 'Is
human heart, and we already know that Pharaoh ^vaj
a prince of sound discernment, and of a benevolent
disposition. But what was pleasing to Pharaoh waii
also pleasing to his courtiers, and his servants. Be-
sides, Joseph had rendered graat service, and had,
therefore, a claim to Egvjitian sympathy. Thus fa>
a dark shadow had rested on his descent; for hf
had come to Egypt as a slave. Now he appears
as a member of a free and noble nomadic family.
— And Pharaoh said unto Joseph. — First, he ex-
tends an invitation to the brethren agreeing with
Joseph's previous invitation. Then Ibllow s a com
mission to Joseph, the terms of which bear evidence
of the most delicate courtliness. — The good of tha
land, — This is generally taken as meaning the best
part of the land, that is, Goshen (Raschi. Gesenius,
and others). Knobel, according to vers. 20, 23, "in
terprets it, of the good things of Egyjit : whateve.
good it possesses shall be theirs. The connectioi
with the following: the fat of the land, would seen
to point to a leasing of possession, but, of course, not
in the sense of territorial dominion. It is not an
argument against this that the leasing of places ia
afterwards asked for (ch. xlvi. 34 ; xlvii. 4). On the
contrary, the petition there made rather rests on a
previous general promise. — Now thou art com-
manded.— Pharaoh had refrained from using the
form of command towards Joseph, but now in adop^
ing it, in a case of his own personal interest, it must
be regarded as, in fact, a refined courtesy. It is the
very strongest language of authorization. — This do
ye. — He regards the cause of Joseph, and his bret'a-
ren, as one and inseparable. The sense, therefore, is
not : cause thy brethren so to do (Knobel) ; for they,
of themselves, could not take wagons from Egypt. —
For your little ones. — " Egypt was rich in wagons
and horses ; they are not mentioned among the no-
madic Hebrews." The small two-wheeled wagons of
the Egyptians "could be also used on the roadless
wastes of the ilesert." Keil. — Also regard not your
stuff. — They slioidd not grieve o\er the articles of fur-
niture they would have to leave behmd ; since they
would have everything abundantly in Egypt. — The
children of Israel. — A decisive ste[> for the house
of Israel. — Joseph gave them w^agons — and pro-
vision for the way. — Changes of raiment. —
Lanoe: Lit., festival habits (holiday ch'thing) as a
change for the usual dress. — But to Benjamin ha
gave three hvmdred pieces of silver, and five
changes of raiment. — He makes amends to this
guiltless br/;ther alter the well-meant alarm which he
I had given him. — And to liis father.— In these
' inesents Itjve .--eems to surpass the measure of its aim.
since Jacob had been invited to come speedily to
1 Egypt ; but there might possibly be hindranCf'S to
j llie journey. Besides the ten asses were for the com
mon transportation, and the occasion ol"their dismis
sioM is em|)loyed to send along with them costly
things of various kinds from the land. — See that y«
fall not out by the way. — The old explanation: da
not (|uarrel by the way, is hehl by Knolnd, Delitzach
and Keil, in opposition to Mie.haelis, Gesenius, and
others, who make it an admonition: fear not. Bui
the language, and the situn'ion, both favor the firsi
CHAP. XLJII. 1— XLV. 28.
625
hiterpretation.* The less guilty ones among them
might easily lie ti.'mpted to reproach the others, as
Reuben had done already. — Joseph is yet alive. —
In this message hi.s heart lost its warnth -f- and joy.
He had not full trust in them. It was l.iy no means
the incredulity ol' joy (Luke xxiv. 44), because the
news seemed too strangely good to be true ; rather
had his suspicion, in its reciprocal working with their
long consciousness of guilt, made him fundamentally
mistrustful. And now that dreadful shalit of Egypt
tiiMis out to be his son Josepli ! Even Benjamin's
wii ness fails to clear up his amazement. — And when
he saw the \7agons. — Not until they had told him
all the words of Joseph, and added, perhaps, their
own confession — how they had sold him, how Joseph
had forgiven them, how he liad referred them to the
divine guidance — is Jacob able to believe fully their
report ; and, now, in connection with all this, there
come the Egyptian wagons, as a seal of the story's
truth, aa a symbol of Joseph's glory, a sign, in fact,
from God, that the dark enigma of his old years is
about to be solved in the light of a " golden sunset."
— It is enough. — ills longing is appeased, he has as
good as reached the goal. — I will go The old man
is again young in spirit. He is for going immediate-
ly ; he could leap, yes, fly.
"Now purified at last, with hope revived,
Por Ufe's new goal he starte."
(See the close of the (Edipits Coloneia.) Delitzsch :
" Thus Jacob's spirit lives again. — And Israel said. —
It is Israel now that speaks. How significant this
change of name."
DOCTRINAl, AND ETHICAL.
(Ch. xliii. 1— xliv. 17.)
The great trial ; 1. Its inevitableness ; 2. its
* rThe old rendering is supported by the fact that the pri-
Doary sense of TJ") is not /ear, but excitement of mind in any
way, like Greek opY'Ii opyi^ofjLai, by which the LXX translaxfl
It, Ps. iv. 5 (dee, also, Eph. iv. 26, Be ye angry^ yet sin «o/),
and which is one of the places referred to by Kosenniuller
for the sense of/ear. In the othen|*laces cited by him the
sense of anger^ or excitement, suits" the contest best ; as
Exod. sv. 14 ; Deut. ii. '25. In all other places the sense of
.•age or anger (6p7^) is beyond doubt. There is no intima-
tion of anything on tte way which should cause feai (in the
sense of terror, commotion) any more than in any of their
previous goings and comings. The fear of apprehension, or
anxiety, such as might be felt on account of tile mishap of
the money found in the sacks, would be expressed by a very
different word. Whereas everything in the context renders
this advice of .Toseph, tliat they should get into no disputes
with one another, vei-y probable. liXX, iii) op-yt^eade, Syriac,
■ lud 0uajv«i on thf **Tod. So tho
Targum.— T. L].
t [Hebrew, !iab 3D'' and his heart grew c?iiU. 1% is the
same idea as the Greek mty, iray, ir^yvfjit, an onomaj.-Vii
word of the second class, denoting some resemblance between
he sound and the effect produced— Aarrfness, solidness, com-
pactness ; hei\ce solidify, coldness. The heart stopping in
iliill and amazement. It is interesting, too, to note how
oommon in language is this metaphor, or secondary sense,
expressing hope and joy by warmth, distrust and despair by
a chill. As in the Odyssey, i. 167—
ov$4 Ti? iffiiv
9aXir<apj}, elirep tic €in)^9oviiitv a.vBp<JoiTu>v
brjtriv €\ev<Te<T0ou • Toy 3* u»\eTo v6<rTi.fi.ov ^uoft.
No warmth to ua, — that is, no warminff hope, should
Miy one on earth declare that he would come atrain, — for-
ever gone, the day of his return." This ie very much as
old Jacob felt. Compare, also, the Iliad, vi. 412, where
9aXiru}p7j, warmth, in this sense, is opposed to chilling grief.
Kpvoc, culdf is used m the opposite way. — T. L.]
40
need ; 3. its apparent end (the banquet) ; 4. its acm# ;
5. its glorious issue.
1. The pressure ^f want, and its power in the
hand of providence: 1) How ine.\nrable in its de-
mands. Jaccib is to deliver up Benjamin. 2) How
full of grace in its designs. By it alone can Jacob'*
house be delivered from the burden of deadly guilt.
2. Judali's confiiience. " A lion's whelp " (eh.
xlix. 9). This confidence he would not have had, if
he had not formerly proposed to sell .Joseph in order
to save him, or had he not been willing to sacrifice
himself foi- Benjamin's sate return. The spirit of
self-sacrifice is the great source of courage.
3. It is in the name of Israel that Jacob treat*
with his sons in the giving up of Benjamm. Uif
reproach, too (ver. 6), is in the name of Israel. It
seems to come, indeed, from Jacob's weakness, and
to be, therefore, wrongly used; but behind the mere
sound there lies the hidden announcement of a suspi-
cion that they were dealing unfairly with the sona
of Hachel. \Ve now recognize Israel's character,
especially in the following traits : 1) Not to his other
sons does he entrust Benjamin, not even to Reuben,
whose weakness he knows, but only to Judah, whose
frankness, honesty, and strength seem to inspire him
with confidence. 2) He again employs the old weap-
on, the giving of presents to a threatening antago
nist ; yet well knowing that the Egyptian would not,
like E.sau, look to the quantity so much as the qual-
ity of the things offered, and so he sends him the
most highly prized or celebrated products of the
land. 3) With a severe uprightness does he require
his sons to return the money found in their sacks,
and thus disarm the suspicion of the Egyptian. 4)
He entrusts to them Benjamin as their brother. 5)
He commits himself to the protection of Almighty
God, i. e., the delivering and protecting God of the
patriarchs, who wrought miracles on their behalf.
6) He resigns himself to God's providence, even at
the risk of becoming entirely childless.
4. TTu prized fruits of t/te land of Canaan. In
Jacob's words there appears an objective poetry, or
the poetry or the lands, as it may be called. First
of all, it consists in their noblest products, not as
they serve the common wants of life, but rather its
healing, adornment, and festivity. When he selected
them, however, Jacob could have had but little
thought how mighty the influence these noble gifts
of Canaan's soil would have upon the great Egyptian
ruler, — how they would impress him as the wonders
of his youth, the glories of his native land.
5. Joseph's state of soul at the appearance of
Benjamin: 1) His joy; 2) his deep emotion ; 3) his
doubt, and the modes of testing it : a. the feast ; 6.
the cup ; c. the claim to Benjamin. If at the first
meeting with his brethren Joseph had to struggle
with his ill-humor, he now has to contend with the
emotions of fraternal love.
6. The agitating changes in the trial of Joseph's
brethren : 1) From fe^r to joy: 2) from joy to sor-
row; 3 ) and again f'om sorrow to joy.
7. 'Their negotianon with the steward, or tht- ile-
lusions of fear. They are innocent (respecting the
money), and yet guilty (in respect to their old crime)
Having once murdered confidence, there 11"^ njwn
them the penalty of mistrust, compelling tt^.o tfl
regard even Joseph's house as a place of tjcachery.
They could have no trust whilst remaining unrecOB
ciled.
8. The steward. Joseph's spiri* had been ir>
parted to his subordinates.
626
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSjiS.
9. Good fortune abounding (the money given to
ihem ; Simeon set free ; the honorable reception ;
the banquet; the messes); and yet tbey had no
peace, because the pure foundation for it was not yet
laid.
10. Joseph's deep emotion, a sign of reconcilia-
tion.
11. The banquet, and Egyptian division of castes.
(The distinction of caste is here recognized as cus-
tom interpenetrated by dogma, and this gives the
taetl.od of the struggle. Joseph sends messes from
his table. The true tendency of the caste doctrine
Is to absorb everything into that of the priesthood.)
Egyptian forms (honorary dishes ; the number five).
An Israelitish nie:il. As the banquet of Joseph's
joy, of his hope, of his trying watch. As the feast
of reviving hope in Joseph's brethren ; their par-
ticipation without envy in the honoring of Benjamin.
As an introduction to the last trial, and a prepara-
tion for it.
12. The successful issue in the fearful proving
of Israel's sons.
(Ch. xUv. 18— xlv. 16. Joseph and Judah.)
1. Judah's speech. Delitzsch: "Judah is the
eloquent one among his brethren. His eloquence
had carried the measure of Joseph's sale ; it had
prevailed on Jacob to send Benjaoain with them ;
and here, finally, it makes Joseph un;ible to endure
the restraint which he wished to put upon himself."
The end, however, is attained, not more by his
touching eloquence than by his heroic deed, when
he offers himself as surety for Benjamin, and is
willing to sacrifice himself by taking his place.
2. And I said. This citing of Jacob's language,
in Judah's speech, must have had something espe-
cially agitating lor Joseph, — all the more so because
the speaker is not aware of the deep impression it
must have made upon him. In this citation of Ja-
cob's last words in respect to that old event, there is
reflected, as Schroder rightly remarks, Jacob's
doubt. I said, that is, I thought at that time.
3. The moral requisites of reconciliation, whether
human or divine, are quite obvious in our narrative.
Reuben represents the better element in the moral
struggle, Benjamin the innocent jiarty, Judah the
surety, who takes upon himself the real guilt of his
brethren and the fictitious guilt of Benjamin. Re-
pentance, faith, and the spirit of sacrifice, severally
appear in these representatives. Thiough three
stages do these elements prepare the reconciliation
to Joseph's heart and to the brethren as opposed to
him. It has for its foundation a religious ground,
though only in an Old-Testament measure. The
thrice-rei>eated declaration of Joseph : Ye have not
sent me, but God has done it, is the strongest expres-
sion of restored peace and forgiveness. As Benja-
min, so to speak, had taken his place, the coiiclusinn
avails : Whatever ye have done to bun, ye have done
it even unto me.
4. It is an especial New-Testament trait in Jo-
»eph's mode of thinking, that he so fully recognizes
how the sin of his brethren, after having been atoned
for, is entirely taken away ; the divine providence
tiring turned it to good. This truth, which he so
promptly read in his mi.ssion, many Christians, and
even many theologians, are yet spelling out in the
letter. Joseph, however, recognizes, as the central
point of the divine guidance, his mission to save
Israel's houtie from starvation, and to preserve it for
a great deliverance. In this thought there lies en
closed the anticipation of a future and an enileal
salvation. For this end the treachery of the bretb
ren is first turned aica//, as guilt expiated, and then
under the divine guidance, tunted to good. Thiu
Joseph's mission becomes a type of the cross of
Christ ; though the expiating points, which are found
separated in Joseph's history, are wholly concentra-
ted ii. the person of Jesus. Here they appear in
divers persons : It is Reuben the .admouisher, Beuja
njin the innocent, Judah the surety, Joseph thf
betrayed and the forgiving. Jacob the father of a
family pressed down by the guilt of his house.
5. Joseph's kiss of peace reminds us of Christ's
greeting to his disciples and to the world.
6. Benjamin, by the way, became in after times,
a wild and haughty tribe, then deeply humbled (in
the days of the Judges), then Judah's rival, in the
opposition of Saul and David, then Judah's faithful
confederate and protegee : in the New-Testament
time, Paul again, its great descendant, connects him-
self in faithful devotion, with " the lion of the tribe
of Judah."
7. The recognitions of relatives, friends, lovers,
long lost to each other, are among the most impor-
tant occurrences in human life, especially as they
appear in their reality, and in the poetry of an
titiuity * (see Lange's " History of the Apostolic
Times," i. p. 42). In the most conspicuous points,
however, of outward recognitions, are reflected the
spiritual (Luke xv. 20), and, in both, those of the
world to come.
8. The ambiguous forms that present themselves
in the history of Joseph, and in which, at last, Judah
and Joseph stand opposed to each other, lose them-
selves entirely in the service of truth, righteousness,
and love. At the same time they appear as imper-
fections of the Old-Testament life in comparison with
the joy of confession that appears in the New Testa-
ment. What tliey represent, of the things that last
forever, is the caution and the prudence of the New
Testament wisdom. "Be ye wise as serpents and
harmless as doves."
(Ch. xlv. 18-27. Joseph and Jacob.)
1. The joyful news : 1 ) The announcers : Joseph,
Pharaoh, Egyptians, the sons of Jacob. 2) Theii
contents : Joseph Uves ; his glory in Egypt ; come
down. 3) Jacob's incredulity ; the chill of his heart
at the words of his sons, whom he does not credit.
4) The evidences and the tokens : Joseph's words,
Pharaoh's wagons. 5. Jacob becomes again Isiael
in the anticipation of the serene clearing up of his
dark destiny, in the discharging his house of an old
ban. Joseph's life restores to him the hope of a
hap])y death.
2. Delitzsch : " In Joseph's history the sacred
record maintains all its greatness ; here, in this scene
• [The dramatic power of sucli rccogiiitions appears In
their navin^ been made tho eflective points in some of th«
noblest Greek tragedies. Aristotle has a special section
upon the iyayviipiaK, as it is tecbnic.ill.v niimid, in bij
Ars rnrficti, cll. si., definiuK it as tf ayvoia-s m yyuytrit
^era8o\ri. i «is ^lAmi- if e'xSpM- "e cites a-^ cxumples tlie
rec.it;iiiiions in the Ddyssey, :in.l especially that ot Oreoloj
and Iplii;;enia, from Jiuripidos, Uo might have cued, a«
a slill more striking example, that of Oio.-tes a d l-.ieeira,
in .'soirlioeles. This story of Joseph, bad it been knim-n tc
him, would hnvo fmnished the great critic with tho lieal
illustiatiim of what he calls llie paUielic, rb iroSot, as thi
chief clement of powr in the dramatic exhibition.-- T..
CHAP. XLUI. 1— XLV. 28
0!?1
»1' recognition, it celebrates one of its triumphs.
It is all nature, all spirit, all art. These three here
become one; each word is bathed iu tears of sym-
pathy, in the blood of love, in the wine of happi-
ness. The foil, however, of this history, so beauti-
ful in itself, is the 6dja, the glory, of Jesus Christ,
wliich, in all direction.-;, pours its heavenly light upou
it. For as Judah (?) delivered up Joseph, so the
Jewish people delivered Jesus into the hands of the
heathen, and so, also, does the antitypal history of
this betrayal lose itself in au adorable depth of wis-
dom and divine knowledge." The samk : This Ja-
cob, over whom comes again the spirit of his youth,
is Israel. It is the name of the twelve-tribed peo-
ple, whose migration to Egypt, and new-birth out of
it, is decided by the HD^S, / wU go, of the hoary
patriarch.
HOMELETICAIi AND PRACTICAI/.
See Doctrinal and Ethical. Forms of character.
Forms of reconciliation. The types in our history.
Tacbe : Joseph's revelation to his brethren — a type
of Him who rose to his disciples.
(Ch. xliii. 1— xliv. 17.)
Starke : Ch. xliii. 10. Bibl Tub. : A less evil
should justly be preferred to a greater. — The same :
A Christian must bear with resignation the troubles
that God ordains. — At the door of the house. Per-
haps that they might leave iu time. The guilty con-
science interprets everything in the worst way
(Luther). [Sitting at a meal is more ancient than
lying (Exod.'xxxii. 6); the latter mode came much
later into use, among the delicate and effeminate Per-
sians.]— OsiANOER : Let every land keep its own cus-
toms, unless they are in themselves indecent and
godless. [Ch. xliv. 15; Joseph is said to have
learned magic in Egypt ; but this is hardly credible.]
• — [Ver. 9 ; that was said very rashly (?).] — Ch. xliv.
16. Cramer: God knows how to reveal secret sins
in a wonderful manner (Ps. 1. 21). — Calwer Hand-
buch : In suft'ering for Benjamin, they were to atone
for their sins toward Joseph. — Schroijer : Conscience
is greater than heaven and earth. If this did not
exist hell would have no fire and no torment.
(Ch. lUv. 13— xlv. 16.)
Starke : When God has sufficiently humbled
hi« faithful children, he makes a way for their es-
cape (1 Cor. X. 13). — Ch. xlv. 5. Lotiier : A poor
weak conscieuce, in tlie acknowledgment of its guilt,
is tilled with anguish. We must hold up and coun-
sel, open heaven, shut hell, whoever can, in order
that the poor soul may not sink into despair. When
a Christian has been exalted by God to high worldly
state, hj must not be ashamed of his poor parents,
bi others, sisters, and other relatiomi, nor despise
them (Rom. vlii. 28). — The same : 1 wonder how
Joseph must have felt when he came to kiss Simeon,
-he ringleader in the ciimes cemmitted against him ;
and yet he must have kissed liiin, too. — Compaiison
of Christ and Joseph, according to Luther and Ram-
bach. — Matt. V. 24. Calwer Uimdbnch : That is th«
most rational view in all cases, especially in tlie dark
dispensations of human life, not to halt at human
causes, or stay there, but to look at God's ways, ai
Joseph does here ; and to traee his leading, like a
golden thread drawn throug.i all the follies and
errors of men. — Schroder : Here (at the close of
J\idali's speech) is the time that the cord breaki
(Luther). — The thoughts and feelings of Jacob'i
sons are all directed intently to this one thing: Ben'
jamin must not be abandoned ; everything else
ceases to trouble them. — Judah is bold because he
.■<pe:iks from the strong impulse of his heart. —
Luther, on Judah's speech : Would to God that 1
might call upon God with equal ardor. — Judah shows
that he is the right one to be surety (Richtcr).- -Ju-
dah may have closed with tears, and now Joseph be-
gins with them (Richter). — Joseph shows himself a
most affectionate brother, while, as a genuine child of
God, he points to him, away from himself and his
people. — In God all discords are resolved. Grace
not only makes the sin as though it had never been,
but throws it into the sea (Micah vii. 19); without
abolishing sin as sin, thct is, as unexpiated, it makes
the scarlet dyed as white as snow (Isa. i. 18) —
Heim: Jerem. Risler, in section x\. of his historical
extracts from the books of the f-)ld Testament, pre-
sents not less than twenty-two points of resemblance
between Joseph and Jesus. Such a giithering, how-
ever, of separate resemblances may easdy divert ua
from the main features. Each essential homogeneity
is always reflected in many resemblances. Yet Ris-
ler's parallel is quite full of meaning (see Heim, p.
540). As yet we have had before iis the fulfilment
of the type in the course of history ; the fulfilment
of the other half still lies m the future (namely,
that Jesus makes himself known to the Jews, the
brethren who rejected him), Zach. xii. 10 ; Matt,
xxiii. 38, 39 ; Rom. xi. 25, 26.
(Ch. xlv. 17-28.)
Starke : Egypt's great honor and glory ; it<
showing hospitality to the whole Church, that is, the
house of Jacob. After dark and long continued
storms, God makes again to shine upon his people
the sun of gladness. The joy of pious parents and
children at seeing each other again in the life to
come. — Schroder : (Three hundred pieces of silver,
equal to two hundred dollars.) He not only wished
to show his love to his brethren, but also, to induce
the absent members of the family to undertake the
journey (Calvin). On the journey to eternity we
must not become angry, either with our compani^ins,
or with God {Berl. Bib.). Christians, as brethren,
ought not to quarrel with each other on the way of
life. — Heim : The first impression that the joyful
news made upon the aged and bowed-down Jacob,
was to cliiU his heart. Cases are not unfrequent of
apoplexy and sudden death arising from the recep-
tion of glad tidings. It was somewhat Ske the joj
of Simeon (Lukeii. 29, 30).
628 GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
EIGHTH SECTION.
ItraePi emigraiion with Ins family te Egypt. The setileineni in the land of Goshen. Jatoi
and Pharaoh. Joseph^ 8 political EconoTuy. Jacobus charge concerning kis burial ai
Canaan,
Chaptirs XLVI. aud XLVIl.
1 And Israel took his journey with all that he had, and came to Beer-sheba, and
2 offered sacrifices unto the God of his father Isaac. And God spake unto Israel in the
3 visions of the night, and said Jacob, Jacob. And he said, Here I am. And he said,
I am God, the God of thy father: fear not to go down into Egypt; for I will there
4 make of thee a great nation: I will go down with thee into Egypt; and I will also
5 surely bring thee up again ; and Joseph shall put his hand upon thine eyes. And Jacob
rose up from Beer-sheba ; and the sons of Israel carried Jacob their father, and their
6 little ones, and their wives, in the wagons wliich Pharaoh had sent to carry him. And
they took their cattle, and their goods, which they had gotten in the land of Canaan,
7 and came into Egypt, Jacob, and all his seed with him : His sons, and his sons' sons
8 with him, his daughters, and his sons' daughters, and all his seed brought he with him
into Egypt. And these are the names of the children of Israel, which came into Egypt,
9 Jacob and his sons : Reuben, Jacob's first-born. And the suns of Reuben ; Hanoch
[initiated or initiating, teacher], and Phallu [diBtingTiished], and Hezron [Furst ; blooming one, beauti-
10 fill one], and Carnu [Furst: noble one, Gesen.: vine-dresser]. And the SOUS of Simeon; Jeniuel
[day or light of God], aud Jamlu [the right hand, luck], and Ohad [Oesen. : gentleness; Filrst : strong],
and Jachin [founder], and Zohar [lightening one, bright-shin ng one], and Shaul [the one asked for] the
11 son of a Canaanitish woman. And the sons of Levi; Gershon [expulsion of the profane Q,
Kohath [congregation of the consecrated?], and Merari [harsh one, severe one, practifler of discipline?].
.2 And the sons of Judaii ; Er [see chap, xxxviii. 3], and Onan, and Shelah, and Pharcs, and
Zarah : but Er and Onan died in the land of Canaan. And the sons of Pharez were
i3 Hezron [see v. 9], and Hamul [sparer? gentle one, delicate one]. And the SOUS of Issachar ;
Tola [worm, cocus-worm, one dressed in crimson cloth, war-dress], and Phuvall [=Phuah, utterance, speech,
mouth], and Job [= -1'^'", see Numb. xxvi. 29 ; I Chron. vii. 1, returner], and Shimron [keeping, guard-
14 ing]. And the sons of Zebulun ; Sered [escaped, salvation], and Elon [oak, strong one], and
15 Jahleel [waiting upon God]. These be the sons of Leah, which she bare unto Jacob in
Padan-aram, with his daughter Dinah : all the souls of his sons and his daughters wtra
16 thirtv and three. And tlie sons of Gad; Ziphion [beholder, walchman, the seemg one], aud
Haggi [Chaygai, the festive one], Sliuui [the resting one], and Ezbon [Oesen. : devoted ; Fiirst : listener],
17 Eri [watchman], and Arodi [descendants], and Areli [heroic]. And the sons uf Asher,
Jimnah [fortune], and Ishuah [like], and Isui [alike, ono to another? twins?], and Beriah [gift],
and Serah [abundance], their sister ; and the sons of Beriah ; Heber [company, associate],
18 and Malchiel [my king is God]. These are the sons of Zilpaii, whom Laban gave to Leah
19 his daughter, and these she bare unto Jacob, even sixteen souls. The sons of Rachel
10 Jacob's wife ; Joseph and Benjamin. And unto Joseph in the land of Egypt were
born Manas.seh and Ephraim' [see chap. L, etc.], which Asenath, the daughter of Poti-
21 pherah priest of On, bare unto him. And the sons of Benjamin were Belah [see chap- xiv. j,
deToun-r], and Becher [yonng camel ? youth], and Ashbel [sprout], Gera [ = ni5, fighter?], and
Naaman [loveliness, graoefiil], Ehi [brotherty], and Rosh [head], Muppim [adorned one, from nc],
?2 and Huppim [prutecied], and Ard [raiert from -n^]. These are the sons of Rachel, which
23 were born to Jacob: all the souls were fourtepn. And the sons [the son] of Dan,
M Hiishim [the hast cner]. And the sons of Napnta.i; Jahzeel [alioted by God], and Gum
25 [hedged around, protected IJa], and Jezer [image, my image], and Shillem [avenger]. These art
the sons of Billiah, wliich Laban gave unto Rachel his daughter, and she bare these
26 unto Jacob ; all the souls were seven. All the souls that came with Jacob into Egypt,
which came out of his loins, besides Jacob's sons' wives, all the souls were threescore
i^ and six: And the sons of Joseph which were born him in Egypt, were two souls; al
CHAPTER XtYl., XLVH. 02t
the aouls of the houso of Jacob, which came into Egypt, were threescore ami ten
28 And he sent Judah before him unlo Joseph, to direct his face'' unto Gosiien; and thej
29 came into the land of Goshen. And Joseph made ready his chariot, and went up tc
meet Israel his father, to Goshen, and presented himself unto him ; and he fell on hit
30 neck, and wept on his neck a good while. And Israel said unto Joseph, Now let m-'-
31 die, since I have seen thy face, because thou art yet alive. And Joseph said unto hit
brethren, and unto his father's house, I will go up. and dhow Pharaoh, and say unto
him, My brethren, and my father's house, which were m the land of Cans .an, are come
32 unto me : And the men are shepherds, for their trade hath been to feel cattle; an i
33 they have brought their flocks, and their herds, and all that they have. And it shall
come to pass, when Pharaoh shall call you, and sliall say, What is your occupatii^u ?
'M That ve shall say. Thy servants' trade hath been about cattle from our youth, even
until now, both we and also our fathers : that ye may dwell in the land of Goshen ; for
every shepherd is an abomination unto the Egyptians.
Ch. XLViI. 1 Then Joseph came 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
2 land of Canaan ; and, behold, they are in the land of Goshen. And he took some of
3 his brethren, even five men, and presented them unto Pharaoh. And Pharaoh said
unto his brethren, What is your occupation? And they said unto Pharaoh, Thy
4 servants are shepherds, both we, and also our fathers. They said, moreover, unto
Pharaoh, For to sojourn in the land are we come ; for thy servants have no pasture for
their flocks : for the famine is sore in the land of Canaan : now therefore, we pray thee,
5 let thy servants dwell in the land of Goshen. And Pharaoh spake unto Joseph, saying,
6 Thy father and thy brethren are come unto thee : The land of Egypt is before thee ;
in the best of the land make thy father and brethren to dwell ; in the land of
Goshen let them dwell : and if thou knowest any men of activity among them, then
7 make them rulers over my cattle. And Joseph brought in Jacob his father, and set
8 him before Pharaoh : and Jacob blessed Pharaoh. And Pharaoh said unto Jacob, How
9 old art thou? And Jacob said unto Pharaoh, The days of the years of my pilgrimage
are an hundred and tliirty years : few and evil have the days of the years of my life
been, and have not attained unto the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the
10 days of their pilgrimage. And Jacob blessed Pharaoh, and went out from before
11 Pharaoh. And Joseph placed hi.s 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 [Ramses, son of the sun.
12 The name of several Egyptian kings], as Pharaoh had commanded. And Joseph nourishc'l his
father, and his brethren, and all his father's household with bread, according to their
13 families' [Sunsen: "To each one according to the number of liis children"]. A-Uii there was no hieni
in all the land; for the famine was very sore, so that the land of Egypt, and all the
14 land of Canaan, fainted' by reason of the famine. And Joseph gathered up all the
money that was found in the land of Egvpt, and in the land of Canaan, for the corn
15 which they bought; and Joseph brought the money into Pharaoh's hou.«e. And when
money failed 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 the
16 money faileth. And Joseph said, Give your cattle ; and I will give you for your cattle,
17 if money fail. And they brought their cattle unto Joseph; and Joseph gave them
bread in exchange for horses, and for their flocks, and for the cattle of the herds, and for
18 the asses; and he fed them with bread for all their cattle for that year. When that
year was ended, they came unto him the second year, and said unto him, We will not
hide it from my lord, how that our money is spent ; my lord also hath our henls of
cattle ; there is not aught left in the sight of my lord, but our bodies, and our lands :
i9 Wherefore shall we die before thine eyes, both we and our land ? Buy us and our
land for bread, and we and our land will be servants unto Pharaoh ; and give us seed,
20 that we may live, and not die, that tlie land be not desolate. And Joseph bought all
li.e land cf Egypt for Pharaoh ; for the Egyptians sold every man his field, because
tl ths fiinine prevailed over them : so the land became Pharaoh's. And as for the people,
ha removed them to cities ' from one end of the borders of Egypt even to the other end
22 thereof. Only the land of the priests bought he not ; for the priests had a portior
assigned them of Pliaraoh, and did eat their portion which Ph; -aoh gave 'hem when-
630 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
23 fore they sold not their lands. Then Jor^epli said unto the people, Behoh], 1 have bought
vou this day, and your land, for Pharaoh ; lo, here is seed for you, and ye shall sow the
24 land. And it shall come to pass, in the increase, that ye shall give the tit'th par^ nuto
Pharaoh, and four parts shall be your own, for seed of the held, and for your (bod, and
'lb for them of your households, and for food for your little ones. And they saitl, Thou has!
saved our lives : let us hnd grace in tlie sight of my lord, and we will be Pharaoh's ser
26 vants. And Joseph made it a law over tlie land of Egypt unto jhis day, that Pharaoh
should have the fifth part; except the land of the priests only, which became not Ph.v
27 raoh*s. And Israel dwelled in the land of Egypt, in the country of Goshoii; and they
28 had possessions^ therein, and grew, and multiplied exceedingly. And Jacob lived in
the land of Egypt seventeen years ; so the whole age of Jacob was an hundred forty
29 and seven years. And the time drew nigh that Israel must 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 wiih me; bury me not, I pray thee, in
30 Egypt: But I will lie with my fathers, and thou slialt carry me out of Egypt, and bury
31 me in their burying-place. And he said, 1 will do as thou hast said. And he said, Swear
unto me. And he sware unto him. And Israel bowed himself upon the bed's head.
