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I
THE GIFT OF I
I
-55
((GO
• 075
THE BROSS LIBRARY
YOLUMB lU
Hf
vt
THE BROS 8 PRIZE . . . 1906
THE PROBLEM OF
THE OLD TESTAMENT
CONSIDERED WITH REFERENCE
TO RECENT CRITICISM
BY
JAMES ORR, D.D.
FBOFS880B OF APOLOGBTIGS AUD STSTBMATIC TBaOLOOT
UNirXD FRBB CHUBCH COLLSaB, GLABGOW
^* Nubecula est^ qwxe cUo evancBcet.**
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
NEW YORK 1906
# •»»
I-
>r t-
TO
^ ; THS PRESIDENT, TRUSTEES, AND FACULTT
^ - OF
^ ^ LAKE FOREST COLLEGE
^ ^^^ Sllto Folume 10 iStatefnlls Bcliicatc)!
THE AUTHOR
152184
THE BROSS FOUNDATION
Ik 1879, the late William Bross of Chicago, lieutenant-
governor of Illinois in 1866-1870, desiring to make some
memorial of his son, Nathaniel Bross, who had died in
1856, entered into an agreement with the ^^ Trustees of
Lake Forest University," whereby there was finally trans-
ferred to the said Trustees the sum of Forty Thousand
Dollars, the income of which was to accumulate in per-
petuity for successive periods of ten years, at compound
interest, the accumulations of one decade to be spent in
the following decade, for the purpose of stimulating the
production of the best books or treatises ^^ on the connec-
tion^ relation^ and mutual hearing of any practical science^
or history of our race^ or the facts in any department of
knowledge^ with and upon the Christian Religion^*'*
In his deed of gift the founder had in view " the religion
of the Bible^ composed of the Old and New Testaments of our
Lord and Saviour^ Jesus Christy as commonly received in the
Presbyterian and other evangelical churches.''^ His object
was ^^ to call out the best efforts of the highest talent and the
ripest scholarship of the worlds to illustrate from science^ or
any department of knowledge^ and to demonstrate^ the divine
origin and authority of the Christian Scriptures ; andy fur-
thery to show how both Science and Revelation coincide^ and
to prove the existen^e^ the providence^ or any or all of the at-
^^ tributes of the one living and true Q-ody infinite^ eternal^ and
unchangeable in Mis being^ wisdom^ power^ holiness^ justice^
goodness and trvUh.
c-
I
r- is
%
,^
X The £ross Foundation
At the dose of the Trust Agreement, the donor ex-
pressed the hope that, by means of this fund, the various
authors might, ^^ every ten year 8^ poet up the science of the
world and show how it iUvstrcUes the truth of the Bihle^ and
the existence of Gf-od,^^ and that thereby " the gospel of our
blessed Saviour ^ Jesus Christy and the glories of His sacrifice
and plan of salvation^'*^ might be preached ^* to the end of
t%7ne»
The books or treatises procured by either of the methods
described below are to be published as volumes of what is
to be known as ^^The Bross Library."
The gift thus contemplated in the original agreement of
1879 was finally consummated in 1890. The first decade
of the accumulations of interest having closed in 1900, the
Trustees of the Bross Fund began at that time the ad-
ministration of this important trust.
The Trust Agreement prescribes two methods by which
the production of books of the above-mentioned character
is to be stimulated : —
A. The Trustees of the Bross Fund are empowered to
select able scholars, from time to time, to prepare books,
upon some theme within the terms of the Trust Agree-
ment, that would ^* illustrate " or ^* demonstrate " the
Christian Religion, or any phase of it, to the times in
which we live.
Ordinarily, the authors of these books are requested to
deliver the substance of such books in the form of lectures
before Lake Forest College, and any of the general public
who may desire to attend them, such courses to be known
as The Bross Lectures.
In pursuance of the first method, two writers have
already been specially appointed : — ^
The Brass Foundation xi
(1) The Reverend President Francis Landey Patton,
D.D., LL.D., of the Princeton Theological Seminary,
whose lectures on *^ Obligatory Morality," delivered in
Lake Forest in May, 1908, are being revised and enlarged
by the author and wHl be published in due time by the
Trustees of the Bross Fund ;
(2) The Reverend Professor Marcus Dods, D.D., of
New College, Edinburgh, whose lectures on ^* The Bible :
Its Origin and Nature," delivered in May, 1904, have
already been published as a volume of the Bross Library.
B. The second method for securing books for the Bross
Library is as follows : —
One or more premiums or prizes are to be offered dur-
ing each decade, the competition for which was to be
thrown open to ^^ the scientifie meny the Christian philoso-
phers and historians of all nations.*^
Accordingly, in 1902, a prize of Six Thousand Dollars
($6,000) was offered for the best book fulfilling any of
tJie purposes described in the foregoing extracts from the
Trust Agreement, the manuscripts to be presented on or
before June 1, 1905.
The following were appointed a Committee of Judges to
make the award: the Reverend George Trumbull Ladd,
D.D., LL.D., Professor of Moral Philosophy, Yale Uni-
versity; Alexander Thomas Ormond, Ph.D., LL.D.,
Professor of Philosophy, Princeton University, and the
Reverend George Frederick Wright, D.D., LL.D., Pro-
fessor of the Harmony of Science and Revelation, Oberlin
College.
The authorship of the various essays was not known
to the judges until after the award was made, the under-
signed having been the custodian of the sealed envelopes
xii The Bro88 Foundation
containing the names of the writers of the respective
manuscripts.
The Committee of Judges has unanimously awarded the
Bross Prize of 1905 to the essay entitled ^^ The Problem
of the Old Testament," which is now issued as Volume
III of the Bross Library.
The next Bross prize will be offered about 1915, and
will be announced in due time by the Trustees of the Bross
Fund.
The Trust Agreement requires that once in every thirty
or fifty years (according as the Trustees of the fund may
decide at the time) the entire sum of simple interest accu-
mulated during the previous decade is to be offered as a
single premium or prize for a competition similar to the
one which has just been completed.
EICHARD D. HARLAN,
Ji'eMent of Lake Forest College.
Lake Fobbst, Illdtoib,
notbmbbb, 1006.
PREFACE
Thb thanks of the author are due, in the first place,
to the TrosteeB of Lake Forest Coll^;e, and to the ad-
judioaton acting on their behalf, who, in their generoeitj,
have awarded to this book the munificent prize at their dis-
posal from the Bross Fund. It is right, however, to saj,
that, although the present volume has been so fortunate as to
obtain the Bross Prize, it was not for the Bross Prize, or
with thought or knowledge of the same, that the book was
written. But for a long-standing promise to the English
publishers, it is doubtful if it ever would have been written
at alL The book was sent to press in the beginning of
this jear, and the delaj in its publication has been due
prindpallj to the afterthought of submitting it in proof to
the judgment of the Bross Prize arbiters. The author is
deeply sensible of the courtesy of the publishers in so
readilj meeting his wishes in this matter at inconvenience
to themselves.
The book in one sense is not new, but represents, as
will probably be evident from its perusal, the gathering
up of thought, reading, and formation of opinion on its
subject, going as far back as the days of the old Colenso
and Samuel Davidson controversies, and of the appearance
of Grafs w^k in 1866, when the author's interest in these
ziT PREFACE
qoestionB was first thorooghlj aroused — an interest which
has never sinoe flagged. Much water had flowed under
the bridge in the interval, and the author entered on the
task of putting his book into shape with many misgivings.
Stilly now that the work is done, and apart altogether from
the material jreward which has so unexpectedlj come to
him, he does not regret having undertaken it The time
is past when the discussion of Old Testament questions
can be left wholly to professional experts, who represent
one, but onlj one, of the many points of view necessary to
be taken into account in considering this subject The
conclusions of the critics, of whom personally the author
would speak only with respect, force themselves on every-
one's attention, and it is a matter, no longer of choice, but
of necessity, to pay r^;ard to their opinion& Especially
for one engaged in the teaching of theology, in whatever
department, it is absolutely indispensable to possess some
acquaintance with the methods and results of Old Testa-
ment study, and to try to come to some understanding with
himself in regard to the theories of Old Testament rdi^pion
and literature which he finds prevailing around him. The
judgment of such an one may not be of the highest value ;
but, if it is his own, and has been reached at the cost of
prolonged thought and study, the expression of it, and the
exhibition of the grounds on which it rests, may not be
without help to others working their way through similar
perplexities.
The standpoint of the present book can be readily
understood from a survey of the Table of Contents, or from
reading the sketch of its scope at the close of the first
chapter. Those who expect to find in it a wholesale
denunciation of critics and of everything that savours of
PREFACE
critiGiBm will be disappointed. The author is not of the
opinion that much good is accomplished by the violent and
indiscriminatmg assaults on the critics sometimes indulged
in by very excellent men. The case which the critics
present must be met in a calm, temperate, and scholarly
way, if it is to be dealt with to the satisfaction of thought-
ful Ohristian people. On the other hand, those who come
to the book expecting to find in it agreement with the
methods and results of the reigning critical schools will
probably be not less disappointed. The author has here
no option. With the best will in the world to accept
whatever new light criticism may have to throw on the
structure and meaning of the Old Testament, he has to
confess that his study of the critical developments — ^now
for over thirty years — ^has increasingly convinced him that,
while Biblical students are indebted to the critics, and to
Old Testament science generally, for valuable help, the
Gxaf-Wellhausen hypothesis now in the ascendant is,
neither in its methods nor in its results, entitled to the un-
qualified confidence often claimed for it He is persuaded,
on the contrary, that it rests on erroneous fundamental
prindples, is eaten through with subjectivity, and must,
if carried out to its logical issues — to which, happily,
very many do not carry it — prove subversive of our
Ghiisfcian faith, and of such belief in, and use of, the
Bible as alone can meet the needs of the living Ghuioh.
Only, if this is to be shown, it must, as far as one's
knowledge enables him to do it, be done thoroughly,
and with due regard for all really critically-ascertained
facts.
Being designed specially foi^ an English-reading public,
the book is purposely OMt in a form as little technical as
xvi PREFACE
the nature of the subject permits. Hebrew words and minute
philological discussions are, as a rule, avoided, and where
English translations of foreign books exist, references are
usuUlj made to these. The customary form of the divine
name, ** Jehovah," is retained ; but in quotations authors
have been allowed to use their own various spellings of the
name. If, throughout, a seemingly disproportionate space
is given to German writers, this is simply due to the
tact that at least nine-tenths of the "Higher-Critical"
theories now in vogue had their origin and elaboration in
Germany, and in Britain and America are largely of the
nature of importations. One early learns that, if these
theories are to be dealt with satisfactorily, it can only be
by going at first hand to the sources — tapping the stream,
as it were, at the fountain-head. At the same time the
Indexes will show that representative writers of English-
speaking countries, of different schools, have by no means
been overlooked.
In so immense a field, it is hardly necessary to say that
no attempt whatever is made at a complete or exhaustive
treatment of Old Testament questions. That would have
been impossible in the space, even had the author possessed
the knowledge or ability qualifying him to undertake it
Some aspects of the Old Testament — the Wisdom litera-
ture, for example — ^have had to be left altogether untouched.
The idea has been, as far as practicable, to concentrate
attention on really crucial points, and to make these
the pivots on which the discussion of other questions turns
(see Appendix to first chapter). In handling so large a
mass of material, and copying and re-copying so many
references, it is inevitable that, with the utmost care, slips
and mistakes should occur. The author can only hope
PREFACE XTO
that iheoe will not prove in any case to be of suoh magni-
tude as seriously to affect the main argument.
Since the book went to press in the spring, no small
amount of literature has appeared to which it would be
interesting to refer. Allusion may here only be made to
the appearance of a valuable work by Professor W. Lotz, of
Erlangen, entitled Das AUe Testament n/nd die Wissensdiaft,
with which, in parts, the treatment in these pages may be
compared. It would be endless to specify articles and
pamphlets. Professor James Bobertson, of Glasgow, has
contributed to the May and June numbers of the periodical
Oood Wards two interesting papers on ''The Beginnings
of Hebrew History and Religion "; and Professor B. D.
Wilson, of Princeton, has completed in July and October
his valuable articles on ^Boyal Titles" in the Princeton
Theological Beview. The October article is specially devoted
to the statements of Dr. Driver on the use of royal titles
in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. Three papers
by Professors Driver and Kirkpatdck on The Higher
! Criticism Have been published, aiming at the removal of
misconceptions. In his Biblische Theologie des Alien Tester
ments Stade has re-stated lus views on the religion of Israel
in more systematic form.
With these remarks, the book must be left to its own
mission. The author entertains no over-sanguine expecta-
tions as to its effect on general conviction, but he is not
without hope that it may at least rouse to reflection some
; who have given too easy an assent to current theories,
simply because they are the theories of the hour. He has
no wish to be ultra-dogmatic on any point Time may
not justify all his conclusions ; but he has the strong per-
suasion that, when the day for summing-up comes — ^if
xviii PREFACE
ever sneh aniTas— the positions into which men's
will be disposed to settle will be found much nearer those
advocated in these pages than they will be to those of the
advanced WeUhansen school The fatore will show.
The vdmney it will be obsenred, has been amply fitted
with Tables of Oontents, Indexes, and oross-ieferenceB in
footnotes. These should make the task of consulting its
pages oomparatiyely easy, and should lighten somewhat
the impression of abstmseness created by certain of its
chapters. The author^s thanks are specially due to the
Bev. J. ]£ Wilson, B.D., Highbury, London, and to Qeorge
Hunter, Esq., Glasgow, for valuaUa aid in the oorrecfeioa
of the proofs.
CONTENTS
OHAPTEB I
IHTBODUOTOBT t TH8 FBOBLUC 8TATID.— J^
Wht* it tiM Old TMunent t
TrMtm of flM Old TBttament t reUtlon to eritidm.
L Tn Pbobudi Twovold: Bkuoxovb Am LmaAxr.
How are wo to oodooIto of the rdigiom t nataxvl or ■apcrnatual t
How an wo to oonodTo of tho HUraimn ff aga^ asttiofahipb tniai-
wofthfaftiii oto*
Dopondoiioe in part of tho looond qaMtion on tho Unt
Popular Tiow of the aabjeot: diatnut of " Hi^or OritioiMn.'*
Hoed Ibr diaoriminatlon of inaea.
Tho qnaation not afanplj ono botwoon ''HighMr OHtioi'* and
"Kon-HighorOritifla."
Daop« inao : the aiipematiiTal in tho nllgloB of InaaL
Sivialon on thli labjoot among critioa.
CMna IHini oritioal noTonontk
IL Tn fovDAMBiTTAL IsavB: AniTUSB TO TBI SunuiinrBAu
Flaoa of religion of larael among hiitoiieal loUgloBa.
Ita olaim to a apedal divine origin.
KnoDon and the "modem " aohool of eritiolan.
brael'a religion "nothing leai^ hot alio nothing aon^** than
other religiona.
Denial of tapematiiral in hiitory and prophoQjy;
"Natural derelopment" alone locognieed.
MIK0 jfrMpM in^olv^d in thia poaition.
fbeta of religion and hiatoiy to be impartially ^nr^miiiH.
Importance of troe guiding prindplea.
A oaaa of oompeting interpretationa of Old Teatamanl
mtlmato teat in fitneaa to meet tho fitetk
ds
CONTENTS
III. Ths Lttbbabt Pboblsic : Its Dependenob oh thb BBLiaiovs.
Intsreet of ChriBtian fidih in literary qnertioiis.
Belief in ■apernatnnl not neoeesarily boand np with qoeetions of
dates and anthonhip.
Yet dole oonneotion between oritioal premises and critical resnlts.
Critical theories have sdentifio Talne.
Yet mainly elaborated in rationalistic workshopsi
Bationalistic " set " of German oritioiBm.
Rationalistic basis of WeUhansen theory.
Its temporary popularity.
Improbability that a theory CTolyed from this basis can be
adequate for Ohristian faith.
In this oonneotion dates, etc., not onimportant.
Dates often determined by oritioal assomptions : used to sabTsrt
credibility.
Need of recasting of theories on belieying principles.
IV. AtTITVDB or GRmOIBK to "BBYBULTIOir."
Argument that contrast of supematoral and non-sapematunl is
less important than it seems.
Flrofbssor W. R. Smith on high views of the '* modem " sohooL
Defects of this Tiew of Israel's religion.
Ambiguity in nse of word " revelation."
Admission of "providential guidance."
"Revelation" in sense of psychological development
Dilemma here that revelation leads to belief in sapematoral,
and in direct commnnioations of Qod to man.
Christ the tonchstone of the supernatural for faith.
That view of revelation alone adequate which enlminates in
His Person and redemption.
Sketch of course of subsequent
APPENDIX TO CHAPTER I
Okuoial Pozxtb IX THB Cbitioal Thxobt.^ /)i. 25, 26.
OHAPTEE II
THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM ITS OWN POINT OF
VIEW.— ^. 27-61.
Place of Old Testament in the economy of revelation. Tendency of purely
critical study to obscure view of this.
Right of Old Testament to be heard for itselt
L Thb Oboaxio Ukitt or the Book,
The Bible a unity.
Many books, but struotarally one.
CONTENTS
ninstration bj contrast : " book-religions.**
No unity in ethnic Scriptures (Koran, etc).
The Bible has an organic character.
Harked by plan, purpose, progress.
Unity grows ont of religion and history.
II. FULPILMBNT OF THB 0U> TsBTAXSinr IN THB KXW.
The Bible in two divisions.
The isoond the counterpart and completion of the first
The ''Serrant" of Isa. liiL: fulfilment in Christ
BeligioB of Israel a religion of hope.
Antioipation of better economy.
The Messianic idea.
New Testament realises hopes and promises of the Old.
This relation inward and vital.
III. TkLSOLOOIOAL ChABAOTXB of THB ffOTOMT,
History dominated by idea of purpose.
Sketcsh of development — primitiye and patriarchal history.
Mosaic and later histoiy.
Hirtory viewed retrogressively.
Umqueness of this,
lY, Uhiqub Idiib of thb JSjuvjof.
The uniqueness generally acknowledged.
1. NesfotiM side — absenoe of features found in other reUgioiis. .
Magic, nature-superstitions, etc
t. FofUiviMB — ^fimdamental ideas of Israel's religion.
(1) Monotheism of religion.
Peculiar to IsraeL
Opposite tendency in other religions.
Underlies the whole of Old Testament
(2) Developing purpose of grace
Sin and grace in Scripture.
The Bible a "history of redemption."
Found in no other religion.
(8) Indissoluble relation between religion and DMrality.
General relations of religion and morality.
Belii^on of Israel dominated by this idea.
Qod as the Holy One.
Union of religion and morality in psalms and prophets.
Such a religion not man-originated.
y. Claim to ak Obzodt nr Rxvielatiok.
Modem substitution of psychology for revelation.
Biblical point of view^"Thus saith Jehovah."
Bevelation of Qod in act and word.
The Israelite conscious of being possessor and guardian of a speelAl
revelation.
zzil CONTENTS
nUgioDf claim simQar origin.
B«ply— -Ab religion has a stoiy of its beginnings like I>rael*&
(1) Monotheism not of natoral origin.
Only three monethoiatlo religiona in world t Jndaiim, Ohrii-
tianity, and Hohammedanitm derired from other two.
(2) Ethioal oharaoter of larael'e religion not of natural origin.
Oontraet with Egyptian religion.
Olaim to rerelation Jnatifled.
YI. SiTBLAnOK IV RlLATIOir TO m BlOOID.
If rerelation then, qneationi about date and pladng of bodka of
odnor unuortenoe.
If rerelation ^ven reeaonable to ezpeot a leoonL
Oharaoter of Bible ahowa it ie eaeh a reoocd.
Qnalitiee of Ser^^tore a proof of inapiiation.
Bible realiaee its own teete of inapiration.
VII. Bbultiov of thb Old Tmtaiont to Oheiik
Ohriet the goal of Old Testament rereUtion.
The fflnminatlng light in ite study.
OHAPTEB III
THB OLD TB8TAMBNT AS AFFECTED BY GBITICISlf— L THB '
HI8T0BY: ABOUMBNT FBOM OBITICAL PBBMISBa —
Ip. 6S-81.
Doee eeientiiie oritioism oTerthrow the history of the Old Testament t
Prorisional adoption of eritical standpoint
I. CnmcAL AasAVLT ok Old Txstamsnt Histobt.
Views of radical eritics : denial of historicity.
Patriaibhal and Moeaic periods.
Later historical books.
Moderste eritical positions.
Grounds of deniaL
Late date of histoiy.
Bndimentptfy state of beliet
Oontradietions^ eto.
IL lovomnro of Txlsologioal BLumrr or thb Histobt.
Kon-reoognition by radical aohooL
BeoQgnition by beUering critics.
Explanation of appearance of teleology —
Beading back of prophetic id<
CONTENTS zziii
B«ftitetloiik of tUt t'—
1. Tdaolqgical eleiiMiit not ob nufam of Usfany, Iral o&ten into
hmbstuMOi
S. WhcraiithiiniiidoapftUoofinTiiitiiigitff
IIL OmiPTTtmrr ov Hmosr oir PBimm of OBmoiL Tmaoww.
Oritioal Uieofy of Hht Hozatoobh.
Tho Doommnti JSDP.
Ooiiiid«mtion oontood to J and &
ThooriM of agt ^ifaith or tii^ih otntoijX oathonhipb vtUlioa^
L Uabk malt ftom fliii thooij^*
J aad S aatioado wiitfen pnpho^*
WaTHing of oritiaiL
li Infonnoet: —
(1) Tdodlogifltl dhinotv aa Intagral port of tlio tnditkm.
Not dna to proplietio maaipiilatloiL
(2) Tradition has alnady do?«lopad and aettiad fonn.
Contimat with popular l^gand.
d) Gritioal thaoiy aammaa two hiatoriaa.
Indapcndant^ j«t in aobatanoa laaambling and panlleL
Hanoo (1) ohaok on frao iuftntkn ; (S) proof of aattlad
^Ma^it^M* of traditlnn*
IV. Snmvo-BTOHia to KaictiIWi Daxb of TnAomoK.
L tradition mnafe antedate diTUon of kingdom.
Age of SolomoOf David, 8aaiiiaL
S. Gritioal datea do not i&z fffMlmia • fiM.
Gritioal aappovt for aarliar datoi
Ko good laaaon for patting lata,
lb Hypothaaia of aarliar raooida.
(1) Sapport from hiatoiy of langoaga.
J and B from "golden age of literatan^*
Kaeeaaity of pre^oaa ooltiTation.
(3) Plooeding dovoIopnuBt of literataia^
Beaalta aa to J and X.
(8) Gritioal adniarion of aarliar reoorda.
T. OomiOBOBATiYB SviBnoB <nr Eaklt Datb of Soviom.
1. New light oaat by diaoorvy of age aad naa of writing; and
doToIopmant of Utaratara.
BoTolotion in ideaa : Baljjlonia, ^^TP^ Ouiaan, atob
1. Oorroborationa of dbto of hiatoiy.
Genaaia zir.; Gonaaia z.; lift of Joaapfa, ata.
lb Witnem of Old TaatoBMBt to early aaa of writing in ImaaL
«^, ■* ^.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER IV
THB OLD TESTAMENT AS AFFECTED BT GBITIGISM— I. THE
HISrOBT : OOUKTSR-THSOBIES TESTED.—^. 88-116.
Gritioal leoonstaniotioii of iibib history.
I. BlYAL OOKSTBUOTIOKS AB DSFENDKNT OV TBXSR PBaBUPPOOnOlIB
The oritioal presappodtion and ita remits.
Natniahiess of the Biblioal view on its own pnrappositions.
Meaning of "history" in the Bible.
Patriarchal history as oarefally presenred (radUiaii, *
II. ThSOKT that PaTBZAIOHB WBBB VOT IVDIYIDVALf, BUT ^'PUI-
BOVIFiaATIOKS.'*
Preralenoe of this theory : itsgroonds.
1. Names of the patriarchs not imdMdual^ bat triboL
This only partially true : examination of names.
Diffionltiss in ease of Abraham.
S. 'FoTEOB ot Seriptun ifenealogiei. ]
Ethnographic genealogies (Genesis z.).
Bat fiunily genealogies also.
No biographies of '< Misraim,** " Ladim," eto.
8. AsmvoMd lavf qf growth qf9oci§t($i, i
Views of Stade, eto.
laok of proof of this " law."
Maine on Patriazbhal theory of Society.
Peooliarity of oall and destiny in IsraeL
Patriarohs both persons and progenitors.
III. WITNX08 07 Israel's Natiokal Consoxousnbss : Turn Patuabohs.
Argoment as to religion postponed.
Dillmann on patriarchal religion.
Minimising of later testimony to patriarchs.
!• Application of oritical method to pn^xActie
H. P. Smith ; Wellhansen.
Disproof of their assertions.
1. Positiye eyidenoe in later litentars—
The prophets.
The JE histoiy.
Book of Denteronomy*
ly. MOSBS ASD THB EXODXTB.
L Belittling of testimony toifMn as lawgiTen
Carpenter on prophetic references.
Moses in Book of Deateronomy.
In JE history.
History to be taken as a vhole.
CONTENTS
S. TIm AmfiM and i2«i jSIm deliyenDoe.
If eyer happened, impossible should be forgotten.
Indelibflity of national reooUeetion.
Testimony of literature.
Song of Miriam ; historical books ; prophetik
Eantisoh on historioity of Exodus.
Ko tenable riyal theoiy.
Unexplained how Israelites did leave Egypt.
" Escape " hypothesis impossible.
v. Inmof AL Ohabaotib ov Nuulatiyis ▲ GvAHAiim foe His-
TOBXOITT.
Yalne of internal eridenoe of tmthftilness.
Application to patriarchal history.
1. CMiK?% of narratiyes as a whole.
Dr. Driyer's testimony.
Sobriety and sparingness of miracle in Qenesiai
Oontrast with period of Exodus.
S. ITiii^ ^jiieft^fv ^iwiMireTU in different sourosi.
Vellhansen's statemente on this point.
Intardependence of sources,
ninstrations from narratiye.
8. 'C^aracUr if Abraham a guarantee of historicity.
General grandeur of character.
His place in reyelation.
Oontrast with later frbles.
YL FiDXLiTT OF KiJULATiyis TO Patbiaxohal CoHDmom.
Frimitiye character and simplicity of ideas.
1. Biatoij morm in priwUHw eondUions,
Free life of patriarchs : primitiye ideas.
Alleged mirroring of later political eyenti.
Gunkel in disproof of this.
T Primitiye character of rdigUm9 idioi and /orms qfwank^
Prayer and sacrifice ; burnt offering, etc
Objeotiye character of reyelation.
The theophany : "Angel of Jehoyah."
TJndeyeloped character of doctrine of angels.
But "Angel of Jehoyih** peculiar form of reyelation in
earliest age.
Identification with Jehoyah.
t. Idea qf Qcd appropriate to this stage of reyelation.
The fUMMf of God in Genesis: El, SLohim, El ShaddaL
Contrast with name " Jehoyah.**
Use of Jehoyah in GeneslB.
The diyine ehamuier and attiribuU$,
Absence of terms "holy," "righteousness," "wrath," etc.
xxvi CONTENTS
4. JBIIflrf mmoipUma of tin pttgiithi nmk lowr tt>fib
HiniageofaitlMn, ete.
WMk« Moae of nn.
Oontmt with pfophtli*
Idfiaoo in Book of Szodm In both vtUgloiM and otUoid
oonooptioni*
Gnoderaoaloofhiftoiyinthiabook; doopw Iditi, otow
GiMtatH of lionio on.
TiridiMM of umtiTei.
Ualtj of lopwunUtioa of Moms mud Aano.
OHAPTEB y
THE OLD TESTAMENT AS AFFECTED BT CRITI0I8M— IL BE-
LIGIOK AND INSTITUTIONS s GOD AND HIS WOBSHIP.—
Fp. 117-147,
Ciitiottl trMtment of problemi of reUgloiu
I. Favkt of thb OuxioAJL Mbthoik
B^eotloii of hiitory wo ha,Y% and rabftitation for it of fmigtmiy
Usfeorj.
JK^.9 Bndde on Yahweb ; bis admissioBS.
A priori rejsotion of Seeond Oommandmenti
Faflnrs of critiaism to abide by its own aasomptionai
X,g.t Jophthah ; David ; golden cali^ ets.
More ijstsniatio inqniiy.
11. EaXLT ISKABLinSB MOKOTHUSII.
1. BiUittU nfpfiMmtaMsM— Israel from first monothelslls.
Inability of people to maintain this standpoint.
Belief in inteior gods.
Beligion itMlf based on belief in ODS tme God.
Genesis a monothelstio book.
JehoTsh in Szodns a sapreme God.
This not oontradioted bj " anthropomorphisinSL'*
2. Vimm qf €oolutienmrf aMcdl §AooL
Early monotheism rejected.
Beligion begins with polytheism.
Yahweh a tribal God.
Theories of early religion in Israel t-~
Molooh theory (Knenen).
Polydemonism (Kaatsaoh).
Kenite theory (Bndde).
Stiperstitioiis elements ; fetishism, ets^
CONTENTS xxvii
Qffouids of oritical theoiy : —
(1) Old Tflttunent oonoeption of God toooltvaM te patriwohal
«ad MoMio tunes.
jUkged dependenoo of monotheism on Idaoi of tho world
and of hmnudty.
MbuT'ofthii; Uriel early in oontMst willi liJIgh ohrlU»-
tlona.
Bifgtk Tiews of God in older inHgionii
YiewB of ofher Old Teetunont leholirfc
Witneae of Deealogne.
(1) Szamination of Eenite theoiT;
Yahweh a new god to leraaL
The atoim-god of SinaL
Ubaea among Kenitea— Song of Debonk
Beply : JehoTah the God of the fiithan.
Yahweh not a Eenite deity.
Not proved by Song of Deborah.
Stade's admieriona of nniyersality of Yahwvh.
Sublimity of Song of Deborah.
(f) Ph)of from apedal paeeagea : —
Jephthah's words on Ohemoah—
Not oondnsiye for Israelitiah Tiew.
DaTid "driTen" from JehoTdi'a inheritanoe^WeU-
hanaen, eta
Ko idea of serring gods other than Jehofih onyialUrv.
Oomparison with Denteronomy.
*'Btbioal monotheism ** not a creation of the propheta.
Prophets all assame knowledge of one tnia God.
IIL Xablt Ubaxutibb Woxship.
Theoriea of fetishism, animism, anoestor-worshlpb tto.
Contrast with Biblical Tiew.
Patriarchal and Moeaic periods.
BiUe on fiue of it does not sapport these theories.
Examination of partioolars : —
1. Theory of scmeliiafifii
Biblical Tiew of origin of sanotnariea (Bethel, ttB.X
Critical view — old Ganaanitish shrines.
Patriarchal legends an aftergrowth.
Proof only by rejection of Biblical historiaii»
Stade's theory and " proofr.**
" Grarea " of patriarchs, etc
Momrning customs, etc.
Bttdde and Addis on ancestor- worahipw
Baselessness of theoiy.
xxviii CONTENTS
8. Animiim — Mcred wella and trees.
'* Wells '* in patriarchal history — ^but for water.
" Trees "—but Qod not thought of as in them.
W. R. Smith on saored tnea.
* * Asherahs " — ^bnt idolatrooa.
4. FOiihiim tokd 9tane^wor$h/^.
<< Ark" alleged to be letUh.
Sacred stones in ark (meteoritM).
H. P. Smith, etc
Sacred "pillars" (maff$ba$).
Jacob at Bethel.
No class of stones called *' Bethels."
God not thonght of as in stone.
Memorial pillars (Dillmann, etc).
The prophets and mof^^oi,
6. TUemiim,
Alleged belief in descent of tribes from ^nimulf,
Animal names, eta
Bearings on sacrifice.
Theory not generally accepted.
6. Ewtum ioeryics.
Connection with Moloch theory.
Other eyidences secondary.
Oase of daughter of Jepbthah.
Interpretation of incident
No proof of general custom.
Attitude of prophets to human sacrifice.
IVc Imags-Wobship is Ibbaxl.
Second Commandment denied to Moses.
Positiye assertion of worship of Yahweh by images.
Alleged antiquity of bull-worship.
Szamination of evidence : —
1. Kotevideaoa in cider history.
Hot in Genesis— case of " teraphim."
Kot in Mosaic history —
Golden calf a breach of coyenant.
2. State of religion muifr/iMf^M.
Lapse into Canaanltish idolatry.
Little eyidence of image- worship of Jehorah.
CaseofGideon—
Not proved that his "ephod " was an image of JehoTah.
No proof that it was image of a bull.
No proof that bull-worship was general.
Case of Micah and Danites.
Real instance of idolatrous worship of Jehovah.
Not proof of rule in Israel.
Micah at first without images.
CONTENTS
S. CfAf^wnM^ of Northern Kingdom.
Assumed reviytl of ancient nsage.
But why need *< reviyal " f
Theory disproved \tj silence of earlier history.
Ko traoe in age of Samuel or David.
Absence of image in temple.
Alleged aheenoe of protest in prophets.
Strong protest in Hoaea.
But also in Amos.
Eiyah's oonflict with *' Baal-worship "—not with calves.
Incredibility of his approval of calf- worship.
Threatens Ahab with doom of Jeroboam.
Omoluslon— Biblical view still valid.
CHAPTEE VI
THE OLD TESTAMENT AS AFFECTED BT ORITICISM— II. RE-
LIGION AND INSTITUTIONS : ABE, TABERNACLE, PRIEST-
HOOD, Era— i)». 149-190.
Dependence of eritioism on view taken of laws and insfcitutiona.
L Gbnxbal Position ov Mosbb as Lawoiysb. '
Difficulty of oritios on this point.
Name of Moses given to all laws^ yet all laws withheld from him.
1. Relation of Moses to Dtealogwt and Book of Oovonant,
Grounds of denial of Decalogue to Moses.
So-called second Decalogue in Ex. zxxiv.
Baselessness of this.
Decalogue gives probability to Mosaic origin of laws in Book
of Covenant.
Antecedent probability of legislation.
II« Tbb SAOBinoiAL Ststxm akd Ritual Law.
Denial of belisf In Mosaic or divine origin of sacrificial law before
ezHa.
L Assertion that P writer ' * knows nothing " of sacrifice before Moses.
3. Sacrifioe in prophetic age not merely " traditional usage."
8. Prophetio denunciations of outward ritual.
Real meaning of these.
Reoognition of divine sanction of ordinances.
4. AdmiMions of Kuenen, Smend, etc.
Incredible that, In settling constitution, Moses should give no
religious ordinances^
Special institutionsL
CONTENTS
IIL Thb SicnoD Abx.
Gritioal theory of the axk ; oontndioted by &ota.
1. The moftin^ of the ark.
An old ark admitted : alleged JE aoconnt of ma.Mii|^
Agreement of Dent, z. 1-5 with P acooant
S. SubsequmUhutoryotttkenxk,
Notioea regarding name, stmotnre, oaei.
Theae not discrepant with P.
The ark and Leyitee : H. P. Smith.
8. Relation of ark to Sohmonic Umgph.
Solomonio ark was the old ark.
P's deaoiiption, if taken from Solomonic ark, wonid agree with
old ark.
N^eot of ark in pre-DaTidio time t leeion of this.
IT. The Tabukaoul
Initial objection to splendour of tabernacle.
1. Admission that tabernacle of «om«Hfwf existed*
Natore of tabemade ; Qrafs views.
Alleged distinction from tabernacle of the law.
The " tent of meeting ** in JB—Bz. zzziiL 7.
Snpposed contrasts.
1. PQMtofthetabemade.
View that JB tent mUM$ of camp ; P tabemade im rnfdd ^
camp.
Bzamlnation of cases : Knm. zL, ziL
Indications that JB tabernacle also wUiMm the camp.
S. {7i« of the tabernacle.
Yiew that JB tent a place of fvocteMon ; P tabernacle a place of
worMp.
Bat (1) P tabemads also a place of lerelation.
Eesemblances of JB and P tabernacles.
(2) And JE tabemade a place of worship.
Kotioes till time of Judges.
The ark at Shiloh : centre for '*all Israel"
Objection that Shiloh sanctnary a " temple "—still, however, a
"tent."
Also that Samnd slept in diamber of aik.
Groundlessness of this.
The Leyitioal dues.
Subsequent fortunes of tabemade.
y. Thb Uhitt ov thb Sahotuabt.
Wdlhauaen on centralisation of cultus in Deuteronomy.
AUflged rdation to £z. zz. 24 (JB) and to P.
Keed of more careftil scrutiny of facts.
CONTENTS
L Tli« fwidiammM law In Bx. zz. 84.
ProfMsor W. B. Smith on freedom of wovdi^
Law does not give fmrulHeted liberty.
'*Beoording" of God's name ooren oaaea of ipMial rtfaUtion
(Qideon, Manoiih, eto.).
S. Unity of motoaiy tfbe icl0a//or /«ni«{ from begfaining.
*' An altar" In ftindamental law.
One ''honse of God " in Book of Coreniaft.
One aanotoary in wilderneM.
The altar 3i in Josh. xdL
Worship at ono oentre in Judges,
tb Denteronomy does not demand immMaU rsaUntloB of tha law
of unity.
Postponomont of fUl realisation till land had "rsst"
Settled state first with David and Solomon,
i. Allowance necessary for irreguiarUisa in times of nnssttlsment
ami disonEanisation.
Period of oonftuiion speoially after oaptnro of ark — "a reUgioiis
intsrregnimL
Samuel's relation to worship.
8]rfrit of law abore its letter.
& Religions attitude to « high plaoes.**
Pandty of early notioea.
Worship till Solomon mainly to Jehorah.
Idolatry in later reigns.
Attitude of prophets to '< hi|^ plaoes.**
TL Tbb Aabovio Pbubthood Aim tee Leyitv.
A IiBTitioal priesthood attested, hut fhrther questiooi.
1. Was the priesthood Aair<m(c t
Wdlhausen's thsorisings on tribe of Ls?L
Denial of Aaronio '* hi|^ priest" before ezila.
Testimony to Aaxonio priesthood— Aaron to Hi.
•* BOi^ priest" seldom in Prisstly Ooda.
Alleged confliet of PC with DeutsNUunqy and early practioe.
A relatxre oontrast grsnted.
(1) Iramination otpknmolcgif,
*'The priests the Lerites" In earlier histoiy.
** Priests oiKi Lerites" not in law.
** Lsrites " ussd also in wide ssnse In P.
" Sons of Aanm" in PO not a universal designation, and
disappsars later.
Ohange in designation with ehoioe of tribe of Ls?L
Komsnblature IbUows fact
(3) Fnnetioins of prissthood attributed to %eM4 Mb€ of Levi
in Deuteronomy.
Kren Urioi and Thummim of priesthood.
xxxu CONTENTS
KeTerthekn traces of difltinotion of orders.
AU "Leritos" not "priests."
Aaroiiio priesthood reoognised.
Priests and LsTites not identioal in Dent ZTiiL 1-8.
Terms for service applicable to both classes.
(8) PotUion qfLeviUs in Deuteronomy and in history.
Alleged contradiction with PO.
Legal provision for Levites, howeyer, not ignored in
Deuteronomy.
Needy condition of Leyites in accordance with situation before
settled conditions.
Leyites in later times.
(4) Seani notices of Leyites in histoiy.
Samuel as Lerite.
Wellhausen and W. B. Smith on Samuel as '* priest**
Groundlessness of this yiew — (1) the ephod ; (2) the mantle.
APPENDIX TO CHAPTER VI
Priests akd Lxtitxs (Dr. Driver on "ministering" and "stsading'*
before Jehoyah).^^. 191, 192.
CHAPTER VII
DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES OF THE CRITICAL
HYPOTHESIS: I. THE JE ANALYSIS.— i)». 198-289.
New problem — ^validity of critical theoiy of documents.
Criticism brings to light real phenomena.
I. Stadia ov thk Cbitioal DsysLOPiixNT.
1. Aitruc : Elohistic and Jehovistio documents.
2. SkhJutm : literaiy peculiarities in documenti.
8. JDe WeUe : problem of Deuteronomy.
4« Hup/eld : separation of 2nd Elohist
6. The G'rc^ revolution : tke law post-eziliaD*
Theories of relation of sources.
Fragmentary — ^supplementary— doeumentaiy.
II. DiFFIOULTIIS OF THB CrITIOAL HyPOTHSBIB IN QeNXBIL.
Points of agreement among oritios.
Wide divergences in detail.
Kanlzsoh and Kuenen on lack of agreement.
Justification of doubts as to soundness of prindples.
CONTENTS Dxiii
1. Om^idi i^cpinion in oritioal lohook.
Hypothetioal character of JSDP.
Lack of agreement at to dates, relations, priority.
2. RxcessiTemuZ^ijpfietiMonyjmiretf.
Serial Js, Es, Fs, Bs.
This a necessity of theory (Ptolemaic epicycles).
Bat ereatee insoluble complications.
Impossibility of longer insisting on minute criteria.
Effect on qnestlons of date.
Oontndiflted by unity of book.
IIL Spioial Pboblbms ov JB: Plaos ov Obioin and Bztint.
1. Fiae$ if origin, with bearings on age.
E Bphraimitio (interest in sacred places, etc.)^^ Judaas.
Qrounds ina^bquate fbr this distinction.
(1) J also placed by leading critics in Northern Israel.
(2) False assnmptions of moUvt*
Gunkel and Euenon deny party-tendency.
(9) NaxratiTes do not bear out preference for North and South.
J interested in Northern localities ; B in South,
(Mtioson"tone"ofB.
(4) Strained interpretation of inoideiitB.
Bethel, Beersheba, eta
% JEeteiUofdocnmentft
Admitted difficulty in distinction after Genesis.
Are J and B found in Judges, Samuel, etc t
Osse of Joshua: FgnUUeueh or ffexaUueh t
Oomill, etc, on distinctness of Joshua.
Differences in language, structure, etc
Wellhausen, etc, deny J in Joshua.
Difficulties with B and P. '
Stylistic difficnltiec
Samaritan Joshua : balance against Hexateubh.
IV. AsB J Aim B Two OB Ont Difvioultibs of Sbpabation.
1. Jiropro<if(lUUJS0V0rvaidUUnddooimetU.
Intermittent, firagmentary character of E.
2. Unity supported by thoroughly parallel character of narrativea
Critical testimonies on parallelism.
8. StglitHc reoonibla/nee of J and B.
Dr. Driver on resemblance.
4. JW«<Of»andifi<MT52a^ioi»ofnarratiyec
Union " bewflderingly dose"
NaxratiTes closely interconnected.
The " omission " theory.
c
xxxiv CONTENTS
ft. yioUid mpMmU needed to make hypothesie workable.
Flaoo and ftmotioiiB of ''redaotor."
Peonliaiitiea of redaetor.
▼• Tbb PxoBLm ov THB DiYim Names in J Am B.
Theoe Ibh lim^ tium tappoaed.
(1) ''Ebbim" in admitted J paaMgea.
(2) " JehoYab** in E paasagea.
(8) Enananli admiflrions on diaoriminatioB.
% JfapfonaMMoffhota.
(1) Theoiy otdUMmHmmrm loaded with dilBoaltiei.
OMer^aouoea not denied, bat theae not J and IL
(2) Hypotheaia of di$orim!inaHcn : baa trae elementa in it.
Oeaaation of ' < Ebbim " in E witb Exodna iii
Difflenltiea of critical explanation.
Berelation of JahoYah in Exodna yi« — ^trae meaning of
naaMiffe.
P aToida " JaboTab*' till Exodoa tL ; two afeigea of
vevelation*
Explanation inadequate for JE.
(8) PoMibflity fdekwnge in text
Exampleaoftlus; E'a naage after Exodna iiL
Double namea in Geneaia ii, iiL
Usage of LXX in Genesis.
Outstanding case : pbenomena of Psalter.
Klostennann's tbeoiy of Jebovistic and Elobistie reoensioDS
of sua work.
TI. LnrouisTio m otbbb aluuxd Gbounds vob Sbpa&atioh.
Illusoiy obanoter of these.
1. X'^n^mMs peonliaritiea.
Typical oaaea examined.
2. Modk if r^prtmUaUcn in E.
The ''dream" oriterion—
Angel calling "out of beayen."
Partition tested by Gen. xxii and Gen. xxriii. 10 ff.
Unity of narratiyea.
Significant use of diyine names*
8. ** Dug^ieaU*' wiirraHMi,
Ganeral principles affecting these.
Bethel— Joseph— Hagar, eto.
Test case : denial of wiyeo by Abraham and laaaa
(1) Thru narratiyea— Itiw in J.
Qritical disintegration processes.
(2) Use of diyine neuMB : exaggerationsi eta.
Difficultiea of analysis.
C»NTENTS
(1) Diiw^fn in namtiTW.
PlobAbly repraent geniiiiMly distinot tnditioiii.
Abraham's aotion a result of settled jwlMy.
Latv nairatiTe rafas to earlier.
APPSNDIX.TO OHAFTS& YII
Tbb HnrouoiTr ov thb Book ov Jobhva.— ^. 240-948.
CHAPTBB YIII
DltnOUI^tBS AND PSBPLSXITIIES OF THX GBITIOAL HYK)
THS8IS : THE QUBSTIOK OV DSUTXRONOMT.-^/y. S^ VI.
Plaoe of Deuteronomy in eritioal fheoiy.
L Statb of ths Quianoir Aim Oxhbbal Yinw.
Contents of Denteronomj*
Odtioal theoiy of origin : age of Joeiah.
OonseqiMnoee of Tiew of late date.
Doubts as to soundness of eritioal riew—
Fiiom oonrse of oritioism itselH
From enonnoiiB dilBealtiee of hypotbesis.
IL UmTT m Sttlb ov Dsunnovoirr.
1. Cr«%^aoii^iUaiKi4^2iinthebook.
Allowanoe for redaction*
Older oritios held <* unity" as indubitable.
Critioal disintegration of the book.
Oonflioting yiews: Wellbansen, Kaenen» Oarpentet c. -
a ''dissolTing yiew."
Dr. Drirer on unity of style.
3.* Relation of j^ to that of otber Pentateuch sonroee.
DeUtaoh on style of Moees *'Jebovi>tie«Deuteronomic. '
AiBnitiee with Deuteronomy in P (Ler. zxri, eto.).
AiBnitias of Deuteronomy with JS.
Book of Oorenant ; Geneeis, eto.
i^fflTi{«n« with Deuteronomy in later hooka.
*' Pre-Deuteronomio " passages.
Deoreaee of Deuteronomio influenoe as histoiy adTanoee
IIL DiFFiovLins 07 OunoAL Tioobt oh Aox hxu Obiod
Presuppositions of eritieism on date.
Belation to age of JS.
1. l!1ie/iMlMHr^''<ibe5oeyfc</(^toi0''inJosiah'sTCign.
Httntire of dJaootwy.
xxxti CONTENTS
(1) Plainly belieTed to be diaooToy of an M book. \
All oonoenied bdioTed book to bo Mosaio. \
Diffiooltioa of opposite hjpotbesia.
(S) Tlieoiy of ''frand** in produotioQ of the book.
This the fiew of leading oritica (Wellbaaaen, etc.).
Snppoeition morally oondemnable and hiatorically un-
tenable.
(8) Aaaiimed earlier date under Manaaaeh or Hezekiah.
Diaadyantages of this Tiew ; gaiding principle lost--
Enenen'a "fktal" objection.
(4) Did the book originate with prophets or priests f
Priests (Enenen) ; prophets (Eantzach, eto.).
Diifionlties of both Tiews.
S. TsaMMony ^ book to its own origin.
Apparently dear elaim to Mosaic anthorship.
Not whole Pentatenoh.
But not code (chaps. ziL-zzvi) only.
Theory of a " free reproduction " of written disooursss of Moses
(Delitssch, etc.).
AdmissibiUiy of this tIsw.
Bat— CM honot
If Moses wrote, a literary "double'' not called for.
Literary capabilltios of Moess.
Beal ground of objection — ^belief In non-historidty of Mosaic
period.
8. IfUomalehairaeUroCbook*
Minimising of difficulties hers.
Book and history do not fit each other.
(1) Josiah not morsd primarily by idea of centraUring
worship.
His reformation directed against idoUUry,
Deuteronomy not aimed directly at ** high places."
JSren in Deuteronomy centralisation of worship not an
all-dominating idea.
(2) Problem of mUeeUamout laws In a book composed to
effect reform of worMp.
Inoongruity and irrelevancy of many of the laws.
Israel an unbroken unity.
Obsolete and unsuitable laws.
Deuteronomic law of death for idolatry not put in force
by Josiah.
Theory of Leyitea as '* dissstablished priests."
•
IV. OKinoAL Bbasons vob L^n DATnra ov the Book : QuBsnon
OV YaLIPITT ov THX8B.
Beal ground with many : altered view of Moses and his sgs.
Importance of question of date : results for JE and P.
CONTENTS Dxvii
1. ExtenaiT« eot^eeaians of oritiGal writait m to Mosaic baaii.
Oettli and DriTor <m relation to older laws.
Only " real innoTatlon " the eentraliaation of worship (Rams).
This ihefumdamMiai piUar of hypotheda.
Besnlta of preyUms inyeetigations on the point.
SL Sabordinate importanoe of other argmnenti.
(1) Alleged disorepandeB in knot,
Former results on Aaronio priesthood and Leritea.
Beprodnction of laws of Book of Covenant
freedom in reiteration and enforoementi
Tithe-laws as illustration of discrepanoiea.
Apparent oonfliot with Nnmbers.
Bat law of Nombers also recognised.
Possible lines of solution.
DiiBonlties of critical alteraatiya.
Minor diierepanoies.
(9) Alleged higtoriaU diBorepancies.
Inconsistencies in book itself : critical explanations of these.
Admitted general fidelity to JB histoiy.
Is P also used! Oritical denial
Instances proring a certain use.
Ezamples of '* eontradiotions " : —
Appointment of Judges : sending the spies.
Ground and time of prohibition to Moses to enter ^^*ft^"i
Joshua and the mission of the spies.
Dathan and Abiram (EonJi omitted).
Aaron's death*
* Cities of refuge.
(8) So^9nt9ions thought to imply post-Mosaie date.
JS,^,, " Other side of Jordan " (standpoint western).
Double usage of phrase in Deuteronomy and Numberai
Summary of oondusions on Deuteronomy.
CHAPTER IX
DimCULTIBS AND PSBPLEXITIES OF THE CEITIOAL
HYPOTHESIS : THE PBIESTLT WEITINO.
I. THE CODE.— i^ 285-329.
The Graf reyolution in Pentateuchal theory.
L Thx G&av-Wxllhaubxn Thsobt of ths Pbiistlt Cods.
The Levitical legislation exilian or later.
EreiythiDg in code not absolutely new.
But now for first time wriUm, and largely developed.
Thrown back into Mosaic age.
Idea of oode from Ezekiel.
EQstory inTcnted to suit the coda.
xxxviii CONTENTS
Introdnetioii of PmUteaeh by Em in 444 B.a
Diflbranoes in tohool m to oztent of Em's law.
TlieQiy of later dortlopmaiti, eto.
Hypotiieiia loaded with diffionltiee.
II. Initial LioBiDiBiUTm ov tbm Tbsost*
1. The ffMTfli ierae iiiTolTed.
Diliborate dealgn of paedng oifcode as Moeaia
Hot a work of mero "oodifioatioiL''
Alleged ooitom of aaoribiiig all lawa to Mooaa.
Oompariaon with mediMral Udorian Deoretalts
InoonaiBteiit with moral itandaid of prophetic oto.
2. Tho MMortarf inondibiUty.
Anaming the law oonoooted, how did it get accepted t
KarratiTe of reading of law in Neh. TiiL
The traaaaotion handjld$.
Ko enapioion of a now origin of law.
Glaeeea moat affected mado no protest.
Parti of law already in operation at first retom (prisitB and
LcTiteSy eto.).
8b CTnMftitaMltS^ofeodatoritaation.
Fot adapted to the conditions of the retam.
Its Mosaic dress tabernacle, wilderness, etc.
Deriations by Nehemiah from Leritical rales.
TJnsnitability of tiie tithe-laws, eta
A tempIe-oi|pmisation at return, of which code knows nothing.
III. Arouiouit noM SusiroQi a its BsAKoros on tbm Oodb.
PoaitlTe groonda of theory : lines of reply.
Precariona eharaoter of argmnent from ^ence.
1. Incondnaivenese of aignment ahown from crUietU aimMom,
Allowed that wusUriaUy a large part of the l^giaktion in
operation before the exile.
Driyer on "pre-existing temple usage."
Critical distinction of " praxis ** and " code."*
Upracrii existed consistently with histoiy, so might eod$.
Improbability that no written law existed regolating practice.
S. Wide ao(p# of this*' pre-existing usage": bearings on law.
How much presupposed in existence of temple, prieethood,
oultias, saorificee, feasts^ etc
Wellhausen's large adnussiona on cultua.
SQenoe of history on " feasts," eta
tb Theory tssted in case of XevtiM.
Most jies^exilian books as silent about Lerites as j^iv-exiliaa.
Rg,, II. Isaiah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malaohi, Psalter.
Silenoa aren in Leyiticus (one exception).
CONTENTS
flO«M inJfew Testament.
Souit Alniion in Qospels and Acta : sOenoe in Hebrews.
Applioatlon to day tfaltoMfmml*
Hare alio jwi^-ezilian booka aa sQent aa ;>r9-ezilian.
Sarljaat notioa In Joaephna.
No notioa in reat of Kew Teatament : jet obaenranoe pffo?ad
by Habrewa.
IT. Pboov ov Sablikb SxunNOB of Priebtlt Lxoislatioit.
Teatimony of hiatoiy to inatitationa (Chap. YL).
1. KaUtion of .fibAkia; to pcieatly lawa.
Xaakial'B aketoh of reatored temple.
Theory that Ptieatly Code baaed on EzekieL
Pkoof that Eaekiel pnw^^fpian prieatly legislation.
Satorated with ideaa of law*
''Statntea and judgmenta."
8. Nearar determination— priority of "Law of HoUneaa" (Lt?;
ZTiL-xxTi) to EaekieL
Admitted relation of thia law to Bzekial.
Theory of Graf, eto., that Ezekiel waa author of law.
Theory of Knenen that law " imitatea " EzekieL
Only aatiafaotoiy view — ^that Ezekiel ««m the law.
I^. Driyer^a agreement with thia Tiew.
OoDdaaionB : (1) Priestly law before the exile ; (2) Large Tiafea
opened of 9gi0tA of written law.
S. Leritioal lawa preanppoaed in 2>0ii<«rofiMiy.
Denial of thia by oritiea.
Dr. DriTer'a admiaaiona on the aabjeot
Yiawa of Dillmann, Biehm, Kitted . etc., on dependence of
Denteronomy on prieatly lawa.
Leading ezamplea in proof of snoh dependence.
Bnt Daateronomyi o|^ other hand, not reflected in Prieatly Coda.
Latter therefore older.
V. DmnouLTUS ov the Obitioal Thxobt of iNSTiTunoNa.
1. Eiekiel-theory of origin of distinction of priuts and LevUa,
Leritea degraded idolatrooa priesta (Ezek. zUy.).
Untenable aasomptiona of thia theory.
Kot prored fWym Ezekiel : —
(1) HaMApmuppotes older law in his denandationa of miniatiy
of nndreamdaed.
(2) Hia Godt pwrdy idM : its degradation neyer carried out.
(8) Inumaitimuiff of Ezekiel'a regnlationa with thoae of Priea^y
Code.
(4) The people received the latter aa in aooordanoa with their ovb
reooUectiona and traditions.
% Qritioal theory of oCWinjei^it^icms.
Kg,, (1) The/NUto of the law.
xl CONTENTS
The three feeats reoognised from the beginning •• naUonai
Paeaorer from tint oonneoted with Exodoa.
Agrioultnral view of peaaorer in Lsr. xziii. — %prUttUy law.
Wellhanaen'a theoiy of peaBorer.
Hiatorical noticea of feaata.
(2) iSVn and ffwgNiM offeringa.
Eaekiel preeuppoaea theae aa weU-known.
Referenoea in Pa. zL and in propheta and hiatoiy.
(8) The oftor itfinomm.
8. Incidental referencee to law in hidory •SiA.pnphdL
Otitioal date of Joel : Joel'a propheoj impUea law.
But not more than laaiah and other propheta.
Coltoa and feaata in laaiah, eto.
Written lawa aaaomed : Hoe. viiL IS.
Preyiona proofr ih>m hiatory.
Unique dharmcter of LeTitioal law. *
YI. Tiicx ov Ouonr of thx Leyitigai. Law. i
If not poat-exilian— when t
Mediating Tiew of Dillmann, Ndldeke (age of kingi), eta. \
UntenableneaB of thia view : *' paaaiTe eziatence " of lawa. i
Senrioe of Wellhauaen theory in eliminating thia Tiew.
Ko halting-pkoe between a poet-exilian and an early origin. .'
Thia involTea aabatantially Moaaio origin of lawa. |
Bedaotion of oode probably early.
OHAPTBB Z
DIFFIOULTDBS Aim PBRPLBXITIE8 OF THB GBITIOAL HTPO-
THESIS : THS PBISSTLT WBITIKG. IL THR DOOUMXNT.^
Fp. M1-S77.
Critioal atages in history of opinion on thia document..
ClMNfNMf of writing— 000 — imd^prntdma^w^iiy,
I. la THSBB ▲ P&naTLT WBXTuro nr DsmHorioir from JX?
The P atyle distiinot from that of JB.
Ita pecnllaritiea.
limitationa of thia differenoe.
Vooabnlary— other alleged marka of P.
IL QuiaTioR OF Unitt and Iin>BPiin>xNOS ov PsnanT WnimraL
L P formerly regarded aa a eoniMetei nomiMfe from a iii^
Ohange with riae of idea of ''aohool*" ate.
Later writera " imiUte " earlier.
Bffeeta on oonoeption of unity of P.
CONTENTS xli
DifTerttit nUtiona of P to JE : —
(1) in QeoMis, (2) in middle booing (8) in Jodiiuu
t. IsPan^iulqMMbftf doonment!
Denial b j Qnf— logioal grounds of his denial.
Independence disproved hj oharaeter of writing.
(1) The drudwn of P adverse to view of independence.
The alleged " completeness " of the history.
This not borne ont by &ots.
Doooment scanty, fragmentary, nneqnaL
Its narratiYes presuppose JB.
Large hiatuses in liyes of patriarchs.
Theory of " omissions " ; its inadequacy.
(2) Relations to J E in miffed-matter disproTe independence.
Parts lacking in P supplied in JE^ and vice vena.
P narratlTe throughout iNMiotfsI with JB.
Euenen and Wellhausen on this.
Onus of proof on these who aflBrm independence.
III. Textual Iktbbbxlations ow ths Pbibbtlt Wbitiho avd JE.
Interrelation of P and JE inseparably dose throughout
L P and JE narratlTes in Chnetis.
(1) Stories of creaHim : these not contradictory, but oooi-
plementary.
CAcse textual relation.
The Priestly Writer and the falL
(2) Stoiy of thejlood : narratiTes again oomplementaiy.
Belation to Babylonian legend.
In separation each narratiTe incomplete.
Alleged discrepancy on duration of iiood*
Discrepancy arises from the partition.
Alleged ignorance of flood in J^
Noah's three sons : critical substitution of Canaan for Ham
(8) Table ofwOumsi critical difliculties.
Inseparability of parts.
(4) liyes ot Tpairiairehe : Abraham, Gen. ziL, iJiL
Gen. ziy. ; peculiaritiea of nanatiya.
Hagar episode : Gen. zyL
Gen. six. 29.
Isaac and Jacob : fragmentary character of namtiyea.
Book a unil^ t divided, the unity dinppeara.
2. Mfoaiic period.
(1) Early ehapUn of Exodus : inseparability of P and JE.
Narratiyes of plagues : critical distinctions untenable.
(2) WUdenu§$ incidents : two examples —
Mission of spies : unity of narxatiye.
Eorah's rebellion : a double moyement, but narratiyes in-
separable.
xlii CONTENTS
lY. Alleged IirooiraiBTEKOiEs akd Histobioal iKOREDiBiLimi ov P.
Impoztftnoe of critical admission that P knew JE.
1. DisproTM sappofled ignoranei in P of fall, patriarchal aaciifioM,
enors of patriarchs, etc
S. DMpMxite narratiyea—nsiially not really saoh.
Jacoh at Bethel ; revelations to Moses, etc
8. SiUarical ineredibUiHet : a chief ground of ohjeotion.
Critical reliance on Colenso's *' demonstrations."
Defects of Colenso's treatment.
(1) Colenso's difSoolties ahont tdbemacU and priesU in the
wHdemeas.
Ahsnidity of his calcnlations.
(2) Difficnlties of the JSxoduB :
Increase of Israel, etc
Colenso creates difficnlties by a groteaqne literalism.
The departure from Rameees.
(8) Special examples : —
Betron and EdmnU in Qen. zlvL
The list of the Descent
The number of tht Jint-bcm,
Key to the solution.
V. Qbkbbaxi Results: MoaAionr of the Pentateuch.
To what point has the argument conducted 1
(1) Kot to view that Moses wrote the Pentateuch in present
shape and extent ;
(2) But to Tiew of the unity, essential ifoMieify, and lelatiTe
antiquity of the Pentateuch.
1 . Support given to this view in tradiUon i oraoial points :—
(1) Old Testament ascribes the three codes to Moses.
Two said to be writUn by him.
(2) Both Deuteronomy and Priestly Writing presuppose the JS
history.
(8) Deuteronomy received as Mosaic in time of Josiah.
(4) Whole Pentateuch received as Mosaic in time of Esra.
(5) Samaritans received Pentateuch as Mosaic
2. Critical results suppori; MoioieUy of Pentateuch.
(1) "So good reason for separating J and E, or giving them late date
(2) Deuteronomy not of Josianic origin, but its disoourses
genuinely Mosaic
(8) Priestly writing; not post-exilian; but legislation and history
early.
8. Prods ofearly date of JE^ooife^^eiMfii.
Later references to GenesiB.
4. Early knowledge and wide diffusion of writing favours the
Mosaicity of the Pentateuch.
Writing known and practised by Hebrews in Mosaio age
This implies earlier use : possibility of pre-Mosaic documents.
CONTENTS xliii
5. Mods of oompoiltfon best oonoeiTed of as cottaboraHim or eo-
How Pentateaoh may liaTo grown to pressnt fimi*
Would saldoiii bo oopisd as a whole.
Tho "law of JehoTah " in pioas oirdlsa.
APPBKDIX TO OHAFTEB X
Thb Latxb Hibtorioal Books.— i)>. 878-891.
I. Bearings of triUeai theory of the Pentateuch on later books.
P histoiy — ^Dsntsionomj— JE.
n. Besnltste later books of ORpofiiivtaiii
DeUtaoh on Joshua.
Deutewitoinls xeiYisionSa
in. CMiMKfWrtmtfirt of later booka.
Qeneral ohaiaoter of later histories.
1. Book of /iK^.
Qritioal analysis of this book (Kantssoli, etaji
Tho Denteronomie framework.
Oonsoioasness of unity in IsraeL
Beligious and moral ideas.
Time of origin.
2. Books of SSdmiMl.
DiTsrsities in analysis.
Kantach, Driver^ H. P. Smith, L5hr.
Alleged divenity of representation.
Alleged partisanahip of souioeSi
Mode and time of origin.
8. Books of Cftfwiietef.
Critical assaults on credibility.
Deepest ground — ^Leritioal representation.
View of wholesale inyention untenable.
Theoiy of older souroes (Dillmann, Klostermann, eto.).
Oorroborations of histoiy.
Question of the numbers.
Geneial result.
CHAPTEB XI
ABOHJBOLOGY AND THS OLD TESTAMENT.— Pi». 898-480.
AreluMlogy as controlling criticism and history.
L GmBAL BxAKiKoa ov Modbem Asghjmlooical Disooyxkt.
Triumphs of arohnology in reocrery of andent
Singular degree ol illumination on Bible.
Effects on attitude of eritioB.
xliv CONTENTS
Alteration of penpeotiTe in relation to IsraeL
Antiquity of letters and arte in Egypt and Babylonia.
Babylonian libraries.
Early explorations at Nineveh.
Palaoe of Saigon — a Biblioal confirmation*
library of Assorbanipal.
11. Babtlonian Lboends and the Saslt Ghaptbbs of OsNiaia.
Does Genesis preserve oldest traditions of the race f
Reasons for looking for answer to Babylonia.
Glance first ht facts, then at eat^laauiticn,
1. Table qfnaH<ms in Genesis x.
Threefold testimony abont Babylonia.
(1) Babel before Nineveh ; (2) Assyria oolonised from Baby-
lonia; (8) Founders of Babylonian civilisation not
Semites.
Monnmental corroboration of these positions, formerly disputed.
Statement that Elam is '* the son of Shem."
Recent confirmation from disooveiy.
Distribution of mankind from plain of Shinar.
Great antiquity of Babylonian civilisation.
Tendency to derive other dvilisations frtmi this — ^Egypt^
China, etc
S. Onation and deluge stories.
Disooveiy of creation tablets— compsriaon and oontrast with
Genesis L
Polytheistic and mythological character ; featnrsi of resem-
blance.
The sabbath — paradise and &1L
The delvffe tablets.
Debased by polytheism, bnt marked resemblance to Bfblloal
account,
t. £xplanaiione of coDJiaaticfXi,
(1) Theory of borrowing from Babylonia.
Babylonian legends adopted and purified.
When was this borrowing 1
In exile T reasons against this.
In time of Ahas or Solomon 1
In time after settlement in Canaan f
Pervasion of Canaan by Babylonian influenees.
Difficulties of "borrowing" theory.
Brought from Ur of Chaldees !
Objection from absence of early mention ; reply to this.
(8) Theory of eognaU relationship.
Radically different character of stories supports this view.
Theory of cognate relationship favoured by many scholars
(Kittel, Hommel, Oettli, etc).
Genesis preserves older and purer venionof original tradition.
CONTENTS xlv
(8) Babylonian monolheimnr—'* Babel and BibUw"
Gronndwork of troth in thia view.
Sapposed ooonrrenoe of name JehoTah (JAIT)*
laraelitiah religion not borrowed from Babylonia.
III. ThB AbEAHAMIO AoX— Thb ChSBOBLAOXXB BXPXDITIOM.
Patriaroha bore personal names.
Importance of age of Abraham.
The Hammnzabi Code.
Ea^fedUicn qf OhsdorUunnsr (Genesis xiy.).
Strange character of stoiy.
Denial of its historicity (Noldeke, Wellhansen, etc.).
Singular oorroborations from modem discovery.
The Blamitio snpremacy ; names of kings ; relation to Palestine ;
Ura-Salim, etc
Slighting of evidence by critics.
Midroih theory of Genesis ziv.
In reality aocorate knowledge of remote times and Uma JUie$ of
writer thoroughly established.
Deftnoe of narrative by critics.
lY. Jo8»H nr BoTFT.
Transition with Joseph to l^gypt
Admitted aoeoracy of piotqrs of Egyptian life and onstoms.
Points formerly challeng|Bd established from monuments.
Egyptian manners ; descent into Egypt, etc
Tale of two brothers.
Bearingi on place and time of origin of narrative
Must have originated on Egyptian soil.
OlJMtion from proper names not valid.
v. Thb Mosaio Pebioi>— Thsxe Gbbat Discoysriss.
Main periods in histoiy of Sgypt
OldJBft^ni Menesasmyth.
Petrie's discovery of Menes and of first two dynasties.
Middle Bmpire : Joseph and Shepherd Kings.
New Empbni Israel and Exodus to be sought for in eighteenth
or nineteenth dynasty.
Theories of Exodus : Bameses ii. and Meneptah.
Eecent discoveries bearing on Mosaic period.
1. Finding of (Kb mummiet of the Pkaraohe (1881, 1898).
Becovery of all the great Pharaohs.
3. Discovery of Tel el-Amama tahleU.
Correspondence of Amenophis iii. and Amenophis ly. (c
1400 B.a).
Language and writing Babylonian.