[1 Ch. ilvi. 20.— The LXX have added, after Manasseli and Ephraim, averse seemingly fi-om 1 Chron. vii. 14, but
diflfering so much, both from the Hebrew of that place, and from the LXX itself, that it can hardly be recognized. No
other ancient version has it. It is not in the Samaritan, which, in most cases of variance, has been made to conform to
the LXX. If it was in some old Hebrew copies, it had clearly been put in to carry out the line of Joseph ; and tliis showa
as how explanatory scholia, referring to later things, may have got a place, and some of them an abiding place, iu the
text of Genesis-— T. L.)
[3 Ver. 28.— n"yinb , to show the way — ir^f. Hiphil of iT^^ . This makes a very good sense here, but there is some
reason for doubting it, since the LXX render ovvajT^aoi, as though they had read Hfit'lpS here, as well as just below.
To the LXX, as usual, the Samaritan is conformed, and gives P5<^p3 twice. The Syriac has g^*^^^/^ , to appear
iinto, or bt seen, which shows that the trrxnslator read rt<"nnb (for PX^nb), llophal infinitive of the verb HX^ ,
or regarded Plinb as being the same defectively written. Xhi!* has some support from what immediately follows in
▼er. 29, T^bx Nl'^1 (Niphal of nxi), and appeared, or *' presented himself'* to him. The Targum of Onkelos renders
it to meet him ; which shows also the reading PX'ipb , like that of the LXX.— T. L.]
[3 Ch. xlvii. 12.— r(I3n ""Sb . This is sometinies a phrase of comparison, or proportion, as also •^SS' (see Lev, sx7.
52; Numb, vi, 21; Ksod! xii.4, etc.), yet here it is more expressive taken literally, to (he mouth of the litUe onesy pre-
Berving the sense of proportion, yet showing, at the same time, Joseph's pathetic care— seeing to the wants and providing
appropriate fond even for the youngest in the great company. — T. L.]
(■* Ver. 13.— y"ii<n ribn". TheTextus Sam:iritanu6 has xbpi (xbni ), which Rosenmuller condemns as a mere
gloss. It seems, liowever, to be the same word, only with a different orthography, X for n ; and so all the old interpre-
ters regarded it— either reading X-P^ , or regarding nbpi as equivalent to it; LXX efeAiwe, failed, fainted; Syriac
h*&'^^» , was desolate. Literally, if we read nX5, the land was weary, faint. So the Greeks use the verb Kanvoi of
lands and cities as well as of persons. Such a poetic transfer has great pathos. So also, in Hebrew, is the verb
P^''U , to rest, transferred to the land. Conip, Lev. xxvi 34, 35. As also other verbs by the same or an opposite figure ;
Is. xxiv. 4, b^P 7^b'22 ribb'Cii V"iXri nbnO Jlbzi^ , mourning, withering, is the land, languid and xoasting the world.
There Is no need of suppo6inij;'a different root, as Gesenius does, or of comp;tring it with HHD , which is quitr a diflerent
word. See in the (Edipus Tyrannus of Sophocles, 26, the description of a land wasting with famine imd pestilence
AtQivovaa. uev xdXv^tv eyKapiroi^ \6ov6f.
-T. L.]
1» Ver. 21.— D^'^si ink 1i2iT1 , tram/erred it Ulie people) lo cities, etc. The LXX read here C'lSsb IPX n^Sl'fl.
which is good Hebrew, nutwithstandinR what RoseninullLT nays about it, and render accordingly, (coTcBouAwaoTo avr^
M naihtK, malic Ihem serve him as servants, which would not, however, be slavery, in the Bensc of man-ownership, ac-
sordiiiK to the most modern notion, but, rather an increaso of their civil subjection. The Samaritan has the Hebrew
corresponding to this ; but the whole iirgumcnt of Ocsoniua on that codex goes to show that it is everywhere a contorm-
ing to the LXJC, rather than an older text whence the rcailings of tho LXX were derived. See on this passage his
tract De Penlaleuchi damarilani Origire, etc. p. 39. The Hebrew gives a clear and satisfactory sense, as it stinds, and
the whole aspect of tlio case proves that the change was frmu that reading rather than to it. The Targum agrees with
the Hebrew. Su does the .Syriac, only with more clearness, having, instead of the single word D^~i' , a repetition,
|- w V I' n v^ from dty lo city, or ralher, /rum farm to farm. Raschi says he did this to bicak up thtir title by
4e?troylng the rosirlence as a memorial of ownership, and so preventing seditiona, as Orolius also remarks upon tl.cp iioe
rhe common loading is confirmed by .Tosephus, Anliq, Jud. li. 7, 7. — T. L.]
[• \'er. 27.— n3 ^THX'". The NiphnI form, with its jmssive, reflexive, or deponent sense, makes tho expreseiot
■;or« concBj-ocd exactly to' the teclinieiil language of the English lunuooii law in icg.ird to the holding of lanA—tlieij w/Tl
itized t,f i7--the passive of the liaheudum el fenendum in tlie languago of a grant. Compare .Tosh. xsii. d cr-THX y^ii
na mn X3 TBN , " l ho land of their holding " of which they were seised, as tenants in fee. having had " Ivcry o/ seisin "
llvon to '.hem, nUJiS TB ," by the hand of Moses." Compare also Numb, xxxii. 30, caDina 1insi5l,"and Ihc]
I
CHAP. XLVI., XLVII.
«3
m«n teized (that i8, they had ponsessiou pven them) in the midst of you." In the verse before (Gen. slvii. Ifl), JcsepI
is 8a;d to have given them possession (acting doubtless as agent or attorney to the kin^, the chief lord, or holder in capitf\
that is, livery of scisinyia some such manner, or with some such ceremonies as are described in our old common-law book*
P'H- riOl^ rrnX ciU^T , *' and Joseph put it for a decree" — a inerL trial of the grant, DTH ~fV , unto this dayj tea
is, "in fee **—in perpeiuum. It is interesting to notice how strikingly similar have been the law-language and ceremcv
niso of ditferent ages. Compare the prophetical, or spiritual, grant, Ps. ii. 8, where H-TriX has the same emphaaie, "the
lations for an inherilance, the ends of the earth for a holding forever."— T. L.]
PRELIMINARY KEIIAEKS.
1. The transplantation of the house of Israel to
Egypt under the divine sanction in the genesis of the
people of Israel, and under the protection afforded
by the opposition to each other of Egy|)tian preju-
dice and Jewish custom ; this being with the definite
reservation, confirmed by an oath, of the return to Ca-
naan. Such is the fundamental idea of both chapters.
2. Knobel finds a manifold difference in the his-
tory contained in chapters xlvi.-xlviii., " between
the ground scripture as it is accepted by him, and the
amplification of the later editor." According to the
Eloliist (he says), Manasseh and Ephraim are said to
have been youtlis ah'eady, whilst here, that is, in the
" amplification," etc., they appear as boys (eh. xlviii.
8-12). In the narrative of the Eloliist, Jacob's re-
quest respecting his burial is directed to all his chil-
dren, whilst here it is made to Joseph only (ch.
xlvii. .'?1). And this is held up as a discrepancy !
See another specimen of this critical dust-raising, p.
336. Here again Knobel knows not how to take
the significancy of his a-ra^ Aeyofiena. Even "tl.
ver. 23, must answer as proof of a second Jehovistic
document.
3. Ch. xlvii. and xlviii. are taken by Delitzsch as
Belonging tb the superscription, as containing Jacob's
testamentary arrangements.
4. Tlie contents: 1) Jacob's departure, ch. xlvi.
1-7 ; 2) Jacob's family, ver. 8-27 ; 3) tlie reunion
and mutual salutation in the land of fTOshen, ver.
28-34 ; 4) introduction of Joseph's brethren .and
his f ither Jacob to Pharaoh ; grant of the Goslien
territory ; the induction and settlement of the house
of Israel, ch. xlvii. 1-12; 6) Joseph's administration
in Egypt, ver. 13-26 ; 6) Israel in Egypt and the
proviso he makes for his return to Canaan, even in
death, vers. 27-31.
EXEGETIOAI, AND CRITICAL.
1. J,icob's depnrtiire (ch. xlvi. 1-7). — And Is-
rael took his journey. — Even as Israel he had a
human confidence that he might follow .loseph's call
to Egypt. But as a patriarch he must have the di-
vine sanction. Until tli'S time he might liave doubts.
When he halted at Beer-sheba (" the place of Abra-
ham's tamarisk tree, and of Isaac's altar ") he offered
sacrifice to the God of his fathers — a peace offering,
which, in this case, may also be regarded as a th;\nk-
oifering, an offering of inquiry, or in fulfillment of a
70W. It must be remembered that Isaac once had
It in view to journey to Egypt, had not (!od forbid-
'len him. And so, in the last revelati(m tliat Jacob
eceived, in the night-vision, there comes to him a
^oice, saying, Jacob, Jacob ; just as Abraham had to
)p. prepared by a decisive prohibition in the repeated
fall, Abraham, .\braham, ch. xxii. 11, so, in a similar
nay, must Jacob liere be prepared fur g'ting onward
to Egypt. The reve'ation wliich Abraham had, ch.
XV., might seem dark to him. Its import neitlier
held him back nor urged him forward on the jour
uey. The transplantation of his liouse to Egypt wa«
a bold undertaking. On this account the (lod of bit
fathers, the Providence of his fatliers, reveals himself
to him as God SI, the powerful one,* with whom he
may safely undertake the journey, notwithstanding
tlie apparent inconsistency that he is leaving the
land of promise. The main thing in the divine
promise now is, that he is not only to become a
mighty people in Egypt, but tliat he shall return to
Canaan. Tlie latter part might be fulfilled in the re-
turn of his dead body, but tliis would be as symbolic
pre-representation of the fact tliat Israel's return to
Canaan should be the return of his people. The
firmness of the departure appears in tlie fact that
Israel, with wives and children, allows himself to be
placed on Egyptian wagons, and tliat they took witli
them all the movable property that they possessed
in Canaan. The picture of such a migration scene
upon the monument of Beni Hassan is described by
Hengstenbeig, " Hoses and Egypt," p. 37, etc.
" Jacob is now to die in Egypt ; this death, however,
in a foreign land, is to have the alleviation that Jo-
seph sliall put his hand upon his eyes. This last
service of love was also customary among other an-
cient nations (comp. Hom. II. xi. 453, etc.-|-)." Kno-
bel. Concerning the wagons, see Delitzsch, p. .562.
2. Jacobs house (vers. 8-27). Three things are
here to be considered: 1) The number 7ii; 2) the
enumeration of the children and gr.mdchildren who
may have been born in Egypt; 3) tlie relation of the
present list to the one given Numb, xxvi., and I
Chron. ii. The numbering of the souls in Jacob's
household evidently points to the important symbolic
number 70. This appears in its significance through-
out the history of the kingdom of God. It is re-
flected in the ethnological table, in the 70 elders of
Moses, in the Jewish Sanhedrin, in the AlexandriaiA
version of the LXX, in the 70 disciples of our Lord,
in the Jewish reduction of the heathen world to 70
nations. Ten is the number of the completed hu-
man development, seven the number of perfection
in God's work ; seventy, therefore, is the develop-
ment of perfection and holiness in God's people.
But between the complete deveiopment and the germ
tiiere mu^t be a correspondence ; and this is the
family of the patriarch, consisting of seventy souls.
"Tlie number seventy is the mark by which the
small band of emigrants is sealed and stamped as
the holy seed of the people of God." Delitzsch. On
tlie manner in wliich the number 70 is formed out
of tlie four columns, Leah, Zilpali, Rachel, Bilhah,
see Dklitzsch. p. 563 ; Keil, p. 270. It is to b«
♦ [Oui- English translation, J am God, fails here in no4
giving the article (bXH), or any emphasis of expresnioa
equivalent to it. The best way would have been to give th«
name itself— /o»i El — as elsewhere there is given the nan*
E! Sh.addai, or else the meaning of the name as Lange ren-
ders it — I am the Mighty One, the God of thv fatberfl.-
T. L.l
t [See a'po the Odyssey xi. 4'26 ; xxi\ 296, and a verj
toucliiu'j' passage to the same etfect in the Elect "a of Sonho
cles. 1138— T. r..l
632
GENESIS, OR THE FIKST BOOK OF MOSES.
observed that Diiiali, as an unmarried heiress, con-
«titutefl an independent member of the house, just as
Serah. daughter of Asher (rer. 17); whilst it may
De supposed, in respect to the other daughters and
granddaughters, that by marriage they became incor-
porated with the families and tribes that are men-
Honed. The fact that a son of Simeon is specially
mentioced as the son of a Canaanitish woman, shows
that it was the rule in Jacob*s house to avoid Ca-
naanitish marriages, though the " Islimaelitish, Ke-
turian, and Edomitic relationship still stood open to
them." Keil. The ancient connection, however, with
Mesopotatnia, Laban had impaired, if not entirely
interrupted. A similar enumeration, Exod. i. 5 ;
Deut. X. 22 ; whilst the LXX, and, after it. Acts vii.
14. presents the number 75, by counting in the five
sons of Ephraimand Manasseh according to 1 Chron.
viii. 14 (see note by Keil, p. 271), an enumeration by
which the persons named are still more distinctly
set up as heads of families.
As to what farther relates to the sons of Pharez,
the sons of Benjamin, etc., it is clear that when it is said
of Jacob, that he brought all these souls to Egypt, it
must have the same' meaning as when it is said of
his twelve sons, that lie brought them out of Meso-
potamia, though Benjamin was born atterwards in
nis home. The foundation of the Palestinian family
state was laid on the return of Jaeob to Canaan,
whilst the formation of the Egyptian family state,
and of its full patriarchal development, was laid when
he came to Egypt. The idea goes ahead of the date.
Baumgarten urges the literal conception ; but the
right view of the matter is given by Hengstenberg.
For a closer discussion of the question see Keil, p.
271, and Delitzsch, p. 564; especially in relation to
the difficulties of Knobel, p. 340. Keil: *'It is clear
that our list contains not only Jacob's sons and grand-
sons already born at the time of the emigration, but
besides this, ail the sons that formed the ground of the
twelve-tribed nation, — or, in general, all the grund-
ind great-grandchildren that became founders of
mischpa-hoth, or independent, self-governing fami-
lies. Thus only can the fact be explained, the
fact otherwise inexplicable, that, in the days of
Moses, with the exception of the double tribe of
Joseph, there were, in none of the tribes, descend-
ants from any grandson, or great-grandsons, of Jacob
that arc not mentioned in this list. The deviations
in the names, as given in Numb, xxvi., and in Chroni-
tles, are to be considered in their respective places."
We refer here to Kkil, p. 'J72; Pklitz^ch, p. 5fi5.
3. Their re-union ami grcethifjs hi thi' Jnud of
Goshen. Ver, 28-34.— And he sent Judah.—
Judaii has so nobly approved himself true and faith-
ful, wise and eloquent, in Joseph's history, that
Jacob may, with all confidence, send him before to
prepare the way. Judah's mission is to receive
Joseph's directions, in order that he himself may be
a guide to Isra<'l, and lead him unto the land of
Goshen. Joseph, however, hastens forward to.-nieet
his father in Tloslien, and to greet him :ind his l>rcth-
ren. — And he presented himself to him. — Kkil:
'* nx'3 otlierwise generally thus used in sjieaking of
an appearance of God, is here chosen to express the
glory in which Jost^ph went to meet his father." *
[• Theriirht viowof ib Xfl (appeared un/o Aim) is nc-
v«8!iyy to (lotorminc tho meniiine of what follows ; aiuJ he
fell uoon hill veck, eti: "Wlio f*-ll 1 Tt is not so clear that thi;
iiibjcnt of the vt-rb Vs"" is Joseph, altlioufrh i1 i« po tiiken
by thel.XX, tboVulgalc, and mostoflbctnmHlators Incur
But sure.y it was less the external splendor, m itsell
considered, than tlie appearance of one beloved, long
supposed to be dead, but now living in glorious proa
perity. — Now let me die. — This joyiul view of
death is not to be overlooked ; it is opposed to the
common notion respecting the Jewish ^lew of the
life beyond the grave. Such language &hows thai
English version, as in that of Lutuer. it is left ambiguoas,
though both convey the impression that it was Joseph. The
Jewish commentators diti'er. Uashi makes it Jopeph, and
raises tlie query, why Jacob did not fall upon his son'.^neck
and kiss him ; for which he gives reasons from the llahbins
that are harii4y inteiligible. Maimunides, on tliC other
hand, makes Jacob the grammatical subject. It would no"
have been according to the ancient notions of reverence foi
the son to have first fallen ou his father's neck and kissec
him. The proper action, he sayf, would have been to have
kissed hie hand, and then to have waited for the father's em-
brace. Joseph, he intimates, appeared to him in all his
glory. At fii-6t he did not recognize him, but as soon as he saw
who it was (Heb., as expressed passively, a2)pfor€d, became
I'isible unto him) he fell, etc. "We m;iy think Maimonides'
other reason to be inconclusive in this case, but the gram-
matic:il one is entitled to much attention. The easy and
natural rule is that "where there are a number of verbs con-
nected, the subject of the first belongs to them all unless
there is a change direct, or implied in eome way, in the
number, gender, or idit»m. Had 13 X"^'" been like the
rest of the verbs, there would have been no ground for
such a supposition. It is, however, passive or deponent ; lie
apjyeared untu hivii (,had\-y rendered, presented himsel/), ot
became visible or known to him. The Targum of Onkeloa
translates ib XT'! by Plb ^byPX , was revealed to him.
In such case the grammatical object of the verb preceding
may become the real subject of the one that follows ; and it
must be looked for here in the pronoun ("Jb) which repre-
sents Jacob. This makes a change as though it bad been
said actively, and he (Jacob) recognized him, and fell on his
neck, etc. The verb X^^ is Niphal, corresponding to thn
Syriac w^L^ ^| • which is used for it here, and is employed
to denote a subjective appearance. Thus, in the Peschito
Version of the New Testament, it corresponds to the Greek
UI0017, and is even used for ave^Xe^pe (he recovered s>ght\
taken in this passive or f^ubjective aspect. As in Murk x.
52 ; John is. 15, where, in the Syriai-, Jesus is the subjec*
nf the verb, and the blind man's seeing, or seeing again, is
most strikingly expressed by saying, he became visible unto
him — thai is, Jesus standing before him. as the first object
on which the new eye fell. Compare, also, in the Greek,
Luke xsii. 43, '*and :m angel appeared Iu>^6t]) unto him^
and he prayed," etc. The subject of jrpooTjiixeTo is different,
on this account, from the grammatical subject of uiif)97), and
is derived from the preceding avTiZ, although no other direct
cause of change intervenes. In the spirit of this the late
Arabic \'eision of Drs. Smith and Van Dyck has well ren-
dered it gj /» fo. he appeared unto him, instead of
jjf. 1 I f when 'w! saw him ^ of a previous Arabic transla-
tion following the Vulgate. Of course, the rule stated and
the apparent exception, become unimportant, and are both
disreiriirded, wbtn the context, of itself, pievcnts all ani-
biLxuity. The more carefully, however, the language it
examined here, the more reason vnW there appear foi re-
garding the lather as the subject of the verb -S'"1 ; as in the
parallel passi-.ge, Luke sv. 20, where it in thc^father who
sees the son. and who falls upon his neck, eliev avrhv 6
■naTt]p KaL eneirftrev ini Tov rpaxv^ov avTOv. It would have
been tlie same had ttie construction been, and he appeared
unto him.
lint whatever view is taken, there is irreat pathos in the
particle "IT?, coramouly lendered again, and here, very
lamety, in our Enirlish Version, a good while. In this pug
B.igc it must have its primaiy sense of reiH-tition, rrHeration
ag it appears in the Arabic ^^Lfc ■ ^hicb tno tranflator,
Arabs Eri)enianus, actually uses for it. So Eashi and Aben
Kzra. They refer to Job xxxiv. 23, Tir C^C^ xb *'foi
not repeat<'dly Cor continually) does God lay up<'n man."
A bettor reference would be to Ps. cxxsix. 18, whcr. Tc.ioaA-,
Tarn still with thee, "T?-: '^'^^y. af?ain and ai-ain with thoo
or I's. Ixxxiv. 5, " Ble-sped are they who dwell in tl y hoae*
CHAP. XLVI., SLTU.
esi
acub recofrnizes, in Joseph's reappearance, the last
mlraoulous token of the divine favor as shown to him
in this world. — -I will go up to Pharaoh. — Knobel
explains the expression from the fact, that the city
of Memphis, being the royal residence, was situated
■ligher than the district of Goshen. Keil explains it
deally as a going up to court. This view liecomes
oecessary if we regard Tanais as the capital, which is,
however, rendered somewhat doubtful by tlie expres-
sion itself, if it is to be taken literally. — That ye shall
say, thy servants' trade hath been about cattle.
This instruction shows Joseph's ingenuousness,
combined with prudent calculation. His brethren are
frankly to confess their occupation ; Joseph even
BCis tliem the example before Pharaoh, although, ac-
cording to his own explanation, shepherds were an
abomination to the Egyptians, that is, an impure
caste. By this frankness, however, they are to gain
the worldly advantage of having given lo them this
pastoral district of Goshen, and at the same time, the
theocratic spiritual benefit of dwelling in Egypt, se-
cured, by this distinction of castes, from all impure
mingling with the Egyptians themselves. Knobel
lays stress upon the word ISX, in distinction from
ip3, because sheep and goats were not generally
used for sacrifice by the Egyptians, because tlieir
meat did not belong to the priestly royal dish, and
because wool was considered by the priests to be un-
clean, and was, iheretbre, never used for the wrap-
ping of the dead. But the conclusion drawn from
this, that keepers of sheep and goats had been es-
pecially nasin (a thing tabooed), cannot be estab-
lished. This, in a very high degree, was the case
only with herdsmen of swine (Heroo. ii. 47), who,
nevertheless, together with the herdsmen of cattle,
were numbered in the seven castes (Herod, ii. 164),
and both together called the caste of shepherds,
(DioD. i. 74). The name SounnAoi is only a naming
a potiori (from the better part)." Delitzsch. Ac-
cording to Grant ("Travels," ii. 17), the herdsmen
are represented on the monuments, as long, lean,
distorted, sickly forms — a proof of the contempt that
rested upon them. Joseph's theocratic faithfulness
preferred for his people contempt to splendor, pro-
Tided that under the cover of this contempt, they
might remain secluded and unmixed (see Heb. xi. 26).
For the cause of this dis-esteem, see Keil, p. 274 ;
K.NOBEL, p. 341.
4. Tiie pre^fjntation of Joseph^s brothers^ and of
his father, lo Fkaraoh. The grant of the land of
they shall be slill praisine thee, evermore praising thee ;" as
In Kev. iv. 8, *' They cease nut day nor nitrht saying', holy,
holy, holy." He wept long, translates Lutlier, t'jeiitefe fange,
but it means more than this ; he fel 1 upon his neck and wppl
repmtedlij, — over and over a^in, — unable to satisfy the
i;iepof — KKa.v9p.olOy as Homer st.\lesthe luxury ofgrtefeven
for remembered sorrows, much less the joy of tears at such
a recognition. Affecting is it in either view, but most otall
vhen we regard it as the long sobbings andlongembracings
of the aired father. The old eyes weeping ! There is not in
our humtu life a u. jre touching scene, even whrn it comes
from senile weakness, and not, as in this case, from recog-
nitions that might draw tears from the stoutest manhood,
and from the recollection of events whose pathetic interest
Ihe utmost invention of the novelist or the liramatist fails
to imi ate. With this passage in Genesis theremay be com-
pared he interview of David and Jonathan, 1 Sam. xx. 4i :
•* Ana chey kissed one another, and wept, one with another,
ontil David exceeded. b^^Sn "TTl 17 ." David aw/em am-
ptius; his emotion went beyond all ordinary hounds. The
expression seems to have much of the force of the particle in
the passage before us. It is another example of the ihet Ti-
Eal fact, that the briefest and simplest language is ever the
nost affecting. — T. L.l
Goshen. The induction a7i<] settlement. Ch. xlvill-12
— Some of his brethren. — (nsp^) This hasbeei
interpreted as meaning some of tlie oldest, and some
of the youngest, or, in some such manner ; but ther
is no ceruiinty about it ; since the expression ma;,
mean any part as taken (cut off) from a whole. A_
Joseph could not present all his brethren tc Pharaoh,
he chooses five, a number of much significance tc
the Egyptians (see ch. xliii. 34). Pharaoh again
shows himself, in this case, a man of tact and deli-
cacy. Of the young men he asks the nature of their
occupation ; of old Jacob he inquires his age. Es-
pecially well does he manage in not immediately
granting to Joseph's brethren their petition tc
be allowed to settle in Goshen, but leaves it to
Joseph, so that he appears before his brethren in
all his powers, and their thanks are to be rendered
unto him instead of Pharaoh. Joseph, at the same
time, receives full power to appoint proper men
from among them as superintending herdsmen
(magistros pecoris).—See K.nobel, who thinks " that
this petition was more suitable for the chief of the
horde (sic)." Yet he quiets himself by the fact
that in other places the narrator brings forward the
sons of the aged father ; as though this were not
an obviously pioper proceeding. Still he will have it
that the ground Scripture, as he calls it, reports but
one introduction of Jacob. — And Jacob blessed
Pharaoh. — When he came into his presence and
wlien he left him. There is something more here
than a mere conventional greeting. Jacob had every
inducement to add his blessing to his thanks foi
Joseph's treatment, for the stately invitation, and for
the kind reception. Besides, an honorable old age is
a sort of priesthood in the world. — Of my pilgrim"
age. — Jacob's consciousness of the patriarchal life,
as a pilgrimage in a foreign land, must have devel-
oped itself especially in his personal experience (see
Heb. xi. 13, etc.).— Few and evil That is, full of
sorrow. Jacob speaks of his life as of something
already past. This is explained from his elevated
state of soul. He is ready to die. In such presenti-
ment of death, however, he is mistaken by almost
seventeen years ; for he died at the age of one hun-
dred and forty-seven. His father, Isaac, also hac
thought to make his testament much earlier (seech
xxvii. 1, etc.). In fact, the age of Jacoli fell much
short of that of Abraham (one liimdred and seventy-
five), and that of Isaac (one hundred and eighty). —
In the land of Rameses. — (Heroon^polis.) Ch
xlv. 10, it is called Goshen. It is here named alter k
like-named place in Goshen (Exod. i. 11); and thiu
we are already prepared for ilie departure afterwards,
which started from Rameses (Exod. xii. 37 ; Numb,
xxxiii. 35). Coneeming the country of Goshen, see
Keil, p. 276 ; Delitzsch, p. 572.
5. Joseph's administration of tlie affairs of Egypt
(Ver. 13-2(3). This proceeding of Joseph, reducing
the Egyptians, in their great necessity, to a state of
entire dependence on Pharaoh, has been made the
ground of severe reproach ; and, indeed, it does
look strange a t first. The promotion of earthly wel-
fare, and of a comfortable existence, cannot eicuse
a theociatic personage in bringing a free people into
the condition of servants. But the question here is
whether Joseph really acted in an arbitrary manner.
He was not a sovereign lord of the storehouses, bul
only Pharaoh's servant. As such, lie could not de
mand of Pharaoh views that in their aspect of liber
ality lay beyond his horizon ; besides it is to be con
sidered that the people themselves desired to savi
634
UENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
their lives at the price of their freedom. The
point we are mainly to look at is that Joseph was
not at liberty to give the coru away, and, to say
nothing of Pharaoh's right, he might thereby have
opened so wide the door of a wasteful squandering, as
to have produced a universal famine. We are also
to suppose that Joseph was urged, step by step, to
these measures, by the pressing consequences of the
Bituation; but that he tried to mitigate, as much as
posible, tbe dependence that necessarily followed, by
&n assessment of the filth part, leaving four-fifths
lo them. The principal aim of the narrative is to
Hhow, in the first place, the advantages of the Israel-
ites in comparison with the Egyptians ; how splen-
didly the former were provided for. Again, Joseph
might have yielded to the urgency of the circum-
stances, all the more freely from the consideration,
that the future of Israel would be more secure by
thus having a favorable position among a depressed,
rather than a haughty and oppressive people. But,
at all events, even in this relation, divine retribution
surpasses, in its severity, the measure of human un-
derstanding. When afterwards the Israelites were
held in bondage by the "Egyptians, it may remind us
of the fact, that, through Joseph, the Egyptians
themselves had been made servants to Pharaoh, how-
ever pure may have been his motive. — Herds of
cattle The expression n?an:n njpa shows that
the fair value of the cattle is here kept prominently
in view ; since TT.p^ denotes property acquired. —
And aa for the people they demanded. — Con-
cerning the ditt'ereiit readings, ver. 21, where the
LXX and the Samaritan, and others, with Knobel, read
T'3"ri instead of T'SSn . see note, Kkil, p. 277.
We must not, however, suppose, with Delitzsch,
a translocation of the people from one place in Egypt
to another in its remotest part, but the distiibuting
of the present crown peasants into the different towns
of their respective districts throughout the whole
land. The ground of this was that, for the present,
they must get their sustenance from their granaries
in tlie cities, and that, afterwards, these became tlie
places in which they were to deliver the fifth part. —
Had a portion assigned them. — \Ve understand
this of the land of the priests, not of their portion of
the provision whicli is mentioned afterwards. — Ye
shall give the fifth part. — This was no heavy tax ;
am! there was a benefit in it, that it tended 10 pro
duce an habitual carefulness in respect to the unfruit-
ful years. That a provision, in such cases, had hei e-
tolore been wanting in Egypt, is evident from the
destitution of the people. Joseph may, therefore, be
looked upon, in all this, as a wise man striving with
the necessities of famine, so sore an evil in ancient
times.*
I* All thiB difficulty, about Joseph's proceeding, vanishes
when one studiuusly consi'ltTS what tbe K^•yltti.ln.^ would
have doiiC. or how latMl thc'ir/re« improvidence niiKht have
proved, without his sag.icious political eev)nomy. There
would haveljeen no cattle to be sold ; the lands would have
IX-eii barren for the want of hands to till them. Each one
/j.' hiit-'elf, without a common weal, and a wise ruler takint;
eare of it, and taxing them for such care, there would not
hovf b™jn, in their future prospects, anyetlmului to fiiipal-
ity, or iniiustry. It is yet un unsettled <iuestion, whether
anre^lated Individual cultivation of lauil, in small por-
.ionn, or a judicious syst^jm of landlordism, for which, of
xurse, there must be r'-nt or tax. Is the hotter method for
the univcisal Rood. The twenty per cent, which Joyepli
•xact<;d for the KOTeimnenlal care, w.ts not a Mysteni of
slavery ; and it may have li(-(;n far better than a much ifioiit-
■r percentage, perhaps, to capitjilists and usurers. — T. L.l
The accounts which Hkrodotus (ii. 109), anti
DionoRCS (i. 73), have given concerning the national
economy of ancient Egypt, seem to refer lo dispjsi-
tions of a later date, at whose basis, nevertheless,
may have lain these measures of Joseph. i;vn as thf
latter may have been grounded on stul older re'v
tions and peculiarities. The main view to be taken
in respect to this economy is, tliat the king, ii
connection with the priest and warrior castes, pos-
sessed the land (Diod. Sic), whilst the peasants and
tradesmen had land subject to rent. Now if Joseph
changed the feudal system, formerly existing, intc
one of servitude, it is to be remembered that the
former was not so favorable, nor the latter so un
favorable, as that which existed in still later times.
The feudal peasant was already under an absolute
autliority, and was obliged, e. g., at the beginning of
the seven years of plenty, to give the tilth part;
whilst the servants, as they are afterwards called,
were only persons put under a more definite direc-
tion in the management of their economic relations.
For more on this, see Keil, p. 278, on the tax rela-
tions of the East, and also Knobel, p. 34t5. (ierlach
maintains that the Egyptians did not become bonds-
men in this transaction, but were only brought into
a feudal relation to Pharaoh. It is said, however,
expressly, that Joseph bought not only their land,
but themselves, their bodies. It is true, a distinction
may be made between this, and an entire bodily sub-
jection ; and, therefore, may it be called servitude
or dependence.
6. Israel in Egypt. Mis proviso. His return in
death to Canaan. Yer. 27-31. — And they had
possession therein. — Personal appropriation and
outward extension. — And Jacob lived. — The nar-
rative prepares us very circumstantially for Jacob's
death, as an event of great moment to his people. —
Put thy hand under my thigh. — See ch. xxiii.
Joseph is to confirm by an oatli his promise to bring
his remains home to Canaan. Because Jacob exacts
this of uU his sons collectively ^see ch. xlix.), Knobel,
as '.sual, discovers a discrepancy. It is, however,
tht same determination, only more fully developed
in be latter passage. After .Joseph's promise, Jacob
p lys upon his bed. The fulfilment of his last wish
J 1," been secured. — And Israel bowed himself. —
,'c nmst think of him as sitting up in his couch ; it
is, therefore, incorrect when Keil says, he turned to-
wards the head of the bed, in order to worship, vhile
li/ing with the face tvrned towards tlie tied. The Vul-
gate wliich Keil quotes, says the reverse : adoravit
Ijeum conversus ad lecluli caput. The idea is, that,
kneeling, he bows himself in the bed, with his face
turned towards the head. The LXX seems to ha^■e read
ntilsn for n:£i2n [ham-mat-lcti for Iiam-tnlt-iah)
caused by a mistake of the vowels to the unpointed
consonants, and the consideration that Jacob is not
repre-ented as sick and confined to his bed until the
next chapter. By this LXX interpretation : irporeici'/-
i-qnfv 'f'paijA (tt'i to &Kpitv rffs fiai85ou ai'Tui" (which
we also find in the Syriae, the Italian, ami ileb. xL
21), there is suggested the rich and bcauiif i! thought,
that Jacob celebrates the completion of his pilgrim-
age (eh. xlvii. !•) in prayer ami thanksgiving. If wt
take it in the other sense, having no greater evi-
dence, and less significance, the turning to the bed's
head in a kneeling posture is the one natural to the
body, if we imagine the bed's head to be the higher
part. .At the same time, it seems here expressed tha!
Jacob, in praying, turns away from the world, and
CHAP. XLVI., XLVII.
est
from men to God, aa the facing and turning of the
priest at the altar expresses the same idea symboli-
cally. Von Bohlen maintains that the question has
nothing to do with praying. It means, he says, that
Jaoob was sinking back upon his pillow, as David,
; Kings i. 47, whilst Joseph put his hand under his
;high. For such an occasion, however, the word
innC'l (generally denothig adoration) would seem
unhappily chosen, and is easily misunderstood. Dk-
tiTzsoH takes the two representations together (as
denoting in one the act of prayer and the oath cere-
monial).
DOCTRDJAIi AND ETHICAI,.
1. Jacob's halt at Beer-shelja furnishes a proof
again of the distinction between human certainty,
and that derived from the divine assurance. Tlius
John the B.aptist knew already of the Messianic mis-
sion, before his baptism, but it was not until the
revelation made at the baptism that he received the
divine assurance which he needed as the forerunner
of Christ. In our day, too, this distinction is of
«peci;d importance for the minister of the gospel.
Words of divine assurance are the proper messages
from the pulpit.
2. The God of Israel is also the mighty God of
Jacob — the same God who commanded the one to
stay, the other to go.
3 Not until Jacob had again made sure and
sealed his patriarchiil covenant-relation with God, is
he able to set forth, with joy and confidence, on a
journey, with his whole family, into a strange and
dangerous world.
4. Exegesis, as in other places, hastens too rap-
idly over the significance of these Biblical names.
Though some are quite doubtful, others have an un-
mistakable importance, opening, by their connec-
tions, a view revealing the spirit of the respective
{.'imilies, and of their fatliers. Thus the name< of
Reuben's sons express a sanguine hope {initiated,
distinguished, etc.). In the names of Levi's sons,
we may recognize the three leading traits of hierar-
chical rule. And so in many other cases.
'). Dinah had to atone for her former freedom,
and the fanatical severity of her brothers, by a joy-
less single life. But she has the honor, along with
Serah, of being reckoned among the founders of the
house of Israel in Egypt. Together with the devel-
opment of the theocracy, there is unfolded the
gradual elevation of woman. The idea of female
inlieritance here presents itself
B. Judah, the father's minister to Joseph. By
his faithfulness, strength, and wisdom, he has risen
in the opinion of his father, and thus it is that Ja-
cob's divine illumination shows itself especially in
respect to the tribe of Judah, — becoming a revela-
tion full and clear in the blessing pronounced cti. xUx.
7. Jacob's and Joseph's reunion, full of unspeak-
able emotion expressed in tears and in embraces.
To Jacob, Joseph appears as one who had come
from the realm of the de.'id.
8. Jacob's declaration: noio let me die, presents
mother aspect in the contemplation of deatli and
Badcs, different from that which is usually raised
through the more common speech respecting it in
01' . Testament times. The men of the Old Testa-
ment describe Sheol as a gloomy region ; but this
eome? from their fear of descending into it before
Jwv have seen the full tokens of grace, or have re-
ceived that peace of the Lord which giveth rest
When they have had a sight of these, they die wil
lingly ; it is then a lying down to sleep, — a goinj
home to the fathers. In general, however, it is truf
that this terrified legal consciousness of death pre
dominates over the Old-Testament evangelical con-
sciousness of unconditional resignation in hope.
9. The instructions that Joseph gives his bnith-
ren show us that this ancient statesman clearly com-
prehended the truth, that the highest ingenuousness,
and the purest frankness, is, at the same time, the
highest wisdom (see the instructions of Christ to the
apostles. Matt. x.). This wisdom of Joseph, it is
true, was not the wisdom of this world. It was a
divine wisdom, that he thus placed the house of
Israel in Egypt under the protection of Egyptian
contempt. By il^s giving them a lowly position, he
secured their worldly wi Ifare, whilst promoting their
theocratic prosperity.
Iv). Pilgrim in youth, pilgrim in age, always a
wrestler, — Jacob just touches upon his sufferings,
4s far as it is meet for Pharaoh to hear. The feeling
of his wonderful deliverances shows itself movingly
in his blessing upon Joseph's sons. The idea of the
spiritual pilgrimage of believers upon earth appears
very distinctly in this picture of Jacob's life, whicli
he sketches before Pharaoh.
11. The last thought of Jacob, erstwhile in
Mesopotamia, and now in Egypt, is that of going
home. There he wishes to return, even in death
itself. And yet Canaan was not his true and proper
home ; though it was for him the type and pledge
of the everlasting rest (see Heb. xi.).
12. The transplantation of Israel had for its aim
the negative and positive advancement of the people
of God. Negatively : It must be transplanted from
Canaan if it would escape being ruined spiritually
by mingling with the people of the land, or bodily,
through premature wars with tliem. Positively: In
Egypt they were parted from heathenism by a double
barrier, namely, their foreign race, and their reputa-
tion as a .caste impure ; but here they found suste-
nance and room lor their enlargement as a people
upon its fertile soil ; at the same time, they were
drawn out, through the Egyptian culture, to develop-
ment of their mental powers. In Egypt were they
prepared for their transition from the nomadic to the
agricultural state.
HOMELETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
See Doctrinal and Ethical. Jacob's last pilgrim-
age.— Jacob's house. — Jacob and Joseph's reunion.
— Jacob's joy in death. — Jacob before Pharaoh. —
Israel in Goshen. — Taube (ch. xlvii. 7-10): Jacob's
life: 1. As a minor of the miseries of human Ufe in
general ; 2. as a mirror especially of a true and
blessed pilgrimage.
Fir.it Section. (Ch. xlvi. 1-7.) Starke: This
departure to Egypt is often spoken of ; Numb. xx. 14,
15 : Josh. xxiv. 4 ; Ps. cv. 23 ; Is. lii. 4 ; Jer. xxii
2 ; Acts vii. 15. — This is the last appearance with
which God favored Jacob. — -Ver. 3. .laoob might b«
afraid: 1. On account of his personal safety (ad-
vanced years) ; 2. on account of the prohibition to
Istac (ch. xxvi. 2) ; 3. on account ot his descend
ants (Egypt a heathen country); 4. on account of
servitude threatening 'hem (as predicted ::h. xv. 13)
5. or account of leaving Canaan, the promised hind
() .Ui'.aham's experiences, ch. xii. 12 (see Jacjh'i
A36
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
dedaration ch. xlv. 28). — A Christian .should enter
apo" his journeys with God accompanying. — Bibl.
Z^l : God guides his people on tbcic ways. — Cra-
mer Ja.c^^ ail example ol the fortune and pilfirinj-
age of believers. — Scuroder : The answer of God
t in reply to his di.-tressing ;uixiety, — to his flesli
ind blood, as we may regard it ; therefore does he
call him by his more human name : " Jacob ! Jacob !
Joseph shall put his liand upon thine eyes ; " the last
•ervice of love that the nearest kindred could ] er-
foim to the dying (Tobit xiv. 15). See Robinson
on the halting of the wagons at Bcersheba.
Second Section. (V»rs. 8-27.) Starke: The
ase of this aceuiate catalogue of the children of Is-
rael ; it shows the separation of the tribes, and marks
the tribe of the Messiah. It gives a clearer view of
the people's increase, and thus shows the fulfilling
of the divine promise. — Oliad, Xundj. xxvi. and 1
Chron. iv. 2], not counted here; probably died
without issue. — (Ter. 15. The numbers do not sum
up to more than thirty-two. The Rabbins remove
the difficulty by saying, God must be counted iu,
since he said that he would go down with them.
But this is not necessary. It would be better to say,
Jacob and Ids children, etc.) — Ver. 21. Un the ditler-
ence between this and 1 Chron. viil. 6, and Numb.
xxvi. 38, 39, in respect to Benjandn's children, see
the explanation in the respective places. The gene-
alogies are important. — Bibl. Wirt. : The true church
of God is a small number, but let no one stumble
thereat. God takes good care of his elect, and
knows all their names. — Schroder : The fact that
Egypt is the hiding-place for Israel, shows that the
relation was not one-sided only; if Israel was some-
thing for the heathen, it is also clciir that the hea-
then, on the other hand, had their mission for Israel
(Baumgarten). — The lull people of Israel consisted
of twelve sons, and seventy souls, and the Christian
church consisted of twelve apostles, and seventy dis-
ciples (lioos).
Third Section. (Vers. 2S-34.) Starke : (In the
land of Goshen ; after several weel<s spent on a jour-
ney of lot ty or fifty miles). — John xvi. 20. — Was
Joseph's joy great when he saw again his father, how
great will be the joy of God's cliildren when they
meet each other again in glory! — Schroder: Now
the patriarch is reidy to die, for in Jo-eph he be-
holds tlif fulfilment of all the promises. — Ver. 33.
To be sure, is lo win. Right ahead, is the motto of
the good rider ( Valer. Elerb.). The pride of the world
makes small estimate of what God regards as highei^t
(Baumgarten). Thus began already in the house of
Jacob, at its entrance into Egypt, that reproach of
Christ which Moses afterwunls esteemed greater
riches than the tre;i8ures of Egypt (Roos). This an-
tipathy of the Egyptians towards the shepherd-
people was a feni'e to them, such as was iifterwards
the law of Mo.ses (Room).
Fourth Section. (Ch. xlvii. 1-12.) Starke : Ver,
1. Joseph does not ask ijarlicidarly lor Goshen, yet
he knows in what manner to arratige it, that I'liaraoh
may readily (jt.Tceive liow tnucli he would be obligeii
to him for the grant of that district, — (Ver. 2.
■^S^TS; some translate it from the ertremea., that is
Vom the oldest and th^' youngest; other? understand
( as referring to those who were of least account.
fiieir iilea is that Joseph meant to prevent Pharaoh's
employing them as soldiers.) — Calvin: Se guis aliter
pure iJeo aervire noti pott^t tfuajn xi mnmlo xe fizti-
dum redflfit, hie omn'ft facetmai iimhitio. A Christian
must not be ashamed of the humble condition in
which God may have placed him. — Mcscol. : Pha
raoh does not inquire after Jacob's piety, re.igion
and godly walk, but only after his age. — SeVt ntee>
years. As long as he had sorrowiuUy cared for Jo
seph, so long Joseph, in return, caied for hin;,
Eartidy benefits God rep.ays by spiritual blessing?
1 Cor. ix. 11. — Cra.mer : God bestows much on tin
man who has many children. — Schroder ; Very
proper that they remain in the border district untU
everything is settled. In the midst of the Egyptians,
the Israelites are ever as strangers in the land. —
Heim : The patriarch standing before Pharaoh. The
patriarch and the priest of (iod's church before the
king of the mightiest and most civilized state at that
time in the word.
Fifth Seel, on. (Vers. 13-26.) Starke: Ver. 13.
A divine punishment of the Egyptians. (They would
not otherwise have regarded Joseph's example in the
sparing use of the com; some, perhaps, would have
scouted his predictions). — Ver. 16. Joseph said:
Fidelity to Pharaoh requires that I should not le*
you have the corn for nothing. — Freihuryer Bibel
Slavery is against the law of nature. — Our dail;
bread, a great proof of the divine beneficence. —
(Ver. 22. Ciicuinstanees sometimes excuse. If Jo-
seph favored the heathen priests it was in obedience
to the express commands of Pliaraoh.) — Schroder :
Concemiug Goshen. It was for the most part a
prairie country, adapted to the grazing of cattle, and
yet there were fertUe agricultural portions (Heng-
stenberg). — See Robi.sson's account ot Goshen, or
the province Surkijeh, p. 62tl. — In the enuiucratioii
of Egyptian herds, hor.~es come fii-st, Exod. ix. 3 ;
for their raising was especially proper for the conn-
try. — Sheep, "held sacred by the Thebans." — Asses,
Were saciificed to Typhon. — The ffth, a religious
political revenue, whose relation to tithes (double
fifths) is obvious. The tax of a fifth is small in a
fei tile land like Egypt, where harvests are from thirty
to a hundred fold.) — (Robinson compares Joseph's
conduct witli that of Mohammed AM (p. 623), who
made himsell' sole owner of all the property in
Egypt; but the great difference between them is ob-
vious.}— The double tithe in Israel was probably a
Mosaic imitation. " As I'haraoli provides by a fifth
for the sustenance of the piiests, so also Jehovah"
(Hongstenberg).
Sixth Section. (Vers. 26-31.) Starke: Bibl.
Tu '. ; It is right that a certain part of what the land
produces should be given to tlie lord." — Ver. 30.
Thus Jacob testifies to the resurrection of the dead,
as one who awakes from sleep. — Schroder : Jacob
dies as the last of the pairiarclis, and his death is
the conclusion of this historical introduction, or his-
tory of the beginning. He dies, nioreovi r, in a for-
eign land. Tliat makes it the nioic important and
conclusive event. (In the expression : have found
grace, there comes into consideration : 1. That it has
not the same weight, nor tlie same subordinate sense,
as it would have in occidenta' speech ; 2. that Ja-
cob here asks a favor ol Joseph which might seem
to him as coming iu collision with his Egyptian
duty.) — IIkim: Jacob had reached a lovely evening
of his wearisome and troubled life; but it might b(
said of him : Forgetting the things that are behind
I reach forth unto the things that are before.
• (So says the European commcntattir. The Aiiiericftn
would rather say; to iha yovcntmfi.nl that protects its pro-
duce and the labor employed in \\» cultivation,— presenting
a simil:ir idea, h.ut in h more rati-;nal, ae well aa in i
milder form. — T. L. ]
CHAP. XLVl., XLVII.
(m
[Note on the Interview between Jacob and
Pharaoit — the Patriarchal Thkology — the Idea
uF the Earthly Life as a Pilukimage. — Commen-
tators have bestowed much study upon the gene-
alogical register in the preceding chapter, the mean-
ing of its proper names {in most cases not easily
determined), and the question, whether all the de-
scendants of Jacob there mentionid were born be-
fore tlie migration. This is valuable, indispL'nsable,
It may be said, to a right knowledge of the Scrip-
tures: but it has led many to pa-'S very slightly over
those scenes of touching lieaiity, and most exquisite
tenderness, that are presented in Joseph's meeting
with his lather (already alluded to in the note, p.
•)33), and in the interview between Jacob and Pha-
raoh, ch. xlvii. : " And Joseph brought in Jai.-ob his
Cither, and set him before Pharaoh." What a pic-
uie of life and reality have we here ! Tlie feeble
patriarch, leaning upon the arm of his recovered son,
19 led into the presence of the courteous monarch,
who receives him, not as an inferior, nor as a de-
pendent even, but with all the respect due to his
great age, and with a reverent feeling that in this
very old man, the representative, as it were, of an-
other age, or of another world, there was something
of a sacred and prophetical character. " And Ja-
cob blessed Pharaoh." It is probable that Pharaoh
asked his blessing. At all events, there is something
in the kindliness of his reception that induces Jacob
to bestow his patriarchal benediction upon him ; and
doubtless the king received it, not as a formality, or
with a mere feeling of courtly condescension, but as
something that had a divine value for himself and
his kingdom. Throughout this narrative of Joseph
there is a life-likeness in the character of Pharaoh
that shows" him to us as one of the most veritable
objects presented in history. And what an air of
reality in all these scenes here so exquisitely por-
trayed! What a power of invention do they exhibit
(if we concede to them no higher excellence) ; what
skill in the art of pictorial fiction. — that | eculiar
talent so cultivated in modem times, and which, it
is supposed, has only reached its perfection in our
own day. It is this, — inconsistent as it may seem
with all we know of the most early writings, — or it
is the most natural and exact drawing from the very
life. There is something here in the internal evi-
dence which the sound mind intuitively perceives,
and on which it confidently reUes. It is no invented
tale. The picture stands out vividly before us ; age
has not dimmed its colors ; remoteness of scene, and
wide diversity of life and manners, cannot weaken
its effect. It produces a conviction of reality strongei
than that which comes, often, from narratives ol
events close to our own days, or even cotemporary.
Away over the chasm of time we look directly into
that old world. We see the figures distinctly mov-
ing on that far-off ancient shore. It is brought nigh
to us in such a way that we could almost as well
doubt our senses, as think of calUng it in question.
At all events, no m vthical theory can explain it. We
»re shut up to a very sharp issue, a very stringent
jjtemative : It is the very truth, the very life, in the
minutest feature of its close hmniug, or it is the
moBt monstrous, as it is the most circumstantial, and
ronsciously inventive, lying. No " higher criticism,"
as it is called, can ever make satisfactory, to a truly
thoughtful mind, the comparison sometimes drawn
between these " Bible stories " and the cloudy fables
that characterize the early annals of other ancient
latiocs. Study well the striking contrasts. The
lives of the pilgrim patriarchs, 80 clear in theii lif»
like portraiture.^, the wild Scamlinavian legends, tilt
wilder Hindoo myths, presenting not simply tl;<,
supernatural, for there are connections in which tha*
is most credible — more crediljle even than its ah
sence — but the tmnalurril, the horrible, the mou
strous, the grotesque ; wliat affinity between these *
The clear, statistical story of .loseph, tlie picture ol
the veritable Pharaoh,— the shadows of Ion, of Dorus
of L'adnms, that flit across the dim jiage of the ear-
liest Hellenian history ; what sane mind can trace
any parallel here ? There is no escaping the issue,
we may say again. It is sharp and decisive. The
reasoning is curt and clear. Absolute fiction in these
Bible stories, with a skill surpassing that of Defoe,
Scott, or Thackeray, — absolute forgery, with a con-
scious intent to deceive iu every particular, or abso-
lute truth, self-verifying, is the only alternative. If
is not such a forgery; it is not such an artful fiction
the most extreme rationalist shrinks from affirming
this; it is, therefore, the truth, and nothing but the
truth. We may reverently use the imagination in
attempting to fill up some parts of the picture, but
we may not disturb the graphic outline. How verj
clear it is in the passage specially before us. Im
agination needs no help. We can almost see them,
the stately monarch, the very aged man, the beloved
son now in the strength and glory of manhood, —
they stand out as vividly as anything now on the
canvas of our present history. We may as well
doubt of Caesar and Alexander, yea of Napoleon and
of Washington, as of Jacob, Joseph, and Pharaoh.
" And Pharaoh said unto Jacob, How old art
thou ? " The Enghsh translation here, in departing
from litoralness in the question, has marred the ef-
fect of the answer, the peculiar language of which
is suggested by it, or, at least, strictly connected
with it. The Hebrew is, TC"|n ^51U i^"' nas.
which we have rea-on, from what Diodorus says of
their views of Ufe (hb. i. 51). to regard as an Egyp
tian as well as a Shemitic idiom — " How many arc
the days of the years of thy life" (or, lives)? It is
a drawing out of the phrase to make it intensive.
It suggests the long years of the earthly sojourning,
enhanced by the thought of the many days of which
they are composed — or days taken in that indefinite
way so common in the early languages to denote
tiinex or periods. In what perfect harmony with
this is the answer ? We see in it the old man's gar-
rulousness (using the term in its most innocent and
natural spr>ip}, the feeling of personal importance
which the very old exhibit, and rightly exhibit, in
view of their surpassing length of years. They love
to dwell on it, and to state it minutely, extending
their words as though iu some proportion to the long
time through which memory looks back. How
strongly we are reminded here of the Greciau Nestor,
except that there is a holiness and a moral grandeur
about Jacob, to which the old Homeric hero, in hie
garrulous worldliness and boasting, makes no ap-
proach. They are alike in the senile reduplication
of their words. Not, however, like the frequent
Nestoric prelude, M' Sis TiSduiut, " 0 that I were
ynnng agam," but in a prolonged strain of solemnity
and sadness comes the slow reply : " The days oi
the years of my pilgrimage are a hundred and thirty
years ; few and evil have been the days of the yean
of my life, and have not attained unto the days of
the years of the lives of my fathers, in the days of
their pilgrimage." We can see the old man as h»
says this, leaning on his staff, and supported by hii
ess
GENESIS. OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
son ; we can almost hear the tones of his trembling
voice, the pauses of his slow utterance, the seem-
ingly tautological yet most emphatic sound of his
repetitions. " Few and evil ; " alas! how ancient is
this style of speech ! How from the very beginning
dates this wailing language so full of the feehng that
iome great evil has befallen humanlly, and that our
aartlily life, in its best condition, is but a pilgrimage
of sorrow. It has not come fi'om tlie world's later
experience. The farther we go back, even into what
would seem to be the very yotith of our race, the
louder and clearer is the voice. It is not confined to
the Scriptures. It meets us everywhere in the ear-
liest heathen writings, but without the placid resig-
nation that is so evident in the most striking Biblical
examples. Compare the O'lyssey, xviii. 130.
ov5kv aKtSvoTfpov yata Tpt'f/>ei ayBputiroto
iTuvTuiVt OCTO'a Te yatav eiTi Trt'etei re fcai epwet —
Sophocles, (Edipus Turc
1186,
iu> yeveal fiporCiv '
TtV ><ip, T'S (i('7)p TiKeov
Tas eiiSatfzoJ'ta? i^e'pet,
Tl TOtrOVTOV 0(TOV SoKCtl',
fcal iofacT* CLTTOK^lvat,
So Pindar's irifias urap Si'Spain-os, Pi/lh. viii. 99.
Compare Job vii. ; xiv. ; Ps. ciii. 15 ; Gen. xviii. 27
("who am but dust and ashes,"); the same. Job
XXX. 19; xlii. 6 ; Sirach x. 9 ("whyis dustand ashes
proud") ; and other passages too numerous for quo-
tation.
Among the most natural and truthful things in
ibis narration is the respect shown by Pharaoh to
Jacob. It might be accounted for by that courteous-
ness and sense of justice which seems so character-
istic of this monarch, as also by his great friendship
for Joseph. But there is soiuetbing more in the case,
and having a deeper ground. It is a feeling of rev-
erence which makes him desire the patriarch's bless-
ing. Respect for age was more felt, and more lauded
as a virtue, in the ancient world, than in the modern,
although it still holds, and nothing but a most disso-
lute civilization cati break it up. There is, moreover,
poniething of awe with which we look upon a very
old man, a centenarian or upwards, one who has
gone far beyond the ordinai-y limit of human life.
It affects us as a strange spectacle. There seems to
be something unearthly about him, superhuman,
almost svijiernatural — as though he belonged to
another age, or world. So to the young Telemachus
appeared the aged Nestor who had survived three
generations of men (Odyss. iii. 24t)),
Siare /iOl adavaroi ifSoAAerat e(aopaiur0ai,
" like an immortal, as I gaze, does he stand out be-
fore me" — like one seen in vision, to give the full
force of that peculiar word iVSaAAerai — or as some-
thing tMiisccnding the ordinary humanity. This
feeling was heightened by the fact that the Egyptians,
■8 compared with the nomadic patriarchs, were not a
long-lived people. Jacob, although he had " not
attained unto the days of the years of the life of
his father.-*," was to them a remarkably old man.
Pharaoh had, prnliably, never before seen a ca-<e of
luch extreme longevity. Herodotus (iii. 23) le.anis,
ftom the Egyptians, of an yKthiopian people, among
whom HOme reached the ago of one hundred and
twenty years, but the manner in which it is narrated
ihowHthat it was regarded as reniarkalile and excep-
tional, confirming the idea that such advanced age
man uik'iown amoig the Egyptians themeelves.
The matter however, of deepest interegt, ao<
most worthy of note in this answer of Jacob, 16 \U
pilgrim tone : " The days of the years of my oil'
grimage — few and evil have they been, and have no>
attained unto the days of the years of the life of mi
fathers, in the days of their pilgrimage." Who can
deny the fairness of the a|iostle's reasoning (Heb. xL
14): " Now they who say such things ileclare plainly
(flvpapi(ov(T:i>, make it very niiinifest) that they seek
a country — that they long (opeyovrai) for a bettei
country, even a heavenly — confessing themselves to
be strangers and sojourners upon earth " ({ti/m Ka\
7rap6Trtfi7;^0(, men away from home). "Wherefore
God is not ashamed to be called their God (not of
the nonexistent, or the perished, Matt, xxii, 32), for
he hath prepared for them a city" — "a city which
hath foundations," stable, enduring, that " passeth
not away." This language of pilgrimage is not re-
solvable into the unmeaning, like a worn-out modern
metaphor, or a mere poetical sentimentality. Such
use of words would be wholly inconsistent with the
character of the patriarchs, and their stern ideas of
reality. It was not a pilgrimage simply in respect to
the old home " whence they came out ; " for thither,
as the .author of the epistle to the Hebrews most
pertinently observes (xi. 14), they could, at any time,
have returned. That certainly was not " the better
country " they were seeking. No going back to
Mesopotamia, the region of the fire-worshipping
idolatry; rather go down to Egypt, the land of
dreams and symbols, yea, down to Sheol even — ever
pressing on their pilgrim-way with unaba.ted confi
dence in the covenant God. He would be with them
wherever they went. Into whatever regions they
might pass, known or unknown, there would be the
bs<!>n TiX^O, the "angel Redeemer," to "deliver
them from .all evil." It was no metaphor except as
a transfer from a lower to a higher sense. The true
pilgrim idea is inseparable from the term constantly
employed. No word in the Hebrew language main-
tains a more clear and emphatic sense : ^"3^,
a sojimrning, a tarrying, a pilr/rimaf/e, from ^13,
to turn aside by the way, to tarry as a stranger, ever
denoting a temporary instead of a settled residence
It is a staying in a land which is not one's home.
So, to the patriarchs, even Canaan is called I'lX,
Dn"'"iJB the land of their pilgrimages. To their de-
scend.ants, or to the Israelitish nation taken collect-
ively, as a corporate historical entity, it was a
KAijpoi'ojiia, a settled earthly i»Aeri7a/«-e, but to them,
individually, it was not "the rest provided for the
people of God," and this language was over to re-
mind them of it. Their only inheritance was the
promise, of which the Canaanitic H\T](nivuaia was the
type, and of this they became "/(.!>« through faith"
— 5(a Tri(TTfa?J KKf^puviiiioVvTCitv TA2 trlArrEAI A2.
Heb. vii. 12. For examples of sncli use of laj,
•".Vj-O and 15, see Gen. xvii. 18, xxviii. 4 (" the land
in which thou art a stranger "), Ps. cxix. B4 ; xxxix.
13; 1 Ohron. xxix. 15; Lev. xvii, 22 (" the stiange:
dwelling in the midst of you "), Deut. v. 14 ; xxiv.
14, and many other places. The idea is ever \w^■»■
ent, that of a stranger tarrying in a .strange land ;
and this language of the patriarclis lias been takei
up by later writers, thus becoming prcdoniinani
among the grave jiictures of the Old-T.'Stamenl
saintly life. See 1 Chron. xxix. 15; Ps. xxxix. 13,
" strangers before thee, and sojourners as all oui
fathers were." The words are alto used of lodginj
CIIAI'. XLVI., XLVU.
63(>
ID an inn, or dwelling temporarily in a tent, and this
calls up the passage before quoted from Diodorus
Siculus (Excursus on Sheol, p. 587), showing that
tiome such an idea of life being a pilgrimage was not
altogether unknown to Pharaoh, and to the early
Egyptians, The other conception of life, as a tran-
Bient dwelling in a tent, gives an inexpressible sub-
Umity to some of the Old-Testament declarations,
evidently accommodated to it, and intended to denote
the security of the everlasthig rest : " From the cuds
of the earth do I cry unto thee" (from this distant
earth, this remote and foreign land) ; " 0 that I
might dwell in thy labernade of the elernities
(C^^b^S Tjljnsa), 0 that I might find shelter under
the covert of thy wings," in the " secret place of thy
presence ! " Ps. Ixi.