Letters from Palestine.
xlvi CONTENTS
8. Discovery qf name "Igrad" on monmnent of Meneptdi^
sappofled Pharaoh of Bzodm.
Diffioalty ariaing from this : Israel already in PalaaUna.
Earlier traces of tribes in Palestine.
Need of modification of view.
VI. ISRAXL AKD THS EZODUB.
Was the Bzodns under nineteenth dynasty f
The dhronologioal diffioolty : —
Too short intenral tQl Solomon ; too long from Abraham.
BibUoal statements : Xzodos plaoed about 1460 B.a
Suitability of oonditions of this time (eighteenth dynasty X
The " store-elties *' not decislTe.
Beign of Thothmes ui. ; on this yiew the oppressor.
Picture of briokmakers.
OsieerofHatasu: "Pharaoh's daughter "T
Problem of the Khabiri of Tel el-Amama tablets.
Their conquest of Oanaan.
Tendeney to identify them with Hebrews.
yn. EmPIU of THS HlTTITS»— PXEIOD OF THK KiNCMk
1. The JTittAw— early Biblical notices.
Existence of empire deni^
Egyptian and Assyrian eonftrmationa.
Discovery of Hittlte monuments.
Hieroglyphic and origin of Hittites.
2. Period if kinffi.
Neariy all points of contact reoeive corroboration.
Asayiian and Hebrew chronology.
Instances in history — Shishak's invasion ; tf esha ; Jehv |
Tigkth-Pileser ; fall of Samaria ; Sennacherib^ ete. \
Manssseh and oredibilily of Ohronioles.
YIII. Thb Book of Daniel.
Daniel put in age of Maccabees.
Theory of an older basiB— historical and propheticaL
Disproof of objections to historicity.
Greek name of instruments.
Discovery of early date and wide range of Greek cultora.
Character of Nebuchadnezzar.
Belshaszar now proved historicaL
The capture of Babylon.
Kot discrepant with DanieL
** Babylonian Chronicle " : stages in taking of Babylmi.
Final capture : Belshazzar slain.
Question of « Darius the Mede."
CONTENTS xlvu
CHAPTER XII
PSALHS ANP PROPHETS : THE PBOGBSSSiyranSS OF
ESVBLATION.— i)». 481-478.
Ftehna and pfopheti the aonl of Old Testament zerelitioB.
Pabt I
DATXD AKD THB PiBALTnt
Yalne of pealma independent of their datei.
Yet dates important in history of roTelation*
L ThBOBT OV TEX POfT-BxXLIAH ObIOIV OF THS PSALTOU
Poet-exilian origin of psalms a dogma of Wellhansen SohooL
Wellhanaen's eetimate of the pealms.
There an post-eziliany possibly liaooaUMn, psalms.
No proof that most, or all, of the psalms are poet-exilian.
The theoiy oonfliots with tradition.
3. Post-exilian period mostly a Uank to our knowledge^
Opening for groondless theorising.
8. AgefM<i»rwliMMwof literatore.
Vonoordofitselil
Betoxn from oaptiTtty an inoentive to psalm-oompositioa.
But balk of psalms show no post-exilian marks.
Many psalms dmnand an earlier date.
Fnlms about king, etc.
i. Traditional eoiMMe<im ^jMolsw icrftA jDavuI.
Presomption in fitvoor of pre-exilian psalms.
PositiTS evidenoee of pre-exilian psalmody.
Temple " singers *' at return.
Beferenoee to temple praise.
" Songs of Zion " ; quotations, eto.
Ascription of psalms to Dayid in titles.
Chronioler traoee temple singing and mnsio to Darid.
IL Thx Histouoal Posinoir of Datid as Psalmist.
Critiod view of David : untrue to history.
1. David's O0f«fr surreyed : —
(1) Am ff<nmg man i early piety and skilL
(8) At 3aiuF$ Court : behaviour ixreproaohable.
(8) As eoeiU i relations to his men ; mode of life ; nlations
with Saul, eto.
(4) As Ung : servioee to ooantry and religion ; foreign
oonquests ; project of temple and promiss.
Blots on life and reign : Bathaheba.
Isti^ifte of ehaimeter.
xlviii CONTENTS
3. Alnmdftnt tiuUerial and motive for paalxn-oompositfoii.
View of Dftyid as model for effeminate IriYolity.
A "aportftil" mnae.
DaTidio psalma : gemimeneaB of Pa. zriiL
If this genninei doubtless many others.
Views of Swald, Hitzig, Bleek, DeUtisoh, ete.
Probably number of Daridio psalms not smalL
Valns of titles of Books I and IL
III. OOLLIOTIOV OV THB PflJOJIS AND PlAGB Of OaJTOV.
Probable main periods of pre-ezilian paalm-oomporitloii.
Dayid : Jehoshaphat : Hezekiah.
Separate ooUeotions of psalms : Davidio, Korahite» sto.
Later psalms : division into books.
Date of collections and of dose of Canon.
Testimony of: —
1. Books of Maoeabees.
3. Septoagint translation (before 180 B.a ; probably a good
deal earlier).
Meaning of titles forgotten.
8. Eooleeiastions (implies Canon before 200 B.a).
4. Books of Chronicles : Canon apparently oompleted ; implisi
pre-ezilian psalmody.
5. Book of Jonah : nse of earlier psalms.
6. Jeremiah : quotes Ps. L (implies Dayidic collection) ; thank*'
giving formula.
7. Musio of second temple an inheritance from first templa.
Qeneral resoll
II
ThB P&EDIOnYB EUOONT IN PbOPHSOT
Uniqueness of Hebrew prophecy.
Nature and development of prophecy.
Prophecy and genius : its supernatural side.
Tests of true prophecy.
I. SUPERNATXTBAL PbXDIOTION AN SLBMBNT IN PbOPHIOT.
Essence of prophecy wrongly placed in prediction.
Modem denial of predictive prophecy.
Prediction not mere deductions of prophets' own.
Inevitable that prediction should enter into prophecy.
Has to do with promise and warning.
With ftiture of kingdom of God.
Distinotion from heathen soothsaying.
II. BbALITT OV SlTPKBNATiniAL PbXDICTION.
Fallnre of critics to eliminate prediction.
Bzamples from VTellhauaen.
CONTENTS xlix
Abundance of prediction in prophetio writings
The oaptiyitiei, 70 weeks, etc
Measianio prophecy ; Profeeeor Flint qnoted.
III. Human Oonditiohino of Pbophbot: Gavohs oi^IimEPBBTA-
TICK.
Psychological side of prophecy ; necessaiy limitations.
Contrast between prophecy of iMor and prophecy of remote events.
The former deJMU ; the latter necessarily more ideal in form
and character.
Bearings on interpretation : —
1. Prophecy of distant fotore preeented in ftnu if premuL
Symbol in prophecy.
2. Time-eUmeiU in prophecy.
Certain fact is triumph of kingdom of Qod ; steps to this hidden,
" Day of Jehovah " as background of every oris i.
Events grouped in ideal, not temporal relations,
t. CiMwfiJuma/ element in prophecy.
Jeremiah on this : examples.
Bearings on Icdfllment of promises to IsneL
Bearingi on Kew Testament Farousia,
' Pabt m
THB PBOOBlSSZyXNXflS OF RkVILATION : MOBAL DlFnOULTIU.
Qeneral recognition of progressiveness, but bearii'.gs not always
dear.
I. NaTUXB AKB ObIOIH of THB MOBAL DiFFIOITLTIBB.
Hot progress in knowledge only.
Growth from lower morality to higher.
Klements of evil in lower stages —
Polygamy; blood-revenge; slavery, etc
Exaggeration of moral difficulties : Deistical controvert.
Centnd difficulty : apparent implication of God in laws and com-
mands which our oonsdences condemn.
II. EbBOHXOVB OB IVADBQUATB SOLTTTIONB.
** Progressiveness " alone not a solution.
Denial of evil in lower stage not a solution.
Bvolutionaiy theory.
Beality of good and evil must be upheld.
OrUieal solutaon — ^Uws and commands attributed to God not really
His.
This a cutting of the knot, not a loosing of it.
Bolls burden on prophetic writers who endorse commands.
JB,g,, Deuteronomy and extermination of Canaanites ; revision
of Joshua.
d
1 CONTENTS
Tandenflj to trndne lowering of morality of early InaeL
Profeaaor Gray on non-reoognition of obligations to QentQea.
Moral precepts of nnivenal scope alwftys recognised.
Lapsea'of individuals not maasore of moral standards.
III. Obnskal Laws of Pboobbssiyx Bkyujltiom.
Laigsr problem of God's general relation to evil of workL
1. Beyelation must iah$ «p man teh&n U finds hdm : xesolts of this.
3. Bevektion reapontibU only for new element U itUroduees, not for
cTerytliing associated with it in mind of recipient.
8. BeyeUtioii2ayfAo2iofi(e<ter«20fiMiite, in order by means of them
to oreroome what is imperfect and eriL
SdncatiTe aspect of revelation.
Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac
Cities of rsfnge and blood-revenge.
Laws of marriage ; polygamy and monogamy.
Restrictions of spirit of mercy ; Canaanites.
All through preparation for higher stage.
EQl^er stsgss of revelation conserve all elements of value in lowes
Thb Closb
Onlmination of progressive revelation in Christ
Faith in Him essential to right view of Old Testament
Bearings of Old Testament criticism on New Testameirtb
Same principles and methods now being applied.
Crisis in view of Christ and New Testament
Bearing of foregoing discnssioB ea issos.
NOTES TO CHAPTERS
Ohaptsb I
TIm J«wiali OmoB
Ohaftib II
The Bibl* and otbcr Sacred Books
Mythology and Hirtoiy in the Old Testament
Inspimtioii and the Hatariala of the Beooid .
Ohaftui III
Oriiioal XztiaTafuiMa
Ohaptsb IV
KJUg on the Psnoniiloation Theory .
The Oonnaiik with Isial
ThaoriM of the BzodoB
Fstriarofaal Ohronology
Gvnkal'B Thaoiy of Patriarchal History
Iha HaoM Jehorah in the Plttriarohal Age
Ghattkb y
larly Ideas of God .
Antiqnify of the Name Jehorah
Ptofeaaor W. B. Smith's Theory of Sacrifice
Saerifioe of Ohildren in Oanaan
H. P. Smith on the Brasen Serpent .
BQlmaiui on Image-Worship .
Ohaptbr VI
OljeotiQna to Mosaio Origin of Decalogne
Tho Fona of Ex. zx. 24
freedom vnder the Law
The Genealogy of Zadok •
DaTid's Sons as Priests •
■
piea
481
484
485
486
488
400
401
402
408
404
406
406
407
408
400
500
501
508
508
504
504
505
lii
NOTES TO CHAFTERS
Ohapter YII
PAn
The Self-Oonfidenoe of Gritiot
. 507
Gomill'sDeooinpositionof J • . •
• 508
TheViewofJttiidEa8«SchooU'' .
• 600
Chapter VIII
The breftkiiig np of Denteronomy . •
. 510
Denteronomic and Priestly Stylos . •
. 511
Deateronomy as Fraua Pia . • •
• 513
Oblivion of Oharlemagne's Code • •
. 514
The Law of the King in Dent ^vii. •
. 515
Minor Discrepancies in Laws . . •
• 515
Chapter IX
Kuenen'B early YiewB of the Post-Exilian Theory . • .517
The Unity of the Law
518
Szekiel and earlier Laws
519
Quotations in Deateronomy from JE and P .
520
LoTites in Ezekiel ....
• • 520
Alleged Contradictions in the PassoYer Laws
520
The Mediating View of the Priestly Code .
521
Chapter X
Eloetermann on the Relation of JS and P
522
Colenso's Nnmerioal Objections
522
Christ's Testimony to the Old Testament
523
The Samaritan Pentateuch •
524
Early Hebrew Writing
525
Hypothesis in Criticism
526
The Idea of " Co-operation" in Critical HUU
)ry . . . 527
State of the Hebrew Text
527
Chaptbb XI
Bthnologioal Bektions in Gen. z. •
529
Cognateness of Babylonian and Hebrew Trad
iitions ... 580
Alleged ** Midrash " Character of Gen. tLy.
581
The Retorrection of Myths •
582
The Identification of Bamesea and Pithom
583
584
Chapter X]
I
Critical Estimate of Darid
585
The Unity of Second Isaiah .
586
The Prophecies of Daniel
536
Kuenen on Unfolfilled Prophecies
588
The Destruction of the Canaanites .
589
bmBZH
541
CHAPTER I
$fltro^ncton? : Ube i^roblcm Stated
**l liare been obUged to h^ttow the giMtoit amonnt of kbonr «a a
hithoto entirely nnworked field, the investigfttioii of the inner oonitita*
tion of the eepento books of the Old Teetament by the aid of the Hl|^
Critiolfin (a new name to no Hamaniat).'* — Sxohhoxv.
** It ia trae that the prcaent destrnotiTe prooeedinga in the department
of Old Teetament oritioianiy which demand the oonatmction of a new edifioe,
are qnite fitted to eonfiiae oonadenoea and to entangle a weak fidth in all
kinda of temptation. li^ however, we keep faat hold in thia labyrinth of
the one tmth, Ohridui v$r$ ruwmmU, we hare in onr haada Aiiadne'a
thread to lead ns out of it.'*»DxLii»GE.
Wellhaiieen "haa identified himaelf with that 'ao-ealled eritidBi'
(Bwald'a phraseology) whioh has 'given up Moses and so mvbh that
is ezoellent besides,' and whioh leada on directly to the oontemptoooa
rejection of the Old Testament^ if not also of the Kew (again, Xwald'a
phraseoli^). "— Chxths.
m
** BrraneoDa eriticism osmMt be oorrsetsd by dogmatfte theology, bat
only by a better, more seardhing, and less pnjiidiosd erltioum.''— Ottuit.
OHAPTEB I
INTBODUGTOBY : THE FBOBLEM STATED
Whkn we speak of a problem of the Old Testament, what
do we mean 7 What is the problem, and how does it arise ?
A consideration of these questions will form a suitable
introduction to the subsequent discussions.
It can hardly be necessary for us, in opening our inquiry,
to define what is meant by the Old Testament, thou^ on
this point also, as between Protestants and Boman Catholics,
a tew questions might arise. By the term is here under-
stood, m brief, that collection^ of Scriptures which now
forms the first part of our ordinary Bibles,^ — ^which the Jews
technically divided into ^the law, the prophets, and the
(holy) writings," ' — which our Lord and His apostles spoke
of as " the Scriptures," ' " the Holy Scriptures," ^ ** the orades
of God," * ** the sacred writings," ' and uniformly treated as the
"(Jod-inspired" ^ and authoritatiye record of God's revelations
to, and dealings with. His ancient people.^ This yields a
firat regulative position in our study. It may be laid down
as axiomatic thieit, whatever they may be for others, these
ancient Scriptures can never have less value for the Chris-
tian Church than they had for the Church's Master — CSirist
^ ThU ezdndet the ApoorypbA. On the name iteelf Bishop Weefeoott
eeyi : "The eetabliahment of Ghrifltiaaitj gave at onoe a diatinct juAtj to
the former dlepensation, and thus St. ^anl could speak of the Jewirii
Soriptares bj the name whidh they hare always retained since, as the ' Old
Testament' or 'Govenant' (2 Cor. iii. 14). ... At the close of the second
ocntniy the terms ' Old ' and ' Kew Testament' were already in oommon
use."— T)U BibU tn the Chunky p. 6.
* OL Lake xziT. 44 : "In the law of Moses, and the prophetic and
the pealms.**
niatt. zzL 42 ; Lnke zxiv. 27. « Bom. L 2.
•Bom. iii. 2. «2Tim. ilLlS.
*2Tim. ilL 16. Of. 2Pet L 21.
* Hatt y. 18 ; ZT. 8, 6 ; zziL 29, 81, 82 ; Lnke zxiy. 27 ; John z. 85,
ete. See Note A on the Jewish Canon.
t
4 INTRODUCTORY : THE PROBLEM STATED
Himself. Believing scholars of all standpoints may be
trusted to agree in thi&^
But wHat is meant bj the problem of the Old Testament ?
Naturallj there are manj problems, but our title indicates
that the problem we have now in view is that which arises
peculiarly from the course of recent criticism. That problem
will be found large and complex enough to occupy us in
this volume, and, as going to the root of a believing attitude
to the Scriptures of the Old Covenant, will probably be
allowed to be, for the present moment, the fundamental
and essential ona In tms chapter we shall seek to convey
as dear an idea as we can of where we conceive the crux
of this Old Testament problem to lie, and shall indicate
generally the lines to be followed in the handling of it
L Thb Problem Twofold: Reugiotts and Ltterabt
The problem of the Old Testament, then, as it presses on
the Church from various sides at the present hour, may be
said to be twofold. First, and most fundamentally, the
question raised by it is — ^How are we to conceive of the
religion which the Old Testament embodies, and presents to
us in its successive stages, as respects its nature and origin ?
Is it a natural product of the development of the human
spirit, as scholars of the distinctively '* modem" way of
thinking — Kuenen, Wellhausen, Stade, and the like* —
allege ; or is it something more — a result of special* super-
natural revelation to Israel, such as other nations did not
possess? Then second. How are we to conceive of the
literature itself, or of the books which make up the Old
Testament, as respects their ase, origin, mode of comjKwition,
trustworthiness, and, generally, their connection with the
religion of which they are the monuments 7
At first sight it might seem as if the second of these
questions had no necessary relation to the first. Nothing,
it may be plausibly argued, depends, for the decision of
the supernatural origin of the religion, on whether the
^ Professor G. A. Smith says : "The Bible of the Jews in our Lord's time
was pmcticallj our Old Testament. For us its snpreme sanction is that
which it denyed from Christ Himself. . . . What was indispensable to
the Redeemer must always be Indispensable to the redeemed^*'— JMsm
OrUieum, p. 11.
'See below, pp. 12 It
INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED s
Pentateach, as we have it, is from the pen of Moses, or is
made up of three or fotir documents, put together at a late
date; or at what period the Levitical law was finally
codified ; or whether the Book of Isaiah is the work of one,
or two, or of ten authors; or whether the Psalms are
pre-exilic, or post-exilic, in origin. Yet, as will be seen more
fully later,^ the dependence of the literary criticism on the
reUgious theory is really very dose. For, if it he true,
as every fair mind must admit, that there are many
scholars who succeed, to their own satisfaction, in com-
bining the acceptance of the main results of the critical
hypothesiB of the Old Testament, even in its advanced form,
with firm belief in the reality of supernatural revelation
in Israel, and in the culmination of that revelation in
Christ ; it is equally true that, in the case of others, and
these pre-eminently, in Dr. Cheyne's phrase, " The Founders
of Criticism," the decisions arrived at on purely literary
questions, — ^the date of a psalm, e.g., the genuineness of a
passage, or the integrity of a book, — are largely controlled
by the view taken of the origin and course of development
of the religion; and, with a different theory on these
subjects, the judgments passed on the age, relations, and
historical value, of particular writings, would be different
also. This dependence of many of the conclusions of
criticism — ^by no means, of course, aU — on the religious and
historical standpoint is practically admitted by Wellhausen,
when he declares that "it is only within the region of
religious antiquities and dominant religious ideas — the
r^on which V atke in his BUlisdie TheoToffie had occupied
in its full breadth, and where the real battle first kindled —
that the controversy can be brought to a definite issue." '
It is the perception of this fact and of its results which
affords the explanation of the very genuine disquiet and
perplexity which undeniably exist in large sections of the
Church as to the tendency and outcome of recent develop-
* See below, pp. 16 ff.
' ffiat, €f Itrael, p. 12. On Vatke, see below, p. 18. Gr»f also, the
pioneer of we new movement (see below, pp. 199 ff.), m his chief work, lays
staresB on the fiust that Pentatenoh criticism was bound to remain ** nnclear,
nneertain, and waTering," tiU it grasped the fact of the post-ezilian origphi
of tiie Levitical legislation. To attempt to decide its problems on mere
Utarsiy grounds was to move in a *' vicious circle." — GetehidU, BlUhitf
pp. 2, 8.
6 INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED
ments in Old Testament criticism. From the popular point
of view — the light in which the matter presents itself to
the average Christian mind — the problem of the Old
Testament is simply one of how we are to regard the Bibla
It is not merely, as the instinct of the humblest is quick
enough to perceive, the dates and authorship of books that
are in dispute in these critical theories: it is the whole
question of the value of the Bible as an inspired and
authoritative record of Gk)d's historical revelation to man-
kind. Has God spoken, and does this book convey to us
His sure word for our salvation and guidance ? Have the
Scriptures of the Old Testament any longer the value for
us which they had for Christ and His ddisciples ? Or are
we to concede to the writers of the school above mentioned,
that, as the result of the critical discussions of the past
century, the historical foundations of Old Testament revela-
tion have in the main been subverted? Must man's
changing and erring thoughts about Otod henceforth take
the place of God's worcb to man? Are the erewhile
*' lively oracles " of Gtod simply the fragmentarv remains of
a literature to which no special quality of divineness
attaches, and is the supposed history of revelation largely
a piecing together of the myths, legends, and free inventions
of an age whose circle of ideas the modem spirit has
outgrown ? These and like questions, that extensive body
of opinion which arrogates to itself the title ''modem*
would answer with an unhesitating "Yes"; it need not
occasion surprise if the great mass of believing opinion in
the Church, on the other hand, meets such a challenge with
an emphatic '* Ko."
It is to be admitted that the position of those who, at
the present time, occupy a believing standpoint, yet are
strongly repelled by the rationalism which seems to them
to inhere in much of the prevailing criticism, is one of
peculiar difficulty. On the one hand, they feel keenly the
seriousness of the issues by which they are confronted.
They seem to themselves to be called to give up, not onlv
those ideas of the Bible in which they have been nurtured,
and with which their tenderest associations are entwined,
but the view of the Bible that appears to them to arise
from an impartial study of its contents and claims. They
see the disintegrating processes which have wrought 8U(£
INTRODUCTORY : THE PROBLEM STATED 7
havoc, as they regard it, with the Old Testament, extended
to the New, and with like results.^ On the other band,
they are met by the assertion that practically all competent
scholarship — believing and nnbelieving alike — is agreed in
the acceptance of those critical conclusions about the Old
Testament which so greatly disturb them. What^ in the
** storm and stress " of this conflict and confusion of opinion,
are those who hold fast by the Bible as the Word of life
for their souls to do? General assurances, such as are
sometimes given, that, when they have parted with the
greater part of what they have been accustomed to regard
as the historical substance of revelation, they will find the
Bible a diviner book to them than ever, do not yield the
desired comfort Is it to be wondered at if, in their per-
plexity and resentment^ many who feel thus should round
on ** Higher Criticism" itself, and uncompromisingly de-
nounce it as the prolific jMurent of all the mischi^ — an
invention of the Evil One for the destruction of the
unwary?
Nevertheless, this attitude of unreasoning denunciation
of what is called " Higher Critidsm " is also manifestly an
extreme; and the prdblem we have to deal with, if it is
to be profitably discussed, requires a clearer discrimination
of issues. In particular, it cannot too early be reco^ised
that this is not, at bottom, a question simply, as is too
commonly assumed, between ''Higher Critics" and ''Non-
Higher Critics." Questions of criticism, indeed, enter
deeply — ^far more deeply, to our thinking, than manv are
disposed to allow — into the dispute; but it is only to
confuse the issue, and is a gratuitous weakening of the
believing case, not to recognise that the real cleft goes
much deeper— viz., into a radical contrariety of view as ^
to the natural or supernatural origin of the religion of '
Israel, and that on this fundamentiu issue those whom we
call * critics" are themselves sharply divided, and found
ranged in opposing camp& There are, one must own,
few outstanding scholars at the present day on the Con-
tinent or in Britain — ^in America it is somewhat different—
^ Am OEimplflf nferanoe iiiAy be made to the artiolee of Sohmiedel
In the JhntifC^ BHUedf and to saoh works, among many others, as
0. Holtnnann's L^e of Jtmu^ and Wernle's Begifwingi qf Chriitkmiiif,
Tsontly translated. 01 Mow, p. 478.
8 INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED
who do not in greater or less degree accept conclusions
regarding the Old Testament of the kind ordinarily de-
nominated critical ; ^ yet among the foremost are many whom
no one who understands their work would dream of classing
as other than believing, and defenders of revealed religion.
Such, among Continental scholars, recent or living, are
Delitzsch, Biehm, Dillmann, Konig, Elittel, Kohler, Strack,
Oettli, Westphal, Orelli; in Britain, Dr. Driver, the late
Dr. A. B. Davidson, Professor G. A. Smith, and many
others : all more or less " critics," but all convinced upholders
of supernatural revelation. This is not a reason for un-
questioning acceptance of their opinions ; as critics it will
be found that they are far enough from agreeing among
themselves. But the attitude to criticism of so large a
body of believing scholars may at least suggest to those
disposed to form hasty judgments that there is here a very
real problem to be solved ; that the case is more complex
than perhaps they had imagined; that there are real
phenomena in the literary structure of the Old Testament,
for the explanation of which, in the judgment of manv
able minds, the traditional view is not adequate, and foi
which they seem to themselves to find a more satisfactory
Rolution in some form or other of the critical hypothesis.*
^ This Ib trae even of so cantioiis a scholar as Professor Jamos
Robertson, of Glaa^w, whose works, in a oonser7ative spirit, have doue
such excellent semoe. It is Dillmann, himself a pronounced critic, but
decided in his opposition to what he calls the " Hegel- Vatke " Yiew of
relicnous development, who speaks of Professor Robertson's Early BdigUm
of Israel as "hitting the nail on the head" (AltUsL Th$ol. p. 69).
Yet, as will appear, tiie yiews of Professor RobertBon, and those, say, of
Dr. Driyer, on such subjects as the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch, the
gradual growth of legislation, the origin of Deuteronomy, etc, are not m
principle so fax apart as might appear, though Professor Robertson's reralts
are somewhat more positiye, and the aeoent falls differently. Of. £arlf
Religum, pp. 882 ff., 882, 420-27.
> An interesting example of how the leading results of criticism may bo
accepted by a deyout and intensely eyangelical mind is furnished by tho
Rey. Q. H. 0. Macgregor, a fayourite teacher of the " Keswick " school.
See his tribute to Professor W. R. Smith in the Biography by his brother
(p. 100), and the frequent references to critieal positions in his Meeeagea
of the Old Testament, with Preface by Rey. F. B. Meyer. It is significant
also that the productions of critical writers of belieying tendency, such as
Kdnig and Eittel, are now being translated and reproduced in oonsenratiye
quarters, in refutation of the theories of the more rationalistic school.
Cf. balow, pp. 79, etc., on Kittel's pamphlet, Babylonian BxeawUions amd
Ettfrly Bible History, published, with Preface by Dr. Wace, by the London
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge.
INTRODUCTORY : THE PROBLEM STATED 9
The truth is, and the fact has to be faced, that no one
who studies the Old Testament in the light of modem
knowledge can help being, to some extent, a ''Higher
Critic," nor is it desirable he should. The name has un-
fortunately come to be associated all but exclusively wit^
a method yielding a certain class of results; but it has
no necessary connection with these results. ''Higher
Criticism/' rightly understood, is simply the careful scrutiny, {
on the principles which it is customary to apply to all
literature, of the actual phenomena of the Bible, with a
view to deduce from these such conclusions as may be
warranted regarding the age, authorship, mode of com-
position, sources, eto., of the different books ; and everyone
who engages in such inquiries, with whatever aim, is a
"Higher Critic," and Cannot help himsell The peculiar
distnbution of the names of Ood in Genesis, e.^., is a
fact to be recognised, whatever account may be given of
it,^ and the colktion and sifting of evidence, with a view
to the obtaining of a satisfactory explanation, is, so far, a
critical process. There is nothing in such scholarly examina-
tion of the Bible, even though the result be to present some
things in a new light, which need alarm anyon& As the
world of nature presents a different aspect to the man
of science, still more to the metaphysician, from that which
it does to the common view of sense, yet is the same world ;
so the Bible may present a somewhat different aspect to
the eye of the trained critical scholar, yet is the same Bible,
for edification, devotion, and instruction in the way of
righteousness.
That we may discharge our debt to criticism, even of
the rationalistic sort, once for all, let us acknowledge that,
with all its attendant evils, its course has been productive,
under the providence of Gtod, of many benefits, which in
la^ measure counterbalance, if they do not outweigh, these
evik. Some of the positive advances in its course it will
be our business to notice hereafter.' It is assuredly not
for nothing that, for more than a century, the light of the
best European scholarship has been keenly directed on every
page, verse, line, and even word, of the sacred record. Many
of the leaders of criticism, however defective in their
apprehension of the full truth of revelation, have been
1 See below, p. 196. > See below. Chap. YII. pp. 190 ff.
lo INTRODUCTORY : THE PROBLEM STATED
men of fine literary gifts, wide culture, acute critical faculty,
and genuine appreciation of the nobler elements in the
religious and ethical teaching of the prophets; and the
residt of their labours, as everyone must own, has been,
in modem times, a wonderful freshening of interest in
the historical, poetical, and prophetical parts of the Old
Testament, and an immensely hdtter understanding of its
textual meaning and historical setting. What student
of Old Testament history or prophecy, e.^., would willingly
part with the aid afiforded by the works of Ewald ? ^ What
most rabid opponent of criticism is not ready to own his
indebtedness, on the linguistic side, to that dry old
rationalist, Gtesenius? There is a yet greater gain. It
is not too much to say that one direct result of the applica*
tion of the strictest historical and critical methods to the
Old Testament has been to bring out, as never before, tiie
absolutely unique and marvellous character of the religion
of Israel' With the best will in the world to explain the
religious development of Israel out of natural factors, the
efforts of the critics have resulted, in the view of many
of themselves, in a magnificent demonstration of the
immense, and, on natural principles, inexplicable difference
between the religion of this obscure people and every
other.* Some may r^rd this as a small result; to us
it presents itself as something for which to be devoutly
grateful
XL Thx Fundamsntal Ibsxtx: ATrrrnra to thi
Supernatural
Still the deep cleft remains between what we have
called the believing and the unbelieving views of the Old
Testament, — ^between the view which admits, and the view
which denies, the properly supernatural element in the
history and religion of Israel, — and it is not in our power,
* "From another side," wrote PrindMl Jolm CaimB, "a flraat toholar
like Ewald redressed the onfaimeas of Sohlaiermaoher to the Ola Testamenti
and, with many and great drawbacks of his own, asserted in his own way
the historical greatness and necessity of the Bible rerelation." — UnMuf
in the BightmSk OgfUwry, p. 280.
' See next chapter.
'This is the argument pursoed, on erltioal lines, in Lecture lY., on
"The Proof of a Diyine Reyelation in the Old Testament," of Profe«or
O. A. Smith's AfodUm Oriticitm, etc.
INTRODUCTORY : THE PROBLEM STATED 1 1
neither is it our wish, to minimise it We must now approach
the subject more closely, and endeavour to fix with greater
predsion where the dividmg-line between the two views lies.
In certain external respects, as in temple, priesthood,
sacrifices, the religion of Israel necessarilv presents a
resemblance to other religion& To the eye of the outward
observer, it is simply one of the great lustorical reIigion&
If at the same time it presents differences, this does not
of itself establish more than a relative distinction between
it and othera Every religion has not only a certain
resemblance to every other, arising from the foot that it
is a religion, but has, moreover, a definite character or
physiognomy of its own, resulting from the different genius
of the people, from the individuidity of its founder, or from
the circumstances of its history. If now, however, we go
further, and affirm that, in the midst of all resemblances,
this rdigion of Israel presents features which not only
differentiate it from every other, but differentiate it in
such a way as to compel us to ascribe to it an origin in
special, supernatural revelation, we obviously take a new
step, which we must be prepared to justify by the most
cogent reasons. It will not be enoush to show that the
religion of Israel is a better religion tnan others— -or even
takmg into account its fulfilment in Christianity, that it
is the mosi perfect of existing religions : for conceivably it
might be that, yet have essentially no higher origin than
they; just as one people may be endowed with the artistic,
or phuosophic, or scientific genius beyond others, — the
Oreeks, for instance, among ancient peoples, in art and
philosophy, — without its being necessary to postulate foi
this a supernatural causa Most critics, even of the
rationalistic order, will admit that Israel had a genius
for religion, and was the classical people of religion in
antiquity ; will not hesitate to speak also of its providential
mission to humanity, even as Greece and Rome had their
vocations to mankind. It is a proposition different in kind
when the origin of the religion of Israel is sought in a
special, continuous, authoritative revelation, such as other
peoples did not possess. Here we touch a real contrast,
and, with reservation of a certain ambiguity in the word
** revelation," ^ obtain a clear issua
1 See below, pp. 19 ff.
12 INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED
For now the fact becomes apparent, — there is, indeed,
not the least attempt to diefguise it, — that, to a large and
influential school of critical inquirers — ^those, moreover, who
have had most to do with the shaping of the current critical
theories — ^this question of a supernatural origin for the
religion of Israel is already foreclosed ; is ruled out at the
start as a priori inadmissible. The issue could not be
better stated than it is by the Dutch scholar Kuenen in
the opening chapter of his work, The JReligum of Israel.
The chapter is entitled ''Our Standpoint/' and in it the
principle is expressly laid down that no distinction can be
admitted in respect of origin between the religion of Israel
and other religions. "For us," he says, "the Israelitish^
religion is one of those religions; nothing less, but also
nothing more.''^ This is, in the style of assumption too
usual m the school, declared to be "the view taken by
modem theological science."' "No one," he says, "can
expect or require us to support in this place by a complete
demonstration the right of the modem as opposed to the
ecclesiastical view."* It is an "ecclesiastical" view,
it appears, to assume that any supernatural factor is
involved in the history or religion of Israel : the " modem "
view rejects this. If any ambiguity could attach to these
statements, it would be removed by his further explana-
tions, which, in so many words, exclude the idea that the
Jewish and Christian religions are derived from "special
divine revelation," or are "supernatural" in their origin.^
He puts the matter with equal frankness in his work on
Prophde and Prophecy. " Prophecy is," he tells us, " accord-
ing to this new view, a phenomenon, yet one of the most
important and remarkable phenomena, in the history of
religion, but just on that account a human phenomenon,
^ BdigUm of Israel, i. p. 6. ' Ibid. p. 6.
» IHd. p. 7.
* Ibid. pp. 6| 6. In a Life of Kuenen in the JewUik QuarUrlf Mtvitw,
Tol. iv., by Mr. Wicksteed, the Dutch '* modem" movement, of whidi
Kuenen was a principal leader, is thus described. "It was an attempt of
singular boldness and vigour to shake the traditions of Christian piety free
from eyery trace of supematuralism and implied exdusiveness. ... It
involved the absolute surrender of the orthodox dogmatics ; of the authority
of the Scriptures ; of the divine character of the Church as an external
Institution ; and of course it based the claims of Jesus of Kazareth to our
affeotion and gratitude solely upon what history oonld show that He, as a
man, had been, and had done for men " (p. 596}.
INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED 13
proceeding from Israel, directed to Israel."^ And later:.
" So soon as we derive a separate part of Israel's religious
life directly from God, and allow the supernatural or
immediate revelation to intervene in even one sinde
ix>int, so long also our view of the whole continues to oe
incorrect ... It is the supposition of a natural develop-
ment alone which accounts for aU the phenomena." ' Quite
similar to the standpoint here avowed by Kuenen is that
of a wide circle of leading scholars — of Duhm, Well-
hausen, Stade, Smend, Gunkel, and a multitude more in
the front ranks of the modem critical movement. We noted
above WeUhausen's declaration of his identity in standpoint
with Yatke — Yatke beinff a thorough - going Hegelian
rationalist in the first half of last century. Shortly after in
his book we have the express acknowledgment : ** My inquiry
comes nearer to that of Yatke, from whom indeed I grate-
fully acknowledge myself to have learned best and most/' '
This, then, quite unambiguously stated, is the issue to
which the religion of Israel — and with it Christianity, for
in this connection the two very much stand or fall together —
is brought at the present day. Yet the contrast drawn by
Kuenen in the alx)ve passage between the '^modern" and
the "ecclesiastical" view, which he announces as the ruling
principle of his treatment, is, it need hardly be said, a
flagrant petUio priricipiL^ To assume beforehand, in an
inquiry which turns on this very point, that the religion
of Israel presents no features but such as are explicable
out of natural causes, — ^that no higher factors are needed
to account for it, — ^is to prejudge the whole question;
while to assume this to be the only view held by " modem "
scholars — ^in other words, to exclude from this category men
of t^e distinction, of those formerly enumerated, who, with
^ Fropheii and Prepheeu in liraei, p. 4.
' IHd, p. 585. Dr. John Miiir, at whose instance the work was nnder-
teken, oontilbnted an bitroduction to the English translation. In the
eonne of this he thns states Dr. Eaenen's position : " Israeli tish prophecy
was not a enpemataral phenomenon, derived from divine inspiration ; but
was a result of the high moral and religions character attained by the
prophets whoee writinn have been transmitted to us " (p. zxxvii). From a
pautshed letter of Knenen'i we learn the interesting fact, otherwise
attested to ns, that Dr. Mnir snbseaaently changed his opinions, and
xeeaUed from oircnlation the Tolnme he bad been instrumental in producing.
* Rid. <^ Itrael, p. 18.
^ CI the remarks of I^idd, DoeL vf Sac Scripture, i. p. 871.
14 INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED
their critical viewa, take strong ground on the suhject of
renrelation — is to contradict fact, and degrade the tenn
" modem " to the designation of a dique. If, on impartial
consideration, it can be shown that thep religion of Isnel
admits of explanation on purely natural principles, then the
historian will be justified in his verdict that it stands, in
this respect, on the same footing as other religion& ' If, on
the other hand, fair investigation brings out a different
result, — if it demonstrates that this reUgion has features
which place it in a different cat^ory from all others, and
compel us to postulate for it a different and higher origin,' —
then that fact must be frankly recognised as part of the
scientific result, and the nature and extent of this higher
element must be made the subject of inquiry. It will not
do to override the facts — ^if facts they are — ^by a priori
dogmatic assumptions on the one side any more than on
the other. Thus far we agree with Kuenen, that we must
begin by treating the religion of Israel exactly as we would
treat any other religion. Whatever our personal con-
victions— and of these, of course, we cannot divest our-
selves— we must, in conducting our argument, place
ourselves in as absolutely neutral an attitude of mind as
we can. We must try to see the facts exactly as they arc
If differences emerge, let them be noted. If the facts ar^
such as to compel us to assume a special origin for thit
religion, let that come to light in the course of the in(]tuiry.
Let us frankly admit also that it is no slight, recondite,
contestable, or inferential differences, but only broad,
obvious, cumidative, indubitable grounds, which will suffice
as basis of a claim to such special origin. If such do not
exist, we concede that candour will compel us to fall back
on the naturalistic hypothesis.
It is perfectly true that it is impossible in any inquiry
to dispense with guiding principles of investigation, and
with presuppositions of some kind, and there is no criticism
on earth that does so— certainly not that of Kuenen and
Wellhausen. Only these should not be allowed to warp
or distort the facts, or be applied to support a preconceived
conclusion. The scientist also finds it incumbent on him
to ** anticipate nature " vrith his interrogations and tentative
hypotheses, which, however, have to be brought to the test
^ This is the argnment in Chap. IL
INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED 15
of experimental verification. We find no fault with these
writers, if they are persuaded that their view of Israel's
religion is the true one, for endeavouring, with all the skill
at their command, to show that it is so. It is even well
that such experiments should be made. The case, in short,
is one of competing interpretations of the Old Testament,
and, assuming Israel's reUgion to be divine, the effect of
the most searching application of critical tests can only be
to bring out this divineness into stronger relief. Ko
Christian, therefore, who has confidence that God, who
spoke to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days
spoken to us by His Son,^ need shrink from any trial to
which critidsm exposes the Bible. It is the Nemesis of a
wrong starting-point in every department of inquiry that
those who adopt it find themselves plunged, as they proceed,
into ever-deepening error and confusion; while a right
guiding-idea as infallibly conducts to a view marked bv
simplicity and truth. If Kuenen and those who think
with him are right in their first principles, they will find
their theory work out easily and naturally in its application
to the phenomena of Scripture : ' if they are wrong, their
hypothesis will inevitably break down under its own weighty
as did that of Baur in the sphere of the New Testament
half a century ago. The ultimate test in either case ia
fitness to meet the facts. It has already been pointed out
that the result of a searching inquiry has been to produce
in many minds the conviction that Israel's religion can not
be explained on mere natural principlea
HL Thb Ltterabt Pboblem: Its Dsfsndenob m
THE BeLIGIGUB
Thus much on the more fundamental part of our
problem; it remains to be asked how far the conclusions
reached on this point affect the questions raised, in the
field of literary discossion, on the age, authorship, structure,
• Xhii iB thcb own olaim. ProfaBSor W. R. Smith, §.g,, in liit PkvfiuM
to WeUhanMn, nys : " In the ooone of the ugnment it avpeen that the
nlein, SAtnnl seme of the old histoiy has conetantly heen outorted hy the
Use prerappositiona with which we haye been accnstomed to approach
ift."— Pnrfl to Hid. ^ iMrael, p. TiiL The implieation is that Wemiaiuen'i
Tiew girea the ''plain, natural aenae."
I
I
i6 INTRODUCTORY : THE PROBLEM STAl^D
and hlBtorioal value of the Old Testament hooks — especially
of the Pentateuch, or '' five books " traditionally attributed
to Mose& What is the interest of CSiristian taith in these
discussions^ or has it any? Ahstractly considered, of
course, as already said,^ questions of age, authorship, and
historical genesis are, in comparison with those we have
now been considering, of secondary importance. The later
age, or composite structure, of a book is no necessary
disproof of its truth. Freeman's History of the Norman
Conquest^ e.g., though written in the nineteenth century,
does not give us a less just or vivid idea of the series of
events to which it relates, than the contemporary monkish
chronicles, etc., on which it is based. The age, authorship,
and simple or composite character of a book are matters
for investigation, to be determined solely by evidence, and
it is justly claimed that criticism, in its investigation of
such subjects, must be untrammelled: that faith cannot
be bound up with results of purely literary judgments.
It will be urged, further, that, as we have admitted, the
denial of the supernatural in the Old Testament history
or religion in no way necessarily follows from any theory
of the dates or relations of documents. All this is true;
still the matter is not quite so simple as this rather
superficial way of presenting the case would picture it
There is, as was before hinted, a very close connection
between critical premises and critical results, and it is
necessary in the present discussion that this connection
should be kept carefully in view.
It has already been explained that it is no part of the
design of these pages to cast discredit on the function of
criticism as such. It is not even contended that the critical
theories at present in vogue are constructed wholly in the
interest of rationalism: far from that. If they were, we
may be sure that so many believing men would not be
found accepting or advocating them. To account for such
acceptance we must assume that they are felt by candid
minos to answer in some degree to real facts, to rest on a
baslB of real evidence, to afford an explanation of real
phenomena, to possess a plausibility and reasonableness
which constrain a genuine assent' On the other hand, it
can as little be doubted that the critical hypothesis, in the
1 See abore, p. S. 'Sat Mow, Chap. VII. pp. 195-0.
INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED 17
form into which it has gradually crystallised, shows, in many
of its features, a marked dependence on rationedistic pre-
suppositions. There is no gainsaying the fact that, histori-
cally,it was in rationalistic workshops.mainly, that the critical
theory was elaborated, and that, from this circumstance, a
certain rationalistic impress was stamped upon it from the
first.^ From Eichhom and those who followed him — ^Von
Bohlen, Vatke, De Wette, and the rest — the critical treat-
ment of the Pentateuch received a *' set " in the direction of
naturalism which it has to some extent retained ever since.
Most of all is it true of the type of theory which is at
present the dominant one — ^the theory which, to indicate
the line of its origin, we might describe as the Yatke-Oraf-
Kuenen-Wellhausen-Stade one — ^that it is rationalistic in
its basis, and in every fibre of its construction. Yet it
is this theory which, chiefly through the briUiant advocacy
of Wellhausen, has for the time won an all but universal
recognition in critical circles on the Continent and in English-
speaking coimtries. Its arguments are adopted, its con-
clusions endorsed, its watenwords repeated, with almost
monotonous fidelity of iteration, by a majority of scholars
of all classes — in Churches and out of Churches, High
Church, Broad Church, and Low Church, sceptical and
believing. This says much for the plausibility of the
theory, but it suggeste also a grave problem. The critical
hypothesis must, of course, be considered on its merits ; but
is there not, on the face of it, a supreme improbability that
a theory evolved under the conditions we have described
should be, in that form, a theory adequate to Christian faith,
or with which Christian faith can ultimately be content ?
Is it such a theory as Christian faith would ever have
evolved from its own presuppositions ? Can it ever be purged
of its rationalistic leaven, and adapted to the use of
the Christian Churches, without a complete re-casting on
•
^ The statement of the late Dr. Oreen may need qualification aa respects
later scholars, but is in the main true of the originators of the cntioal
movement: "The development of critical hynoSieses inimical to tiie
genuineness and the truth of the books of the Bible has from the beginning
been in the hands of those who were antagonistic to supernatural rdigion ;
whose interest in the Bible was purely literary, and who refiised to reoamise
its claims as an immediate and authoritative revelation from Qod." — ^ghtr
OriHeisnif p. 177. Of. Dr. Cheyne on the indebtedness of the German eridcal
movement to English Deism {Fottnder» 0/ OrUieitmf pp. 1, 2). See also
below, p. 58.
1 8 INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED
principles which are the direct antitheses of those which
obtain in the schools in which it originated? We take
leave to doubt it Christian scholars are no doubt entirely
serious in their jacceptance of its conclusions, but there
must grow up, we are persuaded — ^if there is not already
growing up — a perception of the incompatibility of their
belief, as Christians, in a historical revelation, culminating
in the Incarnation,^ with a set of results wrought out on
the basis of a purely naturalistic view of Israel's history
and religion — ^which, in fact, as will be discovered, reduces
the bulk of that history to ruins ! '
Criticism, it is granted, must be untrammelled ; also, the
results complained of do not necessarily follow from the
reigning critical hypothesi& This last remark we must admit
to be true, for part of our own argument in a future chapter
is built upon it.* Still it cannot well be denied that, if all
the results do not necessarily follow from the theory, a
good many of them do very easily and naturally follow;
that the way is logically open for them, as it would not be
on another theory ; and that the reason why the stronger
conclusion is not drawn often is simply that the believing
critics are less logical than their fellows. A theory may
not always be foUaivepl to its conclusions, where these,
nevertheless, very logically /o/^oti^. It could not be other-
wise, when regard is had to the presuppositions under the
influence of which the theory was formed. Everything, as
Bothe said, can be laid hold of by two handles ; and where the
case is one, as before remarked, of competing interpretations
of the same facts, while it is true as ever that both will not
be found equally suitable to the facts, and that no ingenuity
can make them so, the room left for the play of subjective con-
siderations is still very large. In this connection, questions
of age and authorship are far from being always of secondary
moment. The true inwardness of many of these will appear
after in the course of our discussion. It will be forced
upon us when we observe how frequently the dating does
not arise from purely literary considerations, but is deter-
mined by criticiEd assumptions, or by congruity with an
a priori scheme of development, and when we see the use
to which the dating is put, viz., to lower the dates of other
1 See Ottlej below, p. 22. *0t Chap. III. pp. 56 ff.
* Chap. IlL
INTRODUCTORY : THE PROBLEM STATED 19
writingB, or subvert the credibility of the history.^ The
late date of the documents composing the Pentateuch, «.^.,
may be employed to support the contention that the narra-
tive of the Pentateuchal books is wholly, or in great part,
legendary ; the post-exilian date of the Levitical laws may
be used to destroy the connection of the laws with Moses ;
the low date assigned to the psalms may be really a corollary
from a particular theory of Israel's religious development,
and may be used, in turn, to buttress that theory. In other
ways the literary criticism, not intentionally perhaps, but
reaJly and effectively, may be put at the service of the
theory. Books may be divided up, or texts manipulated
and struck out, till the writing is maicle to speak the language
which the critic desire& The hyper-analysis of documents
may result in the dissipation of everything of grandeur,
not to say of consistency and truthfulness, in a narrative.
Whether this is an over-colouring of the character of the
critical procedure, in the hands of many of its representatives,
will be better judged of in the sequel
IV. ArnxuDK of Obitioism to "Revelation"
A little may be said before closing this chapter on a line
of remark sometimes nret with, to the effect that the
contrast we have sought to indicate between the believing
and the " modem " ways of regarding the Old Testament is,
after all, less important than it seems. Partly, it may be
urged, we have unduly narrowed the scope of the words
** revelation " and *' supernatural " ; partly, we have not done
justice to the high views of God and of His providential
government which even rationalistic critics allow that the
prophets of Israel ultimately attained. Professor W. R.
Smith, in his lectures on The Prophets of Israel, may be taken
as representing this latter standpoint. Referring to that
"large and thoughtful school of theologians" which yet
''nrfuses to believe that God's dealings with Isiael in the
times before Christ can be distinguished under the special
name of revelation from His providential guidance of
other nations," he observes that ''in one point of view
this departure from the usual doctrine of Christians is
perhaps less fundamental than it seems at first sight to ba**
^ See Appendix to Chap. X. pp. 878-9.
20 INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED
He goes on : '' For, as a matter of fact, it is not and cannot
be denied that the prophets found for themselves and their
nation a knowledge of God, and not a mere speoulative
knowledge, but a practical fellowship of faith with Him,
which the seekers after truth among the Gentiles never
attained to/'^ The idea seems to be that, these high views
of God and of religion in the prophets being acknowledged
to be there, it is not necessary to burden the argument with
too curious questions as to how they got to be there, —
whether by supernatural revelation, or in the way in which
spiritual truth is grasped by thinkers of other nations.
Enough that we now have theuL
This appears to us, however, to be very fallacious
reasoning ; the more that Professor Smith admits that behind
" there appears to lie a substantial and practical difference
of view between the common faith of the Churches and the
views of the modem school," * and proceeds to give very
cogent reasons for assuming a more direct and special revela-
tion.* Not only, on the view described, is the prophet's
own consciousness of the source of his message denied, and
the higher character of his knowledge of G<xi left without
adequate explanation ; but the results in the two cases are
not the same. The ideas of the prophets on God, on the
naturalistic hypothesis, cannot be allowed, at best, to rise
higher than man is capable of attaining by the reflection of
his own mind on his natural and providential environment,
t.e., to certain general truths about God's existence, unity,
ethical character, and universal providence. Even this, it
might be shown, assumes much more than the premises of
the system will warrant, and, like the *^ natural religion " of the
eighteenth century Deism, implies an unacknowledged debt
to revelation. In any case it does not yield an authoritative
revelation of God's purpose, and saving will for man, derived
immediately from Himself : it lacks, even in what it does
yield, in certitude ; and in both respects falls short of what
is demanded by the full Christian faith. It is further
apparent that on such a view justice cannot be done to the
earlier stages of the religion of Israel. The temptation ot
the critic who proceeds on these lines — ^if, indeed, he has
any alternative — ^is to lower the character of the religion to
suit the conditions of its hypothetical development ; to give
^ FmphstB qf laraa^ p. 9. * Ibid. p. 10. •iKrf. pp. 11, 12.
INl'RODUCTOR Y : THE PROBLEM STATED ai
a mean view of its origin and early manifestationa; and to
oontend against the recognition of a divine cedemptive
purpose manifesting itself from the first in its history.
With respect to the usage of the words "reyelation''
and * supernatural/' we haye gladly acknowledged that
there are few scholars of the present day — among serious
inyestigators probably none — ^who would deny that Israel
had a unique vocation, or would refuse to recognise, in some
degree, a ''providential guidance" in its history. Thus
Duhm makes the quite general statement that, objectively
regarded, there is no alternative to ''the necessity of
accepting a providential guidance in the actual stages of the
development of religion.^ Most, however, in recent years
go further, and freely use the word " revelation " to express
the peculiarity of Israel's religion. Thus Ounkel, one of the
most radical of critics, says : " The conviction remains irre-
fragable that, in the course of the Israelitish religion, the
power of the living Gk>d reveals itself";' and elsewhere:
" Israel is, and remains, the people of revelation." * When
the matter is inquired into, however, it is found that the
term "revelation" is here used in a sense which does not in
reality cover more than Kuenen's " natural development," or
Duhm's " providential guidance." That which, on the human
side, is natural psychological development, is, on the divine
side, interpreted as Ood's revelation of Himself to man.^
Whichever formula is employed, the advocates of this
type of theory find themselves in an obvious difficulty.
God's "guidance" is recognised, but the guidance is of so
faulty a character that it results in a set of ideas as to a
tupernsituial government of the world, and auj^ematural
dealings of Qod with Israel, wholly alien to the actual state
of the facts as the critics represent it If " revelation " is
affirmed, the revelation is held to be compatible with an
abundance of error and illusion, and results, again, on the
part of the prophets, in a total misreading of the past
history of the nation, and in views of Ood, His purpose, and
living relations with men, which, if true, would cut the
* Thedl, d. PropJuten, p. 89.
* SehBjfu/ng vnd ChaaSf p. 118.
' Imrael und Babylonien, pp. 87-88.
^Oimkel sajs: "The histoiy of revelation traiuaots itseir among men
according to the same peychological laws a« orery other human event."—
Ibid, p. 87. Ot the whole passage, ppw 84-88.
22 INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED
ground from under the rationalistdc theory. The elements,
in either ease, which the critics permit themselves to extract
from the prophetic teaching do not, as said, rise above a
vague theism, and the annoimcement of an ethical ideal
'^ Revelation/' in the specific, supernatural sense, is not, and
cannot be, admitted on this view, either in the process or in
the goal Not in the process, for there is nothing there,
confessedlv, transcending natural conditions; and not in
the goal, for Jesus, with all these writers, while reverenced
as the highest type — ^for us the pattern — of spiritual religion,
is nothing more : ^ least of all is He the Son of Grod incar-
nate. Our distinction between natural and supernatural in
the history of Israel, therefore, remains. Even with regard
to those — and they are many — who do in some form admit
''supernatural" revelation, it cannot be too constantly borne
in mind that it is not any and every kind of admission of
the supernatural which satisfies the Christian demand. It
is Christ Himself in the full revelation of His glory as the
only-b^;otten Son who is the touchstone and measure of
the supernatural for faith ; and only that view of revelation
in Israel is adequate which finds its necessary culmination
in His Person and redemption.'
It is now proper that a sketch should be given of the
general course to be followed in the discussions in the
succeeding chapters.
First, a brief preliminary survey will be taken of the
witness which the Old Testament itself bears, in its
structure, and in the uniqueness of its history and religion,
to its own authority and inspiration as the record of Ood's
revelation to His ancient people (Chap. IL). Thus far
critical questions are held over.
^ See on Kaenen abore, p. 12.
* Ottley says : "If Jems Christ were merely the laet and moat eminent
of a line of propheta, there would be more to be said for that &mQiar type
of oritioism which repreaenta laraera reli^ona development as a purely
natural phenomenon, having its starting-point and controUing principle not
in any intervention of a c^raoious and loving God, not in any supernatural
revelation imparted to ekct souls at different epochs in Israel s histofy,
but in fetishism, or totemism, or polytheism, whence by a slow procc« of
purely natural evolution it passed to its final stage in ethical mono-
theism."—.^f^wets ^ O.T., p. 18. Ottley, in this work, with his belief in
the Incarnation and in miracle, admits too much not to admit more. His
positive Christian beliefs fit badly into the frame of Wellhausenism.
INTRODUCTORY : THE PROBLEM STATED 23
The next four diapters will be devoted to the consider-
ation of the question — ^How far is this view which the Old
Testament gives of itself affected by the results of modern
criticism? At this stage the ordinary analysis of the
Hezateuch ( JE, D, P) ^ will be provisionally accepted, and
the aim will be to show that, even on this basis, the
essential outlines of the patriarchal and Mosaic history
(Ohap& IIL, IV.), and the outstandiog facts of the religion
and institutions of the Old Testament (Chaps. V., YL), are
not sensibly affected, — ^that they are not, and cannot be,
overturned. The way being thus cleared for consideration
of the critical hypothesis on its own merits, the four
tooceeding chapters are occupied with a somewhat careful
examination of that hypothesis in its fundamental positions
and several parts. In this examination attention is con-
centrated on the points which are thought to be most
crucial' These chapters (YII.-X.) set forth the reasons
which prevent us yielding our assent to the current critical
hypothesis, except under conditions which essentially
transform its character and bearings. The chapters may,
if the reader likes, be viewed as setting forth our '* sceptical
doubts " on that hypothesis, though in many respects they
are really more than doubts. It is sousht to be shown how
precarious and arbitrary are many of the grounds on which
the critical hypothesis rests, and how strong are the reasons
for challenging its principal postulates, and some of what
are r^arded as its most '' settled " results. This is argued
particularly in respect of :
1. The alleged distinction of the documents J and £,
and the dates assigned to these (Chap. VII.).
2. The origin of Deuteronomy in the age of Josiah or
Manasseh (Chap. VIII.).
3. The post-exilian origin of the so-called Priestly
Code (Chap& IX., X.). Chap. IX. deals with the Code and
Chap. X. with the document.
The question of the divine names is discussed in
Chap. VII.
With respect to the Priestly writing (P), it is contended
that, whilst it is distinct in styUstio character from JE, there
' For explanation of theia symbolt aee Ohap. IIL pp. 66-66, mod Clkap.
VII. pp. 19«?ff."
' Cf. Appendix at end of ehaptei,
24 INTRODUCTORY: THE PROBLEM STATED
is no evidence of P ever having existed as an independent
document; that, on the contrary, it stands in the closest
relations with the other elements in the narrative, and is
most appropriately regarded as (at least in Oenesis) the
** framework " in which the JE narrative is set, with slight
working over of the latter. Reasons are given for carrying
back both books and legislation to a much earlier date than
the critical hypothesis allows, and for recognising in both
a substantially Mosaic basis.
A slance ia taken at the later historical books in an
Appendix to Chap. X.
The conclusions reached in the preceding discussions
receive corroboration in a chapter on the bearings of
Archaeology on the Old Testament (Chap. XL).
A closing chapter deals with the age of the Psftlter,
the reality of predictive prophecy, and the prpgreesiveness
of divine revelation (Chap. XIL},
APPENDIX TO CHAPTER I
Cbucial Ponrrs m ths Cbitigal Thsobt
It 18 interestiBg to note what the critics themselves
i^ard as the crucial points in their theory. Here are
a few utterances on the subject
Westphal says: '^We shall take Deuteronomy as
Ariadne's thread in the labyrinth into which the historical
problem of the Pentateuch introduces us." ^
Delitzsch says: "Since then (Orafs time) the Book
of Ezekiel has become the Archimedean point on which the
Pentateuchal criticism has planted itself, and from which it
has lifted off its hinges the history of worship and literature
in Israel as hitherto accepted"'
Wellhausen says : ** The chapters xL-zlyiiL (in Ezekiel)
are the most important in his book, and have been called
by J. Orth, not incorrectly, the key of the Old Testament" '
Smend also says: "The decisive importance of this
section for the criticism of the Pentateuch was first re-
cognised by George and Yatke. It has been rightly called
the key of the Old Testament" ^
Wellhausen in another place says: ^The position of
the Levites is the Achilles heel of the Priestly Ccxie." ^
Elsewhere he emphasises the centralisation of the cultus
as containing his whole position. '' I differ from Oraf /' he
says, "chiefly in this, that I always go back to the
centralisation of the cultus, and aeduce from it the
particular divergences. My whole position is contained
in my first chapter" (on "The Place of Worship.") •
]^a6nen also has his Achilles heeL Speaking of Graf's
original division of the priestly history and legislation (see
1 Sawrom A* F^fiL iL p. xzIt. * LuthardVa Zeitsehrifi, 1880, p. 279.
' ffi$L ^Itnul, p. 421. « Sxechid, p. 812.
* Hi9L tf IwrtuH, p. 167. * Ibid. p. 868.
26 APPENDIX TO CHAPTER I
below, p. 200), he says: "I saw clearly that his division
of the Chrwndschrift was the Achilles heel of his whole
hypothesis : the solution of Oraf could not be the true one :
it went only half-way." ^
In the argument in the present book special weight
will be found to be attached to the following facts : —
1. The " pre-prophetio " character of J and E, as inyolved
in their admitted priority to Amos and Hosea.
2. The admittedly ^ parallel '' character of J and E, and
their marked stylistic resemblance.
3. The admitted priority of J and E, and of the ** Book
of the Covenant," to Deuteronomy.
4. The admitted priority of J and E to P (in reversal
of the older view), and the fact that P is throughout
parallel to, and presupposes, JE (Wellhausen).
5. The admission by many critics {e.g.^ Driver, Baudissin,
Byle) of the priority of the Levitical collection known as the
"* Law of Holiness " to EzekieL
The turning points in the discussion are those indicated
in the text: —
1. Are J and E two documents, or one f
2. The Josianic origin of Deuteronomy.
3. The post-exilian origin of the Levitical Code.
The critical positions on these three points are traversed
and the rejection of them is shown to involve as its only
tenable alternative (middle views as Noldeke's and DilL
mann's being cut out by the Wellhausen polemic) thi
essential Mosaidty of the Pentateuch.
^ ThtO. TiidtAr. 1870, p. 410l
CHAPTEE II
Vbe 9Vb TCestament trom its own l^ofitt of Wew
** Imfll liM the Uea of tdaologj as a Und of aonL"*— Dobhsb.
^'Bohindit alllathomTfteryof xaoeandofMMiofi. It la an Qltimato
fiwt in tbe hiBtozy and goTsnunent of the world, this eminent genioa of
one tinj people for religion. We know no more : and, in M. Benan'a own
tenm, the people waa 'aeleoted,' just aa, in worda more fiuniUar, larael ia
* tbe ohoaen people.' **— Akdbew Lako.
''When we aaj that God dealt with larael in the way of apeeial reyela-
tion, and orowned Hia dealinga by personally manifeating all Hie grace
and truth in Jeeoa Gbriat tbe incarnate Word, we mean that the Bible
oontaina within itself a perfect piotore of God's gradooa relationa with
man, and that we have no need to go ontaide tbe Bible biatozy to leam
anytiiing of God and Hia aaving will towards ns, — ^that the whole growth
of tbe trae religion ap to ita perfect ftdneaa ia set before na in tbe record
of God's dealings with larael culminating in the manifeetation of Jeeoa
Chrigt"— W. B. Smith.
'* If tbe first three chapters of Genesis are taken oat of the Bible, it ia
depriTcd of the termimu a ^uo : if the laat three chapters of the Apocalypae
are taken away, it ia depriTed of the t§rmimu$ ad jfnem."— Mxnkbk.
OHAPTEE II
THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM ITS OWN POINT
OF VIEW
OUB subject of study, then, is this book of history, of laws,
of prophecy, of psahns, of wisdom literature, which we call
the Old Testament Before, however, entangling ourselves
in the thorny brakes into which the critical study of this
older collection of Scriptures conducts us, it is desirable
that we should look for a little at the book by itself, in
the form in which we have it, and allow its own voice
to be heard on its character and place in the economy of
revelation.
There are obvious advanta^ in this course. No slight
18 intended to be cast on criticism : but it may be gravely
SiBtioned whether this constant discussion going on about
Bible, — ^this minute dissection and analysis of it, and
perpetual weighing of its parts in the nice scales of a critical
balance^ — ^has not at least one harmful effect, that, viz., of
oominff between men and the devout, prayerful study of
the Bible itself, out of which alone can grow that sense
of its harmony and proportion, and experience of its saving
and sanctifying power, which yield the best proof of its
divine origin. The dissecting chamber is necessary; but
it is not exactly the best place for acquiring a sense of the
symmetry and beauty of the living human body, or for
cultivating reverence for it. It is hardly less difficult to
grow into a spiritual appreciation of Scripture, when we
are not permitted to make acquaintance with a Biblical
book till it has first been put upon the critic's table, and
there sliced, severed, and anatomised, till all the palpitating
Ufe has gone out of it, and we are left, as chief result, with
dry lists of the sections, verses, or parts of verses, supposed
■^
30 THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM
to belong to the different narrators or editors I ^ The Bible
has a character and power of impression which belong to
it as a living book ; it is right that these should have justice
done to them before the process of disintegration begins.
We would here indicate, therefore, at the outset, what
precisely it is we propose to do, and what we jdo not propose
to do, in the present chapter. We propose, then, treat-
ing the Old Testament for the time as part of the general
organism of Scripture, to take the Bible just as it is, — just
as it lies before us,-— and to ask what kind of a book it is,
what sort of an account it gives of itself, and what kind of
impression of its origin and source grows out of this first-
hand acquaintance with it We shaU have little or nothing
to say at this stage of theories of criticism — these will come
after ; nothing of questions of age, authorship, or genuine-
ness ; little of theories of revelation or inspiration. There
may be gain, for once, in leaving these things for a short while
aside, and permitting the Bible to speak for itself — to utter
its own unconstrained testimony — to produce on the mind
its own immediate effect, without reference to outside
controversies. The Bible may prove in this way, as it has
often proved before, to be its own best witness, and it is
this aspect and evidence of its divineness which, it seems to
us, it is necessary at the present time, in the difficulty and
uncertainty in which many are involved, most of all to
emphasise.
L The Organic Unity of the Book
We take up the Bible, then, in the way suggested, and
the first thing, we think, that must strike us in connec-
tion with it, is, that this book is, in a remarkable sense,
a unity. From another point of view, of course, the Bible
is not ope book, but a collection of books : as Jerome named
it, "a divine library." It comes to us "by divers portions
and in divers manners." ^ The writings that compose it are
spread over at least a thousand years. Yet the singular
fact is that, when these writings are put together, they
^ In illnstration, the reader may consult, «.^., the tabular eummatione
wliich are the chief outcome of the (otherwise able) article on "Exodus** in
Hastings' PieL qf the BibU (i. pp. 806 ff.). The sensation is like chewing
glue.
• Heb. i. 1.
ITS OWN JPOLNT OF VIEW 31
ooDstitute, structurally, one book ; make up a '^ Bible/' ^ as
we call it, with beginning, and middle, and end, which
produces on the mind a sense of harmony and completeness.
This peculiarity in the Bible, which is not essentially
affected by any results of criticism — since, indeed, the more
the critic divides and distributes his material, the outcome
in the book as we have it is only the more wonderful ' — is
best illustrated by contrast For Christianity is not the
only religion in the world, nor is the Bible the only
collection of sacred books in existenca There are many
Bibles of different religions. The Mohammedan has his
Koran ; the Buddhist has his Canon of Sacred Scriptures ;
the Zoroastrian has his Zendavesta; the Brahman has his
Vedaa On the basis of this very fact, comparative religion
groups a number of religions t(^ether as '* book-religions."
These sacred books are made accessible to us by reliable
translations, and we can compare them with our own
Scriptures. But, not to speak of the enormous superiority
of the Bible to these other sacred books, even in a literary
respect, — ^for few, we presume, capable of judging, would'
think of comparing even the noblest of the Babylonian or
Vedic hymns, or of the Zoroastrian Grathas, in power or
grandeur, with the Hebrew psalms; or would liken the
few really lofty passages on God in the Koran with the
sustained sublimity of the Hebrew prophets ; qt would draw
a parallel between the wild extravagances of the Buddhist
LalUa Vistara and the simplicity, beauty, and self-restraint
of the Christian Gospels,' — ^we would fix attention only on
this one point — the contrast in respect of unity. We seek
in vain in these ethnic Scriptures for anything answering to
this name. The Koran, for instance, is a miscellany of dis-
jointed pieces, out of which it is impossible to extract any
order, progress, or arrangement The 114 Suras or chapters
of which it is composed are arranged chiefly according
to length — the longer in general preceding the shorter.^
> Origitiallj Biblia, <*The Boots/' then "in the thirteenth oentarr, by
a happy solecism," says Westoott, " the neuter plnral oame to be reguded as
a feminine singular, and 'The Books' became, by; common consent, 'The
Book,' in which form the word has passed into the languages of modem
Europe."— ^i6/« in ths Chwreh, p. 6.
* See below, Chap. III.
* See Note A on the Bible and other Sacred Books.
^Thtfj were originally, as given by Mohammed, written on pieces of
stone, bone, leather, palm-leares, or whatever material was iTailable, and
32 THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM
It is not otherwise with the Zoroastrian and Buddhist
Scriptures. These are equally destitute of be^ning,
middle, or end. They are, for the most part, couections
of heterogeneous materials, loosely placed together. How
different everyone must acknowledge it to be with the
Bible I From Qenesis to Bevelation we feel that this book
is in a real sense a unity. It is not a collection of
fragments, but has, as we say, an organic character. It
has one connected story to toll from beginning to end;
we see something growing before our eyes; there is plan,
purpose, progress; the end folds back on the beginning,
and, when the whole is finished, we feel that here again, as
in the primal creation, Otod has finished all His works, and,
behold, they are very good. This is a very external way, it
may be granted, of looking at the Bible, yet it is a very
important one. It puts the Bible before us at the outset
as a unique book. There is nothing exactly resembling
it, or even approaching it, in all literature.^ To find its
explanation, it compels us to go behind the fragmentariness
of the parts, to the underlying unity of thought and purpose
in the whole. The unity of the Bible is not something
factitious — made. It grows out of the unity of the religion
and the history, and points to that as its source.
II. Fulfilment of ths Old Testament in the New
To deepen our impression of this unity of the Bible, and
at the same time carry us a step further into the heart of
our subject, we notice again that the Bible consiBts of two
parts — an Old Testament and a New, — ^and would observe
how the second of these parts folds hack upon the first. The
Old Testament is one group of writings, mostly in Hebrew,
and the Kew Testament is anothei group of writings, in
Greek, with centuries between them. Yet how manifestly
is the latter the counterpart and completion of the former !
The atgument from prophecy has often been overdriven, and
may easily be run into exaggeration and triviality ; but if
thrown into a obost ; thence, after Mohammed's death, they were taken oat
and copied. Some were preserved only by memory.
' "No other literature is linked into one whole like this, instinct with one
spirit and pnrpose, and, with all its variety of character and origin, moying
forward to an unseen yet certain goal." — Kirkpa trick, Divine Library af
the O.T., p. 92.
ITS OWN POINT OF VIEW 33
we take the Bible's own way of putting it, '' The testimony
of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy/' ^ it is difiBcuIt for any
candid mind to deny that the spirit of the Old Testament
fulfils itself in the New. This, again, is a result largely
independent of critical discussions. Take, for example, that
wonderful picture of the suffering Servant of JehoYflJi in the
53rd chapter of Isaiah, which the Church has always,
and rightly, regarded as Messianic' Dismissing for the
moment aU critical considerations as to age, authorship,
or original reference, let anyone steep his mind in the
contents of that chapter, then read what is said about Jesus
in the Gospels, and, as he stands under the shadow of the
Cross, say if there is not the most complete correspondence
between the two. In Jesus of Nazareth, alone in all history,
but in Him perfectly, has this prophecy found a fulfil-
ment The meekness, the pathos of undeserved suffering,
the atoning function, the final triumph, will suit no
other.*
The result is not different if we enlarge our view to the
consideration of the religion of Israel as a whole. The
religion of Israel has been called a religion of hope. Its
face is always to the f uture> The syeftein of things in the
Old Testament presents ^tself prevailingly as something
provisional, temporary, incomplete. There is growth in the
Old Testament — from the patriarchal stage to the Mosaic ;
from the Mosaic to the prophetic ; but it is like the plant
developing from stalk to bud, and from bud to flower, there
is a final stage yet to come — that of the ripened fruit.*
1 Ber. zix. 10.
*0t Dr. A. B. Davidaon, O.T. Prophtejf, p^ 411, 427, 445. "There
is not one," he eajs, " of the better cUtia of cntios who does not reoognise
the pertmence of the qaestion, In whom are the features of the Servant to
be recognised ? or who does not give the same answer to the question as
the orthodox theologian " (p. 411).
' Bleek, quoted by Dr. Davidson, says : "What the prophet here says as
vet in general, in reference to the Servant as saoh, as it were in alnlrado,
nas received its complete fulfilment in the One, who was the only holy and
perfectly sinless among the human race, and therefore the only one whose
sufferings had such a character that, not being due to His own individual
transgression in any way, they can be regarded as serving for the atonement
of the sins of men."— O.T. Prapheey, p. 411 ; ot Oreili, O.T, Prcpkuy,
pp. 887 ff.
*S,g.,Q:9Du ziL 8.
* Dillmann says : " This religion of the ancient people of Israel evor-
where points beyond itself, exhibiting itself as a work begun, which lacks
its final perfection, and so compels us in the nature of the case to apprehend
34 THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM
The old covenant is to give place to a new, — a more
inward and spiritual, — when the law of Ood shall be written
on men's hearts;^ the old national forms are to break up,
and Jehovah is to become the Gk>d of the whole earth ; ' in
their deepest abasement and humiliation the people of Israel
never lose the assurance that from them the light is to go
forth which shall illumine the darkness of the whole world
— that the Gentiles shall come to their light, and kings to
the brightness of their rising.* These thmgs are not to be
brought about without instrumentality, and here we find,
trait after trait, the figure of the Messiah shaping itself, —
the King who is to reign in righteousness/ the Immanuel-
Child, with the wondrous fourfold name, who is the
guarantee for the perpetuity of the throne and kingdom of
David,'^ the Servant of Jehovah, who is to bear the people's'
sins,* the Branch who is to build again the temple of
Jehovah.' The Spirit will be poured out upon all flesh,*
and the kingdom of Otod will come.
Now, let anyone open his Kew Testament, and say if
there is no counterpart to, and completion of, all this there.
Something higher, grander, diviner, no doubt, than even the
prophets could imagine; yet bringing to pass in every
essential respect all that they foretold, all that lay in the
bosom of that old covenant waiting its realisation.* May
we not say that the Christian Churdi itself is a living proof
of the truth of these predictions? Is it not Israefs God
we worship? Is it not Israel's faith that beats in our
hearts ? Israel's Messiah we trust in for salvation ? Israel's
privilege to which we are admitted ? Every time we sing
these old Hebrew psalms, which are to this hour so mar-
vellous an expression of the faith, and hope, and aspirations
of the soul seeking after God, do we not declare that we
it in relation to Ghri8ti«nity, as that in which aflsentially it is per*
f90ted."'-AltU$t, Theol.p. 8.
1 Gf. Dent zxz. 6 ; Jer. zzxL 81-4 ; zxzii 89, 40 ; Esek. xi. 19, 20 ;
xzxvi. 26, 27.
* Nam. ziT. 21 ; Isa. zlr. 22, 28 ; Zeph. ii 11 ; Baf, ii. 6, 7.
* Isa. Iz., etc * Isa. zxzii. 1 ; zzziii. 15, 18.
•Isa. Tii 14 ; TiiL 8, 10 ; iz. 6, 7 ; cf. Mic y. 2, 8.
•l8a.liiL
V Zech. UL 8 ; tL 12 ; of. Isa. iv. 2 ; Jer. zziii. 5.
' Joel ii. 28, 29. On these passages see the works on O.T. Prophecy hy
Davidson, Delitzsch, Riehm, Orelli, etc., and of. helow, Chap. XII. p. 460.
*0f. the suggestive sections in Riehm*s Jfesf. Prophecy (E.T. 1876),
pp. 88 ff.
ITS OWN POINT OF VIEW 35
belong to the same spiritual city as the men who wrote
them ? ^ When, accordingly, the New Testament gathers up
all these types and prophecies of the Old Testament, and
Bees them fulfilled in Christ,'— calls Him, for example, the
^Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world,"'
the " chief corner stone, elect, precious," which God has laid
in Zion/ identifies Him with that Servant of whom it is
declared that the Spirit of Jehovah was upon Him, to
preach good tidings to the meek, to bind up the broken-
hearted, to j^roclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening
of the prison to them that are bound,^ — do we not feel that
it is justified in so doing? When the writer of the Epistle
to the Hebrews sees all the old rites and institutions
glorified in the light of the new religion, and represents
them as types and shadows which have fulfilled their
function, and pass away now that the reality has come,^ — do
we not recognise that he is giving us the truest rationale of
that old economy ? When the Book of Revelation tells of
Paradise restored, and figures the tree of life growing in the
midst,^ do we not feel that the end of revelation, in very
truth, looks back to its beginning, and that here the ruin of
Eden is repaired, and the curse of man's first disobedience,
which '^broi^ht death into our world, and all our woe,"
finally abolished? There is c^n nothing mechanical in
this relation of the Old and New Testaments. The connec-
tion is vital, not external, but is on that account all the
more wonderful, and without parallel
III. Teleologigal Characteb of the History
«
We have seen that this surprising unity which char-
acterises the Bible is only to be explained by going back
to the history and the religion which the Bible makes known
» Cf. Pe. Ixxxvii. (R.V.).
* Knenen allows that this fiiliilment was claimed by Jesns and His
disciples, and says "it is impossible for ns to form too hiffb an estimate of
the importance of tbe applio«tiou of these passages." — Pro^uU and Ptcpheey,
pp. 522 fr. Bnt be bolds that tbe interpretation is unwarranted. Yet how
tfingnlar that these representations should admit of " being merged in one
grand figure," if nothing of tbe kind was intended.
» John L 29. M Pet ii. 6 ; cf. Isa. xxriii. 16.
* Isa. IxL 1 ; cf. Lnke ir. 18. It is Jesos Himself who mi^et thii
identification.
* HeK ix. 9 ; X. 1. * Rev. ii. 7 ; xxii. i.
36 THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM
to us, in which the real mystery or wonder lie& The Bible
is a unique book, because it is the record and literature of a
unique religion. We turn first to the history, and here are
at once arrested by what may be described as its teleologieal
character. " Israel/' says Domer, " has the idea of teleology
as a kind of souL"^ Its history, that is> is dominated by
the idea of purpose. It is this which gives unity to the
history and to the books which contain it The purpose
is not always consciously apprehended by the actors in the
events ; still less, as we shall see hereafter, is it something
which exists only in the minds of the authors of the books,
and is by them ptU into the history.* It lies in the facts
themselves, and reveals itself with increasing clearness as
the history proceeds, till at length the mystery ^ hid from
all etges and generations"' is fully unveiled in Christ
and His salvation. This teleologieal character of the history
is recognised by every writer of genuine insight into the
spiritual nature of Israel's religion,^ and is allowed to stamp
the religion with a uniqueness which absolutely distinguishes
it from every other.
But the fact lies on the face of the history itseUL This
is readily seen by a glance at the development The basis
is laid in the account of the creation of the world, and of
the culmination of that creation in man. From this the
narrative goes on to recount man's fall, and to trace the
development of the race in the lines of piety and impiety
through Seth and Cain respectively, till the growing
corruption of the world brings upon it the judgment of
the flood. A new start is made in the covenant with
Noah, from whom the repeopling of the world, and the
distribution of its races, proceed. The growing spread of
godlessness, and lapse of the nations into heathenism, leads
to the next step in the unfolding of the divine purpose in
the call of Abraham, and in the promises made to hun and
^Syst, ofDocL L p. 274.
' See this diecussed below, Chap. III. pp. 62-S4.
* Col. i. 26 ; of. Eph. iii. 8, 9.
^ Sohultz, «.^., in his O.T. TheoL p. 2, says : "We meao to desorilM,
not various fonns of religion, which have merely an external connection
of place or time, bnt a aingU relicion in the varions stages of its derelop-
ment, which stages oonseqnently nave an organic inner connection. Hence
in such a presentation each member must be properly linked to its fellow.
A common li^ment of living growth mnst bina all the parti togethor.
The presentation must be, not merely historical, but genetic*
ITS OWN POINT OF VIEW 37
to his seed. The promise of blessing, beginning in Eden,^
afterwards restricted to the line of Shem,' is now, in the
Abrahamic covenant, definitely associated with this patriarch
and his posterity — ^not, however, in the spirit of a narrow
particularism, but with a view to the ultimate blessing of
mankind.' Already appears at this early stage of the history
that law of election, — of gracious purpose working along a
defined line for an ultimate larger good, — which is so marked
a feature of the history throughout The line of promise
still further narrows itself — for limitation and definiteness
here are essential to success — ^in Abraham's sons, in the
election of Isaac, not Ishmael ; in Isaac's sons, in the choice
of Jacob, not Esau ; in Jacob's sons, in the designation of
Judah as the royal tribe> The patriarchal age, with its
renewals of the covenant, its prophetic announcements^
its singular providences, its preparation in the elevation of
Joseph for the descent into l^ypt, ends with the removal
to that country, where the people had room and opportunity
to multiply, till, with change of dynasty, the fiery trial over-
took them -by which they were finally welded into a nation.
The Mosaic age, which succeeds the patriarchal, is
closely linked with the preceding through the promises
to the &thers, of which it broi^ht the fulfilment. Allusion
need only be made to the series of events which marks this
beginning of Israel's national life — the birth and call of
Moses, the Exodus, the covenant at Sinai, the discipline of
the wilderness, the settlement in Canaan, the land before
promised to Abraham. The vicissitudes and disorganisation
of the time of the Judges and of Samuel lead up to the rise
of the monarchy, and to the new hopes and promises attached
to the line of David.^ The rending of the kingdom, and
the backslidings and often wholesale lapses into idolatry
of the people, might seem to portend the ruin of these
hopes, and the frustration of the divine purpose. But the
singular — the unexampled — thing in the history of this
people is that the purpose of God in the history is not
^ Qen. iii. 16. Ottley nys tlukt this paanuo^ "strikes at the outset of
redemptive historr the note of promise and of hope." — Hist, qfffths, p. 11.
Cf. Dnver, Oenena, pp. 49, 57.
* Gen. iz. 26. > Gen. x\l 8 ; of. zyiiL 18 ; zzii 18.
* Gen. zliz. 10. On the interpretation, cf. Driyer, Oeiusia, pp. 885^
410-14 ; Oielli, 0,T. Prophecy^ pp. 118-28, etc
•2Sam. TiL
38 THE OLD TESTAMENT FROxM
defeated bj outward failure ; rather, it is in the depth of
adversity and seeming defeat that it asserts itself most
clearly, enlarges, purifies, and spiritualises itself, and is
never, in the prophets, more confident of victory than when,
to the eye of sense, the cause of the kingdom of Qod
appears hopelessly lost
We need not pursue this proof of a teleological character
in the history of Israel further. The same result would be
obtained if, starting with the completed revelation, we
looked at the history retrogressively. Not only does the
Gk)spel of the kingdom which Jesus proclaimed unfold
itself from the bosom of the Jewish community, but the
whole consciousness of Jesus roots itself in the older revela-
tion,— presupposes it, moves in the circle of its ideas, claims
to be the fulfilment of it It was not the prophets only that
Jesus came to fulfil, but " the law and the prophets,'' ^^ — ^the
whole Old Testament revelation. If we go back to the
prophetic age, we find the prophets as uniformly basing
their message on the covenant relation of Israel to Jehovah
which the earlier history attests.* The national conscious-
ness of Israel connects itself unalterably with Moses and
the Exodus, and with the laws and statutes it then received
from Jehovah ; yet with not less distinctness it declares that
the national stage in its history was not the earliest, but
was preceded by the patriarchal, and by the covenants with
the fathers. Israel's God was the Ood of Abraham, of Isaac,
and of Jacob. The starting-point in its covenant history
was not Moses, but Abraham.* There is thus displayed
throughout the whole of these Old Testament Scriptures
a historical continuity, a firmness and coherence of texture,
a steadily evolving, and victorious, self-fulfilling purpose,
which has nowhere, even in the remotest degree, its parallel
in the history of religions.
lY. TTniqits Ideas of the Beugion
Thus far we have looked at the hook and at the history
of Israel's religion, and have found in both a character for
» Matt ▼. 17.
*S.g., Amoa ii. 4, 10: iiL 1, 2; Hos. TiiL 1 ; zL 1-4; MJo. tL 4 ;
laa. i. 2 ; ▼. 1-7 ; zL 16 ; IL 1, 2, 10 ; Jar. u. 17, etc.
> Isa. zziz. 22 ; li. 1 ; Jer. zzziii 26 ; Ezek. zzziii 24 ; Hio. Til 20.
Set on thii below, pp. 94 ff.
I
r
rrs OWN POINT of view 39
whieh no proper parallel can be discovered elsewhere: we
now advance a stage further, and inquire whether the
religion itself does not present a similar uniqueness.
Only those who have not truly entered into its spirit, or
appreciated its relation to other forms of beUef, wiQ
dispute the proposition that the religion of Israel is
uniqua It is not the fact of its uniqueness, but whether
the uniqueness is of such a kind as to require us to
postulate a special, supernatural cause for its explanation,
which is matter of controversy. We shall see immedi-
ately what the Old Testament itself has to say on that
point
1. A unique religion will display its character equally
by what it has and by what it wants. There are, on the
negative side, many thines absent in Israel's religion which
we should expect to find there, if it was simply one among
other religions. Besemblances, as before remarked, in out-
ward respects, there necessarily ara In the religion of Israel
we have a sanctuary, priesthood, altars, sacrifices, ritual —
much more that has its counterpart in other cults. When,
however, from this outward vesture of the religion, we
come to its heart and essence, it is not the resemblances,
but the contrasts, whii^h impress us. We are not disposed
to be stinted in our acknowledgment of the better
elements in the ethnic religions ; but, whatever place may
be given to these, the fact remains that, in their historical
forms, the higher elements are hardly visible, while the
foreground is occupied by an idolatrous worship, an ex-
travagant and often immoral mythology, customs and
usages debasinff to the last degree. We need only recall
the spirit-worship and magic of Babylonia; the animal-
worship and ancestor-worsmp of i^ypt; the stone-worship,
and tree-worship, and serpent- worship, the human sacrifices,
the lustful rites, the self-immolations, which enter so deeply
into most non-Biblical religions. How great the contrast
when we come to the religion of Israel! We do
not enter into details at present, for we shall have to
return to the subject in dealing with the very difierent
theory of the critical school, that Israel began practically
on the same level, and with much the same beliefs and
practices, as its heathen neighbours, and only late in its
history, in the days of the prophets, attained to higher
40 THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM
conceptions.^ It will not be contended, at least, that this is
the view of things that meets us on the /ace of the religion.
Few will be bold enough to maintain that tree-worship,
stone-worship, serpent-worship, image-worship, and similar
superstitions, are conspicuous features on the Bible page.
These things, we grant, or some of them, are found in the
Bible history — ^in patriarchal and Mosaic times in sparse
traces; later, in times of general declension, when the
people fell awaj into the idolatries and vices of the nations
around them, more abundantly; but they are no proper
part of Israel's religion, and are invariably resisted,
denounced, and condemned, as apostacy from Jehovah.
Idolatry is sternly condemned in the oldest code of laws : *
divination, necromancy, consulting with familiar spirits,
are prohibited ; ' the instances in which contrary practices
appear, as Bachel's teraphim,^ Micah's images,^ Saul's con-
sulting of the witch of Endor,® etc., are sporadic and
occasional, and appear either as survivals of older super-
stitions, or as violations of fundamental principles of
the religion, such as are met with in every age and
country.^
2. We do not dwell longer on these negative features
of Israel's religion, but turn to the positive side, in which,
naturally, the clearest proof of its uniqueness must lie.
Here it may be sufficient to fix attention on three great
fuTidamerUal ideas, in which, perhaps, the contrast between
it and other forms of religion is most distinctly to be traced.
(1) We take, first, what meets us on the surface — the
monotheism of this IsraeUtish religion. This of itself is
much, if we think of the polytheism and idolatry which
everywhere else overspread the earth. We look to the
religions of ancient Babylonia, Assyria, and Egypt, or
1 See Chaps. lY. p. 86 ; Y. pp. 188 ff. * Ex. zx. 4, 6 ;
» Dent ZYiii. 9-14.
^ Qen. zzzi. 84 (stolen from her father Laban, ver. 80).
* Judg. ZTU.
* 1 Sam. zzviii. The fiust that Saul had pnt down all witches and
wizards is proof of the law.
^ Knenen objects that the current conceptions of Israel's religion are
drawn, not from the facts, bat from the general reviews of the Hebrew
historians. — NaL Rtligums, etc (Hibbert Lectures), pp. 69 ff. Professor
Robertson aptly replies that, if we tarn to these retlews, " ^y are predsely
in the tone of the prophets Amos and Hosea, the very earliest witnesses to
whom we are allowed to appeal.'* — £ariy JUL <(f Itradt p. 116. '
rrs OWN l^oiNT of view 41
to those of Israers own kinsfolk and neighbours in and
around Palestine;^ and, while recognising hieher elements
in these religions, ever, however, becoming dimmer as we
recede from their source, we find them, one and all, in
historical times, grossly, growinglj, and incurably, poly-
theistic and corrupt In Judah alone was God known.
In no single case, moreover, was this polytheism ever thrown
off by inherent effort Even, therefore, were the theory,
favoured by modem critics, that "ethical monotheism"
was only attamed by Israel in the age of the great prophets,
allowed to be established, the fact would still remain to be
accounted for that Israel, alone of all nations, did attain to
it, and became the teacher of the rest of the world. We
do not, however, give our adherence to the view that
this monotheism of the religion of Israel was a late develop-
ment of the time of the prophets. As will be shown more .
fully in a subsequent chapter,* the Old Testament knows of
no time when the people of Israel were without the know-
ledge of the one God as the Creator and providential Buler
of the whole world. Monotheism is not the doctrine of
one part of the Old Testament, and not of another. Its
oldest parts — those which the critics allow to be the
oldest' — have this doctrine of the unity of Qod as well as
the latest In these oldest parts, we have as fundamental
ideas the creation of the world by God, the unity of the
human family as descended from a first pair, made by God,
the destruction of the whole race by a flood on account of
sin, the promises to Noah, embracing the whole earth,^
a new descent and distribution of the race from Noah, the
recognition of Grod by Abraham as the Judge of the whole
earth,'^ — all laying the foimdation for the call of Abraham,
ohe covenants with the patriarchs, the growth of Israel into
a nation, its redemption from bondage, and formation into
% people for God's glory. While, therefore, it is not
contended that there was no advance in the ideas of God, —
no deepening, purifying, or spuitualising of these ideaa^
— from the cbstys of Abraham and Moses, it may very con-
fidently be maintained that, in the Old Testament as we
' At respects the Semitio peoples, ot Professor G. A. Smith's Modem
Oriiieitm, pp. 111-29.
* Chap. V. pp. 123 ff. ' Tlie J and E histories, see pp. 66-66.
« Gen. YiiL 20, 21 1 iz. • Gen. ZTiii 25.
42 THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM
have it, the unity of God is present as a basal conception
from the first
. (2) The monotheism of Israel, however, is not the whole*
is not even the main thing, in this religion. It is not so
much, after all, in its declarations of what Gkxl is in
Himself, or of the unity of God, as in what it tells us of
the relations of Ood to man, and of His purposes of grace to
the world, that the peculiarity of the religion of the Old
Testament lies.^ No religion exalts man so high as the
religion of the Bible, in representing him as made in the
image of God, and capable of knowing, loving, and serving
God ; and no religion abases man so low, in picturing the
depths of his apostacy from God, and his inability to deliver
himself from the guilt and bondage in which that apostacy
has involved him. But it is the glory of the religion of
the Bible — this in both Old Testament and New — that over
against the picture it gives of the developing sin and cor-
ruption of the race, there appears almost from its first
page the developing plan and purpose of God for man's
salvation.' The history of the Bible is essentially, what
Jonathan Edwards called it, ''the history of redemption."
If the malady is aggravated, the remedy provided is
adequate to cope with it, even on the Bible's own showing
of its eviL In Paul's language, " Where sin abounded, grace
did abound more exceecUngly."' This again brings us to
the idea of teleology, but now shows us more precisely in
what the teleology consists. It is the unfolding in its suc-
cessive stages of God's gracious counsel for man's salvation.^
It is this which gives its unity to the Bible ; which is the
golden thread running through history, psalm, prophecy,
Gospel, epistle, and binding all together. There is nothing,
again, which even remotely resembles this in any other
religion. The partial exception is the Zoroastrian, which,
in a dim, mythological way, has the idea of a conflict of the
good principle with the evil, and of a final triumph of the
> Gf, Kirkpatriok, DMne Libra/ry, p. 98.
' See below, pp. 61-62. ' Bom. ▼. 30.
* Gf. Ottley, Aipedt </ 0,T,, pp. 56 ff. : "The Old TesUment is to b#
stadied, in the first place^ m a record of the history of redemption. It
contains the account of a oontinnons historical moyement of whidh the
originating cause was the grace of God, and the aim the salvation of the
huhian race." On p. 98 : ''In the Pentateuch and the historical books, the
two most prominent ideas are those of redemption and rerelation."
ITS OWN POINT OF VIEW 43
good. But, apart from the fact that, as was inevitable on
a dualistic basis, good and evil are in Zoroastrianism largely
physical conceptions, the idea receives no development, is
the subject of no history, is embodied in no plan which is
hii^rically carried out The uniqueness of the Biblical
religion appears only the more strikingly from the
contrast
(3) The aim of God's salvation, of His entire work of
grace in humanity, is, that man shsJl be. made 7u>ly} This
brings us to a third marked feature in the religion of the
Old Testament, as of the Biblical religion generally — the
indissolvhU relation it establishes "between religion and
^norality. Beligions can readily be found which have no
close connection with morality ; we are familiar also with a
morality which would fain make itself independent of
religion. In few of the higher religions, however, is this
relation between religion and morality altogether obscured
Throughout history there is generally some dim perception
that the gods will protect and reward the good, and will
not fail to punish the evil-doer. The peculiarity of the
Biblical reli^on is that in it this idea of the connection of
religion with morality is the all-dominating one. To minds
awakened to the significance of the moral it may now
appear self-evident that a religion has no real worth which
does not ally itself with moral ends, — ^which, going beyond
even external guardianship and sanction of duties, does not
take morality up into itself as the expression of the will
and character of Gk)d, and count moral obedience an
essential part of His service. But it should not be forgotten
that this was not always the view taken of religion, and
that it is larsely through the influence of th^ religion of
the Bible, purifying and ennobling our conceptions, that we
have now come to perceive even this truth as clearly as we.
da Already in its first pages — before the word " holy " is
yet met with — the Old Testament sets itself against sin in
heart and deed.* God accepts and vindicates righteous men
like Abel, Enoch, and Noah ; overwhelms with His judgments
a world corrupted by sin; destroys wicked cities like
Sodom and Gtomorrah. He requires that Abraham shall
walk before Him and be perfect; Abraham's assurance
> Cf. Dillxnann, AUteH. Thcol, p. 42.
> Set below, pp. 114-15.
44 THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM
about Him is that the Jadge of all the earth will do right^
As revelation advances, the indissolubleness of this con-
nection of religion and morality becomes only clearer. The
ethical was never so exalted; the ideals of condact were
never raised so high; religion and duty were never so
completely fused together, as in the pure and sublime
precepts of psalms and prophets. '' He hath showed thee,
O man, what is good, and what doth Jehovah require of
thee, but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly
with thy God."« A religion of this kind, so high in its
views of Gk)d, so true to the needs of man, so adequate in its
provisions for man's deliverance, so holy in its spirit, so
exalted in its moral demands, never emanated, we may be
sure, from man's own devisings. It is too high for him ; he
could not attain to it Even if be could have conceived the
idea of it, he could not have translated it into fact and
history as is done in the Scripturea
y. Claim to an Origin in Bevblation
This, accordingly, is the next thing which impresses us
in our study of the Old Testament, — the consciousness
which everywhere pervades it that this religion, the
historical stages of which it unfolds to us, is not the
creation of man's own spirit, but is a product of special
divine revelatioTL The tendency of the modem mind, it
was before seen, is to substitute psychology for revelation.
Instead of Grod's word to Isaiab) or John, or Paul, it gives
us the thoughts of Isaiah, or John, or Paul about GkxL
Even where the word ''revelation" is used, it is with this
purely psychological connotation.' This, however, is not
the Bible's own point of view. The Bible is not primarily
a record of man's thoughts about God, but a record of what
God has done and revealed of Himself to man. Its basis is
not, '' Thus and thus thinks man," but, '' Thus and thus saith
Jehovah," or, "Thus and thus Jehovah has done." It
records, indeed, man's thoughts about God — ^his prayers,
struggles, hopes, meditations, aspirations — but these spring
always out of what God has made known of Himself in
word and deed. The Bible is not a mere revelation of
* Gen. zyii. 1, zviii. 25, eto.
' Mio. Ti. 8. * See above, p. 21.
rrs OWN POINT of view 45
abstract, or what Leasing would call ''eternal/' truths about
Gkxi, but above all a discovery of the waj in which God has
revealed His loving wiU to man in word and deed in history.
** He made known His ways unto Moses, His doings unto
the children of IsraeL"^ It is this, we would here observe,
which makes the historical element in Scripture so indis-
pensable and precious, and warns us against the tendency
to speak slightingly of it, as if myth and legend would
serve the purposes of revelation equally with fact.*
Everyone feels that this is not the case with the history
of Christ in the Gospels ; but in the Old Testament also it
is in great measure true that it was not from inward in-
tuition, or jreflections of their own, that prophets and
psalmists, or the ordinary pious Israelite, derived their
knowledge of G<xl, and assured: confidence in Him, but from
what God had revealed of Himself in the past history of
the people.' The acts were the source, the medium, the
authorisation of the knowledge; and, if these were taken
away, the knowledge would disappear with them. Accord-
ingly, we find that, in the highest point which the saint of
the Old Testament can reach in the apprehension of this
revelation, he still feels that it transcends him, is infinitely
above him, in a way which anything proceeding from his
own thoughts could not be. Thus : ^ Many, O Jehovah my
God, are Thy wonderful works which Thou hast done, and
Thy thoughts which are to us-ward: they cannot be set
in order unto Thee: if I would declare and speak of
them, they are more than can be numbered." ^ Or again :
" My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways
My ways, saith Jehovah. For as the heavens are higher
than the earth, so are My ways higher than yom* ways, and
My thoughts than your thoughts" ^
Here, then, we strike on another great peculiarity of
Israel's consciousness — the sense, viz., that it was the
» Pi. diL 7.
"Thus, «.^., Schults, O.T. Thed. L pp. 17-28: "In fiut, l^nd must
be regarded u fitted in a higher degree than history to be the medium of
the Holy Spirit." Would Siohultz apply this to the history of Jesus in the
Oospels t See Kote 6 on Mythology and History in the Old Testament.
'ClW.fi. Smith, PropheUf pp. 10-14 ; Ladd, DocL of Sac. Scripture,
i pp. 787 ff. ; Bruce, CM^ Snd of BevdaiUm, pp. 57 ff. This connecting
•f rerelation with atU of God is the strong point made in Eothe's Zwr
VoffmaiQi,
« Pa xl. 6. * Isa. It. 8, 9.
s/
46 THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM
possessor and guardian of a quite peculiar revelation from
God, and in this respect occupied a perfectly unique
position among the nations of the earth. The answer to
this, we know, is thought to be simple. It is often said by
those who believe aU religions to be equally a natural
growth : ** Every nation in the beginning of its history has
its wonderful stories to tell of miracles, revelations, appari-
tions of the gods : all religions in this respect are much the
same : the Jewish ^d Christian religions are just like the
rest" But we would take the liberty to reply : That is not
quite the casa There is no other nation on earth which
has such a story to tell of the beginnings of its religion —
even as a story, we mean — as the Israelite had to tell of
his, and the Israelite was perfectly conscious of this
absolutely unique character of his history. Mythologies,
fables, l^ends of appearances of the gods there are in
abundance ; but no such orderly, coherent history, charged
with great ideas, as that which meets us in the Bibla
This consciousness of the absolutely exceptional character
of the history is brought out very strikingly in one passage
in the Book of Deuteronomy. Moses there speaks: "For
ask now of the days that are past, which were before thee,
since the day that God created man upon the earth, and
from the one end of the heaven unto the other, whether
there hath been any such thing as this great thing is, or
hath been heard like it ? Did ever people hear the voice
of God speaking out of the midst of the fire, as thou hast
heard, and live ? Or hath God assayed to go and take Him
a nation from the midst of another nation, by temptations,
by signs, and by wonders, and by war, and by a mighty
hand, and by a stretched-out arm, and by great terrors,
according to all that Jehovah your God did for you in
Egypt before your e/es? Unto thee it was shewed, that
thou mightest know that Jehovah He is God : there is none
else beside Him."^ If this be true of the origin of the
religion of Israel, it is still more true of the origin of
Christianity; for, assuredly, no other religion is founded
on such a history as that of Jesus Christ,— on the character,
claims, work, Ufe, death, and resurrection, of such a Person
as Jesus Christ is, — no, not in aQ the world !
The truth is, it is vain to attempt to find a parallel for
^ Dent It. 82-86 ; oC T«n. 6-4.
ITS OWN POINT OF VIEW 47
this wholly unique phenomenon of the religion of Israel
Take again the two points already mentioned : the mono-
theism of this religion, and the indissoluble connection it
establishes between religion and morality. It is not
uncommon to hear this monotheistic faith spoken of as if
it were a stage which, given only favourable conditions,
every nation was -bound to reach in the course of its
development.^ Man begins, it is supposed, by worshipping
spirits, or ghosts of ancestors, or something of the kmd;
then mounts to the conception of a tribal deity; then
extends the power of this deity, or blends the deity with
others, till he is viewed as the sole ruler of the world. But,
unfortunately, the facts do not bear out this ingenious
theory. It has frequently been pointed out that there are,
even yet, only three monotheistic religions in the world —
the Jewish, the Christian, and the Mohammedan, which,
in this respect, is derived from the other two. That is to
say, all the monotheistic religion there is in the world is
derived from the religion of the Bible. It is not meant
that, beneath and behind the polytheism of older religions,
there are not many indications of a purer monotheistic
consciousness, or that there have not often been, in indi-
viduals and schools, very remarkable approximations to the
truth about the unity, power, wisdom, goodness, and
providence of God.* In that sense God has never left
Himself without witness. But it is a well-understood truth
that philosophical speculations have never founded, or can
found, a religion ; and it is simple fact of history that no
monotheistic religions — religions, that is, based on the unity
and spirituality of God as fundamental articles — ^have ever
arisen, except those above mentioned.
Or take the other point — ^the indissoluble blending of
morality and religion. Where, again, do we find anything
corresponding to this outside the Biblical revelation ? One
of the early fathers of the Church gives us a description
of an Egyptian temple — ^lof ty, spacious, gorgeous, inspiring
the worshipper by its grandeur with solemn awe. You
V
> Kuenen, B.a,, nju: "To what wa might call the univenal, or at least
the oommon rule, that religion begins with fetishiani, then derelope into
polytheism, and then, but not before, ascends to monotheism — that is to
say, if this highest sta^ be reached [a verr important proTiso]— to this rule
the Israelites are no exception. *^~i2e/. <^ larael, i. p. 226.
' See p. 128 below.
48 THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM
enter the precincts of the temple, bnt when the priest, with
grave air, draws aside the veil that hides the inner shrine,
you behold — what? A cat, a crocodile, a serpent, or
other animal, rolling on a purple coucL^ Visit now the
temple of Jehovah at Jerusalem. Here, too, you have a
gorgeous building ; here, too, a priesthood, altars, a shrine
hidden by a veil Within the veil stands the ark of the
covenant, covered by the mercy-seat, sprinkled with blood
of atonement, and shadowed by the golden cherubim. Let
that covering be lifted, and within that ark, in the very
core and centre of Israel's religion, in its most sacred place, '
you find — what ? Tf^ two tdbUs of the moral law. There,
in a word, is the contrast of the two religions. There is
the declaration of the truth that, before and above all
things else, Israel's is an ethical religion. For these are
" the tables of the testimony " ' — the basis and bond of the
nation's covenant with Grod — and all the ritual of ceremonial
institutions is but a scaffolding to protect this ethical core
from injury, or a means of restoring the worshipper to
favour when sin has disturbed his fellowship. It will be
remembered that, when Jesus came, He did not cut Himself
off from that older revelation, but declared that on its two
commandments of love to Gk)d and love to man hung all
the law and the prophets.'
VI. Ebvklation in Relation to rrs Record
If we thus let the Bible-— Old Testament and New —
speak for itself, and compare it part with part : still more
if we yield ourselves to its power, and strive faithfully to
follow its directions, the conviction will irresistibly grow
upon us that it is right when it claims to be based on
divine revelation. Out of that revelation, the literature of
revelation^ which we call the Bible, grow& If this fact be
firmly apprehended, particular questions about the dates or
placing of books will not much trouble us. The revelation is
there, and no changes in the dates or placing of books — ^none
at least that are likely to be permanently brought out — can
do anything to alter its fundamental outlines. If a revela-
tion has been given, it is surely the most natural thing in
^ Clem. Alex. Tied, iii. 2.
* Ex. zzzii. 15. See below, Chap. YI. pp. 152 ff. * Matt xzii. 40
ITS OWN POINT OF VIEW 49
the world to expect that a record should be made or kept
of the stages of that revelation, either by its original
recipients, or bj those who stood within the circle of
revelation, and possessed in an endnent d^ee its spirit^
That such a literature exists, adequate in every respect for
making known to us the revelation, animated and pene-
trated by its spirit, though in varying degrees, — ^for the
strictest upholder of inspiration wiU hardly place the Books <
of Qironicles on the same level with the Gospel of St. John,
— fitted as a whole infaUibly to accomplish its great end of
making men wise unto salvation thn>ugh faith in Jesus
Christ, and of completely furnishing the man of God unto
every good work,' — that such a literature exists, the only
ultimate proof that can be given is the existence of the
book itself ; and such a book, as we have seen even from
this brief inspection of its character, we have in the Bible.
The simple fact that in this sacred volume, so marvellous
in its own structure, so harmonious and complete in the
view it ffives of the dealings of God with man, so rich and
exhaustless in its spiritual content, so filled with the mani-
fest presence and power of the Spirit of God, we have every-
thing we need to acquaint us fully with the mind and will of
God for our salvation, and to supply us for all the ends of
our spiritual life, is sufiQcient evidence that the revelation
which God has given is, in every essential particular, purely
and faithfully embodied in it No more than the revela^
tion from wMch it springs, is the Bible a product of mere
human wisdom, but has God for its inspiring source I
This, as we understand it, is the Bible's own test of its
inspiration, alike in Old Testament and in New,' and by
it, without nearer definition, we are content, for our present
purpose, to abida The subject is taken hold of by its
wrong end, when the test of inspiration is sought primarily
^ " What wonld be the oonoelTable nators of reywled reliflioii, without a
reoord of facta I The briefest consideratioii oonvinoee ub, that either the
whole nature of revelation most be essentially changed, or else a reoord of
its historio process mnst somehow be preserved. To be sure, the fact of
ultimate and supreme importance Is the hct of revelation itf>elf. But the
venr nature of revelation, if it is to take the form of an historio process, is
such as to demand a record of that process. The foundations of Christianity
are historically laid," etc. — Ladd, j>ocC. of Sac Script, i. p. 787.
« 2 Tim. iil 16-17.
'Gf., s.^., Deut zzx. 10-16 ; Josh L 7, 8; Pas. L, six. 7-14, oxix.;
John ziv. 26 ; zx. 81 ; Bom. xv. 4, etc
so THE OLD TESTAMENT FROM
in minute inerrancy in external details, as those of
geography, or chronology, or of physical scienca Inspira-
^tion does not create the materiids of its record: it works
upon theuL^ The crucial question is — Do the qualities
which inspiration is expressly declared to confer on
Scripture — e.^., in such a classical passage as 2 Tim. iii
13-17— really belong to it ? We think it will be difficult
for any candid mind to deny that they do. Who, coming
to this sacred book, with a sincere desire to know Ood's
will for the direction of his life, will say that he cannot
find it? Who, desiring to be instructed in the way of
salvation ''through faith which is in Christ Jesus," will
consult its pages, and say it is not made plain to him ?
Who, coming to it for equipment of his spiritual life, will
say that there are still needs of that life which are left
unprovided for? Who, seeking direction in the way of
the life everlasting, can doubt that, if he faithfully obeys
its teaching, he will reach that goal ? The Scripture fulfils
the ends for which it was given ; no higher proof of its
inspiration can be demanded.*
YIL BSLATION OF THE OLD TESTAMENT TO CHBIST
There ia but one further remark we would make in
closing this chapter. It relates to the place which Christ
holds in Scripture, and ought to have in our study of every
part of it. If what has been said of divine revelation is
true, it follows that everything else in Scripture has its
centre and point of connection in Him. If the Bible is a
structure, Christ is the comer stone in that structure. All
else in it is designed to lead up to Him, while in knowing
Him, in learning to see in Him the image and revelation
of the Father, in being drawn into sympathy with His
' See Note 0 on Inspiration and the Materials of the Beootd.
>C!: Weetoott, BibU in ike Chwreh, p. 14: "The Bible oontaina in
iteelf the fullest witness to its divine authority. If it appears that a
laree collection of fragmentary records, written, with few exceptions,
wiuioat any designed connection, at most distant times and under the
most Taried circumstances, yet oombine to form a definite whole, broadly
separated from other books . . • if in proportion as they are felt to be
separate they are felt also to-be instinct with a common spirit ; then it
wul be readj'ly acknowledged that, however they were united afterwards
into the sacred volume, they are yet legibly stamped with the divine seal
as ' inspired of Qod' in a sense in which no other writings are."
ITS OWN POINT OF VIEW 51
Spirit, in tasting the grace of His salvation, — in coming
to know that in Him we possess "the true God and
eternal life/'^ — ^we gain the key which sets all else in
Scripture in its true light. Without this key we Are
bound to miss our way in the search for its secret Ko
learning, no cleverness, will enable us to find it out. In
vain do we go to the Old Testament, or to any part of
Scripture, for the satisfaction of a mere intellectual or
literary curiosity. It was not for this it was given, but
to conduct us into the presence of Him who, of God, is
made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification,
and redemption.* What the closing verse of the 20th
chapter of John's Gospel says of that book : ** But these are
written, that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the
Son of God, and that believing ye may have life through
His name," ' may with equal truth be applied to the Bible
as a whola Christ is the central sun in that firmament :
only when we are brought within the range of His beams
have we the light of Ufa
UJahnT.SO. «lGor.L80. •Jofanzz.iL
CHAPTER III
Vbe Olb trestament ae affected b^ (Ttttfcfsm—
E Zbe Distors : Bcdument from Critical
premises
".The Bible is through and through of historioal nature end apfarit*—
EwiXD.
"For what ia the Old Testament from the Ohristian point of view—
and from no other point of view oan it be rightly understood — ^bnt the
record of God's gradual revelation of Himself to Israel in His purpose of
redeeming love with a view to the establishment of His universal kingdom t
The Incarnation was to be the culminating point of that revelation and
that purpoee."— A. F. Eirkpatrigk.
"On the other hand, writers of the liberal school in Germany take so
completely for granted, — either on mere critical grounds, or because they
assume from the first the utter impossibility of miracles or supernatural
revelations, — the unhistorical character and non-Mosaic origin of the greater
portion, at least, if not the whole, of the Pentateuch, that they do not
generally take the trouble to test the credibility of the stoiy, by entering
into such matter-of*&ct inquiries as are here made the basia of the whole
argument "— Ck>LXNBO.
"We nevertheless firmly maintain that the preceding Ustory of Israel,
from the Elohlstio account of the creation to the histoiy of Joseph, was
written in andent pre-exilian times." — ^Dbutzsoh.
" Kuenen's name for the book [J£] with which we are dealing, vli.,
the ' Prophetic ' narrative, is scarcely happy. Some of its most remarkable
elements are, as Euenen himself points out, pre-prophetic. • • • The two
books evidently proceeded in parallel lines of narrative, and it is often hard
— ^nay, impossible— to say whether a particular section of the Hezateaoh
belongs to the Jahvist or the Elohist."— Addis.
CHAPTEB III
THE OLD TESTAMENT AS AFFECTED BT GSTTICISM
—I. THE HISTORY : ARGUMENT FROM CRITICAL
PREMISES
♦
Long ere this point is reached, loud protests will have
been raised against the flagrantly ** uncritical " character of
our procedure, as shown in our ignoring of those well-
established results of scholarship which have had the
effect of shivering the supposed unity of the Old Testament,
and of destroying the credibility of its narratives, especially
of those which have had most weight attached to them in
the history of revelation. We shall now do what we can
to remove this reproach by proceeding to inquire how far
the view of the Old Testament to which we have been led
by the consideration of its own structure is overthrown or
modified by the application of a really scientific criticism.
Further, that no undue advantage may be taken, or cause
given for complaint that the strength of the critical position
is overlooked, we propose, in the first instance, as indicated
in the preliminary sketch, to discuss the questions of the
history, and of the religion and institutions, of Israel, on
the basis of the critical theory itself, that is, with pro-
visional assumption of the correctness of the ordinary
critical analysis and dating of books. The canvassing of
the critical theory on its merits will come after. But it is
well at the outset to see what follows, even if the generally-
accepted critical analysis, to its full extent, is admitted.
In this chapter and the next we shall deal with the history.
It is not necessary to repeat the caution formerly given,
that all critics are not ql^iand to be classed as of the same
mind on this and other subjects. There are, as we shall
constantly have occasion to see, more radical and more
moderate schools of criticism. But it has also in justice
ft6
56 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
to be recognised that it is largely the methods and con-
clusions of the most radical school —the Graf-Kuenen-Well-
hausen school — which, without always the adoption of its
anti-supematuralistio premises, have been imported into
English-speaking countries, are actively propagated under
the name ''Higher Criticism/' and chiefly rule the
current representations of Old Testament history and
religion.^ The late Professor W. B. Smith already claimed
in 1885: ^'Almost every younger scholar of mark is on
the side of Yatke and Beuss, Lagarde and Graf, Kuenen
and Wellhausen"' — an ominous utterance for the Old
Testament. This is our justification, if one is needed, for
treating the radical school as representative.
L CRrncAL Assault on Old Testament Histoby
We begin by looking at the general attitude of this
advanced school to the history of the Old Testament.
1. It does not put the matter too strongly, then, to say
that, to the more radical school of critics, the Old Testament
is in the main unhistorieal. Not necessarily, of course, that
there is not in parts — some would acknowledge in con-
siderable parts — a historical substratum. Everyone may
not go so far, at one end of the history, as Stade, who
doubts whether Israel as a people was ever in Egypt at
all ; ^ or, at the other end, as £osters, who denies the return
from the exile at Babylon under ZerubbabeL^ But the
books as they stand are, for all that, held not to be, at
least till the days of the kings, and even then only very
partially, genuine history.
^ Gt aboTe^ pp. 12, 17. In proof we may refer generally to the Old
Testament artLclee in Hastmn' Viet, qf Bible (with ezoeptionB) or Cheyne'i
Bnayc, Bibliea ; to Addia and Carpenter on Uie Hexateuch ; to the Tolnmea
on Joehoa, etc., in "Polvcbrome Bible"; to those on Nmnbers, Judges,
Samnel, eto., in the "International CSrit. Oommentary"; to Professor
H. P. Smith's O.T. History, in the "International Theologioal Library,"
and many other works of the same olass.
> Preface to Wellhansen*s ffisi. vf ItercuX (E.T.), p. yL
* OesehiehU, i. pp. 129-80.
* In his Set herstd van Israel (1894), H. P. Smith adopts his theory,
O.T. Hist, chap. zvi. Aecording to the latter writer, "the decree of (Tyros
is impossible," and " the theory of a return, of an intermption of the work,
of any interference by Darius, is contradicted by Haggai and Zechariah "
(p. 858). Of Ezra, if he existed, "we know nothing " (p. 896). See below,
Ohap. IX. p. 296.
I. THE HISTORY 57
To illustrate : the Book of Genesis, we are told, is " a
book of sacred legend, with a mythical introduction." ^ It
yields us ''no historical knowledge of the patriarchs, but
only of the time when the stories about them arose in
the Israelite people: this later age is here unconsciously
projected, in its inner and outer features, into hoar antiquity,
and ia reflected there like a glorified mirage."' The ''de-
scriptions of the Exodus from Egypt, the wandering in the
desert, and the conquest and partition of Canaan . . • to put
it in a word, are utterly unhistoriecU" ^ " Briefly described,
then, the Book of Joshua is an historical romance. . . . We
must lose much of the religious value the Book of Joshua
possesses while we treat it as history, and, indeed, until we
treat it as what it is — ^romanca"^ "The narrative gives
us exactly what did not occur at the conquest."^ The
Jehovistic writer in the Hexateuch (J) "feels himself in
an ideal fairy land in which no wonders are surprising." ^
The unfortunate Priestly writer (F), on the other hand, has
neither historical nor literary merit, and is refused credence
on all handfu Noldeke, we are told, made an end of him
"once for all"; but "Colenso is properly entitled to the
credit of having first torn the web asunder."^ His names,
numbers, and precise details, which imposed even on such
good critics as Bleek, Hupfeld, and £nobel, "are not drawn
from contemporary records, but are the fruit solely of late
Jewish fancy, a fancy which, it is well known, does not
design nor sketch, but counts and constmcts, and produces
nothing more than barren plan&"^ In brief : " We have no
really historical knowledge of a patriarchal period preceding
Israers conquest of Canaan. The individuals, Abraham,
^ Sohultz, O.T. Theol. i. p. 81.
* WeUhauseii, RisL qfltrad, pp. 818-19.
* Kaenen, Hexateiuhj p. 42 (italics hia). It ia of thia writer*! work that
ProfefisoT W. R. Smith permitted himaeir to say : " His (Kuenen's) discussioiis
of the more complicated qaestioiis of Pentateach analysis are perhaps the
finest things that modem oritioism can show." — ^Pre/ace to Wellhansen,
p. yiii.
^ Professor G. B. Gray, in a review of Bennett's Joshua (*' Polychrome
Bible"), 1899.
• H. P. Smith, O.T, ffist, p. 882.
• F. H. Woods, art "Hexateach " in IHet. qfBibU, ii. p. 872. Of. with
Dr. Driver's statement in his Omieiis, p. xlv, <|uoted below, p. 105 : *'The
patriarchal narratires are marked by great sobriety of statement and repre-
sentation," etc
' Wellhansen, ffist. iffliraa, p. 847. * Ibid. p. 848.
58 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
Isaac, and Jacob, are eponyms — personifications of clans,
tribes, or ethnological groups — and they are nothing
more."^
As respects the later books, a basis of political history
is necessarily recognised, but the books as we have them
are declared to be throughout unreliable and misleading.
'* In Judges, Samuel, and Elings," we are told, '* we are not
presented with tradition purely in its original condition:
already it is overgrown with later accretions. ... To vary
the metaphor, the whole area of tradition has finally been
uniformly covered with an alluvial deposit by which the con-
figuration of the surface has been determined." * Here are a
few examples. On 1 Sam. vii : ** The mere recapitulation of
the contents of this narrative makes us feel at once what
a pious make-up it is, and how full of inherent impossi-
bility." • On 1 Sam. xix. 18-24 : ** We can scarcely avoid
the suspicion that what we have before us here is a pious
caricature ; the point can be nothing but Samuel's and David's
enjoyment of the dii^race of the naked king."^ On the
Deuteronomic revision of Kings: "The most unblushing
example of this kind, a piece which, for historical worthless-
ness, may compare with Judges xix.-xxi., or 1 Sam. vii. teq,,
or even stands a step lower, is 1 Kings xxii." ^ On editorial
additions: ''These valuable notes commence even with
Solomon, though here they are largely mixed with anecdotic
chaff." * Chronicles, of course, so far as it does not embody
extracts from older works, is regarded as past redemption.
It is the product of a " law-crazed " fancy, which effects " a
complete transformation of the original tradition."^ ''His
work must not be called history." ^ In the irreverence of
much of this, one is forcibly reminded of what Dr. Cheyne
says of the indebtedness of the newer criticism to eighteenth
century English Deism.* The atmosphere into which we
are brought back is that of Morgan, and Bolingbroke, and
Hume, and the impression produced is correspondingly
painful**
> H. P. Smitli, 0. T, Hitt, p. 48.
* WelUiAiuen, Hitt. qflwrad, p. 228.
• IMd, p. 248. « lUd. p. 268.
• Ihid. p. 286. • Ibid. p. 286.
' Ihid. pp. 196, 224. • H. P. Smith, O.T. Hid. p. 6.
* Fouiiden of Criticism, pp. 1, 2.
^ We hare not taken notice of the older mytiiological theories, ^.g
I. THE HISTORY 59
2. It will not be dispnted, we think, that these extracts,
taken almoet at random, fairly represent the views and
spirit of the majority of the books and articles written from
l£e newer critical standpoint, — certainly those of the most
influential representatives of the school, — but, as already
said, there are critics also of more positive tendency, who
contest these deductions of the extremer party, and take
much firmer ground on the historicity of the patriarchal
and Mosaic periods. Such, e.ff., on the Continent, are
Eonig, Strack, Kittel, Oettli, and many more.^ In England,
Dr. Driver, in his reverence and moderation of tone, repre-
sents the mediating position of many believing scholars,
though he is obviously hampered by his adherence to the
Wellhausen basis. He argues for a historical " core ** in the
patriarchal narratives, thinks, even, that there are *' reasonable
grounds for concluding that the narratives are in substance
historical"; but comes in the end to the rather lame
conclusion, that ''it is still, all things considered, difficult
to believe that sovne foundation of actual personal history
does not underlie the patriarchal narratives." ' The main
stream of the critical movement, however, is not to be held
in by these feeble barriers, and continues to spread itself
over the entire field of patriarchal and Mosaic history in a
broad flood of scepticism.
3. What are the grounds on which this sweeping indict-
ment against the Old Testament history, and spe(ually the
thoM of Goldziher in his Mythology among (he HehrewSf who takes the chftr-
aoten in Genesis and Judges to be sun-myths ; or of the newer extravagances of
Winc^ler, whose theories are faTourably regarded by Dr. Cheyne (Nineteenth
Cmdwry. Deo. 1902). See Note A on Critical Eztravagances.
^ In his NeuuU Prinziyien Eonig combats the views of Stade, Onthe, and
otheirs, who would resolve the patriarchs into '* personifications " of tribes (see
below, pp. 88ff.) ; Kittel defends the earlier history in his lecture (translated)
on The Babylonian ExcawUians and JSarly Bible Ristory, etc Dillmann,
in his posthumously published ^;<^e«^ Theol. (pp. 77-78, 82-88), says: "We
have no right to explain these GenesiB narratives as pure fiction, as so manv
now do. . • • We mistake if we do not reco^ise that the^ rest in eseenUah
on sound historical recollection. • . • Even if none of their names had been
handed down to us, we would require to postulate such revelation-figures as
we have in Abraham and those who followed him. • . . The facts, therefore,
afford rational justification for the picture of the course of events siven in
Genesis, at least in its main features (m groseen unA ganzen). Even
Dillmann, however, concedes a good deal more than is necessary.
' OeneeiSt pp. xlv, xlvii, Ivil. Canon Cheyne, on the other hand, isseriously
disturbed at what he thinks to be the halting attitude and spirit of com-
pronuse in Dr. Driver's IntroducHon. He thinks *' his fences are weak, and
may at any moment be broken down." — Foundere of Criiieiem, pp. 251 fl!^
^ I
J
60 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY C»ITICISM— .
earlier part of it, is based? Thej are, as we shall see,
variotis : the late date of composition, the manifest legendary
character of the narratiyes, assumed variations and contra-
dictions in \tbe sources, supposed incompatibility with the
rudimentary state of religious belief in early times, and the
like. The historicity of the early narratives, it is held,
cannot be maintained in view of the fact, which criticism
is said to have established, that the Pentateuch (or with
Joshua, the Hexateuch) is composed of documents of late
date, based on tradition many centuries old — ^in the case of
the Exodus at least 500 or 600 years, in the case of the
patriarchs 1000 to 1300 years — ^which, therefore, cannot
be supposed to preserve accurately the memory of such
distant events.^ Kuenen, who here may be taken as repre-
sentative, gives four special reasons for rejecting the
patriarchal narratives. They are : the religious ideas which
are ascribed to the patriarchs, insoluble chronological
difficulties, the familiar intercourse of the deity with the
patriarchs (" we are not in the habit of accepting as history
the legends which afford evidence of that belief "), and, " the
principal cause of hesitation," the persons who appear as
actors in the narratives ''are all prc^enitors of tribes."*
We wonder how many readers of the Bible feel these
" obstacles " to be as *' insurmountable " as they were to Dr.
Kuenen.* Much of all this, in any case, as we shall soon
discover, is undiluted assumption: the criticism rests on
the theory, not the theory on the critidsm. How obviously,
«.^., does the argument from "religious ideas "^ rest on a
certain assumption as to the stage of religious knowledge of
the patriarchs — ^an assumption which has no warrant save
in the critic's own theory of the course of the development.^
* Cf. Kaenen, Bd, of Israel, i. pp. 16, 17 ; Driyer, Genesis, p. xliii ;
H. P. Smith, O. T, EisL i. p. 7.
' Bd, of Israel, i. pp. 108-9. Gf. below, pp. 88 ff.
* Cf. Lodd, Doct. qf Saered Scripture^ i. p. 862.
* Dr. Drirer also argaes for an " idealisation " of the narratives, on the
ground that " in the days of the patriarchs religion must have been in
a relativelv rudimentary stage" (p. Iz). It is shown later (p. 115),
however, tnat it is not the case, as Kuenen argues, that the patriarohs are
represented as "not inferior to the prophets of the eighth centuiy B.a, in
pureneas of religious insiffht and inward person^ piety .^
'Hommel says: "When we find tnat a whole school of evangelical
theologians do not hesitate to declare that a passage was composed at a later
date or interpolated, simply because they are unwilling to recognise the
existence of any high moral teaching or lofty coQceptiou of the Godhead prior
I. THE HISTORY 6i
PoBtponing meantime, however, the disciission of these
objections, we propose to proceed in more constructive
fashion, in setting forth, first, the grounds of our belief in the
substantial trustworthiness of the Old Testament history,
even under the limits prescribed bj the critical hypothesis.
II. lONORiKa OF Teleologigal Element in the Hibtobt
The critical treatment breaks down the Biblical narra-
tives, disintegrates them, causes them to crumble to pieces.
But there are features in the narratives which resist this
ixeatment, and constitute a standing protest against it
In the previous chapter we laid stress on the singular
character of "teleology" in the Hebrew history. It is
history dominated by the idea of purpose, and that a
purpose o{ grcxe — of redemption. There is little, if any,
recognition of this in the writers we have chiefly in view,
though, to do them justice, they do not seek to get rid of
the impression of the extraordmaiy and unique in Israel's
history. Still the necessity of explaining the development
out of purely natural factors causes a very different picture
to be given from that which the Old Testament itself
sketches.^ One looks in vain in Kuenen, or Wellhausen,
or Stade, or Gunkel, or in such an Old Testament History
as that of Professor H. P. Smith, for any perception of the
deeper ideas that lie in the Genesis narratives, or of their
organic relation to the rest of Scripture. To a developing
purpose of salvation they seem altogether blind. In this
their criticism is already self-condemned; for what they
fail to see *is discerned by many others, as keenly critical
as themselves. An example or two may be cited from such
critical writers, if only to show that this idea of purpose is
no hallucination of our own fancy, which we are seeking per-
versely to import into the narratives. Dr. Kautzsch, of Halle,
in a lecture on The Abiding Value of the Old Testament,
thus writes : " The abiding value of the Old Testament lies
above all in this, that it guarantees to us with absolute
certainty the fact and the process of a divine plan and way
to the time of the propheta of the eighth or Mventh centuries b.o., then.
In Tiew of the facts adaaoed in the present Tolnme, we cannot but regara
their attitade as a deplorably mistaken one, and hope that it uiaj soon
booorae a thing of the past"— ^nc. Beb, Trad. pp. 291-92.
> See below, pp. 86, 188 ff.
62 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITiaSM—
of Balvation, which found its conclusion and fulfihnent in
the new covenant, in the Person and work of Jesus
Christ" ^ Dillmann likewise sees in the Old Testament the
developiiient of God's redemptive "plan." "So soon" he
says, "as man becomes untrue to his original idea, and,
forsaking the attitude of obedience to God, begins his
self-seeking way, there comes also to manifestation the
saving activity of God directed to this apostacy of the
creature. ... So soon as, and so long as, sin is in the
world, there is also a saving activity of God." * Dr. Driver
says of the narrator J : " ^e patriarchal history is, in his
hands, instinct with the consciousness of a great future:
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are vouchsafed in succession
glimpses of the divine plan."* Kautzsch, again, just quoted,
says of his (two) J writers: "Both relate the primeval
history from the standpoint of a history of redemption." ^
To all this, so far as it is admitted, the reply which
comes from the side of the criticism that seeks to get rid
of the teleological element in the history is, that the
Biblical representation is an unreal and artificial one : not
a development in accordance with the actual history, but
an imaginary development, the result of a reading back into
the primitive legends of the ideas of the prophetic age.
The appearance of development is superimposed on the
historical tradition by the manner in which its materials
are manipulated. Grant, it is said, the critical scheme — ^its
analysis and partition of documents — and the illusion of
teleology in the Old Testament story disappears ; so far at
least as any extraordinary cause is required to account for it.
In the words of Professor Bobertson : " What tHey maintain
is, that the scheme of the Biblical writers is an afterthought,
which, by a process of manipulation of older documents, and
by a systematic representation of earlier events in the light
of much later times, has been made to appear as if it were
the original and genuine development" ^
^ DU BUibende Bedeutung de$ A, T,, p. 28.
* AUU3t» ThecH. p. ill. See whole section.
* OcTiesis, p. xzi ; ct pp. Ixx £f.
* Lit. of O.T., p. 88. See also Ottley's Aspects of the O.T., pp. 56 ff. ;
MoFadven 8 Messctges of the Prophetic and PriesUv ffistorianSf pp. 27 ff.
on " The Progress of the Divine Parpose in the Book of Genesis."
' Early Religion^ p. 80. Most critios agree with the above view, so Ux
M the reading back of prophetic ideas into the narratives is oonoemed.
L THE HISTORY 63
Now we do not wish to shirk any real difficulty : we do
not really feel that there is any difficulty here that needs to
be shirked We shall not even at this stage, as before said,
raise any objection to the currently-accepted critical view.
We are prepared to assume provisionally that, within
reasonable limits, that view is correct But we ad^ — Is it
the case that, if the general critical hypothesis be granted,
this organic unity of the history, with the remarkable
teleological character which we have seen to belong to it,
disappears, or is shown to be an illusion? It is there in
the Old Testament as it stands:^ can it be got rid of by
any skilful dividing up, or re-dating, of documents, or sup-
posed later touching-up, interpolation, or re-editing? We
answer that question very confidently in the negative.
1. For, in the first place, this teleological character we
speak of is not a thing upon the twrface of the Biblical
history, — not a thing that could be produced by any number
of editorial touchings and interpolations, and ingenious
piecing together of fragments, — but is ingrained into the
very substuice of the history, is part of its texture, is, to
use the happy fi^e of Bushnell about the image of Christ
in the Gospels, hke a watermark in paper, which cannot be
destroyed without destroying the paper itself. It is not the
ingenuity of the writer in arranging his materials, but the
facts of the history and development of the people, which
work out this plan for us. It makes little difference how
far we multiply the parts ; the singular thing is that, when
the parts are put together, this remarkable appearance of
teleology should present itself. If the critic persists:
** That depends on your way of arranging the materials : let
me arrange them my way, and this appearance of develop-
ment will be destroyed " ; it is a fair reply to make that, if
the Biblical way of arranging the materials brings out a
manifest divine design, whereas his yields only confusion,
this of itself is a good reason for thinking that the Biblical
way is probably the right ona Take an illustration. The
pieces of a child's puzzle map are put together to form,
say, flie map of Europe. •* Oh," says a bystander, " that is
because you have put the bite together in a particular way.
^ WeUhaoBen himself we shall find, aUows: "There is no primitiTe
legend, it is well known, so well-knit ss the Biblical one," and he speaks of
" the linked unity " of the narratiTe. — Hitt, of larad, pp. 286, 818.
6+ THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISIVI—
Let me arrange them in another way, and you will have no
map at alL" FoBsibly ; but the fact that the pieces, when
80 put together, form the map is the best proof that this
was the contriver's intention. But the map of Europe is a
small matter compared with this purpose of God wrought
out in the history of Israel from patriarchal times, and
culminating in Chriat
2. A second reason for our answer is, that, if the plan
inwrought into the history of Israel is an artificial or in-
vented one, we have to find the mind capable of inventing
it If anyone can brilig himself to believe that the teleology
we meet with in Scripture — the divine plan of grace which
forms its connecting thread — is of so simple and superficial
a character that it would readily and naturally occur to any
casual collector of legends, or prophetically-minded man, in
the ninth or eighth century B.a, so that he could sit down and
work it into a whole history, and give it an appearance of
naturalness there, we can only say of such an one that he
has a very large faith, — a faith nearly as great as that of the
theorists who suppose that the portrait of Jesus in the
Gospels was created by a Church gathered promiscuously
out from Jews and Gentiles, working on the legendary
reminiscences of a good and wise teacher, when the real
image of Jesus had been forgotten ! The difficulty is tenfold
enhanced if we accept the descriptions furnished us by the
Wellhausen school of the state of prophetic orders in the age
when the narratives are supposed to have originated; and
further assume, with the newer critics, that the authors of
these narratives were not, as formerly believed, individuals,
but were "schools" of writers.^ This is how Wellhausen
speaks of the prophets before Amos : ** In the time of Ahab
and Jehu the Nehiim were a widespread body, and organised
in orders of their own, but were not highly respected ; the
average of them were miserable fellows, who ate out of the
king's hand, and were treated with disdain by members of
the leading classes. Amos of Tekoa, who, it is true, belonged
to a younger generation, felt it an insult to be counted one
of them."* Truly a likely soil for the growth of such
conceptions as we have in the Book of Genesis 1
^ On this, see below, pp. 206 ff.
* History (^ Israel, p. 293; of. p. 461. See also Stade, O^i^ehiefUef I
pp. 476 fL
I. THE HISTORY 65
III. Credibiutt of History on Premises ot
Critical Theory
It is possible, however, we believe, on the premises of
the critical theory itself, to show that this " teleology " in
the history of Israel is not an invented or manipulated
thing, — an element which does not inhere naturally in
the facts, but a conception unhistorically imported into
them, — and to furnish strong reasons for belief in the
essential trustworthiness of the narratives. This we shall
now attempt to do. We confine attention to the Pentateuch,
or Hexateuch, in which most will admit that the crucial
part of the problem lies, and limit ourselves, at this stage,
to absolutely essential outlines and most general agreements.
The full discussion of particular points involved in the
theory belongs to later chapters.
We take, then, the history of things that lies before us
in our present Pentateuch, and ask what, on the critical
theory, is the origm of this book. Setting aside Deuteronomy,
commonly assumed to be a composition of the age of Josiah,^
we have, on the currently-accepted view, three main strands
of narrative in the Pentateuch, of which one — the Priestly
Writing (P) — ^is understood, in its present form, and principal
contents, to date from the time of the exile, or after. It
furnishes the ''framework" of the Book of Genesis,' and
contains, in the middle books, the Levitical legislation, to
which the slender thread of narrative and genealogy in the
earlier part serves as introduction.' It is not supposed to
be an independent historical source, but in its narratives
— BO Wellhausen thinks^ — presupposes and runs parallel to
the other and earlier history books, J and E, by that time
united into one. Nothing is lost, therefore, by meanwhile
leaving this P portion aside, and confining ourselves to the
two older writings. The theory regarding these, in brief,
is, that they were originally separate, probably independent
productions, extending, with inclusion of the Book of Joshua,
to the conquest of Canaan, but latterly were combined with
>Cf.Chap.yiII. *DillmaT)n,G<0nMis,i.p.l6. See below, pp. 215, 840 ff.
* See Wellhansezi, History of Irrad^ p. 382, quoted below, p. 842.
^Ihid, pp. 295, 818. See below, p. 107. Th^ ? narrative ap to Sx. tL
Is given by WellhaaBen, pp. 827-82.
5 >.