As Canaan was not " the rest," so neither was
Sheol, whether regarded as the grave merely, or some
strange state of continued being, lying beyond. No
mere sentimentality about the sepulchre as a place
of repose from life's weariness could answer to these
grave declarations of grave men, much less that mon-
strosity of conception which would connect the ideas
of rest and utter non-existence. Sheol lay in the
road of their pilgrimage. Through this unknown
region — so very dark then, so obscure even yet, —
they had to pass ; but only as a part of their ap-
pointed journey. The " city which had foundationi>,"
lay still beyond. But why, it may be asked, as it
often has been asked, did not the patriarchs, and the
pious Bible writers who followed them, say more
kbout this better country, instead of only, now and
then, giving a glimpse of it in some pious ejacula-
tion ? It may be answered, that peihaps theii-
learts were. too full of it to say much about it. They
jad the pilgrim's reticence in the midst of frivolous
and unsympathizing strangers. These old " men of
faith " had that precious thing so pleasing unto God
as the only root of any true human virtue, and which
made these uncultivated Old-Testament heroes, im-
perfect as they were in some things, fairer in His
sight than an Epictetus, a Seneca, or an Antonine,
with all their lauded and refined morality. They had
*' this precious faith," but they did not weave it into
dogmas, or construct from it systems of heartless
ethical speculation. They did not talk of their spir-
ituality ; and yet, even in the few things they said,
what approach is made to them by the modern ra-
tionalist, or our flippant litterateur, who calls them
gross, and pronounces their views so defective as
measured by the later progress in all elevated and
refined thinking ? Who hears, or exjiects to hear,
'rom critics of this class, the utterance of any long-
ing desires for the better country ? How strange it
would soimd to liear them say: "I have waited for
thy salvation, 0 Lord," or to make, in earnest, the
declaration that they regarded themselves as " pil-
grims and sojourners " upon this unsatisfying earth I
Again, a reason of their silence may have been
the reserve arising from the thought of the dark and
unknown journey yet to be made before their pil-
grimage was wholly ended. Their views of Sheol
were sombre, because Sheol (in its true sense) was
to them, perhaps, a stronger, a sterner, if not a clear-
er reality, than it has become to us w'th those con-
fident expectations of an immediately jierfeet stat ?
that lia^e placed the old doctrine, with much valua-
Dle Scriptin-e connected with it, almost wholly in the
background of our theology. But to understand
their language we must go back to their standpoint,
dark and inadequate as it may seem to us. As death
was not non-existence in any view (see note on tht
earliest ideas of death, p. 274), but a stale of beini)
however strange, — not the opposite of being, at all,
but of active life, — so Sheol was the contiimauce, the
prolongation of the judicial death jfronounced upon
man, not a state following it. Deliverance from orit
was deliverance from the other. Their pilgrimage
led them through this shadowy place, and though
they still trusted to their covenant God, they knew
not when, nor where, nor how that deliverance should
be. Sheol was not their liotiie, their language ira.
plies that; it was not the end of their journey.
They did not talk of going to Heaven, or to glory •
these ideas, as we now hold them, had not yet come
in ; and yet, if we may take many expressions in
the Psalms as the language of the Old-Testament
religious experience, there was ever the thought of
a divine presence, of a nearness unto God, of the
support and guidance of the redeeming Goel, what-
ever ideas of locality, of time, or of condition, might
be present or wanting to the conception. As their
eyes grew dim in death, their hope grew stronger,
though, perhaps, no more definite than before.
Hence Jacob's ejaculation, coming in so strangely
and so suddenly, whilst presenting the visions he
had of his sons' worldly destiny. To cheer his dying
heart, there seems to have mingled among these far-
off yet earthly pictures, as they crowded upon the
seer's mind, a ray still more remote, from the other
side of Sheol. What else could he have meant in
that remarkable interruption of the prophetic series ;
nin';' ■'ri^l'p ~'^?'"^''i!, " for thy salvation liave t
waited, Jehocah" (Gen. xlix. 18). What salvation?
nothing, surely, in this life. It was no deliverance
from Laban, or Esau, no expectation of worldly se-
curity, such as followed his vision upon the stone
pillow at Bethel. That was all past and gone. Sheol
was before him, but Jacob still trusts the angel of th«
covenant, and this dying ejaculation shows that there
was with him, then and there, in some way, the pres-
ence of the nameless power that had met him at
Peniel. What meaning in it all, unless th.it power,
and that guide, was expected to go with him through
the still darker journey ? The supposition that this
sudden exclamation refers to something seen in vision
in respect to Dan and Samson (an opinion derived
from its place among the blessings which it inter-
rupts), seems the merest trifling, — with all respect,
be it said, to the learned commentators who have
held it. Even if we regard the whole as an ecstatic
dream, there must be some consistency in it.
The whole patriarchal theology may b'* summed
in one great article, trust in the covenant Gud, — a
trust for life, a trust for death, for the present being,
or for any other being. There was something ex-
ceedingly sublime in this faith. They were like met
standing on the border of an immense ocean, all un-
known as to its extent, its other shore, if it had any,
or its utter boundlessness. Ready to launch forth
at the divine command, they had the assurance that
all would be well, whatever might be their individual
destiny, since this covenant God was also the God
of their fathers, who must, therefore, in some way,
'' live unto Him," that is, they must have yet a being
that would make them the proper subjects of such a
covenant relationship. Still Sheol had a gloomy as.
peet ; it was associated with the idea of i)enalty
Death and Hades went together ; the one was but *
form of the other, a carrying out of the great sen-
tence. Though a part of their pilgrimage, the waj
;vas very dark Not with rapture, therefore, but
540
GENESIS. OB THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSlSS.
with calm confi;let]ce. did thev go down into its un-
Known depths, stiil holding fast tbe hand of the " re-
deeming angel." who in death, as well as in the
active earthly life, would '* deliver them fiom all
evil." They knew that this " Redeemer lived " (Job
lix. 25), and they felt that in some way, they kneiv
not how, his life wa,s theirs. He conld "quiekin
them, and bring them up again from the depths of
the earth " (Ps. Ixxi. 20). Thus their hope look the
form of a icairiH/, until " th« wrath should turn"
(TJEX :"'j IS, Job xiv. 13), and the dread penalty,
in some way, be satisfied. Thus Job says: "all the
days of my appointment (there) will 1 wait, until my
change shall eonie " — my haJipah, my reviviscence
or renewal (see how the word is used Ps. xc. 5, and
cii. 27). So Ps. xvi. 1 ■, " Thou wilt not leave my
Boul in Hades," Ps. xlix. 8-16, " No man can redeem
his brother " ; " yet God will redeem my soul from
the hand of Sheol, for He wUl take me." Let the
rationalist say what he will of this language, the
taking out of the /latid, and the preventinci, for a
brief and unimportant time, the hand from seizing,
can never be made to mean tbe same thing. To the
same etfect Ps. xxxi. 6, " Into thy hands do I trust
my spirit, for thou hast redeemed me (rescued, ran-
tomed me), Jehovah, God of truth'"— of covenant-
faithfulness. Sometimes it seema to take the form
of a hope ihat this Goel, this "angel of the cove-
nant," would be perionally with them in Sheol.
There is good reason foi thus mterpretiug the pas-
sage Ps. xxiii. 4, as referring rather to Sheol itself,
the spirit-world, or world of the dead, instead of a
state of sorrow in this life, or a drawing near unto
death, as is commonly supposed. For places in which
r^abs [tzahiiaveth, there rendered shadow of deaih)
is put for death itself, or the state of the dead, see
Job xxxviii. 17 (r'l'sbs "'l)"'^" , gates of tzalinaveth),
X. 22, xii. 22, compared with Job xxviii. 3, and
especially Job xxviii. 21, 23. Such a rendering
seems necessary to the climax intended Ps. xxiii. 4 :
" Even in the valley of tzalmaveth," in the land of
the shades, the terra uiiibrarum, "I will fear no evil
(comp. Gen. xlviii. IB), for thou art with me, thy rod
and thy staff' they shall comfort me" — ■'STansv
restore me, revive me, and iience the Syriac N^nsjD .
for reviviseence, resurrection. In Hades they are
Still with " the Shepherd and Bishop of Souls."
This patriarchal faith, in its pilgrim as|iect, seems
k strange thing to our modern conceptions ; but
there is a view of it which may lead us to regard it
as even a stronger, if not a better, faith than our
own. Involved in the very essence of all spiritual
religion are two great truths: 1. The being of a (!od,
A moral guvemcjr who treats man as something
tbove the plane of nature, that is, enters into a cove-
nant with him ; and, 2 the existence of the human
<iial in another Iif( as groundol, in its ultimate per-
fection at least, upon sue. covenant. The first of
these is also first in value and importance. It is the
first less., n in the catechism of theolo.s;y. It musi
be learned thoroughly, or the second, by itself, ai
the mere idea of continued spiritual existence, b*
comes a perversion, and may be a source even of
dangerous imaginative error. The patiiarchs were
educated chiefly in this greater and more funda
mental dogma, belief in God, trust in God, submit
sion to God, whatever might be the human destiny
Nothing can be purer or more lofty than their theism
when viewed alone ; though, as has been befoi e re-
marked, it is never wholly separate from some form
of the other doctrine. The purity with which men
hold the second must depend upon the thoroughness
of their initiation into this prime idea of a God to
be trusted, in Ufe, in death, in light, in darkness, and
to whose sovereign wisdom and goodness there must
be an implicit resignation, whatever may be known
or unknown in respect to his dealings with the finite
being he has created. To this sfcite Job was brought,
when, at the close of the long drama, he tell upon
his face before God, and said ^mto Uiin ('ix, mita
nie, not, concerning we) that "right thing" for which
he was commended, rather than for any superiority
in the previous argument. Hence it is that this first
truth takes precedence, not in rank only, but in the
time order of revelation, though the second, in ita
rudimentary .■^tate. may be almost coeval with it.
The one is fully developed, while the other is in its
germ. As best expressing the contrast, the editor
would venture here to quote from something he haa
elsewhere written (" Article on the Clo.sing Chaptera
of the Hook of Job," Mercersburg Review, Jan.
1860): "The pairiarchs were first instructed in that
first and greatest chapter in theology. Is there not
something in modern experience to show the evil of
reversing this order of ideas, of making the subordi
nate primary, of coming to regard the human spis
iiual destinv too much as the chief thought in re-
ligion, and the belief in a God as something mii.is-
terial or mediate to it ? We refer not now to that
naturahstic form of spiriiualism which has lately be-
come so rife among us, but to much that appears in
the better thinking of the religious world. We may
yet learn from the Old Testament. We may see a
glory in its theism thus standing alone in its sublim-
ity. Boast as we may of our progress in theology,
unless this order of ideas is preserved in all its purity,
our belief, our reverence, our highot thought of
God, may fall below that of the Syrian i)i'griin, or
of that ancient son of ihe East whose suiferiugs and
exjierience are recorded in attestation of this first
and greatest of truths." We must guard against such
tendency, or there is danger that our Tc-lig'o, — oui
\ievr of the bonil between the infinite ind the finite
soul, — may become nature instead of cwenan',—-»
dieamy sentimentality instead of faith. -T. L.1
UHAP. XLVm. 1-22. 641
NINTH SECTION.
Jacob's sickness. Hi» blessing of his grandchildren. Joteph't son*.
Chapter XLVm. 1-22.
1 And it came i-o pass, after these things, that one ' told Joseph, Behold, chy father u
2 sick ; and he took witli him his two sons Manasseh and Ephraim. And one told Jacob,
and said, Behold, thy son Joseph cometh unto thee ; and Israel strengthened himself,
3 and sat upon the bed. And Jacob said unto Joseph, God Almighty appeared unto me
4 at Luz [Bethel] in the land of Canaan, and blessed me. And said unto me, I will make
thee fruitful, and multiply thee, and 1 will make of thee a multitude of people; and I
5 will give this land to thy seed after tliee, /or an everlasting possession. And now thy
two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, that were born unto thee in the land of Egypt, be-
fore I came unto thee into Egypt, are mine ; as Reuben and Simeon, they shall be mine.
6 And thy issue, which thou begettest after them, shall be thine, and shall be called after
7 the name of their brethren in their inheritance. And as for me, when I came from
Padan, Rachel died by ' me in the land of Canaan, when yet there was but a little way
to come unto Ephrath ; and I buried her there, in the way of Ephrath ; the same is
8 Bethlehem [reason for enlarging the descendants of Rachel]. And Israel beheld Joseph's sons,
9 and said, Wiio are these? And Joseph said unto his fother. They are my sons whom
God hath given me in this place. And he said. Bring them, I pray thee, unto me, and
10 I will bless them. Now the eyes of Israel were dim for age, so that he could not see.
11 And he brought them near unto him, and he kissed them, and embraced them. And
Israel said unto Joseph, I had not thought to see thy face ; and, lo, God hath shewed
12 me alsp thy seed. And Joseph brought them out from between his knees [Jacob's],
13 and he bowed ' himself with his face to the earth. And Joseph took them both,
Ephraim in his right hand towards Israel's left hand, and Manasseh in his left hand
14 towards Israel's right hand, and brought them near unto him. And Israel stretched
out his right hand, and laid it upon Ephraim's head, who ^vas the younger, and his lefl
hand upon Manasseh's head, guiding * his hands wittingly ; for Manasseh loas the first
15 born. And he blessed Joseph, and said, God, before whom my fathers Abraham and
16 Isaac did walk, the God which fed ' me all my life long unto this day. The angel
which 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
17 in the midst of the earth. 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 re-
18 move it from Ephraim's head unto Manasseh's head. And Joseph said unto his father,
19 Not so, my father; for this is the first-born; put thy right hand upon his head. 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; but truly his younger brother shall be greater than
20 he, and his seed shall become a multitude of nations. And he blessed them that day,
saying, In thee shall Israel bless, saying, God make thee as Ephraim, and as Manasseh ;
21 and he set Ephraim before Manasseh. And Israel said unto Joseph, Behold, I die;
22 but God shall be with you, and bring you again unto the land of your fathers. More-
over, I have given to thee one portion ° above thy brethren, which I took Out of th«
hand of the Amorite with my sword and witii ray Ijow.
^ Ver. 1. — *1*'0K*T . An ellipsis of n?2TNn, or T^STaH , one who told. The construction is rare in thu siingulaf.
It IS probably nsed here, not impersonally, or passively, as some grammarians say, but emphatically, by way of c-iUing
attention to it — denoting, perhaps, a special messenger. Raslii gives it as the opinion of the Kabbins that it was Ephr.aHMl
wbo "was the messenger, and that the same i* the subject of "IS'' , ver. 2. — T. L.]
f* Ver. 7. — "^bV nn*^ . Died by me. It cannot here denote simply nearness of position ; for Joseph need not haw
been infonned of that. There is an emotional tenderness in the preposition. Oit account of me, for my sake ; — as Langt
intimates, she had borne for him the hardships of the journey in her delicate state, and that had brought on the dcadlj
IraTail. Or it may be used like fxoi redundant, as it is wrongly called, in Greek — Rachel to me, or viy Rachel, more «••
J.1
M2
GENESIS, OR TUK Fli;ST BOUK OF MOSES.
phatic than the g3nUive would have been. Very near to it, would be Luther's rendering, starb mir Rachel. The LXS
ftni? '.ue Vuljrate both omit it, but the LXX adds, Rachel thy mother, which has much, internally, in iin favor ; tdnce U
would Bt-em sti-ani^e that Jacob, in speaking to Joseph, her son, should call her Kachel merely, just as ne would speak o.
Leah, r"^!" . rendered a little way. Rashi makes it a thousand cubits^ or the same as the PC— Dinn , the limit ol I
eabbath day's journey.— T. L.]
[3 Ver. 12. — iinn'i.''" . And he bowed. The LXX render it in the plural, «at Trpoaexvyriaav avriZ, and they bowed,
or knt-elcd down before him, that is, Manasseh and Ephraim ; as if the>' bad read TinpUJ'^'l , which is ^aven in thf
Samaritan Codex. The reading is also followed by the Syriac, and has much internal probability on its side. — T. L.]
[* Ver. 14. —^■'1^ nX bSTU . Literally, he viade his hands intelligenty that is, did not go by feeling only, in aid o*
kis dim ey^s. The LXX rendering, evoAAdf rd? x^'Po^, his hands a-osswise, and the Vulgate, cmtimutans vianvs, ismerel.
boferetitial, and requires no change in the Hebrew text. See Glassii Phil, Sacra, 1629. — T. L.]
(* Ver. 15.— ■'PX n2-'~in D'^iT^iiil —the God who /cd me. It is the pastoral image. The God who was my shepjierdf
— or, ir a more general sense, my («tor, guide, or guardian ruler. Oompare the frequent Homeric notfxrjv, n-ot/iotvei, to
express the kingly relation. — T. L.j
[« Ver. 22.— "inx C3VL'. See what is said on this in the Exegetical and Critical. See also the very same phraila
Zeph. iii. 9 iwith one shoulder, that is, with one consent, or shoulder to shoulder), though it-s usage there does not shed
much light on this passage. Glassius ( Phil. Sacra, p. 1985) gives it as an example of the Biblical enigma. The coujecturo
of Gesenius seems very probable. He regards it as the common word for shoulder, taken metaphorically for a traxit o
tand, from some supposed resemblance, like the Arabic ._ ^JLi-tf . So the English word shoulder is used in architectur*
See Websiee.— T. L.]
PEELIMINAET EEMAKKS.
1. To the distinction of Judati, in the historj' of
Israel, corresponds the distinction of Joseph, name-
ly, that he is represented by two tribes. This liis-
torical fact is here referred baclj to the patriarchal
theocratic sanction. In this Jacob authenticates the
distinction of Rachel no less than of Joseph. Tiie
arrangement is of importance as expressing the fact
that the tribe of his favorite son should be neither
that of the priesthood (Levi), nor the central tribe
of the Messiah (Judali). Only through divine Ulumi-
nation, and a divine self-renouncement of his own
wisdom, could he have come to such a decision. It
was, however, in accordance with his deep love of
Joseph, that he richly indemnified him in ways corre-
sponding, at the same time, to the dispositions of the
Bons and to the divine determination ; and that, in
this preliminary blessing, he prepared him for the dis-
tinguishing blessing of Judah. If we regard the right
of the firstborn in a three-fold way : as priesthood,
princehood, and double inheritance (I Chron. v. 2),
then Jacob gives to Joseph, by way of devise, the
third part, at least, namely, the double inheritance.
Thus this chapter forms the natural introduction to
the blessing of Jacob in ch. xUx. Neither of them
can be rightly understood without the other.
2. Contents: 1) The distinguishing blessing of
Joseph, especially the adoption of his sons, Manas-
•eh and Ephraim, vers. 1-7 ; 2) the blessing of
Ephraim and Manaaseh, vers. 8-16; 3) the prece-
dence of Ephraun, vers. 17-19; 4) The preference
of Joseph, vers. 20-22.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL.
. 7" ! adoptiiin of Josrph'g sons, ilanassch and
Ephraim (vers. 1-7). Df-mtzsch: "We nmst call
it an act of adoption, although, in the sense of the
oivil law, adoption, strictly, is unknown to Jewish
uit>quity ; it is ati adoption which may We compared
to tbu adoptio /ilena of the Justinian code (adoption
on the side of the ascendants, or kinsmen reckoned
upwards)." The theocratic adoption, however, has,
liefoie all things, a religious ethical character, though
including at the same time, a legal importance. —
After these things. — Jacob's history is now spir-
itually closed ; he lives only for his sons, as testator
and prophet. — And he took with him. — The sons
of Joseph must now have been about twenty years
old. They were already born when Jacob came to
Egypt, and he lived there seventeen years. — And
Israel strengthened himself. — Delitzscii ; " It
is Jacob that lies down in sickness ; it is Israel that
gathers up his strength (compare a similar significant
change of these names ch. xlv. 27 : Jacob recovers
from his fainting ; it is Israel that is for going straight
to Egypt)." — God Almighty appeared unto me
— Jacob makes mention first of that glorious revela-
tion which had shed its light upon the whole of his
troubled life. He makes prominent, however, the
promise of a numerous posterity, as an introduction
to the adoption. — They shall be mine. — They
shall not be two branches, merely, of one tribe, but
two fully-recognized tribes of Jacob and Israel, equal
in this respect to the firstborn Reuben and Simeon.
— Shall be thine. — The sons afterwards born shall
belon;; to Joseph, not forming a third tribe, but in-
cluded in Ephraim and Manasseh ; for Josejih is
represented in a two-fold way through these. Alter
tliis provision, the names of tlie other sons of Jo-
seph are not mentioned ; it was necessary, liowever,
that they should be contained in the genealogical
registers. Numb. xxvi. 28-37; I Chron. vii. 14-19
(Josh. xvi. 17). — As for me, when I came from
Padan. — The ''SNI here makes a contrast to Joseph.
The calling to mind of Racliel here would .seem, at
first glance, to be an emotional interruption of the
I I lain of thought. In presence of Joseph, the re-
niembrance of the never-to-lic-forgotten one causes
a sudden spasm of feehng(DeUtzsch). But the very
course ol the thought would lead him lo Rachel. Site
dud III/ him on the way to Eplirath cb" would mean,
hteruUy, /or him ; she died for liun, .since, while
living, she shared with him, and for him, the toils
of his pilgrimage life, and through tins, perhaps,
brought on her deadly travail. She dietl cm tlic way
to Ephrat;ih, that is, bothlehem, after she had only
two sons. And so must he make tliis satisfaction to
his heart's longing for that one to wlioni he e&pe-
ciallv gives the name of wife (see xliv. 27), his first
lovej tliat there should be three full tribes Iron
CHAP. XLVIII. 1-22.
CAi
these two branches of Rachel. And thus, through
their eiilurgemont, is there a sacred memorial, not
only of Josepli, hut also of the loves and hopes of
Raclicl and Jaeoli Knobel rightly remarks that the
descendants of Joseph became very numerous, infe-
rior only to those of Judah (Xumb. i. 33, 35), and
3ven surpassing them, according to another reclcon-
ing Numb. xrvi. 34, 37) ; so that, as two tribes, they
wore to have two inheritances (Xumb. i. 10), a fact
which Ezeliiel also keeps in view lor the Messianic
times (Ezek. xlvii. 13; xlviii. 4); although {Deut.
xx.^iii. 13) they are put together as one house of Jo-
seph. Knol)el, however, will have it that it is the
narrator here who must be supposed to make this
explanation instead of allowing that the patriarcli
himself might have foreseen it. — Padan. — Put liere
for Padan-aram. — Bethlehem. — An addition of the
narrator.
2. The blessiiii) of the sons, Ephraim and Manas-
seh (vers. 8-16).' — Who are these? — "The old,
dim-eyed patriarch interrupts himself. He now per-
ceives, for the first time, that he is not alone with
Joseph, .and asks. Who are these here ? Here again
Knobel puts us in mind, in his presumptive way,
that the narrative follows the old view, that the ut-
tered blessings of godly men have power and effica-
cy" (a view which has not wholly died out), and re-
marks that these young persons ought to have been
well known to Jacob. In the Elohistic time-reckon-
ing, therefore, the question was an improijable one
(he would say). Then, too, ought the old, and al-
most blind Isaac to have been able to distinguish his
;wo sons, Jacob and Esau ! — And he brought
'Jiem near. — The emotion of the grandfather grows
itronger as he calls to mind, bow God had given him
joy beyond his piayers and anticipations. He had
not even expected to see Joseph again, and now he
oeholds not only him, but his two children. — And
foseph brought them out. — Jacob, in his embrace,
lad drawn them between the knees, and to his
oosom ; for we must think of him as sitting. This
would suggest the idea of buys, or of children in the
arms, a thing which Knobel has not overlooked ;
and yet it is self-evidi-nt that even as grown-up chil-
dren, they might stand between the knees of Jacob.
The blessing was a religious act, and in receiving it,
they mu-t take another and more solemn attitude.
Therefore does Joseph draw them back, and kneels
down himself, to prepare the sons, and himself wiih
hem, for the patriarchal blessing. Hereupon he
irings them in the right positions before .lacttb. If
Jacob would lay his right hand upon Manasseh, .To-
Beph must present him with his left, and. with like
care, must Ephraim be placed before the left hand
of Jacob. Among the Hebrews the right hand was
the place of precedence ( 1 Kings ii. 1 9). But .Jacob
crosses his expectation — Guiding his hands ■wit-
tingly.— Delitzsch and Knobel are in favor of the
LXX interpretation, witl -^'hich agrees the Vulgate
and the Syriac, he chrrrhfjed, crossed his hands ;
Keil disputes it. The expression denotes a con-
scious and well-understood act. This is the first
mention, in the Scriptures, of the imposition of the
hands in blessing (Numb, xxvii. 18,23). — And he
blessed Joseph. — In his blessing of Manasseh and
Ephraim, " who are also comprehended as Joseph in
the blessinL' of Jacob (ch. xlix.) and Moses." Kno-
bel.— God before whom. — The '^ish here s not
to be disregarded (see ver. 16). It is the God who
reveals tiimself to the fathers through His Presence
the angel of His Presence, "^JQ
9). — Who fed me. — Led me.
-t^h^. Is
Ixiii
uided me, as mj
shepherd, Ps. xxiii. — The angel. — Compare Isa.
Lxiii. 9. The word "X'SH has no Wau conversive;
Delitzsch explains this as showing " that the sepa-
r.ite self-existence of the God-sent angel mentioned
Numb. XX. 16, is inconsistent with the idea of hi»
being a medium and mediator of the divine self
witnes.sing." This is evidently a mingling of the di
vine and the creaturely wliich the Old Testameu
does not recognize. A creaturely angel cannot Htand
in connection with God as a fountain of blessing (but
see Keil, p. 281). It Ls incon.sistent when Ilditzsch
would here, too, regard the Logos as represented by
this angel. It is worthy of notice, that along with
this tlireefold naming of God (which would seem to
sound like an anticipation of the trinity; see Keil,
p. 281), there is, at the same time, clearly presented
the conception of God's presence, of his care as a
shepherd, and of his faithfulness as Redeemer — all,
too, in connection with the laying on of hands. We
have, therefore, in this passage, a point in which the
revelation makes a significant advance. — Prom all
evil. — Jacob could tell of many seasons of sore
pressure, in which the prospect of deliverance had
almost vanished. They are coimected wiih the
names Esau, Laban, Shechem, Joseph, and the fam-
ine. The most grievous calamity was the ban of
unrevealed guilt, that, lor so many years, lav as a
burthen upon his house, and which threatened to
carry him away into a death-night of anguish ; foi
here, along with evil there is also wiekedness, and so
the first ground laid for that last prayer " Our Father
(deliver us from evil).'' — Bless the lads. — "There
is expressed here, in the singular, the threefold de-
notation of God in the unity of the divine being."
Keil. And so also in the unity of the ilivine gov-
ernment.— And let my name be named on them.
— The bles.sing divides itself into a spiritu.al and an
earthly aspect. Here, the first rightly precedes ;
for the words are not at all nota adaption is (C\i\7m),
in which case not only would the name of the fathers
be unsuitable, but the extinction of Joseph's name
would be altogether out of place ; much rather are
they to be acknowledged as f/envine children of the
patriarchs, and so prove themselves to be, notwith-
standing their mother was the daughter of an Egyptian
priest. The remembrances and the promises of salva-
tion are to be sustained by them ami through them.
The name of the lathers is the expression of the life of
the fathers, and the thus becoming n.amed denotes the
realization of that which is verifieii in these names,
that is, the faith of the fiithers, as well as ihe recog-
nition, which, by virtue of them, becomes th ir por-
tion. To the predominant spiritual blessing there is
added the predominant earthly, or. rather, the hu-
man, with like force. — And let them grow into
a miJtitude. — The verb nan is from j~ with rela-
tion to the extraordinary increase of the fishes. And
truly shall they so multiply themselves in the
midst, that is, in the very core of the land.
3. ?7m! precedence of Ephraim (vers. 17-19). —
When Joseph saw. — Joseph looks to the uaiuraJ
riglit of the first-born. He supposes that his father
has made a luistakc, and this, all the more, from the
pains he had taken in the proper presentation of the
sons. — I know it^ my son I know it. — Joseph,
with his merely natural judgun-nt. stands here iJD
contrast with the clear-seeing and divinelv inipirte<}
1 wisdom of the prophet, who knows right well tl-at
&u
GKNESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
by his crossed hands, he is giving the precedence of
the birthright to the younger son. From his inter-
position he takes occasion to announce to the father
the future relations of the iwo. True it is that a
rich blessing is bestowed upon Manasseh, but Epliraim
shall be the greater. — " This blessing begins to
fulfil itself from the days of the Judges onwards ; as
the tribe of Ephiaim in power and compass so in-
creased that it became the head of the northern ten
tribes, and its name became of like significance with
that of Israel ; although, in tlie time of Moses,
Manasseh still outnumbered Ephraim by twenty
thousand (Xumb. xxvi. 34 and 37)." Keil.
4. The in-eference of Joseph (vers. 20-'i2). —
In thee shall Israel bless. — This rich expression
of benediction shall, in its fulfilment, liecome pro-
verbial in Israel. — And he set Ephraim before
Manasseh. — These words close the preceding nar-
rative, but they belong here, as denoting that
Ephraim is preferred only in the sense that Manas-
seh, too, was to be a great people. It was, moreover,
a single tribe that again branched into two great dis-
tricts, having separate inheritances on each side of
Jordan. — And God shall bring you again.—
This was, for Joseph and his children, a great
promise and dispensation: Notwithstanding their
Egyptian relations they are not to complete tlieir
history in Egypt. — Moreover, I have given unto
thee one portion. — Josh. xvii. 44. We may well
suppose that D3C is a play of words upon Shecheni,
which lay in the district of Joseph (Josh. xxi. II),
and where, at a later day, the bones of Joseph him-
self were interred in the field pui-chased by Jacob
(ch. xxxiii. 19). This is to be inferred from the
great importance that Shechem attained in the later
history of Israel ; but not at all, as Von Bohlen and
others suppose, that there is reference here to an
actual occupation of Shechem, on the ground that
Jacob had afterwards appropriated to himself the
act of his sons The perfect, ^nni^^i '^ "^'^'' '" •'
prophetic sense. Keil: "The words cannot t)e re-
ferred to the purchase at Shechem (ch. xxxiii. 19),
for a forcible taking by sword and bow cannot be
called a purchase ; * much less can they relate to tJie
wicked robbery perpetrated by Jacob's sons (ch.
xxxiv. 25) ; for Jacob could not possibly take to
himself, as his own act, this evil deed lor which he
lays a curse upon Simeon and Levi (ch. xlix. 6) — to
gay nothing of the fact that the robbery had, for its
consefpience, not the occupation of this city, Itut
the withdrawal of Jacob from the couniry. More-
over, the conquest of that district would have been
in entire contrariety to the character of the ]>atri-
archal history, which consists in renunciation of
self-willed human works, and in resigned believing
hope in the (!od of the promi.se (Delitzsch)." Nev-
ertheless, this connection of Jacob's prediction with
the tinjc then present, is not without significance.
There appears here, in an isolated form, the first
indication that the Israelites, in their return out of
Egypt (wlien the iniipiity of the Amorites shall have
become full, ch. xv. Ill), should acquire lands by
conquest with sword and liow. This foresight of Ja-
cob, however, may have had its suggestive origin In
• ( It in, hownver, m - calloil in the languace of tlie Knfrlish
ommon law. Accord nt; to Littleton and Mlack.stone, pur-
thasf- (to which the flehrew nsp and HSp^ well cor-
rvupon'l) it* any mode of f/rjliiip, or aequirivg, lands, or other
OToperty, except by denccnt. Such also is the wide fionrto
m 111'- <'ircek tcrriiTic. KTiiua T. L. 1
the thought, how two of his sons, in a religious yet
unholy zeal, had once conquered the entire city of
Shechem. In the germinal fanaticism of such " sons
of thunder," the prophetic eye discerns the seed of
a future purer heroism. Thus regarded, the private
acquisitions of the patriarchs in Hebron, and espe-
cially in Shechem, are a kind of symhohcal occupa-
tion of the land, in which the i)rouuse of God ij
typically realized. Beyond all, in this respect, is
the designation of Canaan as the home of Israel,
and the strengthening of its home-feeUng, as thit
by which, at a later day, the march of Israel, after
the migration from Egypt, is directed. And so, too,
the preiiiction of Jacob becomes the first established
point for the future partition of Canaan, causing
that Josepli's children, especially the Ephraimites,
would, at all events, be pointed by a well-understood
indication, to the land of Shechem. On this account,
too, might it have been said, in later times (John iv.
5), that Jacob had given his field at Shechem to his
son Joseph. That pointing, however, must have
exerted an influence in the whole partition of the
land of Canaan among the twelve tribes. — The
Amorite. — A poetical name for Canaanites generally
DOCTRINAl AND ETHICAX.