66 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
each other into Bomething like the form in which we now
find them in the Pentateuch. They are allowed to be works
extremely similar in character, and largely parallel in
contents;^ but are marked, the one by the use of the
divine name Jehovah,' the other by the use of the divine
name Elohim (6od).* Hence the designations J and E
applied to them respectively. One of these histories (J) is
commonly thought to have originated in the Southern
Kingdom of Judah ; the other (E) in the Northern Kingdom
of Israel/ How far they were the fixing of mere oral
tradition, or how far they rested on older written material, is
a moot question, to which different answers are given. It is
further a point in dispute which of these assumed narratives,
J or E, is the earlier;^ but it is agreed that, in the words
of Dr. Driver, " both belong to the golden period of Hebrew
literature."^ The stylistic and other differences between
them are slight ; whereas both present a strong contrast to
P, which is distinguished by marked peculiarities of style
and method.^
What are the dates of these books? On the current
view, we may say roughly, not later in their independent
form than the ninth and eighth centuries, or from ggO to
750 B.a; in combination a century or two later. Dr.
iJriver may be usefully quoted on this point "On the
relative date of E and J," he says, " the opinions of critics
differ. Dillmann, Kittel, and Biehm assign the priority to
E, placing him 900-850 B.a, and J e. 750 (DiUmann), 830-
800 (Kittel), or c. 850 (Riehm). Wellhausen, Kuenen, and
Stade, on the other hand, assign the priority to J, placing
him 850-800 B.C., and E e. 750 B.a" In a footnote to the
^ See below, pp. 218ff.
' Variously spelt by the critics, in its original fonn, Yabweb, Yahyeh,
Jahweh, Jahveh, Yahve, etc The form "Jehovah/' arising from the com-
bination of the Hebrew consonants with the vowels, of the name " Adonai"
(see below, p. 228), was first introduced by the Franciscan friar Petrus
Galatinus, in 1518 ▲.D. It is, therefore, quite modem.
' S is supposed to begin in Oen. xx. : according to some, earlier (chap. xr.).
See below, p. 217.
« See Chap. VII. pp. 208 if. * See Chan. YII. pp. 204 ff.
' IfUrod. p. 124 : Wellhauften also says that J£ '^dates from the golden
age of Hebrew literature." — History of Jgraelf p. 9.
* J is described as vivid, flowing;, anthro|iomorphio : E as slightly less
so, more elevated, etc. P, on the other hand, is pragmatic, formal,
precise, statistical, genealogical, juristic, and abounds in words and phrasea
peculiar to himself. Bee below. Chap. X. pp. 880 ff.
I. THE HISTORY 67
first of these sentences, he adds : ** So most previous critics,
as Noldeke (J c 900), Schrader (E 975-950 ; J 825-800),
Kayser (c. 800), Reuss (J 850-800 ; E ' perhaps still earlier y
And in a second note : " H. Schnltz, O.T. Huology^ L pp. 66 ff.
(J to the reign of Solomon: E 850-800)/'^
Accepting provisionally this account of the documents^
we proceed to inquire what inferences may be deduced from
it as to the trustworthiness of the history.
1. And, first, we invite the attention of the reader to the
imp(»rtant fact, that, according to the dates given, these
writings arUeude the age of written prophecy, and embody
the tr^tions which the Israelitish people possessed of its
history prior to that age. We do not ask at present
whether this tradition was oral, or was already in any
degree written. It was there, and these writings are the
literary depository of it, in somewhat the same way as the
Synoptic Gospels are the records of the oral teaching about
Christ in the apostolic age. It is customary to speak of
J and E as the reduction to writing of the popular legends
of the Israelites about their own past. Be it so: the
essential point is that they are at least not histories in-
vented or doctored by prophets in the interests of a later
theorv of the religious development. The more noViw the
consciousness they exhibit, the less can they be regarded as
the products of reflective manipulation. In any case they
antecede the period of written prophecy.' They cannot,
therefore, as r^;ards their general character, be reasonably
assumed to be influenced, modified, or transformed, by the
ideas of that period. Their author^-^the unknown J and E
— we are entitled to suppose, put faithfully down the
tradition as they found it in circulation among their people.
They might select according to predilection from the
material furnished to them, but they did not consciously
falsify or invent It is a contradiction, in one breath to
speak of these writers as giving literary form to the current
* IfUroeL p. 128. Farther dates of interest are given below, pp. 78-74.
* ''The seneral oonclnaioDS," says Dr. Driver, "to which a oonsideration
of an the facts has led critics ... are that the two sources, J and £,
date from the early centuries of the monarchy, J belonging probably to the
ninth and S to the early part of the eighth century b.o. (brfoTB Amos
or Hosea).'* — Oeneits, p. xtL See below, p. 97. It wiU be seen after,
howerer, that this theory has come to be greatly modified in the interests of
later dating (see pp. 205 ff).
68 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICTSM—
traditions of their nation, and in another to represent them
as elaborating and transforming the narratives to make
them the vehicles of the ideas of an age which, on the
hypothesis, had not yet come.
It could be wished that critical writers showed them-
selves a little clearer here as to the implications of their
own admissions as to the dates of these J and E narratives.
Two representations cross and mingle continually in their
pages : one, that the writers of these narratives were simple
" collectors of legends," ^ as Grimm might collect the folk-
tales of (jermany; the other, that they were consummate
literary artists, altering, embellishing, and idealising their
material at pleasure: one, that the narrators are ''pre-
prophetie" ^ that is, antecede the age of the great writing
prophets, when, we are told, ''ethical monotheism" was
first introduced; the other, that they were prophetic
narrators, instinct with the pi*ophetic spirit, dominated by
prophetic ideas, and adepts in recasting their narratives to
make them express these ideaa' Manifestly the critics
cannot have it both ways : on the one hand holding the low
views of Wellhausen, Kuenen, and Stade, on the state of
people and prophets in " pre-prophetic " Israel, and regard-
ing " pure Jahvism " as the " creation " of Amos and Hosea ; ^
and on the other, picturing the ninth and eighth centuries
as already penetrated with lofty prophetic ideas, bringing to
the birth, and giving exquisite expression to, the elevated
conceptions which we find in Gtenesis and Exodus — writing
histories ''from the standpoint of redemption." A choice
must be made, and either the books be brought down to an
age when prophetic ideas were in the ascendant, which
involves the abandonment of the given dates, or the con-
tention be surrendered that these higher ideas first entered
^ "The Jahvifit and the Elohist," says Addis, "were historians, or
rather collectors of national myths and legends, which passed for history."
— Hex, p. Ixvi.
* " Both belong," says Bennett, "to the pre-Denteronomio, pre-prophetio
stage of the reli^on of Israel." — iWfiMr, pp. 11, 16. Cf. Wellhausen,
etc., pp. 25, 26 (** Prophetic Docnments^: Kuenen likewise uses thif
Hist, of Israel f p. 32 ; Addis, p. liii ; Driver, Uenesie, n. xlviii, etc
'Thus, e,g,, Eautzsch, Lit, of O.T,, pp. 85 fT. ; McFadyen, MeseagBS,
designation (Hex, pp. 188 !f., 282if.)i but resards J and £ as undergoing
extensive changes in a later " Judsan edition (p. 248).
* Or, with jDuhm, Micah and Amos. "Micah and Amos," he says,
"first raised religion out of the sphere of nature into that of morality:
thence it could develop higher." — Thed, d, Proph, p. 108.
1. THE HISTORY 69
with Amos and Hosea. The natural coarse would seem
to be to regard the writings as, indeed, " pre-prophetic " in
the sense of anteceding written prophecy, but at the same
time as faithfully recording the ancient tradition,^ in which
prophetic ideas were already present
2. The fact thus conceded of the ''pre-prophetic"
character of the narratives yields several weighty results.
(1) We deduce from it, first, as just said, that the internal
unity and teleological character so conspicuous in these
narratives formed an integral part of tJie tradition, and was
not put into it by later prophetic manipulation. It was
part of the tradition as early as the ninth century, when at
least one of these narratives took written shape. If here,
again, anyone is content to think of what he finds in the
J and E histories as answering to the idea of loose, popular
legend, he must be allowed to retain his opinion, but we
cannot share it. Legend does not usually assume this char-
acter of depth, coherence, developing purpose ; does not em-
body ideas, transactions, promises, such as we find in these
narratives, — the protevangelium, for instance, the call of
Abraham, the covenants, the revelations at the Exodus, —
containing in them the germs of a long future. If these
things are there in a "pre-prophetic " narrative, they clearly
formed part of the original tradition, and were not jm^ there
by a later prophetic hand.
(2) We deduce, next, that this tradition, at the time of
its being written down by J and E, must already have
assumed a quite developed and settled form. When we look
at the range of this J and E history in the Pentateuchal
books — at its rich content, at its well-developed biographies,
with their wealth of characterisation, finished dialogue,
connection with specified locaUties and situations, at its
' On this point of the faithful recordinff of the tradition, on which much
hinm, we have such testimonies as the foUowing : —
Dillmann says that £ "preGer^es unchanged in its narrations the
manner, tone, and colour of the liying legendary lore of the people." —
Genesis, p. 9.
Gnnkel says : "The legends of J and E are taken oyer by the collectors
ssstnHall'ftts theyfownd them.** — Genesis, In trod. p. Ivi.
Driver says : "J and E give us pictures of tne traditions as they were
current in the early centuries of the monarchy." — Genesis, p. Iviii. He
speaks of the indications "that these narrators were keeping themselves
within the limits of a tradition which thev had received, rather than freely
creating ideal pictures of their own ** (p. xlv).
70 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CMTICISM—
articulated unity from beginning to close, it seems clear as
day that it is no floating, Protean legend we have to deal
with, but a legend — ^if the critic will have it so — already
firmly fixed in outline and in the bulk of its contents,
already clothed with flesh and blood, already as definite in
substance, if not in form, as a written narrative itself could
be. The loose way in which many speak of J and E giving
literary shape to floating, popular legends, as one might
write down countryside fairy tales, shows that they have
never clearly apprehended what kind of history this in the
J£ narrative is, or what it is needful to presuppose as the
condition of such a history being there to write. If the
ideas in these writings were elaborated in any early
prophetic workshop, how profoundly spiritual, how deep-
seeing, the minds in that workshop must have been!
How explain the presence, or prevalence, of such ideas
in the age of Elijah and Elisha, on Wellhausen's theory
of the religious development and of the state of the
prophetic orders?^
(3) There is a yet weightier consideration — one based
directly on the critical hypothesis — which we do not see
how anyone can easily get over. It is the fact that, on this
theory, we have not one only, but two histories of early
times to reckon with. Here, as the critics tell us, are
two lengthy and practically independent' histories, one
emanating from the South, the other from the North, at
a time when (on the hypothesis) the kingdoms were
already divided, and separate in interests. Both cover the
same ground, and give the history of the people for the
same period. But now comes the startling thing about them,
that, while two in authorship, place of writing, and perhaps
tendency, these histories are, in nearly every other respect,
almost identical The substance of the narrative is the
same, or varies only in trifling details. They record the
same incidents, follow nearly the same order, tell their story
' Elyali was, in Wellhausen's riew, the first to grasp the idea " that
there exists over all bat one Holy One and one Mighty One, who reveals
Himself not in nature, but in law and righteousness, in the world of
man." — HisL of liradf p. 462. But Elijah's idea was not generally shared.
' Addis says that Hupfeld made it plain "that each of these documents
had once been an independent work.'^— J7«a;. p. xziz. Gunkel strongly
affirms the independence of the documents {OenuU^ p. Ivii). Other arituSt
suppose partial aependenoe of one on the other. See oelow, p. 204.
L THE HISTORY 71
in almost the same language. They are parallel narratives
in the fullest sense. The proof of this lies in the fact that,
on the critical view, these narratives have subsequently been
combined, and in the union, not only is sometimes the section
of one, sometimes the section of another, taken into the
record, but in many chapters the two narratives are blended
line by line, clause by clause, with such minuteness, some-
what after the fashion of a Harmony of the Gospels, or are
so completely fused together, that the keen-scented critics
often declare themselves baf9ed to separate them, and differ
widely in their attempts to do so.^ The reader has only
to examine the analysis offered of such chapters as Gen.
xxviL, xxviii, xxx., xxxvii, to be convinced of the truth of
what we state.
So striking a class of phenomena naturally suggests the
question wheSier we are really dealing with two documents
at alL' Keeping, however, meanwhile to the critical
hypothesis as given, we ask — What follows from it ? Two
things very plainly. In the Jirst place, such phenomena put
an effective check on any theorist who would contend that
the J and E writers did not, as we have supposed, faithfully
reproduce the tradition, but wrought it up artistically in a
new form of their own, as Shakespeare might work up the
old stories of Macbeth or King Lear, or Tennyson the
l^nds of King Arthur. If that were admissible for one
writer, it plainly would not be admissible for two, working
independently. The fact that two writers — one Northern,
the other Southern — give the same cycle of stories in much
the same way, is proof that both are reproducing, not in-
venting. But, second, it proves also the truth of what has
been said above of the fixed character of the tradition.
Here, ex hypothesis we have two writers setting down the
traditions current in their respective localities and circles ;
and these, when compared, are found to be, in the words of
1 On the panlleliBin of the narratiTes, tee below, Chap. VII. pp. 218 ff.
Wellhaasen, as already noted, extends the parallelism to P ; see below, p. 107.
Testimonies as to the closeness of the resemblance, and intimate union, of
the JE narratiTes are found in every writer. Dillmann says : " It is often
▼B17 difficult or impossible to make a complete separation between them,
where their narratiTes haTe been worked into each other by later editors,
and material criteria are wanting."— 6^e9ims, p. 14. Cf. Qunkel, OenetiSf
pp. Ix ff. ; and see below, pp. 219 ff.
' The question is discussed in Chap. YII. pp. 216 ff., and there answered
in the n^gatlTe.
72 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
Klofltermann, "throughout parallel/'^ The slight discre-
pancies that are alleged are quite outweighed by the
substantial agreement. Criticism, therefore, if its division
of these documents could be trusted, would furnish us with
a powerful corroboration of the genuineness and fixed char-
acter of the tradition at a period not later than the ninth
century B.a It would give us two witnesses instead of ona'
IV. Stepping-Stones to Earlikb Date ot TBADrnoN
The above results are obtained from the simple con-
siderations that our assumed documents antedate the age
of written prophecy, and that they are two in number.
From the vantage-ground thus gained, we may how push
our inquiry into the value of the Hebrew tradition a good
way further back. Obviously there is need for doing this.
Grant that we have a rich, and in the main coherent, tradi-
tion as a possession of the people of Israel in North and
South as early as the ninth or eighth century, it will be
felt that we are still a long way from the events them-
selves to which the tradition relates,' and the question may
properly be asked whether an earlier date can be assigned
to the tradition than that which we have yet reached?
Conjecture here is of little value ; but there are some very
definite stepping-stones, to which we may, we think, trust
ourselves with great confidence.
1. It is first to be noted that the/o^;^ already ascertauied
about the tradition of themselves carry us a good way beyond
the dates assumed for the reduction of the tradition to
writing. The point here is, that, whatever the date of
authorship of the supposed documents, the tradition itself,
from its fixed and settled character in both branches of the
kingdom, must be much earlier. The tradition which
J and E found did not come into existence in that year,
or that century. It had a definite, stable form, which it
1 Der PerUaUuch, p. 10 ; see below, pp. 218-19, 345.
'Cf. Kittel, Hist, of ffebs. I p. 168; Driver, QeM9i$, p. xliv ;
Westphal, Les Sources du Pent, i. Pref. p. xxviii.
' Kucnen asks in regard to these narratives: "Do we arrive at the
certainty of which we are in search with regard to Israel's former history ! "
and he answers : "To begin with, we obtain nothing but the idea which was
entertained of that history in the eighth [or ninth] century B.a" — Rel,
oflsraelf i. p. 108.
I. THE HISTORY 73
mnst have possessed for a considerable time before, and
whicL took a much longer time to grow into its settled shape.
It must have had substantially the shape in which we find
it before the division of the kingdom, — only thus can we
account for its being found in practically the same form in
both North and South, — and for the absence of all allusions
to the division.^ This means that it was the possession of
Israel in the days of Solomon and David : there is no great
stretch of imagination in saying, even in the days of
Samuel If it be urged that this is incompatible with its
mode of transmission by vague popular repetition, it may
with great cogency be replied that the coherence, consist-
ency, and persistence of the tradition may be itself a proof
that it was not left to depend entirely on this mode of trans-
mission, but already existed, in some form, in written shape,
or was at least the subject of careful and continuous in-
struction.*
2. With this has to be taken into account another fact
of great importance. We have hitherto, in deference to pre-
vailing views, accepted the ninth and eighth centuiies as
the periods of the composition of the J and E narratives*
These dates, however, it is now necessary to remind the
reader, are at most the termini ad quern for the writing of
these histories. They were not later than 850-750 B.a, but
it does not follow that they were not much earlier. " The
terminus a quo*' says Dr. Driver, ** is more difficult to fix
with confidence : in fact, conclusive criteria fail us." * The
statement that J and E originated at about the dates named
has settled down into a kind of commonplace in the critical
schools ; yet it is fsur from being a secure result of criticism :
we should be disposed to say it is one of the most insecure.
If the reader will consult the list of dates formerly given,
he will see that critics like DiUmann, Biehm, Kittel, carry
back the date of E as far as 900-850 B.C.; Schrader to
975-950 B.C. ; Noldeke puts J about 900 B.c. ; Schultz puts
J in the reign of Solomon, etc. Writers of older standing
went back still further. Bleek, e,g., put the Jehovist in the
' Stade, indeed, thinks that the Jacob-Joseph legend supposes the
dirided kingdom (Oesehie/tU, L p. 128). This is a go^ specimen of the
style of argument.
* Gf. Gen. xviii. 19 ; Ex. xii 26, 27 ; Deut vi. 7, 20-25 ; xi 19 ; Ps.
IxxTiiL 8, 4.
• IfUrod. p. 128.
74 THE O.X AS AFFECl'ED BY CRITICISM—
reign of David ; Colenso, in the age of David and Solomoa^
But many recent writers also uphold a very early date.
Konig, e.g.^ thinks that E can be placed with greatest cer-
tainty in the time of the Judges ; J is put by him in the
reign of David.' Kohler gives similar dates : E in the time
of the Judges (e. 1100 B.a) and J in the reign of David
{c, 1000 B.C.).' Klostermann, from an independent stand-
point, attributes to the old Fentateuchal history a very
high antiquity, the upper limit of which cannot be
determined.^
If, in surprise, the reader asks on what grounds
the dates have undergone so remarkable a lowering in
the Wellhausen school, the answer ia not far to seek. It
is not that any new and revolutionary discoveries have
been made as regards the language, text, or contents of
the books. The really determining factor will be found
generally to lie in a new theory of religious development^
combined with assumptions as to the reflections of later
events (e.^., the wars of Syria with Israel) in the patriarchal
stories.^ But here again, as we shall see more fully below,
the newest school of all — that of Gunkel — comes in with
a weighty caveat Gunkel argues strongly for the ''pre-
prophetic " character of the narratives ; finds the formation
of patriarchal legends concluded as far back as 1200 B.C.;
is clear that their after working-up is not later than the
early kings; rejects the mirroring of the Syrian wars,
and (with one exception due to lat^ addition) can discover
^ PmU, Pt tL p. 586. It is to be remembered that all these older
writers put the Elonist writer (inoloding P) still earlier than J. Ewald,
tf.0r., places his "Book of Origins " under oolomon ; Colenso assigns his £lo-
histic narratire in Genesis to the age of Saul and Samuel {fimL Pt. tl
App. p. 116).
* MnleUung, p. 205.
' Hauck's RetUeneye, art " Abraham," L p. 102.
^ PifU. pp. 77, 219-20. There hare, of course, alwajs been those also
who defended a direct Mosaic authorship.
* Dr. Driver says : "We can only argue upon grounds of probability
derived Arom our view of the progress of the art of writing, or of literary
composition, or of the rise and growth of the prophetic tone and feeling in
ancient Israel. . . . For estimating most of wnich, tiiouffh plausible aigu-
ments, on one side or the other, may be advanced, a standutl on which we
can confidently rely scarcely admits of being fixed." — Inirod. pp. 128-24.
'iP.^., "In the story of Jacob and Laban, again, the contemporary
backffrouBd shines through the patriarchal history veiy distinotly." —
Wellhausen, Hist, of Imu^ p. 828 ; of. Addis, Aak i. p. 62 ; Driver, Oimti$,
p. liz. See below, pp. Ill, 209.
L THE HISTORY 75
no indication of political conditions after 900 B.a^ It
need not be said that if dates such as those preferred hj
the above-mentioned writers be admitted, the whole state
of the question is revolutionised, and we are brought within
measurable distance of a period from which sound tradition
could easily be preserved. The argument from the firmness
and consistency of the tradition acquires in that case
enhanced importance.
3. The suppositioji is made above that the J and E
histories, if the dates assigned to them by the critics are
correct, were not based wholly on oral tradition, but may
rest on older written material as welL Is this entirely
conjecture ? Let us see.
(1) The history of the langtiage affords the best grounds
for believing that the history of the people must have
existed in some earlier written form. We have argued
that the existence of the tradition in a fixed and settled
form in the ninth and eighth centuries implies its existence
at a long anterior period. But what shall we say of the
works J and E themselves, and of the language in which
they are written? That language belongs, as we have
seen, "to the golden age of Hebrew literature."* It was
a fuUy-formed literary language — a language with the finest
capabilities of historical narration already developed. How
did that language come into being ? Whence did it derive
its literary capabilities ? Whence the literary art and skill
to produce these books we are dealing with? These are
questions which seem often strangely ignored. The language
of Shakespeare wa39 not Shakespeare's creation ; neither was
the language of Chaucer, Chaucer's creation. But here are
two historians — according to some, " schools " of historians
— expert to the highest degree in the use of the pen. The
men who wrote the 24th chapter of Genesis — that ''charm-
ing idyll, the captivating picture of the wooing and bringing
home of Bebekah"* — the story of Joseph, the dramatic
scenes between Moses and Pharaoh, the narrative of the
crossing of the Bed Sea, were authors of the first rank.
How were they created ? On what models did they work ?
Is it not necessary to assume earlier literature, and that,
' OenenStjm. Izi, IxiL See below, pp. Ill, 209.
* Driyer, Wellhausen, see above, p. 66.
* Delitzach. Oenesis, iL p. 104.
je THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
too, of a highly developed kind, — ^not songs merely, or dry
court chronicles, but historical compositions, — ^to explain the
existing productions ?
(2) But here, again, it is important to note, we are not
left wholly to inference or conjecture. The productions of
J and Eare not^ on the current view of their dates, the
earliest specimens of Hebrew literature we possess.^ We
need not go further than the pages of Dr. Kautzsch, whose
devotion to criticism will not be doubted, in proof of this
statement. According to this authority, the language was
already highly developed, and the art of writing dis-
seminated among the common people,^ in the time of the
Judges. The Song of Deborah in Judges v. — "a poem of
priceless worth," ''genuine, splendid poetry" — ^is ascribed
by him to about 1250 B.C., and the fable of Jotham (Judg.
ix. 7 ff.), the artistic finish of which, he says, is so high, and
the delicate satire so great, " as again to suggest the conjec-
ture that this form of composition must have been long
and diligently cultivated, is referred to the same period." '
Between this and the reign of David fall other pieces,
as the Song of Miriam, the poetical fragments in Numbers,
the address to the sun and moon in Joshua. To David's
reim (1020-980 B.C.) belong the elegies of David on Saul
and Abner, and to the same age, or that of Solomon, a
number of other highly finished productions.^ The speech
of Solomon at the dedication of the temple, 1 Kings viil
12 ff. (how much ?) is held to be "an authentic monument
^ It would scarcely be neeeasaiy to emphasise this, bnt for the sagffestion
in a remark of Wellhansen's, that in the interval between El^ah anoElisha
and Amos, ''a non-literary had developed into a literary age." — KUA. oj
Israel, p. 465.
*LU, fif 0,T.y p. 10; of. Judg. viii. 14 (R.y.). Mai^ eritios carry
literary composition much fortlier back. Ewald, «.^., supposes Gen. xliz.
22-26 to go back to the times before Moses (written!). — Bevdaiicn: Us
NcUtire ana Record (KT.), p. 828. Delitzsch thinks the Song and Blessing
of Moses may have been wntten b^ him. — Osnsais, i p. 46, etc
' Ibid, pp. 4, 6. Eautzsch thmks it probable, however, " that we must
come down tc the time of David for the writing out of the products of those
earlier days" (p. 10. Why?). Stade also says the Song of Deborah bears
traces of having been composed under the immediate impression of the
victory it records. See the remarkable list of testimonies on this point in
Konig'^s art *< Judges," in Diet, qf Bible, ii p. 818. Professor Robertson
thinks the Song ''may have come down in writing from that period." —
EaHy Belifdon, p. 79.
^ He includea here the Blessing of Jacob, and Uie original form of the
Balaam- Discourses.
I. THE HISTORY jj
of the reign of Solomon."^ Then we come to the so-called
'' Hero-Stories " of the Book of Judges, and to the '' Jerusalem-
Stories," the " David-Stories/' and the " Saul-Stories," which
make up a large part of the Books of Samuel These are
placed between 933^911 B.a— the "Saul-Stories" a few
years later.' The '' Jerusalem-Source " is assigned " to the
period immediately after Solomon,"* and is described as
''one of the most complete, truthful, and finished pro-
ducts of historical writing which have come down to us
from the Hebrews, and indeed from the whole ancient
world."*
Here then we have the language nearly in its prime
carried back to the thirteenth century B.a, with a long
cultivation necessarily preceding, — are brought, in short,
almost to the verge of the Exodus. Are we to suppose
that all this while nothing was done to produce some
records of the people's history, of the events of the Exodus,
which admittedly so deeply moved them,^ and, beyond that,
of the traditions of the fathers? To us this appears so
incredible, that, even if no literature existed which seemed
to require such records for its explanation, we should be
forced to suppose that they once existed, but had unfortu-
nately become lost. Much more are we driven to assume
them, if r^;ard is had to the mass of the tradition, and
to the clearness, coherence, and religious importance of its
contents, so different from what forms the staple of popular
oral legend. It is not a conclusive answer to this to say
that we have no direct evidence of the existence of such
recorda If the essential parts of such records are in-
corporated in the works we have, it can readily be understood
why they should drop out of memory and use;^ or it may
turn out in the end that the so-called J and E are
themselves such records, — that is, we may be compelled by
the internal character of the history to antedate its written
^ lAi, nf 0. 7*., p. 12 ; of. p. 177. See below, p. 102.
•iWrf. pp. 178-79. • Ibid. p. 27.
^ IMd. p. 25. Dr. Driver eaya of thii namtiye (2 Sam. iz.-xz.) : " The
abundance and partionlarity of detail show that the narratiye mnst date
from a period reiy little later than that of the events related. The etyle
is ainffolarly bright, flowing, and picturesqae." — IrUrod, p. 188.
* See below, pp. lOOlT.
'Thus the volnminons recorda which underlie the hirtorical bookt
(Samuel, Kings, Chronicles, etc.) have perished : so also the early attempt!
at the compoation of written Goepeli (Coke i. 1}*
78 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
f onn, and to revise our conceptions of the literary capabilities
of an earlier age.^
(3) A third consideration under this head remains. The
use of earlier records in the composition of J and E is not
a hypothesis opposed to critical science : it is one to which
adherents of the critical school in perhaps increasing number
are coming back. Not to speak of others more conservative,
such writers as Delitzsch always insisted on the use of
ancient material, part of it Mosaic, in the Pentateuch;
but, as representing a newer position, we may instance
KitteL '' Certain it is," this writer says, " that such sources,
probably even in documentary form, to some extent, lay
before E as well as J. ... In many cases it seems
demonstrable that E worked in accordance with sources
that were ancient, and in part very andent. And further,
where this cannot now be discerned, we mav accept his
descriptions as resting on older material, oral or written,
except where there are conclusive reasons of a special
kind to the contrary." '
y. COBBOBOBATIVB EVIDSNGB OF EaBLT DATB Of SOUBOBB
There are, we would say in concluding, three thin^
which strongly corroborate the positions we have laid
down. .
1: The first is the enormous increase of light which recent
discovery has cast on the very early, and indeed command uee
qf writing, and high development of literature in the ancient
East We return to this subject in a later chapter,* and only
here anticipate the general result The discoveries amount
to a revolution in old beliefs, and, as scholars are beginning
to recognise, alter the perspective of everything that
relates to arts, laws, and letters in the early parts of the
Old Testament Culture and writing are carried back in
Babylonia to an almost fabulous antiquity — ^millenniums
1 This, it will be seen after, is what we take to he the trae eolation.
The olassio period of the J£ writings does not then come after, bnt, as seems
most reasonable, lies behind the flourishing age of Eaatzsch's *' Jerusalem-
Sonroe." Can it be thought likely that such skill should be bestowed on
the reign of David, while the whole wonderful past of the nation stood
neglected?
* BuL rfffOi. I pp. 90. 95.
' Chap. XL, where details are giTsn*
L THE HISTORY 79
before the days of Abraham, and the age of Abraham itself
is shown by the Code of Hammurabi and the contract
tablets of the same age to have been one of hiffhlj-developed
civilisation and general enlightenment In Egypt we find
that the MeroglTphic system was ah*eady complete by the
time of Menes, founder of the first dynasty (e. 4000 B.a) ;
in Oanaan, as the Tel el-Amama tablets discover to ns,
epistolary correspondence was freely carried on about
1400 RG., in the Babylonian language and cuneiform
character;^ Orete is proved to have been the abode of an
advanced culture long before the age of Moses: if Dr.
Glaser's speculations are correct,' the inscriptions of the
kingdom of Maon in South Arabia are possiblv as old as the
Exodus. It cannot be denied that this whoUy unexpected
light on the all but universal diffusion of letters in the
ancient world* puts the problems of the patriarchal and
Mosaic times in an entirely new setting.^ It is no longer
sufficient to reply that a nomad people like the Hebrews
was an exception to the general rule. The nomad theory
rests on the critic's own assumptions, and is of no force
against the indications of the history itself.^ Moses was not
a nomad, but is figured as " learned in all the wisdom of
the Egyptians." ^ Joseph and his family were not nomads,
and the position of the Hebrews in E^pt under Joseph's
r^lime must have been one of great honour and influence.^
2. The progress of discovery, again, has brought to l^ht
^ Dr. Sajoe goes 10 ftr «a to ny of Ouiaan : "Schools and Iflmries, in
fliet, nrast nare existed erenrwhere, and the art of reading and writing must
hare been as widely spread as it was in Europe before the days of the
penny poet"— iTti^Asr OriL p. 57 ; of. his Sarly Jsrad, Introduction.
* Of. Sayoe, Higher OriL pp. 89 ff.
*Sayoe says: "From one end of the civilised andent world to the
other men and women were reading and writing and corresponding with
one another ; schools abounded and great libraries were formed, in an age
whjeh the critic only a few years ago declared was almost wh<my
iUiterate."— ifoftumsn^ F^uU, p. 42.
^ " Aooordins to all analooTf" uys Professor Kittel, " we may heneeforth
expect tliat in the case of Biblical science also, the stakes may be pushed
ftirther forward and the cords much farther lengthened than anxious minds
were prepared for, and that, too, without leaving the ground of the
historically possible and admissible. If in the case of Hellas and the
Islands the second miUennium before Christ is no longer absolutely a
terra ifnoognUat in all probability the presumably older culture - field of
Syria and Palestine wiUoe still less so.*'— ^a5v/. Excars. pp. 17, 18.
* See below, pp. 104, 164. * Acts vii. Tl,
'- 1.1.7-11; ' •
V Oen. 1. 7-li. Cf. Hommel, Aneieni Heb. Trad p. 229.
8o THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICTSM—
60 mnch minuiely eonfirmatory of the historical, geographical,
and ethnographical data of the early parts of the Old Testa-
ment, that the assumption of early records seems indispens-
able to explain how such knowledge— often antiquarian and
obsolete — has been preserved. Such, e.^., is the light thrown
on the historical conditions in the account of the expedition
of Chedorlaomer in Gen. xiv. ; or on the remarkable state-
ments in Gen. x. as to the origin and relations of the most
ancient peoples ; or on the vivid picturing of Egyptian life
and customs in the history of Joseph, and in the narratives
of Moses and the Exodu&^
3. Lastly, there is the emdmice of the Biblical narratives
themselves as to the early use of writing in Israel Thus
far we have refrained from drawing on the Biblical history,
but, in an inquiry of this kind, its evidence cannot in
fairness be disregarded It is not to be thought of, that,
while every scrap of testimony from pro&ne sources is
welcomed, and made the most of, the Scriptures alone are to
be treated like criminal suspects, whose every word is to be
doubted, unless hostile cross-examination foils to shake it,
or independent confirmation of it can be produced.' like
other witnesses, the Biblical writers are entitled to be heard
with a prima fade presumption of their honesty. It is the
case, then, that writing and written records are frequently
referred to in the Fenteteuchal narratives. Not, indeed, in
the patriarchal narratives — an internal mark of their
truthfulness ' — ^but in the age of Moses and Joshua. Be-
peatedly things are said to be written, or are commanded
to be written. Writing is implied in the name of the
"officers" {Shoterim a scribes)^ set over the Israelites in
their bondaga No inconsiderable amount of written matter
is directly ascribed to Moses, creating the presumption that
there was more, even when the fact is not directly stated.
Moses wrote ''all the words of Jehovah" in the "Book
of the Covenant"^ He was commanded to write in a
^ See below, OhAp. XI. pp. 418 fL
* Cf. Ladd, VocL qf Sac Scripj^f 1. p. 845. Ladd qaotee Leniiig on
the N.T. : ** If now Liyy and Dionvsins and Polybine and Tacitna are
treated ao frankly and noblv that we ao not put them to the nok for every
syllable, why not also Matuiew and Mark and Luke and John t"
* Gf. Delitzsch, OmesU, i, p. 8. But see below, p. 875. The argoment
from silence is preoarioos, and Babylonian analoff7 wouM suggest that
writing would be used in such a oontract as that in Gen. xziiL
* Bx. v. 6, 14, eto. • Ex. xxiv. 4, 7.
L THE HISTORY 8i
(the) book the decree against Amalek.^ He wrote 'Hhe
goings-out'* of Israel from Egypt, ''according to their
joumeyings." ' There was a written redster of the seventy
elders.' He wrote " the words of this law " at Moab, '^ in a
book until they were finished,"^ and also wrote his ^ Song/'
and ''taught it to the children of Israel"* ^All me
words of this law" were to be written on stones at
Mount Ebal,* and the Book of Joshua records that this was
doneJ Joshua assumes, in conformity with Deut zzzL 24-
26, the existence of a " book of the law," and it is said of
Joshua's own address to the people that " he wrote these
words in the book of the law of Grod." All this, as we now
know, is in keeping with the state of culture at the time,*
and lends support to the view that much first-hand material
from the Mosaic age is substantially preserved in the books
which riefer to this period.
The conclusion we draw from the whole discussion is,
that the view is untenable which regards the Biblical
history of Israel's early condition and religious development J
as a projection back on patsiairchal times of the ideas
of the prophetic age. Even accepting the critical pre-
mises— ^in part by help of them — we are warranted in the
belief to which we were led by the consideration of the
organic and purposeful character of the Old Testament
narrative itself, that it is a faithful representation of the
actual course of the early history of the people. This con-
clusion will obtain confinnation from the detailed examina-
tion which followa
^ Ex. xTiL 14. * Num. zzziiL S.
* Nam. xi 26. « Dent xxxi. 9, 24, S«.
* Deat. xxxL 19, 22. * Dent xxriL 8.
^ Josh. viii. 80-85. See below, p. 268.
* Eeferring to the Tel el-Amarna discoyeries, Professor Boberteon eayt t
"We need no longer, therefore, wonder that amons the towns taken hv
Joehna was one oaUed Eirjath-Sepher, Book-tmon (Josh. xr. 15 ; Jodgi l
11), or Eiriath-Sannah [dtv of Instnieticn\ (Josh. xy. 49) ; or that a lad
canght at the roadside was able to write down the names of tiiie chief men of
Saccoth in the time of the Judges (Jndff. yiii. 14, B.Y.)." — Batrly Beligian,
p. 78. See farther on Hebrew writing m Chap. JL below, ppi 874-5.
CHAPTER IV
QDe <PI^ TCeetament ae attcctcb fys Crftfcfsm-
E Ube Didtots : CounterotCbeotf e0 Treated
"The ohanotoiitle of the Imelltiah mind wm an oaflook into the
tatan, • . • Was the cue different with Abraham t If he waa anything
like that oharaoter which these earl j histories describe him to have been,
nothing would seem more natural than that he should be made to know
what the goal was to be to whioh his history looked. One can soaieely
ezpUin how Israel oame to direot ito attention to Oanaan when it escaped
from Egypt, unless it bad some tradition of ito destiny alire in itp** —
A. B. Dayidsov.
"Abraham in tiiat early dawn of histoiy, with polytheism and idolatry
all aromid him, saw bis own creed triompbant in the world ; he predicted
its triomph, and the prediction has as a matter of fkct oome true. It is
trinmphant. The creed of Abraham has become the creed of the dviUBed
world. The patriarch's creed has been Yiotorions oyer the idolatry of the
human race, and grown from a deposit in the breast of one man into a
nniyersal religion." — Mozlit.
"There are oertain points which all the sonroes take for granted as
firmly estobUshed by tradition : namely, that Koses, of the tribe of Levi,
waa tiie first to proclaim Jahweh as the God of the whole people of Israel,
and as their DeliTerer from the bondage of Egypt ; that at Sinai he brought
about the conclusion of a 'ooyenant' between Jahweh and Israel ; tiiat he
at least laid the foundation of the judicial and oersmonial ordinanoes
in Israal, and that ha left behind him more or less copious notes on all
this."— KAiniiGE.
CHAPTER IV
THE OLD TESTAMENT AS AFFECTED BY CBITIOISM
— L THE HISTORY : COUNTERrTHEOEIES TESTED
It is necessary now to widen our argument, and look more
closely at the construction of the history which the radical
criticism opposes to the Biblical — to t^t its grounds, and
weigh the force of the considerations which are thought to
be fatal to the latter. This will afford us opportunity of
reinforcing our previous conclusions, and will prepare the
way for the discussion, in succeeding chapters, of the bear-
ing of critical principles on religion and institution&
L BlVAL COKBTBUCnONB AS DePENDSNT ON THSIB
Fresuppositiokb
It was pointed out in the first chapter^ that nearly
everything in the critical discussion of the history and
religion of the Old Testament depends on the presup-
positions Vith which we start. If the Old Testament is
read in the light of its ovm presuppositions, — which, surely,
in the first instance, is not an imfair thing to ask, — ^its
contents present a very different aspect from what they do
if read in the light of principles which contradict these
presuppositions Let one assume, and hold fast by the
idea, that there has really been a great scheme of historical
revelation extending through successive dispensations, and
culminating in the Incarnation in Jesus Christ, and many
things vriU appear natural and fitting as parts of such
a scheme, which otherwise would be rejected as incredible,
or be taken account of only to be explained away.
It need not surprise us, therefore, that, rejecting the
Biblical presuppositions, the more radical criticism rejects
^ See ftbove, p. IC
\
86 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
of necessity the history which depends on these, and, foi
the picture of the origins of Israel, and of Mosaic times,
given in the Old Testament, substitutes another and very
different one, evolved from its own assumptions. For it,
the unhistorical character of the Biblical narratives is
decided before the inquiry begins. Israel, on its view,
emerges from the dim past as a loose aggr^ation of tribes ;
])oly theists, or at least monolaters ; not a people chosen and
eddied of Grod, with the memory of a past, and the con-
sciousness of a future, but a horde of semi-barbarians,
sharing the ordinary Semitic ideas, customs, and super-
stitions, and indebted for what rudiments of culture they
ultimately came to possess to the more advanced
Canaanitea There was no revelation; everything
happened by natural development It is obvious that
such a people could not have had the history which
the Bible ascribes to it . With such a theory in the back-
ground of his mind, and consciously or unconsciously used
as the standard of his judgments, the critic has no alterna-
tive but to regard the stories he is dealing with as a
bundle of legends. The sole question he has to ask
himself is. How did such legends come to be formed?
What tribal reminiscences may be supposed to shimmer
through them? The paradoxical thing is, when his con-
clusions are taken over by those who do not share his
presuppositions, and receive endorsement as the results
of the latest critical scholarship!
When, however, as just said, the standpoint is reversed,
and we look at the matter from the Bible's own point of
view, things appear very differently. Assume, for instance,
what is the Bible's own assertion, that Gfod did really
call this man Abraham, and make His covenant with him,
— assume that this was a grave, serious transaction, of the
utmost moment to Abrahun himself, to his posterity, and
to mankind, and was felt to be so, — assume that it was
required of him that he should diligently train his children
and his household after him in the knowledge of it,^^ — then,
can it be doubted that the utmost pains would be taken
to preserve and transmit ftdthful accounts of these doings,
till sudi time as a permanent record could be made of
them; and does not the patriarchal history, with its tidh
1 Ot QoL xTiiL 18, 19.
L THE HISTORY 87
biographies, and impregnation with covenant-ideaB, present
preoisely the character we might expect in such a record t
Assume, again, that the Exodus really took place in some
such way as the Bible relates, — ^that Jehovah, the covenant-
keeping Ood of the fathers, really revealed Himself to
Moses, and really brought the people out of Egypt with
wonderful manifestations of His power and grace, — we have
only to ask the question. Could the people ever f oreet it ?
to see how impossible is the supposition. We shaU then
cease to wonder at the graphic narratives which have come
down to us from that soul-stirring time, and vriU be ready
to see in them a faithful reflection of the consciousness
of the period.
All thiSy naturally, is folly to the newer eritical school ;
for does it not imply those higher religious ideas, and that
"familiar intercourse of the Deity with the patriarchs,** ^
which Kuenen tells us are conclusive marks of the un-
historical character of the narratives ? We are not without
hope that a different impression may be produced by a
candid examination of the erounds of his objections.
The forcing, it should be noticed, yields us the right
point of view for answering the question sometimes asked
— In what sense do we speak of ''history" in these early
parts of the Bible ? So far we must agree with the critics
when they remind us that the history in the Bible is
rdigiauB history — that is, not bare narratives of outward
occurrences, as an ancient chronicler, or modem newspaper
reporter, might set them down, but history written from a
religious standpoint, for purposes of edification, and reflect-
ing in its story the impression on the mind of the beholder
and on the writer, as well as the objective fact As
respects the early periods, it follows from what has been
said, and is evident of itself, that what we have to do with
is, for the most part, not contemporary narration, but
historr in the form of earefuUy preserved tradition^ — not,
indeea, as the critics will have it, mere floating folk-lore,
but sacred tradition of real events and transactions in the
lives of real men, and of Gk>d's revelations and dealings
with them — ^tradition on which we can rely as faithfully
conveying to us the contents of GUxl's message to them and
to oursefves — yet still tradUum^ having the rounded,
^ Set. pflwrml^ L p. 108. See above, p. 60.
88 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
dramatic oharacter which narratives naturallj assume aa
the result of repeated telling,^ and recorded in the form in
which they finallj reached the literary narrator. Such
transmission may not exclude a measure of 'idealisation/'
and reflection of later ideas and conditions; but this, we
are persuaded, to a far smaller extent than many — even
believing writers — suppose. The view of the history thus
indicated we now proceed to vindicate.
XL Theobt that Patriarchs werb not Individuaui,
BUT " Pkrsonifioations "
An interesting light is thrown on the method of un-
proved assumption and arbitrary hypothesis by which, as
we think, much of the work of this newer criticism is done,
in what Kuenen adduces as his " principal cause of hesita-
tion " in accepting the patriarchal narratives, viz., that the
actors in them '' have one characteristic in common — they
are all progenitors of tribes" He infers from this " that the
narratives in Genesis present us, not with real historical
personages, but with personifications."' Since the days of
Ewald the theory of personification has been a favourite one
with critical writers, though generally there has gone with
it, as in the case of Ewald himself, the recognition of a basis
of real personal history in the narratives. Wellhausen, Stade,
and the more thorough-going members of their school, how-
ever, make no such reservations. With them all historical
reality is given up, — logically enough, for, if individual
progenitors of tribes are admitted at all, a main foundation
of the theory is destroyed, — and only collective names, and
reflections of tribal relations and characteristics remain.'
Wellhausen actually thinks that Abraham was a compara-
> Dr. John Smith, in his InUgrUy qf ScritOuref p. 88, speaks of the
Pentateuch, which he upholds as "a orediole ana suhetsAtially oon-
temporary record of a true revelation of God to Koses, and through Moses
to iBraei/' as "incorporating the saored family traditions of sarlisr
reyelations."
« JUL of lama, I pp. 109-112.
' Of. Kuenen, ut tupra ; Wellhausen, HitL of ItnuH, pp. 818 ft ; Stade,
ChtehichU^ pp. 28 ft ; Gunkel, Genesis, Introd. ; Qutne, art " Israel,"
JSney, Bib. (also arts, on Patriarchs) ; Comill, EisL of Israel ; H. P. Smith,
O.T. Hist. pp. 88 ft, eto. For criticism of the theory, tH Ednig's NsisssU
Prinseipisn. pp. 85ff. ; Kohler, art. << Abraham" in Haook's iisalMMye.;
Robertson's Sarly Bel, pp. 121 ff., eto.
L THE HISTORY 89
tively late *' tree creation of unconscious art " ; ^ others can
persuade themselves that even Amos and Hosea did not
regard the patriarchs as individual persons.* It is well that
Kuenen should tell us that this is his strongest proof, for,
in testing his chain in its firmest link, we are better enabled
to judge of its strength as a whole.
The theory, then, is, that the patriarchs were not actual
individuals, but " personifications " of tribes. To the critic's
mind nothing could be simpler or more demonstrable. '' To
the Oriental," says Professor H. P. Smith, "it is natural
to speak of the dan as an individual . . . The common
method of our Hebrew writers was to personify dans,
tribes, nations, or geographical divisions, and treat them
as individuals."' No shade of doubt is held to rest on
this condusion. *' What interests us here is the fact that
the patriarchs cannot be taken as individuals. If individuals
Beuben, Oad, and Judah never existed^ it is plain that
individuals JfiU3ob, Esau, and Abraham cannot have any
more substantial reality. We have to do here with figures
of the poetic or legend-building imagination."^ Let us
look at the reasons by which these confident assertions are
supported.
1. The theory has its starting-point in the statement
that the nanus of the patriarchs in the history are not in-
dividual, but tribal But this, to b^in with, is only partially
true. Of the majority of the progenitors of tribes (^.^.,*Dan,
Gad, NaphtaU), little is recorded save the names; of a few
(Judah, Simeon, Beuben), only special incidents; of the
three great patriarchs — ^Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob — on the
other hand, and of Joseph, we have full and detailed bio-
graphiea But, as has often been pointed out, neither
Abraham nor Isaac* gave their names to tribes; Joseph,
also, did not do so directly, but only through his sons,
Ephraim and Manasseh. Lot is not the name of any tribe,
Ihough this "weak-kneed saint," as Wellhausen calls him,
^ SisL cf JbraO, ^. S20.
' H. P. Smith says : " Amoi and Hosea at anyrate had little idia of the
patriarohs as indiyiaual men."~0.!r. ffitt, p. 88. So Gathe, etc.
* /Mtf. pp. 88, 89. «/6u2.p. 42.
* In Amoa Tii. 16 the designation " house of Isaao " is nsed, bnt for the
whole nation, and plainly with referenoe to the Biblical stat^enti as to
tlie lelation of Isaac to Jacob. No light is thrown from the history of the
tribes on the origin of the name. .
90 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
is the father of the Moabites and Ammonites. Neither
does Esau give his personal name to his descendants, the
Edomites. Even of Jacob, whose names (Jacob, Icnrael)
became, quite naturally and reasonably on the Biblical view,
those of the nation, it is to be noted that he is regarded, not
as the f omider of a special tribe, but as the progenitor of the
individual tribes from whose imion the nation was formed.
His name and character, therefore, can hardly have been
a mere abstraction from the nation collectively. There
seems, indeed, to be now evidence that both his name, and
those of Abraham and Joseph (with Ishmael, and others)
were proper names in use in Babylonia and Palestine from
early times.^
Abraham, as might be expected, is a special difficulty to
the theory. He is, as Wellhausen owns, " a little difficult
to interpret.*' ' We have just seen that his name is not a
designation of either tribe or nation: neither is Isaac's.
The critic is therefore driven, as above hinted, to suggest
that he is " a free creation of unconscious art " ; ' later than
Isaac.^ But then how explain these long and detailed
biographies, which bear so inimitable a stamp of reality,
yet have so little to suggest the reflection of the features
of a later age ? For here again the theory is in difficulty.
** It is remarkable," confesses Wellhausen, ** that the heroes
of Israelitish legend show so little taste for war, and in this
point they seem to be scarcely a true reflection of the
character of the Israelites, as known from their history. . . .
The patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, are all peace-
loving shepherds, inclined to live quietly beside their tents,
anxious to steer dear of strife and clamour. • . . Brave
and manly they are not,* but they are good fathers of
families,"^ etc. lliere are evidently knotty problems still
^ In a list of ThothmeB in. (e, 1480 B.O.) there oocnr the lutmee Jaoob-el
and JoMph-el (the latter doubted by some), as those of places in Central
Palestine. Much earlier, in Babylonian oon tract tablets (o. 2200 B.a), are
found the names Jacob, Jacob-el, and the name Abe-ramu, similar to
Abraham. See below, Chu». XI. pp. 409-10.
* ffisL qf Israel, p. 820. The Idea that Abraham was the name of a
"god " has been wtij generally abandoned, but is now revived by Winckler ;
see above, p. 69.
^ Professor RobertK>n pertinently remarks : "One would like to know how
much of the story of Isuo, as a popular legend, would be comprehensiblf
without reference to that of Abraham." — Mel, efhnul, p. 126.
* See below, p. 109. * ffist. o/Ierael, pp. 820-21.
L THE HISTORY 91
unsolved on the theory that the history is simply a form of
** ethnographic genealogy."
2. A special proof of the personifying tendencies of the
Hebrew writers is sought in the forms of some of the
Scripture genealogies. These, it is pointed out, are frequently
ethnographical, not individual. A familiar example is the
" table of nations " in Gren. z. When, e.g., one reads there :
''The sons of Ham; Cush, and Mizraim, and Phut, and
Canaan. • • . And Mizraim begat Ludim, and Anamim, and
Lehabim, and Naphtuhim. . . . And Canaan begat Sidon his
first-bom, and Heth, and the Jebusite, and the Amorite, and
the Girgashite," ^ etc., everyone readily perceives, that not
individual persons, but nations or tribes, are meant The
Snealogies bear their ethnographic character upon their
se. But all genealogies are not of jbhis nature ; and the
existence of such tables no more proves that Abraham and
Sarah, Isaac and Bebekah, Esau and Jacob, Joseph and his
brethren, Moses and Aaron, were not real persons, than it
proves, say, that Elkanah was not the father of Samuel, or
Eli of Hophni and Phinehas, or Jesse of David, but that in
all these cases we are dealing only with tribal abstractions.
We do not suppose, e.g., that when we read, ^ Salmon b^gat
Boaz, and Boaz begat Obed, and Obed begat Jesse, and Jesse
begat David,"' we have before us a scrap of ''ethnographic
genealogy," because elsewhere it is said that Canaan begat
the Jebusite and the Amorite. When we find richly-
developed biographies like those of Abraham and Jacob
attached to such names as " Mizraim," or " Ludim," or " the
Oirgashite," it will be time to consider the analogy.'
3. The crowning support for the personification theory
is sought by Kuenen, Stade, Outhe, and others, in an
asgumed law of the growth of societies. " New nations," Stade
says, " never originate through rapid increase of a tribe ; new
tribes never through derivation from a family propagating
itself abundantly through several generations."^ To which
Konig aptly replies : " Often as I have read these sweeping
statements, I have always missed one trifle : I never found
a proof of this thesis." ^ Such a proof, in fact, is not to be
> Qen. X. 6, 13, 16, 16. * Bath iy. 21, 22.
* See ftirther illostration in Note A — EOnig on the Penonifieatioii Theory.
* OtmiMckU^ L p. 28. Cf. Knenen's Ma, of Isroa, i. p. 40.
Jfewsfe Pri9U^^ p. 30»
92 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
found; foi: none can be offered which does not, as in the
present case, assume the thing to be proved As a general
dictum on the origin of society, its truth would be deputed
by many far bett^ entitled to be listened to on the subject
than Stade. H. S. Maine, for instance, in his book on
Ancient Law : its Connection with the Early History of Society ^
maintains the directly opposite thesia To him the
"patriarchal theory" of the origin of society is the one
which best accords with all the facts. Jurisprudence, he
affirms, is full of the clearest indications that society in
primitive times was not a collection of individuals, but
an aggregation of families. " The unit of an ancient Society
was the Family. . . . The elementary group is the Family,
connected by common subjection to the highest male
ascendant. The Abrogation of Families forms the Gens or
House. The Aggregation of Houses makes the Tribe. The
Aggregation of Tribes constitutes the Commonwealth."^
AUowing, however, what is probably the truth, that society
does not follow everywhere the same law of growth, we are
still in no way shut up to the conclusion that it was not
thus that the Hebrew nation, under its peculiar conditions
of call and destiny, did develop. The development from
the one chosen individual into the many,^ in fulfilment of
promise, is the most natural thing imaginable, provided the
nation's own account of its antecedents and mission to the
world is accepted. The history here is in complete harmony
with itself. From the earliest period to which we can trace
back the Hebrew tribes, they are ** the sons of Israel," and
of what that title meant they believed themselves to have
the clearest historical recollection. Why should that
recollection not be trusted, and designations like " house of
Jacob," " house of Isaac," " seed of Abraham," not be allowed
to mean what they obviously suggest, and were always
believed to mean — that the people were historically de-
scended from these patriarchs, instead of being twisted into
proofs that these progenitors of the race never existed ?
The result to which we are thus far led is that the newer
criticism is unsuccessful in its attempt to make out the
patriarchs to be ^not persons, but personifications." The
^ AneUnt Law, pp. 126,. 128.
* Isa. IL 1, 2 : * ^When be was bat one, I called bim, and I blessed bim,
and made him many."
I. THE HISTORY 93
patriarchs, in the Biblical view, are both persons and pro-
genitors of tribes, and there is no necessary contradiction
between the two things. It is to be anticipated that
ancestral traits will reappear in the descendants, and it is
not inadmissible to suppose that characteristics of the
descendants, to some degree, will be found, designedly or
unconsciously, reflected in the portraiture of the progenitor
— as, for instance, in the cases of Ishmael and Esau.^ In
this sense there may be an element of " idealisation " in the
narratives, as there is, in fact, in every eood painting, or
every good biography, of a person who has become historical.
This does not detract from the fidelity of the history, but
enhances it by interpreting its inner significance, and
investing it with the charm of literary art
IIL WiTNlEBB OF IsBASL'S NATIONAL CONBaOUBNESS :
The Patbiabghs
There is another branch of the critical method on which
it is proper that something should now be said. This relates
to the point just touched on — the testimony of the national
eonscioueness of Israel to its own past.
It was seen above that exception is taken to the high
religious ideas ascribed to the patriarchs, and to the stories
of the divine communications made to them. The question
of the early religion of Israel will be investigated in next
chapter. Meanwhile it may be permitted to remark on
Kuenen's diettm that ''at first the religion of Israel was
polytheism," that that can hardly be a sure result of criticism
which many of the most distinguished critics of both past
and present times energetically repudiate. Ewald was free
enough in his treatment of the history, but he had no doubt
of the existence of the patriarchs, or that they " thought and
spoke monotheistically."* Dillmann, and Delitzsch, and
Biehm were critics, but none of them would assent to the
propositions of the Euenen school about the religion of
early Israel As little would Konig, or Eattel, or Baethgen,
or Klostermann, or Oettli, or the late Dr. A. B. Davidson,
or many others that might be named. Dillmann may be
quoted in this connection as an example. ''If anyone,''
he says, " desires to maintain that this representation rests
> Gt Oen. XTi 11, 13 ; zxrii 40. > ffiit, qfUraa, I p. 820.
94 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
only on an idealising conception of later writers, and is not
to be accepted as historical, it must be contended in opposi-
tion that not merely Genesis, but the whole Old Testament,
speaks of a oovenant, of a peculiar relation in which Ood
stood with the fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; tiiat
Moses attached himself with his work to the Otod of the
fathers; that without this attachment his work would be
incomprehensible ; that, therefore, even if Genesis had said
nothii^ on the subject, we should be compelled to postulate
a certam acquaintance of these Others with the living God,
a hij^er faitn in God." ^
This deep consciousness which the Israelites possessed
throughout their history of their origin from Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob, and of the peculiar favour of God to these
fathers of their race in making His covenant with them,
might be deemed an irrefragable argument for the truth of
the Biblical representations. So in reaUty it is ; but it is
essential to the modem critical view that the argument
should be deprived of its force, and the method by which this
is sought to be accomplished is an excellent example of the
arbitrariness we complain of in the critical procedure. The
aim is to show that the references to the patriarchs and
their doings — even to Moses — are so late as to deprive them
of all value, and the means employed for tins end is the
summary excision from the text of all passages that speak
to the contrary as later additions. It is a method beautiful
in its simplicity, easily worked, and, when applied with
sufficient courage, as it is in both history, and prophets,
never fails in silencing all opposing witness.'
"-h We begin by giving two examples of the application
of this method to the prophets, '* A striking fact is," says
Ptof essor H. P. Smitli^ " that none of the prophets allude to
Abraham till we come to EzekieL The weight of this in an
inquiry into the historicity of the patriarchs can hardly be
1 AttiuL l%eot. p. 82; o£ pp. 414-16. Ct Klortemuuin's OeaekUhU dm
VMe$ Itrasl, pp. 28 fL Elostennaim rejeots as an " abtolately imtionid
opinion" the view that the patriarchs are mythical fonns, and contends that
only gronnds of real tradition could hare led the people to see, not in Moee8|
who actoally fonned them into a nation, but in fathers, sharply distinguished
from Moses, and Uving in quite other times and relations^ the founders of
their monotiieistio relimon.
' It need scarcely oe said that our remarks are not intended to apply
to soberly-directed attempts to correct errors or corruptions in the Hebrew
tizti which reliable evidence shows to be really such. See Note H to CRbap. Z.
L THE HISTORY 95
over-eBtimated" ^ Wellhausen, who, as we saw, is dispoeed
to regard Abraham as '* a free creation of unconscious art/'
simikrlj writes: ^The later development of the legend
shows a manifest tendency to make Abraham the patriarch
far exeellenee, and cast the others into the shade. In the
earlier literature, on the other hand, Isaac is mentioned
even by Amos. Abraham first appears in Isa. z1.-1xvl" ' The
two statements, it may be ol^erved, are not quite in
harmony, for Ezekiel, in which the one critic allows a
reference to Abraham, is at least earlier than the date
assumed by Wellhausen for Isa. zL-lxvL, where, on his
showing, Abraham first appears. The passage in Ezekiel
(chap. TTTiii 24) reads : " Abraham was one, and he inherited
the land." Even on the meagre footing of these passages,
it might be urged, we would not be without important
witnesses to the singular place occupied by Abraham in the
Israelitish tradition.
But are the facts as stated? If we take the Hebrew
text as it stands, they certainly are not. We go back to
Jeremiah, and there read, chap, xxxiii 26 : ** I will take of his
seed to be rulers over the seed of Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob." We go back a stage further, to the earlier Isaiah,
and there read, chap. xxix. 22: "Jehovah who redeemed
Abrahamu" We turn to Isaiah's contemporary, Micah, and
read, chap, vii 20 : " Thou wilt perform the truth to Jacob,
and the mercy to Abraham, which Thou hast sworn to our
fathers from the days of old." Here, then, are passages
which directly contradict the categorical assertions of the
critics : how are they dealt with ? In the simplest possible
fashion, by denying that they should be there. Thus, to his
statement that no prophet prior to Ezekiel alludes to
Abraham, Professor H. F. Smith calmly appends the foot-
note : ** Ilie present text shows two passages, Micah vii 20
and Jer. xxxiii 26, but both are confessedly (?) late additions
to the prophetic text"* Wellhausen is equally summary:
> 0. T. Si9t. p. 49 ; of. p. 88. * SiH. qflirad, p. 810.
* As aboTB. The whole peasage Jer. xzziu. 14-26 is omitted in the
TiXX, whioh otherwise takes extensiye liberties with the text But no good
ffronnd exists for its rejection from the Hebrew text. Graf defends it, and
Ewald says: "Nothing is so perverse and sronndless as to find in this
passage, or generaUy, in ehapa. xxx.-xxxiii., aaditions by a later prophet" —
2>M firopAtien^ ii p. 268. The remaining pasiagee an in the LXa as well
as in the Hebrew.
^ THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
"Micah vii 20/' he says, "belongs to the exile, and the
words 'who redeemed Abraham' in Isa. xxix. 22 are not
genuine: they have no possible position in the sentence."
To which it may be as summarily replied, that there is no
convincing reason for changing any of the passages, — if
reason at all, except in the critic's own caprice. Even
Kuenen, in his Bdigion of Israel, accepts as genuine the
passages to which Wellhausen takes exception*^ Gunkel,
one of the newest and most radical of critics, enters a much-
needed protest against the whole system of procedure. " The
author," he says, " at this point cannot conceal his conviction
that the reigning school of literary criticism is all too zealous
to explain as not genuine the passages which do not exactly
fit in with its construction of the history, or which are hard
to be understood by the modem investigator, and that a
powerful reaction must follow on the period of this criticism." '
2. It is now to be remarked, however, that even if the
critics were right in their assertion that there are no express
allusions to Abraham in the prophets prior to the exile, no
such dire results would follow for the historicity of the
patriarchs as the authorities we have quoted imagine.
Direct allusions in the prophets are, after all, only a fraction
of the evidence, and hardly affect the force of the argument
from the national recollection of Israel In the first place,
it 18 to be observed that where allusions to Abraham do
occur, it is always as to a person well known, and enshrined
in the highest honour in the memory of the people. It is
no stranger that is being introduced to them. Israel is
" the seed of Abraham My friend." ' They are exhorted to
look to Abraham their father, and to Sarah that bare them,
and are reminded for their encouragement, how, when he
was but one, God called him, and blessed him, and increased
him.^ He was one, and he inherited the land.^ It is
declared that Ood will perform the truth to Jacob, and the
mercy to Abraham, which He had sworn to their fathers
from the days of old.* But further, these patriarchs appear
* Sel. of Israel, i. p. 101. ADOther historical passage in Micah, chap. tL
8, 4, declared by some to be late, is also accepted by Kuenen in this work
(p. 113).
' Oenesiit p. 118. Gnnkel't own methods, as will be seen after, ars
sufficiently arbitrary.
* Isa. zli. 8 ; cf. Iziii. 16. « Isa. 11. 1, 2.
* Seek. xzziiL 24. • Mic. yii. 20.
L THE HISTORY 97
as figures in a connected history, and whatever in the
prophets implies acquaintance with part of that history may
fairly be regarded as implying knowledge of the rest, at
least in its main features. The admitted allusions to Isaac
and Jacob, for instance, and to incidents in the life of the
latter,^ inf erentially imply some knowledge of Abraham as
welL
But this is by no means the whole. Nothing is surer in
criticism, as was shown in the last chapter, than that, by the
time of Amos and Hosea — {.«., long before the time of the
exile — ^written histories of the patriarchal period existed,
and were in circulation, embodying the current tradition of
the nation,' in which Abraham pktys so prominent a part.
" When stories were told of Isaac and Ishmael, and Lot and
Esau," says Wellhausen himself, speaking of a time when,
as he thinks, the stories only circulated orally, '* everyone
knew at once who these personages were, and how they were
related to Israel, and to one another."* Is it credible
that the same should not be true of Abraham? What
stories of Isaac, or Ishmael, or Lot, could be in currency in
the days of the monarchy, which did not imply a knowledge
of that patriarch ? Or what stories could be told of Joseph
which did not bting in Jacob, and Judah, and Beuben, and
Benjamin, and the patriarchs generally ? ^ Then what of die
Book of Deuteronomy ? — a prophetic book, on the theory of
the critics, yet based upon, and saturated with aUusions to,
this whole earlier history, including the Abrahamic covenant
and promises.* Is not this book before Ezekiel, or Isa.
xL-lxvL, as the critics date the latter ? What, in view of
such facts, becomes of Professor H. P. Smith's "* can hardly
be over-estimated" in relation to the historicity of the
^ E,g.^ Amos yii 9, 16 (Isaac) ; Hoa. zii. 8-6, 12.
* ProfesBor W. B. Smith says that the story of the patriarchs "is still
recorded to ns as it lived in the mouths of the people. . . We still read it
▼eiT much as it was read or told in the house of Joseph in the days of Amos
and Hosea."— iVqp^i^, pp. 116, 117.
* HitL qflmuel, p. 888.
^ Professor Bennett says : "The story of Joseph may he taken as tha
aeooont of events which really happened to a historical individual, Joseph,
who TMdly existed. Such history might he supposed to he accurate in
every detail hy those who held the strictest theory of verbal inspira-
tion."— Oeneais, p. 47. But how much of the remaining history is involved
in that of Josepn f If he is historical, Jacob, Judah, Beuben, etc.« are bo
longer "personifications."
*Deut. L 8, vi 10, etc
7
98 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
patriarchs, — because, as he alleges, nothing is heard of
Abraham before Ezekiel? Does not the use of such
language recoil rather on himself as showing his mngnlar
lack of perspective in dealing with the subject ?
lY. Moses and ths Ezontm
To the testimony which the prophets and related writings
bear to the period of the patriarchs falls to be added that
of the later historical books, and of the psalms.^ Here,
however, we prefer to cast a glance at the MouUc period,
to which objections of the same kind are made, and to which
the same general considerations, based on the immovable
certainty of the consciousness of the nation as to its own
past, apply. Attention is naturally concentrated in this
connection on two things — the personality of Moses, and
the gtedX deliverance of the Exodu&
1. If there is one personage in Hebrew history about
whose character and doings it might be supposed without
doubt that every Israelite had some knowledge, that person
is Moses. Yet in regard to Moses also we have occasionally
the suggestion that the earlier prophets knew little or
nothing about him;' and particularly it is argued that
only in the latest period is he definitely connected with a
code of laws. Thus in an authoritative work we read:
" The indications of subsequent literature suggest that Moses
was only gradually connected by tradition with the pro-
duction of a continuous body of legislation. . . . Even to
the author of Isa. Ixiii. 11 Moses is the heroic leader
under divine guidance to whom Israel owed its liberty
rather than its laws. Malachi is the first of the prophets
to refer to a Mosaic code (iv. 4)." '
This appears to us, in the light of admitted facts, to
be remarkable reasoning. We go back again to the Book
' Fta. zItU. 9, CT. 9, 42, eta On the Pialms, see Chap. Xlt.
' Mia tL 4, with iti explicit reference to Moees, Aaron, and Miriam, ia
declared to be an interpolation. GhillanT, an older writer, cannot find
Moaee named in the propheta before MalacM. Cf. KSnig'a Ham^^prM0m$t
pp. 16, 16. Tet besides Mia vi. 4, which Knenen accepts as genuine,
there is Isa. Iziii 11, and the reference to Moses in Hos. zii 18. Eren
Eantzsch, howeyer, who, on tiie whole, stands np for a higher conception
of Moses, arbitrarily declares the passage in Hosea to be an interpolatioD
(<< HeL of Israel," DieL p. 625).
' Oarpenter, Ozf. Hex, i. p. 19.
L THE HISTORY 99
of Deuteronomy, alleged by critics to be a work of
''prophets/' which, in anj case, came to light in the days
of JosiaL . This book, in point of form, is a repromulgation
by Moses in the steppes of Moab of the commandments,
statutes^ and judgments received by him thirty-eight years
before from Qod in Horeb, aad by him then commimicated to
the people. In it, it will hardly be denied, Moses appears
pre-eminently as the lawgiver. But the book itself it is
now well recognised, presupposes the older code of laws
in the ^Book of the Covenant" of Ex. xz.-xxiiL More-
over, not only are the laws Mosaic, but both the ^ Book of
the Covenant,'^ and the " law ** of Deuteronomy, are declared
to have been iariUen by Moses.^ What then does the writer
of the above-quoted passage mean by saying that " for the
pre-exilian seers there was no fixed and definite 'law'
recorded in precise and definite form " ? ' Was Deuteronomy
not a law-book ? The Mosaic authorship of Deuteronomy
and of the " Book of the Covenant " may be disputed ; but
can it be denied that " tradition " at any rate had by that
time come to regard Moses as a lawgiver, and in the raUest
and most "definite" way ascribed the laws of the nation
to him, or to Gk>d through him? There is the furtiier
argument from the JE histories. Already in these histories,
wMch antecede the time of written prophecy, and extend,
in the view of the critics, to the conquest, there is
embodied the whole history of the Exodus, of the lawgiving
at Sinai, of the covenant, of the events of the wilderness,
of the entrance into Canaan. How then could any Israelite
or prophet of that or any subsequent time possibly be
iffnorant of the rdle of Moses as a lawgiver ? How could
the writer of Isa. IxiiL 11 be ignorant of it ? It is amazing
that the critics do not see more dearlv the force of their
own admissions in these matters. If Deuteronomy was
promulgated in the reign of Josiah; if the JE histories
existed a century and a half earlier ; it is a strange in-
consequence to talk of the paucity of references in the
prophets before Malachi as showing that Moses was not
> Sz. zzIt. 4 ; Dmt xzzL 24. See below, Chap. VIII. pp. 98S it
' As above. Kantacb layi : " Over affainrt this [scanty mentioii] must
be sat the fact that, thronghont the Old Testament, all the Tarioos leffisla-
tipns ... are said to have been introduoed, and in part even wntten
down by him."—" BeL of Israel,'* DieL p. 626.
100 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
connected in the Israelitish mind with the work of
legislation.^
The basis of the arffmnent is greatly strengthened, if,
from the references to legislation, we extend our view to
the related historfr. Here, again, it is to be remembered,
the history goes in a piece. The people who knew of the
Exodus, of the Bed Sea deliverance, and of the wilderness
journeyings, knew also of Sinai, of the covenant of their
nation with Gk)d, and of the commandments and laws on
which the covenant was based. It seems futile to contend,
with Professor W. R Smith, that " the early history and the
prophets do not use the Sinaitic legislation as the basis of.
their conception of the relation of Jehovah to Israel, but
habitually go back to the deliverance from Egypt, and from
it pass directly to the wilderness wanderings and the
conquest of Canaan."' The Levitical legislation, if that
is meant, the history and prophets do not use, — no part of
Scripture uses the Levitical law as the basis of God's
relation to Israel, — ^but it is hard to see how anyone can
imagine that either prophets or people could be familiar
with the Exodus and the wilderness wanderings, and leave
out of view, or be indifferent to, that which forms the
kernel of the whole history, — ^the covenant which God
made with the nation through Moses; when, as Jeremiah
says. He '' brought them out of the land of Egypt, from the
iron furnace, saying. Obey My voice, and do them [the words
of the covenant], according to all which I command you";*
or when, as Hosea expresses it. He espoused the nation to
Himself in the wilderness, in the days of its youth.^ Are
we to suppose that the prophets (even Jeremiah) were
ignorant of the recapitulation of the law of Horeb in
Deuteronomy?
2. It is true, nevertheless, that the great foot in which the
consciousness of Israel ever rooted itself, as that which first
gave the nation its freedom, and made it a nation, was the
Exodus, with which is constantly associated the deliverance
at the Bed Sea. It was remarked at the beginning that we
have only to reflect on the nature of such an event as the
^ The position of Motm m kgiiUtor k ftirtiier disoossod in Ohap. VI.
Of:i>p.l51ff.
*FnphBt9, p. 111. ■ J«r. xi 4.
* Hos. iL 16 ; of. viiL 1. The putages are uaonf those cited by Pn^^
- t Smith himself. See Note B on the Ck>Tenant with IsneL
L THE HISTORY loi
ExoduB to see that, if it really happened, it could never
again be forgotten by the people whose redemption it was.
Some things in a nations history may be forgotten; of
others the memory is indelibla Could the English people
ever forget the Normans and the Conquest; the Scottish,
Bannockbum or Flodden, or the events of their Beforma-
tion; Americans, Bunker's Hill or the Declaration of
Independence? Yet these are small matters compared
with what the Exodus, and the events which followed it,
were to the Israelites. When we turn, accordingly, to the
poetical and prophetical books of the Old Testament, we
find that, amidst all the vicissitudes in their fortunes, the
memory of the Exodus, with its attendant circumstances,
never was obliterated, but remained fresh and green in the
minds of the people as long as their national life lasted.
In song, and psalm, and prophecy, the echoes of this
wonderful deliverance in Egypt and at the Bed Sea ring
down their history till its closa^ The same difficulty meets
us here, indeed, as before, that the historical and prophetical
books are not allowed to be used as witnesses till they have
been critically adjusted, and, in the multitude of editors
and redactors among whom their contents are parcelled out,
it is never hard to find a way of getting rid of an incon-
venient testimony. Apart, however, from the direct narra-
tives, which, in their fireshness, force, and dramatic power,
speak so unmistakably to the liveliness of the impression
under whidi they were composed, the literature en bloe is a
witness to the vivid recollection of the essential facts. An
old monument is the Song of Miriam at the Bed Sea, in
Ex. XV., the genuineness of which there are no good grounds
for disputing.' Joshua and Samuel go back on these facts
in rehearsing the great deeds of God for their nation.'
^ Cf. Ex. XT. ; Joth. xxiT. i-7 ; 1 Sam. xii. 6 ff. ; 1 Kings viii. 16,
61-58 ; Pm. xliy. 1. IxxviL 12-20, Ixxviii, eto. ; Amoa ii 9, 10 ; Hoe.
xi 1 ; xii. 18 ; Isa. li 9, 10 ; Jer. iL 6, eto. ; Dent iy. 84 ; xtL 8, 6, 12 ;
xxvi. 6, etc
* Dr. Driver says : " Probably the greater part of the Song is Mosaic, and
the modification or expansion is limited to the closing rerses ; for the
funeral style is antique, and the triumphant tone which pervades it is
just snob as might naturally have been inspired by the event whidi it
celebrates." — IfUrod. p. 80.
' References as above. Josh. xxiv. is usually ascribed by the critics to
E, with later touelies. 1 Sam. xiL 6 ff. is attributed by Eautzscb to his
Sanl-Sonrce in the tenth or ninth century B.a H. P. Smith, on the other
I02 THE 0,T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
Solomon dwells on them in his speech and prayer at the
dedication of the temple.^ Thej appear as the motive to
obedience in the Decalogue,' in the disconrses and legislation
in the Book of Deuteronomy, and in the Levitical Code
known to critics as the ''Law of Holiness/'* assigned by
very many to an early date. Amos, Hosoa, Jeremiah, and
the other prophets appeal to them ; and they inspire many
of the psalma These recollections of the nation we can
fully trust. ** No nation," as Professor Kautzsch says, '' ever
gratuitously invented the report that it had been ignomini-
ously enslaved by another; none ever forgot the days of
its deliveranca And so through all the centuries there
survived in Israel the inextinguishable recollection that it
was once delivered out of E^^t, the house of bondage, by
Jahweh, the God of its fathers, with a strong hand and
outstretched arm ; that specially at the passage of the Bed
Sea it experienced the mighty protection of its Gk)d."^
This knowledge dwells, not as a vague reminiscence, but as
a strong, definite, historical assurance, in the heart of the
nation, and it is as inconceivable that Israel should be
mistaken about it, as that a ^wn man should forest the
scenes of his boyhood, or episodes of his early life that
burned themselves into his very souL
The confidence which the dramatic vividness and tone
of reality in the Mosaic history beget in us is not dissipated
by the often far-fetched criticism to which its details are
subjected by writers like Colenso, in search of arithmetical
and other "contradictions" and "impossibilities." This
criticism will come before us for consideration after;* mean-
while it would be well if those who urge these objections to the
hand, boldi it to be exilian. Driyer, following Bndde, ranka it as pre-
Denteronomio, eto. See below, p. 886.
^ Kaatisoh laya that " in his speeoh dedicatory of the temple, 1 Kings
viii. 12 ff., we have an anthentio monument of the time of Solomon.** He
apparentir attribntes, however, yers. 14-48 to the " Deuteronomist "
{IaL 9f O.T., pp. 12, 241). The LXZ deriyes yers. 12, 18 firom "the
bookoftheSong.^
* Bz. zz. 2 ; Deat t. 6, 16.
* Ley. ziz. 86 ; zziL 88 ; zziiL 48 ; zzr. 65, eta On this CSode sea
below, pp. 808 ff.
^lAL <f 0,T., p. 9 ; of. his " ReL of Israel,*' Did. p. 681. It is the
more nnaooonntable that, acknowledging the essential hcta, Kantach
shoald sit so loosely to the history as given. He rejeots, s.^., the upbringing
of Moses at the oonrt of Phanoh.
*8sa below, Ohap. X. pp. 862£
L THE HISTORY 103
truth of the history would reflect a little on the diffioultiee
which, on the other side, attach to their own too hasty
rejection of it. After all, these things which the Mosaic
books record were not, any more than the events in Christ's
life, to which Paul appealed before Agrippa, ^'done in a
comer." ^ They were public events, in the fullest sense of
the term. Does it involve no strain on belief to say that an
event so extraordinary as, in any case, the Exodus of Israel
from Egypt must be admitted to have been,' happened in
the full light of one of the most brilliant civilisations of the
time, and yet that the people who came out, with a leader
like Moses at their heaid, did not know, or could not re-
member, or could ever possibly forget, how it happened?
The Israelites themselves, as we have seen, did not believe
they did not know. They had but one story to give of it
all down their history — the same story which, in circum-
stantial detail, is embodied in these old books. If this is
not how the Israelites got out of Egypt, will the critic, in
turn, furnish us with some plausible explanation of how
they did get out f It is here as in the discussion of the
origins of Christianity. It is not enough to discredit the
Gospels and the Acts; the critic must be prepared to
show how, if these are rejected, Christianity d%d originate.
So, in the case of the Exodus, it is not enough to di»3redit
the one history we have of that event; the critic has to
show how, if the whole history was different from that
which we possess, it came about that no echo of it was
preserved in Israel, and that this lifelike, vivid, detailed
narration came to take its placa It is admitted, with few
extreme exceptions, that the people of Israel were once in
Egypt; that they were in bitter bondage; that Egypt at
the time was ruled over by one or other of its powerful
monarchs ; that they came out, not by war, but peaceably ;
that they were at least tolerably numerous, with women,
children, and cattle; that they found their way, under
pursuit, — so WeUhausen allows, — across the Bed Sea. Is
it un&ir to ask — ^How did they make their way out?
Theories of course there are: ingenuity, when freed from
iAotizxyi26.
* Cf. Wellhaoflen, Biti. qf Itrael, pp. 482-88 : "His deiUn wm aided
in a wholly unlooked-for wa^, by a marvelloas oocurrenoe, onite beyond his
oontrol, and whioh no Mgacity oonld poaaibly hare foreseen. '
I04 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED. BY CRITICISM—
the necessity of respecting facts, is equal to anything. But
have they warrant, or even verisimilitude ? ^ It is easy to
pen sentences about an ** escape " of nomadic tribes on the
border, in whom the despotic policy of the Pharaoh had
awakened " the innate love of freedom " ; ' or to hazard the
conjecture that there was a slipping away of the tribes one
by one;* but such speculations, aJongside of which the
I^ptian story of an expulsion of lepers is respectable,
conflict vrith tradition, and break on the hard facts of the
situation. For the Israelites were no loose conglomeration
of tribes on the border.^ According to every testimony,
they occupied a wide territory, dwelt in houses, were the
victims of a systematic oppression,^ were engaged in forced
labour, were broken-spirited, under strict surveillance of
tyrannical overseers, etc. How, in these circumstances, was
furtive escape possible ? Where is there analogy for such a
horde of " runaway slaves " finding their way out of bondage,
and defying the power of a mighty king to bring them back 7
It is a simple method to reject history as we have it, and
evolve hypotheses, but the process is not always as satis-
factory as it is simpla There is need in this case for the
" strong hand " and '' stretched-out arm.''
Y. Internal Character of Narratives a Guarantee
FOR HisTORicrry
Attention may now be given to the internal charcuster
of the narratives, and to the bearings of this on their
credibility.
It soimds paradoxical, yet it is the case, that internal
evidence of truthfulness is sometimes such as to outweigh
in value even external evidence, and to support confidence
in a narrative where external evidence is lacking or dis-
puted. Had we, for instance, no external evidence for the
Oospels, — did they come to us for the first time from
* See Note 0 on Theories of the Ezodiu.
' ThuB Knenen ; of. Golonso, PetU. Pt vi. p. 600.
' This theory is thought to find support in indications of the presence of
the tribes of Asher (W. Max MUller ; cf. Hommel, ffeh. Trad. p. 228) and
Judah (Jaatrow) in Palestine prior to the £xodas. The facts probably
really point to an earlier date for the Exodus. Cf. below, Ohap. XL pp. 422 ff.
* Cf. above, p. 79,
* Note the reoorrence of *' hoiue of bondage " in hiatoiy, law, prophecy.
L THE HISTORY 105
unknown hands, — ^it might still be possible to argue that
the holy and gracious Personage portrayed in them was no
invention, but a drawing from a divine Original In like
manner it may be contended that there are internal marks
which support our confidence in the patriarchal and Mosaic
. histories, apart from all reasoning as to the age of documents,
or mode of transmission of the traditions. Something has
already been said of the teleological character of the narra-
tives ; the argument may, however, now be widened to in-
clude a number of other features, hardly less remarkable. We
draw our illustrations chiefly from the patriarchal aga
1. A first question relates to the general credMlity of
the patriarchal narratives. Discussion of alleged historical
and chronological "contradictions" can stand over; but
what of the credibility of the narratives as a whole ? Here
we willingly avail ourselves of the well-weighed judgment
of a moderate critic like Dr. Driver. ''The patriarchal
narratives," Dr. Driver says, " are marked by great sobriety
of statement and representation. There are no incredible
marvels, no fantastic extravagances, no surprising miracles ;
the miraculous hardly extends beyond manifestations and
communications of the Deity to the earlier patriarchs, and
in the case of Joseph there are not even these : ^ the events
of his life move on by the orderly sequence of natural cause
and efiect There is also a great moderation in the claims
made on behalf of the patriarchs." He goes on to ask:
"Do the patriarchal narratives contain intrinsic historical
improbabilities? Or, in other words, is there anything
intrinsically improbable in the lives of the several patriarchs,
and the vicissitudes through which they severally pass?"
And he answers : " Though particular details in them may
be improbable (0.^., Gren. xix. 31 ff. [?]),' and though the
representations may in parts be coloured by the religious
and other associations of the age in which they were
written, it cannot be said that the biographies of the first
three patriarchs, as told in JE, are, speaking generally,
historically improbable : the movements and personal lives
of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, are, taken on the whole,
credible."*
^ Cf. ProfeaBor Bennett on Joseph, above, p. 97.
* See below, p. 116.
* 6^MM9if, pp. zIt, xItL Bzoeption if taken by Dr. DriTer, howerw, to
io6 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
The witness here borne is trua Nothing is more
striking to an impartial mind than the sobriety of tone and
sparingness of miracle in the Book of Grenesis, where, on
the legendary theory, one would expect a superabundance
of marvels. To say, as is done, for instance, in the
article, " Hezateuch, in Hastings' Dictionary, that, '^ in J
the most wonderful phenomena appear quite natural, the
writer feels himself in an ideal fairy land in which no
wonders are surprising,"^ is to convey a quite misleading
impression. Apart from the theophanies to the patriarchs,
and a few instances of revelations in dreams, there is but
one recorded miracle in the whole long period from Abraham
to Moses — ^the destruction of the cities of the plaip, and
even this, like the Noachian deluge, is connected with
physical causes. If the birth of Isaac is reckoned another,
there are twa This, as one has said,' is a frugal provision
of signs and wonders for the first foundation of an economy
by which all families of the earth were to be blessed. In
this respect the patriarchal period presents a marked
contrast to the period of the Exodus, which is distinguished
by the number, frequency, and stupendous character of its
miracles. All the remaining miracles of the Old Testament,
in fact, are scarcely so numerous and striking as those
which are crowded into this single generation. But this
again is intelligible from the nature of the case. It is
characteristic of the miracles of the Bible that they are
never mere prodigies, or aimless displays of power, but
stand in intimate connection with, and strict subordination
to, the ends of revelation. It need stagger no one that the
Exodus took place, and the foundations of the covenant
with Israel as a nation were laid, amidst surpassing mani-
festations of divine power and grace, designed to produce
an indelible impression on the minds of the beholders, and
bum into their hearts a grateful sense of their indebtedness
to Jehovah. And this end, as we saw from the history, was
effectually attained.
2. As another point in the argument from internal
character, which powerfully supports belief in the historicity
the ohronology '*a8 it standi. " A partionltf example from an artide bj
Dr. Driyer in the Coniemiporwry Bgvi&w, ItII, p. 221, ii oonsidered in Note D.
on the Patriarchal Chronology.
^ Did 0/ BibU, iL ^ Z72.
iRirka.
L THE HISTORY 107
of the patriardhal narratives, we may note the unity of the
picture of the patriarchs in the various sources. There are,
we are assured, three main strands of narrative, at least, in
Genesis, — ^in the case of Abraham there are ftmr^ for G^n.
ziv. is allowed to be a source by itself, — ^yet it is the same
personages, the same environment, the same doings, the
same icuosyncrasiee, essentially, which we have in eacL
** There is,'' as WeUhausen himself declares, ** no primitive
legend so well-knit as the Biblical one." ^ Nor is this simply
a matter of artificial arrangement. ** This connection," he
says, ''is common in its main features to all the sources
alike. The Priestly Code runs, as to its historical thread,
quite parallel to the Jebovist history."* Again: ''In the
history of the patriarchs also, the outlines of the narrative
are the same in Q [ = P] and in JE. We find in both,
Abraham's immigration into Canaan with Sarah and Lot,
his separation from Lot, the birth of Ishmael by Hagar,
the appearance of Ood for the promise of Isaac, Isaac's
birth, the death of Sarah and Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac's
marriage with»Sebekah, Jacob and Esau, Jacob's journey to
Mesopotamia, and the foundation of his family there, his
return, Esau, Joseph in Egypt, Jacob in Egypt, Jacob's
blessing on Joseph and his sons, his death and burial".*
Closer observation discovers that the case for unity is
even stronger than Wellhausen represents it. The sources
specified not only presuppose the same persons and the
same history, but are so interwoven as to constitute a
compact single narrative of which the several parts imply,
and depend on, each other. Kg., the change of the names
of Abram and Sarai in Gen. xvii into Abraham and Sarah
governs the rest of the story,^ and there are continual
similar interlacings. Wellhausen, in fact, overstates the
matter when he says that all the above details are found
in each of the three sourcea It is not the case, e^., that
the birth of Ishmael, or the death of Abraham, is mentioned
in JR^ The separation of sources only makes the problem
^ Itiai. ^ Israa, ^, 2»5.
' Ibid, By " JehoYist " WeUhaoMn meana the eof/ibimd J and E.
* IM. pw 818.
* This u aasumed to be the work of a redactor. See below, p. 220.
* Wellhanaen points oat (Campos, d, Btx. po. 27, 28) that Abraham
disappears from yiew iu Gen. zxir., and (quite arbitrarilv) ooxneotures that
•rigmsUy yer. 67, ''Isaac was comforted after his motnei^s death," may
io8 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
harder; for the unity which exists in the book as it is
disappears when its parts are sundered. Abundant illustra-
tion is given in later chapters,^ and onlj an example or two
need be cited here. Thus, Haran is assumed in JE as the
place where Abraham received his call,' but, with the
elimination of Gen. xi 31, xii. 4b, 5, assigned to P, the
reference to Haran in the story of Abraham's migrations
disappears. So no explanation is given in J of '^ the land "
which Abraham, chap. xiL 6, is said to have passed through :
it is P, in ver. 5, who tells us it was ** the land of Canaan.''
It has been mentioned that the death of Abraham
is not recorded in JK But, strangely enough, it is in
P alone, on the current analysis, that an account is found
of the deaths of any of the patriarchal In J£ the account
of Jacob's funeral is actually given before any allusion to
his deceasa^ This had preceded in P. Apart, however,
from such details, which might be indefinitely multiplied,
the entire picture of the patriarchs, alike in their personal
characters, their attitude to Grod, the promises made to
them, and of the persons connected with them in the story,
as Sarah, Lot, Hagar, Ishmael, Esau, is identical throughout,
and leaves essentially the same impression on the mmd in
all the supposed sources. Thus, in the P narrative of
Abraham's dealings with the sons of Heth in Gen. xxiii,
he appears as '' a mighty prince " (ver. 6) ; with this agrees
the picture of him in chap, xiv — a separate source — as
the possessor of 318 trained servants, bom in his own
house.
3. This leads us to remark that ths figure of Abraham
might almost be adduced as of itself a guarantee of the
historicity of the narrative in which it is embodied. It is
difficult, indeed, in our familiarity with the story, rightly to
estimate the nobility and grandeur of the personality that
here presents itself. To speak of Abrahcun's faith is to
touch the central and most conspicuous point in his great-
ness; yet it must not be overlooked that this faith is only
the highest expression of a largeness of soul which manifests
have read, "after hia iather'a death." Addis aotaally adopts this oon-
jeotare into Ms text !
» Cf. Chaps. VII., X.
' Qen. XZ17. 4, 7, 10 ; cf. xxvii. 48.
* Gen. xxT. 7-10 ; xzzr. 28, 29 ; xliz. 28-88 ; 1. 12, IX
^ Gen. L 16.
L THE HISTORY 109
itself in all the aspeote of his character. As instances of
this magnanimity, with which is joined a rare meekness,
peaceabkness, and unselfishness, together with a never-
failing courtesy and politeness, we need only refer to his
deali]^ with Lot about the choice of a settlement,^ his
relations with the king of Sodom and with Melchizedek,'
and his negotiations with the sons of Heth about a burying-
place for his dead.' But this is only one side of his
character. Wellhausen was never further astray than when
he spoke of this patriarch as unmanly. With his gentleness
and reasonableness of disposition were united, as the rescue
of Lot showed, the most conspicuous courage and decision.
Abraham was no mere wealthy sheikh; no mere stay-at-
home watcher by the sheepfolds. His was a strong as well
as a meek nature. Sarah, his wife, though in many respects
a noble woman, worthy of such a husbwd, is a far inferior
character. She moves throughout on a lower level Stead-
fast and loyal in her affection to her lord, and moved by a
true religious feeling, she has not Abraham's strength of
faith, tends to be haughty, imperious, and impatient, can
brook no rival, is stung by Hagar's conduct, though she
was herself to blame for putting the girl in her false posi-
tion, complained petulantly to Abraham, treated her maid
with intolerable harshness, and finally would be content
witii nothing but the expulsion of Hagar and Ishmael
from the household. In comparison with her, the strong,
patient, much-enduring Abraham appears greater than
ever.
Yet there is no attempt to picture Abraham as faultless.
It is, indeed, difficult to understand how a man whose faith
was uniformly so strong should so far yield to fear as twice,
according to the history, to stoop to falsehood or evasion to
conceal his true relation to his wife. It was not a casual
lapse, but seems to have been part of a settled policy, that
Abraham should pass off Sarah as his sister, when travelling
in dangerous parts.^ One can only say of it, that, by
whatever excuses Abraham may have sought to justify his
behaviour to himself, it was a course of conduct unworthy of
him, indefensible even with such moral knowledge as he
possessed, inexcusable in the eyes of God, and certain to
1 Gen. zffi. * Gen. xiv. * Gen. xziii.
• * Gen. xz. 18. On thie incident, see below, Chap. YII. pp. 237 ff.
no THE 0,T, AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
involve him, as it actuaUy did, in much danger and
nnhappmesa.
The highest point of view, however, in which to consider
Abraham in these narratives is in his connection with the
plan and purpose of revelation. Alike on the divine and
the human sides, we are here in presence of transactions
unsurpassed in the Old Testament in interest and import-
ance. The call of Abraham — ^the covenant made with him
— ^is the beginning of a new era in the religious history of
mankind.^ The faith with which Abraham responded to
that call, and, in prompt and unhesitating obedience to the
divine word, left home and kindred to go to a land which
yet he knew not ; his patient waiting, in spite of apparent
natural obstacles, for the fulfilment of the promise of a son ;
his disinterested and lofty intercession for Sodom; above
all, the ^eat act of surrender of Isaac on the altar at
Moriah, m undoubting confidence, apparently, that God was
able to give his son back to him, even if from the dead,* —
in general, his habitual enduring as seeing Him who is
invisible, — all show the magnificent greatness of this man,
as, to the end of time, the Father of the Faithful ! It is this
unique and profoundly significant character which the
revolutionary criticism would dissipate into unsubstantial
myth or legend. But the thing cannot be done. What
legend can effect for the life of Abraham is sufficiently
evidenced by the fables and stories in Jewish, Mohammedan,
and Persian sources. The history of Abraham in the Bible
stands, from internal evidence alone, on an entirely different
footing from these. In its simple, coherent, elevated
character, its organic unity with the rest of revelation, its
freedom from the puerility and extravagance which mark
the products of the myth-formiug spirit, it approves itself
as a serious record of important events, the knowledge of
which had been carefully preserved— posw6/y at an early
age had been written down ' — and the essential contents of
which we may safely trust.
1 Gf. fha fine ramarks of Mozley on Abraham, RiUmg IdeaSt ate., pp.
21 ff.
' Heb. xL 17-19 ; of. Mozley, p. 60.
• Gt Hommel, AneietU Hebmo TradUum, pp. 277, 296 ; and aee below,
p. 676.
L THE HISTORY in
VL FiDSLiTT OF Nabbatives TO Patbiabohal Conditions
One of the most pronounced internal signatures of the
truth of the patriarchal history is undoubtedly found in its
primitive character, and its simplicity of ideas and worship,
as compared with later stages of revelation.
1. This appears on the surface in the fact that the
patriarchal history moves in primitive conditions, and keeps
true to these throughout. The patriarchs have a character
of their own, and are not modelled after the pattern of
heroes, and prophets, and warriors of a later time.^ They
live their own bee life under the open heaven, moving from
place to place, building their altars, and calling on the name
of Jehovah. Their thoughts, hopes, interests, outlook into
the future, are all relatively simple. They are untroubled
by the problems and mental conflicts of later times, — the
problems met with in Job, for instance, or in some of the
psalms, — even their temptations, as in the command to
sacrifice Isaac, are those of a primitive aga It is generally
agreed, therefore, that it would not be possible to assign a
late date to the narratives in Genesis on the ground of that
book alone.' Many critics, no doubt, think otherwise, and
fancy they can see in the narratives in question reflections
of almost the whole political history of Israel, — the revolt of
Moab, the contempt for the wild Arabs on the south-west
border, the subjection and revolt of Edom, the Syrian wars,'
the prosperity and pride of the Northern Kingdom, etc>
But it may safely be affirmed that most of these supposed
mirrorings of later conditions are imaginary. Gunkel
recently has cogently argued that the narratives in Genesis
— " legends " as he calls them — are far more distinguished
by contrast to the later period than by resemblance. With
> Qt Robertson, Early RdMon, p. 126.
*"The Book of Genesis, says Enenen, "may here be left oat of
aoooont, since the picture it contains of the ace of the patriarchs giyes as no
nneqaiyooal indications of the period at which it was produced" — Hm»
!». 42. " The question of the daU» of the sources of which the Book of Geneiii
u oomposed," says Dr. Driver, " cannot be properly answered from a consider-
ation of this book alone," etc— (Tenens^ p. zy. See below. Chap. Z. p, 278.
' See aboye, p. 74.
^ A larse oollection of these may be seen In tiis Introduction to Mr.
Map's boMc on The Oempontion of deneais, written from the standpoint of
112 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
one exception, that of the revolt of Edom (regarded hj him
as a later addition^ he can find no trace of reflection of
Eolitical events after 900 B.C., and the narratives themselves
e takes to be much older— completed by the time of the
Judges. He points out that there is no trace of the
sanctuary at Jerusalem, of the kingdom of Saul, of the
conflict of Saul with David, of the kingdom in its united
form under David and Solomon, of the division and wars of
the separate kingdoms, of the frightful Syrian wars, etc
As little, he argues, is there any trace of the later conflicts
of the prophets against image-worship, Asherahs, moffebas
(pillars), high places ; the worship of the patriarchs, on the
contrary, is na^ and free, and betrays no sense of the
existence of these bitter contests.' Gunkel's own theory of
the origin of the patriarchal stories is, we grant, as untenable
as any which he criticises ; ' but he is surely right, at any
rate, in his defence of their relative antiqmty.
2. We observe next, in partial anticipation of subsequent
discussion, that the rdigiom ideas, and forms of ioorship, in
the patriarchal history, are those which suit an early
stage of revelation, and would not be in place later. The
patriarchs worship one Gk)d — ^there is no trace of any other
in Genesis^ — but their worship is of the simplest order:
prayer and sacrifice. There are no temples or fixed
sanctuaries. The only ceremonial rite is circumcision ; the
one suggestion of Levitical prescriptions is in the distinction
of clean and imdean animals, and this is found in J,^ not in
P. The form of revelation is not, as in the prophetic age,
internal, but is predominatingly objective — ^by dream, vision,
theophany, or through the Mal'ach, or " Angel of Jehovah."
This last mode of revelation is one deserving of special
attention. The doctrine of angels generally is undeveloped
in these earlier books. The critics note it as a mark of P
that he does not introduce angels; but even in J and E
angels are brought in very sparingly. In E they are only
^ On Edom, see below, p. 209.
* Chnesis, IntrocL pp. bri-lziiL Gf. Note B on Gunkers Theoiy of
Patriarchal Hietory.
' It is saiprising that Gonkel does not see that his argument is as oof^nt
against the laU wrUing daum of the nanatiyes in their present form (ninth
and eighth oentnries) as against their eomposUion in or near that age. The
" mii^rings " are a chief reason for the later dating.
^ See bdow, p. 124.
* In the story of the flood, Gen. viL '2, 8 ; yiii. 20.
I. THE HISTORY 113
introduced twice, and then collectiyelj — ^in Jacob's dream at
Bethel,^ and again at Mabanaim, when " the angels of Qod "
— "Gkid's host"' — met him. J mentions "angels/' in
forms of men, at the destruction of Sodom.' The apparent
exception to this reticence, the appearances of the
" Angel of Jehovah/' or '' Angel of Qod," is really a striking
confirmation of our argument. For this form of revelation
is one almost peculiar to the earlier periods — ^patriarchal and
Mosaic— and stands bj itself. ** The Angel of Jehovah " is
not an ordinary angel, like those in the above passages, but
is a peculiar manifestation of Jehovah in the creaturefy
sphere, for purposes of revelation. Jehovah's name is in
lum; he is distinct from Jehovah, yet again mysteriously
identified with Him; in address his name is interchanged
with that of Jehovah ; he is worshipped as Jehovah.* novr
came so remarkable a conception, to be there in this early
age, and how came it to be confined to this age? It is
certainly no creation of the prophetic mind, and can only be
explained as the tradition of a well-known form of revela-
tion of the older time.
3. The idea of Ood Himself in these narratives is ap-
propriate to that early age, and is readily distinguishable
from the more developed conceptions of later epochs of
revelation. Without discussing at present the divine names
as the basis of a theory of documents,^ we can at least say
that the names of Grod proper to the patriarchal history —
El, Elohim, El Elyon, El Shaddai — are those which re-
present God under the most general forms of His beixur and
manifestation, and in this respect stand in contrast with the
name Jehovah, as, in its fullest significance, the covenant-
name of the Otod of Israel. El, the most generic of all, is
the only name that enters into the composition of proper
names in Genesis. It corresponds with the Babylonian Ilu,
but is not ordinarily used without some predicative designa-
tion—El Elyon (God Most High), El 01am (God Everkst-
1 Gen. xxriii 12. • Oen. xzzii. 1, 2.
* Gen. ziz. 1, 15.
« Gf. Gen. ZTU 7, 11, 18 ; zxi. 17 ft ; zziL 12, 14, 15 ; zzzi 11-18 ; zlTiii
15, 16 ; Ex. iu. 2, 6 ; ziii. 21 ; ziv. 19, 24 ; zziiL 20 ff., etc On the TiewB
taken of theee appearances and their sjgnificanoe, aee the works on O.T.
Theology of Oehler, Schnlts, Dillmann, Smend, eta (Oehler, L pp. 188 ff.,
has good remarks); art "Angel" hv Dr. A. B. Davidson m Did, i
BiUe, ete.
* See below, pp. 221 ff.
8
114 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
ing), eta Elohim, a plural form with a fiingolar sense, is
peculiar to Israel, and is likewise general in signification.
It denotes Qod as the God of creation and providence. El
Shaddai, again, marks a distinct stage in patriarchal revela-
tion,^ but seems still, like the two former names, to be
connected with the idea of power.' The fuller manifest-
ation of the divine attributes implied in, or to be historicallj
connected with, the name Jehovah, lay yet in the future.
It is true that in the sections of Genesis ascribed by
criticism to J the name Jehovah is carried back into the
days of the patriarchs — ^is put even into the mouth of Eva*
Even there, however, careful observation of the phenomena
will suggest that while, in the view of the narrator, the
name Jehovah was not unknown in earlier times, it is used
by him sparingly and with discrimination in comparison
with other designations — often is used simply proleptically.^
Its absence in proper names is a testimony to this dis-
crimination in its use.
The ideas of the divine cUtrSnUes suggested by these
names, though high, are yet in many respects undeveloped,
relatively to later stages of revelation. What later Scripture
means by the holiness, righteousness, wrath against sin,
condescending grace, and covenant-keeping faithfulness of
Gk)d, is, indeed, everywhere implied. God is the Judge of
all the earth, doing right He accepts and saves the
righteous, and overwhelms a sinful world, or sinful cities,
like Sodom and Gomorrah, with His judgments. Yet the
terms " holy," " righteousness," " wrath," •* love," are not yet
found. The word " holy " firat appears in connection with
the revelations at the Exodua* Schultz, in his Old Testct-
ment Theology, speaks of ^the impression of the terrible
God of the Semites " in earlier times, and says ** the ancient
Hebrews, too, tremble before a mysterious wrath of God" •
1 Gen. zriL 1 ; zliiL 14 ; zliz. 25 ; of. Ex. ri. 8.
*Th6 etyxnolojpr of this, as of the other iiAmes, is nnoerbdii, bat
inrobablT the root-idea is ^wer {God Almighty). The power denoted by
£1 Shaadai is power exercised within the sphere of reyeiatioD, s.^., in the
promise of a son to Abraham. Cf. Driver on "The Names of God" in
thnetU, pp. 402 ft, ; Ottley, Aspects t^ O.T,, pp. 181 ff. ; also Oehler, O.T.
Thsoi. i. pp. 128 ff.
* Gen. !▼. 1 (LXX, however, has " God ").
^ See Note F on the Name Jehovah in the Patriarchal Age, and Note B
to Chap. y.
• Ex. liL 6 ; XT. 11. • O.T, Thiol, ii. p. 175.
L THE HISTORY 115
He strangely forgets that, on his own hypothesiSy the
passages he cites in proof are all from the very latest parts
of the Pentateuch — ^from P. The Book of Genesis has no
mention of the *^ wrath/' any more than of the '' holiness/'
of God — a fact the more striking that the writers are
familiar with these ideas in Exodus.^ But the limits of the
earlier revelation are in the former book carefully preserved.
4 As it is with the idea of God, so, we observe lastly,
it is with the ethical conceptions of the patriarchs. These
again, as already seen, are relatively high, yet fall short in
many respects of the ethical standards of the period of the
prophets. Abraham marries his half-sister ; Jacob marries
two sisters, Leah and Bachel ; the custom is recognised of
the childless wife giving a handmaid as concubine to the
husband for the purpose of obtaining children by her — a
custom now so singularly attested by the provisions of
the Code of Hammurabi as belonging to that age.' The
conduct of the daughters of Lot in Gen. xix. 30 K, and that
of Judah in chap, xzxviii., shock our moral sense, but are
in keeping with the degrading offer made by Lot of his
daughters to the men of Sodom. The patriarchs Abraham
and Isaac fail in a due sense of the sin involved in their
conduct about their wives. With aU the religious and
ethical elevation we must ascribe to the patriarchs, there-
fore, Euenen is not borne out in his formerly-quoted remark
that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are pictured as ''not in-
ferior to the prophets of the eighth century B.C., in pure-
ness o( religious insight and inward spiritual piety.'*'
When we advance to Exodus, we are conscious of a great
progress. The writers are, on the theory, the same, and
the history is the continuation of the preceding. Yet
everything is on a changed and grander scale. The ideas
are deeper; the scene is larger and more imposing; the
forces at work are more titanic; the issues are more
> Of. arts. "Anger" and *'Loye," in DieL of BiMe. A similar line of
aigament is developed in Dr. Watson's little work, The Book Genesis a True
mdofrjfy which we had not seen before writing this. Dr. Driver singnlarly
misses tiie point of Dr. Watson's argument m supposing it to prove only
that the narratives reached their present form before the age wnen Amos,
Hosea, etc., "beffan to emphasise and develop beliefs and tmths sooh as
those refened to ififfmstisy p. zlviii). Dr. Watson's argument tarns on the
contrast of Oenesis with Exodus, which was likewise prior to tiiat age, yvl
has these ideas.
* Code (Johns' edition), sects. 144-47. * Seo AboTB» pw M.
ii6 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM
tremendouB. The hour has come for Jehovah to fulfil
promises to the fathera The instrument is prepared ; the
yoke of bondage is to be broken ; the people are to be led
forth to breathe the air of liberty in the desert^ and, as
redeemed, to make voluntary dedication of themselves to
their Deliverer. With this access of religious enthusiasm,
and unparalleled experience of divine grace, goes of necessity
an immense uplifting both in the religious ideas and in the
standard of ethical obligation. The people have now given
them '^ statutes and judgments'* which are to serve as the
norm of moral conduct The ideal set before them is
nothing less than the holiness of Jehovah Himsftlf. They
are to be a "holy" people to EQm,^ and are to prove their
fidelity by obedience to His voica The scenes in this
great drama are depicted with a realism and fresco-like
vividness of colouring which irresistibly suggest that the
narratives were written under the recent impression of the
events which they record : when, at least, the vividness of
that impression had not yet &ded from the memory and
heart of the nation. The strands of the story may be
multiple, — that is yet to be inquired into, — ^but we cannot
admit that thev are diverse. Moses and Aaron are the
central figures m the history, but, as in the case of the
patriarchal narratives, the portraits of the two are the same
in J, E, P, D alike. It is one and the same Moses, with
one and the same Aaron beside him, who appears in all the
so-called " sources," and mediates, under Qoif the freedom
and covenant-organisation of the nation.
CHAPTER V
Zbc ®l^ XTestament as affected lyg Crftfdsm—
li. Ilengfon and Snatitntions : Ood and t>i9
Vnorsbfp
"The wpQrrw fevdof, hirtoiiodly oonBidered, of Oiaf, Eiuneii, uid all
their IbUowen, ooiurists in this: that they make use of the variety of
material afforded them for positively constmoting a history of andent
Israely only to destroy the possibility of saoh a history. This they appear
to do, not to mnoh because of the discrepancies which exist in the
materials, as because of their predetermination to reject as nntmstworthy
all the materials which partake largely of the Hebrew belief in the snper-
natoraL " — L add.
"The view of Israel's early history, offered by any writer, will largely
depend npon his thought of Israel's Gtod."— J. K Oabperteb.
" We must first firmly assert that, while there bave been different fbnna
of monotheism in many peoples and at yarions times, nerertheletB Israal
is and remains the olaasioal people of monotheism ; of that monotheism
which we confess, or, more strictly, which is the preonrsor of oon ; and
in Israel this monotheism is of natiTa origin : we know the histoiy of its
origin very welL^'^-OuHSSL.
"Qod, in creating, theomorphises man; man, therefore, necessarily
anthropomorphises GhxL"— Jaoobi.
ut
CHAPTER V
THE OLD TESTAMENT AS AFFECTED BY CBTTICISM
—11. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS : GOD AND HIS
WORSHIP,
It will be eyident from the preceding discnssioiiB that the
real leyera^ of the newer criticism is found in its theory
of the rehgions developmeot in ancient Israel: to this
subject, therefore, special attention must now be given* It
is not disputed that difficult problems have to be faced on
any theory of the Israelitish religion and institutions.
Questions exceedingly hard of solution arise in regard to
laws, institutions, and practice, and it is the service of
criticism to have set these in the clearest lighb We are
far from persuaded, however, that the methods which have
come into vogue with the radical school hold out the promise
of a satisfactory solution of these difficulties. On tilie con-
trary, these methods seem to us eaten through with an
arbitrary subjectivism which vitiates their application at
every point Stade and Budde are conspicuous examples
of this fault ; but few of the other best-known writers of
the school are far behind in their wilful setting aside, or
mutilation, of the Biblical accounts, and substitution for these
of an imaginary history, built up from ingenious conjectures,
and brilliant combinations on the line of what the critic
thinks the history shouid have been.
L Fault of thb Cbitical Method
It may be useful, before entering on the main discussion,
to ofliar one or two examples of what we regard as the
radical vice of the newer critical method — ^its continual
substitution of arbitrary conjecture for the facts of the
history as given.
119
I20 THE O.T, AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
We take the following from Budde, who prides himself —
be it said — on his respect for the history.^ After propounding
the extraordinary thesis that " the tradition claims that it
was not Israel's ovm QoA who performed these great deeds "
at the Exodus, *'but a Ood up to that time completely
unknown to the Israelites, whose name even they then
learned for the first time " ' (the statement that the fore-
fathers had known Tahweh is a later *' palliating addition "),*
he proceeds to explain how this Gk)d became transformed
into the Yahweh of a later period by the absorption of
" other gods " into Himseli '' Yahweh had not expelled or
annihilated them (the C&naanitish gods), but had made them
subject; He had divested them of their personality by
absorbing them into His own person."^ Then, with charm-
ing fran&ess : "To be sure, neither the law, nor the historical
narratives, nor the prophets, say a ioord of aU this, yet it can
be proved," etc.* Nearly anything, we imagine, could be
proved in the same manner.
Budde's respect for the history does not allow of his
agreeing with those who, "while relinquishing everything
else, have tried to save the Ten Commandments, the * Mosaic '
moral law, for these oldest times." For, " the Ten Command-
ments base all their demands on the nature of the (3od of
IsraeL If, then, they really did come from this period " —
we may ask the reader to note what, in Budde's view, is
involved in the acceptance even of the Decalogue — ^^it
appears that there existed, even in the earliest times, a
conception of God so sublime that hardly anything could
have remained for the prophets to do. This of itself should
suffice to show the impossibility of the Mosaic origin of the
Ten Commandments." Then, with the same engaging
frankness: ''It is, therefore, in the highest degree im-
probable that Yahweh demanded at Sinai the exclusive
veneration of His own Godhead. True, this is the unvarying
testimony of Old Testament tradition. It is to this day the
generally accepted view, and is held even by advanced
specialist& But it can hardly be maintained," eta^
^ *' Thiis treated,** he eays, "the Biblical traditioD, even of the oldest
times, has proTed itself to me to be, in its main features, trustworthy —
I speak of the history of Israel as a nation, not of the stories of primeval and
patriarchal times in Genesis."— iZ^/. <^ Israel, p. 8.
• IHd. p. 14. • Ibid, p. 16. * Ibid. p. 41.
^Ihid. (italios are ours). ^Ibid. p. 59.
n, RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 121
We quote these passages because they are typical
Delitzsch has said: "If history is critically annihilated,
what is left but to fill the tabula rasa with myths ?"^
This we take, as said, to be the primary vice of the prevail-
ing theory — eUTier, the arbitrary setting aside of the biblical
narrative in favour of some novel, no doubt highly ingenious,
construction of the critic's own ; or^ the persistent reading
into the history, in the interest of some fancy, of a meaning
which it cannot be made to bear. A main difficulty, in fact,
in the discussion, is, that, in the multitude* of hypotheses,
and unbounded liberty claimed by the critic to accept or
reject as suits his convenience, it is impossible ever to feel
that one has a sure hold on anything. The critic should at
least, one would think, abide by his own assumptions ; but
he is far from doing so. How constantly, for instance, are
Jephthah's words in Judg. xL 24,' relied on in proof that,
in the time of the Judges, Jehovah sustained the same
relation to Israel as Chemosh did to Moab. Yet this section
is declared by the critics not to belong to the older stratum
of the Book of Judges, but to be a late insertion of uncertain
date : ' certainly, therefore, on the theory, no real speech of
Jephthah's. Wellhausen cites it,^ yet, as Dr. A B. Davidson
points out, '^ elsewhere r^ards the whole passage, with the
allusion to Chemosh, as a later interpolation founded on
Num. XXL 29." ' Similarly, the statement of David in 1 Sam.
xxvi 19, that his enemies had driven him out of Jehovah's
inheritance, saying, "Qo, serve other gods" — continually
quoted in proof that to David Jehovah was only a tribal
god ^ — is, with the chapter to which it belongs, assigned by
Kautzsch, with others, to a comparatively late date:' is
valueless, therefore, as a testimony to David's own sentiments.
Is it desired, again, to prove an original connection between
Jehovah and Moloch? Kuenen, to that end, accepts as
"" historical " the statement in Amos v. 26 that the Israelites
carried about in the desert "the tabernacle of Moloch," ^
if , L p. 9. * See below, p. 181.
'Thus Kantzach, Moore (Judgn), Thatcher {Judgn, ''Cent Bible"),
eto.
^BUL ifUraA^ p. 285.
*iSi^pMitor, 8rd Series, ▼. p. 49. "This pet pa^ieage/' Dr. Davidson
■ays, " fignres of oourse in Wellhanaen, as it does everywhere else since
Yatke." He refers to Wellhausen's BUtk^ p. 195.
• See below, p. 182. * IM. qf O.T., pp. 45, 287.
•SO. ofJtrael, I p. 250.
122 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
though the whole history of the wanderings, which, in its
JE parts, is allowed to be oULer than Amos, is rejected by
him. A proof of the boll-worship of Jehovah from ancient
times \b found by some in the story of the making of the
golden calf in Ex. zxxiL ; yet the story \b rejected as nn-
historicaL^ Others take it as a protest agairat bull-worship : '
Kuenen, as will be seen below, thinks it glances at the fact
that the idolatrous priests of the Northern Kingdom claimed
descent from Aaron.'
To take only one other example. Professor W. B. Smith
writes thus of the sacred pillars of the patriarchs : ** In the
Biblical story they appear simply as memorial pillars, without
any definite ritu^d significance." This, however, he goes on,
" is due to the fact that the narratives are conformed to the
standpoint of the law and of the later prophets, who look on
the ritual use of sacred pillars as idolatrous."^ The critic
forgets, or ignores, that, on his own showing, these patriarchal
stories anteceiled the age of written prophecy, and that,
according to him, in the days of Amos and Hosea, pillars
were still thought to be legitimate.* Whbio then is the
place for the conforming of the narratives to the ideas of
"later prophets"? With the talismanic power which
such instances exemplify of getting rid of unwelcome facts,
and making a theory prove itself by employing it as a means
to break down opposing testimony, it is not difficult for
criticism to produce astonishing results.
Accepting for ourselves the historicity of the Biblical
narratives, till at least their title to our confidence is
disproved, we propose to invert the procedure of the
schools, and, instead of sacrificing the history to a priori
considerations, to inquire at every point whether reason
is shown for setting it aside.
^ Most writers see some oonnection with the bull* worship, $,g,, Stade,
0Msh4e/Ue, i. pp. 466-67. Addis dates the narrative later than the fall
of Samaria (722 b.o.) on the ground that onljr then "the old worship of
Tahweh under the form of a calf, long maintained by kings and Leviaoal
priests (Judg. zriii. SO), received its death-blow."— iTsas. L pp. 161-^2. On
this see below, pp. 148 ff.
>Gf. Eittel, Hist, offfehs, I p. 152.
'ir«B. p. 245. See below, p. 211.
^Bel. ig' Semites, p. 186 ; O.T, in J. C, pp. 241, 854.
^IHd. pp. 186-87 ; Ptopfiela of Israel, p. 116.
IL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 123
IL Eablt Israeutish Mokotheism
We begin by contrasting the Biblical and the critical
views of the early Israelitish conceptions of Ood.
1. It was formerly shown that, in the earliest tradition
we possess of IsraeFs beliefs, there is no trace of any con-
ception of Qod but one essentially monotheistic There
is bat one qualification, which, in justice to the facts, it
is necessary to make on this statement. It is not contended
that, at any period of their history, the Israelitish people
as a whole rose to, or maintained themselves at, the full
height of the monotheistic conception : we know they did
not. To many the conception of Jehovah was no doubt
simply that of their national god; nor was it always, or
perhaps even generally, dear, that some kind of inferior
reality did not belong to the gods worshipped with so
much pomp and ardour by the nations around them.^ Even
in apostolic and sub-apostolic times, Christian believers
and Church fathers did not r^ard the idol-gods of the
Gtentiles as simple nonentities: paganism was to them a
system of demon-worship.' Still harder would it be for
Israel to rise to the height of the prophetic conception
that the idols were " nothings " {dUim)^ in a world where
every ]^ple was polytheistic but themselves. But that
the religion of Abraham, and Moses, and the other great
leaders of the nation was at heart the worship of the one
true God, recognised by them to be the Creator, Buler,
and Lord in providence of the whole world, we see not
the smallest reason to doubt. This was the common view,
prior to the advent of the Kuenen-Wellhausen school,
among the critics themselves,^ and, as the passage above
dted from Budde acknowledges, is the view of leading
^ It would be unsafe, howeyer, to infer this from saoh enressions as,
"Who is like Thee, 0 Jehoyah. among the godst" (Ex. zy. 11), for snch
expressions are foond in prophets and psSms where the monotfaeistio
consdoDsnets is not donbteiL See below, p. 488.
* 1 Cor. z. 20, 21 ; el Jnstin Martyr, 1 Apd. 14, 64, 62, eto.
* OL Dent zzzii 21 ; Ley. ziz. 4 ; Isa. iL 8 ; Fe. zcyi. 4, 6, eto. In
the last passage we read : Jehoyah "is to be feared aboye all gods^** bat
in yer. 6, " For all the gods of the peoples are nothinos."
^ 80 De WetUL LengBrke, Hitdff, £wald, Bleek, Dillmann, eto. On the
other hand, the yiews of Vatke, and of writers like Danmer, Ghillanj, eto.,
met wftb little opnntenapoe. QL KOnig's ffmiptprobUvu, pp. 7 £
124 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
Old Teetament spedaliBts stilL^ It is the view also, we
are persuaded, which answers to the natural reading of
the iact&
The Book of Genesis, originating, it is to be remembered,
as respects at least its JE parts, in the ** pre-prophetic " age,
is, as before pointed out,' throughout a monotheistic book.'
Qod is the Creator of the world and of man : destroys the
whole human race hj a flood; is present and active in
all lands — Babylonia, Mesopotamia, Egypt; works out a
OTadous purpose in the lives of men. The difficulty in
Genesis is not its recognition of Gk)d as supreme, — ^that
appears in every part, — ^but its almost entire ignoring of
what we nevertheless know to be the fact, the existence of
polytheism and idolatry in tribes and nations outside the
patriarchal circle. The God worshipped by the patriarchs
is the OTiiy God whose existence, presence, and working
are recognised in it. We read nothing of gods of Canaan
or Egjrpt. Melchizedek is, like Abratuim, a worshipper of
El £ly6n — *' God Most High," ^ and even Abimeledii and
Pharaoh speak generally simply of "GkxL"' The single
glimpse we get to the contrary is in the ''strange gods'*
(teraphim) which Jacob's household brought with them
from Mesopotamia, and which Jacob required them to
put away.* In Exodus and the remaining Pentateuchal
books it is different There we have a sharp contrast
drawn between Jehovah and "the gods of Egypt '';^ the
people are stringentiy forbidden to worship " o^er gods " ; *
^ See above, p. 120 ; and Chap. IV. p. 98. * Gf. abore^ d. 41.
* Thia IB yery generally admitted of the Book of Genesia aa we naye it.
H. P. Smith, e.^., aays of the early part, where anthropomorphiam ia moat
marked : " What J haa preaoryed ne waa able to bring mto harmony
with the atriotest monotheism. For the Yahweh of onr aoconnt, anthro-
pomorphio aa He is, is yet the Supreme God." — O.T. SUt. p. 16. Of.
Wellhaasen, EisL of Israel, p. 804. Gnnkel acknowledges thia " mono-
theistic trend " of Genesis, and carries it back to an early date. — Cfenetia,
p. zlyii ; aee also his Israel wnd Babylenien, p. 29.
^Gen. xiy. 18-22. It ia not easy to say how far polytheism had
adyanoed in Canaan in the time of Aoraham. The Tel el-Amama tablets
speak of Baalat of Gebal (freqnently), Asherah, Milkn (Molooh), Ammon
(I Amon), Samas, Dagon, eto., bnt do not giye much definite light.
*Gt Qan. zzL 22 flC (in chap. xxyL 27, 28, "Jehoyah'^); Gen. xlL
89, eta
* Gen. zzxL 19, 80 ; zzzy. 2, 4.
' Ex. ziL 12 (P) ; zy. 11. It will not be claimed that P, in the fomm
paassffe, writes other than monotheiBtically.
* Sz. zz. 8 ; zziiL 82.
n. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 125
thej are enjoined to keep themselves apart from, and to
root out, the idolatry of the Canaanites.^ But Jehovah
is still regarded as exalted above all these other gods in
nature, ^gnily, and power, as the God of the whole earth
— ^its Creator, Ruler, and Lord. He is the One who says
of Himself, '' All the earth is Mine." ' Budde, we have seen,
acknowledges that this is the view of Gk)d involved in the
Decalogue. While, therefore, Kuenen is right when be
sums up Israel's religion in t^e formula, ** Yah web Israers
God and Israel Yahweh's people," * this does not in the
least imply that Jehovah was simply to Israel a tribal or
national god. He was the God of their fathers — ^the God
of heaven and earth ^ — ^who of His condescending love had
chosen them to be a people for Himself, with a view to
the ultimate larger blessing of mankind. The keynote
in these early books is precisely the same as in Amos —
the alleged introducer of the ''ethical monotheism":
''You only have I known of all the families of the
earth,"*
What is here said of early monotheism is not contra-
dicted by the anthropomorphisms attributed peculiarly to
the J writer in the Genesis narratives. The anthro-
pomorphisms are na%ve and popular enough ; * yet, beneath
them, the conception of Jehovah as the Creator and Ruler
of the world is never lost sight of ; ' and the sublimity of
the representations of God in other parts of the J narrative
— ^in the revelation of God's name, e.g., in Ex. zxziiL 18, 19,
xxxiv. 6-8* — shows clearly that no such paltry ideas of
God as the critics ascribe to this writer were really his.
The anthropomorphisms belong either to the older tradition
the writer is dealing with, or to a vivid and personalising
way of setting forth God's presence and interest in human
iEz.zzffi.S4; of. Dent xii2fl: *Ez.ziz.S.
* NaL and VMv. BeligionB (Hibbert LeetnreB), p. 106.
^ Gf. Qen. zzir. 8, etc ' Amos iiL 3.
* " JehoTBh fomu men and beasts, hreaihei the breath of life into
tiian's nostrila, kuikU a rib into a woman, plants a garden, takes a man and
puts him into it, Mnffs the beasts to the man, tpal& in the cool of the day,
speaks (Oen. iiL 22) as though He were jealous of the man " (Knobel, m
fifllmann).
* Ot the namtiTe of the flood, the representations of God in Gen. r?iii. 25,
zzir. 8. Bee H. P. Smith, onotod above.
* On the sole ground of tnis loftier oharaoter these passages are treated
bj certain oritios as later insertions. — Of. Ozf. ffez. ii. p. 184.
126 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
things,^ such as is found in prophets and psalmists to the
latest tima
2. Entirelj different from this is the early Israelitish
conception of God ifnagined by the vsw critical school. The
guiding idea here is no longer " revelation/' but *' evolution.''
Man's oldest ideas of Grod being supposed to be his poorest,
an original monotheism in this people is decisively rejected.
"At first," says Kuenen, "the religion of Israel was poly-
theism." ' " Monotheism," says Wellhausen, " was unknown
to ancient Israel"* "The knowledge that there is a
supreme spiritual Being, alone of His kind, Creator and
Preserver of all things, is perfectly lacking to ancient
Israel," is the first sentence in Stade's chapter on pre-
prophetic religion in Israel^ If we ask what conception
is to take the place of that which is discarded, we have first
the general answer that "the relation in which Yahweh
standis to Israel is the same as, for instance, that of Chemosh
to the Moabites."^ Beyond this, we are offered a wide
choice of theories. Kautzsch, e.g.^ can find nothing in the
religion of pre-Mosaic Israel but a species of " polydemonism."
" It is only in a very restricted sense," he thinks, " that we
can speak of such a notion [as God] at all" ^ A connection
is sought by £uenen between Jehovah and Moloch, the
fire-god, who was worshipped with human sacrifices.^ A
favourite theory at present, revived by Budde, is that
Yahweh was originally the storm-god of Sinai, worshipped
by the Kenites, from whom Moses borrowed the name and
cult* With these theories are blended by Stade and others
^Cf. Dr. A. B. Davidson, art ««God" in Diet, of BibU, ii p. 198:
"The langoage only testifies to the warmth and intensity of feeling of the
writers"; TheoL ^ O.T., pp. 108-9. Gunkel remarks: *<In the Old
Testament there are occasionally strong anthropomorphisms ; bnt they are
not so gross as is usual in Babylonia ; Israel neyer said that Jehoyah eats
and drinks. Snoh anthropomorphisms are, in the Old Testament, archaisms,"
etc.— j2t. and Bah. p. 82.
' MbI. oflvTiuX^ L p. 228. He deduces this from the later practice of idolatry.
* Itr. und JwL GtkMMe (1897), p. 80. « Q^aehuihie, i. p. 428.
' Enenen, Ba. of Urael, p. 224 ; so Wellhausen, Stade, Budde, W. B.
Smith, etc.
* Art " Rel. of Israel " in Diet, qf Bible (Extra), p. 628. Kautzsch severs
himself from naturalistic theories when he oomes to Moses. Bis idea of
Qod, he tihinks, can only have come from special revelation (p. 625). But it
was not yet a monotheism : only a " monolatiy."
^ Bel, qf Israel^ L pp. 226-28, 240, etc On the similar theoiy of
Daumer, etc., cf. Konig, Juaupfytroblemet pp. 7 ff.
' The Eenite theory, on which see below, pp. 129 ff. , is advocated by Bodds^
11. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 127
a number of other elements drawn from fetishism, animism,
ancestor-worship, totemism, etc — of which more again.
What are some of the ^unds of these allegations, and of
the rejection of the Bibkcal view ?
(1) Ebrst, and perhaps deepest, of the reasons for this
rejection is the a priori one, that such a conception of Grod
as the Old Testament attributes to the patriarchs and to
Moses was impossible for them at that stage of the history.
It is too elevated and spiritual for their minds to have
entertained. The idea of the uiiity of God has for its
correlates the ideas of the world and of humanity, and
neither of these ideas, it is asserted, was possessed by ancient
Israel^ The idea of the world did not arise till the time
of Amos, when it was introduced through the Assyrian
invasions. These "introduced,'' says WeUhausen, "a new
factor, the conception of the world — the world, of couise,
in the historical sense of that expression. In presence of
that conception, the petty nationalities lost their centre of
gravity, brute force dispelled their illusions, they flung their
gods to the moles and to the bats."' Thus arose the
universalism of the prophets: thus was brought about
the transformation of Yahweh-worship from monolatry to
monotheism.
This seems to us xnost singular reasoning; is, indeed,
throughout, both as. to the idea of the world, and the
impossibility of framing a spiritual conception of God,
again a huge petitio prindpii. Here is a people whose own
traditions, with the best warrant, went back to Babylonia
and Mesopotamia ; who had lived for centuries in Egypt in
the most brilliant period of its civilisation ; a people of the
age of the Tel el-Amama tablets; who entered Canaan
when it stood in connection with, and was the highway of,
Tiela, Stade, Gheyne, eto. It was fayoiued by Oolenao, and some older
writen. It is one of the conceits of Bndde that originally the Israelites
tnced their descent to Cain t Cf. Delitiaoh, Oeneait, L p. 192.
> Thus Stade, Knenen, WeUhausen, eto. On the creation of the world,
Wellhaosen declares that *' in ayouthfol people such a theological abstraction
is unheard of, and so with the Hebrews we find both the word and the notion
only ooming into use after the Babylonian exile." — Hist, of Israel, p. 805.
" Ttt religious notion of humamiiy underlying Gen. iz. 6 is not ancient with
the Hebrews any more than with other nations." — Ibid, p. 812.
* Ibid, p. 478. WeUhausen fails to show what other nations flung their
gods to the moles and the bats as the result of the Assyrian conquests, or
eren that Israel did so as the result of these conquests, or till after the exile.
128 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
all the great empires of the world ; who knew something of
the vast power of the Hittites in the north; yet we are
asked to beUeve that it had no conception of the world, or
of anything larger than a petty state, till the days of Amos !
The JE parts of the " table of nations " alone, in Gen. z.,
cry out against such a notion. As to the spirituality of
Gtod, how can it well be maintained, in view of the exalted
conceptions of God now proved to have ezifited in both
the Babylonian and the Egyptian religions in periods long
anterior to Abraham and Moses,^ that such conceptions
were beyond the grasp of the greater spirits in these times ?
The Code of Hammurabi, in the simplicity and elevation of
its idea of ''Gtxl," as the One in whose name, or before
whom, oaths were to be taken,' is a singular example of
what thoughtful minds were capable of in the age of
Abrahcun. In the Mosaic religion itself we have the
powerful witness of the Decalogue. We agree with Budde
in his testimony to the spirituality of the conception of
God involved in the Ten Words,* but we do not, on that
account, in face of the strongest historical improbabilities,
deny these precepts to Moses. The First Commandment,
indeed, ** Thou shalt have no other gods before Me,'' might
be interpreted in the sense of monola^ry,^ not of monotheism ;
but, in its actual setting, the obvious meaning of the precept
is, that Jehovah alone is to be worshipped, because He alone
is the living and true God.^
1 On the TOonoonood monotheistio elements in the oldest Egyptian texts,
cfl Eenouf; EM&ri Lectwrei, 1879, pp. 89 ff. See also Note A, below.
* The formnla in the Oode is simply, " shall swear in the name of Ood,"
"shall reooont before God," or the like. The Language is nearly identical
with that of the Book of Genesis. The difference is, that witii this high
conception of diTinity, the Babylonians worshipped many spedal gods, whue
the Hebrews were forbidden to worship any bat Jehoyah. See ]Note A on
Barly Ideas of God.
9 Wellhansen also speaks of " the actoal monotheism which is nndonbtedly
presappoeed in the muyersal precejits of the Decalogue." — ffist. of Israel,
p. 440. We have thus the altematiye of denying the Decalogue to Moses,
or of admitting that a monotheistio conoeption of God lay at the foundation
of the religion of IsraeL See below, pp. 152 ff. £yen Euenen admits that^ in
its fundamental form, the Decalogue is Mosaic
^Thus Kuenen, Kautzsch, ete. The theory on which this rests, yis.,
that "monolatrjT," or the worship of one sole (tribal) god, was the rule
among surroundmg peoples is open to the grayest doubts. Cf. Dr. A. B.
Dayic&on, art. "God," in Did, of BibU,
' ^ Dr. A. B. Dayidson on this precept in JEasposUar, 8rd Serisi^ v.
p. 44.
11. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 129
(2) The modem theory may be usefully tested by
reference to its most prevalent recent form — the alleged
Kenite origin of the Yahweh cult The theory, in esseuce,
is, as above stated, that Tahweh, whose name and worship
Moses introduced into Israel, was originally the storm-god
of. the £enites, believed by them to have his local seat on
Mount SinaL A connection is thought to be established by
the facts that Moses was living among the Kenites, with
Jethro, when Yahweh was revealed to mm ; that the abode
of Yahweh is placed at Sinai ; and that His presence there
is associated with thunder, lightning, and storm. The
classical passage in proof is Deborah's Song,^ in which,
according to Wellhausen, Yahweh is "summoned to come
from Sinai to succour His oppressed people, and to place
Himself at the head of His warriors." ' Budde, it was seen,
draws the conclusion that Yahweh was a God absolutely
unknown to the Hebrews before the Exodus, and explains
His intimate association with Canaan by the notion that He
*" absorbed " the Canaanitish deities into Himself I
The far-fetched and arbitrary character of this theory,
which Budde allows to be contradictory of the uniform
tradition of the Old Testament, can be judged of bv the
most ordinary reader. Not only does it lack real evidence,
but it is directly in the teeth of the fact that the Jehovah
who appeared to Moses is expressly identified in the oldest
sources with the God of the fathers, and His interposition
is represented as in fulfilment of His covenant promises to
them.* This is independent of any theory we may form as
to whether the sacred name was known earlier or not In
point of fact many of the critics now hold that it vkia
known, if only in limited circles.^ On the other hand,
there is not the least proof, as Kittel points out, that
Yahweh was the name of a Kenite deity.^ When Moses,
later, invited Hobab the Kenite, his brother-in-law, to come
with the Israelites, it was that they might do him good,
" for Jehovah hath spoken good concerning Israel," not that
he, as an earlier worshipper of Yahweh, might do them
good.^ It is but a precarious hold which the theory finds
^ Judg. T. * HiU, oflsrad^ p. 844.
• Ex. ii 28-25, ill. 18-16, eta
^ See Note B on the Antiquity of the Name Jehovah. Many now tnm It
as £ur back aa Babylonia. See below, p. 409.
' Hiat. of ffebs. i p. 260. * Num. x. 29.
I30 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
in the Song of Deborah, especially when it is remembered
that bj the time of the Judges Jehovah's presence is beyond
all question presupposed as in the midst of His people in
Canaan.^ How then should He require to be "summoned"
from Sinai?' The bold, figurative language in the opening
of the Song is most easily understood as a reminiscenoe of
the manifestations of Jehovah's presence and power in the
desert and at Mount Sinai, viewed as a pledge of present
help,»
Stade has himself no little difficulty in maintaining his
theory of a local and limited deity, whose seat was at SinaL
Yahweh, he allovrs, was ** every where " present to His
worshippers in Canaan, and could be worshipped "every-
where.^ His presence and help are not confined to His
own land: He accompanies His worshippers into foreign
lands, and there guards and defends them. Thus Me
promises to Jacob at Bethel to be everywhere with him:
He is with Joseph in Egypt, goes with Jacob down to
Egypt, works miracles for Elijah at Zarephath, etc. He
knows Sarah's thoughts ; it is declared of Him that nothing
is too hard for Him ; He can help by many or by few ; He
destroys wicked cities ; visits landls like Egypt with famine ;
and otherwise displays His universal might.^ Stade speaks
of these things as indications of a tendency to "break
through "* the old notion of God;* they are in reality a
disproof of his theory of that notion. The Song of Deborah
itself, rightly regarded, is evidence of a far higher conception
of Jehovah in the time of the Judges than the moidem
theory will allow. How sublime the picturing of the
majesty and omnipotence of God in the opening theophany ;
how irreconcilable with the idea of a local deity the resist-
^ The whole book is eyldenoe ; but of. Jndg. i 19, 22 ; or chap. zi. 11 :
" Jephthah nttered all his words before Jehovah in Mizpeh " ; or the preeenoo
of the ark of Jehovah at Bethel and Shiloh.