1. In the decline of life, the believer looks cheer-
fully back upon his entire experiences of the graca
of God, that he may thereby quicken his hopes and
prospects for the future, and for eternity.
2. The adoption had for its aim not only to in-
corporate into tlie people of Israel the sons of Jo-
seph who had been born in Egyptian relations — not
only to honor and glorify Rachel in her children —
not only to assign to Joseph the double inheritance
as the third part of the birthright — but also to keep
full the trilies to the number twelve. By the adop-
tion of Ejjhraim and Manasseh, theie is also, already,
introduced the spiritual distribution of the tiibe of
Levi among all the tribes ; although this turn of
ihings can only Indicate such a dispcr-sion (ch. xlix.).
The historical compensation between the line of Leah
and that of Rachel, is indicated in this lilessing, as
in later times there appears the contrast between
Ephraim and Judah. The Messiah, indeed, is to
come from the tiibe of Judah ; but the first element?
of his Church, to .say the least, came out of Galilee,
the district of the ten tribes, and Paul was from the
tribe of Benjamin.
3. The crosswise position of Jacob's hands has
been interpreted allegorically of tlie cross of Christ.
On this account has the occasional appearing of the
cross figure been regarded as momentous; ami yet,
without reason, unless there is kept in view the
goneral idea, namely, that one direction, or deter-
inlnalion, has been thwarted by an opposing one ; as
here the natural expectation of Joseph in respect to
Manasseh. In the symbolical sen-ie, the form of the
blessing hei-e carries with it no theocratic destiny of
sorrow.
4. Here first appears the imposition of hands in
lis great significance for the kingdcmi of God. The
evident ed'eet, outwardly, is th:it Jacob makes a dif-
ference in the value of the ble.s.smg for both sons.
It is, in the first feature, a symbolic of the bUssing,
through the .symbol of the hand, especially the right.
Then there isa tlieocratic inauguration nnd inve>tlture.
The grandchililren of Jacob are raised to the condl
tion of stnis. Thus alterwards does the imixn'tioi
CUAP. XLVIII. 1-a-z.
twa
}f hands denote a legal consecration, Numb, xxvii.
18-23; Deut. xxxiv. 9. The impartation thereby
of an actual power of blessing, appears already in
tlie Old Testament, in its typical beginnings; but in
tlie New Testament it comes forth in its full signifi-
eance, Matt. six. 13 ; Acts vi. 6. The idea in com-
mon of the different applications of tlie imposition
of hands, is the transfer, or traduction, of the com-
munity of life through the hand. Through this,
the animal offerings became symbolical resignations
of human life, and so, inversely, the sick were re-
stored to health. See the article "Imposition of
Hands," Hkrzoo's Real-Encyclopedia ; also Keil,
p. 281. On the significance of the hand see also
the citations fsom Passavant by Schroder.
5. On the great place of Ephraim in the life and
history of Israel, compare the History of the Old
Testament.
6. The blessing of Joseph's sons is throughout
denoted as a blessing of Joseph himself in his sons.
We cannot say that this was because Joseph hiid be-
come an Egyptian. Such service had no more taken
away his theocratic investiture, than the foreign po-
sition of Nehemiah and Daniel had done iji their
oa-ses. Even Joseph's bones still belonged to Israel.
7. It is incorrect to regard the effect of Jacob's
benediction as a representation merely of Hebrew
antiquity ; and so is it also when we regard the pro-
phetic significance and power of the benediction
alone, as a positive addition to the authority of the
divine promise. The divine promise reveals itself
even in the human life germs. Ephrauu's future lay
in the core of Ephraim's life, as laid there by God.
8. The elevated glow of Jacob's spirit, as it
lights up OH the hearth of his dead natural life, his
eagle-like clairvoyance with his darkened eye-sight,
reminds us of tlie similar example in the blessing of
Isaac. The fact of a state of being raised high
above the conditions of old age, meets us here in
even a still stronger degree. The possibiUty and in-
ner truth of such a contrast, wherem the future life
already seems to present itself, is confirmed by man-
ifold facts in the life of old men when pious and
spiritually quickened.
9. In the threefold designation of God in the
blessing of Jacob, Keil, without reason, finds an an-
ticipation of the trinity (p. 281). But, in fact, this
is the first place in which the previous duality of
Jehovah and his angel begins to assume something
of a trinitarian form. That, however, which is to
be regarded, m its general aspect, is the unfolding
of the revelation cosscionsness in the blessings be-
fore us, especially the appearance of that conception
of deliverance from all evil.
10. The prophetic bestowment of territory on
Joseph, at the close of the blessing, is the first indi-
cation that Israel shall conquer Canaan by the sword
and the bow. The allusion to Shechem can only be
regarded as the crystallization-point for the whole
IsraeUtish acquisition. If Shechem is to bo a por-
tion for Ephraim, Judah must be transferred to the
Bouth, and find its point of holding (its habe?idwn et
tetiendum) in the grave of Abraham. These deter-
tcinations have others for their necessary conse-
(uences.
HOMILETICAL AJfD PEACTICAL.
The benedictions of Jacob. — Jacob almost blind,
fct with an eagle glance in the light of God. — Jo-
seph left out in the numbering of the brethren, ye
obtains his blessing before them. — Joseph's doubly
inheritance. — The settlement of the birthright iit
Israel: 1. In correspondence with the facts, or the
diverse gifts of God ; 2. as a pi evontiou ol' envy on
the one side, or of pride on the other ; 3. an indica-
tion of the divine source of the true, or spiritual,
birthright ; 4. a preparation for the universal prieslr
hood of the people of God. — Tlie blessing of Jacob
as given to Ephraim and Man:isseh : 1. The names ;
2. the fulness ; 3. the certainty.
1. The adoption of Joseph's son* (vers. 1-7)
Stakke : Here, for the first time, is Ephraim prelerred
to Maiiasseh. — Herewith, therefore, is the first priY
ilege of the birthright, namely, the double inherit-
ance, taken from Reuben and given to the two sons
of Joseph, in the same manner as the princehood,
and the magisterial power, is given to the tribe of
Judah, and the priesthood to Levi. — The duty of
visiting the sick, of ordering one's own household,
of remembering kindred and friends when dead. — •
C AhVfER HanMuch: Observe how the names of Is-
rael and Jacob are changed. — When the spirit is ele-
vated and strong, the sick body gets a new power
of life, especially for the transaction of high and
holy duties. — Ver. 3. Canaan ; ever Canaan. Egypt
was only his transition-point, and so it must be for
Joseph. — Schroder ; They who are blessed of God
can bless in turn.
2. The blessing of the son.^, Ephraim and lianas-
s«A (vers. 8-16). Starke: The laying on of hands
in the various applications. Among others, in the
condemnation of a malefactor (Lev. xxiv. 14 ; Hist.
Susanna, ver. 34.) [As far as concerns this kind of
hand-imposition, it expresses merely that the wit-
nesses feel themselves stained with the guilt of the
accused, and this guilt, with its stain, they would lay
upon his head (see Lev. v. 1). A still deeper com-
prehension of this act of laying on the hands, makes
it an acknowledgment of human community in the
guilt, and a symbolical carrying over of a penitent
guilt-consciousness to the guilty, as that which can
alone impart to punishment a reconciling character.
On the meaning of Goel (5'5<'i5), see the Dictionaries.]
— Christians are called that they may inherit the
blessing.— Calwer Handhuch : Though born in a
foreign land, they are engrafted into the patriarchal
stem. — Schroder : Ha-Elohim, who fed nie, or was
my shepherd ; a form of speech dear to all the pa-
triarchs, and, in the deepest sense, to Jacob on ac-
count of his shepherd Ufe with Laban (Ps. cxix.
176). — Heim : He is my redeemer (or, who redeemed
me), my goel. It is the word that Job u.^es (Job.
six. 25), when he says, "I know that my redeemer
Uveth."
3. The precedence of Ephraim (vers. 17-19).
Starke: How God sometimes prefers the younger to
the elder, we may see in the case of Shem who was
preferred to Japheth, in the case of Isaac who was
preferred to Ishmael, of Jacob who was preferred to
Esau, of Judah and Joseph who were preferred to
Reuben, of Moses who was preferred to Aaron, and
finally, of David, who was preferred to all hs breth-
ren. God set thee : a form of speech to this day in
use among the Jews. As Ihey greet with it men and
their young companions, s d it is also said to wives
and young women : God make thee as Sarah and
Rebecca. — Cramer: Human wisdom cannot, in di-
vine things, accommodate itseh" to the foreknowledge,
the election, and the calling of God; but must eve'
546
GEN'ESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
mingle with them its own works, character, and
meril. — Ver. 10. Ckamer : When God speaks, the
deed must follow. — Sciirodkr : He fancies that the
Jimness of his father's eves may deceive him, even
as he once deceived his father Isaac
4. Tlie preference of Joseph (vers. 20-22). God
distributes his gifts as he wills ; in so doing he
wrongs no man. — Ver. 22. Citation of various inter-
pretations (some hold that sword and bow mean
merely the impressions on the coin with which he
bought the field at Shechem. Rashi explains the
bow as meaning prayer. There is also an interpre-
lation of it as prophetic). — My God, let me set my
house in order in due season, Ps. xc. 12. — Schroder :
Wh'ch I took Old of the hand of the Amorite. With
prophetic boldness, he uses the past for the future.
The proplietic impulse, as it appears in this language,
prepares us for that which immediately follows.
[Interpretation of the words Goel, Malak
Haggoel, Redee-mer, Angel Redeemer. Gen.
XLViii. 16. — In the Homiletical and Practical, just
above, the re;ider is referred to the Dictionaries for
the meaning of tliese words. Their gieat impor-
tance, both in the patriarchal and the Christian the-
ology, makes proper a more extended examination
of them. The primary sense of the root 5S5 is that
of staining, or being siaiiud, with blood. Then it
is applied, metaphorically, to the one who suffers a
brother's or kinsman's blood to go unavenged, on
the ground that he himself is stained with it, — pol-
luted by it, as ihe idea is afterwards applied to the
land, or civil community, that takes the place of the
individual Jllutracher in the ancient law. Then it is
given to him officially, and he is called from it 5S3."l,
or the one who removes the stain by taking ven-
geance. Hence it becomes a name for the next of
kin himself, and, later still, it is applied to him as
one "ho redeems the lost inberitaiioe, — being a
transfer, as we may say, from the criminal to the
civil side of jurisprudence. See Lev. xxv. '15 ; Ruth
IV. 4, 6 ; iii. 12 ; Numb. v. 8. This civil sense could
not have been the primary, as it could only cnme in
after the establishment of property and civil institu-
tions. Gesenius, in making it first, is illogical as
well as unpliilological. His referring it to the later
Hebrew, Ilebraistno sequiori, has no force. The
word is found, in this sense of polluted, in Isaiah,
and iTi the Lamentations of Jeremiah. There having
been a few occasions for such use in Malachi and
Nehemiah, decides nothing as to the earlier senses
of the word. The land-redeeming idea, at all events,
must be secondary. It is not difficult to explain,
too, how the primary sense might come out in the
vivid language of the prophets, whilst the secondary
meets us oftcner in the less impassioned historical
portions of Scripture. Both transitions are clear.
The next of kin who avenges, and the next of kin
who redeems (buys back) the lost inheritance, is the
same person. It is redemption in both legal aspects,
the criminal and the civil, as .said before. And so
the shadow of the word, and of the idea, is pre-
Bervcd in the legal nomenclature of later times.
Thus in the Greek judicial proceedings, whether in a
crinjinal or a civil action, the plaintiff was called
SiuKwu, the purMuer, the defendant (pivyuf, the lleeer.
We find it still in our most modern law langjiage.
The words proxccufur and pursuer (the latter used
in the Scotch lawj are remnants of the old idea,
though reib-tmer lias no counterpart.
The term Goel is applied to God, or to an anga
representing God, and this makes the derivation fi-oir
blood-siaining, as above given, seem harsh and un
suitable. It has led t.)lshausen, and others, to rejec'
it when given in the interpretation ot Job xix. 26,
where Job says ^n ^5sj, "I know that my Goel
my redeemer, liveth." It is an appeal there to some
one as an avenger of his cause, of his blood, we maj
say, as against a cruel adversarj'. Comp. Job xvi.
18, " 0 earth, cover not thou my blood," and the
appeal, in the next verse, to "the witness on high"
(D-'B'i^Bla ■'■'flir, the same etymologically with the
Arabic JjoLi , the attesting, or prosecuting angel
on the day of judgment, Koran xi. 21). Whom
could Job have had in mind but that great one who
was believed on from the earliest times, and who
was to deliver man from the power of evil. He waa
the antagonist of the avStpu-noKrovos, or "man-slayer
from the beginning " (John viii. 44), who plays such
an important part in the introduction to this ancient
poem, or Jobeid, as we may call it. It is this Deliv-
erer that meets us, in some form, in all the old
mythologies. He is the great combatant by whom
is waged the iiaxn oSiivaTos, the " immortal strife "
between the powers of good and evil, — " war in
Heaven, Michael and his angels fighting with Satan
and his angels." He was to be of kin to us. The
theanthropic idea can be traced in most of the old
religions, and especially was it an Oriental dogma.
All this points to that ancient hope that was bom
of the protevangel. Gen. iii. 15, whatever form it
may have taken according to the varied culture or
cultus of mankind, — whether that of warrior, legis-
lator, benefactor, or of the more spiritual Messiah as
depicted in the Hebrew Scriptures. This Deliverer
of humanity was to be D'lS l? , Son of Man, and,
at the same time, one of the bene Elohim, Sons of
God, or chief, or firstborn, among them. The patri-
archs knew him as ixsri "xbHri , the avenging or
" redeeming angel." The first, or rescuing aspect,
however, is earliest and most predominant. The
other, or the redeeming idea, in the more forensic
sense, came in later. In moilern times it has become
almost exclusive. In the patristic theology, how-
ever, the avenging, or rather, rescuing aspect of the
Redeemer's work, had a conspicuous place. He ap-
peal's more as a militant hero who fights a great bat-
tle for us, who deUvers us from a powerful foe, when
we " had become the prey of the mighty." Ke-
demptiou consisted in sometliing done for us, not
forensically merely, but in actual contest, in some
mysterious way, with the great Power of evil, who
Seemed to have a claim, or who asserted a claim, to
our allegiance, and whom the Redeemer overcomes
before the forensic work can have its accomplish-
ment.
From the two ideas have come two sets of fig-
ures, the forensic and the warlike, as we may call
them, both clearly presented in the Bible, but the
ioi-mer now chiefly regarded. Hence the ideas of
debt, of satisfaction, of inheritance lost and recov-
ered. These are most true and Scriptural, but they
should not have been allowed to cast the others into
the shade. Much less should they have led any, as
has been lately done, to speak of the patristic view
in which these figures of rescue are most prominent,
as " th<! devil theory of the atonement.'' The re-
demption is explained by both ; it is the raneominj!
CHAP XLIX 1-
fm
)f the captive taken in war ; it is the paying of the
aanknipt's licavv debt. We owed ten thousand tal-
ents without ;i farthing to pay ; but we were, none
the less, prisoners to a " strong one " who had to be
bound and de-^poiled of his prey, — or who had shed
our blood, and who was. therefore, to be pureued
and slain. The forensic language undoubtedly
abounds in the New Testament, but, there is there,
as well as in the Old, much of the other imagery.
Thus Col. i. 13," Who hath rescued us from the
{lower of darkness" — the strong Homeric word
i^jivaaTo, so often used of deliverance on the field
of battle. Compare also Col. ii. 15, " Having spoiled
(stripped of their armor) principalities and powers,"
^vil spirits (see Eph. vi. 12; John xii. .31). The
Redeemer did a work in Hades. It is clearly inti-
mated as a fact, 1 Peter iii. 19, though the nature
of it is veiled from us. He made proclamation
(e/(7Jpuf€) in Sheol, not a didactic sermon, but an an-
nouncement of deliverance. '* Thou wilt cal/" says
Job, "and I will answer" (Job. xiv. 15). The pa-
triarchs waited there for the coming and the victory
of the bsJin 'Hh/a , the angel Redeemer. In 1
John iii. 8 it is said that the Son of God came, Vi-a
Auo-Tj, that he might unbind the works of the deril,
that is, free his captives. In Rom. xi. 26, he is
called 'O PT0MEN02 ; " there shall come forth from
Zion the DeUverer." It is the LXX rendering of
bsij , Is. Ux. 20, as in Is. xlviii. 20, and other places.
The petition in the Lord's prayer is jyvaat rtuas anh
Tov irofTjpovy " reacue us from the evil one." The
rendering deliver would be well enough if the old
sense of the word were kept, but probably to most
minds it suggests rather the idea of prevention, of
keeping safe from, than that of rescue from a mighty
power by which we are carried captive ; and thus
the weaker sense given to ^Oaai obscures the person-
ality that there is in toO iroi'Tipov, the evil one.
These ideas are as much grounded on the Scrip-
ture as the others, and it will not do to treat {hem
lightly, as " speciraeas of patristic exegesis," to use
a phrase that has been sneeringly employed. Johi
Bunyan may have known little of patristic interpre
tatious, but he was deeply read in the Scripture, and
impressed with the significance of its figures. This
militant view of the Redeemer's work is, therefore,
the ground conception of his greatest book, the
" Holy War, or the Battle for the Town of Mansoul,
between Immanuel and Satan." Such a view, too, ia
necessary to give meaning to some of the Messianic
titles in the Old Testament, besides that of the Goel
or Redeemer. Especially is it suggested by the El
Gibbor (^135 ^S) the hero God, or divine hero, of
Is. ix. 5, who " poured out his soul unto death, and
divided the spoil with the strong," Is. liii. 12. It
may be said, too, that this militant idea is jiredomi-
nant in Christian feeling and experience, although
the forensic is more adapted to formal articles of
faith. Hence, while we find the one prominent in
creeds, as it ought to be, the other especially appears
in the hymns and liturgies of the church, both an-
cient and modem.
For striking examples of bx9 {Redeemer, in the
sense of resaier or avenger), see such passages as
Is. xlix. 26, " Thy Redeemer, the mighty one of
Jacob ; " Is. xliii. 1, "Fear not, for I have redeemed
thee;" Exod. xv. 13, "thy people whom thou hast
redeemed ; " Exod. vi. 6, " Redeemed you with a
stretched-out arm;" Ps. xix. 15, "My rock and my
Redeemer ; " Ps. Ixxviii. 35, " the Most High their
Redeemer ; " Ps. Ixxvii. 16 ; Ps. ciii. 4, " who re-
deemeth thy life from corruption;" Ps. cxix. 154,
" contend for me in my conflict and redeem me ; "
Jer. 1. 34, ptn Dbxj, " their Redeemer is strong,
Jehovah of Hosts is his name; " so Prov. xxiii. 11,
" come not nigh to the field of the orphans, for their
Goel is strong." Compare also Hosea xiii. 14, " I
wi'J ransom them from Sheol, nbxjx riBB , from
Death will I redeem them ; I will be thy destruction,
0 Sheol ; " Is. xxxv. 9, " the redeemed shall walk
there ; " Job xix. 25 ; Is. xliv. 22 ; and many other
similar passages. — T. L.]
TENTH SECTION.
Jacob's blessing of his sons. Jttdah and his brethren. Jacob's last arrangements. Bis burial
in Canaan. His death.
Chapter XLIX. 1-SS.
1 And Jacob called unto his sons, and said. Gather yourselves together, that I may
2 tell you that which shall befall you in the last days. Gather yourselves together, and
3 hear, ye sons of Jacob ; and hearken unto Israel your father. Reuben, thou art my
first-born, my might, and the beginning of my strength, the excellency of dignity, and
4 the excellency of power : Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel ; because tlioti wentesi
5 up to thy father's bed ; then defiledst thou it : he went up to my couch. Simeon and
6 Levi are brethren ; instruments of cruelty are in their habitations. 0, my soul, com*
not thou into their secret ; imto their aasemblv, mine honour, be not thou united ; for is
7 their anger they slew a man, and in their self-will they digged down a wall. Cursed
be their aager. for ittuiis fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel; I will divide them ii
d4»
GEXESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
8 Jacob, and scatter them in Israel. Judah, thou art he whom thy l)relhren shall praise
thy hand shall be on the neck of thine enemies; thy father's children shall bow dowi
9 before thee. Judah is a lion's whelp; from the prey, my son, thou art gone up; h«
10 stooped down, he couched as a lion, and as an old lion ; who shall rouse him up? Th*
sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh
1 1 come ; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be. Binding his foal unto the
vine, and his ass's colt unto the choice vine ; he washed his garments in wine, and his
12 c'othes in the blood of the grapes. His eyes shall be red with wine, and his teeth white
13 with milk. Zebulun shall dwell at the haven of the sea, and he shall be for an haven
14 of ships; and his border shall be unto Zidon. Issachar is a strong ass, couching down
15 between two burdens. And he saw tliat rest was good, and the laud that it was
16 pleasant; and bowed his shoulder to bear, and became a servant unto tribute. Dan
17 shall judge his people, as one of the trilies of Israel. Dan shall be a serpent by the way,
an adder in tlie path, that biteth the horse heels, so that his rider shall fall backward.
18,19 1 have waited for thy salvation, 0 Lord ! Gad, a troop shall overcome him ; but
20 he shall overcome at the last. Out of Asher his bread shall be fat, and he shall
2 1 yield royal dainties. Naphtali is a hind let loose ; he giveth goodly words.
22 Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well, whose branches run over
23 the wall. The archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him :
24 But his bow abode in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the
hands of the mighty God of Jacob : (from thence is the shepherd, the stone of Israel :)
25 JSven 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 lieth under, bless-
26 ings of the breasts ^nd of the womb : The blessings of thy father have prevailed above
the 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
27 from his brethren. Benjamin shall raven as a wolf; in the morning he shall devour the
28 prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil. All these are the twelve tribes of Israel :
and this is it that their father spake unto them, and blessed them ; every one according
29 to his blessing he blessed them. And he charged them, and said uiito them, I am to be
gathered unto my people; bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of
30 Ephron the Hittite; In the cave that is in tlie field of Machpelah, which is before
Mamre, in the land of Canaan, which Abraiiam Ijought with the field of Ephron the
3 1 Hittite for a possession of a burying-place. There they buried Abraiiam and Sarali his
32 wife; there they buried Isaac and Rebekah his wife; and there I buried Leah. The
purchase of the field and of the cave that is therein was from the children of Heth.
33 And when Jacob had made an end of commanding his sons, he gathered up his feet
into the bed, and yielded up the ghost, and was gathered unto his people.
{There is quite a nnmber of rare Hebrew words and phrases in this XLIXth chapter ; but as it is diHicult to separate
Ihe philological and textual consideration of them from the more general interpretation, the reader is referred to the
places in the Exegetical and Critical where they will be found discussed, and to niargrinal notes subjoined. — T. L.)
PEELIMINAHY EEMAEKS.
In this moat important and most solemn closing
prophecy of Genesis, there come into cousiiieration :
1. Tlie prophetic development generally; 2. the
eharactfM- of" its contents: 3. its poetical form; 4.
its orip^n; 6. the analogies; 0. the literature; 7.
Ihe i>o:n'.s of particular interest.
1. T/w. prophetic dnelopmcnl. The blessing of
Jacob forms the close, the la-st full bloom of the
patriaichal prophecy, or of the theocratic promise of
the patriarchal time. The seed of the piotevaugel
passes, in its unfolding, through the blessing of
Noah, through the piurnises given to Abraham (es-
pecially the closing one of ch. xxii.), and, finally,
through the blessing of Isaac, and the ]iroinises made
to Jacob, to become, at last, the prophetic foini of
life, as ■* is manifested in the future of the twelve
tribes. Thenceforth, in respect to its tenor, is the
Messianic germ more distinctly unfolded than in flie
promises hitherto ; whilst the poetic fornj, which is
so peculiar a feature of the Messianic jiredictiong,
attains in them to the full measure of its bloom.
We shall mistake the meaning of this blessing, un-
less we estimate it according to the theocratic degree
of its develoiiment, or, if we do not bear in mind
that it stands midway between the blessing of Isaac
and the Mosaic ])romisi-s.
In respect to the fumlamental ideas contained io
these benedictions, it may be said that the blesshiL,
of Judah forms evidently its central point, to which
tliat of .Tosejih makes a corresitonding eontnust.
The spirit of Israel finds its corresponding expressioD
in the one, the heart of Jacob in the other. The
others group themselves around these, not as isolated
atoms, but in significant relations. The declaratioof
CHAP. XLIX. 1-33.
vii
made in respect to Reuben, Simeon, Levi, link them-
selves together, and have a direct view to ihe dis-
tinction of Judah. In those of Zebulun .and Issauhar,
who, as sons of Leah, are placed before the sons of
t.ic handmaids, there is a reversal of the natural
order of succession, since Zebulun, the younger, pre-
cedes. Tliere seems to have been a motive here
Rimilar to that which led to the preference of Ephraim
to Mauasseh. Zebulun's preference seems to consist
in this, that he has place between two seas, extend-
ing from the Galilean sea to the Mediterranean, an
indication of a richer worldly position. Dan closes
the group which, like a constellation of seven stars,
forms itself around Judah. Then follows the ejac-
ulation (ver. 18), in which there seems to be agam a
sound of Judah's destiny. In the natural order,
Naphtali would have come next ; liut the blessing
includes both the two sons of Leah's handmaid. Gad
and Asher, between the sons of Rachel's handmaid,
Dan and Napthali. It is not easy to see the reason
of tills, unless it was somehow to reinforce the line
of Rachel through Naphtali ; or we may suppo.^e
that the position of the three named before Joseph
led to Joseph and Benjamin. Gad is like Joseph an
invincible hero in defensive war. Asher makes the
prelude to the rich blessing of Joseph in natural
things. NaphtaU ranks with Benjamin in impetuous-
ness and decision of character. It is strictly in accord-
ance with the spirit of prophecy, that the picture here
given of the future of Israel's tribes should have its
light and shade, its broad features, and its mere points
of gleaming, and thatitshould bejust as indeterminate
in its chronology. In respect to the nature of its con-
tents, Knobel maintains that this portion of Scripture
is incori ecUy called the blessing of Jacob. The bless-
ing of Moses, Deut. xxxiii., is rightly so designated,
because it contains only good for the tribes ; whilst
this, on the contrary, has much that is to their dis-
advantage. " Judah and Joseph, as the most im-
portant, are treated in the most favorable manner ;
Kaphtali, also, is spoken of favorably in respect to
deeds of heroism, and poetic art, as Asher for his
productive territory. To a tolerable degree the same
may be said of Gad, who, indeed, is overcome, but
overcomes at last ; whilst it is not saying much for
Zebulun that he shall dwell by the seas. What is
declared of Issachar, that he yields himself to labor
like an ass, or concerning Dan, that like a serpent
he lurks in the path, or of Benjamin, that he shall
DC like a ravening wolf, contains, at least, a mingling
of disapprobation," etc. This shows but a poor
comprehension of the prophetic forms of speech.
If, in a good sense, Judah is a lion rampant, why,
in the same sense, may not Benjamin be a wolf, es-
pecially a victorious one, that " in the evening di-
vides the spoil ? " And why should not Dan, who is
judge in Israel, be compared with the serpent in
view of his strategical cunning? Along with Naph-
tali, the swift-footed deer may also be named, in no
unfavorable way, the strong-boned ass Issachar, who,
in his comfortable love of peace, devotes himself to
P'-asaut service, and to the transport of burdetis be-
tween the Galilean sea and the southern regions.
Vext to these animal figures, whose characteristics
ire to be regarded according to the oriental usage,
iiid not moralized upon in our occidental way, comes
the figure of the plant : Joseph the fruitful vine, sup-
plemented by the human figure ; Joseph, the archer,
or mark for the archer's arrows. Less developed is
the figure of Asher, the royal purveyor, or of Zebulun
the shipper, or that of Reuben drawn from the insta-
bility of water. Is it an evil doom pronounced upor
Reuben, pointing, as it does, to his sin, that he sliould
be deposed from the birthright '? Rather, according
to the Scripture, is it a misfortune when a man eit
braces a calling to which he is utiequal, an, for ex
ample, Saul and Judas. The prince of the twelvo
tribes must be .something more than an unstable va-
por. It was, however, by this tletermination that
Reuben was guarded from his own destruction. Hj
remains the first below the first-born, and, from fhi*
state of forbearance and protection he may still de-
velop the more moderate blessing proiio'-'-..ced
Deut. xxxiii. 6. Simeon and Levi have not, like
Reuben, so repented of their old guilt, that it may
not be again charged upon tliem, with a malediction
of the deed that may yet become a blessing, if it is
the occasion of chastising, warning and purilying
them. How their dispersion in Israel, which is im-
posed upon them as a penalty, may be transformed
into a distinction, is shown in the position of Levi,
and in the blessing later pronounced upon liim,
Deut. xxxiii. 8. Through this dispersion, Simeon,
indeed, disappears as a tribe, but he becomes incor-
porated with Judah, the best of the twelve (Judg. i.
3). Benjamin, "the ravening wolf" becomes, in
the blessing of Moses, a protector of the beloved of
Jehovah. Zebulun is praised for his maritime posi-
tion ; Issachar, the broad-limljed peasant, rejoices in
his tents. Gad, the fighter in Genesis, becomes, in
the blessing of Moses, a Uon like Judah ; and so Dan
is a young lion, ready to spring, as before he was
compared, in a similar manner, to a darting serpent.
Naphtali is still described as full of grace, though in
more expressive language. Asher, who, in Genesis,
is full of bread, is changed, in the Mosaic blessing,
to the "abounding in oil." We need not wonder
therefore, that Joseph, who is ever praised, is com
pared, in the blessing of Moses, to the ox and the
buffalo. In the later benediction, the blessing of
Judah becomes more mysterious, more individual,
more spirituous, whilst yet there is a falling back of
the rich development presented in Genesis. This
designation, therefore : the blessing of Jacob, is well
grounded, besides being expressly confirmed in ver.
28. In regard to the relations, or the perspective
of this prophecy, it is incorrect to say, as Baumgar-
ten and Kurtz do, that the seer here looks at the
time of the Judges as giving the fuhiess of his pic-
ture. Thus to limit the prophecy m the olden time,
is to divest it of its character as true prediction, and
make it a mere presaging. Each prophecy, indeed,
has its own provisional points of aim and rest, be-
longing to the time in whose forms and colors it
clothes itself, yet still, in its last aim, ever points tc
the perfection of the kingdom of God. This, more-
over, is here expressed in the very letter, " r"'"inxa
a'"a''n, literally, at ihe end of the days, that is, in
the last time, eV eaxarwv tuv ij^Lfpaii/ (LXX) — no!
the future in general, but the closing future, in fact,
the Messianic time of the completion," etc. (Kkil,
p. 284). True it is, that the period from the time of
the Judges to that of David appears as the deter-
minate foreground view of the seer, but this is, itself,
a symbolic configuration, in which he looks through,
and beholds the whole Messianic future, even to it«
close, though not in its perfectly developed features.
Just so does the protevangel point already to th*
end, but only in its most general outlines as the sal
vation of the future.
2. 7%e blessiiig, in the character of its co:itenti
050
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MCSES.
In each prophecy we must distinguish three capital
points: 1) Its basis in the present, or its point of
departure ; 2) its nearest form of the future ; 3) the
sjTnbolical significance of the same for the wider
fiilfilliTig of the redemption liistory. And so here
Israel is at the standpoint of promise as hitherto un-
folded; ill the prophetic clearness of its illumination,
ic sees the charactei- of his sons, and the real pro-
phetic as it lies in their individuality. What is more
clear than that Judah already reveals the lion nature,
Joseph that of the fruitful tree, or that Reuben,
Simeon, and Levi do already show clear points of
distinction in then- lives. But in the character of the
eons he sees, too, the first unfolding of the tribes in
Canaan, even as it reveals itself from the time of the
Judges to that of David. Then Reuben is no more
the first-born, yet still well provided for in a way
3orresponding to his impatient nature. The disper-
sion of Simeon and Levi has already begun. The
tribe of Judah advances more and more towards the
royal dignity. Zebulun has his position, so favorable
for worldly intercourse, between the Galilean and
the Mediterranean seas. Issachar has drawn his lot
in the rich regions of the plain of Jezreel, etc.
But now one would go entirely out of the prophetic
sphere, if he should mistake the theocratic redemp-
tion idea, as it .'chines through these outlines and
colors, or their symbolical eharaetei-. This charac-
ter comes clearest into view in Judah.
?.. The pnetic form. With the sacred appear-
ance of the people of God, the people of the new
world, comes the speech of the new world : that is
its poetry, perfectly developed. There is already the
rhythmical song, the beautiful par.ilklism, the exu-
berance of figures, the play upon names (vers. 8,
13, 16, 19, 20, 22; according to Knobel also 15 and
il), the play upon words (vers. 8, lii),the pecuUar
forms of expression, the elevation of spirit, the
beart feelings ; and all these fonn a poetry coi-
•esponding to the greatness of the objects as well
IS to the character of the speaker, who shows
so many traits of the human heart in his deep emo-
tion, and in the grandeur of his fuith in God.
4. The last remark takes us to the subject of
origin. The reckless inclination of our times to
disconnect the choicest productions of genius from
the names with which they are associated, and to
ascribe them, in any and every way, to some un-
known author, finds a special occasion for its lawless
rritivisni in the passage of Scripture now before us.
Nevertheless, the reference of it to Jacob, and in tlie
fonn in which it stands, still finds its many and
able supporters. Those who now best represent this
riew are Delitzsch, Baun)garten, Diestel, Hengsten-
berg, Keil, and others. On the other hand, the as-
cription to Jacob is wholly rejected by De Wette,
Schumann, lileek, Knobel, and others. This is due,
in part, to the spirit of rationalism, a fundamental
assumption of wliich is that prophecies must have
arisen alter the events they are supposed to predict.
Governed by this, Knobel transfers the origin of the
passage to the time of David, and is inclined, with
Bohlen and others, to ascribe it to the prophet Na-
than. Knobel deems it a weighty objection, that a
" simple nomade " could never have produced any-
thing of the kind, especially an enfeebled and aged
one. This may be carried farther, so as to deny
generally that the patriarchal nomades could have
carried with them anything of the spirit of the Mes-
eianic future ; which would show that this confident
UKuraption of the critic runs clear into absurdity.
In respect to the last ground see the Analogies. Ai
far as concerns the objection of Heiurioli and others
namely, if the patriarch could foretell the future a
all, why did he not go beyond the Davidian period, il
may be said that it is too narrow, too limited in it*
scope, to demand attention. (In the question, wheth-
er the poem is to be ascribed to the Elohist, or to
the Jehovist, see Knobel, p. 335. As it will not ex-
actly suit either the Elohisi or the Jehovist, Knobel
h;is to betal:e himself to his documentary store
house that he keeps ever lying behind the scenes.
As to what concerns the aie and authority of our
document, a writer who lived at the time of the first
formation of the Aaronic priesthood, would hava
hardly ventured to place the tribe of Levi in so
unfavorable a light as that in which it here :ippears.
And so, too, the tribes of Reuben and Simeon would
never have allowed any Hebrew song-writer to make
such a representation of their ancestors. In respect
to its character, the poem claims tor itself not only
a patriarchal age, but also a patriarchal sanction.
Nevertheless, a distinction may be safely made be-
tween the patriarchal memorabilia (whose safe-keep-
ing was doubtless attended to by Joseph) and a ca-
nonical recension which did not venture to change
anything essential.
5. Tlie QTUxlogies. The dying Isaac (ch. xxvii.),
the dying Moses (Dent, xxxii.), the dying Joshua
(Josh, xxiv.), the dying Samuel (I Sam. xii.), the
dying David (2 Sam. xxiii.), in the Old Testament,
the dying Simeon, the dying Paul, and the dying
Peter, in the New, prove for us the fact, that the
spirit of devoted men of God, in anticipation of
death, soars to an elevated consciousness, ami either
in (iriestly admonitions, or prophetic foreseeings, at-
tests its divine nature, its elevation above the common
life, and its anticipation of a new and glorious exist-
ence. The testimony of antiquity is harmoni'ous in
respect to such facts, — even heathen antiquity. So
declared the dying Socrates, that he regarded him-
self as in that stage of being when men had most of
the foreseeing power (Plato : Apologia SocratU).
Pythagoras taught that the soul sees the future,
when it is departing from the body. In Cicero, and
other writers, we find similar declarations. (See
Knobel, p. 49.) Knobel, however, presents it, as a
grave question, whether the narrator means to assert
a direct gift of prophetic vision in the dying Jacob,
or whether there is not rather intended an immeiliate
derivation of knowledge from God. This is just the
way in which orthodox interpreters oftentimes place
the divine inspiration in contrast with, and in contra-
diction to, their human preeonditionings ; whereas a
rational comprehension of lite sees here a union of
natural human states (consequently a more fully devel-
oped power of anticipation in the dyingi with the illu-
minating spirjt of revehition that shine.; through them.
t'l. The literature of the passage, Mcc the Introduc-
tion, p. 120. The Catalogue, by F.nobel, p. 356.
Note in Keil, p. 286. See Marg. Note, p. 661.
7. The division : 1) TheintrodUv'tion (vers. 1-2);
2) the group of Judah, or the theocratic nurabei
seven, under the leading of the Messianic firstrbora
(vers. 3-18) : a. The declaratiom that are intro
dnctory to Judah, Reuben, Simeon, Levi (verg.
3-7) ; II. Judah the praised, the pr'nce ai long
his brethren (ver. 8-12); c. the brother e associated
with .ludah, as types of the Jewish nn-, .rsalism, of
the Jewish ministry, and of the Jewi^i public de-
fence: Zebulun, Issachar, Dan (vers. 1? '8V 3) the
group of Joseph, or the universal-jti' 'i., /ptian'
i;flAP. SLIX. 1-38.
lifll
number five, under the leading of the eirthlv first-
born (ver. 19-27): a. the tribes that are introduc-
tory to Joseph's position, the culture tribes : Gail,
Asher, Naphtali (vers. 19-21); 6. .Joseph, the de-
voted, as tlie Nazarite (or the one separated) of his
brethron (vers. 22-26); c. Benjamin, the dispenser
md the propagator of the universal blessing of Israel
(ver. 27) ; 4) the closing word, and connected with
t, Jacob's testamentary provision for his burial
vers. 28-83).
[ExcDRSUs. — Jacob's Dtino Vision of the Tribes
»»D THE Messiah. — There is but one part of the
Scripture to which this blessing of Jacob can be as-
signed, without making it a sheer i'orgery, and that,
too, a most absurd and inconsistent one. It is the
very place in which it appears. Here it fits perfectly.
It is in harmony with all its surroundings ; whilst
its subjective truthfulness — to say nothing now of its
inspiration, or its veritable prophetic character —
gives it the strongest claim to our credence as a fact
in the spiritual history of the world, or of human
experience. There is pictured to us a very aged
patriarch surrounded by his sons. He has lived an
eventful life. He has had much care and sorrow,
though claiming to have seen visions of the Al-
mighty, and to have conversed with angels. His sons
have given him trouble. Their conduct has led him
to study closely their individual characteristics. He
lives in an age when great importance is attached to
the idea of posterity, and of their fortunes, as the
sources of peoples and races. This is more thought
of than their immediate personal destiny. It is, of
all ages, the fartliest removed from that sheer indi-
vidualism," which, whether true or false, is now be-
coming so rife in the world. Men lived in their chil-
dren, for the future, as they looked back " to be
gathered to their fathers," in the past. The idea of
a continued identity of life in famiUes, tribes, and
nations, making them the same historical entities age
after age, is in no book so clearly recognized as in
the Bible, and in no part of the Bible is it more
striking than it is in Genesis, thoui^h we are present-
ed there with the very roots of history. Along
with this were the ideas of covenant and promise,
which, whether real or visionary, were most peculiar
to that time, and to this particular famUy. In such
a subjective world, the patriarch lives. At the ap-
proaching close of his long pilgrimage of one hun-
dred and forty-seven years, he gathers around him
his sons, and his sons' sons, to give them his bless-
ing, or his prophetic sentences, as they were regard-
ed in his day. This is, in itself, another evidence of
inward truthfulness. Hehad derived from his fathers
the beliet, that, at such a time, the parental benedic-
tion, or the contrary, carried with it a great spiritual
importance. It was not confined to this family ;
such a belief was very prevalent in the ancient
world. It was a partial aspect of a still more general
opinion, that the declarations of the dying were pro-
phetic. How much of this do we find in Homer. It
is still in the world. The most sceptical would he
cheered by the blessing, and made uneasy by the
malediction of a departing acquaintance, much more,
of a dying father. Besides this, Jacob had specially
•aheiited the notion, and the feeUng, from his grand-
father Abraham and his father Is.aac. Thus affected,
he would no more die without such a benedictory
close, than a loving and prudent father, at the pres-
ent day, could leave the earth without making his
testament. Keep all this in vew, and think how much
more impressive is the scene from its being in a for
eign land, whither they had been driven by famine, and
from which, as the firmly-believed promise assured
them, they were eventually to go forth a great people.
Having thus placed before us the accessories of
tlie vision, we may ask the question, was it real ?
that is, subjectively real, if the term is not deemed a
paradox. Were these utterances merely formal sen-
tences ? Was it all a ceremony with the dying o\i
man, — a solemn one, indeed, but requiring only cer-
tain usual benedictory formulas. Or did he see some-
thing? that is, was there corresponding to each of
these utterances an actual state of soul, visionary,
ecstatic, clairvoyant — call it what you will, — the pro-
duct of an excited imagination, the movement of a
weak or shattered brain, a delirious dream, or a true
psychological insight, dim indeed, irregular, flitting,
fragmentary, yet real as an action of the soul coming
in close view of the supernatural world, and by the
aid of it, seeing something, however shadowly, of the
successions and dependencies in the natural and his
torical ? Think of it as we may, all that need be
contended for here, as most important in the letter
interpretation, is the inner truthfulness of such a
vision state, and its harmonious connection with the
whole subjective life that had preceded it. This
granted, or established, the outward truth these
visions represent, or are supposed to represent, may
be safely trusted to the credence of the serious
thinker. Such a vision, with such antecedents, and
such surroundings, compels a belief in higher reali-
ties connected with them; though still the vision it-
self, if we may so call it, is to be interpreted pri-
marili/ in its subjective aspect, leaving the interencea
fr^m it to another department of hermeneutics a.s be-
longmg to theology in general, the analogies of Scrip-
ture, and what may be called its dogmaiie, in distinc-
tion from its purely exegetioal interpretation (see
Excursus on the Flood, p. 315 and marginal note).
It may be conceded that commentators have been
too minute in their endeavors to trace in this imagery
a connection with particular events in subsequent
history ; as though Jacob had before him the his-
torical event itself, just as it took place, and invented
the imagery as a mode of setting it forth. Better to
have left it as it was, with no attempt to go beyond
what may be supposed to have been actually seen by
the dying man — flitting images of his sons, as indi-
vidual persons in some future aspects of their genea-
logical history, — these images reflected from his own
spiritual experience of their characteristics, — truly
prophetic, but not getting far out of their individual
traits, as so well known to him by their conduct.
Though all the pictures are thus more or less pro-
phetic, they are still subordinate to one that stands
out in strongest light — the vision ofone coming from
afar, the Shiloh prophecy, wherein is unfolded the
Messianic idea inherited from his father, — a sight he
catches of the Promised Seed, the one " in whom
all nations should be blessed," the " one to whom the
giithering of the peoples (CSS . in the plural, the
Gentiles) should be." This is the central vision,
coming from the central fdding, and around it all
the rest are gathered. They are to it as the histori-
cal frame to the picture. All their importance comea
from it. Judah is more closely coimected with thia
central vision than all the rest. Joseph we would
have thought of. though Judah's Ia(e noble conduct
had done much to draw the father's heart towardi
him ; but here comes in the thought of something
controlling the merely natural subjective state
r>52
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
The main thing, however, is the Messianic idea re-
garded by itself, and for this the history of Jacob
and his father, the feelings and beUef in which he
had lived, that ever-vivid idea of a covenant God,
that other conception of a Goel, or " Redeeming
angel" delivering from all evil, — the very name sug-
gesting the idea of some liumin kinsinanship — alfunl
in ample ground. He calls this one who is to come
by the mysterious name of Shiloh. Commentators
nave given themselves unnecessary trouble about
the exact objective point indicated by the word. It
may refer to the great Deliverer, or to tiie great de-
liverance that woidd characterize his coming. The
closest examination of this anomalous form shows
that, in some way, there enters into every a>pect of
it, whether as proper name, or as epithet, the idea
of peace, stillness, gentlene.^s, and yet of mighty
power. It is perfectly described, Isaiah xlii. 2 : " He
shall not cry. nor Uft up his voice, nor cause it to be
lieard in the streets ; a bruised reed shall he not
break, and the smoking wick he shall not quench ;
but lie shall bring forth righteousness victoriously."
Why does the dying man speak this uimsual word
Shiloh ? Unusual then, — perhaps before tmuttered,
— unusual since in the form it takes, although the
verbal root is more common. A reason can hardly
be given for it. It was, most likely, a strange, if
not wholly unknown, name to those who then heard
it uttered. We can trace it to no antecedents. It
was a wondrous, a mysterious name. A startling
dream-like character pervades the whole chapter,
with its sudden transitions, its rapt outpourings, it«
quick changes of scene, defying all the canons of
any mere rhetorical or poetical criticism ; but tliis
vision aspect appears especially in the unexpected
coming in of this remarkable word Shiloh, .and the
extraordinary use that is made of it. It suggests
the mysterious ^sisD (rendered secret) of Judg. xiii.
18, the Wonderful, XSE of Isaiah ix. 6, and the in-
eommunicahle one, Gen. xxxii. 30, who says, " why
inquirest thou after my name ? " The patriarch him-
self, perhaps, could not have explained, how or why
he used it, or in what way it came to liim, whether by
some conscious association, or as having its birth in
a sudden arresting of the mind by sume new and
wondrous thought, like that which prompted the
strange ejaculation in verse 18. It was intended lo
be mysterious fwe may reverently say who believe in
the pro[ihetical character of the vision), that men
might ponder much upon it, and be the better pre-
pared to understand its glorious import, when it
should be fully realized upon the earth. The whole
vision is like other prophecy in this, that it is the
remote a|ipeariiig strangely as seen from a present
standpoint, and through intervening historical scenes
regarded as more or less near. We cannot reduce
the perspective to chronological order. We can
only seize the i)rominent point of view in the picture,
and feel that the other parts, with their greater or les-
ser degrees of light and shade, are all subordinate.
So, too, there must not be pressed loo closely, in
our exegesis, wliat is t-aid about Juduh, and the
BOeptre, atid the ppnis , the ruler's stalT, or as other-
vrise rendered, " the law-giver, from between his
feet." We cannot square it with the moniirchy of
Herod, or any precise historical change of magis-
tracy. We carmot make out, as indicated by it, a
Jewish royalty to u certain period, or a .lewisli inde-
peii ience, general or partial, to some other period.
But wtien we view it as ex])resHing chiefly t!ie rela-
tion of Judah to the other tribes, his surviving as i
tribal name, and giving the name Jews (Juda-i) tc
the whole Israehtish people, after the other tribei
had lost their histoiical identity, and when we re-
member about what time even tliis ceased to be, and
the Jews (Judwi) became utterly denationalized po-
Htically, nhetlier as an indepemlent or a subject
people, we see a light and a power in tlie picture
which is unmistakable, — a point of view wliich we
may suppose to have flushed upon the seer's mind,
without regarding it as occupied with any precise
historical dates or dynasties, contemplated merely in
their poUtical aspects. Until here (^3 ^") means
u7ito and then ceasing, or unto and not after. Judab
shall survive them all, but he too shall disappear
when Shiloh comes, and the "gathering of the peo-
ple " takes place. Then was to be fulfilled that
ancient prayer wliich was sung by the whole Israel-
itish nation before they lost the world-idea founded
on the patriarchal promises, and the later narrow,
exclusive spirit took full possession of them : " That
thy way may be known in the earth, thy saving
liealth among all nations, — let the peoples praise
thee, 0 God, let all the peoples praise thee." See
Ps. Ixvii. 3, 4, and other similar passages.
What, then, was the historical date of this writ-
ing, and of tlie vision it records, whether subjective
or objective, genuine or Ibrged? There has been
a strenuous effort to assign it to a later period. And
why? Because it assumes to prophesy, and all
prophecy must have been written after the events.
This is the canon, the bare dictum rather, to which
everything else must yield. Take it, however, out of
its place in Genesis, and the thouglitful mind cannot
avoid seeing that there is no other which does not
destroy its subjective character, obliterate all the
marks of its inward truthfulness, and make it not
only a lie, a forgery, but a most unnnaning one.
Had it been made up at any other time, it woidd
have had more distinctness of historical reference.
What it told us, whether it had been more or less,
would have had a more unmistakable application.
Had it been all a fiction, made after the supposed
events, they would never have been left in such a
dream-hke, shadowy state, unless on the hypothesis
of sueh a style being carefully imitated, with a skil-
ful throwing in of the antique coloring, and that,
for reasons elsewhere given (see p. 637). would have
been incredible, we might almost say, inconceivable.
There would have been no such irregnlaiities as we
find, no such shadows; tlie dim perspective would
have been filled up ; for in any such case it would
have been a sheer forgery, a conscious lie in every
part, with every word and figure showing design. It
would have given evidence of its being tlie language
of art rather than of emotion which uses words
simply as the vehicles of its utterance, rather than
with any studied aim of conveying precise concep-
tions, whether true or false. The metaphors which,
even in their incongruities, fit so well into the pio-
ture of the patriarch's dying condition, with its ante-
cedents and surroundings, would have been made
more suggestive of the know-n histoiical than of
those individual traits on which ihey are so evidently
grounded. The young lion, the lioness, the foal
bound to the vine, the strong ass betwei'ii his tw.i
burdens, the serpent by the way, the adder in the
path, the hind let loose and giving goodly words,
the ravening wolf, in the morning devouring the prej
and at night dividing the s|)oil — all these woulti
either have been entirely left out, or tl ey would havi
CHAP. XLIX. 1-:J3.
65-A
oecD made to mean more, in their particular applica-
tions, as well as in their general bearing. They are
far more trutliful in the supposed vision of the liying
man, than thcv would be in such a conscious for-
gery, even tiiongh we might regurd the former as
only a dream of delirium. The picture, too, of the
future power to whom '' the gathering of the peo-
ples should be," would have been painted in more
gorgeous sph'udor, instead of biing left like a far-
off light, guiding to a sublime hope, and yet giving
«o dim a view of the Messianic royalty. Thus to
epeak of it is not to disparage its true excellence as
viewed from the place it occupies in the earliest
Scripture. It is, indeed, the whole of it, a divine
fision, with its central glory, yet irregularly refracted
und reflected to us from a broken and uneven human
mirror. This central light has grown brighter in the
trance of Balaam (Numb. xsiv. 17); how much
clearer still has it become, and higher in the pro-
phetic horizon, as it appears in the nearer visions of
the evangelical Isaiah : " Arise, shine, for thy light
is come, and the glory of Jehovah is rising upon
thee."
Again, when we regard the record in question as
the forgery of a later date, its moral aspect wholly
changes. It is strange that they who talk of prophe-
cies made after tlie event do not see what a moral
stigma they cast upon the supposed makers. It is
usual for this " higher criticism " to speak, or affect
to epeak, With great respect of the Hebrew prophets
as very sincere and honest men, upright, professing
a stern morality, in advance of their age, etc. ; but
what are they, on this hypothesis, but base liars,
conscious, circumstantial liars, — yea, the boldest as
well as the most impious of blasphemers ! It is no
case of seFf-deludiug prognostication, or of a fervid
zeal creating iti the mind a picture of the ftiture,
which the seer honestly believes as coming from the
Lord. They know that the events are not future,
but that they themselves have falsely and purpo.-^ely
put themselves in the past. They have simply anti--
dated, or forged an old n.ame, turning history into
prediction, and greatly confusing and exaggerating
it to keep up the imposture. And then the dating
impiety of the thing for men professing such awe of
Jehovah, the Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord Ood of .Saba-
oth, with his immutable truth, his everlasting right-
eousness,— the God who especially alihors falsehood,
" who is of purer eyes than to behold evil, — that
frustrateth the tokens of the liars, and maketh the
diviners mad, that turneth wise meit backward and
maketh their knowledge foolishtiess, — that confirm-
eth the word of his servants, and performeth the
counsel of his tnessengers." Take, for example, the
prophecies of "the later Isaiah," as this "rationid
school " are fond of stylinsr him, and whom they so
greatly praise for the loftiness of his morality. He
lives after the events he assumes to predict, he
knows that they have come to pass, and yet with
what bold blasphemy he throws himself upon Jeho-
vah's prescience as the attestation of his prophetic
power, and challenges the ministers of false religions
to produce anything like it in the objects of their wor-
ship : " Let them bring forth and show us what shall
happen; let them show the former things, and thing-
to come, that we may know that ye are gods; who
hath declared /ro»} the beginning, that we may know ?
and befnre the lime, that we miiy say. He is true ?
Behold the former things are come to pass, and new
things do I declare ; before they spring forth I tell
you of them " See how this impostor who pretends
to predict a captivity that is past, represents God at
specially challenging to himself foreknowledge, and
proclaiming it to be the ground of trust in bin
messenger ; '" I am God, and tlieie is none like me
declaring the end from the beginning, and from an
cient times the things that are not yet done ; calliu|
from tlie East the man that executeth my coutisel,
from a far country ; yea, I have spoken it, I will also
bring it to pass."
The absurdity and difficulty of such a hypotheaii
become still more striking when cotisidered in refer-
ence to this patriarchal document. Had it been I
concoction of later times, some things in it would
certainly not have appeared aa they actually do in
the vision as it has come down to us. Laiige has
well shown this in what he says, p. 6D0, about the
tribes of Levi and Simeon, and those condemning
utterances, which, nither in the times of the judges
nor of the kings, would the tribes of Keuben atid
Dan, much less the proud Levitical priesthood, have
ever borne. Above all does such a view become
incredible when this pretended ancient prophecy is
ascribed to Xathan, as is done by Bohlen, Kiiobel and
others. Who was Ifathan ? and wltat is there re-
corded of him that can be supposed to have made
him the fit instrument for such an imposition. We
have but little about him, but that is most distinct.
See 1 Chron. xvii. where lie brings to David the mes-
sage concerning the Lord's house, atid '2 Sam. xii
The latter passage, especially, presents an unmistak-
able character, warranting a most intense admiratiop
of the man. He is no mere theoreticid moralist
Seneca wrote some of the choicest ethical treatises,
containing sentiments which some have represetited
as vying with, or even surpassing, those of Paul;
and yet he was more than suspected of conniving at
some of the worst crimes of his impei-ial master
Nero. How different the character, and the attitude,
of the old Hebrew prophet ! How stei-uly ]iractical
was he, as well as theoretically holy. The king liad
covered over his adultery by man iage. Had Seneca
been there, or some philosophical courtier of his
class, he woidd have pronounced it well, whilst of
the murder, and the manner of it, he would have
thought himself, perhaps, not called to speak ; see-
ing that such events were not strangers to thrones
and palaces, and a prudential respect for authority
might justify silence, when speech, perhaps, might
be useless as well as dangerous. The Hebrew seer
was of another school. He appears before the king,
now in the height of his power, Rabbah fallen, and
all his enemies subdued. He addresses him in that
parable of the poor man and his hmib, which has
ever challenged, and must continue to challenge, the
admiration of the world. Not by ethical abstrac-
tions, but by a direct appeal to the conscience, lying
oft belosv the individual's consciousness, yet most
mysteriously representing to him the voice of God,
he uncovers the strange duality of the human soul,
and brings out the monarch's sentence, yea, even
his malediction, upon himself: "As Jehovah liveth,
the man that hath done this thing shall surely die."
Every reader of the Bible is fanuliar with the scene.
The prophet's intei-view with the self-forgetting king
is unsurpassed by anything in the world's literatin-e,
historic, epic, or dramatic. The human soul never
appeared purer or loftier than in that wise, that
gentle, and, at the same time, most powerful, lebuke
of royal utn ighteonsness. This is what we have of
Nathan. Aiiii now to think of such a man delib-
; erately sitting down to fabricate a lie, to personat*
054
GZXKSIS, OR TilA FlUSr BUOK OF llOSJiS.
the cliaraeter of old Jacob, the revered father of liis
nation, treating with contempt the old records or old
traditions of his day, making no scruple of rejecting
them, or of altering them in any way to suit his pur-
poses, making them falsely seem prior to events al-
ready past, and with all this, most aljsurdly as well
as dishonestly, assuming to foist upon his cotemuo-
raries at that later day, what they had never before
heard ot" as connected with the sacred aticcstr:d
;aame. Tliiuk of liim ndnutely forging tlie scene
presonled bj- the dying old man, and the sons sur-
roundiug his bed, racking his invention, like some
modern Chatterton or Defoe, to find figures, and
epeechcs, and antique idioms, to put into his mouth,
consciou': all the time of lying in the whole and
every part — sucli inconsistent, unmeaning lying,
too — and then palming it off as an old prophecy !
Incredible ! We could not believe it of the most
scoffing Sadducee of Jacob's race, how much less of
the truthful, incorruptible, holy Nathan, in name
and character so like the one whom our Saviour
pronounced "an Israelite in whom there was no
guile."
There is no need of going farther in this to meet
the rationalist. The same mode of argument, and
from the same point of view, may be applied to all
their hypotheses of pseudo Jacobs, pseudo Isaiahs,
apocryphal Moses, and personated Jeremiahs. The
later they bring down this patriarchal document, es-
pecially, the greater becomes the nildness atid the
absurdity. Their tlieories of prophecy :ifter the
event, it will bear to be repeated, are utterly incon-
sistent with any moral respect for these old Jewish
lights, whom they affect to a.dmire as far-seeing men,
most patiiotic, most humanitarian, elevated in their
views of reform, Hsitig above the prejudices of a
dogmatic legal tradition, righteous beyond the for-
mal worship and superstitions of their times, but not
to be regarded as veritable seers of the future, or as
specially inspired by God in any w'ay dill'erent from
all " lotty-minded men," or as assuming to be such,
except in a rhetorical or poetical way. Most pious
are they, most reverent, yet have they no scruple
about announcing in the name of Jehovah events as
foretold which they knew to be past at the time of
the announcement, or to be utterly false as assumed
divine messages. There were, it is true, some men
of old who did this, but in what abhorrence they
were held we learn from Jer. xxiii. 25-32, and 1
Kings xxii. HI, 20.
There arises here a sharp issue, as has been al-
ready said, but it cannot be evaded. There is no
honest middle-ground of compilation and tradition
mixed together. The Bible statements are of such
a nature as not to allow the supposition. They are
so peculiar, so linked together, they form such a se-
rial unity, that we must believe it all a forgety, Na-
tlian, David, as well as Jacol) and liis blessing, or we
must give credence to it as beitig, all together, a
coherent, chronological, consistent history. (See p.
99, introduction, and marginal note.) It i.<, through-
out, delusion, imposture, forgery, nonentity, or it is
tb« most serious and truthful chapter in all this
wor-J'" history. If the former view staggers even
the most sceptical, — if, in itself, it is more incredible
thao any suriernatural events recorded in such for-
geries, then must we come back heartily to the old
belief, — the liible a st truthful book, — all true
(allowing for textiml inaccuracies) — all sulijeelivctly
true, at all evctits. although admitting of human mis-
miiceDtione in respect to the science and mediate
causalities of things narrated, or that which often
comes to the same thing, human imperfections nece*
sarily entering into the language employed as :he
medium of their record. In other words, everything
is honestly told, and believed by the writers to be
just as they have told it. Whetiier it lie narrative,
description, statistical statement, precept, sentiment,
thouglit, devotional feeling, pious emotion of any
kind, Uioral musing, sceptical solilo(iuizing, as in
Ecelesiastes, passionate cxpostuhition, as in Job, pro-
phetic announcements groundetl on visions or voices
believed to come from the Lord, — all is given just as
it was experienced, laiown, or believed to be known,
heard, received from accredited witnesses living in
or near the very times, conceived, felt, remembered
seen by the eye of sense, seen in the ecstatic nance,
dreanted in the visions of the night, or in any way
present to their souls as knowledge, thought, mem-
ory, or conception, tiiost carefully and truthfully
recorded. There is no fiction here, no invention, no
art, no " fine writing," no mere aiming at rhetorical
effect, — no use of metaphors, images, or impassioned
language, except as the expression of inward vivid
and emotional states that imjieratively demanded
them as the best medium for their utterance.
We must choose between this or the grossest
forgery. 'I'he more the issue is distinctly seen, tlie
more certain, for every thoughtful mind, the only
decision it allows. This human, so appearing, de-
mands the superhuman and divine. This naiura!,
subjective truthfulness onee admitted, thoroughly
and heartily admitted, the supernatural cannot be
excluded. It must come in somewhere in both i^s
forms, — whether it be the objective supernatural
which the Scripture itself records, or the inward,
spiritual supernatural, still more wonderful, connect-
ed with the very existence of such a book in such a
worid.— T. L.]
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL.
1. Vers. 1, 2. 77ie introduction. — That I may
tell you. — He has called thetn to his dying bed ;
Init its highest purpose is that he may tell them how
lie himself lives on in them. — That which shall
befall yovi. — According to their dis|)()sitions and
char.icter, which he has long known. Lie .announces
to them the destiny which shall befall them a< a con-
se(pience of their characU'rs as shown in the events
of their lives, but this as seen in the divine light —
In the last days, D-'vn pi^nK:.— The expres
siiin is used in reference to the world time as a whole,
and denotes, especially, die Messiatnc time of the
completion (Isa. ii. 2 ; Ezek. xxxviii. S, and other
places; see KEtL, p. 284). — Ye sons of Jacob,
hearken unto Israel your father. — Sons of Ja-
cob are they predimrinantly ; S(M1s of Israel must
they evermore become. From nature and from
grace, from human disposition and Irom divine
guidatice is their future to be formed.
2. Vers. 3-18. 7'//« group of .ludtili. a. Tht
hlessinijs tliuf are iiitroflurtori/ to Jiidah : Ileuhrn,
Hiiiicdn, Leri. — Reuben, thou art my first-born.
— My strength. The meaning of iirst-iKUii explained.
He is tlie first fruits of his vigor spirilnally as well
as bodily. — The excellency of dignity and the
excellency of power. — A referimee to the dividing
111' the liirtliriglit into two rights. In the diyniti,
there lie together the priesthood and the double in-
heritance. The pimer is the germ of the warUkt
CHAP. XLIX. 1-33.
(i;>5
chieftainship. Further on Jacob disposes of the
power in favor of Juilah ; the double inheritance he
gives to Joseph. The priesthood does not liere
specially appear ; and it is this feature that speaks
for the antiquity of tlie blessing. — Unstable as
water, — The verb used here denotes literally the
bubbling and exhalation of boiling water. Spirit-
ually it denotes a rash and passionate impulsiveness,
LXX, f(i0iiiaa^. Kor other interpretations see Kiio-
bel. This trait of character is immediately ex-
plained : — Because thou wentest up to thy fa-
ther's bed (see ch. .xxxv. 22). — This impulsiveness
shows itself likewise in his offer of his two sons as
hostages. Later it shows itself, in the tribe, in the
insurrection of Dathan and Abiram, who desired a
share in the priesthood — -a claim which, doubtless,
had reference to the lost birthright of their father.