* *'The truth is," says Professor Robertson, "the Song says not a word
about Jeho^ih beiiig ' summoned ' from Sinai on the occasion of the batUe
referred to "—Early Eel. p. 193.
• Gf. for parallels, Deut. xxziii 2 ; Hab. iii 8 ff. ; Pss. zviii. 7 ff., IzviiL
7 ff., etc. Enenen himself says : " Of course, we do not deny that the pioua
among the Israelites, in using these expressions, were aware that they spoke
in metaphors." — Eel, cf Israel^ i. p. 241.
« Oetehiehte, I p. 446.
'Ihid, i. pp. 480-82. Ct the references, Gen. zviii. 14 ; zzviii 15 1L;
1 Sam. zir. 6 ; 2 Kings v. 15 ff., etc
•iM(i.p.480.
IL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 131
leflB presence of Jehovah in Seir, at Sinai, in Canaan;^
how manifest the supremacy of this God in nature and
providence, when even ''the stars in their courses" fight
against His enemies ; ' how distinct the assertion of Jehovah's
righteousness ; * how lofty and spirUtuU the closing strain —
suggestive of the Second Commandment and of Deuteronomy
— *' Let them that love Him be as the sun when he goeth
forth in his might I"^ The theory as a whole thus fails of
evidence, and we are not surprised that critics like Konig,
Eattel, Kautzsch, Dr. A. B. Davidson,^ and others reject it.
The fact that Horeb is already spoken of in Ex. iii 1 as
** the mountain of God" is a very fragile buttress: the ex-
pression is probably used proleptically.
(3) We come back, then, in support of the theory that
Jehovah was a 'Hribal" (or merely national) god to the
tvH) passages which, from their perpetual recurrence, may,
without offence, be called the stock proofs of that hypothesis,
viz., the words of Jephthah in Judg. xl 24, and those of
David in 1 Sam. xxvL 19. But, impartially examined,
what do these passages amount to ? Jephthah says to the
king of the Ammonites : " Wilt thou not possess that which
Chemosh thy god giveth thee to possess ? So whomsoever
Jehovah our God hath dispossessed from before us, them
will we posses&" Even accepting the interpretation put
upon the words, one may reasonably demur to the erecting
of the utterance of this rude Gileadite chieftain, in a time
Ct religious disorganisation, into a standard for the true
idea of God in the Mosaic religion. That must be judged
of on its own ampler evidence, apart from a passage like
this. But even on the Ups of Jephthah, rude soldier though
he is, it is by no means clear that the words are intended
as more than a form of speech in accommodation to the
1 Judg. ▼. 4, 6.
* Yer. 20. "In the Song/' says Dr. A. B. Dayidson, ** we obflerre Wm
regarded aa raling in heaven and on earth, commanding the stars in their
ooursea, and the riyers as thej flow." — O.T. Prophecy, p. 88.
' Yer. 11. In Bodde's yiew, the Yahweh of Moses had not eyen monl
dharacter (22^. ^Israel, n. 80).
ioson savs
prophetic minds sach as this, and not the external histories of rude' soldiers.
* Yer. 81. Dr. Dayioson says here : " Had we a few more poems bj
sach as nnfortonately we possess alone [But see below, pp. 148, 884], we
should, I believe, be able to form a higher idea even of the religious condition
of the people under the Judges." — Ibid. pp. 87-38.
' Kautzsch speaks of it with respect, but does not accept it — '^BaL ef
Uraal,'' Did, p. 62 ; of. Davidson, Thsol. of O.T., pp. 50-62.
132 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CJEUTICISM—
Ammonite point of view. The section seems based,
before said, on Num. xxi. 22 ff., where, it might be shown,
a soffioiently high idea of God is implied Jehovah, in any
case, is obviously far more to Israel than Ohemosh is to
Ammon; is even, in ver. 27, invoked as 'Hhe Judge" to
judge between them.^ The second passage, in which David
says, '' They have driven me out this day that I should not
cleave unto (or, have no share in) the inheritance of
Jehovah, saying, Go, serve other gods," has, to our mind,
even less probative forca Wellhausen entirely misrepre-
sents its import when he speaks of David as ^ compelled to
serve other gods," ' and Professor W. R Smith not less when
he says that David takes it for granted that a man who is
excluded from the commonwealth of Israel ^must go and
serve other gods." * One desiderates here some more exact
thinking. Does anyone— even Wellhausen — really suppose
that when David crossed into Philistia he ceased to worship
Jehovah, and served Dagon instead? or that Naomi
worshipped Chemosh in'Moab ? or that Elijah served Baal
at Zarephath ? What, on this theory, would be the meaning
of Naaman's apology for ** bowing down " in the house of
Bimmon ? ^ We have learned from Stade himself, what all
the history teaches, that Jehovah accompanied His servants
in their wanderings : how could David imagine it would be
otherwise with him? Taking the passage most literally,
David is not speaking for himself, but declaring what others
say ; and he uses this bold mode of speech to emphasise his
sense of the deprivation implied in being banished from
Jehovah's immediate presence, and driven into a land where
other gods are worsUpped. The fact that precisely the
same expression occurs twice in an undoubtedly mono-
theistic book like Deuteronomy should warn us against
attaching too much weight to its presence here.*
1 We may quote Dr. A. B. Davidson again : ** The trath is that snoh
references to Gnemorii and other heathen gods prove nothing, because thej
would prove that even Jeremiah regarded Chemosh as a real divinity (Jer.
zlviiL 7)." — SaGposUar, 8rd Series, v. p. 49. We may compare our own way
of speaking of heathen gods. Even in the case of a monotheistic reU^don
lUce Mohammedanism, we make a distinction between the Christian's Qod
and Allah. Both are designations of the Supreme Being, yet the concep-
tions of Qod are so different that we hold them apart in thought, and give
them different names.
' Hist, qfltrasl, p. 22. ' ProphiU, p. 54. « 2 Kings v. 18.
' Dent, zzviii. 8o, 64. Wellhausen cites as another proof : ** When
IL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 133
We conclude that no good ground has been shown for
the view that "ethical monotheism'' was first introduced
hj the prophets, beginning with Amos.^ We have found
monotheism already embedded in the narratives in Genesis,
which, in their J and E parts, are, on the critic's own
showing, " pre-prophetic." So far from monotheism being
the creation of the prophets,-^with, perhaps, Elijah as
precursor, — these prophets, without exception, found upon,
and presuppose, an older knowledge of the true God. ^07
bring in no new doctrine, still less dream of the evolution
from a Moloch or a Eenite storm-god, — as much the product
of men's fancies as Chemosh or Dagon, — of the living, holy,
all-powerful, all-gracious Being to whose service the people
were bound hy every tie of gratitude, but from whom they
had basely apostatised. They could not have understood
such evolution from an unreality into a reality. They were
in continuity with the past, not innovators upon it.
Dillmann speaks for a large class of scholars when he says,
in decisively rejecting this theory : " Ko prophet is conscious
of proclaiming for the first time this higher divine
Principle : each reproaches the people for an apostacy from
a much better past and better knowledge : God has a con-
troversy with His people." '
in. Eablt IsRASLrnsH Worship
Budde stands nearly alone in denying an ethical element
in the original Mosaic conception of God ; but it is hardly
possible to put lower than most writers of this school do
the ideas entertained by the people in the pre-prophetic age
of the proper mode of representing and worshipping the
deity to whom they had attached* themselves. Fetishism,
animism, totemism, image-worship, ancestor-worship, tree-
and stone-worship, human sacrifices, eta, all play their part
Cain is driyen out of the land (Canaan), he la driyen from the presence of
Jehovah" (Gen. iy. 14, 16). Similarly Stade: "Cain, driven out of
Palestine, and pleading for the alleviation of his punishment, is made to
■aj," eto. (i. pp. 44^-47). (yain, on this view, is supposed to have had his
abode in Palestine. Wonderftil is the power of criticism to make the text
■ay what it pleases — even to the turning of it into nonsense I
* Of. Duhm, quoted above, p. 68.
* AlUesL Theol. p. 56. Cf. Schultz against Stade in O.T. Tk$oi. i. pp.
128-24. Baethgen maintains that the religion of Israel never was p<My«
theistio : that ito strange gods were imported. — BeUrSge^ p. 289.
134 THE O.T. AS AFFECl'ED BY CRITICISM—
here. Most writers are content to explain a religion by the
help of one or two snch principles — by fetishism, e.g.^ or
ancestor-worship, or totemism. It is reserved for Stade,
in his picture of pre-prophetic religion, to blend aU these
forms of superstition in one grand mHange. We shall con-
sider this subject under the general head of worship.
The simple elements of patriarchal worship, in the
Biblical yiew, are prayer and sacrifice. The patriarchs
build their altars, and call on the name of God. After the
Exodus, worship is regulated by the Mosaic constitution.
The fundamental laws of the covenant forbade the worship
of God by images, required the extirpation of idolatry,
denounced witchcraft, and condemned the practices of the
Canaanites generally.^ In the hands of the critics this
picture of Israel's history undergoes a complete transforma-
tion. It was seen before that the Biblical Mstory, on the
face of it, does not lend support to the view that ^e- and
stone-worship, ancestor-worship, totem-worship, teraphim-
worship, human sacrifices and the like, were prominent
features of the religion of the patriarchs, or of the people
who came out of Egypt with Moses.' How then is &e
theory made out ? Tji the first place, as before, by rejecting
the history we have, and substituting for it a construction
evolved from a general theory of the origin of religion; in
the next place, by reading back the disobediences and cor-
ruptions of the later history into the original form of the
religion, and fastening on stray passages and incidents an
interpretation contrary to the general impression of the
narrative.* The method can best be illustrated by observing
it at work.
1. The Book of Genesis gives us a clear and intelligible
account of how places ' like Bethel, Hebron, Beersheba,
Shechem, came to be regarded with peculiar veneration by
the Israelites. They were places hallowed by the residence
and worship of their fathers, and by the revelations of God.
These stories form part of the patriarchal history, and we
have sought to show that there is no reason for discrediting
them. The newer criticism, however, cannot accept so
> Ex. xz. 4, S, 28 ; zxiL 18, 21; zzui 24, 82, 88.
* 8«e aboTe, pp. 89, 40.
* KantzBoh says he " mnit empliasise yvtj ttrongly that in almost vmrj
Initanoe we have here to deal with hypotheses, and not with facta." — "BeL
of Israel," Diet. p. 618.
IL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 135
nmple an explanation. It rejects the history, and assumes
that these places were really old Canaanitwh mncttuiries,
which the Israelites adopted on their entrance into Canaan,
and afterwards glorified by weaving around them this web
of patriarchal legend.^ If we ask for proof, none is forth-
coming. We are thrown back on assertion, and on the
assumption of the mythical character and non-historicity of
the patriarchal narratives generally.
2. Stade gives the matter a further development. There
were ffraves at some of these places (Hebron, Machpelah,
Shechem). What is clearer than that the real origin of the
sacredness of these sanctuaries was ancestor - worship ?
" Before the altars at Hebron and Shechem were altars of
Yahweh, sacrifices were offered on them to the ancestral
spirits of Abraham and Joseph, and we have here a proof "
—the reader will note the stringency of Stade's ideas of
proof — ''that we are right in our conclusion that the
worship of ancestors was a usage in ancient Israel"' The
tribal system is thought to be connected with ancestor-
worship,* and additional proofs are found in mourning
^ustoms.^ Other writers amplify the suggestion. "The
teraphim,** Budde thinks, " belong to the extensive domain
)f ancestor- worship, which, in many lands and continents,
•ven in the New World, has formed the oldest verifiable
foundation of religion."^ The yearly sacrifice of David's
family in Bethlehem may be presumed to have been
originally offered "to a deified eponymous hero."* The
rule is a simple one — wherever you find mention of burial-
places, be sure you are on the track of worship of ancestor&^
Addis finds Jacob in Gen. xxxv. 14 " pouring out a libation
> WeUhaxuen, Hid. cf Imtuly pp. 18, 80, 826, eto. ; Budde, Bd. cf
lartult p. 107, etc £.g,, Jacob's tow at Betiiel is supposed to be meant
as a sanction of the payment of tithes to the priests of the calf-worship at
that place.
* GeKhiehte, I pp. 451-62. * IHd. ^. 452.
^ Mourning customs are supposed to haye their rationale in the attempt,
as KautEBch says, "to render oneself unrecognisable by the spirit of the
dead, and thus to escape its malign influence." — "Bel. of Israel," Diet.
pp. 614-16. Kautzsch criticises the theory, and concludes that if ancestor-
wonhip erer prevailed in the pre-Mosaic period, no consciousness of it sur-
Tired to historical times.
^Sel. cf Israel, p. 64. Max Miiller subjects the theoiy of ancestor-
worship to a historical examination in his Anthropological Religion(lMX^\ ,\
and reiects it as based on totally mistaken data.
• tkid. p. 65. 7 Ibid.
136 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
to tbe 80ul of the dead."^ And these things, in all serious-
ness, are regarded as " scientific " treatment of the history.
3. Was animism, or belief in a spiritual presence in
natural objects, a feature of the religion of ancient Israel ?
These writers have no doubt of it Primitive peoples are
accustomed to connect the presence of the deity with wells
and tree&' Now there are " wells " mentioned in Genesis^
at Beersheba and elsewhere.* It is true that there is no
hint in the patriarchal narratives that the wells were valued
for anything but the supply of water they yielded But
this is no obstacle to the belief that originally the wells
were thought of as dwelt in by spirits, and thBit this was
the real ground of the reverence paid to them.^ So trees
were wont to be r^arded as manifestations of a divine life.
And the patriarchs were fond of the shade of spreading
trees, built altars near them,^ sometimes even planted them.
Abraham dwelt by the " oaks " or '' terebinths of Mamre ; ^
he planted a tamarisk at Beersheba; Deborah, Bebekah's
nurse, was buried under" the oak" at Bethel, which thence-
forth was called "Allon-bacuth" — ^**the oak of weeping."*
" The famous holy tree near Shechem,"y3ays Professor W. R
Smith, ''called 'the tree of soothsayers,' in Judg. ix. 37,
and ' the tree of the revealer ' in Gen. xiL 6, must have been
the seat of a Canaanite orade." * Possibly ; though there is
in the statement the full measure of assumption usual in
such matters.^ But there is nothing to connect the
patriarchs with these superstitions, or to indicate that they
thought of a god as dwelling in these trees. The Canaanite
^ Sex, ii. p. 226. Addis takos this Terae from its place, and oonneota it
with the death of Deborah.
*Ofl W. B. Smith, Bel. of Semites, pp. 151 ff.
* Oen. ZTi. 7 ; zzi 25, 80 if. ; xxiy. 16 ; xzTi 15, 19 ff., eto.
« Stade, GfeschichU, L p. 456.
' Oen. ziii. 18.
* Oen. ziii. 18 ; ziy. 18 ; zviii. 1. The LXX has the singular, "oak."
^ Oen. zzzY. 8. Stade would connect the very names of the trees —
Elah, Elan, Alien — with the divine name £1 (L p. 455). ''This attempt,"
says Professor A. B. Davidson, "may be safely neglected." — DieL of Bible,
ii. p. 199.
^ JReL of SemiUs, ^, 179.
* "The famous holy oak" has already a touch of such assumption. It
is assumed that the " Moreh ** in Gen. zii. 6 is not, like Mamre, a proper
name (cf. Dillmann, in loc,), and that the identity of this tree is certain with
the "oak of Meonenim" in Judg. iz. 37. Similarly, "the palm tree"
under which Deborah sat and judged (Judg. iv. 4) is identified with " t^e
oak " which marked the grave of Bebekah's nurse (Gen. zzzy. 8).
II. REUGION AND INSTITUTIONS 137
•
Asherahs, or tree symbols of Astarte, on the other hand, —
another of the proofs, — were no doubt idolatrous ; biit they
were from the first, and all down the history, absolutely
condemned.^
4. The proofs offered of fetishism and of stone-worship in
ancient Israel are equally numerous — and equally incon-
clusive. Only allusion need be made here to the ark of
the covenant, which will form a subject of discussion by
itself after.' The history speaks of an ark, the visible
symbol of the presence of Jehovah among His people,* in
which were deposited the two tables of the law.^ Jehovah
dwelt, not in, but above the ark, between (or upon) the
cherubim."* This, however, in the view of the critics, is a
mistake. Analogies are drawn from other religions to prove
that '' the ark of Yahweh " was really a fetish-chest ; and
the tradition that it contained tables of stone is to Stade
the ** most convincing " evidence that it had in it two stones in
which Tahweh was believed to dwelL* The stones were pro-
bably " meteorites " — appropriate to the lightning-god.^ ** If
the divinity of Sinai resided in a rock," says Professor H. P.
Smith sagely, — '*^ which from Arabian analogies seems very
probable, — it would be natural for the people to secure His
presence bv providing such a chest in which to transport
the fetisL * One feels sometimes that it would require
1 Sz. xzziY. 18 ; of. Deat zvL 21.
« Cfc Chap. VI. pp. 161 flf.
' Num. X. 88 ff.; Josh. iiL 6.
^ Hence the name "ark of the ooTenant." Gf. Deat x. 1-6, 1 Kings
Tiii. 9, with Sz. xziy. 12 ff., zzt. 21. See below, p. 162.
* 1 Sam. iy. 4 ; 2 Sam. yi 2. Cf. A. B. Dayidson, Theol. ofO, T., p; 112.
Kuenen ei^s of these passages: "We most hold that the author wrote
* the ark of Yahweh,' ana ' the ark of Ood,' nothing more."— iZs^. of Israel, i.
p. 259. Apart, howeyer, from the omission of the words " of the ooye-
nant" in the LXX (Vat God.) of 1 Sam. iy. 8-5, which is not deoisiye,
the " most " is in his own theory. See below, p. 162.
* CfesehiehU, L pp. 448-49, 457. "This conception," Stade says, "is
what from the standpoint of the history of religion must be called
fetishistio" (p. 448).
^ Ihid. p. 458 ; of. Knenen, i p. 288. Kantzsch adopts the " meteorite **
theory. — "ReL of Israel," Diet, p. 629. Bennett says: "According to
early tradition, two sacred stones were presenred in tae ark." — GeMsis,
p. 282. Tx«dition, howeyer, says nothing of " two sacred stones," it speaks
only and definitely of the two tables of the law.
■ 0,T. HisUrry, p. 71. Professor A. B. S. Kennedy, in art "Ark" inZ>ict
<f BibU (i. p. 150), dissociates himself from this yiew, "now generally
adopted," he says, "by Gontineutal writers." On the literatmw, see
Kantoioh, as aboye*
138 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
the irony of an Elijah to deal fittingly with each
hypothefies, but we are content to leave them to the reader's
own reflections.
A more direct proof of stone-worship, however, is
thought to be found in the setting up of sacred ^piUajs"
or moffebou by the patriarchs and others — as by Jacob at
Bethe V by Jacob and Laban in Mount OUead,' by Joshua
at Shechem,* by Samuel at Ebenezer,^ etc. It is ^e that,
as Professor W. R Smith admits, these pillars or stones are
never represented in the narratives as anything but
memorial pillars;* but it is insisted that the reu idea
underlying them is that Grod was actually present in the
stone, or at least then took up His abode in it.* It is
pointed out that, in the case of Jacob, not ''the place,"
but the ''stone" itself, is called "Bethel," in Gen. xxviiL
22,^ and a connection is sought with the Greek word
fiauriXia, a name for sacred stones.^ But there is not
a vestige of evidence that there was ever a class of sacred
stones in Israel called " Bethels," ^ and it is surely obvious
from the context that the stone is called " Bethel," merely
as marking the site of the pUiee. This ingenious hypothesis,
in short, is simply a reading into the narrative of ideas
which do not necessarily belong to it "It cannot be
inferred," Dillmann says justly, " from Gen. xxviii 18, xxrv.
14, 15, xlix. 24, that the patriarchs worshipped holy stones :
the stone of Jacob appears only as a symbol of a place,
and monument of the experience of God's nearness; also
in later times we read nothing of stone-worship among
the people."^* Neither, we may add, is there the slightest
evidence that the prophets, in their later polemic against
idolatrous moffebas, intended the least disrespect to such
memorial pUIars as were set up by Jacob or Joshua. In
^ Gen. xxviii 18, 22 ; zzx7. 14.
' Gen. xzzL 46. Also in vera. 46-49, a heap or cairn.
' Josh. zxi7. 26, 27.
« 1 Sam. yii. 12. " Gf. above, p. 122.
* Professor W. R. Smith distingniahes soch dwelling in stones from fbtiali-
ism proper {Eel, ofSemiUs, p. 189).
7 Ibid. p. 187.
• Cf. art. " Bethel *' in DicL of Bible, i p. 218.
' As Schnltz, e.g., would seem to suggest, O.T. TKed. i p. 207.
^ AlUetL Thsd. p. 90. So Konig in art ''Symbol" in Did. ^ BHU
(Extra), p. 170 : "The ma^feboth, win, were not set up on their own
account. They were not meant to bo dwelling-plaoes or the dei^, bnt
were symbols, expressive of gratitade for a divine revelation," etc
II. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 139
laa. zix. 19 it is even predicted that ''in that day there
shall be an altar of Jehovah in the midst of the land of
Egypt, and a pillar (moffela) at the border thereof to
Jehovah." It is a forced explanation of such a passage
to say that, in Isaiah's time, pillars were not yet regarded
as unlawfuL^ Memorial pillars never were so r^rded:
"pillars" on the other hiand, connected with idolatrous
worship were already condemned in the first legislation,'
— ^far older, on any showing, than Isaiah.
6. Another form of superstition with which the religion
of Israel is brought into relation is totemism^ or belief in
the descent of a tribe from a sacred animal Professor W. B.
Smith found in this the key to the clan system and
sacrificial customs of the Semites — the Hebrews included.'
Support is sought for the theory in Biblical names — ^in
the name Caleb, e.g,, which means a dog,^ — and Stade
urges such facts as the ''horns" of the altar, and the
bull-worship of the Northern Kingdom.* The theory has
not niet with general acceptance, and hardly needs here
fuller discussion.*
6. To the long list of heathenish practices asserted
to belong to the religion of ancient Israel may be added —
human iadsrifUe. Human sacrifice was a feature of
Moloch- worship : the Israelites were acquainted with it ;
in times of religious declension even caused their children
to pass through the fire to Moloch.^ If, then, as Kuenen
thinks, Yahweh was originally connected with Moloch,
^ Aooordinf^ to Yatke, Enenen, Duhm, etc, the abolition of fiw^^ebas
was indnded in the reforms of Hezekiah. Ct Konig, H(Mi^pr<Mem4^ pi 68.
*Ex. sdii 24 (imageB=maffe5a«); of. Isa. zyiL 7, 8; Mio. ▼. 18.
Hoeea, in chap. iiL 4, seems to group together lawful and unlawful objects.
• BO. tfSemiUs, pp. 117 ff., 180,. 261 ff., 424 fil ; Kinship and Marriage,
chap. viiL ; ''Animal Worship and Animal Tribes," Jowr. ^ Philology,
1880.
.^OL Kinship and Marriage^ pp. 218 ff. : "The nomadic populations of
Southern Palestine, which ultimately became incorporated witn Judah, also
present animal names, of which the most important is that of the Oalebbites,
ordog.tribe*'(p. 219).
•GesMehUt p. 466. Stade mentions (p. 466) that W. B. Smith
sappoees the serpent to be the totem of the house of David.
' See Note 0 on Professor W. B. Smith's Theory of Sacrifice. Kautzsch
eiiticises ^e totem-theory in "Rel. of Israel," JXet. p. 618. If the theonr
were as ingeniously applied to British personal (animal) names, symbols
(e.f., John Bull, British Lion), tavern signs (a large dass), etc., it would
bring out startling results.
^ Of. 2 Kings zvi. 8 ; zzi. 6 ; xsiii. 10 ; Jer. zzzii. 86, etc
I40 THE O.T, AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
haman sacrifioe was to be expected in His service.^ If,
on the other hand, this abhorrent idea of the connection of
Jehovah with Moloch is rejected, the chief basis of the
theory is destroyed, and other proofs become of secondary
account No fair reader of the history of Israel can say
that human sacrifice was at any time a legitimate or
recognised part of the worship of the nation. Proofs
drawn from Abraham's temptation (the moral of which
is that such sacrifices were not desired by Jehovah),^ from
the destruction of the first-bom,' Samuel's hewing of Agag
in pieces before Jehovah,^ the hanging of Saul's seven sons,^
eto., are quite illusory, for none of the last-named cases
answers properly to the idea of sacrifice. If Micah asks :
" Shall I give my first-bom for my transgression, the fruit
of my body for the sin of my soul?"* — asks it only to
reject the supposition — this no more proves that human
sacrifice was a usual or recognised part of Jehovah's
religion, than Paul's words, ''If I give my body to be
burned,"^ prove that surrender to death by fire was a
common form of devotion in the* apostolic Church. There
remains the case of Jephthah's sacnfice of his daughter in
fulfilment of his rash vow.' The circumstances are unusual,
and there is still doubt as to the manner in which Jephthah
fulfilled his vow.^ But, admitting that the maiden was
actually slain as a sacrifice, and not simply devoted, we
may be excused, as before, for not accepting the action of
this very partially enlightened Gileadite, in a rude age,
as a rule for judging of the true character of Israel's
religion. How would it fare with Christianity, if it were
judged by individusd instences of misguided zeal, in con-
trariety with its own first principles, occurring, say, in the
Middle Ages ? We may safely apply to all human sacrifices
^ Of. M, qf Israel, i. pp. 228, 237. Knenen carries over all the thinf^
condemned by the prophets, including female prostitation, into the worship
of Yahweh (of. p. 72).
'Gen. zziL
* Ex. xiii. 2, 11-12, etc The redemption of the first-born is thought
to haye its origin in this practioe. C(. Enenen, L p. 290.
« 1 Sam. XT. 88.
* 2 Sam. zzi. 1-14. These are Enenen's own instances (L p. 287).
< Mio. vi 7, 8. M Cor. xiii. 8.
•Jndg.zi80, 81, 84-40.
* Gf. Sanday, Insptration, p. 138 ; and see the fiill discussion in
KdV-er*s Bib. OuchicKU, ii pp. 100-8.
IL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 141
what Jeremiah says of the sacrifioes to Moloch : " Which
I commanded them not, neither came it into My mind,
that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah
tosin."*
IV. Image- Worship in Israiel
A more important question than any of the above is —
Was imag^-ivorBhip an original or permissible part of
Israel's religion ? To most the Second Commandment would
seem decisive on that point; but it is not so to the critic^.
The Decalogue is denied to Moses, and a principal reason
for rejecting the precept prohibiting images is precisely
that images are held to have been, in point of fact,
worshipped.' That there was deplorable defection, and
lapsing into idolatry, in the time of the Judges, and under
the kmgs, no one, of course, denies; it is the assertion of
the Bible itself, and the constant subject of the denunciation
of the prophets. It is a different matter when it is maintained
that the worship of Jehovah was originally, and all down
the history, by imagea The assertions of tiie critics here
are of the most positive kind. Wellhausen says roundly :
''The prohibition of images was during the older period
quite unknown.''* Professor H. P. Smiui tells us that even
the great prophets ''no doubt conceived Qod as existing
in human fonn."* It was not, however, in human form,
but under the image of a buU, that Jehovah is supposed
to have been worshipped from ancient times in Israel.^
The support for this is chiefly drawn from the calf -worship
set up by Jeroboam in Northern Israel, and confirmatory
evidences are sought in the ephod of Gideon,* the images
^ J«r. zzxii 86. Another prophetio pusu^ Adduced by Eneneii ii Hob.
zilL 9^ with the readings "Sa<nifiomg men, they kiss the oalyes" (L p. 76).
Sren so, thepractioe ie only mentioned to be condemned. See Note D on
Saorifioe of Gmldren.
* See aboTe, p. 120 ; and below, p. 168. Ct Kittel, Rid. t^Sigbs. 1. p. 248.
Ct Schnlts. 0,T. TheU. i. p. 210. ProfeoBor W. B. Smith says : " Even the
prindple 01 tiie Second Commandment, that JehoTah la not to be wonhippod
Dy images . • • oannot, in the light of hiatoiy, be regarded aa having so
fundamental a plaoe in the religion of early IsraeL" — Prophets, p. 08.
^ O.T. BUiory, p. 18. Kantzeoh also thinks that the idea of Jehoyah
as having bodily form oontinned HU the pmphetio age. — "BeL of Israel,"
Dicl. p. 087. CC Kittel, EitL qfHebs, i. pp. 248 ff.
* Thns generally. ' Jndg. viiL 27.
142 THE O.T. AS AITECTED BY CRITICISM—
of Micah,^ the brazen serpent of Moses * It is allowed
that there was no ime^ of Jehovah in the temple at
Jerusalem;' but it is urged that there were other visible
symbols/ and that images were common among the people.^
Nothing, in our view, could be more baseless than this
contention, but it will be well to^ look at the subject more
closely.
1. We are entitled to say that the oldest periods of the
history afford no confirmation of this theory. The worship
of the patriarchs, in the Book of Genesis, was without
imases. The only apparent exception, as before noticed, is
in the " teraphim ** of Laban's family.' What these " tera-
phim '* were is obscura They are probably correctly enough
described by Kuenen as ''images which were revered as
household gods, and consulted as to the future."' They
were at any rate not images of Jehovsdi, and were put away
by Jacob at Shechem as incompatible with the pure worship
of God.' In the cases of Abraham, of Isaac, of Jacob, of
Joseph, or, indeed, of any of the patriarchs, image- worship
is not so much as hinted at. " The worship of Grod in the
house of Abraham/' as Dillmann says, "was imageless."'
BaudiBsin, indeed, would carry back the bull- worship even
to Abraham ; ^' but this is baseless conjecture. Again, in
Mosaic times, and in the Book of Joshua, there is no sugges-
tion of a lawful worship of images. The only record^
instance of image-worship is in the makii^ of the golden
calf at Sinai,^ and this is denounced and punished as a
flagrant transgression, which all but cost the people their
covenant privuege. The prohibitions of image- worship, and
of participation in the idolatry of the Canaanites,are, on the
other hand, absolute. The brazen serpent erected by Moses
was not an image of Jehovah, or an image for worship at
all, though it became at a later time an object of worship
to the Israelites, and was in consequence destroyed by
> Jndg. zvii. 8, 4 ; ZYiii. 14, 20, eto. ' Num. xzi. 8, 9.
* Kuenen, JUL cf Israel, i. pp. 80, 289.
^ The ark ib held by Kuenen, Stade, etc., to haye been sooh a symbol.
The two brazen pillars in the temple of Solomon are alleged xbv Ihxifessor
W. B. Smith to hare been ''doubtless symbols of Jehovah. — JSsL ^
SemUes, p. 191.
* Kuenen, as above, p. 80.
* Oen. xxzi. 19, 30-35. * JRel, oflsrasl, p. 246.
> Gen. xxxY. 2-4. * AUtesL Theol, p. 90.
V Cf. Konig, HauptprdbUme, p. 68. " Bz.
IL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 143
Hezekiah.^ Neither Moses nor Joshoa — none of the
leaders — showed the least tendency to image-worship. The
first notice of idolatrous practices in the wilderness joumey-
ings is in the prophet Amos — if even there.'
2. When we pass to the Booh of Judges, it is different.
We are now in a period expressly signalised as one of
declension and sinful adoption of Canaanitish idolatries.'
But even here we seek in vain in the greater part of the
book for evidence of an image-worship of Jehovah. The sin
for which the people are blamed is much more that of
forsaking Jehovah, and serving "the Baalim and the
Ashtaroth" (Astartes), ''the B^lim and the Ashe^oth"
(sacred trees or poles), of their heathen neighbours, — an
undeniable violation of fundamental law, — than image-
worship of their own Grod.^ One clear example of the latter
is in the case of the Epbraimite Micah, whose images were
carried off by the Danite&^ The other case usually cited is
that of Gideon, who, after his victory over the Midianites,
made from the spoils a golden ^ ephod," which, it is declaim,
became a ''snare" to Gideon and his house.^ On this
mistaken act of a man whose zeal had been conspicuous
against the Baal altars and the Asherahs,^ a whole edifice of
rickety conjecture is built up. It is first assumed that
Gideon's "ephod" was an "image" of Jehovah; it is next
taken for granted that the image was in the form of a
bull ; ' lastly, it is concluded that bull-worship, or at least
^ 2 Kings zviii 4. Professor H. P. Smith, who seos in the brazen serpent
a tnrviTal of primitive totemism in Israel, has some characteristic remarks on
the sabjeot. See Kote E on H. P. Smith on the Brazen Serpent.
* Amos y. 25, 26. The interpretation of the pasdage is mnch disputed.
* Jiidg. it 11-14.
^ Jndg. ii 11, 18 ; iii. 7 ; z. 6, etc. It is possible, however, to paint
eren this period of backsliding and disonnnisation in too dark colours. It
ia, s.^., an exaggeration to say with Hr. Tnatcher ; *' There is no conception
of spiritual worship or moral daty in our book.'* — Judge$ ("(>nt. Bible"),
Introd. p. 88. This is only true if first of all the higher elements (the repent-
ances, etc.) are critically eliminated. The yery absence of image- wordup in
so large a j^art of the book is a disproof of the statement. The Song of
Debonh stnkes a lofty, and at the end, spiritual note. Ot aboye^ p. 181 ;
and see the remarks of Konig on this point in art. "Judges," DieL (fBibU,
liL p. 816 (cf. below, p. 884). G£. also the Book of Buth.
* Jndg. zviL, zviii
* Judg. viii. 27. ' Judg. vi. 28-82.
* Thus even Schultz, 0, T. Theoi. I p. 149 : *' The molten imaM • . • ii^
aooording to the analogy of other passages (Judg. zviiL 80 ; 1 Kings zii 23
ft ; Bz. zxziL 4) to be thought of as the image of an oz." CL KoeiMB.
Bd of Israel, i. p. 286.
144 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
image-worship, was oommon among the people. It may be
observed that, even if it were true that Gideon made an
image for worship, these sweeping inferences would not be
justified. There would in itself hd nothing more wonderful
in this heroic man falling in his latter days into the sin of
idolatry, than there is in Solomon, in his old age, building
idolatrous shrines for his wives.^ But the inferences are
unwarranted on other grounds. What the text says is, not
that Gideon made an ''image," but that he made an
''^ephod *' • — a massive and costly piece of work,' certainly,
and not designed for actual use, but in some way suggestive
of the high priest and his oracle. There is no indication
that he meant the ephod for worship. Least of all is there
any ground for the assertion that it was an imape in the
form of a buIL^ The ephod is expressly declared to have
become a " snare '' to Gideon and his house : a condemnatory
statement not to be got rid of by the too easy hypothesis of
interpolation. There remains, therefore, as the single prop
of the theory of an image- worship of Jehovah in the time of
the Judges, the case of Micah, who made for himself ''a
graven image and a molten image/' a sanctuary, ** an ephod
(here evidently distinguished from the images) and tera-
phim'':^ an undisputed instance of idolatry in the worship
of Jehovah. We willingly make a present of this weak-
minded, superstitious Ephraimite, and of the Danites who
stole his images from him, to the critics; but decline to
accept his behaviour as evidence of the fundamental law, or
better religious practice, in Israel It is more to the point
to notice that even Micah does not appear to have had
images till his mother suggested this use oi the stolen silver
to hrm.
3. The stronghold of the case for image-worship, how-
1 1 Kings zi 4, 5.
* Kuenen, in a long note in his Hel, of Israel (L pp. 260 ff.)> "decidedly
rejects " the opinion tnat the ephod was an image ; bat in hia H&Urt Lectures
he accepts it (p. 82).
' This is shown by the amount of gold used, abont 70 pounds.
* The idea rests, as l^e passage from Schultz above cited shows, on the
reading back into the time of the Judges of the calf-worship of Jeroboam. It
has no Msis in the Book of Judges itself. Even so extreme a rationalist as
Dr. Oort contests this idea (of. Kuenen, L pp. 261-62).
* Judg. zTiL 8-<{ ; ZTiii« 14, 20. Budde says of Micah's ephod, which
he takes to be "a silver, oracular image," that "unfortunately we do not
know its form."— JSsZ. ef hrmly p. 80. See Note F on Dillmann on Image-
Worship. .
IL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 145
ever, is in the tv}0 calves of geld which Jeroboam set up at
Bethel and Dan, after the (Uvision of the kingdom. It is
true that no hint is given that such images were known
before in Israel, unless the words, ''Behold thy gods, 0
Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt,*" be
an allusion to the golden calf of Ex. zzzii; but it is
thought unlikdy that Jeroboam would set up a symbol
entiiily new,^ and it is pointed out — at least alleged — ^that
no protest was made against the worship of the calves by
prophets like Elijah and Amos.' The denunciations in the
Books of Kings are r^arded as representing a later point of
view. Here, again, the. history which we have is thrust
aside and a new history invented which suits the critic's
theory. No ingenuity, however, can give this new theory
the semblance of probability. How strange, if this was an
old and well-known custom in Israel, that absolutely no
trace of it should be discoverable, or that it should need to
be '' revived'' ! How remarkable that nothing of this bull-
worship should be known in Jerusalem, or in the temple,
the seat of Jehovah's worship,' in which there was no imi^,
or, apparently, in Judah generally, where it was university
regarded as an aboioination I The narrator in the Book of
^igs, who had access to old records, plainly regarded it as
something new. The judgment of the prophets, when we
turn to these, does not differ from that of the Book of
Kings. Hosea, it is generally admitted, is unsparing in his
denunciation of the calves/ and he was a prophet of
Northern Israel. It is held, however, that his attitude in
this respect is not that of his predecessors. ** There is no
feature in Hosea's prophecy," says Professor W. R Smith,
" which distinguishes him from earlier prophets so sharply
^ A oonnection ia coigectoially sought with the old Muiotauy at Dan,
Jndg. XTiiL 29-81.
* Thus WeHhausen, Knenen, Stade, W. B. Smith, uid genonlly. The
enggestion may be made that Jeroboam ^t the idea from i«7pt, where he
reuaed from tiie time of his reyolt against Solomon till the tooession of
Rehoboam (1 Kings xL 40 ; ziL 1-8). Knenen, howeyer, r^eots this, and
says : " It is much more reasonable to suppose that the ten tribes who rebelled
against Solomon's exaetions, and his leanings towards foreign manners and
enstoms, hitrodnced a genninely national and andent Israeliosh worship.*' —
JSsZ. o/isras;, Lp. 286.
* Are the " Hons, oseen, and ohembim ** that supported the " bases " in
the temple (1 Kings viL 29) thought to be an exception t They were
eertainly not ol^eets of worship.
^ Hos. viii. 0, 6 ; xiii. 2.
10
146 THE O.T, AS AFFECl^ED BY CRITICISM—
as his attitude to the golden calves, the local symbols of
Jehovah adored in the Northern sanctuarie& Elijah and
Elisha had no quarrel with the traditional ^ worship of their
nation. Even Amos never speaks in condemnation of the
calves."* This last sentence is astonishing. To the
ordinary reader Amos and Hosea would seem to speak
with precisely the same voice on the Northern calf-worship
— ^Amos, if possible, with the greater vehemence of the twa
" When I visit the transgressions of Israel upon him/' says this
prophet, ** I will also visit the altars of Bethel'' * " Come to
Bethel/' he exclaims, " and transgress." ^ He speaks of those
" that swear by the sin of Samaria, and that swear. As thy
god, 0 Dan, Uveth."' Even Kuenen agrees that Amos
speaks in the same way as Hosea of the calf -worship.^
With greater plausibility it may be maintained that
there is no direct denunciation of the calf -worship by Elijah
and Elisha. The argument from silence, however, is a peculi-
arly unsafe one here. In the only episodes in which ij^ah is
brought before us, he is engaged in a Hfe-and-death struggle
of another kind — the conflict between Jehovah and Baal
arising from the introduction of the Tyrian Baal-worship
into Samaria by Ahab and Jezebel^ It requires great faith
to believe that a stem and zealous monotheist like Elijah
could have any toleration for the calf-worship, which every
other prophet of that age is represented as denouncing.'
It is a sounder application of the argument from silence
to observe that Elijah is never found as a worshipper in
the neighbourhood of Bethel or Dan, and that he never
drops a word indicative of recognition of that worship.^
When he speaks despairingly of Jehovah's altars being
thrown down,^^ he can hardly have included Bethel and Dan
among their number, for these altars stood, and doubtless
^ The reader wiU mark the peiitio in the word ' ' traditionaL " To FtofesMr
Smith also the oalf-wonhip is as old as the days of the Judges {Png^ets,
p. 96).
^ FropheU, y. 171^
* Amos iii 14. ^ Amos iv. 4 ; ot v. 4, 6.
* Amos viii. 14.
* JUl, €f Israel, L pp. 78-74. C£ the pungent remarks of Dr. A. B.
DsTidson, Bib. Euays, pp. 91, 120-22.
V 1 Kings zvi. 80-84.
* JT.^., AhQsh (1 Kings ziv. 7 ff.) ; the prophet from Jadah (chap. ziiL
S); Jehu, the son of Hanani (chap. zvi. 1, 2).
* SliBha was mocked at Bethel (2 Kings iL 28).
» 1 Kings Jdz. 10.
n. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 147
had their crowds of worshippers. We may suppose that to him
they would be practically in the category of the Baal-altars.
And does his threatening to Ahab, " I will make thine house
like the house of Jeroboam, the son of NebaV' ^ etc., convey
no allusion to that by wMoh peculiarly Jeroboam ''made
Israel to sin"?
A dispassionate review, therefore, of this long catalo^e
of superstitions alleged to belong to pre-prophetic religion
in Israel fails to establish the theory of the critics that any
one of these formed part of the genuine religion of Israel
They show abundant defection in particular periods from
the pure norm of that religion ; but the evidence is over-
whelming that they were foreign to the true genius of the
religion, were condemned by its laws and by the prophets,
and at no time received countenance from its great re-
presentatives. The ideas on which the religion rested — the
unity, holiness, universal providence, and saving purpose of
(xod — were, as before shown, entirely distinct from those
of other reUgiona As it is with the idea of God and with
the adjuncts of His worship, so, we shall next see, it is with
the institutions of the religion.
1 1 EisflB xxL 21-M.
... J-
CHAPTER VI
TTbe ®I^ XCestament as affected Irs Crftfctetn—
SE. iReUdton ant) 3nstttutfon6 : Uth, UalKx*
nacle» priestbooD, etc.
'' I beliore that^ tlongalde of tlie modern repreaentatbna, wliicih reoolTe
the foundera of the Old Testament religion into flitting shadows that elade
the grasp, and throw overhoard the solid mass of the Pentatenchal history,
like nnneoessaiy hallast from a ship, my attempt wiU still meet with sym-
pathy, to find an intelligihle meaning in the narratiye of the Pentstench,
and to apprehend the religion of Abraham as the preliminary stage, and the
proclamation of Hoses as the firandation, of tiie Old Testament faith,
thought, and life. The Bible remains : soientifio attempts to represent
the Biblical history come and go."~KL08TERKAivK.
** It [German criticism] hss generally been wanting in flexibility and
moderation. It has insisted upon knowing every thing, explaining eyerythini^
precisely determining everything. • • • Henoe complicated and obacore
theories, provided with odd comers in which all the details may be sheltered,
and which leave the mind little opening or leisure to observe the tendency
of &ots and the general onrrents of histoiy."^DAKiCE8TBTXB (in Ottley).
"In WeUhansen's review of the history, he has mnch to say of the
gradual rise of fessts from the presentation of fiist-finiits, and of their
annual observance at neighbourhood sanctuaries, and the growth of laiger
sanotnariestowardsthedloseof the period of the Judges. . • • Bntthewholo
thing is spun out of his own brain. It is as purely fictitions as an astro*
nomioil map would be of the other side of the moon."— W. H. Gxxnr.
OHAPTEE VI
THE OLD TESTAMENT AS AFFECTED BY GBITIGISM
— n. religion and institutions: aek,taber.
nagle; pbiesthood, etc.
Thb subject of laws and institutioiis in Israel is boimd up
with so many intricate , critical questions as to dates and
succession of codes, thai it may seem scarcely possible to
deal with it satisfactorily till the critical questions have
been, at least in some provisional way, disposed of. On the
other hand, it is to be observed that the discussion of laws
and institutions does not wholly depend on the conclusions
reached on such matters, say, as the age of Deuteronomy,
or date of compilation of the Priestly Code ; for, conceivably,
these books, in their present form, might be late, yet the
laws embodied in them might be very old.^ It will be
found, in fact, that the determination of the critical
questions themselves depends in no small measure on the
view we are led to take of the history and nature of the
institutional There is room and need, therefore, for some
preliminary consideration of the latter, so far as this can
be done without begging any question not yet critically
dealt with.
L QxNKRAL Position of Mossb as Lawgivsb
We may first advert a little further than has yet been
done to the general position assigned to Moses in tradition
as the lawgiver of Israel* This is a point on which the
critics can hardly avoid involving themselves in some
inconsistency. On the one hand, it is necessary to exalt
* Thii is the pontion taken up by some erities, •• KSnig.
* See Wellbansen above, p. 6.
> See above. Chap. IV. pp. 98-99.
161
152 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
the personality and work of Moses, in order to explain how
it comes about that all the l^islation in the Old Testament
is connected with his name;^ on the other hand, it is
necessary to minimise his influence almost to yanishing
pointy in order to make it credible that he really gave to
Israel no laws at all — ndne at least of which we have any
knowledga It will be recalled how we are told that
" MalacM is the first of the prophets to refer to a Mosaic
coda" ' This line of reasoning, as shown before, is fatuous.
The JE history, put by the critics as early as the ninth or
eighth century, gives the foremost place to Moses .as a law-
giver. The Book of the Covenant, older than this history,
and incorporated into it, is expressly ascribed to Moses as
its author. The Book of Deuteronomy, again, whenever
written, is evidence that Israel had but one tradition about
Moses — that he gave and torote laws for the nation. The
force of this testimony is not in the least satisfied by sup-
posing, with Wellhausen, W. B. Smith, and others, that the
repute of Moses rested on such oral decisions as those
referred to in Ex. xviiL 13-16, 26.' Budde will have
nothing to do with this basing of the legislation of Moses
on these oral toroth of Ex. xviiL,* and there is certainly
something arbitrary in founding on this chapter as more
historically trustworthy than its neighbours. If it is
accepted, one must notice the evidence it yields of a high
organisation of the people at the time of the Exodus.*
What then are the reasons for refusing to Moses such
legislation as the Old Testament ascribes to him ?
1. If anything can be attributed with certainty to Moses,
it surely is the Decalogue, which lies at the foundation of
the whole covenant relation of Jehovah to Israel. Yet even
this, which Delitzsch calls "the most genuine of genuine
1 QL WeHhanaen, Hitt, qf Israel, pp. 482 ff., 488 fL ; Knenen, SO.
of lirael, i. pp. 272 ff. The latter says : "The coUeotionB of laws were
fearlessly emoellished with his name, because it was known that he had laid
the foundations of all legislation " (p. 279). He thinks, indeed, that " this
he oonld do without writing down a single precept."
* Carpenter, as above, p. 98. " The prophets of the eighth century," says
Ftofessor W. R. Smitii, ** never speak of a written law of Moses."— O.T. fi»
J. 0,, p. 802. To show this, he has to put a non-natural sense on Hos.
▼ill 12 (see below, p. 825). But at least the prophets knew of the Book
of the OoTenant^ professing to be written byMoses.
* Wellhausen, EitL qf Israel^ p. 489 ; W. R. Smith, O.T. ^ J. (7., pp.
804, 889.
* Sa. of Israel, p. 88. * Ex. xriiL 81, 26.
IL REUGION AND INSTITUTIONS 153
produotdonB/' ^ it has of late become almost universallj the
fashion to deny to the lawgiver. But on what subjective
and arbitrary grounds !' A main reason, as we have seen,
is the prohibition of images in the Second Commandment ' —
a subject already discussed.* Apart from this, and the too
elevated idea of God in the Decalogue as a whole, two
special objections may be noticed : (1) the variation in the
form of the Fourth Commandment in the Deuteronomic
version,^ and (2) the alleged occurrence of a second Deca-
logue in Ex. xxxiv. 12-26 — a notion borrowed from Goethe.
The first of these objections comes badly from those who
see in Deuteronomy a free prophetic composition of the
age of Josiah, and, apart tram the supposition of an
original shorter form, seems sufSciently met by Delitzsch's
remark that " the Decalogue is there freely rendered in the
flow of hortatory oratory, and not literally reproduced.''^
The variation may indeed be regarded as an incidental mark
of genuineness in Deuteronomy, for hardly any other than
the lawgiver would be likely to allow himself this liberty
of change. The second objection derives some colour from
a slight ambiguity or confusion in the language of Ex. xxxiv.
27, 28 ; but cannot overbear the clear connection of ver. 28,
''And He (Jehovah) wrote upon the tables the words of
the covenant, the ten commandments (words)," with ver. 1,
" I wiU write upon the tables the words which were upon
the first tables, which thou brakest," or the plain intention
of the narrative as a whola The so-called second De'calogue
of J in Ex. xxxiv. 12-26, is, in fact, pretty much, as schoktrs
are coming to see, a figment of the critical imagination. It
is only by straining that the section can be made into a
Decalogue at all,^ and, with its mixed precepts, it has no
* 0en$9i$, L ^ 29. Smend also fomxerlj wrote : " The Decaloffae,
whoBe Moeftio onffin no one can doobt." — Stud, u, KrU, 1876, p. 648.
Gf. in defence of the gennineneae, Riehm, EinML L p. 166 ; Eittel, nitL ^
Rebi, L p. 244 ff. (in ahorter form).
* For a sonunary by Addia, aee Note A on Objectiona to the Deoalogae.
C(. alao Wemianaen, MisL of Israd^ pp. 802-98, 489 ff. ; Smend, AUtett,
JReligvmigeaehiehU, p. 47.
' "There would be no yalid reaaon," aaya Kantzadh, "for rafhaing to
attribute to Moaee himaelf a primitiye, conciae form of the Decaloffue, were
it not for the formidable difficulty preaented by th0prt^ibUion 0/ tM um oj
tmoM."— *<Bel. of Iarael,"2>i6^ p. 688.
* See aboTe, pp. 141 ffl ' Deut y. 15.
* Gmeais, L p. 80.
' Scarcely two critica divide the precepta ao aa to make ten in preciady
154 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
suitability for taking the place of the historical "words"
of the table&^
2. If the Decalogue is allowed to be Mosaic, there is
little reason for denying that the remaining laws ("judg-
ments ") of the Booh of the Covenant, with which the " ten
words " stand in so close a connection, also proceeded from
Moses in mbstantiaUy their present form.* The principal
objection urged to this is that they imply a settled life
and agriculture.* But, on the one hand, the laws in
question are of a very primitive and simple character,
probably resting on old usage ;^ and, on the other, the
people were not the undisciplined horde the critics for
their own purposes would make them out to be.^ They
had long had the experience of orderly and settled life,
and were, moreover, on the point of entering Canaan.
They were organised, and bad "statutes of God" and
" laws " given them in the wilderness.* What more likely
in itself than that Moses, by divine command, should draw
up for them a simple code, suited for present and prospective
needs ? How, indeed, could a people like Israel have been
kept together, or have preserved its distinction from the
Canaanites, without some such body of laws, — moral, civil,
and religious,^ — and this not simply in the form of floating
the same way, and the attempt to do so ia now being pretlg^ generally given
up, even by advanced oritica Addis speaks of tiie division into ten as
*' mere guess-work." " Many critics," he says, " (s.^., Wellhausen), adopting
a suggestion of Goethe, Iiave tried to disentangle ten 'words or the
covenant,' answering to the Ten Words or Decalogue of the Elohist. This,
however, is mere guess-work." — Hex, L ^. 157. Carpenter also does not
favour the notion. Kittel says : '* It reqmres the utmost arbitrariness even
to find in it the number ten." — Hist, (if Hebs, i. p. 198. Kautzsch rejeota
the second DeoalQcne.
^ Cf. Kittel and Riehm, as above, in reply to Wellhausen.
* Thus Delitzsch, Otnesis^ i. p. Sl.
' Thus Wellhausen, Euenen, Addis, etc, Cf. Biehm in reply, L pp. 170 ff.
^ The Code of Hammurabi presents interesting ancient analogies. See
for detedls art. in DicL of Bible (Extra Vol.). One regrets to find Mr.
Johns, in the section on comparison with Hebrew legislation, writing in
the usual flippant style — "The current opinion of critics does not ascribe
much of the Hebrew law to Moses, So his personality may be set aside "
(p. 608).
* See above, pn. 79, 104. * Ex. zviiL 16, 21, 25.
^ WeUhausen himself points out that " when the Israelites settled in
Palestine, thev found it inhabited by a population 8U|)erior to themselves
both in numbers and in civilisation," yet "it never had the effect of
making the Israelites Canaanites ; on the contrary, it made the Canaanites
Israelites. Kotwithstanding their inferiority, numerical and otherwise,
IL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 155
oral toroth, but in the shape of definite, authoritative
** statutes and judgments," such as the history, the prophets,
and the psalms, uniformly assume the nation to have
possessed?^ And if this was needed, can we suppose
that a man of Moses' capabilities and prescient mind would
have left the people without it? We have several codes
of laws — ** programmes " — which the critics assume to have
arisen at various junctures in the history of the nation.
But, as Dr. Bobertson observes, " it is strange indeed that
critical historians should postulate the putting forth of
* legislative programmes' at various later points in Israel's
history, and should be so unwilling to admit the same for
the tune of Moses."* We seem fully entitled, therefore,
in accordance with the whole tradition of Israel, to look
on Moses as the fountain of both civil and religious institu-
tious to his nation, and to consider without prejudice any
statements attributing such institutions to his time. The
question of ritual laws demands separate treatment
II. The Sacrifigial Stbtbm and Bttual Law
The Book of the Covenant deals mainly with civil
matters, and, except in the law of the altar,' and the
ordinance about the three feasts,^ has no properly religious
enactments. This of itself creates a not unreasonable pre-
sumption that such will be found elsewhera To most it
will appear incredible that, in settling the constitution of
Israel, Moses should not have given the people, among his
other laws, at least some ordinances for religious worship.
The critics, however, hold a directly contrary opinion. Not
content with denying that Moses was the author of anv
ritual legislation, they go so far as to maintain that, till
the time of the exile, no sacrificial or other ritual existed
which was even hdieved to have Mosaic or divine sanction.
The prophets, it is declared, show clearly by their denuncia-
tions that they know nothing of such a divinely-ordained
ritual " Thus it is," says Wellhausen, '' that the prophets
ihej muntaiiied their iodividnality, and that without the rapport of any
external oiganisation. Thus a certain inner unity rabdstea lone before
it had found any outward political expression : it goes back to the time
of Moaes, who is to be regarded as its author." — Rigt, 0/ Israel, p. 483.
' See below, pp. 808, 824. * Airly Bdigicn oflnvm, p. 887.
• IBx. XX. 24-26. * Ex. xxiii 14-19.
IS6 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
are able to ask whether then Jehovah has commanded
people to tax their energies with such exertions : the fact
presupposed being that no such command exists, and that
no one knows anything at all about a ritual torah,**^ The
idea of a ritual which '' goes back to Moses or to Jehovah
Himself " ' is said to be foreign to them. It first came in
with the Priestly Code, which is so insistent on the Mosaic
origin of lawful sacrifice that it carefully avoids, in the
earlier history, ever ascribing sacrifice to the patriarchs.'
Without at this stage entering into details, which will
more properly come up when discussing the Cpde itself,
we would make on these representations the following
remarks: —
1. There is, to put it mildly, some absurdity in the often-
repeated statement that '* the Priestly Writer knotos nothing
of sacrifice by the servants of God before Moses." ^ We
might ask — ^How often is sacrifice mentioned altogether in
the Book of Grenesis? And in how many instances does
the meagre thread of narrative assi^ed to the Priestly
Writer admit of the act of sacrifice bemg introduced ? But
there is a more obvious answer — one of which a good deal
more will be heard as we proceed. The Priestly Writer
knew at least about the patriarchal sacrifices all that the
J and E histories had to tell him ; for he had, on the newer
theory, these histories before him, presupposes and founds
upon them, if he does not actually furnish the frame in
which their narratives are set.^ He cannot, therefore, be
supposed designedly to contradict them on this point of
patriarchal sacrificea^ It is in truth no part of the theory
^ JBuL nf Itrad^ p. 66 ; ot the whole section, pp. 52-69. Thiis alao
Euenen, Etx. pp. 176-77 ; W. B. Smith, 0,T, in J. (;., pp. 298-95. " AU
this," sajB Professor Smith, " is so olear that it seems impossihle to miBonder-
stand it. Tet the position of the prophets is not onl^ hahituallj explained
away by those who are determined at any cost to maintain the traoitional
Tiew of the Pentatendi, " eto. We ahaU see immediately abont the ' ' explain-
ing away."
* Hist, of l9ma, ^ b^ ^Ihid.
^ Addis, ffex. p. IL * See below, i>p. 840, 860.
' Colenso, in oombatins Enenen on this point, says : " Is it credible that
he supposed tiie patriarcns to have offerecl no samfices €U all before the
deliyety of the sacrificial laws at Sinai-^more especially if he had before him
the saooifices mentioned in Gen. ir. 8, 4 ; liu. 20, 21 ; xxxL 54 ; xlvL 1,
eto. " ; and in another connection : " It seems incredible that a later po«t-
eaptivit^ writer, sitting down (as Knenen supposes) with the J narrative
before him, and of course known to him, and now vrnisrabU by ag$, should
deliberately contradict it"— Ani. Pt vi pp. 126, 189.
11. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 157
of the Priestly Writer that sacrifices began with Moses.
His own legislation gives no hint that up to that time these
were unheard-of. £itther, in such phrases as, '' If anj man
bring an offering to Jehovah/' ... "If his offering be a
burnt offering of the herd/'^ ^tc., it assumes that such
sacrifices are well-known and customary.
2. As little can it be maintained, with any show of
reason, that, up to the time of the exile, sacrifice in Israel
was simply, as Wellhausen affirms, traditional custom,
wiUiout divine sanction, or regulation of the when, the
where, the hy whom, the how} The Book of the Covenant
already makes a b^inning in regulations about the altar,
and the times and manner of sacrifice — ^"My sacrifice";'
and the Book of Deuteronomy, "which still occupies the
same standpoint as JE,"^ has abundance of prescriptions
and regulations about sacrifices — described as "all that I
command you."* How can it be claimed that Jeremiah,
whose mind is steeped in Deuteronomy — if he had not,
as some of these writers think, to do with its production —
is ignorant of these commands, or means to deny them, in
his impassioned protestations that it was not about burnt
offerings and saorificee, but about obedience, that &od
commanded their fathers, when He brought them out of
Ifeypt?«
3. The strong language of the prophets in denwiwiaiion
of outward rUtuU,^ while the ethiciBd side of religion was
neglected, admits of easy explanation : the one explanation
it will not bear, it is safe to say, is that which the critics
put upon it This for a twofold reason. Probably, first,
not one of these prophets could form the conception of a
religion for a nation which had not its temple, priesthood,
sacrifices, and outward order of worship, or ever dreamt of
the abolition of these thinss ; and, second, so far from regard-
ing sacrifice as not well-pleasing to Jehovah, when the right
spuit was present, there is not one of the greater prophets
who does not include sacrifice in his own picture of the
> IflT. i. 2, 8, eto. * ffisL tfliraa, p. 54.
* Bx. xz. 2^, 25 ; ttW. 18, 19. « Wemiaiuan, as abore.
* D«at. zii 11, eto.
* Jor. Tii 22, 24. Profanor W. B. Smith nerertheleas thinks "it it
impoMiblt to giro a flatter contradiction to the traditional theory that tha
Leritioal system was enacted in the wilderness." — 0. T, in J, C, ^ 295.
V Amos ir. 4, 5 ; t. 21, 27 ; Isa. L 10-15 ; Jer. yii 22, 28, eto.
158 THE aT. AS AFi^CTED BY CRITICISM—
restored and perfected theocracy.^ It is to be remembered
that it is not sacrifice alone, but prayer, feast-days, Sabbaths,
etc, that the prophets include in their denunciations ; yet
we know the importance they attached to prayer and the
Sabbath in other parts of theur writings.' In many places
and ways, also, we see incidentally their recognition of the
divine sanction of these outward ordinances, which, in other
connections, viz., when made a substitute for heart-piety
and moral conduct, they condemn. It was in vision of the
temple of Jehovah that Isaiah received his call, and by
the touch of a live coal from the altar that his lips were
purged.* It is Jehovah's courts — " My courts " — ^that were
profaned by the people's splendid but unholy worship;^
just as in Hosea it is ''the sacrifices of Mine offerings"
which the people turn into "sacrifices of flesh." ^ If the
40th Psalm is relegated, as on the critical theory it must
be, to post-exilian times, we read in it also : " Sacrifice and
offering Thou didst not desire . . . burnt offering and sin
offering hast Thou not required" * But who misunderstands
these words ?
4. Strange to say, all this, and a great deal more, is, in
the end, admitted by the critics. Their argument means
nothing, if it does not amount to a rejection by the prophets
of a ritual worship of God absolutely. Yet we are told by
Euenen : '' We must not assert that the prophets reject the
cultus unconditionally. On the contrary, they too share
the belief, for instance, that sacrifice is an essential element
of true worship (Isa. IvL 7 ; Zech. xiv. 16-19 ; Mic. iv. 1 ff. ;
Isa. ii 1 ff. ; xviii 7 ; xix. 19 ff., etc. etc). The context
always shows that what they really protest against is the
idea that it is enough to take part in the cultus," etc^
Only, it is argued, they did not allow this cultus to be of
Mosaic or divine origin. It is precisely on this point that
the proof fails. The proof was supposed to be found in the
fact that the prophets condemned the cultus; now it is
owned that they did not condemn it as in any sense incom-
» Ct iBa. IvL 6, 7 ; Ix. 7 ; Ixyi. 23, etc. ; Jer. xviL 24-27 ; xxxiiL 17-lS,
eto. (cf. p. 95) ; Ezek. xl. ff.
*Cf. Jer. XYU. 21-27; "As I commaDded your fathers" (yer. 22);
Isa. Iviii. 18, 14.
• Isa. vi. * Isa. i. 12. • Hos. viii. 13. • Ps. xl. 6.
* ffegx p. 176 ; cf. Smend, AlUesl. Beligicnsgesehichte, p. 168. See also
Smend's article, referred to on next page.
II. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 159
patible with the belief that it was a lawful and necessary
part of the service of Jehovah. If, further, we ask — ^What
kind of cultus was it which existed in the days of the
prophets? we get a number of surprising admissions, to
which it will be necessary that we return later. It was a
cultus ^ of very old and sacred usage," ^ and highly elaborate
in character. There were " splendid sacrifices . • . presum-
ably offered in accordance with all the rules of priestly
skill" * We have, in &ct, only to analyse the passages in
the prophets to see what a highly elaborate ritual system
was already in operation in their day — as elaborate, practi-
cally, as in the Levitical Code itself. It is interesting to
read what one of the ablest adherents of the Graf school —
Budolf Smend — had to say on this point at an earlier
stage in his development. In his work Mosu apud
PraphUas, Smend discerns what he calls " Levitismus" peering
out from the pages of the oldest prophets — Amos and Hosea.
He says, even : " It is sufficiently evident that the cultus of
J^ovah, as it existed in the time of the earlier prophets,
and doubtless long before, is by no means at variance with
the character of Leviticus. Whatever judgment may be
formed of the age of this book, the opinion hitherto enter-
tained of the birth, growth, and maturity of the religion of
Israel will undergo no changa"' In a vduable article
contributed to tne Studien und KrUHcen in 1876, he
reiterates these views, and concludes : '' Accordingly, we do
not know what objection can be made to the earlier com-
position of Leviticus on the ground of the older prophetical
writings."^ In such statements, supported by reasons
which time has done nothing to refute, we are far enough
away from the theoiy that nothing was known of a divine
sanction of ritual oroinances till after the time of the exile.
To ourselves, as before said, it appears incredible that
no ordinances for religious worship should have been given
to the people by Moses, in settling the constitution of
> WelUuuuen, HitL qfltrad, p. 59.
*i6k<.p.55. See below, p. 808.
» P. 76.
« Stud, vand KriL 1876, p. 661. This important article was written ten
▼eait after the appearance of Grafs work (see below, p. 825), in oritioism of
Dahm, and from the standpoint that np to that time "a stringent proof"
had not been oflfered ''either for or against" Grafs hypothesis of the
age of Levitlous, and that snoh "was not to be looked for in the near
ftitare"(p.644).
i6o THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
IsraeL If such iaer« given, they must, in the nature of the
case, have included r^nlations about priesthood, sacrifice,
purification, and much else.^ This does not prove the
existence of the Levitical ritual Code; but such laws, if
given, must have covered a large part of the ground of that
Coda It does not prove even that the laws were written,
but it is highly probable that they soon were.' If these
laws are not incorporated in our present Levitical Code, it
is certain they are not to be found anywhere else. We
shaU be better able to judge on this point, when we have
looked at some of the more special institutions of the
national worship.
We proceed now, accordingly, to consider how it stands
with such institutions as the ark, the tdbenuxde, thepriestJiood,
and, in connection with these, with the unity of worship^
made by WeUhausen, as we shall see, the turning-point of
his whole discussion.' Graf, with his thesis of the post-
exilian origin of the Levitical Code, is the pioneer here,
and we are not sure that the case for the new theory, as
respects the above institutions, has been more plausibly
presented anywhere than it is in his pages.^ It is not
denied by the Graf school that there was an ark, a tent to
cover it, and priests of some sort, from early times, but it is
contended with decision that these were not, and could not
have been, the ark, tabernacle, and priesthood of the
Levitical Code. All we read on these subjects in the Priestly
sections is " unhistorical fiction" of exilic or post-exilic
origin. Bejecting hypotheses, our duty will be to turn the
1 We ahaU aae below that DUlmann, iu fact, auppoaea Ler. ZY]i.-zxyi
(mainly) to be a yerr old, and in basia Mosaic, code, which he thinks may
originally hare stood after Ex. xzir. Cf. his Baood.-Lw. on Bz. zxr. and
Lot. ztu., and see below, pp. 828, 878.
* See below, jp. 829. Dillmann says in the Preface to his Commentary
on Exodoa-Lenticns : "That the priesthood of the central sanctuary
already in ancient times wiote down their laws is the most natural assump-
tion in the world, and can be proved from A, G, D [s P, J, D] : that the laws
of the priesthood and of divine service were written down, not to say made,
first of all in the exile and in Babylon, where there was no service of God,
is contrary to common sense."
*BisL <S^ Israel, ^, 868. See below, pp. 178 ff.
^ On Graf and ms place in the critical development, see next chapter
(pp. 199 ff.). His principal work, Die OeaehichUichen BUcker des AUen
TedamenU, was published in 1866. His chief predecessors were Yatke and
George, but their works had produced little impression, and were regarded as
conoUisively refuted. Ct Delitzsch, Luthardt's ZeiUchrift, 1880, pp. 67 ff.
IL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS i6i
matter round about, and try to look at the facts historically.
This will prepare the way for the later critical inquiry.
UL Thb Sacred Ark
It has been seen above what the critics think of the
original ark which they allow to have existed. It was a
sort of fetish-chest in which Jehovah, represented by two
stones, probably meteoric, was thought of as carried about ;
or it was itself a fetish.^ This may be met by observing
that, while Jehovah's presence is conceived of as connected
with the ark, the special symbol of His presence— the cloud,
or pillar, or glory — ^is always distinguished from both ark
and sanctuary : this in both JE and P sections.* The cloud,
or pillar of cloud and of fire, is represented as above the
tabernacle, or over the people, or as going lefore them in their
joumeyings. Jehovah descends in the pillar to commime
with Moses at the tabernacle. He dwells upon or between
the cherubim.' His presence, therefore, it is perfectly plain,
was not identified with the ark, or with anything in it
1. It is not denied, then, and it is a valuable admission,
that there was an ark of Jehovah in Israel from the times
of Moses. Where did it come from? The ark does not
appear to have been with the people in Egypt: we may
therefore conclude it to be a Mosaic institution. A first point
of interest relates to the maJcmg of the ark. The only
account we have of its construction is in the Priestly Code,
Ex. xxv. 10 ff. ; xxviL 1 £f. ; outside of P the first incidental
notice is in the important passage, Num. x. 33-36, ''And
the ark of the covenant went before them," etc., where,
however, its existence is firmly assumed. On the critical
side it is said — indeed, is taken for granted as one of the
things about which "no doubt" exists^ — that originally
the JE narrative also must have had an account of the
making of the ark, now displaced by that of P.* Let ^is
^ See aboTe, p. 187.