At a still later period, the tribe of Reuben, and that
of Gad. desire to have their inheritance specially
given them together in the conquered district, on the
other side of Jordan, Numb, xxxii. 1 ; in which case
their request was granted on condition that they
should help fight out the war for the conquest of
Canaan. Through this Reuben gets an isolated po-
sition ou the southwestern border, in the pasture
land over the Arnon. Again, in the erection of the
altar at the Jordan, on their return (Jos. xxii.), there
manifests itself the same old impetuosity, which
might have occasioned a civil war, had they not suf-
ficiently excused it. — Thou shalt not excel (that
is, thou shalt not have the dignity). See 1 Ohron. v.
1. Joseph has the double iuheritance, and, so far,
the rr^Sa (or birthright) ; whilst Judah became
prince. To a certain degree, therefore, as Delitzscli
"emarks, tlje first-born of Rachel comes into tlie
place of the first-born of Leah. " In order that God's
.■ighteous ruling here may not be arbitrarily imitated
by men, the law forbids (Deut. xxi. 15-17) th.at any
preference should be shown to the first-born sons of
a beloved wife, over those born of one less favored."
Delitzsch. The good will, and fraternal fidehty,
which belonged to Reuben's character, a|)pear in
the history of the tribes. Points of interest in the
character of this tribe : the victory, in connection
with the Gadites, over the Amorite king Sihon ; also
over the Gadarenes (1 Chron. v. 8-10). The less
significant bh'ssing of Moses (Deut. xxxiii. 6), sim-
ply indicating the danger of transgi-ession. A re-
proach cast upon them (Judg. v. 15) for their di-
visions, etc., in the nation's peril. — He went up to
my couch. — Jacob speaks indirectly (of him) in
the third person. Was it because he turned away
from him in displeasure ? We may rather suppose
that he turns liimself to the other sons in oicler to
6\ their attention upon his sentence. — Simeon ajid
Levi. — True brothers in their disposition, as it ap-
peared in their treatment of the Shechemites.
Therefore it is, that they are included in one
deelaiat'.on. Its most obvious aim is to revoke tor
them also their leadership. — Instruments of cru-
elty.— They must have been something else than
sw.irds. Clericus, Knobel, and others, understand
cn^r~;'3 as denoting malicious and crafty purpose,
marriage proposals, etc., an explanation that seems
not easy.* — Into their secret. — As he would clear
himself from their fanaticism, so also, in respect to
* |rn^n3T2. There is hardly any warrant for ren-
dering this their habitaliotis, as in our English version, A
better rendering would be swordsy but the one to be pre-
ferred 13 that ot LttD. DE Diet, Critica Sacra, p. 22. lie de-
the prophetic destiny would he clear his people, and
the Church of God. It is the very nature of a se
cret plot, or of a factious conspiracy, to make itscK
of more importance than tlie connnunity, and thai
to produce disunion.* — Unto their asiemblyi
mine honor. — My life, or my soul (Ps. vii. 6; xvi.
9). The expression here is well chosen. The b»
liever cannot trust his personality, with its divint
dignity, to a congregation in which secret conspirft
cies, and fanaticism, are allowed to be the ruhng
powers. So, too, is the expression hr.p jignificant-
ly chosen, as also the verb ^^^^. There Is no union,
no communion, between the soul of Israel, and th«
companionship of such fleshly zeal. — They slew a
man. — Man is taken collectively. — A wall (an Ox
Lange more properly renders itf). — They cut the
sinews of the hinder foot of the cattle in order to
destroy them. This was done after the manner of
war mentioned Josh. xi. ti, 9 ; 2 Sam. viii. 4, with
relation to the horses of the Canaanites and Syrians.
According to ch. xxxiv. 28, they could not have done
it to any cattle that they could carry ofl' with them ;
and this, therefore, must be taken as a supplemental
account. — Cursed be their anger, for it \7ag
fierce (Lange, violent). — They were not personally
cursed, but only their excess and their angry doings
neither are they reproved for simply being angry.—
I vrill divide them. — A prophetic expression ol
divine authority. So speaks the spirit of Israel,
giving command for the future, as the spirit of Paul,
though far absent in space (1 Cor. v. 3). This dis-
per.sion was the specific remedy against their insur-
rectionary, wrathful temper. In the first place, thej
could not dwell together with others as tribes, and,
secondly, even as single tribes must they be broken
up and scattered. Tims it happened to the weakest
of these two tribes (Simeon, Numb. xxvi. 14), in
that it held single towns, as enclosed territory, within
the tribe of Judah (Josh. xix. 1-9) with ^Yhich it
went to war in company (Judg. i. 3-17), and in
which It seems gradually to have become absorbed.
In the days of Hezekiah, a portion of them made an
expedition to Mount Seir (1 Chron. iv. 42). In the
blessing of Moses (Deut. xxxiii.), Simeon is not
named. Levi, too, had no tribal inheritance, but
only an allotment of cities. At a later day, by rea-
son of his tithe endowment, lie is placed in a more
favorable relation to the other trities ; nevertheless,
he lacked the external independence, and because of
the privations they suffered, they yielded themselves
sometimes, as individuals, to the priestly service of
idolatry. The turning, however, of I^evi's dispersion
to a blessing, threw an alleviating light upon the lot
rives it from the Arabic
^,to
deceive, practise strata-
gems. The whole phrase would then denote instruments of
lu'olfiice^ their treacheries, equivalent to instruments of vio-
lence and treachery. How well this suits the context if
easily seen. Late Arabic Version of Smith and Van DykOi
,^ ^ *>«-»■ V r their swords. — T. L.]
* [For verunreinifft in Lange, read veritneintgt. — T. L.)
t ["lie ^~ip2?. Our English version, digged down &
trail, is clearly wrong, as, to make that sense, it should bftV€
been "I^HIJ ; besides, "ipi" is never used in such a way. I?
is applied, Josh. xi. 9, to houghing, as th'- old English word
is, or to cuttiug the hamstrings of cattle to disable them.
The pariiUolism here denote:^ the intensity of their wiath a«
it laged against man and beast. There is no need of referring
IIJ^S to Hamor alone. It is a general term — man they sltw,
ox they hamstrung — everything fell before their ferocity.—
T. L.l
656
GENESLS, OR THE FIR8T BOOK OF MOSES.
of Simeon, who, together witli Benjamin, came into
closest union with Judah.
b. Judah (vers. S-12). — Judah, thou art he
whom thy brethren shall praise. — Lutlier hap-
pily remarks tliat Jacob savs this as one who hithcito
had been in vain looking about for the right one:
Judah, thou art the man. For the history of Judah
and the literature pertainini; to this blessing, see
Knoekl, p. 3G2. — Shall praise. — A play upon the
/lame Judah, as meaning one who is celebrated. At
« later day this name (Judea, Jews) passes over to
ihe wliolo peo|)le. Originally it is the name of one
for whom thanks are given to God. — Thy hand
shall be upon the neck. — The enemies flee or bow
themselves ; as victor, or lord, he lays his liand upon
their necks. His power in peace corresponds to his
greatness in war ; a contrast which, fuither on, ap-
pears -till more strongly. — Shall bow dovm be-
iFore thee. — He, the foremost and strongest against
the foe, shall, therefore, be chief among his brethren.
" That he should be a "'"33, a prince, among them
(1 Chron v. 2), is his reward for the p:irt he took in
that blesaed turn which the liistory of Israel received
through Joseph." Delitzsch. — Thy father's chil-
dren.— All of them ; not merely thy mother's sons,
but aU thy brethren. — A lion's ■whelp n?5 is to
be distinguished from "i^B3 as quite a young lion.
'I'he expression denotes, therefore, the innate lion-
nature whicli .Judah had shown from his youtli up,
not only Judah personally, but the tribe especially.
His faults were no malicious ones ; on the contrary,
he early withstood his brethren in their evil design,
and, at a later period, became their reconciling me-
diator before Joseph. — Prom the prey, my son,
thou art gone up. — By Knobel and others triiis lan-
guage is interpreted of the lion seizing his prey in
the phiin, and then carrying it npto his abode in the
mountains (Cant. iv. 8), which seems especially ap-
plicable to Judah, as dl^elling in the liill-country.
We prefer, however, the interpretation of Herder,
Gesenius, and others, who understand the word of
growing, advancing in strength and size, and espe-
cially because it is said ""iliia, from the prey, in the
sense of t/irouph, or by the means of, the prey ;
since it is with the prey that the lion goes back to
the hills At the same time, growth, in warlike
ieeds of heroism, forms a contrast to the quiet yet
tearful ambush of the lion. The old lion is stroiigi>r
than the yoimg one ; iind more fearful still is the
lioness, especially in defence of her young. So lies
down the strong-grown Judah ; who shall venture to
attack, or (hive him up for the cliasi'? This pro-
phetic lion-figure was especially realized in the royal
and victorious iloniinion of David ; although even in
the wililerncss, the tribe of Judah marched before
the other tribes — a figure of the young lion. — The
sceptre shall not depart from Judah. — The scep-
tre is till' mark of royal power. The ruler's staff,
pirril, seems, from the parallelism, to express the
same thing. The word denotes that which estab-
lishes, makes laws ; hence the ruler's staff. Here,
however, is meant the stall' or mace o'' the warrior
ch'ef; and so it would be Iheducal, or fiehl-marshal's
staff. In correspondence with this the term T'^Si
(at his feet) would seem like an allusion to the army
that follows the chieftain, although the expression
would primarily prc-ent the figure of the chief sit-
ting upon his throne, with his sceptre between his
tset. Id resjieet to the sceptre, and representations
of princes with the sceptre between their feet, imx
KnobiiL, p. 3i'i4. If we had to choose, we should
prefer the interpretatiou of Ewald and others, accord-
ing to which vbjT here, arcording to the conni'C-
tiou, must mean the people or army. For other ex-
planations see Knobel. Judah is not merely to pos-
sess the sceptre, hut also command with it, and rule
with vigor.* — Until Shiloh come. — [Lange trans-
lates, until he (Judah) comes home as the rest-
giver.] The expression "S"1S does not denote thi
temporal terminus where Judah's lordship ceases,
but the ideal terminus where it reaches its gloriouf
perfection. According to the first supposition, the
place has been, in various ways, interpreted of the
Messiah. With the dominion of Herod did the scep-
tre depart from Judah, and, therefore, the/i must the
Messiah, or Shiloh, have made his appearance. The
different interpretations of the word Shiloh do not
re(iuire of us here a more copious exegesis ; we may
simply refer to the commentaries. There are, 1. The
verbal prophetic Messianic interpretations, that
n'S^'iT is the abstract for the concrete (see the verb
nbi:;), and denotes the author of tranquillity^ the
Messiah. This is the old Jewish, the old Catholic,
and the old Protestant interpretation. Those who
still hold it are Hengstenberg, Schroder, Keil and
others, as also Hofmann, according to his later view.
Modifications : a. It is from 3^B filius, and i, and
so means his son (see, on the contrary, Keil) ; h. the
word stands for ifelU^lb ^IDX ; imtil he comes to
v.>hom it belongs ; namely, the sceptre. This inter-
pretation is made to depend upon a false ap])lication
of the passage Ezek. xxi. 27. In a similar way the
LXX, €u>s %.v iXhri lit airOKeififfa ai'Tw, or S> ii-n6KiiTai
(accoi'ding to Aquila and others) ; the Vulgate, yui
initlendus ext, from the supposition of anotlier verb
(nbc); 2. unmessianic interpretations: a. Shiloh
is the same as Shalomo, king Solomon himself (Abu
said and others). — Shiloh denotes the place Silo
(Shiloh), where the ark was set up after the conquest
of Canaan (Josh, xviii. 1) ; and in the sense until
he come^ that is, generally, itntil they came (Herder
and Tuch) ; b. Knobel's view : until the rest ( nbia )
comes, and to it shall the obedience of the people be;
3. typical interpretations : a. Until he comes to rest
(Iloi'mann's earlier view) ; b. until he comes to Shi-
loh, Init in the sense that Shiloh is the type of the
city of the heavenly rest, the type of that into which
Christ has entered ; c to these we add our inter-
pretation : until he him.self comes home (namely,
i'lom his warlike career) as the Shiloh. the rest-
bringer, the establisher of peace. Suggestions in
oppo.-ition to the preceding interpretations : 1. That
of' the pcisonal Messiah. The idea was not fully de-
veloped in the time ol Jacob. Moreover, l)y placing
liun ailing with Judah, the connection is interrupted.
Keil charges Kurtz with presumptuously determining
hiiw far, or how much, the patriarch should be able
to prophecy ; but, he hiinsell' seems to acknowledge
no regular development in the predielion. 2. Shiloh
as a place. That would be, in the first |ilace, a geo>
graphical prediction, from which the mention of
• [Pnp^ mains obedience, reverent e, 'ind not galheringj
as the 'I'arguma and Ji-wish commeiitators give it. Thia is
evident from Prov. xxx. 17, CN Pnp"^ , whore it f enotei
filial piety, as aluo from the Arabic mot . — i*« i etyroologi.
cally identical with it, and which in verv common.— 7. L.Y
CHAP. XLIX. 1-33.
t)57
Sidon greatly differs ; in the second place, until the
conquest of Canaan, Joshua, of the tribe of Ephrakn,
was leader, so that the sceptre did not belong to Ju-
dah. This explanation would be more toierable if
taken in the typical sense of Delitzsch ; only we
would have to regard Shiloh as the ideal designation
of the city of rest, transcending altogether the con-
ception of Shiloh as a place. But now Keil shows
us that Shiloh can be no appellative, but only a
proper name, originally "pb^B. 3. There is finally
the interpretation "b ^f S, which is verbally doing
great violence to the expression by taking it as an
abbreviated or mutilated form. — Other interpretations
demand from us no attention. The grounds of our
oum interpretation : 1. That Shiloh, as concrete, may
denote not only one who rests, but also one who
brings or establishes rest (see Keil, p. 290) ; 2. xia
denotes often a returning home, or forms a contrast
to a former departure from home ; 3. an analogy in
favor of our view, according to which we take nsUJ
as in apposition with the subject Judah, may be
found in Zach. ix. 9 : " Thy king cometh unto thee,
just " (a righteous one), p'^^X 7]^ Stia; — that is, in
the attribute of righteous rule ; 4. this explanation
alone denotes the degree of unfoldment which the
prophecy had received in the patriarchal age. First,
the Messiah is implicitly set forth in " the seed of
the woman," then with Seth and Sheni, then with
Abraham and his seed, afterward with Jacob and
Israel, and, finally, here with Judah. What, there-
fore, is said verbally of Judah, relates typically to the
Messiah. He is here, in the same full, theocratic
sense, the grince of peace, as in other places Israel
is the son of God (Hos. xi. !).• — Binding his foal
nnto the vine. — The territory o*' Judah is distin-
guished for vineyards and pasture-land, especially
near Hebron and Engedi. On account of the abund-
ance of vines, " they are so little cared for, that the
traveller ties to them his beast. In the oldest times
the ass, together with the camel, was the animal
usually employed in travel ; as the Hebrews seem
not to have had horses for that purpose before the
times of David and Solomon. The ass also suits
better here as the animal for riding in time of peace."
Knobel. The same : He washes his garment in wine
— that is, wine is produced in such abundance that
it can be applied to such a purpose ; a poetical hy-
perbole, as in Job xxix. 6. On account of the men-
tion of blood, the passage has, in various ways, been
interpreted allegorically of the bloody garment of
David, or of the Messiah (Isa. Ixiii). — His eyes red
with wine. — (Lange translates it dark gleaming.)
He shall be distinguished for dark lustred eyes f
and for white teeth ; a figure of the richest and most
ornate enjoyment ; for there can be no thought here
of debauchery — just as little as there was any idea
* [The best and fullest discussion of the Shiloh prophe-
cy, with a collection and critical examination of the author-
iles, aucient and modem, may be found in Dr. Samuel H.
Turner's excellent commentary, modestly entitled. "A Com-
panion to the Book of Genesis," pp. 371-388. especially his
comparison of the Jewish Targums and the old versions
T. li.]
t [C;"'? ■'b'bsn. The difficulty aU vanishes if we
fe«d, with the Samaritan codex, ib^bsn (the slightest of
variations, H for P.). The LXX and Vulgate have evi-
dently followed i\r~x°-P°^^'-°^ o^ o^9aXti.ol — prUehriorts sunt
tculi. Compare "Bi b-ibs, Ezek. xivili. 12 ; '^B'' bbsia,
Pi. 1. 2.-T. L.l '
42
of drunkenness when the brothers of Joseph becamt
merry at the banquet, or in the marriage-supper,
John ii.
c. 7%e brothers associated with Judah : Zebulun
Jssachar, Dan. Vers. 13-18. — Zebulun, at the
haven of the sea. — Zebulun extends between two
seas, the Galilean and the Mediterranean, though
not directly touching upon the latter (Josh. xix. 10) ;
we do not, therefore, see why the word D^O^ should
made us think merely of the Mediterranean. Th»
mention of ships denotes that he had a call to com-
merce ; especially when it is said that he extends
unto Sidon. This blessing (Deut. xxxiii. 19 ; JoSE-
PHCS : Ant. v. 1, 22; Bell. Jud. iii. 3, 1) is in the
highest sense universalistic (as distinguished from
theocratic). — Issachar, a strong ass Literally,
an ass of bone. He possessed a very fruitful district,
especially the beautiful plain of Jezreel (Josh. xiii.
17 ; comp. Judg. v. 15). In the rich enjoyment of
his land, he willingly bore the burden of labor and
tribute imposed on his agriculture and pasturage.
The figure here employed has nothing mean about
it.' The Oriental ass is a more stately animal
than the Western. " Homer compares Ajax to an
ass ; the stout cahph, Merwan II., was named the asa
of Mesopotamia." Knobel. — And he aavi that
rest was good (Jos. De Bella Jud. iii. 3, 2). —
We are not to think here of servitude " under a
foreign sovereignty ; " yet still the expression tribu-
tary (133 Oiib) is used of the Canaauites and of
prisoners taken in war; moreover, it may be said
that the Israelitish disposition towards servitude was
especially prominent in this tribe. — San shall
judge. — As he is the first son of a handmaid who is
mentioned, it is thp~efore said of him, with empha-
sis, that he shall h .-le a ful' inheritance, a declara-
tion which avails for the sons like him in this r^
spect. It may, however, be well understood of them
on the ground that they were adopted by the legiti-
mate mothers Rachel and Leah. The expression
shall judge is a play upon the name Dan. He shall
judge as any one of the tribes. By many this is re-
ferred to his self-government, on the ground of the
tribe's mdependency (Herder and others). Accord-
ing to others (Ephraim, Knobel) the word relates to
his transitory supremacy among the tuibes; as in the
days of Samson. At all events, in the life of the
strong Samson there appears that craft in war which
is here especially ascribed to Dan. Nevertheless,
the expression he shall jwige denotes, primarily, a
high measure of independence. The tribe of Dan
was crowded in its tract between Ephraim and the
Philisimes (see K.nobel, p. 369), and, therefore, a
part of it wandered away to the extreme boundary
♦ [How the merest prejudice, soraetimeB, aflfects our view
of events, and destroys the power of what might othenrise
be most impressive I There is hardly any miracle in the
Old Testament that has more of a significant moral lesson
than the rebuke of Bala<am, the mad prophet, by the mouth
of the beast on which he rode. See the use made of it i
Peter ii. 16. As an example, too, of the supernatural, there
is no more objection to be made to it (except the general
onej than though an angel had spoken from the sky, which
would have been thought fjublime, at least. And yet fcir
how many minds has this miserable modem prejudice, this
unfounded contempt for the animal named, desti'oyed tba
effect of the miracle, and turned all allusion to it into ■
standing je.^t, as it has also irration.al!y bL-littled Elomer'i
really fine comp.arison. The ignoble view uf the animal
has had tlie same effect in making an nfftndiculum of our
Saviour's most significant miracle of the demons and the
swine. Bible interpretnrs, critics, and especially " ration*
alists." should be above anything of the kind. — T. Kl
658
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
on the north, surprised the Sidonian colony Laia, at
the foot of Lebanon, and established there a new
eity, named Dan, on the ruins of the old (Josh. xix.
47; Judg. xviii. 7, 27). — Dan shall be a serpent
by the way. — The word "'iT' may stand poetic'ally
for n^ni (Gesen. § 128, 2), and so the form is to be
regarded; out of which may arise tlie question,
whether the figure that follows is to be taken in a
medial or in a vicious sense. In respect to this, we
hold that the sense is primarily medial, but that there
may be a vicious allusion. The war stratagems of
Samson are not reckoned to his disadvantage ; and
yet cunning in war passes easily into malicious guile,
as it appears in the figure cf the adder, aTid as it
was actually practised in the surprise of the peace-
ful city Lais. " The viper (cerast)* has in a special
degree this common property of the serpent tribe
(ch. iii. 1). It lays itself in holes, and rests in the
road, and falls unexpectedly upon the traveller. It
is of the color of the earth, and there is danger
from the lightest tread (Diod. Sic. iii. 49)." Kriobel.
The serpent in the path is by the Targumists, and
some church fathers, interpreted of Samson. By
Ephr.iim, Theodoret, and others, it is referred to
Antichrist ; whereto Luther remarks : Puto </iabo-
lum hiijns fabula auctorem fuisse (see Keil, p. 298).
It must always seem remarkable that Dan should be
left out in the enumeration of the tribes in the Apoca-
lypse.— I have waited for thy salvation, O
liOrd. — In the exhaustion of the death-struggle, the
patriarch here utters a sighing interjaculation. Was
it on account of a foresight he had of the future
degradation of tlie tribe of Dan into the practice of
idolatry, or of its struggle with the Philistines, or
would he declare by it that there was a higher salva-
tion than any achieved by Samson ? In no one of
these ways does the position of the ejaculation seem
to be clearly explained, but only by the supposition
that he makes in it a division among his benedic-
tions, separating thereby the group of Judali from
that of Joseph.
3. Vers. 19-21. 7%e group of Joseph— a. The
tribes that are hUroductory : Gad, Asher, Naphtali.
— Gad, a troop shall overcome him. — We can
only make an attempt to carry into a translation the
repeated play upon words that is here found. Gad
occupied on the other side of the Jordan, and was
in many ways invaded and oppressed by the eastern
hordes, but victoriously drove them back (see 1
Chron. v. 18 ; xii. 8-16). We must here call to
• [■pE'^BlU . Hebrew names of animals are eminently
characteristic, as they are, indeed, in all languages, when-
ever they can be traced. It is not enough, therefore, to re-
fer this to the Syriac root
I to creepy as Gesenius
doea. ITiat would only give the generic name serptns. This
was evidently a venomous and most maUfjimnf sci-pcnt. It
is rcnilcrcd ;iddrr in our version ; Vulgate eerodfs. An the
words Dfmhip. Jin and Ain Wan are closely allied, especial-
ly in their intensive conjugations, this niimo, as bere used,
may help in fixing the meaning of that difficult word, r]1tll .
as employed Gen. iii. \f> (see marginal note p. 2'M')}. It miiy
have the sense of fijhip in vjuit (insiftiandi), or of ulivijiva,
Ooth of which well suit the passage in Genesis (at least in
jne of its applications, to which the other seems a paronn-
niftstic accommodalion) and th'' figure intended here. It
wa«, probably, some thought derived from this name, as
denoting a very malignant animal, and a resemblance lo the
old serpent. Gen. iii. Vi^ that led some of the old intorjire-
ters to connect Dan with Antichrist. If .Jacob could lie
iupposed to have had a glimpse of such ari idea, it would
boner explair. the sudden ejaculation that follows, than any
ftther mere historical reference that has been mentioned as
•uggestlvc of it.— T, L.1
mind the brave warriors from Mount Gilead, in th<
time of the Judges, and especially of Jephthah. Ic
this power of defence Gad is akiu to Joseph. Out
of Asher his bread (shall be) fat.— Asher had
one of the most productive districts by the Mediter-
ranean, extending from Carmel to the Phcenician
boundary, rich in wheat and oil ; but together with
the fertility of his soil, the blessing expresses also
his talent for using and honoring the gifts of nature
in the way of culture. A second feature that ia
found in Joseph. But this is also especially true of
Naphtali. — A hind let loose — There are presented
of him two distinct features ; he is a beauteous and
active warrior, comparable to the so much praised
gazelle (2 Sam. ii. 18, etc.). The word nnbir finds
its explanation in Job xxxix. B ; see Keil, p. 299.
The second trait : he giveth goodly words. The
first has been especially referred to the victory under
Barak, of the tribes of Naphtali and Zebulun over
Jabin ; the second to the song of Deborah. At all
events, Naphtali is praised for his rich command of
language. As he himself, like the gazelle, is poet-
ical in his appearance, so also is his speech rich in
poetry. Not without its importance is the reference
to Is. ix. 1, Matt, iv. IB, and the fact that the preach-
ing of the gospel first proceeded from these districts.
Yet they did not strictly belong to Naphtali. The
word, by many, is interpreted of the terebinth, " he
is a slender, fast-growing terebinth" (V. Bohlen)
There is but little pertinency in this. The traits ol
Naphtali prepare us especially for Joseph.
b. Joseph. Vers. 22-26. Joseph comes before
us: 1. Asa fruit-tree; 2. as an unconquerable ar-
cher ; &. as the darling of his father ; 4. as the
Nazarite, or one separated from his brethren. — A
fruitful bough (literally, son of a fruit-tree). — Its
place is by a well in a garden. Its daughters — its
twigs — run over the garden wall. The word nib
contains an allusion to Ephraim. Other interpreta-
tions see in Knobel (niS=a^na, ovicula). — The
archers have sorely grieved him. — The figure
does not present to us here the past enmity ol the
brethren (to which many refer it), but the enmities
which the tribe of Manasseh had especially to en-
counter from the famed Arabian archers.* Gideon,
* \lt is difficult for as to agree with Dr. Lange here.
The view seems to jiroceed from a misconception of the true
nature of Jacob's sunjective state. What did he see in his vis-
ion ? Was it, as is most likely, the actual figures, such as the
lion going tip to the hills, the serpent by the way. the rider
falling backward, an ass lying down, a flying hind, archera
shooting at their object, a sceptre departing, and a people
gathering, a ravening wolf, etc., assuppoied represenlativea
of histoncal events, so to be interpreted by himself or oth-
ers ; or did he see something like the hi.jtoncal events them-
selves, and invent the metaphors for their expression ? In
the last case, individual characteristics in the sons, as known
to his experience, are no longer the suggestive grounds, but
something entiiely separate and arbitrary. Or WOB he,
throughout, a mere tnechanical uttftrer of words, having
nothing in actual conception corresponding to them ? If we
take the former view, then the suggestive ground of this
archer pictnie was something in .Joseph's individual his-
tory, though it may well he regarded as tvpical, or pre-
figurative, of that of his descendants, — an idea in harmony
with all the Biblical representations of this most peculiar
andtyijical pcoph-. Tho same n-narks apply lo what l)r,
Lange and others have .said in re,,pcct to the ejaculation,
ver. IH, as though it were prompted by some actual viow of
Dan's idolatry, or of Samson fighting with the riiilistines,
seen as hi.storical events actually taking place in vision.
Better regard It as entirely disconnected, a sudden crying
out from some emotion having its origin in view of soma
salvation higher than these, and for which lie had been
waiting, — a term which eiin in no way be referred to thesa
supposed historical deliverances. Separate &om Joseph
CHAP. XLIX. 1-3S.
oaSi
the vanquisher of the Midianites, belongs especially
here.— His bow abode in strength.— The victo-
rious resistance and enduring strength of Ephraim
and Manasseh.— The mighty (God) of Jacob.—
He who wrestled with Jacob at Peniel, the God El
that strengthened Jacob, lias strengthened Joseph ;
he who proves himself the shepherd of his life, liis
rock at Bethel on whose support he slept as he pil-
lowed his head upon the stone. In a general way,
-.00, the stone may be taken as denoting his rock-
like firmness. Jacob's wonderful guidance and sup-
port reflects itself in the history of .his son. The
bow is the figure of strength, of defence ; so also
the arm.— Who shaU bless thee.— The blessings
that are now pronounced.— Blessings of heaven
above : dew, rain, sunshine. — Of the deep that
Ueth under : fountains, fertilizing waters.— Of the
breasts eind of the womb : increase of children.
—The blessings of my progenitors.— D^-ih,
Vulgate, which the LSX had changed into C'ln,
mountains. The word mxn here does not mean
desire, but limit, from nxn. The blessings of Jo-
seph shall extend to the bounds of the ancient hills ;
that is, they shall rise higher than the eternal hills,
that Uft themselves above the earth, — an allusion to
the glorious mountains, most fruitful as well as beau-
tiful, in Ephraim and Manasseh, in Bashan and in
Gilead. These surpassing blessings beyond those of
his forefatliers, can only be understood of a richer
outward unfoldiiig, and not of deeper or fuller
ground. — That was separated from his breth-
ren (Lange renders, devoted as a Nazarite). —
See Deut.'xxxiii. 16. He is a Nazarite (a separate
one) in both relations — in his personal consecration,
as well as in his historical dignity.
c. Benjamin. Ver. 27. From morning until
evening is he quick, rapacious, powerful. An inti-
mation of the warUke boldness of the tribe (Judg.
V. 14 ; XX. 16 ; 1 Chron. vUi. 40). Ehud. Saul.
Jonathan. The dividing of the spoil points to his
higher, nobler nature. Paul, the great spoil-divider,
from the tribe of Benjamin.
4. Vers. 28-33. T)ie closing word. — When he
blessed them. — It was a blessing for all. The coui-
mission in relation to his burial is an enlargement
of the earlier one to Joseph. The burial of Leah in
Hebron is here mentioned first. His death a peace-
ful falling to sleep. Though then dying, at that
moment, in Egypt, he goes immediately to the con-
gregation of his people. It cannot, therefore, be the
grave, or the future burying, that is meant.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. The blessing of Jacob. An intervening stage
m the theocratic revelation between the blessing of
Isaac and that of Moses. It is to be taken together
with the special blessing upoo Joseph in ch. xlviii.
personally, there is nothing in this figure of the archers
ih;it would not about as well suit any other wars, of any
other tribes, as the conflicts of Manasseh with the Arabians.
Besides, what is to be done with all the rest of the figures
that precede and follow this in the blessing of Joseph, and
which can no more be referred to Manasseh historically
than to some other of the tribes? There is clearly predicf-
>1 grevil fruitfulness and general prospei-ity to Joseph, and
a him to the two tribes that were to represent him, but all
this^s made the more striking by being suggestively ground-
ed on the sorrows and persecutions he had individually ex-
perienced. It is the remote seen as compeiisation of the
Dear. See the remarks on the subjective character of the
whole rision, in the excursus, p. 662. — T. L.]
The nearest addition is the song of Moses and th«
prophecy of Balaam.
2. The blessing of Jacob denotes already an an
tici|iation of the victory of life over death. As i
prophet, Jacob is lifted over the foreboding of death
His death-bed is made glorious by a Messianic glance.
3. What shall befall you.— What lies in the
innermost experience of man, that befalls him froir
the extreme borders of the earth, and out of the fat
remote in time. The relation between the heart and
the destiny. In the heart lie the issues of life (Prov.
iv. 23).
4. On the geography of the passage, see the Book
of Joshua, and the geography of Palestine. The
blessing of Jacob goes on beyond the whole interven-
ing time of the Israelitish residence in Egypt, con-
templating the blessed people as they are spread
abroad in the holy land. So in prophecy, although
pertaining to all time, the period next following its
utterance forms its peculiar picture of life, or it,i
foreground, as it were, without being that in which
it finds its close.
5. On the prophetic consecration and illumination
of pious souls in the act of dying, see what is said in
the Exegetical and Critical.
6. Since Judah is denoted as the prince, and Jo-
seph as the Nazarite among his brethren, so evidently
has the whole blessing two middle points. As, more-
over, the declaration: I have waited (or I wait) for
thv salvation, 0 Lord, cannot be regarded as having
its position arbitrarily, there must be formed by it
two distinct groups : one, seven in number, and the
other, five. The first group has the theocratic Mes-
sianic character, the seoond, the universalistic. All
the single parts of each group are to be referred, sym-
bolically, to their middle point. Both groups, how-
ever, are mutually unplicated and connected. Judah's
sceptre avails for all the tribes; Joseph is the
Nazarite for all his brethren. The first group stands
under the direction of the name Jehovah ; the second,
in respect to its character, falls in the province of
Elohtm. Typically, the first is predominantly Davidic,
tlie second. Solomonic (Joseph the Nazarite amtjng
his brethren) ; the first has its consummation iu Christ,
the second, in his church.
7. The crime of Reuben is actually that of incest ;
its peculiar root, however, was ii/3pis (the violence of
his temperament). Just as in the Grecian poetry it
is represented as a fountain of gross transgression.
8. In respect to the fanaticism of the brothers
Levi and Simeon, see what is said in the Exegetical,
and ch. xxxiv. In the sentence of Levi's dispersion,
the thought of a special priestly class evidently ap-
pears in the background, yet so that Jacob seema
to let it depend on the future to determine whether
Judah, or Joseph, is to be the priest, or who else.
This shows ths great antiquity of the blessing.
9. As the remedy for Reuben's SSpis, or his reck-
less, effervescent temperament, lies in his disposition
and weakness, as proceeding naturally Irom such a
disposition, so the remedy for the fanaticism oj
Levi and Simeon lies in their dispersion, ^r the In-
dividuahziug of the morbidly zealous spirits.
10. Judah — Shiloh. In Isaac's prediction con-
ceridng Jacob there was denoted, for the fii-?t time,
the Messianic heir of Abraham as ruler, and, there,
fore, the possessor of a kingdom. Here the domin-
ion branches, in Judah, into the contrast of a war-
like and peaceful rule. And, truly, this contrast ap-
pears here in the greatest clearness, as announced
ver. 8. The lioti nature of Judah is developed in \nt
660
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
Hon throughout, — the lion rampant, the lion resting,
and even the lioness watching over the lion's lair.
To the same wide extent goes the warlike leader-
ship, whose ruler's staff, then, is naturally a mar-
shal's staff, and is to remain so until he has achieved
a perfect triumph. Then he returns home as Shi-
loh, and the people are wholly obedient to him.
Now follows the painting of this picture of peace.
The contrast of the warhke and the peaceful rule
branches out in the governments respectively of
David and Solomon. But Christ is the complete
fulfilling. He is the victorious champion, and
the Prince of Peace, in the highest sense;
he is "the lion of the tribe of Judah who hiith
overcome," Rev. v. 5. He binds to the vine the
animal on which he rides, as one employed in
peace. As the olive tree dispenses its oil as a
symbol of the spirit, so is the vine a fountain of
inspiration, dispensing a joy of the spirit. The
blessed joy of faith denotes the turning-point to
which the old war-time brings us, and whence the
new time of peace begins. On this account is the
vine presented in its name of honor, np^ 123
(Isai. V. 2; Jerem. ii. 21). The washing of his
garment in wine, as the blood of the grape, is
here put in contrast with the warrior's bloody
panoply in which he returns home. In the festi-
val joy of the new salvation, the painful recollec-
tions of the old tune disappear (Isai. ix.). He pre-
pares his festival garment ; yet is ornate in the
midst of enjoyment (Ps. civ. 15). The figure thus
approaches that later representation in which Israel
itself is the vme typically, Christ really ; the fairest
among the children of men.
11. In Zebulun we see denoted the universalietie
aspect, in Issachar the willingness for service, in
Dan the might of craft in a small worldly power, as
against stronger foes (be wise as serpents), all of
which were needed for the theocratic unfolding of
the group of Judah.
12. 1 have waited for thy salvation, Jehovah, — thy
help — thy deliverance. There comes out strongly
here the conception of salvation ; and, indeed, as
a future salvation, as a salvation from Jehovah,
which forms the central point and the aim of every
hope of Lsrael.
\?j. That a number five forms itself around Jo-
seph should not surprise us, when we take into the
account the significaiice of this number, and its pe-
culiar universalistic position. In correspondence
with it we see in (iad the valiant defender of culture,
as the boundary guard against the Eastern hordes ;
in Asher the cherisher of *he material culture; in
Naphtali the guardian of the spiritual ; in all three,
single traits of Joseph.
14. Joseph's glory. His blessings present the
blessing of Israel predominantly in its earthly as-
pect ; still, in the expressions, the ancient moun-
laim, the eternal hills, there lies a symbolical sig-
nificance that points away beyond the hills of
Ephraim and (iilead ; especially when it is consid-
ered that these blessings are to come upon the
head, the crown of the Nazarite, separated, elect,
— the personal prince among his breihrcn. As Ju-
dah in his hereditary, so is Joseph in liia personal
figure. The early figs or bloom of the patriarchal
time. As Melchizeiiek was a gleam froin tlic de-
parting primitive time, so was Elias a fiery meteor
with which the l-iw period, in its narrower sense,
nomes to an end.
15. Benjamin, who in the evening divides th«
prey. A wild, turbulent youth, an old age full of
the blessing of sacrifice for others. That dividing
the spoil in the evening is a feature that evidently
passes over into a spiriiual allusion. Our firsi
thought would be of the dividing of the prej
among the young ones, but for this alone the ex-
pression is too strong. He rends all for himself
in the morning, he yields all in the evening ; this
is not a figure of Benjamin only, but of the the-
ocratic Israel ; and, therefore, a most suitable closfl
(see Isaiah liii. 12)
HOinLETICAl AlTD PEACTICAi.
The dying Jacob as prophet. — His blessing big
sons: 1. 'The sons themselves; 2. the districts; 8.
the tribes. — The characteristic diversities of the
tribes, a type of the diversity of apostolic gifts.^
Moreover, the severe sentences of Jacob become a
blessing (see the Exegetical). — Judah, thou art he.
— Therein lies : 1. The typical renown of Judah ;
2. the archetypal renown of Christ; 8. the repre-
sentative renown of Christians. — Waiting for the
Lord's salvation, as expressed by the mouth of the
dying: 1. A testimony to their future continuance
in being: 2. a promise for their posterity. — The
blessing of Joseph ; Joseph the personal chief,
Judah the hereditary ; relation between Melchizedek
and Abraham.
1. Vers. 1-2. The introduction. Starke: In
this important chapter Jacob is to be regarded
not only as a father, but, preeminently, as a prophet
of God. — The words of the dying are oftentimes of
greatest weight. — Schroder : A choral song of the
swan. — The last one of the period that is passing
away is called to bless the beginning of the new. —
His blessing is, at the same time, a prophecy. — The
word of God is first addressed to individuals, and
that, too, in deepest coufidence. — The trusted of
God become the bearers of his word. — When Ufe's
flame begins to be extinguished, there appears, at
times, the most vigorous health of the spirit. There
is a change of speech, an elevation of language, in
this condition of clairvoyance.
Passavant: (Herder:) It is a high outlooking, a
heroic announcing in figurative paraboUc style ; a
poetical letter of donation ; the most ancient poeti-
cal map of Canaan. The poetical mode of speech
not arbitrary, but the self-limitation of excited feel-
ing in a measured form of diction. — Lisco : The
spiritual peculiarities of the sons of Jacob form the
groundwork of the prophecy, and these the father
had sufficient opportunity for learning during his long
life. The main tenor is their future life and action
in Canaan, where he points out, prophetically, to each
tribe, its place of residence, and to which he would
direct their look and longing, as persons who were
to regard themselves only as Ibreigners in Egypt.
2. Vers. 3-18. The group of Judah — vers. 3-7
— a. Reuben, Simeon, Levi. Starke : Bibl. Thh.
Parents should punish the faults of their children
seriously and zealously, and not, with untimely fond-
ness, cloak them to tlieir hurt. — Ver. 6. Such cruelly
"ill their children imitate, as sufficiently shows itself
in the treatment that Christ received from the high
priest^ who were descended from Levi. — Jacob curses
only their wralh, nut their persons, much less theil
descendants (not their wrath simply but its excess)
— Levi hail no territory but forty-eight citifs --PrlvBt4
OHAP. XLIX. 1-33.
601
rerenge U punishable. — Gkrlach : The punishment
here threatened, was fulfilled in respect to Levi, but
changed to a blessing for himself and his people. —
Schroder : The comparison of the grace with which
God prevents us, and of the punisliment which fol-
lows guilt, is most painfully humbling (Calvin).—
Mine honor, used for my soul : Because the soul, in
the image of God, makes man higher than the natu-
ral creation. — Simeon and Levi. They were sepa-
rated from each other and dispersed among the
tribes ; and so the power was broken which would
have been their portion in the settlement of the tribal
districts (Zeigler). — (Luther.) By such a proceedmg
God intends to obstruct the old nature and the evil
example. It is especially worth mentioning that
Moses exposes here the shame of his own tribe. Thus
clearly appears the historical truthfulness (Calvin.)
(The Rabbins pretend that most of the notaries and
schoolmasters were of the tribe of Simeon).
Vers. 8-12. 6. Judab. Starke: In his pro-
phetic inspiration Jacob makes the announcement
gradually : He calls Judah : 1. A young lion, who,
though strong, has yet more growth to expect ; 2. an
old strong lion ; 3. a lioness who shuns no danger in
defence of her young. Christ, the true Shiloh, the
Prince of Peace. — Schroder : The power of the
figure increases in the painting ; probably an intima-
tion of that ever-growing warlike power of the tribe,
which has its perfection in the all-triumphant one,
the Uon of the tribe of Judah. — Gerlach : Until the
peace, or the rest, shall come. A poetical proper
name of a great descendant of Judah. The outward
blessing here directs the mind to the inexhaustible
fountain of heavenly blessing that shall proceed from
hun. — Taobe : (Vers. 10-12.) Jacob's blessing
Judah. — A promise relating to Christ and his king-
dom. It promises : 1. The victorious hero for the
establishment of this kingdom ; 2. the Prince of
Peace with his gentle rule for the perfection of this
kingdom.
Vers. 13-18. c. Zebulun, Issachar, and Dan.
Starke: Zebulun (Isai. ix. 1-2); compare Matt. iv.
18-16. Issachar's land. Josephus ; Pinguis omnia
et pascuii plena. Ver. 13. It is a glorious gift of
God to dwell by navigable waters. (The tribe of
Dan a type of Antichrist, although Samson himself
was a tvpe of the Lord the Messiah.) — Ver. 18. The
Chaldaic translation : " Our father Jacob does not
say, I wait for the salvation of Gideon, nor for the
salvation of Samson, but the salvation of the Mes-
siah " (Acts iv. 12). — Schroder: Dan. Some inter-
pret : For thy salvation (that of Dan) do I wait upon
the Lord (Judg. xviii. 30 ; 1 Kings xii. 29). Many
church fathers expected that Antichrist would come
out of Dan. The salvation of God is the opposite of
the serpent's poison, and of the fall (Roos). The
omission of Dan, Rev. vii. 6. — Calwer Handbuch :
The tribe of Dan brought in the first idolatry (Judg.
xviii.), and is not in the Revelations among the one
hundred and forty-four who were sealed. — Tadbe :
Ch. xlix. 18; xxix. 33. — Jacob's death-bed. — His
confession the confession of Christian experience. —
His end the end of the believer, full of confidence
and hope. — Hofuan.s : (Ver. 18.) Jacob's dymg
ejaculation. — The tenor of his whole pilgrunage. —
Waiting for the salvation of God.
3. Vera. 19-27. The group of Joseph. — Vers.
19-21. a. Gad, Asher, Napbtali — Starke: Luthci
on Gad. Fulfilled when they assembled the Reubei.-
ites and the half tribe of Manasseli, as prepared t«
occupy the land of Canaan before the other Israclitea
came there. Their neighbors were the Ammonites,
Arabians, etc. These people sometimes invaded this
tribe, and plundered it ; though they also avenged
themselves. — [Comparison of NaphtaU : 1) To a limd,
2) to a tree, according to one of two interpretations.]
He ffiveih goodly words. Most of the apostles who
preached Christ through the world were from this
tribe (land of Galilee). — Schroder : (Luther :) Ful
filled in Deborah and Barak.
Vers. 22-25. h. Joseph. Starke : Luther :
The blessing of Jacob goes through the kingly his-
tory of Israel. — ScHRiJDER: All the enmities of hia
brethren, whom the old father (who preferred him to
them) compared, even in his forgiveness, to a battle
array, had only made him stronger (Herder). The
strong one who wrestled with Jacob had made Jo-
seph strong. He who was his stone (ch. xxviii.) was
also the protector of his son (Herder). — Calwkr
Handbuch : Joseph has the natural fuhiess, Judah
the spiritual.
c. Benjamin. Starke : Interpretations of the
prediction as referred to Ehud, Saul, Mordecai,
Esther, Paul. — Schroder : Luther, after TertuUian :
This may be very appositely interpreted of the Apos-
tle Paul, for he had devoured the holy Stephen like
a wolf, and after that divided the gospel spoils
throughout the world.— Calwer Handbuch: This
blessing of Benjamin is fulfilled by Saul corporeally,
by Paul spiritually.
4. Vers. 28--31. The closmg word. Starkk :
Moses says that he blessed each one of them without
exception ; but the blessings of Reuben, Suneon,
and Levi, had fear and shame belonging to them.
They were not, however, without the benediction ;
the curse was only outward ; they still had part in the
Messiah. The punishment is transformed into a
healthy discipline, especially in the case of LevL
We never read that Joseph wept amidst all his suf-
ferings (?); but the death of his father breaks his
heart. Burial with one's fathers, friends, etc. ; a
desire for this is not wrong ; yet still the earth is all
the Lord's. — Schroder : He saw death coming, and
lays himself down to die, as one goes to sleep.*
* [To the literamre of this chapter (see p. 650, 6) may b«
added a tract jagt published, by K. Kohler, Berlin, 1867,
entitled Der Segen Jacob's. It is v.aluable as presenting a
good argument fur the antiquity of the piece, in opposition
to the theory of its being a later fiction (see p. 9). It is
ver\' suggestive, truly learned, especially in the Jewish
Midrashin, in wliich, however, the writer, though a Jew,
has little faith, even as he shows still less of reverence for
the Scriptures. He holds it to be a very ancient song, yet
does not hesitate to make Jacob a miith, Jacob's God a great
IDEA, and Jacob's sons to be only the names of supposed
^uMartribal ie\iiei(SchulzgMheil€n-). He rejects, of course,
the derivation of these names as given \>y the mothers, but
shows himself a much more extravagant etymologist than
Rachel and Leah. Reuben, "alXI , he turns into SrmS^ .
and interprets it as meaning sun-god (Sonnengott. or Oott
dAS SIralils). Jacob himself is only a SchuJtgoUheil, dit
verschiedenen Stdmme gemeinsam beschirmr^nde. The tract
is valuable and noteworthy as showing the extreme progres*
of this "more refined exegesis." It may be regarded as »
specimen of '*the higher criticisin " evaporated, *^ gone M|
into Tohu " (Job vi. 18), or of '* rationalism " run mod.-
T. L.J
862 GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
ELEVENTH SECTION.
Jtteph't rrjouminff. Jacob'i burial in Canaan. Tke brothers' dread of Joseph. Bit word of
peace and trust for them. Joseph's last provision for his own return hmne to Canaan
after death, similar to the provision of his father.
Chapter L. 1-26.
1 And Joseph fell upon his father's face, and wept upon hitn, and kissed him.
2 And Joseph commanded his servants, the physicians, to embalm ' his father : and the
3 physicians embalmed Israel. And forty days were fulfilled for him ; for so are fulfilled
the days of those which are embalmed : and the Egyptians mourned for him threescore
4 and ten days. And when the days of his mourning were past, Joseph spake unto the
house of Pharaoh, saying. If now I have found grace in your eyes, speak, I pray you,
5 in the ears of Pharaoh, saying, 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 liim went up all the servants of
8 Pharaoh, the elders of his house, and all the elders of the land of Egypt. And all the
house [attendants, servants] of Joseph, and his brethren, and his father's house ; only their
9 little ones, and their flocks, and their herds, they left in the land of Goshen. 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 [buckthorn], which is beyond Jordan, and
there they mourned with a great and sore lamentation ; and he made a mourning for
11 his father seven days. And when the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the
mourning in the floor of Atad, they said, Tiiis is a grievous mourning to tlie Egyptians;
12 wherefore the name of it was called Abel-mizraim, which is beyond Jordan. And his
13 sons did unto him according as he commanded them. For his sons carried liim 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 burying-place, of Ephron the Hittite, before
14 Mamre. And Joseph returned into Egypt, he and his brethren, and all that went up
15 with him to bury his father, after he had buried his father. And when Joseph's brethren
saw that their father was dead, they said, Joseph will peradventure hate us, and will
16 certainly requite us all the evil we did unto him. And they sent a messenger unto
17 Joseph, saying. Thy father did command before he died, saying. So shall ye say unto
Joseph, Forgive," I pray thee, now, the trespass of thy bretiiren, and their sin ; for they
did unto thee evil ; and now, we pray thee, forgive the trespass of the servants of the
18 God of thy father. And Joseph wept when they spake unto him. And his brethren
also went and fell down before his face ; and they said, Behold, we he thy servants
19 [literally, and more patheticaUy, Behold us, thy servants]. And Joseph said untO them, Fear not,
20 for am I in the place of God? But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God
meant it unto 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
22 them, and spake kindly unto them.' And Joseph dwelt in Egypt, he and his father's
23 house; and Joseph lived a hundred and ten years. And Joseph saw Ephraim's children
of the third generation: the children also of Machir the son of Manasseh were brouHit
24 up upon Joseph's knees. And Joseph said unto his brethren, I die ; and God will surely
visit you, and bring you out of tliis laud unto the land which he sware to Abraham,
25 to Isaac, and to Jacob. And Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying,
26 God will surely visit you, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence. So Joseph
lied, being a hundred and ten years old ; and they embaln -.1 him ; and he was put ir
a CofSu [a Barcophaum] in Egypt
OHAP. L. 1-26.
063
(* Ver. 2.— I33n occtus only here, and in Cant. ii. 13, where it is applied to the ripening of the flg. The Arabl«
1/^ I"^ has also both these Eenses of ripening and of embalming. The T.XX have rendered it ci^of^taa-ai, to 6ury, putting
a part of a proceeding for the whole — to prepare him for burial. Vulgate — ut aromatibui condireni.—T, L.l
[3 Ver. 17.— ^^iI^ , forgive; literally, li/l up. The figure may be either the lifting up the supposed prostrate face, of
the lifting off the burden of remembered guilt. It is most expressive either way. — T. L.)
(' Ver. 21.— cab by "IZIT^I . Rendered, and he spake kindly unto them. Literally, he spake unto their hearty and
flo the LXX have rendered it. ile did not merely use good oratorical forma of encouragement, but spoke words cominf
from the heart, and which the heart immediately underbtood. It was the language of deep emotion. Compare the same
expression, 1 Sam. i. 13, and Is. xl. 2, rendered in the latter place, speak ye cc»m/or/a6iy— literally, speak to the heart qf
/enualem. It is to be regretted that such intensive expressions of the Hebrew had not been more generally preserved ill
our English version. Some of them might have sounded strangely at first, but time would have naturalized them, and
given item a place among the choicest idioms in our language.— T. L.]
PBKLIMINABY BEMARKS.
1. As the fundamental idea of the preceding
chapter denoted, with solemn foresight, the future
appearance of Israel in the promised land, so, in the
closing chapter before us, the actual return of Israel
to Canaan is settled, by way of anticipation, in the
burial of Jacob in Canaan, and by the oath which
Joseph gives to his brethren. The spirit of the
theocratic home-feeling in its higher significance, and
of the assurance of their return, breathes through
this whole chapter. In this. Genesis points beyond,
not only to the exodus of the children of Israel, but
away beyond this also, to the eternal home, as the
goal of God's people.
2. Accordmg to Knobel, merely vers. 12, 13 be-
longs to the ground Scripture, while all the rest is
an enlargement made by the Jehovist ; but then the
Jehovist must be supposed to follow the first docu-
ment (see p. 377, Knobel). As respects this criti-
cism, now, must things themselves be allowed to
speak, especially such things as the strong presence
of Joseph, and other facts of a similar kind !
3. Contents: 1) The mourning for Jacob's death,
and the prepaiation of his dead body in Egypt, vers.
1-6. — 2) The mourning procession to Canaan, vers.
7-13. — 3) The bre.aking out of an old wound. The
fear of Joseph's brothers, and his declaration that
their guilt has been expiated imder the government
of God's grace, vers. 14-21.
4. Joseph's life and death. His provision ex-
acted from them by an oath : that he should be
carried home to Canaan at his death, vers. 22-26.
KXEQETIOAL AIO) CEITICAL.
1. Vers. 1-6. — And Joseph fell. — An inimitably
touching expression of his soul's deep emotion. —
And the forty days -Hrere fulfilled. — For forty
days did the process of embalming continue. Then
follow thirty days, whicb make the full three-score
and ten days — the time of mourning for a prince.
" The embalming of the body was an Egyptian cus-
tom, practised for pay by a special class of skilled
artists (-rapixiurai), to whom the relations g.'ive the
body for that purpose. According to Herodotis,
li. 86, there were three modes of proceeding, of
which the most costly was as follows : they drew out
the brain through the nostrils, and filled the cavity
In the head with spices; then they took out tlie
Tiscera, and filled the space with all kinds of aromat-
ica, after which they sewed it up. The next step
was to salt the body with natron, and let it lie scv-
oity days, or longer. Then they washed it off,
wrapt it in fine linen, and smeared it with gum.
Finally, the relatives took it back, enclosed it in •
chest, and kept it in a chamber for the dead. We
derive the same information from DioDoans Sic, i.
91, and, moreover, that the taricheutists (the embalm-
ers) were held in high honor, and ranked in the so-
ciety of the priests. In the several districts they
had particular places for their business (Strabo, xvii.
p. 795). They used asphaltum which was brought
from Palestine to Egypt (Diod., xix. 99 ; Strabo,
xvi. p. 764). From thence, too, they obtained the
spices that were employed (see ch. xxxvii. 25 ; xliii.
11). The intestines they put in a box and cast into
the Nile ; doing this because the belly was regarded
as the seat of sins, especially those of gluttony and
intemperate drinking. (Porphtr. Abstin., iv. 10.)
See more on this subject in Friedreich {Zur. Bibel,
ii. p. 199). See also Winer, Jiealworterb., 'Em-
balming.' Jacob was prepared as a mummy. Jo-
seph in the same manner, ver. 26. This is related of
no other Hebrew. The embalming mentioned later
among the Jews was of a different kind (John xix.
39)." Knobel. The mourning for Aaron and Moses
was observed thirty days. — Speak in the ears of
Pharaoh. — On an occasion so peculiar he lets oth-
ers speak for him ; moreover it was unseemly to ap-
pear before the king in mourning. — The grave
which I have digged for me. — This is not at va-
riance with the supposition that Abraham had pre-
viously bought the cave. In this cave of Machpelah
Jacob had, at a later time, made a special prepara-
tion of a grave for himself. It is a conjecture of
Von Bohlen, with Onkel and others, that ma
here, should be rendered bo-ught ; but there is no
need of it.
2. Vers. 7-13. The great mourning procession
of the Egyptians here proceeded, on the one hand,
from their recognition of Joseph's high position, and,
on the other, from their love of funeral festivity
(Hengstenberg). — Threshing-floor of Atad. — So
called from laX, thorn^ because, perhaps, surround-
ed by thorn-bushes. — Seven days. — The usual
time of mourning. The place is called by Hierony-
mus, Bethagla. Concerning the late discovered
traces of the place, lying not far from the northern
end of the Dead Sea, see Knobel, p. 379. It is this
side of Jordan, though the account says beyond
Jordan. The expression is explained, when, with
the older commentators, we take into view that thk
traditionary mention arising from the old position of
the Israelites, had become fixed. Bunsen would re-
move the seeming difficulty by maintaining that
1^^'" ""r!?? actually means this side of Jordan
Deiitzsch and Keil suppose that the place denoted ii
not identical with Bethagla, but actually lay on tb>
other side of Jordan. There probably did the Egyp
(504
GENESIS, OR THE FIRST BOOK OF MOSES.
tian mouming-train remain behind, after having gone
round the Dead Sea ; whilst the sons of Jacob, ac-
cording to ver. 13, actually entered Canaan proper.
The difficult question, why the mouraing-train did
not take the usual direct way from Egypt to Hebron,
is answered by saying, that on the usual route they
would have to guard themselves against encounters
with warlilie tribes; and this is supported by the
fact, that the children of Israel, Ukewise, at a later
day, had to avoid the direct route on the western
tide. Moreover, the march was in some respects
typical, presenting an anticipation, as it were, of the
later journey. Even at that time the Canaanites at-
tentively watched the mourning procession ; but
they had no presentiment of its significance for the
later time, and were especially quiet as they looked
on during this "grievous mourning of the Egyp-
tians."
3. Vers. 14-21. — And when Joseph's breth-
ren saw. — The father had stood as a powerful me-
diator between them and Joseph; and now con-
science again wakes up. In their message to him
they appeal to their father's words, and there is no
ground lor what Knobel says, that this was a mere
pretext. Joseph's weeping testifies to an elevated
and noble soul. Once they had sold him for a slave,
and now they offer themselves as his servants. This
is the last atonement. Joseph's answer contains the
full reconciliation. Am I in the place of God ? Can
I by my own will change his purposes ? God has
turned the judgment into a deliverance, and in this
must they find peace and reconciliation. God has
forgiven them ; and, therefore, he himself can no
longer retain their sins ; nor would he ; since that
would be to put himself judicially in the place of the
forgiving God. — What he says, ver. 20, gives us the
grand golden key to his whole life's history — yea,
it is the germ of all theodicy in the world's his-
tory.
4. Vers. 22-26. — The third generation. — That
is, great-grandchildren. The dead bodies were placed
in chests of sycamore wood, and kept in the cham-
bers of the dead. So Joseph's body was kept. In
the exodus of Israel it was carried along (Exod. xiii.
19), and laid in the field of Jacob at Shechem (Josh.
uiv. 82).
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL.
1. We have denoted this chapter as the chapter
of the home feeling. It is a trait that breathes
through it. Canaan the home-land of Israel — type
of the heavenly home.
2. Joseph's disposition, mourning, and truthful-
ness.
8. With wonderful propriety does Joseph unite
hi his own person the Israelitish truthfulness with
that which was of most value in the Egyptian cus-
toms and usages.
4. The monrning-train of Jacob, a presignal of
Israel's return to Canaan.
B. As God Tnakes Genesis glorious in the begin-
ning, by tlic account of his creation, — so here, at
tbe end, by a display of his providence (ver. 20).
6. The admonitions of conscience.
1. Perfect love casteth out fear. Joseph's word
of peace for liis brethren.
8. Joseph's provision an act of faith. Pointing
^4> tbe exodus.
HOMELETICAL AND PRACTICAL.
Consecrated death. — Consecrated mourning
The consecrated mourning usage. The pious mourn
ing procession. The divine sighing for home. Thi
dead Jacob draws beforehand the living Israel to Ca
naan. Before all is the dying Christ. — The way of
our future wonderfully prepared : 1. In the mourn
ing-train ; 2. in the exodus of the spirits; 3. in th«
gomg forth of the heart in its longing and sighing
for home.
First Section. (Vers. 1-6.) Starke : Extract
from Herodotos ii. 85, 86, on the Egypti,in mourU'
ing usage-, and the embalming of the dead. — Bibl.
Tub.; The bodies of the dead are rightly honored
when they are buried in the earth, with the common
usages, when they are not superstitious ; but they
are not to be exposed for spiritual reverence, or car-
ried about for that purpose, or have ascribed to them
any miracle-working power. Though we may weep
for the dead, it mu.<t not be with us as it is with the
heathen, who have no hope — Calwer Handbuck .
Egypt swai-med with physicians, because there was
one specially for each disease.
Second Section. (Vers. 7-13.) Starke : Thus
was there almost royal honor done to Jacob in his
death ; since for the dead Egyptian kings they used
to mourn for seventy-two days. — Schroder : In this
there was fulfilled the promise made ch. xlvi. 4 : Ja-
cob was literally brought back from Egypt to Ca-
naan ; since for his body did God prepare this pro-
phetic journey.
'ITiird Section. (Vers, 14-21.) Starke: Attend-
ance upon the dead to their place of rest is a Chris-
tian act. — Ver. 16. They sent a messenger., saying.
It was probably Benjamin whom they sent. — Hall:
To one who means good, there can be nothing more
offensive than suspicion. — The same : The tie of re-
ligion is much stricter than that of nature. — Ver.
20. Lange: The history of Joseph and his brethren
an example of the wonderful providence of God. —
Bibl. Tub. : The wicked plots of wicked men against
the pious, God turns to their best good.
Gerlach : The revelation of the most wonder-
fully glorious decree of God's love and almighty
power, which man cannot frustrate, yea, even the
transformation of evil into blessing and salvation —
this appears to have been fulfilled throughout the
entire life of Joseph. His feeling, so greatly removed
from the revenge which Ids brothers still thought
him capable of, goes far beyond them. He speaks
to their heart. His words drop like balm upon a
wound. It is a beautiful pictorial expression which
elsewhere occurs. — With an act of faith of the djing
Jacob, connecting the first book of Moi-es with the
second, this history closes, and thereby points to the
fulfilling of the promise that now lollons. — Sciiiio-
der : As we have one father, they woidd Siiy, so have
we one God, our father's Goil ; forgive us, therefore,
for God's sake, the God of our father. They make
mention of servitude as their deserved punishment,
with reference to their evil deed to Joseph (Baum-
garten).
Fourth Section. (Vers. 22-26.) Starke: It is
not ])robabIe that, at that time, the brothers were all
living. [In that case the meaning would have refer-
ence to the heads of families. — To tlie wood out of
which the coffins of the dead were made, there seem»
to have been ascribed the property of being incor-
ruptible ? — Coit paris in of Joseph with Christ in t
CHAP. L. 1-26.
nnti
tones of resemblances] — God does not suffer fidelity
to parents, or love and kindly deeds to one's own
people, to go unrewarded. — Bibl. iVirt. : God is wont,
sometimes, even in this life, to recompense to believ-
ers their cross and misery. That is the best thought
of death, to remember the promise of God and his
gracious redemption. — Schroder : It all ends with
the coffin, the mourning for the dead, the funeral
procession, and the glance into the future life. The
ige of promise is over ; there follows now a silent
chasm of four hundred years, until out of the rushes
of the Nile there is lifted up a weeping infant in a
little reed-formed arls. The ige of law be^na,
which endures for fifteen hundjed years. Then in
Bethlehem -Ephratah is there bom another infant,
and with him begms the happy time, the day of light
and quiclsening grace (Krummacher). — Calweb
Bandbuch: His place as primn minister of Egypt
had not extinguished Joseph's faith in the divini
promise. He shared in the faith ; he is to be a CO
heir, a sharer in the inheritance. — Lisco : And so
speaks Joseph yet, through faith, unto his people,
though he has long been dead, and in his grave. —
Heim : Joseph closed his life with an act of faith.
Date Due
FACULTY'
T7
Jl
o 1 '47
JKfl^ "*
ifiSfW
Cj/a.-n'J^^
oH^,-^\ct</iiL
•;Fi
u^^
»»