*Cf. Ex. xxxiiL 9; zl. 84-88; Num. z. 84; ziv. 10-14; xz. •; Deat
xxxi. 15, eto.
> Ex. xxT. 22 ; 1 Sam. ir. 4. eto.
^ Addis says : "He [the J writer] no doobt also mentioned here the
making of the ark, to which he refers shortly [where f] afterwards." — Hex.
L p. 155.
* Thus practically all the critics, as Wellhansen, Enenen, Dillmaim,
DiiTcr, Addis, Carpenter, Kenedy, etc
XI
i62 THE O.T. AS AFFECl^ED BY CRITICISM—
be assumed : we discover from Deut. x. 1-5, which is supposed
to follow this older account, that the ark of the JE story
was an ark made " of acacia wood/' and was the repositorj
of the two tables of the law, which agrees perfectly with
the history we hava Thus far, therefore, there is no con-
tradiction. It remains to be seen whether any emerges in
the further notices of the nature, uses, fortunes, and
destination of the ark.
2. We pass to the sttbsequeni history of the ark, and note
on this the following interesting facta Its familiar ndme
is "the ark of the covenant/'^ It is connected with the
presence of Jehovah among His people.^ It goes before, or
accompanies, the people in their joumeya' It is invested
with the most awful sanctity: to touch it irreverently is
death.^ It is taken charge of, and borne, by Levitical
priests, or by Levites simply.^ It is found, in the days of
the Judges, at Bethel, where Fhinehas, the son of Eleazar,
the son of Aaron, ministers before it.^ In Eli's days it is in
the sanctuary at Shiloh.^ It is overshadowed by the
cherubim.^ After its captivity among the Philistines, and
prolonged sojourn at Kirjath-jearim,* it is brought up by
David with the greatest solemnity and the utmost re-
joicings to Zion, and there lodged in a tent he had pitched
for it.^® Finally, it is brought into the temple of Solomon,
when we are told it had nothing in it " save the two tables
of stone, which Moses put there at Horeb."^ Here, as it
stands, is a very fair history of the ark from pre-exilian
sources, and it requires some ingenuity to discover wherein
the ark of these accounts differs, in structure, character,
and uses, from the ark of the law in Exodus. That ingenuity,
^ This Dame oocars in Num. x. 88 ; xir. 44 ; Deot. z. 8 ; zzxL 9, 25, 26 ;
Josh, ill (seven times) ; ir. 7, 9, 18 ; vi. 6, 8 ; viii. 88 ; Jadg. zx. 27 ;
1 Sam. iv. 8-5 (see above, p. 187) ; 2 Sam. zt. 24 ; 1 Kings iii. 15 ; vi. 19 ;
viiL 1, 6, etc. etc In alt the comb in the older history tne words " of the
covenant " an simply struck out by the critics, Cf. , 0.^., Euenen, Hist, of Israel^
i. pp. 257-58; or Oxford Htx, on Josh, iii., iv. The passages then read
*' the ark of Jehovah '* only. See Note at end of chapter.
' Num. z. 88, eto.
> Num. z. 88-86 ; of. Ex. xL 86, 87 ; Nam. ix. 16-28 (P). Ob tfaa
position of the ark, see below, pp. 168-69.
^ 1 Sam. vi. 19 ; 2 Sam. vi. 7.
* Josh, iii., iv ; 2 Sam. xt. 24, 29 ; c£ Dent. xxxi. 9, 25.
* Jodg. XX. 27, 28. 7 1 Sam. iii. 3.
* 1 Sam. iv. 4; 2 Sam. vL 2. • 1 Sam. vii. 1, 2.
» 2 Sam vL » 1 Kings viii. l-ll.
IL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 163
however, is not wanting. One point of alleged contradic-
tion, viz., that in JE the ark is represented as borne at a
distance in front of the host, while in P it is carried, with
the tabernacle, in the midst of the host, is considered below
in connection with the place of the tabernacle.^ For the rest,
the method is always at hand, and is freely resorted to, of
getting rid of inconvenient testimony by the assumption of
interpolation. This disposes, as noted above, of the words
" the covenant," and also of the mention of the " cherubim," '
and gets rid of the notices of " Levites " as beariDg the ark, in
distinction from the priests. Thus, e,g,^ Professor H. P. Smith,
following Wellhausen, disposes of the testimony in 2 Sam. xv.
24 thsX passage reads : '' And lo Zadok also, and all the
Levites that were with him, bearing the ark of the covenant
of Ood." This will not do, so the comment is : *^ The present
text inserts 'and all the Levites with him.' But as the
Levites are unknown to the Books of Samuel [they had
been mentioned before in 1 Sam. vi 15], this is obviously a
late insertion. Probably the original was 'Zadok and
Abiathar.'"' On tins subject, it can scarcely be held to
be a contradiction that in some of the above passages it is
the "priests" who bear the ark, while the Levitical law
assigns that duty to the "Levites." The carrying of the
ark by the Levites on ordinary occasions, and as servants
of the priests,^ does not preclude the bearing of it by priests
on special occasions, as in Josh, iii., iv. It was the priests
who were at all times primarily responsible for its light
conveyance.*
3. A point of some importance in its bearings on the
descriptions of the ark in the Priestly Code, which, how-
ever, we do not remember having seen adverted to, is the
' This, as will be seen below, is a question of some real difficaltj. It is not
elear whether the ark was always, or only on special oocasions, borne in front
of tiie host ; or whether it was not borne usually in front of the tabemade
in midst of the host, still with the idea of leadership. In either case, as the
passages cited show, it was the movement of the ark, or of the guiding
pillar, which determined that of the camp.
* "It is more than probable," says Knenen, "that the cherubim were
not mentioned by the author himself, but were inserted by a later writer." —
Rd, d' Israel, i. p. 259.
' Samuel (" Intemat. Orit. Com."), p. 844. In defence of these passaget
(also in LXX), see Van Hoonacker, Le Saeerdoee L4viiiqve, p. 199.
^ Num. ir. 15, etc.
* Num. ir. 19. In 1 Sam. It. 4, Hophni and Phinehas (priests) are said to
be " there with the ark of the ooyenant of Qod " (not, apparently, its bearers).
i64 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
rdatian of the aneieni ark to that of the Solomonic temple.
It is not denied, as we have seen, that there was an old
Mosaic ark ; but the fact is perhaps not always sufficiently
attended to that, according to every testimony we have, it
was this identical ark which was brought up and deposited
in Solomon's splendid housa The Mosaic tabernacle, on
Grafs view, is a " fiction " — a '* copy " of the temple : it is
the temple made "portable," and projected back into
Mosaic times. But the ark, at all events, was not a new
thing in the temple. It was the old ark that was brought
into it;^ the same old ark that can be traced back to the
times of the Judges, and of Moses, and had experienced so
many vicissitudes. It was an ark, therefore, which con-
tinued to exist, and whose character and structure could be
verified, down to late historical times. It follows that, if
the ark of the law is a " copy " of the ark of the temple, it
must, in its general character, form, and structure, be pretty
much a ''copy," likewise, of the real ark of the pre-
Solomonic age. Exilian priests would hardly invent an ark
totally different from that which had perished within quite
recent memory.
Another reflection is suggested by the pre-Solomonic
history of the ark. No one disputes the sacredness of the
ark in the eyes of the Israelites. It was in a sense the
centre and core of their religion. They had the most
undoubting belief in the manifestations of God's presence in
connection with it, and in the importance of its possession,
and of worship before it, as a pledge of God's favour and
protection. Yet after its return from the Philistines, and
the judgment at Beth-shemesh, we find this holiest of
objects taken to the house of a private Israelite, Abinadab,
and allowed to remain there tUI David's time, ie.,* during
the whole reign of Saul, guarded by this man's son;
apparently, therefore, without Levitical ministration,
neglected and almost forgotten by the peopla' Then agftin
> 1 Kings Tiii. 6ff. *<Th6 trk wu gnwded," says Dr. DriTW, '*till it
was transferred by Solomon to the temple."— /niroci. p. 188.
' The twenty years of 1 Sam. rii. 2 do not denote the whole duration of
the ark's stay at Kiijath-jearim, bnt the period, apparently, till the time
of Samnel's refonnation.
' 1 Sam. fit 1, 2. Of. below, p. 178. The ingenious soffgestion of Van
Hoonacker {Le SaeertUw, p. 192) that " Eleazar his son" sS^nld be "son
of lEleazar " (a priest) is without sufficient warrant.
II. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 165
we find it raised to highest honour by David and Solomon.
We ask — Would it be safe to argue from the seeming
neglect, at least intermission of religious use, of this sacred
object for so long a period, to the denial of its earlier high
repute, and established place, in the worship of the people ?
Or, if so extraordinary an irregularity must be admitted in
this confused time, must we not^ in consistency, admit the
likelihood of many more ?
IV. Thb Tabsbnaclb
An initial difficulty in the Mosaic account is the richness
and splendour of the ** tent of meeting," said to be reared by
command of God in the wilderness. This of itself, however,
IB not insuperable. Neither the resources nor the skill of
the people in leaving Egypt were so slender as the critics
represent,^ and the rearing of a sanctuary was an object for
which they would strip themselves of their best If the
ark was as fine an object as its description implies, we
should expect that the tabernacle made for its reception
would have some degree of splendour as welL Much more
radical is the position now taken up by the Graf-
Wellhausen critics. Such a tabernacle as the Priestly Code
describes, they tell us, never existed. The tent of the
wilderness is a pure creation of the post-exilian imagination.
In Wellhausen's language: ''The temple, the focus to
which the worship was concentrated, and which was not
built until Solomon's time, is by this document regarded
as so indispensable even for the troubled days of the
wanderings before the settlement, that it is made portable,
and in the form of a tabernacle set up in the very beginning
of things. For the truth is, that the tabernacle is the copy,
not the prototype, of the temple at Jerusalem."* The
critical and other difficulties which inhere in such a
conception are left over for the present ; we look only at
the facts.
1. Our starting-point here, as before, is the admission of
the critics that a labemacle of some sort did exist, as a
^ Of. Enobel, quoted by Dillmaim, Sxod.-Lev, yp. 268-70.
' £M, (f Itrael, pp. 86-87. In these expreeeions about the aanotuarj
being "made portable, " and the tabernacle being "the copy," not the
prototype, of tne temple, Wellhaueen but repeati uraf, OtachiM. Blkkitf
1 66 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
covering for the ark and a place of meeting with Jehovah,
at least as far back as they will allow the history to go.
Graf may be quoted here, though his concessions are ampler
than those which Wellhausen would be disposed to make.
" The presence of the ark in the field (1 Sam. iv. 3 ff.)/' he
8&yB» '' presupposes also that of a tent, of however simple a
character, which might serve as a protection and lodging
for the ark and for the priests with the sacred utensils;
and it lies likewise in the nature of the case that before this
tent, where sacrifice was offered by the priests, and the will
of Jehovah inquired after, meetings and deliberations of the
host were also held; hence the tent was the ohel moed
(tent of meeting)."^ But then, it is contended, this is not
the tabernacle of the it^riestly Code, and reference is made
in proof to " the tent " which, in Ex. xxxiii. 7, Moses is said to
have pitched (RV. " used to pitch ") " afar off" without the
camp, and to have called '' the tent of meeting," when ai
yet the tabernacle of the law was not erected. Wellhausen
goes further, and will have it that the pre-Solomonic
tabernacle was not a single tent at all, but a succession of
changing tents, staying himself in this contention, of all
authorities in the world, on the OhronidBT^ whose words —
*' have gone from tent to tent, and from one tabemade to
another" — are made to bear a sense which that writer
assuredly never dreamt of.
Now it is the case, and is an interesting fact, that after
the sin of the golden calf, before the Sinaitic tabernacle was
made, Moses is related to have taken — strictly, ''used to
take" — ^**the tent," and pitched it "without the camp,
afar off from the camp," and to have called it '' the tent
of meeting." The mention of "^Ae tent" comes in quite
abruptly, and may fairly suggest that we have here, as the
critics say, part of an originaJly independent narrative — the
same to which also Num. xi. 16 ff., and xii 4ff. (ci Deut
xxxi 14, 16) belong. As it stands in the context, however,
1 QtatSkiM, BHucker, pp. 67-68.
^EiA, vf Iwad^ p. 46: "The parallel ^laasage in 1 Chron. xriL 6
oomotly interprets the senee" (of. 2 Sam. yii. 6). How the Chronicler
could M supposed to say this, in Wellhausen's sense, not only of the
'< tent " (ohtl\ but of the " Ubemacle " {,miihkan\ is not ezpluned. ** The
passage says no more," remarks Delitzsch, "than that the ark of Jehoyah
wandered from place to place, so that He abode in it, sometimee here and
sometimes there. "^Luthardt'siRsitnAri^, 1880, p. 68.
11. REUGION AND INSTITUTIONS 167
the impression distinctly produced is, that the withdrawal
of the tent or tabernacle from the camp is penal in character
(of. vers. 3-5 : " I will not go up in the midst of thee "),
and that the tabernacle itself is a provisional one, meeting
a need till the permanent " tent of meeting " is got ready.
The tenses, indeed, imply usage ; but duration of usage is
limited by the writer's thought, and need not cover more
than the period of alienation, or at most the interval — ^the
greater part of a year — till the erection of the new
tobemacle.^ The critics, however, will not admit this ; and,
comparing the passages above mentioned, maintain that
there are the clearest points of distinction between this J£
tent or tabernacle and that of the Priestly Code. The
former, «it is said, is always represented as pitched without
the camp ; the latter is as invariably pitched in the midgt of
the camp. The one is a place of revelation (Jehovah
descends in the pillar to the door of the tabernacle); the
other is a place of divine service or foorship. The one has
Joshua as its attendant ;' the other is served hj priests and
Levites, On this last objection — ^the absence of Levites —
it is enough to remark that, at the time referred to in Ex.
zxxiiL, Levites had not yet been appointed ; the ark itself
had not yet been mada The other two objections deserve
more consideration. They rest on groimds which have a
d^ree of plausibility, though closer examination^ we are
convinced, will bring out the essential harmony of the
accounts.
2. The first question relates to the place of the taber-
nacle. Is there real contrariety here between the JE and
the F accounts ? When we examine the evidence for the
contention that all through the wanderings, in the JE
narrative, the place of the tabernacle was without the
camp — "afar off" — ^we are struck, first, with its exceeding
meagrenes& It consists of the two passages in Numbers
above referred to, concerning which it may be observed
that, while their language, taken alone, will agree with this
hypothesis, it certainly does not necessitate it. It is not
1 Cf. Ex. xzxY. 80 ff. ; zL 1 ff.
' WellhatiBen aajB ; " Thus Moses has Joshua with him as his mdfUwuSy
who does not onit the tent of Jehovah." — Hist, of Israel, p. 180. Cf.
Addis in loc, Msx, i. p. 155 : ''The tent of meeting is ontside the camp ;
it is not gnaided hy Leyites, mnch less hy the sons of Aaron, bat by
Joshua, the 'minister' of Mosea " But see Deut. xzzi. 0, etc.
168 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
conclusive that we are told on one or two occasions that
persons " went out " from the camp to the tent/ or that Moses
''went out" from the tent to the people;' for the same
language would be as appropriately used of going out from
any particular encampment to the open space in the centre
where the sanctuary stood; just as it is said of Dathan
and Abiram that they ''came out" and stood in the door
of their own tents.' The question requires to be decided
on broader grounds. Even in Ex. xxxiii 7» the natural
suggestion of the statement that Moses, in particular
circumstances, took the tent — assumed as known — and
pitched it "without the camp, afar off from the camp,"
would seem to be that the original and proper place of
the tent was vrithin the camp ; and there are not wanting
in the narratives indications that this was the real state
of the casa Both in the JE and the P sections the
region outside the camp is regarded as a region of
exclusion from Jehovah's presence; it would be passing
strange if His tabernacle, surmounted by the cloudy pillar,
were thought of as pitched "afar off" in this region. It
requires much faith, for instance, to believe that when
Miriam, smitten with leprosy, was "shut up outside the
camp seven days,"^ she was nearer the tabernacle of
Jehovah than the people who were within ; or that, when
quails were sent, the tabernacle was in such a position as
to be certainly smothered by them when they fell;* or
that, when Balaam, looking on Israel, testified, "Jehovah
his God IB with hhn, and the shout of a king is among
them,"' the tabernacle of Jehovah was really beheld by the
seer as far apart from the people. But there are other
and more crucial JE passages. When, in particular, it is
declared in Num. xiv. 44 that "the ark of the covenant
1 Nun. zi. 24-80 ; zU. 4, 6.
* Num. zi. 24. Of. Strack's rem&rka on these pusages in his Cow^
metUaryt in loe,
' Num. zvi 27.
* Num. ziL 14, 16. It shotild be noted that this JE narratiTe impliea
the leprosy law of Lev. ziii. (P).
'it'uin. zi. 81, 82. Van Hoonaoker, in his Le Saeerdoce LHUiqm
(pp. 145-46), has an ingenious way of ezpluining these passages, in
oompaiiaon with Ez. zzziii. 7 (where, as he points oat, ''the tent" is
assanied as already known), by t)ie supposition of a series of transpositions
in the narrative ; but we do not feel this to be Justified or neoessaiy.
'Num. zziii. 21. Balaam, in chap. zziv. 2, sees "Israel dwelling
according to their tribes," which implies the orderly encampment of P.
II. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 169
of Jehovah, and Moses, departed not out of the camp," it
cannot be supposed that the ark was, before starting,
already outside of the camp — "afar o£f"; the words imply
as plainly as may be that its resting-place was within the
camp. When, again, Moses is related in Num. x. 36 to
have said at the resting of the ark, '' Betum, 0 Jehovah,
to the ten thousands of Israel,"^ his formula has hardly
any meaning if the ark did not return from going before
the people to a resting-place within the camp. In the
same direction point such allusions as "the cloud of
Jehovah was over them by day, when they set forward
from the camp " * — " and Tbj cloud standeth aver them • —
allusions which those who adopt the hypothesis we are
criticising think it necessary to relegate to F or a redactor ; ^
together with instances of an immediate acting, speaking,
or calling of Jehovah from the tabernacle^ (were Moses,
Aaron, and Miriam, e.g,, " afar o£f '' when they heard Jehovah
call '' suddenly " to them, as in Num. xii. 4 ?), or of direct
transactions with the officials of the sanctuary.^ Taken
together, these things show that, while there mav be
divergences in the mode of representation, there is no
essential disagreement in the accounts as to the place of
the tabemade.
3. Neither, when we take the history as a whole, does
there appear to be any better basis for the statement that
in J£ the tabernacle is a place of revelation only, whereas
in P it is peculiarly a place of worship. In P also, as in
^ Cf. DfllmAnn and Stnok, In Ice, Professor Gray's oomments on this
pasBBge, Num. x. 88-86, are ft good example of the new method. '*Here/'
ne says, ''if we may judge from so fragmentary ft record, it [the ark] is
oonoeired as moving of itself (!)... 86. Here, as in yer. 88, the ark starts
of itself, and the words that follow [' Rise np, 0 Jehorah,' etc.] may be
taken as addressed to it. . . . 86. Such words could be suitably addressed
to the ark returning fit>m battle to its fixed sauctuair . . . after the
people were settled in Canaan. It is less clearly suitable to the circum-
stances of the march through the wilderness: the people orertake the
ark, the ark does not return to them " (\)~-Numb€rs (*' Inter. Grit. Com."),
p. 97. How would Dr. Qray apply his canon to Ps. cxxxii. 8 1
* Num. X. 84. ' Num. liy. 14.
^ Thus Dillmann-, Gray, the Oxford ffex., etc. (not Addis). On the
ground that " E nowhere describes it [the pillar] as * oyer ' it " [the tent] —
the thing to be proved — the Oxford annotator arbitrarily makes the word
aver in Sum. xii. 10 bear a different sense from what it ordinarily has
in this connection. The phrase is identical with that in Ex. xl. 86 ; l^om.
ix. 17 (P).
* Kg., Nnm. xL 1, 10, 16 ; xii 4. *Jf-9't Dent, xxxi 9, 25, 26.
I70 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
JE, the tabernacle is a place of revelation ; in JE, and in
pre-Solomonic times, as in P, it is a place of worship, with
its altars and sacred furniture, its priestly ministrants, its
assemblies at the feasts, etc. Only by isolating one or two
special passages, in which the aspect of revelation in J£
is prominent/ can it be made to appear otherwise. In
certain respects there is obvious resemblance from the
first In P, as well as in JE, the tabernacle is called
ohel moed (tent of meeting):* in P this alternates with
the name mishkan (dwelling). A curious fact here, and
one puzzling to the critics, is that in certain sections of
P (1^ xxv.-xzvii 19) only mishkan is used; in others
(chaps. xxviiL-xxxL) only ohel moed ; in others the names
intermingle.' In both JE and P Jehovah manifests His
presence in a cloud of fire ;^ the fact that in JE the doud
is spoken of as a "pillar" is no contradiction. If in JE
Jehovah descends in the pillar to the door of the tabernacle
to speak with Moses, this mode of communication is also
recognised in P ("At the door of the tent of meeting . . .
where I will speak with you," Ex. xxix. 42, 43);* else-
where Jehovah speaks from between the cherubim.* The
tabernacle in both JE and P contains the ark of the
covenant; a Levitical priesthood in its service is implied
in the JE notices in Joshua,^ and in Deuteronomy.* A
tabernacle existed, and was set up in Shiloh, in Joshua's
time, as Josh. xviiL 1, ascribed to P,* declares: this re-
appears under the name " the house of Qod " in Shiloh, in
Judg. xviiL 31.^^ In this connection it should not be
^ Nmn. XL, ziL ; Deat xzzi. 14, 16. These are the only paangat efiar
Ez. zzziiL 7-il : a narrow barie for an indaetion.
' In JE, €.g,t in Num. zi 16 ; ziL 4 ; Dent zzxL 14.
* Gf. Oxford ffex, u, p. 120. In oonsiatency different aathon on^t to
be assumed.
< Nnmbers and Dent for JE ; in P, Ez. zL 84-88 ; Num. iz. 16-28,
etc It should be noted that in the narrative of the dedication of the
temple in 1 Kinf;s viii., tots. 10, 11 are modelled directly on the Fpauagt,
Ex. zl. 84-85.
» Cf. Oxford Bm, ii. p. 120. * Ez. zzr. 22 ; Num. TiL 89.
1 Josh. iii.-yi. * Deut. z. 6, 8 ; zzzL 9, 26, 26.
• On the critical analysis here, et Van Hoonaeker, Le Sae^rdoei,
p. 177.
1' Cf. Judg. ziz. 18, *'to the house of JehoTah," where, however, the
LXX has ' * my (the man's own) house " (B. V. man;.)* The " house of God "
in Judg. zz. 26 is more correctly "Bethel," where either the tabemade
was for a time (of. chap. iL 1, in LXX), or where the ark was temporarily
taken for the war.
EL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 171
overlooked that the Book of the Covenant (JE) akeady
Jrovides for offerings being brought to ^the house of
ehoyah thy God." ^ At the sanctuary at Shiloh an annual
feast, described as " a (or the) feast of Jehovah/' * is held,
which is most naturally identified with one of the three
prescribed feasts' (cf. 1 Sam. i 3). The notices of the
ark/ again, and the custom of ^inquiring of Jehovah/'^
attest the existence of a stated priesthood, of sacrifices — the
offering of ''burnt offerings and peace offerings before
Jehovah "* — and of the priestly ephod. In face of all this,
Wellhausen's assertion that in the Book of Judges " there
is no mention of the tabernacle ... it is only in pre-
paration, it has not yet appeared/'^ can only excite
astonishment
When we pass to the Books of Samuel, we get fresh and
valuable light on the tabernacle, and its place in the
religion of Israel. At the end of the period of the Judges,
it is still at Shiloh, with Eli, of the house of Aaron, as its
principal priest. It bears the old name — ^"the tent of
meeting" — ^to which no suspicion need attach;' contains
the ark with its cherubim;' is the centre of worship foi
''all Israel";^' in its furniture and ritual suggests the pre-
scriptions of the Levitical Code. "The lamp of God"
bums, as directed, all night ;^ from the later incidental
mention of the shewbread, and of the regulations connected
with it, at Nob,^' we may infer the presence of the table
* Sz. zxiiL 19. It ifl one of the astonndiiig statements in Wellhaosen
that '* house of Qod " always means " house of an image."~J7»M. qf Israel,
p^lSO.
' Jtidg. zzL 19.
* According to Berthean, the word ^ag is almost without exoeptbn used
of the three great feasts.— JSw^. ffandb, p. 278.
« Jndg. xz. 27, 28.
* Jndg. L 1 ; zz. 18, 28, 28.
* Jndg. zz. 28.
* HisL of Israel. Graf also sajs that there is no mention of " a sacred
tent ** in the time of the Judges, but remarks that this is not to be wondered
at, as the ark of the covenant is also not mentioned (p. 58). The oritics
in both cases reach their results bv rejecting what does not please them.
" The house of Ood " and *' the ark of the covenant " are both mentioned
in Judges. *
* Sm nezt page. * 1 Sam. iv. 4 ; cf. above, p. 187.
^ 1 Sam. ii. 14, 19 ; iii 19, 21.
" 1 Sam. iiL 8 ; cf. Ex. zzvii 20-21.
'' 1 Sam. zzi Dr. Driver objects that these allusions do not prove that
the institations "were observed toith the precise formcUiUes vrestirihed
in P." — IntrocL p. 142. How mti<:h does one expect in a historical allusion t
172 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
with the shewbread Elkanah goes up yearly to worship,^
and his sacrifice for his vow is according to the law.* In
1 Sam. ii 22, there is allusion to "the women who did
service at the door of the tent of meeting'* — the only other
mention of these women being in Ex. zxxviiL 8. (P). The
genuineness of this important passage, the second half of
which, for reasons that may be guessed, is omitted in the
LXX (Yat. Cod.), has been disputed, but, it seems to us,
without sufficient reason.'
Thus far the resemblance of "the house of God** in
Shiloh to the tabernacle of the law must be admitted. But
objections, on the other hand, are urged, which, it is thought,
disprove the identification.^ It is pointed out that the
sanctuary is described, not as a tent, but as a "temple**
{hikal)^ with doors and posts, which implies a permanent
structure;'^ that Samuel is represented as sleepmff in the
room where the ark of God was ;^ that the sons of Eli were
within their Levitical rights in demanding uncooked
flesh, etc.^ But there is needed here not a little forcing of
the text to make out a case in favour of the critics. " Every-
where else in 1 Sam. i.-iii.," says Wellhausen, arguing against
the name ohel moed^ "the sanctuary of Shiloh is called
1akai**i^ the "everywhere else" being simply twica And
it does not prove his point Whatever structures or
supports may have grown up about the sanctuary (for safety,
stability, protection, convenience) during its century-long
stay at Shiloh — and from its age such were to be expected
—it was still essentially, as 2 Sam. vii. 6 shows, "a tent and
a tabernacle,'* nor did Israelitish tradition ever know of
When the Ohronider expands, it is taken as a proof of non-historioity. See
below, p. 800.
1 1 &m. i 8, 7. Professor W. B. Smith allows that the yearly feasts
were observed {0,T. in J, CL, p. 845).
* 1 Sam. L 21, 25 ; cf. Ley. vii. 16 ; Kmn. xv. 8-10.
'The name ohd moed is, as we have seen, an old, well-attested name
of the tabemade (cf. Graf, p. 58), and is found again, in both Heb. and
LXX, in 1 Kings viii. 4. As regaids the women, even on the Bup{>osition,
which we do not accept, of a post-exilian composition of Ex. xxxviiL, it is
inconoeivable that there should occur this single mention of the women at
the tabernacle in the Oode, if there was not old, well-established tradition
behind it.
* Cf. in Wellhausen, Knenen, W. R. Smith, and the critics generally.
See the very dogmatic statements in O.T» in J, C, pp. 269-70.
* 1 Sam. i. 9 ; iii. 8. • 1 Sam. iii. 8.
' 1 Sara. u. 15. • ffist, of Israel, p. 41 (italios ours).
IL REUGION AND INSTITUTIONS 173
any other kind of habitation of Jehovah. The further 8up-
poeition that Samuel slept literally in the shrine of the ark
IS, trom the point of view of an Israelite, an outrage on all
probability; neither does the language of the text compel
any such meaning.^ Samuel and Eli slept in contiguous
chambers of some lodgment connected with the sanctuary,
such as may be presumed to have been provided for the
priests and others engaged in its servica llie sin of the sons
of Eli consisted in their greed and violence, and in the appro-
priating of such portions as their ** flesh-hooks " laid hold of,
before the fat was burned on the altar, as the law required.^
The Levitical dues are presupposed : not contradicted.
What remains to be said on the tabernacle may be briefly
summed up. Ark and tabernacle, as above noted, were
separated during the long pmod that the former was at
Kirja^-jearim. When David brought the ark to Zion,
the tabernacle, probably then old and frail, and unfitted for
removal, was at Gibeon.' Thence it was brought up with
its vessels, and preserved, apparently, as a precious relic, in
Solomon's templ&^ The supposition that the oJid moed
of 1 Kings viii 4 was not this historic tabernacle, but the
temporary tent set up by David on Zion, is contradicted by
the name,'^ which is not given to that tent, by the mention
of the vessels, and by the unlikelihood that a temporary
tent would have such honour put upon it, while one can
well understand why the old tabernacle should.
v. Thb UNrrr oi the Sanctuabt
We now approach a subject of cardinal importance —
probably the one of most importance — ^in this discussion:
the unity of the sanctuary ^ and the conflict alleged to exist
on the eentralisation of the euUue between Deuteronomy and
the earUer law and practice in Israel The point of the
* DeHtBZch says : " That he should sleep beside the ark would certainly
be a ooloAsal oontradictioiii of the law, but Wellhauaen reads this into the
tezt."— Luthaidt's Zeiteehrift, 1880, p. 232. Of. Wellhausen, p. 130. On
the alleged jmerthood of Samuel, see below, pp. 189-90.
» Lev. iiL 1 ff. ; TiL 28 ff.
* 1 Kings iiL 4 ; Till 4 ; of. 1 Ohron. xri. 89, 40 ; 2 Ohron. i 8.
According to 1 Ohron. zvL 89, Zadok ministered at Gibeon.
* 1 Rinn yiii 4 ; 2 Ohron. ▼. 5. If this be admitted, then the tabernacle,
M well as ue ark, was there for inspection till late times.
* Of. DeUtisoh, as abore, p. 68.
174 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
critical position on this head, briefly, is, that, while in
Dent xiL — ^placed in or near the age of Josiah — ^we have
the law of a central sanctuary at wmch alone sacrifices ore
lawfcd, in the earlier history we have not only no trace of
this idea of a central sanctoary, in which all lawful worship
is concentrated, but, in the absolute freedom of worship
that prevailed, convincing proof that such a law was neither
observed nor known. The older law in Ex. xx. 24, on
which the people acted in that earlier time, granted, it is
allied, unrestricted liberty of worship ; as Professor W. R
Smith interprets it — *^ Jehovah promises to meet with His
people and bless them at the altars of earth or unhewn
stone which stood in all comers of the land, on every spot
where Jehovah has set a memorial of His nam&"^ The
idea of the central sanctuary was, it is contended, the out-
come of the great prophetic movement which resulted in
the reign of Josiah in the suppression of the hamoth^ or
''high places," till then r^rded as lawful The relation
of the Deuteronomic to the Priestly Code — assumed to be
still later — on this subject ia thus expressed by Wellhausen :
"In that book (Deuteronomy) the unity of the cultus is
commanded; in the Priestly Code it is presupposed, . . .
In the one case we have, so to speak, only the idea as it
exists in the mind of the lawgiver, but making no claim to
be realised till a much later date ; in the other, the Mosaic
idea has acquired also a Mosaic embodiment, with which it
entered the world at the very first" ^ The case, however,
iB not nearly so strong as these statements would imply,
as many critical writers are coming themselves to perceive.*
Beserving, as before, what is to be said on the purely critical
aspects, we proceed to look at the subject in its historical
relations.
The Priestly Code may be left out of consideration at
this stage, for it will scarcely be denied that, if there was a
sacrificial system in the wilderness at all, it would be a
system centralised in the sanctuary, as the Code represents.
The question turns then, really, on the compatibility of the
law in Deuteronomy with the enactment in Ex. xx. 24, and
* TiropheU tf hroA^ p. 109. * HiA, qflmwH, pp. 85, 87.
* This point is empnaBised in an interesting lecture by Dr. S. A. Friea,
delivered to a Scientific Congress at Stockholm in 1897, entitled Modem*
Vbrstellwigen tUr OeaehiMe lamels (Modem Representations of the History
of Israel). See below, pp. 176, 278.
n. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 175
with the later practice. And the first condition of a satis-
factory treatment lies, as the lawyers woold say» in a proper
adjustment of the issues.
1. We do well to begin by looking at the precise form
of the fundamerUal law in Ex. zx. 24 itself. The passage
reads: ''An altar of earth thou shalt make to Me, and
shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt ofierings, and thy peace
offerings, thy sheep and thine oxen : in every place where I
record My name, I will come to thee and I will bless thea"
The law is general in form, but it must be observed that
there in nothmg in it warranting the worship " at the altars
of earth and imhewn stones in all comers of the land,**
which Ftofessor W. R Smith reads into its terms. It is
addressed to the nation, not to the individual ; and it does
not speak of *' altars," but only of " an altar.'' It in not a
law in the least giving imrestricted liberty of worship ; its
scope, rather, is carefully limited by the clause, ** in every
place where I record My nama"^ It would be unduly
narrowing the force of this law to confine it, with some, to
the iueeemve places where the sanctuary was set up during
the wilderness wanderings and in Canaan ; it must at least
include all places sanctified to their recipients by special
appearances or revelations of Grod. This fully explains,
and l^timises, 0^., the cases of Gideon,"* of Manoah,'
of David,^ of Solomon,<^ of Elijah.* Neither is there any-
thing here that confiicts with Deuteronomy. The law m
Deut xii gives the general rule of worship at the central
sanctuary, but is not to be understood as denying that
circumstances might arise in which, under proper divine
authority, exceptional sacrifices might be offered. The
clearest proof of this is that Deuteronomy itself rives
directions for the building of an altar on Mount Ebal,
precisely in the manner of Ex. xx. 26.^
^ Profeasor W. R. Smith, nplving to Dr. Wm. H. Green, eeemt to Insist
tliAt these words can only bear the meaning, '* in all plaoes " in the sense of
a number of co-existent sanctuaries. — FropheU, p. S9i. On this see Note B
en tiie Force of Ex. xz. 24.
* Jndg. Ti. 25, 20. • Jndg. xliL 10.
«2Sam. xxiy. 18. *1 Kuigsiii 4, S.
• 1 Kings xriiL 81.
' Dent xxrii. 5, 6. — ^Van Hoonaoker advocates the yiew tSiat there were
two STstems of wonhip--« private and a public— «nd supposes tiiat the law
in Sxodns refers to the former, and the law in Deuteronomy to the latter.
See his Ingenioos discussion in his Xs L%€U du OuiU dam la
176 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
2. With this, in the next place, miiBt be taken the fact,
which the critics too much ignore> that, even in the earliest
period, ihs nde and ideal in Israel is that of a central
saaictuary, as the legitimate place of worship. It has just
been seen that the fundamental law itself speaks of "an
altar," not of ''altars," and no countenance is given anj-
where to a multitude of co-existing altars.^ It is not
questioned that the Priestly Code — the only Code we possess
for the wilderness — "presupposes" unity of worship;
neither, in the history, is there trace of any other than
centralised worship of a lawful kind during the wanderings.
The Book of the Covenant — the same which contains the
law of the altar — ^has plainly the same ideal of the unity of
the sanctuary. It takes for granted " the house of Jehovah
thy Gkxl," and requires that three times in the year all males
shall present themselves there before Jehovah.* The
idolatrous shrines in Canaan are to be broken down.' It is
in keeping with this, that, in prospect of entering Canaan,
Deuteronomy relaxes the law requiring the slaying of all
oxen, lambs, and goats at the door of the tabernacle,^ and
permits the slaying of animals for food at home.^ In the
Book of Joshua, the incident of the altar Ed — the narrative
of which, in a way perplexing to the critics, combines
peculiarities of P and JE * — ]b a striking testimony to the
hold which this idea of the one altar had upon the tribes.
We have already seen that the tabernacle at Shiloh was the
recognised centre of worship for " all Israel " in the days of
riiiudU d«i ffibrevx, and in his Z« Saeffrdoe$ LMHque (pp. 5 ff.). Similar
▼lews are advocated by Fries, referred to above (p. 174), in bis work, Die
ZmUraliioticn de$ itradUiteken Kultw, Tbe bjpothesis is probably not
wi^oat its elements of tmtb, and wonid explain certain anomalies, but we
bare not felt it necessary to adopt it.
^ Ex. XX. 24 ; xzi 14. Cf. Bobertson's Early Bdigion, pp. 405-18.
*' It is remarkable," says Professor Robertson, " tbat we do not find in all tbe
Old Testament sncb a diyine utterance as 'My altars' ; and only twice
does the expression 'Thy altars/ addressed to God, occur. It is found in
ElMab's complaint, which refers to Northern Israel, at a time when the
legitimate worship at Jerusalem was excluded ; and in Ps. Ixxxir., where
it again occurs [on the critical view, post-exilian], no inference can be drawn
from it On the other hand, Hosea says distinctly, 'Ephraim hath multi-
pUed altars to sin ' (Hos. viii 11) " (p. 112).
* Ex. xxiii 14-17. * Ex. xxiii. 24.
^ Lev. xTiL 1 ff. The object of the law is to preyent promiscuous saori-
fidngto demons C^ors. 5, 8).
* Deut xii. 20. See below, pp. 270, 814.
* Josh. y»i<- 9-84. On the onticism, of. Oxf. Hex,, Drirer, eto.
11. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 177
Eli^ In Judges, legitdmate sacrifices are offered at the
sanctuarj,' or before the ark,' or where God has " recorded
His name " in a special revelation ; ^ all others are condemned
as transgressions.^ The period succeeding the captivity of
the ark is considered below.
3. When we turn, next, to Deuteronomy, we discover
cmother fact of great importance in this connection, viz.,
that there also, as Wellhausen says, the unity of the cultus
is an "idea" which makes ^ no claim to be realised till a
much later date." ^ The law in Deut. xii, in other words,
is not given as a law intended to come into perfect operation
from the first. It has just been seen that the principle of
centralisation of worship was involved in the Mosaic system
from the commencement, but the realisation of the idea
was, and in the nature of the case could only be, graduaL
The law of Deuteronomy, in agreement with this, roars on
its face that it was not intended to be put strictly in
force till certain important conditions had been fulfilled —
conditions which, owing to the disobedience of the people,
who, during the time of the Judges, so often put back the
clock of their own history, were not fulfilled till as late as
the days of David and Solomon. The law reads thus:
"When ye go over Jordan, and dwell in the land which
Jehovah your God causeth you to inherit, and He giveth
you rest from all your enemies round about, so that ye
dwell in safety : then shall it come to pass that the place
which Jehovah your God shall choose to cause His name to
dwell there," etcJ In point of fact, the unsettled state of
things here described lasted till the reign of David.*
> See aboye, p. 171. Of. Jer. Til 12. * Jndg. zzL 19.
* Judg. XL. 26, 27 ; xzi. 2-4 (for **hon8e of God" read "Bethel").
^ Gideon, Manoah, as above, p. 175. Cf. Judg. ii. 1-5. It has been
inferred, and is not improbable, that Gideon's altar in Judg. yL 24, to
which he gave the name " Jehovah-Shalom, " was a monamental altar, Kke
the altar ** Ed " in Joeh. xiiL This would explain why he was required next
day to boild a new altar beside it (ver. 26).
' Jndg. yiii. 27, xvii. 5, 6, etc. Dr. W. B. Smith appears to assame
that the phrase "before Jehovah" (Judg. xi 11, etc.) always implies
sacrifioe. That, however, is not so. Cf. Gen. zxvii. 7 ; Ex. vi. 12, 80 ;
Deut It. 10 ; ix. 25 ; 1 Sam. xxiil 18. See Graf, Otidiieht. Sueher, p. 68.
* See above, p. 174. ^ Dent xii. 10, 11.
* 2 Sam. vii. 1. Professor W. R. Smith allows that Deuteronomy ** pots
the ease as if the introduction of a strictly unified cultus was to be defemd
till the peacefol occupation of Palestine was aocomplished."— O.T. tn /. d,
p. 272. Where then is the contradiction t
13
;
178 THE ax. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
Accordingly, in 1 Kings iii 2, it is not urged that the
law did not exist, or that it was not known, but
the excuse given for irr^ularities is that ''there was
no house built for the name of Jehovah until these
dajrs."^ This principle alone solves many difficulties, and
goes a long way to bring the history and the law into
harmony.
4. Ijiis leads, finally, to the remark that, in the inter-
pretation of these laws, large allowance needs to be made
for the vrregidarities incident to times of political confusion
and religious declension. It is not fair to plead, as contra-
dictory of the law, the falling back on local sanctuaries in
periodi3 of great national and religious disorganisation, as
when the land was in possession of enemies, or when the
ark was in captivity, or separated from the tabernacle, or
when the kingdom was divided, and the state-worship in
the Northern division was idolatrous. In particular, the
period following the rejection of Eli and his sons was one of
unusual comphcations, during which Samuel's own person
would seem to have been the chief religious centre of the
nation.* It is here that the critical case finds its strongest
support, and there are undoubted difficulties How could it
be otherwise, after ''the capture of the ark, the fall of
Shiloh, and the extension of the Philistine power into the
heart of Mount Ephraim " ? • We are reminded, however,
that even after the ark had been brought back, and settled
in the house of Abinadab, Samuel made no attempt to remove
it to Nob, but "continued to sacrifice at a variety of shrines " ^
— Bethel, Oilgal, Mizpah, Ramah. It is a sweeping and
unwarranted inference to draw from this that "Samuel
did not know of a systematic and exclusive system of
sacrificial ritual confined to the sanctuary of the ark."^
Samuel evidently knew something of it as long as Shiloh
stood ; for we read of no attempt then to go about the shrines
1 Ot 1 Kings Tiii. 29 ; iz. 8 ; 2 Ghron. tL 5, 6.
* Shfloh had probably fallen. Ct Jer. rii. 12, zzyi 6, with sabsaqnent
mention of Nob, 1 Sam. zzi
•0.r. *»/. (7., p. 271.
^ IHd, p. 272. Trofessor Smith, as lusiial, orenhoote the mark in his
statement wat " Eleazar ben Abinadab was oonsecrated its prietL" There
is no mention of a '* priest" in 1 Sam. yii. 1. Eleasar was sanctified for
the OQstodT of the arc. Samnel's apparent negleet of the ark has to be
aooonnted for on any theory (see aboTe, p. 164).
11. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 179
aaGiificing.^ The ark and Stuloh had been rejected; the
former had been taken to Eirjath-jearim under jnd^ent
of Gkxl ; Israel felt itself in a manner under bereavement,
and ** all the house of Israel lamented after Jehovah." * The
age was truly, as Professor Smith sajs '' is generally argued/'
"one of rel^ous interregnum";' are we, in such circum-
stances, to judse Samud by the law of an orderly and
settled time ? He fell back naturally, as even the law in
Deuteronomy permitted him to do, on local sanctuaries
until such time as Jehovah would give the people rest.^
The law had its place ; but even under the law, ''.the letter'
killethy but the spirit giveth life;^ and in no age were
prophetically-minded men the slaves of the mere letter of
the commandment to the d^ee that the critics suppose.*
Samuel acted with a measure of freedom, as his circumstances
demanded; and writers who suppose that priests and
prophets were perpetually engaged in changing and modi-
nring laws believ^ to be cUvine should be the last to
chauenge his riffht to do so.
6. when all is said, it is plain from the statement in
the Book of Kings that, in the b^inning of Solomon's
reign, there was a widespread resort of the people to high
pmes for worship, and that even the establishment of
Solomon's great temple» with its powerful centralising
influence, was not effectual to check this tendencv. The
compiler of Kings looks on worship at '' high places before
the temple was founded as irregular, but excusable ; * after
that it is condemned. The history of these ** high places "
has vet to be written in a fairer spirit than is generally
manifested in notices of them. Much obscurity, in reality,
rests upon them. In Judges the word does not occur, and
the defections described are mostly of the nature of worship
at the Canaanitish shrines of Baal and Ashtoreth.^ The few
allusions in Samuel are connected with Samuel's own dty
* The itetameiit that Samuel TQgolarly aacrificed at all the i>laoe8 men-
tioned ifl an importation into the text. The special mention of his boilding
an altar at Bamiah (1 Sam. yii. 17) would saegest that he did not Profeawr
Smith's list of " sanctaariee " needs a good deal of sifting.
« 1 Sam. ril 2. • O.T. *» J,0., p. 272. < 2 Oor. iiL 6.
* See Note 0 on Freedom under the Law. Ct Num. z. 16-2U) ; 1 Sam.
XT. 22 ; xzL 1>6 ; 2 Chron. xziz. 84 ; xxz. 17, 19.
* 1 Kings iii. 2, Z.
^ Allusions to Canaanitish "high plaoes" are found in law, xxfL 80 ;
Kum. xzi 28 ; zzii. 41 ; zzziii. 52.
i8o THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
of Bamah, and with the residenoe of the band of prophets
at Oibeah:^ elsewhere in Samuel thej are unnoticed. It
may be inferred from the toleration accorded to it that the
greater part of what worship there was at " high places "
prior to the founding of the temple was directed to
Jehovah; afterwards, partly through Solomon's own evil
example,' idolatry found entrance, and rapidly spread.
What the ** high places " became in the Nortjiem Kingdom,
latterly in Judah also, we know from the prophets. It
^8, however, a perversion of the facts to speak of the
prophets as ever sanctioning, or approving of, this style of
worship. If it is replied that it is idokUrovs worship which
the prophets so strongly reprobate, not worship at the ** high
places" as such, it may be pointed out that they never
make such a distinction, or use language which would
suggest the acceptableness of the hamath worship in any
form.' That Elijah mourned the breaking down of the
altars of Jehovah in Northern Israel is readily explicable
from the peculiar circumstances of that kingdom. To
Amos and Hosea, Micah and Isaiah, not less than to
Jeremiah and Ezekiel, the one legitimate sanctuary is that
of Zion at Jerusalem.^
The conclusion we reach on this subject of the unity of
worship is, that the history is consistent with itself, provided
we accept its own premises, and do not insist on forcing on '*
it an alien theory of religious development. The reforma-
tions of Hezekiah and Josiah then fall into their proper
places, without the necessity of assuming the invention of
ad hoe** programme&"
YL Thb Aaronic Pbiesthood and thb Levitib
Ark and tabemade imply a priesthood, and the notices
already cited from Joshua, Judges, 1 Samuel, and Deuter-
onomy, abimdantly show that &om the days of Moses such
' 1 Sam. Iz., X. * 1 Kings zL 7, 8.
' Dr. W. H. Oreen says: "The people ere nerer told that thej may
saerifioe on the high hllla and under green trees, or at Bethel and Oilgal and
Beersheba, if only they sacrifice to the Lord alone, and in a proper manner.
They are neyer told that God will be pleased with the erection of nnrnerons
altars, provided the sendee upon them is rightly conducted.*' — Metet mud
the Prophets, p. 167.
^ Cf. Amos i. 2 ; Isa. ii 2 ; Mic It. 2 ; Hos. ilL 6. See BobertM>n»
Sarly Mel. p. 405.
11. REUGION AND INSTITUTIONS i8i
a priesthood existed, and that it was LeaMical. But was it
Aaronic^ And was there from early times such a dis-
tinction between priests and Zevites as the Priestly Code
represents ?
1. It is a fundamental contention of the new school that
a distinctivdy Aaronic priesthood was unknown before the
exil& Till Ezekiel, in tus sketch of the new temple arrange-
ments (chaps. xL-xlviii), initiated a distinction between
Zadokite priests and other Levites — a theory considered in
a later chapter^ — ^there was no distinction in principle
between priests and Levites : all Levites are po88Q>le priests.
In particular, a high priest of Aaronic descent was
unknown. The question of the relation of the priests to
other Levites is considered below; we inquire at present
whether it is the case that the earlier books give no traces
of an Aaronic priesthood. We affirm that they do, and
believe that the proof of this can only be set aside by the
usual circle method of first assuming that the Aaronic priest-
hood is late, then, on that ground, disallowing the passages
which imply it
Wellhausen has some wonderful constructive history on
this subject, on which we need not dwell The Levites of
history, he affirms, have nothing to do with the old tribe of
Levi : in the J narrative in Exodus, Aaron was not origin-
ally mentioned at all ; it is the line of Moses, not of Aaron,
that gives rise to the clerical guild.' As an instance of the
critical procedure, we may take the case of the high priest
It is, as just said, an essential part of the Wellhausen theory
that this functionary is a creation of the exile. He is, we
are told, still ** unknown even to EzekieL" ' Unfortunately
for the theory, the high priest is expressly mentioned in
at least four places in 2 Kings, viz., in chaps, xii 10, xxiL
4, 8, xxiii 4^ — the last two diapters being those relied
on as furnishing one of the main pillars of the critical
theory, the finding of '* the book of the law " in the reign of
^ See below, Chap. IX.
^JEM, ef Imulf pp. 142-48. *< Aaron,'* he sajB, " was not originally
S resent in J, bat owed nis introduction to the redactor who combined J and
! into JB." Fteeiaely the opposite view is taken by Dillmann, Exod.'^Ln,
p. 487. See also Knenen below.
* Ibid. pp. 148-49.
^ It ocoon earlier in 2 Sam. xr. 27, if Wellhansen's amended reading of
that text is aooepted.
1 82 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
Joeiah. The texts are sustained by the parallel passages in
Chronioles and by the LXX. What is to be done with
them ? They are simply struck out as interpolations, though
it is unaeoonntable why a redactor should have inserted
them in just those places, wheoi so many more invited his
attention.^
If, on the other hand, we let the history speak for itself,
we get such notices as these, which are sufficiently unam-
biguous. Deut X. 6, attributed by the critics to E,' informs
us that, after Aaron's death, '* Eleazar his son ministered in
the priest's office in his stead.'*' Josh. zxir. 33 carries
this a step further by narratin|^ the death of Eleazar, the
son of Aaron, and his burial m the hill of Phinehas, his
son. This is continued in Judg. xx. 27, 28, where we
read that ** Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron,
stood before it [the ark] in these daya** From some cause
unexplained, the high priesthood became transferred from
the Ime of Eleazar to that of Ithamar, and in the opening
of 1 Samuel, Eli, of this younger branch,^ is found in office.
For the sins of his sons it is announced to Eli that his
house' shall be deprived of its pre-eminence.* This took
place in the reign of Solomon, when Abiathar was deposed,*
and Zadok, of the older line, obtained the sole high priest-
hood.^ Thus far the case is exactly that described in the
words of the "man of God" to Eli in 1 Sam. ii 27, 28:
** Thus saith Jehovah, Did I reveal myself unto the house of
thy father, when they were in bondage to Pharaoh's house 7
And did I choose him out of all the tribes of Israel to be
^ Graf does not challenge the earlier mention of the *<high priest **
(GeaehiehL Bileher, p. 4, etc.). Delitzsoh {ZeU$chr^, 1880, a 228);
Dillmann {Num,-Joi. p. 645) ; Bandissin (Diet, qf BiMe, It. p. 7d) ; Van
Hoonacker, etc, defend the passages. Kantzsch removes 2 Eincs zii. 10 as
a ^oss, bnt lets the others stand. See below, p. 806. Cf. Professor H. P.
Smith's treatment of the Leyites in Samuel, above, p. 168.
* Thus Oxf. JTIssB., Addis, eto.
* Van Hoonacker draws attention to the harmony of JS and P In passing
by Nadab and Abihu ; see below, p. 854.
^ Thus 1 Ohron. xziv. 8, bat in 1 Sam. ii. 27, 28 also, Eli is assumed to
be of the house of Aaron. Wellhausen's idea that in this pu>age Moses,
not Aaron, is intended soaroely deserves notice. Of. W. R. Smith, 0. T. in
J, 0., p. 268.
* 1 Sam. ii 27-86. • 1 Kin« ii 26, 27.
^ 1 Kings ii 85. Owing to ths political division in the reicn of
David there was for a time a double priesthood. On Wellhansen's denial
of the Aaronite descent of Zadok, see Note D on the Genealogy of
Zadok.
n. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 183
Mj priest, to go up unto Mine altar, to bum incense, to
wear an ephod before Me?"^ In using here the term
** high priesthood/' we do not forget that it is held that tiie
high priest is an exilian creation. But is that so ? It has
just been pointed out that the title is repeatedly used in the
history of the kings. How, in fact, can we otherwise
express the undoubted position of supremacy or dignity
held by priests like Eleazar, Pbinehas, Eu, Abiathar^
Zadok ? But there is another point of much interest. If
the high priesthood was a creation of the exile, we should
expect that the title would be one frequently met with in
the Levitical Code — at least more frequently than else-
whera Yet it occurs there only thru timet altogether —
twice in Num. xxxv. (vers. 25, 28), and once in Lev. xxi 10
— the last a passage which many take to be very old.* The
term ordinarily used in the (Tode is simply " the priesf
The priesthood was Aaronic, but was it exchmoely so ;
or even exclusively Levitical? This is contested, but
without real force, on the ground of certain notices in the
historical books, as where the king is represented as taking
a lead in religious celebrations, offering sacrifices, blessing
the people,' etc., or where David's sons and others are
spoken of as ^ priests."^ A peculiar place is accorded,
certainly, to the King, as representative of Jehovah, in the
arrangements and conduct of worship,* but this as much in
Chronicles and EzekieP as in the Books of Samuel or
Einga Nor is the king permitted to usurp functions
strictly sacerdotal^ It is not to be supposed that Solomon
offered with his own hand the 22,000 oxen and 120,000
sheep mentioi^ed in 1 Kings viii 63, to the exclusion of the
^ Knenen diffen from Wellhansen in allowing in hia Bdigion qf ItrcuH
% Leritioal and ariainaUy Aaronio priesthood. "Levi was one of the
twelve tribes from the first . • . Moses and Aaron were Leyites ; Aaron's
lamilj disohar^ the priestiy offloe at the common sanotnary," etc — ii.
Su 802. Bandissin argaes for an Aaronio priesthood at least older than
osiah's n(orm,^IHeL qf Bible, iT. n. 89.
' On this subject see more ftilly oelow. Chap. IX. Cf. also Delitzsoh,
Lathaidt's Z&Usehrift, 1880, p. 228.
* DaTid, 2 Sam. yi. 17, 18 ; Solomon, 1 Kings lii. 4 ; yiii. 82-64.
« 2 Sam. Tiii. 18 (B. V.) ; xx. 26 (R.y.} ; 1 Kings iv. 5 (B. V.).
* See the admiiable remarks on this m Van Hoonacker, Le Saardoee,
pp. 256 ff.
* 1 Chron. xr. 27 ; rri. 2 ; 2 Ghron. tL 8, 12 ff. ; rii. 4 ff., eta ;
Esek. zliF. 8 ; xIt. 7, 16, 17, 22, etc.
' Gf. the judgment on Usdah, 2 Ghron. xxvi. 16 ff. ; et 2 Kinge xr. 6.
1 84 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
priests mentioned in vera 3, 6, 10 ;^ or that David, earlier,
slew for himself the numerons offerings of 2 Sam. vi 17, 18,
from which " a portion " was given to the whole multitude (also
with his own hand ? ). The priesthood of the sons of David,
however that difficult passage and related texts are to be
understood,* was evidently something different from the
ordinary service of the altar, and cannot outweigh the very
full testimony to the Levitical character of the latter.
2. This brings us to the second question — that of the
relations of priests and Levites, The subject will coijie up
at an after stage, and we need not do more here than inquire
whether the representation of a special order of Aaronic
priests, in distinction from other Levites, is really, as
alleged, in conflict with Deuteronomy, and with the facts of
the earlier history. The general position of critical writers
is that the view of the priesthood in the Levitical Code is
irreconcilable with the representation in Deuteronomy, and
with the earlier practice. In the Code a strong distinction
is made between ''the sons of Aaron," who are the only
lawful priests, and the ordinary Levites, who are servants
of the sanctuary. In Deuteronomy, it is held, this distinc-
tion has no place. The tribe of Levi as a whole is the
priestly tribe. As Professor W. R Smith puts it:
"Deuteronomy knows no Levites who cannot be priests,
and no priests who are not Levites. The two ideas are
identical" ' The phraseology in this book, accordingly, is
not "sons of Aaron," but "sons of Levi" It speaks oi
" the* priests the Levites," not of " priests and Levites.'
This also, it is pointed out, is the phraseology of the older his-
torical books — so far as not revised. The distinction between
" priests " and " Levites " is held to be due to a later degrada-
tion of priests of the " high places," as sketched by EzekieL^
^ Wellhansen says that doubtless Solomon vith his own hands offered
the "first" sacrifice {Hiat, of Itrael, p. 188), on which Van Hoonacker
remarks: "If the 21,999 oxen that remained can be said to be offered bj
Solomon, when in reality thej have been offered by others in his name,
the first may have been so also ; the text knows nothing of an offering of
thefir8t"(p. 259).
' Ot the discussion in Van Hoonacker, pp. 268 ff., and see Note E on
David's Sons as Priests. On other oaestions in the historical books bearing
on the TOiesthood, see pp. 858, 868 n., 888 below.
• O.T. in J. C, p. 860.
* See below, Chap. IX. p. 815 ff. The older theory was that Deuteronomy
implies an eleveUion of the Levites from their original lower sUtoM, ana
IL RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 185
What is true in this contention is to be frankly acknow-
le(]^ed. The difference in point of view and mode of speech
in I)enteronomy must be apparent to every reader ; and it
may at once be conceded to an able writer on the subject^
that, if we had only Deuteronomy, we should never be able
to arrive at a knowledge of the sharp division of the tribe
of Levi into the superior and subordinate orders with which
the Levitical law makes us acquainted. But it does not
follow that the distinction is not there, and is not pre-
supposed throughout.
(1) We do well, in the first place, to look with some
closeness into tfte phraseology on which so much — practically
the whole case — is based. When this is done, we discover
that the phenomena are not quite so simple as the above
statement would suggest. The expression ** the priests the
Levites," occurring in Deut. xviL 9, 18, xviiL 1, xxiv. 8,
xxvii 9 — Tvot earlier in the book,— of itself, it will be
allowed, decides nothing: it means simply "the Levitical
priests." It is not found, indeed, in the Priestly Code ; but
as little is the other expression, ''ptiests aki Levites."
That is peculiar to the later books,' and even in Chronicles
is sometimes interchanged with 'Hhe priests the Levites."'
The Book of Joshua, likewise, has ''the priests the
Levites":^ never "priests and Levites." On the other
hand, the Priestly Writer occasionally uses "Levites," as
in Deuteronomy, to cover loth priests and Levites:^ this is
the case also in Chronicles.* Finally, it is true that " sons
of Aaron" is not used in Deuteronomy to describe the
priests, though there is the recognition of the Aaronic high
priest. But it is very noticeable that, even in the Leviti^
the Ute date of the book was argaed for on the jproimd that it miiBt have
taken a long time to bring this change about. The newer criticism gives
up the premises, bat retains the oondndon.
^ Van Hoonacker, Le Stteerdooe^ p. 170. The theory of this writer is,
that the distinction existed, bat in popular usage the name " priests " came
to be applied to all Leyites, whetner of the higher or lower grade (cf.
Dillmann on Deut. rviii. 1). The theory, whue containing suggcstiye
elements, does not seem to ns in this form tenable.
* Chronicles, Ezra, Kehemiah ; once in 1 Kings viii. 4, where the parallel
paaH«e in 2 Chron. r. 6 has "the priests the Levifces."
* 2 Ghron. v. 6 ; xxiiL 18 ; zzz. 27.
« Josh. iii. if. (or "priests" simnly).
* Kg,, Num. XXXV. 2, 6, 8 ; Josn. zir. 4 ; xzi. 8 (cf. Van Hoonacker).
* 1 Cluron. zri. 4, 87 ; 2 CHiron. zzix. 6 ff. In Malachi also (chap. iiL 8)
the priests are " the sons of Levi'*
1 86 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
Code, ''sons of Aaron" is by no means the only, or uni-
versal, designation for the priests; there are considerable
sections of the Code in which it either does not occur at
all, or occurs only sparingly.^ It is, moreover, chiefly in the
laws and narratives of the earlier part of the wilderness
sojourn that this usage is found ; it is not characteristic of
the later chapters of Numbers. Nor can this change from
a narrower to a more general designation, on the assumption
of the truth of the history, be regarded as strange. At first
the priests, " the sons of Aaron," stood out from the people
with sharp distinctness as alone invested with sacred office.
The case was greatly altered after the separation of the
tribe of Levi,' when the designation " sons of Aaron " seems
to have been gradually dropped for another identifying the
priests more cSrectly with their tribe.' Priests and Levites
had more in common with each other than either class had
with the general body of the people; and, besides, the
priests were Levite& The rise of such a designation as " the
priests the Levites " is therefore quite natural, and the view
in Deuteronomy of the tribe of Levi as, collectively, a
priestly tribe, is entirely in keeping with the situation in
which the discourses are supposed to have been delivered.
To the popular eye, the tribe of Levi stood apart, forming,
as a whol^ one sacred body, engaged in ministering in holy
things to God.
(2) It does not surprise us, then, to find in Deuteronomy
the functions of the priestly ministry — even to the " Urim and
Thummim," which was the peculiar prerogative of the high
priest — ascribed to the tribe of Levi as a whole.^ The question
of real importance is — Does the book contain any indication of
such a distinction as we have nevertheless assumed to exist
between the different orders in this tribe, or does it exclude
such distinction ? We believe there is evidence of such dis-
tinction ; the newer critics deny it.^ The question belongs
more properly to the discussion of Deuteronomy,' but, in the
> For detaOs see Eittel, Hist, cfffebM. I p.
' Nam. i 47 ff. ; lii. 6 ff. ; viii. 5 ff., etc.
120.
* After Numbers the phrase ooonrs only in Josh, zzi, where disorlmSnA-
tion is neoeesary in the appointment of the oities.
^ Dent z. 8 ; zxxiiL 8.
* Dillmann, Delitzsoh, Kittel, etc, Van Hoonabker abo from hit oim
point of view, hold that distinctions are not ezclndad*
* See below, Chap. YIII
II. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 187
interest of the history, we may be permitted thus far to antici-
pate. We would draw attention first, then, to the fact, that
m Deuteronomy the terms ** priest " and ** Levite " are, after
all, not quite synonymous. There are ''the priests the
Levites," but there are also ** Levites ** who are not priests.
Even allowing them to be '^ possible " priests, though we do
not believe this to be the meaning of the book, they have
still to be distinguished from those who, in the sense of the
writer, are adual priests. It is a perfectly unwarranted
assumption that, wherever the term Levite is used we
have a synonym for priest. A distinction is already in-
dicated, and the fact of at least certain gradations within
the tribe established, by the statement in chap. x. 6 that
'' Aaron died, and Eleazar his son ministered in the priest's
office in his stead." ^ The clearest indication, however, is
in chap. xviiL 1-8, where an obvious distinction is made
between the ''priest" serving at the sanctuary (vers. 3-6),
and the " Levite " not thus serving * (vers. 6-8) ; the only in-
telligible reason for the more general designation being,
either that ordinary non-priestly Levites are meant, or at •
least that they are intended to be indudecL It is a reading
into the text what is not there to assert that every
" Levite " going up to the sanctuary is a " possible " priest
in the stricter sense. This rules the meaning to be
attached to the opening sentence : " The priests the Levites,
all the tribe of Levi'^ The second designation includes
the first: in apposition it cannot be, since, in the writer's
sense, all Levites are not actual priests. To us it seems
most evident that when he speaks of "the priests the
Levites," he has a definite class in view, and by no means
the whole body of the tribe.^ This view of the passage,
^ Of. chap. xxxiiL 8. To what again oan the aepsration in ohap. z. 8
refer, if not to the setting apart of the aona of Aaron, and afterwards of
the whole tribe of Levi, reooraed in the P sectionB of the histoiy t Critios
suppose an amiUed narrative of this sepsration in JS (of. Driver, DeuL
p. 121).
* Thus, s.^., Dillmann, Num^^os.^ inloe. It is to be remembered that
it is only in uie few passages above cited that priests are mentioned at all.
* Ohap. zriii 1.
^Dr. Driver refers to the freqnency of explanatory appositions in
Deuteronomy, and gives examples {JkuL p. 214). The case seems rather
analogous to those m which the lawgiver ea^9and8 his original statement by
enlar^ng additions; s.^., "Ye shall eat ... ye and your household
(ohap. xii 7); "Te uiall rejoice ... ye, and your sons, and your
daughters," £ta eta (chap, zii* 12) ; ef, chap. xii. 18 ; xv. 11, etc.
1 88 THE O.T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM—
we are aware, the critical school meets with a direct
negative, assigning as a reason that the terms used in
ver. 7 to describe the Levites' services (''to minister in
the name of Jehovah," "to stand before Jehovah") are
those regularly used of priestly duties. We believe this is
far from being really the case ; but the question is a little
intricate, and had better be discussed apart^
(3) A word may be said before leaving the subject on
the difficulty arising from the representations in Deuter-
onomy of the dispmed and needy eanditian of the Levites.
The objection is urged that, instead of being furnished with
cities and pasturages, and enjoying an independent income
from tithes, as the Priestly Ckxle provides, the Levites
appear in this book as homeless and dependent, wandering
from place to place, and glad to be invited, with the
stranger, the widow, and the fatherless, to share in
charitable feasts.' Here, in the first place, it must be
remarked that the legal provision is not ignored, but is,
on the other hand, expressly alluded to in chap. xviiL 1, 2
(cf. chap. X. 9), " And they shall have no inheritance among
their brethren; Jehovah is their inheritance, as He hath
spoken to them," where the reference seems unmistakable
to the law in Num. xviii 20, 23, 24 Dillmann says:
"The corresponding law stands in Num. xviiL"' But,
waiving this, may we not surest that, if a time is sought
when these exhortations to care for the Levite would be
suitable, no time is so fit as that when they are supposed
to have been delivered, before the tithe-laws had come into
regular operation, — when in truth there was Uttle or
nothing to tithe,~and when the Levites would be largely
dependent on the hospitality of individuals. The Levites
were dependent then, and might from very obvious causes
1 See Appendix to Gliapter— " Priests and LeviteflL" Cf. also the case of
Samuel, oonsidered below, pp. 189-90.
» Deut xii. 12, 19 ; xvi. 11. etc.
' Num,^ot,f in loe. Dr. Driver argues against this on the ground that
in Num. xviiL 20 "the promise is made expressly to the pruds (Aaron)
alone, as distinguished from the Levites (vers. 21-24), whose ' inheritance ' is
s^cified separately (ver. 24) ; here it ii given to the whole tribe witiiout
distinction — 2>e«<. p. 125 (on chap. x. 9). But surely it is obvious that the
whole passage in Ifumbers (xviii. 20-24) ^oes together, and that the
principal part of the "inheritance " of the pnests is the tenth of the tithe
they are to receive from the Levites (ver. 26). Lot tho rvador compare the
paasagM for himself.
11. RELIGION AND INSTITUTIONS 189
come to be dependent again. Their state would not be
greatly bettered in the unsettled times of the oonquest.^
Nothing could be more appropriate in itself, better adapted
to create kindly sympathies between Levites and people,
or more likely to avert neglect of the tribe by the with-
holding of their just dues, than the perpetuation of these
primitive hospitaJities. It is to be remembered that no
tribunal existed to enforce payment of the tithes: all
depended on the conscientiousness of the individual payer.
It is easy to see that an income of this kind was in the
highest aegree precarious, and that, in times of religious
dc^ension, the body of the Levites would be reduced to
great straits. The Levites no doubt suffered severely in
the days of the Judges, and under bad kings ; under good
kings, like David, and Solomon, and Hezekiah, the oi^der,
we may believe, experienced considerable revivals. At
otiier times it sank in the general corruption, and Levites
were content to earn a doubtful livelihood by irregular
ministrations at the ''high places." There is no evidence
we know of that their condition in the later days of the
kingdom was so deplorably destitute as the critics represent.
(4) It will be seen later how little can be inferred from
the general silence of the history about the Levites ; ' yet
that silence, as has already been hinted, is not idtpgether
unbroken.' Two instances, at least, of mention occur in
1 Sam. VL 16, and 2 Sam. xv. 24 ; perhaps also the presence
of Levites may be inferred where Hophni and Phinehas are
spoken of as "vnth the ark of Jehovah."^ A case of
special interest is that of the youthful Samuel, who is
described as ''ministering unto," or "before" Jehovah at
Shiloh,' though his duties were the subordinate ones
of the Levite.* The words "ministered before Eli" also
show that this was his position.^ The attempt, on the
other hand, sometimes made to prove Samuel to be a priest
1 Gf. ESnig, art " Judges, "Dfef. qfBibU, ii p. 816 : "Further, we see a
Lsyite wanderuur about, ready to settle down wherever he found office and
bread (Judg. mi. 8 ff. { xWiL 19 ff. ; zix. 1). This situation of the members
of the tribe of Levi was an actual one as long as a number of the Levitical
cities were not jet conquered [Konis accepts the historicity of these], such
as Qezer, and those remarks of the Book of Judges would have possessed no
probability if they had proceeded firom a period when Jeroboam selected
priests from among the people at large." etc.
' See below, Chap. lA. p. 804. * Cf. p. 168. « 1 Sam. iv. 4.
• 1 Sam. ii. 11, 18 ; ilL 1. • 1 Sam. iii. 16. ^ 1 Sam. iii 1.
190 THE 0,T. AS AFFECTED BY CRITICISM
(in contradiction of the law) from the mention of his
''linen ephod" and "little robe," most be r^;arded as
another instance of forcing the text.^ It is inexcusable
exaggeration when Professor W. R Smith writes: ''As a
child he ministers before Jehovah, wearing the ephod
which the law confines to the high priest, and not
only this, but the high priestly mantle (me't/)."' The
high priestly ephod, as every reference to it shows,* was
something distinctive, and different from " the linen ephod,"
which was worn by ordinary priests,^ but not by them
exclusively.^ The 97te'iZ, or robe, again, was a long sleeve-
less tunic, "worn," says Gesenius, "by women of rank
(2 Sam. xiiL 18), by men of rank and biith (Job L 20;
ii 12), by kings (1 Sam. xv. 27; xviiL 4; xxiv. 4, 11) "•
— therefore no peculiar property of the high priest. The
usurpation of high priestly or even of ordinary priestly
functions by Samuel is on a par with his sleeping in the
inner temple beside the sacred ark.
Note. — The Ark: In connection with the discussions,
pp. 137-38 and 161-65, the author would draw attention
to the searching Essay by Professor Lotz, of Erlangen, Die
Bwndedade (1901), which did not fall into his hands till this
chapter was printed. It lends valuable support to the
contentions in the text. See especially the discusssion of
the names of the ark (pp. 28 ff.).
1 Thus Wellhausen, W. R. Smith, eto. Wellhaoaen's note should be
quoted: "Rotue of Ood is never anything but the house of an image.
Outside the Ftiestly Code, ephod is the inuu^e; ephod had (the linen
ephod), the priestly gamient '^—^is^ <f IsraO, p. 180. Was Abiathar's
ephod then (p. 182) an image t
«ar. i»/. a, p.270.
* Gf. Ex. zzYiiL 6 ; 1 Sam. ii 28 ; zxOL 8, 0 ; zxz. 7.
* 1 Sam. zzii* If. It was not, howerer, tkvnsoribod part of the drasa.
• 2 Sam. Ti. 14 •Lexieon, Ai Ice
APPENDIX TO OHAPTEB VI
Pbiestb and Levitss
DiL Dhivsb gives a reason for rejecting the view of the
relation of priests and Levites indicated in the text, which,
if it were valid, would be fatal; but which, as it stands,
seems to xiB, we confess, an example of that overstraining
which plays so large a part in these discussions. He writes :
''The terms used in [Deut xviii] 7 to describe the Levite
services are those used regularly of priesUy duties. To
minister in the name, as xviiL 6 (of the priest ; ct. xviL 12 ;
XXL 6); to stand 'before — ijt,, to wait on (see, e.^., 1 Kings
X. 8)— JisAot^^, as Ezek. xliv. 16 ; Jude. xx. 28 ; cf. Deut.
xviL l2; xviii 5. (The Levites *stana before' — *.«., wait
upon — the congregation, Num. xvi 9; Ezek. xliv. lift. In
2 Chron. xxix. 11, prieds are present; see v. 4)."* We
should not, of course, presume to differ from Dr. Driver
on a question of philology or grammar; but this is a
question of palpable fact, and invites examination. All
Hebrew scholars, besides, are far from agreeing with Dr.
Driver in the above dicta. The statement made, we venture
to think, needs much qualification. It is not denied that
the terms employed are appropriate to priestly duties; the
question is whether they are used of these duties '* regularly "
and only. And this it is difficult to admit. The exact
phrase ''to minister in the name'' is, so far as we know,
found nowhere else than in vers. 5, 7, of this passage ; but
the verb itself, " minister ** (shargth) is used constantly in
the law and in Chronicles of Zevitieal as well as of priestly
servica' The Levites, we read, shall be appointed over
the tobemade of the testimony, ''and they shall minister
> Mnd. p, 83 (note) ; of. W. B. Smith, 0. T. in J.O., p. Ml.
• Hum. C 60; iiL 6, 81 ; iv. 9, 12, U; Tiii. 26 ; zri. 9; zriiL 2;
1 Ohron. zr. 2 ; xrL 4, 87.
m
193 APPENDIX TO CHAPTER VI
to it"*;^ aged Levites ^ shall minister with their brethren
in the tent of meeting/' * but shall do no service; the
Levites "* are chosen to carry the ark of Grod and to minister
unto Him for ever " ; ' they '' minister before the ark of the
covenant of Jehovah/' ^ etc. In fact, the only use of the ward
**miniuter" in the Booh of Numbere, if we are not mistaken,
is with refersTyDe to the service of the ZevtiesJ^ With this may
be compared Dr. Driver's own note in his Devteronomy,
where the facts are stated more fully, but still, as we
think, onesidedly. " To minister^" he there says, ** is a less
distinctive term, being used not only of priests, but also
of Levites (Num. viiL 26), and other subordinate attendants,
as in 1 Sam. iL 11, 18 ; iii 1 (of Samuel)." * fWe gather
from this that Dr. Driver does not adopt Wellhausen's
theory that Samuel was a '"priest."] But then, what
becomes of its peculiar force in Deuteronomy ? For Samuel
also ministered ''to Jehovah"; so in 1 Ohron. zv. 2, etc.
It does not fare better with the expression " to stand before
Jehovah." Apart from the passage quoted, it is used in
Deuteronomy once of the tribe of Levi,^ and once of the
Levitical priest.^ In the Levitical law it does not occur at
cM — a curious instance of " regularly." On the other hand,
in Chronicles, the Levites ''stand every morning to thank
and praise Jehovah, and likewise at even,"^ and "priests
and Levites" are addressed together as "chosen to stand
before Jehovah." ^^ In Kehemi^ also " priests and Levites "
are spoken of together as those who " stood." ^^ Can it be
claimed that the case is made out ? ^
^ Hum. L 60. * Hum. viii 26.
' 1 Chron. xt. 3. ^1 Ohron. xwL 4, 87.
* The note on the word •• found in P in the Oxf. ffexcOeueh is : ''Of
priests in the ssnctnsiy, or of Lerites attending on priests " (i. p. 216).
* JhuL p. 128. ' Dent x. 8.
* Dent XTii. 12. * 1 Ohron. xxiii. 80.
M 2 Ohron. zzix. 11 ; o£ zxxy. 6. Dr. Driyer says that here "priests
are present.'* The important point is that LmtiUs also ars present^ and
that both an addressed.
u Keh. ziL 44 (Heh.).
^ In LsT. ix. 5, and a few places in Deuteronomy (iv. 10 ; xix. 17, etc.),
"stand before JdiOTah " is used of Isrsel generally. "To stand before the
congregation " (used of the Levites) occurs cne$ (Kum* ZTi 9 ; ot Ezek.
xUt. U).
CHAPTER VII
SXtncttlded an& |>etpleiitied of tbe Cdtfcal
Dspotbesfs : I. Tlhc 5£ Bnalssto
** Ho His Hibrlo of the HeaToit
Hftth loft to thoir disputes ; porhaps to mov9
His laughter st their qosint opinions wide
Hereafter, when they oome to model Heaven
And oaloolate the stars ; how they will wield
The mighty frame ; — ^how build, oontrive
To saye appesranoes ;^how gird the sphere
With oentriok and eocentrick scribbled o'er,
Qyde and epicycle, orb in orb." — ^Hiltoh.
''To bsse a determination of age on bare peculiarities of langusge,
espeoially in things that concern legal relations, in which the form of
expression is not arbitrarily employed by the writer, is precarious. When the
relationship of certain sections is assumed on perhaps insuificient criteria,
and then other sections are added to them because of some similar lin-
guistic phenomena, and from these again further and frirther conclusions are
drawn, one easily runs the risk of moving in a vicious circle."— Obav.
"The history of critical investigation has shown that &r too much
weight has often been laid on agreement in the use of the divine names—so
much so that it has twice led the critics wrong. It is well therefiire to
utter a warning against laying an exaggerated stress on this one phenomenon."
" No intelligent observer, however, will deny that the work of investiga-
tion has gone onwards^ and not moved in a efrole." — Dxlitzsoh.
CHAPTER VII
DIFFICnLTIES AND PEBPLEXITIES OF THE GBITI-
CAL HYPOTHESIS : I. THE JE ANALYSIS
Texts &r we have been content to proceed on the assnmption
of the correctness of the ordinary critical analysis of docu-
ments in the '' Hexateuch/' and, without challenging either
documents or dates, have endeavoured to show that, even
on this basis, the essential facts of the history, and the
outstanding features in the Biblical picture of the religion
and institutions of Israel, remain imaffected. We now take
a further step, and go on to inquire whether the critical
theory of documents, as usually presented, is valid, and,
if at all, how far. Here we part company with many,
of whose help, in def endine the truth of supernatural revela-
tion, we have hitherto gladly availed ourselves, but who,
we are compelled to thmk, have unnecessarily hampered
themselves, and weakened their contentions, by assent to
critical positions which are far from being solidly established
We shaU still seek, as far as may be, common ground with
these writers, and hope to show that, it we break with them,
our doubts are bom, not from an obstinate wedding of the
mind to obsolete traditions, but from a sincere regard to
the facts, as we are constrained to apprehend them.
It is not uncommon to find the course of criticism
during the last century represented as purely a work of
unbelief, resulting in hopeless error and confusion. That,
however, is not altogether our opinion. If it cannot well
be denied that, as before stated, what is called ''Higher
Criticism'' was cradled in, and received its characteristic
''sef from the older rationalism,^ and if, unfortunately,
* That tUs statement is not too etrong may be seen from the names of
its fonnders as given in Gheyne and other writers. Gheyne himself oensnres
the early excesses of oritioism. " In the prerions age" (before Gesenins), he
196 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
this vice of its origin has dung to it, more or less, in all
its subsequent developments, it would be unreasonable not
to acknowledge that it is also, in large part, the product
of a genuinely scientiGc temper, and of a true perception
of phenomena which are there in Scripture, and, on any
theory, require explanation. Its course, too, has been
marked by a real and continuous advance in the appre-
hension of these phenomena, and, with whatever mingling
of error, has tended to an ever closer definition of the
problem to be solved. A brief glance at the principal
stadM in the history of the development will ulustiato
what we mean.
L Stadia of thb Gbhigal Dievklofmimt
The chief stages in the development of the critical
hypothesis have been the following: —
1. The beginning of the criti(»d movement is usually
associated with the French physician Aetrue,^ who, in his
C(mje<^ures, in 1753, drew attention to the presence of
Elohistic and Jehovistic sections in Genesis, and on this
based his theory of the employment of distinct documents
in the composition of the book. The fact thus founded on
is a highly interesting one, and, once pointed out, cannot
be ignored. It is the case that some chapters, and portions
of chapters, in Genesis are marked by the use, exclusively
or predominatingly, of the divine name ''Elohim" (God),
and others by a sunilar use of the divine name '^ Jehovah"
(KT. Lobd). This distinction continues till Ex. vi.,
when God reveals Himself by His name Jehovah, then
(mainly) ceases. A considerable part of Gtonesis, accordingly,
can really, by the use of this criterion, be divided into
says, "there had been an epidemic of arbitrary emendation in the depart-
ment of textual oritioiBm, and a tendency (at any rate among aome ' higher
critics ' of the Pentateuch and Isaiah) to break np the text into a nnmber
of separate pieces, which threatened to open the door to nnbonnded caprice."
— FowuUn of Criticism, p. 68. fWhat will a futnra critic say of Dr.
Ghevne f] The result is described by Tholnok in his inaugnnl leotare at
Halle in 1821 : " For the last twenty or thirty years the opinion has been
generally prevalent, that the study of the Old Testament for theologians,
as well as the devotional readins of it for the laity, is either entirely profit-
less, or at least promises little aa vantage" {Ibid, p. 67).
^ One of the best accounts of Astmc is that by Dr. H. Osgood in The
Preshyttrian and Jtef armed Bmew for Jannaiy 1892. It shows that Astmo's
personal character was deeply marred by the vices of French society.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 197
Elohistic and Jehovistic sections.^ A &ct to be placed
alongside of this, though its full bearings do not always
seem to be perceived, is that in the Paalter we have an
arrangement of psalms into Jehovistic and Elohistic groups
by a similar distmction in the use of the divine names.'
2. A further step was taken when Sichham (1779),'
to whom is due the name ''Higher Criticism/' and who
seems to have worked independently of Astruc, pointed out
that the Elohistic and Jehovistic sections in Genesis were
distinguished, not simply by the use of the divine names,
but by certain other literary peculiarities, which furnished
aid in their discrimination. The Elohistic sections in
particular — ^not all of them, as came afterwards to be seen —
were found to be characterised by a vocabulary and style
of their own, which enabled them, on the whole, to be
readily distinguished. This result aJso, whatever explana*
tion may be offered of it, has stood the test of time, and
will not, we believe, be overturned. The long lists of words
and phrases customarily adduced as characteristic of the
Elohut (now P), need, indeed, much sifting,^ but enough
remains to justify the critic in distinguishing a P hand in
Genesis, different from that of JR^
3. It was at this point that De Wette struck in with his
thesis (1806-6) that Deuteronomy, shown by him to have
also a style and character of its own, could not have be^n
^ As ezamplas of EloUatio seotioiu in this sense, ct Qen. L-iL 8 ; r. ;
xriL; zziii. ; zzt. 7-17, etc. : in the story of the flood, vi 9-22 ; viL 11-
16 ; iz. 1-18, etc As specimens of Jehovistic sections, of. Gen. iL 4-iT. ;
zL 1-9 ; ziL; ziiL (msinly); zriii, ziz., etc, with the alternate sections
in tiie flood story.
* The Psalter is diTided Into Atc Books, each oondnding with a dozology
(Pss. zli 18 ; Izxii. 18, 19 ; Izzziz. 62 ; cyi. 48). In the first three of
these books the psalms are gronped aooording to the predominant use of
the diyine names : Book I. fL-zlL), Jehovistic, ascribed to David ; Book II.
(xliL-lzziL), Mohidic, ascribed to sons of Korah, Asaph (one psalm), David ;
Book III. (Izziii'-'Izzziz.), Jehovistie, ascribed to Asaph, sons of Korah, etc.
The last two books are mainly Jehovistic See below, pp. 277 ff., on theee
ffronps of psalms, and their significance For details, ct W. B. Smith,
0,T, ill /. C, pp. 195-96, etc
* Bichhom was a rationalist of the Paolos type, giving a naturalistic
explanation of the miracles.
^ See below, pp. 886 ff.
* Astrao and jSichhom did not cany the analysis beyond (Genesis, though
Eiehhom suggests such extension ^cf. De Wette, Intrid, ii. p. 160). Both
regarded Hoses (wholly or mainlv) as the ooinpiler. Their position may
be compared with that of Principal Cave in his jSimiralion oftheO.T,, who^
however, makes Moses also the probable author of ooth documents.
198 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
composed earlier than the reign of Joeiah. This he inferred
mainly from the law of the central sanctuary in Deut.
xil, and from the breaches of that law in the older history,
considered in last chapter. Westphal has declared that
** Deuteronomy is the Ariadne's thread in the labyrinth of
the historical problem of the Pentateuch/' ^ and we are not
sure that we are not disposed to agree with him, if in a
sense different from what he intended. Meanwhile, as
was inevitable, the question arose as to whether the
Elohistic and Jehovistic documents did not extend beyond
Gtonesis into the remaining books of the Pentateuch, and,
further, into Joshua (Bleek, 1822), with which the earlier
books are so closely connected. In this extension, the
criterion of the divine names failed,' but the other linguistic
phenomena, and relations with acknowledged J and E
sections, were relied on to establish the distinction. Thus,
mainly under the guidance of Bleek, Ewald (1831), and
Stahelin (1835),' the criticism of the " Pentateuch " passed
definitely over into that of the ''Hexateuch" — the
Pentateuch and Joshua.
4 The next step is connected with Hup/eld (1853), and
marks again a distinct advance. Ilgen (1798) had preluded
the discovery, but Hupfeld, with more success, drew
attention to the fact that the assumed Elohistic document
in Genesis was not all of one cast. Certain sections — all,
indeed, up to chap. xx. — had the weU-marked characteristics
now attnbuted to P; but other portions, agreeing in the
use of the name Elohim, were quite dissimilar m style,
and closely resembled the Jehovistic parts — ^were, in &ct,
indistinguishable from the latter, save in the difference of
the divine names.^ Hupfeld's solution was that we have
here a docimient from a third writer — ^named by him the
2nd Elohist (E), who agreed with the older in the use of
^ Sawreei du PenL ii. p. zxir. De Wette, with most soholars of that age,
regarded the Elohistio aooument as the older, and partly <m VuU growul
argned for the lateness of Deuteronomy (to gire time for deTelopment}.
Modem toholars, revening the relations of age, yet hold by De Wette's
oonolnsion.
' Oolenao to the last (in published works) broke off the Elohistic narra-
tive at Sx. Ti. ; Care, attributing it to Moses (or earlier writer), does the
same — a curious instanoe of extremes meeting.
*Stihelin made important contributions in SkuL wnd KriL, 18S5
and 1888.
^ Bzami^eB are Qen. zx. ; zxi 6.-xxii. ; xxri
L THE JE ANALYSIS 199
the name Elohim, but whose 'style, yoeabulary, and mode
of representation were akin to, and nearly identical with,
those of the Jehovist This observation, again, in substance
corresponds with facts ; for it is the case that in the sections
in question there is little or nothing to distinguish the
Elohist from the Jehovist, beyond the use of the divine
namea^ A natural solution would seem to be that, despite
the difference in names, the documents are not really two,
but one ; ' but modem critics generally adhere to Hupf eld's
distinction of J and E, and evolve a number of other
peculiarities which are thought to distinguish the two
writer& The theory had its disadvantages, which kept
many of the older scholars, e.g.^ Bleek, from assenting to
it; for, while explaining certain stylistic phenomena, it
destroyed, in duhig so, the previously boasted unity of the
Elohistic narrative,' and created in the latter great and
unaccountable hiatuses: left in &ct, as we shall see, only
a few fragments and lists for P after Gen. xziiL to the end
of the book 1^
6. The final stage in the development — ^if that can be
tenned development which is more properly revolution —
outstrips in importance all the preceding. Hitherto, with
some little regarded exceptions,^ the universal assumption
had been that the Elohistic Writer, or Ist Elohist — ^was the
oldest of all, and his date was variously fixed in the time of
the Judges, or in the reigns of Saul or David. The order
was assumed to be : 1st Elohist — Jehovist and 2nd Elohist
— Deuteronomy. Then came the somersault of Oraf, who,
m his Historical Boohs of the Old Testament, in 1866,
* Oolenao, who only partially aooepted Hupfeld's analysis, says : "The
style of the two writers is so very similar ysxcept in the use of the divine
names, that it is impossible to dutingoish them by oonsidermtions of style
alone. ^'—Psnt ▼. p. 69.
*Oolenso faYoois this solution for the parts he aooepts of E: so
Klostermann. Cf. below, p. 218.
' CflDe Wette, IfUrod. li. p. 77 : "The Elohistio fragments form a whole
which can be reduced to a form almost perfect." (See Mow, pp. 888, 841.)
On the other hand, writers like Bleek (more recently Cave), who accept the
Elohistio narratiTe in its integrity, are in this dilemma, that they destroy
their own grounds for distin^ishing the Elohist from the Jehoyiat. For it
has to be admitted that considerable sections of the Elohistic document are
in ereiy n>P^t of style (except the names) indistinguishable from tha
Jehovistio. Those again who, like Oolenso^ in purts identify E with J, hafv
to own that the names are not an infallible criterion.
^ See below, pp. 841 ff. "See below, p. 204.
200 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
propounded the view,^ which he owed to Beuss,' that the
legislation of the middle books of the Pentateuch (the
Levitical law) was not earlier, but later, than Deuteronomy
— ^was, in fact, a product of the age of the exile. Graf,
howeyer, was not yet of the opinion that all the Mohistic
sections of the Pentateuch were late: he accepted the
ordinary view that the Elohistic writing was the oldest for
the historieal sections, but contended that the priestly laio$
were a later, and post-exilian, insertion.' Euenen and
Biehm, from opposite sides, wrote to show that this was an
untenable position. History and laws go together, and
either the whole is early, or the whole is late.^ Graf before
his death acknowledged the force of Euenen's arguments
for the late date of the (P) history as well as of the legis-
lation,^ while not admitting that the P writing constituted
an independent document Owing mainly to the powerful
advocacy of Wellhausen,* the more thoroi^hgoing view has
prevailed, and, as formerly stated, it is now held to be one
of the "settled" results of critidsm^ that the Priestly
element is the very latest constituent in the Hexateuch,
and is of exilian or post-exilian date. Yet in one respect
^ See aboTe, p. 160. An earlier work in 1865, D9 templo SUcnemi, pre-
luded the idea of his chief work.
' Ot Knenen, ffex, pp. zzziy-r. Benas's own work, L'ffistoire SbUnU ei
la Loif waa publiahed in 1879.
* Thia also was Golenao'a position in hia published works, after he had
come round to Grafs standpoint {PenL Pts. y. and Yi.)^histary early, lavm
late. See below, p. 884.
^ Kaenen puts it thua ; " Must the laws stand with the narratiTes, or
must the narratires fall with the laws f I could not hesitate for a moment
in accepting the latter altematiTe." — ffex. p. zzii
' Ilnd. pp. xxviii, xxz. Professor Robertson properly says : " To say
bluntly that the narrativea must go with the laws, is no more a process of
criticism than to say that the laws must go with the histoiy. It is therefore
inaccurate to describe the position of Graf as a conclusion of criticism. It
was amplj a hypothesis to eyade a difSculty in which oritidam had kmded
him."— ^r/y Al, pp. 418-19.
* Wellhausen tells us : '< I learned through Bitschl that Earl Hdnrich
Graf placed the law later than the prophets ; and, almost without knowing
his reasons for the hypothesis, I waa prepared to accept iV* — JlisL nf
laraelf p. 8.
' Professor W. B. Smith names ** Euenen and WeUhausen aa the men
whose acumen and research haye carried this inquiir to a point where nothing
of importance for the historical study of the Old Testameut stiU ramaina
uncertain." — Mel. qf Semites, p. yii There can be "no doubt," says a
recent able writer, that "all this part of the Hexateuch is, in its present
form, {tost-exilio."— McFadyen, Jieee, qf pietoriam. See Note ▲ on Self-
Confidence of Critics, p. 240.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 201
even this theory, which we shall have occasion to oppose
very decidedly, appears to us to mark an advance. In so far
as a documentary hypothesis is to be accepted at all — on
which after — ^it is difficult to resist the conviction that P
must be regarded as relatively later than J£, for whose
narratives, in Genesis at least, it furnishes the " framework," ^
and that it is not, as former critics held, a separate older
work. In agreement with Graf,' however, we do not suppose
that ai way period it ever formed a separate, independent
writing.
As supplementing this sketch of the chief stadia in the
critical development, a glance may be taken at the views
which have been held on the relation of the dements of the
Pentateuch in the course of this long history. These may
be roughly divided into the fragmentary, the supplementary,
and the documentary.
(1) At an early stage Yater (1805) and others developed
the idea that the Pentateuch was made up, not of continuous
documents, but of a great number of 8maller/ra;77itfn^«. This
view was vigorously contested, especially vdth respect to the
Book of Genesis, by Stahelin, Ewald (1823), Tuch (1838),
etc., as well as by the thoroughgoing defenders of the
Mosaic authorship, who, till the middle of the century,
formed an influential group.' The fragmentist view was
regarded as overcome ; but it will be seen as we advance that
the newer criticism, with its multiplication of documents
(pi P* P» eta), its substitution of " schools " for individual
authors, and its minute tesselation of texts, represents
largely a return to it^
(2) The theory which superseded the fragmentary was
that of an Elohistic groundwork, or fundamental document
(Orundsehrift), supplemented at a later time by Jehovistic
additions. This was the view of Bleek, and of most of the
above-named writers : later representatives of it are Knobel,
^ Of. Elosterauum, PmkUeueh, p. 10. On P aa " frtmework," see Mow,
pp. 216, 840.
* Qraf adhered to this till his death, of. Knenen, Sex, p. zzz. See
below, Chap. X.
* The beet known names in this conserrfttiYe school are those of Banks,
Dreohder, Henffstenberg, H&verniok, Eeil.
* For examples, eL text and notes in Oxford ff§aoaUuch, whioh haidlj
Isayes a paragraph. Tons, or ersn danse nntonohed.
202 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
Schrader, and Colenso.^ It was a theory which, granting
its initial assumption, had much to reoommend it Its
advocates based on the fact that the Jehovistic nanatiye,
as it stands, is incomplete, and presupposes the Elohistio :
e,g.^ it has no command to build the ark (cf. Gen. vii 1),
and contains no notices of the deaths of the patriarchs.
" It is still more unmistakable," argued Bleek, ^ that those
Elohistio portions in the first part of our book refer to one
another, presuppose one another, and follow one another
in due course, whilst they take no notice of the Jehovistio
passages lying between them." ' Its opponents reply that it
is impossible that the Jehovist could have filled in passages
which, as they hold, are contradictory of the main narrative.'
Hupfeld's theory of the 2nd Elohist weakened this view,
and it fell to the ground altogether when the Graf theory
came to prevail, that P (=the Elolust) was not the earliest,
but the latest, of the sources.
(3) The documentary hypothesis — earliest of all — after-
wards revived by Hupf eld, rose again to favour, and since
Graf's time has generally been held in the form already
described, viz., JE and P as independent documents, which
have been combined with each other, and with Deuteronomy
(D), by a redactor, or series of redactors. So stated, the
theory seems simple : its enormous difficulties are only re-
vealed when the attempt is made to work it out in detail
We advance now to the consideration of these difficulties^
with a view to the attainment of a more positive result
n. DlFnOULTDES OF THE CBTnCAL HtPOTHESIB
IN GEN1ERAL
The course of criticism, we have granted, has been in
a very real sense onward, so far as the discovery of
phenomena is concerned. As the outcome, the critics are
justified in saying that on certain leading points there is
very general agreement in their ranks. It is agreed that
four main sources are to be distinguished in the Pentateuch
(or Hexateuch)— J £ D P — and that these have been oom-
^ OolniBO mri^it^fny^ his tapplemeiituy theoiy to tlw 0I088 agftissl
Hupfeld and Knenen. See below, p. 834.
^ inlrmi. L p. 275.
* 01, «.^., Dillmum, OmutUp L pp. 14, 15 1 KaoiMi, Biem, p. IM.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 203
bined by one or more hands to form the preeent work. It
is also very generally believed (not, however, by Dillmann),
that J and E were combined, if not before the time of
Deuteronomy (Kittel, Addis, and others think afUT\ at
least before their final union with that book (D) and with
F. Beyond these very general results,^ however, it is, as
will immediately be seen, highly misleading to speak, as is
sometimes done, of unanimity. Agreement in main features
of the critical division there is, especially with regard to
F, — the original premises being granted, there is Uttle
alternative, — hut whenever the attempt is made to carry
the analysis into details, or to establish a consistent theory
of the rdations of the documents, or of their mode of com-
bination, divergences wide and deep reveal themselves, com-
plications thicken at every step, and inevitable doubt arisen
as to the soundness of the premises which lead to such
perplexity in the results. Two unimpeachable witnesses
may be cited at the outset in general corroboration of what
is said as to the absence of unanimity. Kautzsch, the
author, with Socin, of OAe of the best typographical analyses
of the Book of Genesis, makes this remarkable statement ;
** In the Fentateuch and the Book of Joshua, it is only with
regard to F that something approaching to unanimity has
been reached."' Kuenen, again, says with special reference
to JE : ''As the analysis has been carried gradually further,
it has become increasingly evident that the critical question
is fiur more difficult and involved than was at first supposed,
and the solutions which seemed to have been secured have
been in whole or in part brought into question again."'
These words might be taken as the text of nearly everything
that follows.
1. With eveiy allowance for what may be said of pro-
gress, inevitable doubt is awakened in regard to the soundness
of the critical process by the oomfiiUz of opinion which the
' Weftphal rednoes the resaltB on which thers if agreement to three :
*' (1) The eziMenoe^ henoeforth established, of fonr sonroee in the Pentateuch :
the 1st Elohist, or Priestly Code, the 2nd Elohist, the Jehovist, and the
Denteronomist ; (2) the admission of the &ot that each of these sonroes,
bdToira its entranoe into the composition of onr Biblical books, existed as an
independent writing ; (8) the nnanimitr of scholars as to the manner in
whien it is necessary to reoonstniot, at least in theirgreat lines, the fonr
sonroes indicated." — Sou/rea du Pent. ii. p. zxri We ahali see that eren
this statement requires considerable modification.
*LU.^ O.T.^ p. 220. * ffex, p. 180.
204 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
history of criticism itself discoyers. It is to be remembered,
in discussing this subject, that the J E D P of the critics —
so far as not simply symbols for the supposed documents
themselves — ^with their serial duplicates, to be immediately
referred to, and the numerous retinue of redactors, are,
though spoken of so familiarly, purely hypothetical entities
— ^postulated beii^, of whom history or tradition knows
nothing. Moses, Jc^ua, Samuel, we know, or think we do ;
but these shadows have left no trace of themselves, save, if
it be so, in their work, now taken to pieces again by the
critics. When we desire to know something more of their
time or their relations, we are in a r^on in which, the
history of criticism behig witness, the agi*eements are far
overborne by the disagreements. Do we ask when they
lived ? the dates assigned to P (the 1st Elohist), we have
found, range from the days of Samuel (Bleek, Colenso, older
writers generally), through the period of the kings (Biehm,
Dillmann, Noldeke, Schrader, etc.)> to the time of the exile, or
later (Graf school). The dates of J£ run from the time of the
Judges (Konig, Kohler, etc.) to the tenth, ninth, eighth cen-
turies, ¥dth, in the view of Kuenen, *' Judaean editions " after.
The composition of Deuteronomy is commonly placed in
the reign of Josiah, or of Manasseh ; but many able critics
(DeUtzsch, Oettli, Klostermann, etc.) hold it to be much
older, and in kernel Mosaic; while others divide it up,
and put extensive portions later than Josiah. Do' we
inquire as to dependence ? The older view was, as we saw,
that J and £ are supplementary to P; the newer theory is
that P is later than JE and presupposes them. J is
held by many (Dillmann, Noldeke, Schrader, Eittel, etc.) to
be dependent on E and to have borrowed from him;
Wellhausen, Euenen, Stade, etc., as confidently reverse the
relation, and make E dependent on J;^ others treat the
documents as practically independent (0^., Woods).' One
set of critics (Dillmann, Biehm, eta) hold that the marks
demonstrate E to be about a century older than J; the pre-
vailing tendency at present is to make J about a century
older than K Addis says that this question of priority " is
> Wellhanaen points ont that E '<haa come down to xm only in extnofa
embodied in the Jehovist narrative," and appears to doubt its indopendenoe.
ETist. of Israel, pp. 7, 8. See below, p. 217.
' Art. '* Hexateuoh " in Diet, of Bible.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 205
still one of the most vexed questions in the criticism of the
HexateucL" ^ The interesting point in the discussion is the
cosency with which each critic refutes the reasonings of his
neighbours, and shows them to be nugatory. All tlus would
matter little, it it were, as is sometimes said, mere variation
on the surface, with slight bearing on the soundness of the
theory as a whole. But it is far from that. The criteria
which determine these judgments are found on inspection
to go deep into the substance of the theory, and afford
a valuable practical test of the principles by which it is
built up.'
2. These perplexities are slight, however, in comparison
with those arising from another cause now to be mentioned
— the excessive miUtiplicatwn of sowrees. The matter is
relatively simple when we have to deal only with a J E D
or P, and when the critic honestly abides by these. But,
as the analysis proceeds, we find it impossible to stop
here. As the old Ptolemaic astronomer discovered that,
to explain the irr^ularities in the visible motions of the
heavenly bodies, he had to add epicycles to his original
cycles, tiien fresh epicycles to these, till his chart became
a huge maze of complications — and incredibilities; so the
critic finds that the application of the same criteria
which guided him in the severance of his main documents,
necessitates, when pushed further, a continuance of the
process, and the splitting up of the documents into yet
minuter part& Hence new divisions, and the gradual
resolution of the ordinal JE, eta, into the nebulous series,
JiJ«J»; WWE?\ P1PP»P*; ^^W&\ etc., or equivalents;
all of which have now become part of the recognised
apparatus of the critical schoola^ Can we wonder that
* Hex. L ^ IzzzL
* S,g,i Dnyer sars on the opposite yiews of DiUmann and WeUhauMn
aboat J and E : " l&e difference tnmain part upon a different conception of
the limit^df J. Dillmann's 'J' embraces more than Wellhansen's ' J' . . .
Dillmann's date, t, 750, is assigned to J largely on the ground of just those
passages which form no part of Wellhausen*s Z,'^—Introd, p. 128. Kittel,
again, upholding Dillmann's view, says : '' When Wellhausen finds £ to be
in closer contact than J with the specially prophetic spirit . . . this arises, at
any rate in part, from his altogether peculiar analysis of J; an analysis
wmch, again, is based on this character assigned to J by him." — Hist, qf
Sebs. i. p. 80. Again : " Enenen will not admit any reference (in Amoe
and Hosea) to E, but only to J; Dillmann cannot see any acquaintance witii
J, but only with K I cannot assent to either Tiew."- Ibid. p. 83.
* 0£ Oxford SexaUueh, or any of the text-books. As a popular book|
2o6 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
even a tolerably advanced critic like Dillmann should
write: "with a QiQ«Q» [= P], JPJ»J», E^E^E* I can do
nothing, and can only see in t^em a hypothesis of per-
plexity.''^ Assume such multiples to have existed, does
anyone with a modicum of common sense believe it possible
for a twentieth century critic to pick their handiwork to
pieces again, and assign to each his proper fragment of the
whole ? These processional Js and Es, however, should not
be scoflTed at as arbitrary. They are really indispensable
parts of a critical stock-in-trade if the original prirusiples of
the theory are to be consistently carried ovJt. In that respect
they serve again as a test of the value of these prmdples.
The critic thinks he observes, for instance, within the limits
of the same document, a discrepancy, or a new turn of
expression, or a duplicate incident — ^the denial of a wife,
0.^., in Qen. xiL xxvL, both in J,* or a seeming intermingling
of two stories — ^in Eorah's rebellion, e.^., in Num. xvL 2—11,
P,' — or a reference in J (older writer) to E (younger) : what
is to be done except to assume that there is here a trace
of a distinct source, or of a redactor ? * The hypothesis
is as essential to the critic as his epicycle was to the
Ptolemaic star-gazer.
3. The matter becomes still more complicated when,
finally, the problematical J E D P lose all individuality,
and are franldy transformed, as they are by most of the
newer writers, into schools,^ When these "schools'' are
made to extend over a very long period, as from the
statements made, and the work attributed to them, we
must suppose them to have done, the problem of maintain-
ing for them the identity of character and style with which
the investigation started becomes insoluble. Obviously, if
the writers are to be regarded as "schools," it will be
impossible, as before, to insist on minute criteria of language,
often descending to single words, and the finest ntiances of
expression, as infallible means of distinguishing their several
see Bennett's OenesiSf Introd. pp. 28, 32, 87, 62, etc Enenen has a P*,
with redactors (JTisse. jpp. 86 ff.).
^ Pref. to Exod.'LA), > Gf. Oxford Hexateuck, \L p. 10.
* Jhid, p. 212. Ct Dillmann, in loc. See below, p. 858.
^ For a lonser example, see Note 6 on Corniirs Decomposition of J, and
compare in full Comill s Einleitung, pp. 52-58.
* See Note C on the Views of J and E, etc, as "Schools." See also below
on P, Chap. X. p. 885.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 207
contributions. It is possible to argue, however unreasonably,
that an individual author must be rigidly bound down to one
style, one set of phrases, one idea or circle of ideas ; but this
will hardly apply to " schools," lasting for centuries, where,
within the limits of a general tradition, there must, with
difference of minds, inevitably be wide diversities of culture,
thought, and speecL We may properly speak, e,g., of an
''Anglican," a " Bitschlian," or a "Cobdenite" school, and
may mark how in each the influence of dominant ideas
stamps a general resemblance on the style and speech of
the members, but none the less individual idiosyncrasies
will assert themselves in each writer. If, furtiier, the
writers are to be regarded as ''schools," the question of
date assumes a new aspect. How far may or do these
''schools" go back? Why must J and E be any longer
forced down to the ninth or eighth century ? " ^ Wliy must
the priestly narratives be of the same age as the priestly
laws ? Dehtzsch was of opinion that " the literary activity
of the Elohistic pen reaches far back to ancient times nearly
approaching the time of Moses." ' Why, on this hypothesis
should it not be so ?
There is, one cannot help feeling, something essentially
mechanical in this idea of "schools" of writers continuously
engaged for centuries in patching, revising, tesselating,
resetting, altering and embellishing, the work of their
predecessors. We are here back, in &ct, by another
route, and under another name, to the old " fragmentary "
hypothesis, thought so long ago to have been exploded.'
But the striking thing about the labours of these manifold
unknowns is that the product shows so little trace of this
excessive fragmentariness of its origin. The Pentateuch —
pre-eminently the Book of Grenesis, but even the legal part *
— ^is undeniably a well-planned, massively-compacted work.
Apart from the " firmly-knit " character of its story, it is
marked by a unity of thought and spirit, is pervaded by
1 Carpenter allows that the question of the date of J (so of the othois)
has become '* increasingly complex " under the influence of this new idea
{ff$x, i p. 106).
* Oenetii, p. 49.
* Carpenter says with reference to this newer theory of ''tehools":
"This was the tmth that lay behind the fragment-hypothesis of the older
eritioism : is it possible to re-state it in mors soitable form I "— JSte L p. 108*
« Sea below, pp. 294, 825-26.
2o8 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
sreat ideas, is instinct ^dth a living purpose, as no othei
book is. Its organic character bespeaks for it a higher
origin than a concourse of literary atoms.^
Ill Spsoial Pboblsms of JE: Plage of Origin and
Extent
It is now necessary, in order that the value of the current
critical theories may be thoroughly tested, to investigate the
analysis and other questions connected with the different
documents more in detaU ; and first we consider the problems
invdved in the relatione of J and E. These problems, in our
view, aU converge ultimately into one— Are the critics ri^ht
in distinguishing two documents at all ? To set this question
in its proper light, and reveal more clearly the serious
differences that emerge on fundamental points, it will be
advisable to look, first, at the views entertained as to the
place of origin of the assumed documents, and as to their
exient. Some hint of the range of these differences has
already been given.
1. Much light is cast on critical procedure by observiog
the methods employed to determine the place of origin of
the documents, with the implications as to their age. We
saw before that it has become customary to take for granted,
though without real proof,* that J and E first originated, the
one {which one is in dispute) in the ninth century, the other
about the middle of the eighth century B.a It is also very
generally held, and is confidently stated, that E was a native
of the Northern Elingdom, while J, probably, was a native
of the Southern, or Judsean Kingdom.* The chief reasons
siven for localising E in Ephraim are his peculiar interest
m the sacred places of Northern Israel (Bethel, Shechem,
etc.), his exaltation of the house of Joseph, and his preference
in the story of Joseph for Ephraim over Judah. How
shadowy and assumptive all this is, and how inadequate
as a ground of separation of the documents, will be evident
hrom the following considerations : —
(1) In thiB first place, there are eminent critics {tg^
^ See iiirther in Ohap. X.
' See abore, p. 78.
*Cf. DiUmann, Driyer {'^rOoHvay probable," Inirod. p. 123). Adiia,
Oarpenter, eto*
L THE JE ANALYSIS 209
Schrader, Beuss, Kuenen, Eantzsch), who place J also in
Ndrthtm Israel, and for precisely the same reason of his
supposed interest in Ephraimitic shrines.^ The two writings,
therefore, it may be concluded, cannot really stand far
apart in this respect Eautzsch, e.g., thinks it inconceivable
" that a Judahito, at a time when the temple of Solomon
was already in existence [note the assumption on date],
brought the sanctity of Sbechem, Bethel, and Peniel into
the prominence they have at Gton. zii 6, zxviiL 13 ff., and
xxxix. 30 S." ' Yet the Judsean origin of J is one of the
things which Dillmann, among others, regards as '' demon-*
strable with certainty." •
(2) In the next place, the whole reasoning proceeds on
the assumption that the writings are as late as the ninth or
eighth century, and that the motive for recording the move-
ments and residences of the patriarchs is to glorify existing
sacred places, or exalt one branch of the divided kingdom
above the other. The naivetd of the narratives might save
them from this charge of "tendency," which has reoUy
nothing tangible to support it. There is no trace of the
divided kingdom,* or of partiality for one side or the other,
in the patriarchal narratives. The history of Joseph is
recorded with fulness and freshness by both writers.
Gunkel takes strong cround on this point "There can,"
he says, " be no talk of a party-tendency in the two collec-
tions for the Iflforth or for me South Kingdom : they are too
faithfuL"^ Even Kuenen writes: "It would Jbe incorrect
to say that the narratives in Grenesis exalt Joseph at tiie
expense of his brothers, and are unfriendly to Judah. This
^ "The data," njB Oarpenter, "do not appear to be dedBire, and each
potsibility finds eminent advocates. • . . GrituMdJadgmenthasoonseqnently
oeen mnon divided." — ffex» i. pp. 104-6. Hommel also places J in Northern
~ ael (Ane. Heh. Trad, pp. 289-90).
*i^. <2/^ar.,p. 88. Kittel also thinks it " impoMiNf to assert that J
originated in Northern Israel" (p. 85). Eantaoh and Knenen ea[plain
recalcitrant phenomena by the hypothesla of a later Jad«an rsdaotion
(which Kittel rejects, L p. 85).
* OenetiSf p. 10.
^ Of. Gnnkel, Cfenuia, p. Iz, and see above, p. 111. The older writers
jnstly laid stress on this in evidence of date {t,g., Bleek, Int/rod, pp. 291 ff.,
298 ff.). It is cnrions how little stress, for different reasons, oritios are
disposed to lay on the one passage which mi^ht be regarded as an exception
—the reference to the subjection of Sdom in Oen. zxvii. 40. De Wette
nrged this as proof of a late date, but the inference is rejected bj Bleak,
Kittel (i p. 88), Eautzsch [Lit. p. 89), eto.
' OenesiSy p. Ix.
»4
210 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
would contradict their ever present idea that all the tribes
have sprung jErom a single father, and on the strength of this
common descent are a single people. . . . Neither J nor E
takes sides mth any one of the tribes, or specifically for
or affainst Joseph or Judah; for both alike occupy the
Israditish position, in the widest sense of the word."^ The
real reason why the sojournings of the patriarchs are
followed ¥dth such interest in J and E is simply that, in
the old Israelitish tradition, Hebron, Beersheba, Bethel,
Shechem, were Idieved to he (he real spots where these
patriarchs dwelt, and built their altars.'
(3) When, further, we look into the narratives, we do
not find, in fact, tJuU they hear out this idea of a special
favouritismL in E for localities in the North, and in J for
places in the South. Addis remarks on J's "large-hearted
interest in the myths (?) and sacred places both of Northern
Israel and of Judah." ' Abraham's home in J is at Hebron,
but his first altar is built near Bethel* Latterly, in both
J and E, he Uyes at Beersheba (in South).^ Isaac also, in
both sources, lives at Beersheba. J narrates the vision of
Jacob at Bethel (with E),^ his wrestling with the angel at
Feniel,^ his residence at Shechem (with E and P),^ etc. E
also has his stories about Bethel, Shechem, and Beersheba,
but he records Jacob's residence in "the vale of Hebron"
(South),^ as, earlier, he had shared in the story of the offering
of Isaac on Mount MoriaL^® As little are we disposed to
^ uETeas. pp. 280-82. He thinks be finds significance, howeTer, in tht &ot
that Joaepn was ''crowned" of his brethren, etc
' '' In weighing these aooounts," says Euenen, "for onr present pnrpoee,
we must remember that the writers were not free to choose whaterer spots
they liked. Hebron was Abraham's 'territorial cradle,' and Beersheba
Isaac's. It needs no explanation or justification, therefore, when they
make the two patriarchs dwell respectively in these two places " ; but, he
adds, "we hare to give some account of why Abraham is transplanted to
Beersheba."— i7«x. p. 281. But whyt if, as both J and £ declare, he
actually went there T The lives of Abraham and Isaac were mainly spent in
the South, that of Jacob in the middle of Palestine.
* Hex. L p. liv. ^ Gen. zii. 8. ■ Gen. zxi 88 ; zxiL 19.
* Oen. xxviii. 10 fT. ^ Gen. xzxii. 24 ff. * Gen. xxxiv.
* Gen xxxviL 14. Though it is clear from the context that Jacobus
home was not at Shechem (vers. 12, 18), yet simply on the ground that it
mentions Hebron, this verse is treated by Kuenen, with others, as an
interpolation {Hex, pp. 280, 231). Carpenter says flatly: "Of Hebron,
which belonged peculiarly to Judah, no notice is taken. '^^jBesB. il
p. lie.
»» Gen. xxii.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 211
trust the critic's " feeling " for an ** Ephraimitic tince '^ in E,
when we find, e,g., one authority on this '* tinge " (f autzsch)
declaring that "it [E] no longer conveys the impression
of a triumphant outlook on a glorious future, but rather
that of a retrospect on a bygone history, in which were
many gloomy experiences ; " ^ and another (Kittel) assuring
us that ''the whole tone of E bears witness to a certain
satisfaction of the national consciousness, and joy over what
has been won/''
(4) Finally, if anything were lacking to destroy our
confidence in this theory of tendencies of J and E, it would
be supplied by the interpretations that are given of particular
incidents in the narrative. It strains our faith to breakine-
point to be asked to believe that the interest of a prophetic
writer like E, of the days of Amos and Hosea, in Bethel and
Beersheba, arose from the fact that these places were the
then famous centres of (idolatrous) worship (cf. Amos
V. 5; viiL 14; Hos. iv. 15);* or that Qen. zxviiL 22 is
intended to explain and sanction the custom of paying-
tithes at the calf -shrine at Bethel;^ or that Hebron was
preferred as Abraham's residence because it was ^the
ancient Judsean capital" (Kittel),' or had become ''the
great Judaic sanctuary " (Driver).* In the view of one set
of critics. Gen. xxxviiL is a bitter mockery of Judah (J
therefore is Northern) ; ^ according to another, it is a tribal
history written expressly to favour Judah (J therefore is
Southern).* Eautzsch is of opinion that "at Ex. xxxii
1 & there is in all probability a Judahite condemnation of
the Ephraimite buU- worship " ; * others see in the narrative
an Ephraimitie condemiiation of the same practice; ^^ Kuenen
thinks it glances at a claim of the Korthem priests to a
1 LU. tfO.T.,^. 44. *Eisk i^EOi. L p. 88.
* Carpenter, Jsix, i. p. 118 ; of. Drirer, Introd, p. 118.
^ Driyer, ibid, p. 122 ; DiUmann, Eittel, Bennett eto. See aboye, p^ 186.
What of JTs motiye in the referenoee to Bethel and BeonBhebat
* ff%9t, L p. 88. * IfUrod. p. 118.
^ Thus Benaa, Schrader, Benan, eto.
*Thna Kittel (i. p. 88), eto. Gf. Kuenen, Sn, p. 282; Waitphal,
Sowreea^ ii p. 259 ; Curpenter, ffex. L p. 106.
*Lii, qfO.T.,V. 88.
^ DiUmann, wno thinks a North Israelite conld not haTB framed this
protest against Jeroboam's bnU-worship lStod.-Lev,y, 882). Kittel differs
(L ]>. 89). It should be noticed that Kautzsoh, DiUmann, Kittel, eto.,
ascribe the main story in Ex. zzzii. to J ; others^ as Westphal, as
eonfidently giye it to £.
212 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
descent from Aaron.^ So ad tibUum. When one re-
members that it is chiefly on the gronnd of these supposed
" mirrorings " of later events that the narratives are placed
where they are in date,' one begins to see the precarionsness
of this part of the critical structure. Thus far nothing has
been estabhshed as to place or time of origin, or distinct
authorship of the documents.
2. A second problem of much importance in its
bearings on the possibility of a critical distinction of J and
E is that of the extent of the supposed documents. The
consideration of Genesis may be reserved. There is agree-
ment that the J narrative in Qenesis begins with chap. iL
3b, and, in union vdth other sources, contmues throughout
the book, and into Exodus. E, on the other hand, though
some flnd traces of its presence earlier,' is understood to
enter clearly first in chap. zz. With Exodus iii, the
criterion of the divine names fails, after which it is allowed,
on all hands, that the discrimination is exceedingly difficult,
and often impossibla In the words of Addis, ** In other
books of the Hexateuoh [after Qenesis] the Jahvist and
the Elohist are rather fused than pieced together, and
discrimination between the two documents is often im-
possible." * In their union, however, it is commonly agreed
that the presence of the two documents can be traced, not
only through Exodus and Numbers (in small measure in
Deuteronomy) but through Joshua — that Joshua, in fact,
is an integral part of the total work now called the
^ Hexateuch." The validity of this conclusion will occupy
us immediately.
Beyond thii9 rises another question, now keenly exercising
the minds of scholars, viz., whether there must not be
* ffex, p. 246 ; c!l Van HoonAokv, L$ Sacerdooi, p. 188. 8m abore,
p. 122.
*0£ Carpenter, ffex, L p. 107; Kuenen, Aa p. 286. See abore,
p. 74 ; also Gunkel, Cfenesis, p. bdi.
* See below, p. 217.
^Sex. L p. xxxL MoFadyen lajs elmikrly: ''After Ex. vL H ii
eeldom poHsible to distbiffoish with much oonfidenoe between the Jehovist
and the Elohist, as they haye so mnch in oommon." — Afe$i. iif ffitiontuUf
p. 18. The impossibility is owned by oritios (as Eaataeh and Sodn) in
considerable parts of (JenesiB as welL Straok Bkjt ffeneimlly : " Sinoe J and
E are on the whole (un Chrosaen wnd Ckmaen) similar to one another, it is
often no longer possible to separate what originally belonoi to E and what
originally belongs to J.**— 2>m BUchtr Qmiui$, eta. ("HandkoiDmcntar,''
L, IL), fnlrod. p. zviii*
L THE JE ANALYSIS 213
reoognised a still further continuation of these documents —
J and E — ^into the Books of Judges, Samuel, and even
Kings. Such a possibility was early hinted at,^ but the
newer tendency to resolve J and E into '^schools "has led
to a revival of the idea,* and to its adoption by many
critical scholars Comill and Budde have no doubt about
it; Moore adopts it in his Commentary on Judges;
Westphal goes so far as to make it a chief ground in his
determination of the dates of the documenta' E.g.,
Comill discerns J in 1 £iii^ ^with perfect certainty'';^
the traces of E, he thinks, are slight after the story of the
death of SauL These conclusions, with good reason, do
not commend themselves to other scholars, so that the
camp remains here also divided.^ The hypothesis has a
value as showing the precarious grounds on which writers
often build their critical ** certainties"
Betuming to Joshua, we may briefly test the assertion
that the J and E documents are continued into this book,
and that Joshua forms mth the Pentateuch a single larger
work. The question of ''Pentateuch" or ''Hezateuch"
need not be discussed at length; we touch on it only as
far as relates to our subject Addis, however, speaks far
too strongly when he declares that the unity of Joshua
with the other five books ''is acknowledged by all who
admit the composite character of the Pentateuch." * This
is by no means the case. Even Comill says : " Many now
speak of a HezateucL Joshua, nevertheless, presents an
essentially different literary physiognomy from that of the
Pentateuch, so that it appears to me more correct to treat
the latter by itself, and the Book of Joshua as an appenduc
to it" ^ There are, in fact, tolerably strong indications of
a tendency among recent critics to separate Joshua again
from the Pentateuch, and regard it as a more or less
> Gnmbeiig (1880) ; Sohnder (1869).
* Cf. Wes^hal on the views of Ed. M^yer (1884) and Broston (1886) in
Sources du linU it pp. 265 (L Stade fhonght he dieooyered txaoee <tf E
in above works ; Bohme tiaoes of J, eto.
* Sources, ii p. 266.
« JBinUOung, pp. 117, 121.
* Kittel aoatefy oritioised the theory in Shtd. wnd KriL 1891 (pp. 44 ff.) ;
ef. \k\MHid. ii. pp. 16 ff. E^nenen, Kantzseh (LU. fffO.T., pp. 27, 287-89).
Driver (Introd. pp. 171, 184), Kdnig, H. P. Smith (Samml^ p. zxii), eto.,
lejeot it.
* Hex, pp. ziv, xnk * MnML p. 86.
214 DIFFICULTEES AND PERPLEXITIES:
independent work.^ For such a view also there are many
cogent gromid& Comill gives as one reason that the
sources are quite differently worked up in the Book of
Joshua from what they are elsewhera In the narrative
portions they are fused together so as to be ordinarily
inseparabla The language, too, presents peculiaritie&
Even in the P parts, as wOl be seen immediately, it is
doubtful if the sections are from the same hand or hands
as in the other books. The book has, also, according to the
critics, been subjected to a Deuteronomic revision,* which,
cuiiouialy, was not extended (or only slightly) to the earlier
bookSb'
It is beyond doubt, at least, that, in the separation of
the sources in Joshua, the critics continually find them-
selves involved in inextricable difficulties. With respect
particularly to J and E, it has become not simply a
question of whether J and E can be severed (admittedly
they can not), but of whether J and E are present in the
look at aU. Wellhausen came to the conclusion that J was
wholly absent,* and Steuemagel more recently has affirmed
the same opinion.^ ''The original scope and significance
of E" are admitted by Carpenter to be ''hiurdly less
difficult to determine."* The high- water mark of his
^ Cf. the Ti0?r8 of Wemuuuen, Oompog. d. Hex, pp. 116-17 ; Carpeikter,
Hex, L pp. 178-79 ; Bennett^ Primer qf Bible, p. 90 ; of. his Joehma
i^Polyohromo Bible"), p. 44 : " Perhaps the Joshua aeotioiiB of JED and
* were aepaiated trm the preceding aeotiona before the latter were
oombiiied to form the Pentateuon " (or perhaps never formed part of them).
' That is, if " revision " is the proper wora, and not rather " invention."
If, e.^., the incident of the reading of the law on Mount Ebal in Josh. viii.
80-S5 did not happen, it was simply invention on the basis of Deut. xzviL
The Deuteronomic reviser is called D* to distingoish him from the author
of Deuteronomy (D*). Ete belongs to the D "•ehool«'' and writes a
similar style.
'On supposed Denteronomio traces in the earlier booki^ see below,
pp. 264-66.
^ Comp. d. Bex. p. 118. Eittel's view of the matter is: "The com-
paratively few traces which paint at all deoisivelv to J frequently allow of
the assumption that they have no lon^ preciBely the same form as when
they came from the author's pen. E is in almost the same case : of this
source, too, there are only a few remnants in the Book of Joshua." — Bid,
qfBebe. L p. 288.
* Oarpenter notes that Steuemagel's IMu Bwh Jatua invites comment,
" for his results vary veiy widely from those already set forth. ... In
regard to J, Steuemagel returns to the view of Wellhausen and Mqrer that
it recMpiised no Joshua," etc^Bex, U. p. 818. Thus theories chase each
other uke clouds in the sky.
• Ibid, ii p. 808.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 215
assurance is reached in the statement: ''Budde, Eittel,
Albers, and Bennett have all concurred in believing that
the main elements of J and E are not disgvdsed beyond
recognition, though their results do not always run side
bj side." ^ The separation of the P sections in Joshua at
first sight seems easier, but in detail the difBioulties are
nearly as insuperable, and of a kind that set theorising at
defiance. '^The inquiry" (as to "the relation of the P
sections to the rest of the book "), Carpenter admits, ^ is full
of difficulty, and the seemingly conflicting facts have been
differently interpreted in different critical schook."* The
language, as already said, is markedly different ** In chaps.
L-xiL, xziii, zxiv.," says Professor Bennett, ''there are
only a few short paragraphs and sentences in the style of
P, and most of these are rather due to an editor than
derived from the Priestly Code."' Still more instructive
is the fact, pointed out by Professor Q. A Smith, that '' in
the Book of Joshua P does not occupy the regulative
position, nor supply the framework, as it does in the
Pentateuch."* As Wellhausen puts it: "Without a pre-
ceding history of the conquest, these [P] sections are quite
in the air: they cannot be taken as telling a continuous
story of their own, but presuppose the Jehovistic-
Deuteronomic work. . . . We have already shown that
the Priestly Code in Joshua is simply the filling up of
the Jehovistic-Deuteronomic narrative."* As interesting
illustrations of the stylistic perplexities, reference may be
made to the two important chapters — ^xxiL and xxiv. The
phraseology in chap. xxiL 9-34, " is in the main that of P "
says Dr. Driver ("almost a cento of Fs phrases" says
^ ITaBB. IL ^ 808 (italics outb).
* HM, p. 815. Kg., " If xYi. 1-8 is rightly assigned to J. a piobabiUiy
is established that it may have contained other geographioal desoriptions,
now perhaps absorbed into P's more detailed surrey. But it appears to be
beyond the power of any oritical method to disooTer the dues to their
separation" (pp. 807-8).
* Primer, p. 90. The P sections, CSarpenter says, "show several cnrions
features, and doubts haye consequently been expressed concerning their
orinnal oharaoter («.^., by Wellhausen).'^ — Hex. i. p. 178.
« Art "Joshua" in Diet, qf Bible, ii. p. 784. Similarly Bennett says :
"In the Pentateuch P is used as framework; in Joshua JBD." — Book ^f
Jwkua ("Polychrome Bible"), p. 46.
* EitL tf Israel, pp. 867» 885. As shown later (Chap. X.), Wellhausen
regards the " main stock ** of the Priestiy narratiye as ceasing with the
dMkih of Hoses.
2i6 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
Carpenter), " but the narrative does not display throughout
the characteristic style of P, and in some parts of it there
occur expressions which are not those of P." He proceeds :
"Either a narrative of P has been combined with elements
from another source in a manner which makes it difficult to
effect a satisfactory analysis, or the whole is the work of
a distinct writer, whose phraseology is in part that of P,
but not entirely." ^ Wellhausen, on the other hand, thinks
it is Fs wholly (but not the P of the earlier book^). Addis,
with Kuenen, assumes that *'it is a late production in the
school and after the manner of P/'* Chap, xxiv., in
turn, is assigned generally to E ; yet, says Dr. Driver, " it
might almost be said to be writt^ from a standpoint
approaching (in this respect) that of D*." ' Addis
aiLnes a Deuteronomic Uon, and abundant inter-
polation.^ What, one is tempted to ask, can such criteria
avail f
Not much support, we think it will be felt, is to be got
from the Book of Joshua for an original distinction of J and
E — ^if for their existence in that book at alL When it is
added that the Samaritans seem from the beginning to have
had, in Buhl's words, ** outside of the Canon an independent
reproduction of the Book of Joshua,"^ it may be realised
that the reasons for affirming a ** Hexskteuoh" are not so
conclusive as is generally assumed.
IV. Abb J AND E two or ONSf DnrncuLTiES of
SSPABATION
The decisive grounds for the separation of J and E must
be sought for, if anywhere, in the Book of Genesis, where
the divine names are still distinguished It is important
^ Inirod. pp. 112-18. • ffex. ii. p. 478. ' InirocL p. 116.
^ Eiex, L p. 288. It is a onriouB observation of Carpenter's that "thb
Deuteronomic editors of the national histories during tne exile were oon-
temporaiy with the priestly schools of Ezeldel and his successors, and some
interchange of phraseology would be only natural" (this to account for
oceasionar appearances of P in D passages), -^ffex. ii. p. 816. It is
interesting to see how the theoir of J£D and P schools eztendiug into the
exile tends to work round to a theory of eatUemporary authorship for much
of the matter. But may not the same thing be assumed for early co-opera*
tion in the production of t^e book t See below, pp. 876-6.
* Oanon <^ O.T.^ p. 41. On the historicity of Joehuai see Appendix ta
chapter.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 217
for the purpose of our inquiry here to remember how the
discrimination of J and £ was originally brought about.
It will be recalled ^ that, till the time of Hupfdd, E was
commonly regarded as an integral part of P — a proof that,
notwithstandmg their differences, even these documents are
not so far apart as many suppose.' Then E was separated
from P on the ground of its greater literary afEinities with
J, and, not unnaturally, in view of the difference in the
divine names, continued to be regarded as a distinct writing
from the latter. Now the question recurs — Is it really
distinct? The only actually weighty ground for the dis-
tinction is the difference of usage in the names, and that
peculiarity must be considered by itself. Apart from this
it is our purpose to show that the strongest reasons speak
for the tmity of the documents, while the hypothesis of
distinction is loaded with improbabilities which amount, in
the sum, well-nigh to impossibilitiea
1. In the first place, then, there is no clear proof that E
ever did exist as a continuous independent document. It
has a broken, intermittent character, which excites doubts,
even in Wellhausen.* Bouehly, after Gen. xx.-xxL, where
the document is supposed lubruptly to enter ,^ we have only
fragments till chap, xxxi, then again broken pieces till
^ See aboTe, p. 198.
* Bleek, Oftye, Lange, Perowne, etc., retained the older view. An inter-
esting eeriee of equations might be drawn up along this line, based on the
axiom that things that are eqoal to the same thing are equal to one another,
weakening lomewhat the foroe of the ordinary doonmentuy theory. If, e.a.,
B resembke P safficientlj to haye been regarded by most eritios tul Hupfeld,
and b^ many nnce, as part of P, and E is at the same time practically indis-
tingaishable stylistically from J, an obvious conclusion follows as to the
relations of J and P. So in other places approximations may be shown to
exist between £ and D, D and J, and eren between JB and P, D and P.
See below, pp. 258 ff.
' Wellhausen says : " Not merely is the Elohist in his matter and in his
manner of looking at things most dosely akin to the Jehovist ; his docu-
ment has come down to us, as K5ldeke was the first to perceive, onlv in
extracts embodied in the Jehovist narrative." And in a note: "What
Kuenen points out is, that certain elements assigned by me to the Elohist
are not fragments of a once independent whole, but interpolated and
parasitio adcutions. What effect this demonstration may have on the judg-
ment we form of the Blohist himself is as yet uncertain."— ^w<. of ftrau,
pp.7, 8.
^ IVaoes of E are thought by some to be found in chap. xr. (Wellhausen,
Dillmann, etc. ). Dillmann would attribute to E part of the matinial in ohapt.
iv. (17 it ) ; vi. (1-4) and xir. ; but he is not generally followed in this. QL
Kuenen, Ate. p. 149.
2i8 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
chaps. xL-xlii, in the life of Joseph, and a few portions there-
after, chiefly in chaps, xlv. and L^
2. Next, doubt, and more than doubt, is awakened by
the thoraugldy parallel character of the narratives. As was
shown at an earlier stage,* the two supposed documents are
similar in character, largely paiallel iif matter, and, as
proved by their complete interfusion in many places,
must oftcoi have been nearly verbally identical A few
testimonies on this important point may not be out of
place.
'' In the main," says Wellhausen, '' JE is a composition
out of these two paralld books of history," adding, " We see
how uncommonly similar these two history books must have
been."«
*' The two books," says Addis, " evidently proceeded in
parallel lines of narrative, and it is often hard — ^nay
impossible — to say whether a particular section of the
Hexateuch belongs to the Jahvist or the Elohist" ^ " Two
accounts of Joseph's history, closely parallel on the whole,
but discordant in important details (?) ^ have been mingled
together." •
^It [JE]," says Kautzsch, ''must have run in almost
unbroken paialleUsm with the Jahwist in the patriarchal
histories, the history of the Exodus, and of the conquest of
Canaan."^
''In the history of the patriarchs," siqrs Dillmann,
" especially in that of Jacob and Joseph, it [E] shows itself
most closely related to [J]; so much so that most of its
narratives from chap. xxviL onwards have their perfect
paraUelsin[J]."«
After this, it does not surprise us that an able scholar
like Klostermann — at one time a supporter of the usual
criticid hypothesis — ^was so impressed with the similar
character and dose relation of these " throughout parallel "
narratives as to be led to break with the current theory
1 Oolenio, to far A8 he accepted Hupfeld'e B, did not regard it as independ-
tQt, bat identified it with J. See above, p. 199.
* See aboye^ 71.
' Oonw. d. Bex, p. 22. It has already been seen that Wellhauen eztenda
thiB paraSel, as regards matter, to P (Mist, qflmul, pp. 295, 818). Cf. above,
p. 107 ; but specially see below, pp. 844 ff.
^ffex. p. Ini. *See below, p. 287. * Asbl p zliz.
^LU. (fO.T.,^. 48.
* CfMBiU, p. 11. In a similar strain Drivw, KSnig, Stiftok, Gunkel, ett.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 219
altogether, and to recast his whole view of the origin of the
Pentateuch.^
3. Again, the marked gtylistic resemblance of J and
E speaks strongly against their being regarded as
separate doomnents. On this point it may be sufficient at
present to quote Dr. Driver. ** Indeed/' he says, " stylistic
criteria alone would not generally suffice to distinguish J
and E ; though, when the distinction has been effected by
other means, slight differences of style appear to disclose
themselves."* Maw slight they are will be afterwards
seen.
4 The force of these considerations is greatly enhanced
when we observe the irUimaU fusion and aose mterrekUians
of the documents, and the impossibility of separating them
without complete disintegration of the narrative. The facts
here, as elsewhere, are not disputed.' ** The mutual relation
of J and E," Kuenen confesses, ** is one of the most vexed
questions of the criticism of the Pentateuch."^ " It must/*
he says again, "be admitted that the resemblance between
E and the narratives now united with it is sometimes
bewilderingly close, so that when the use of Elohim does
not put us on the track, we are almost at a loss for means
of carrying the analysis through."* "There is much
difference of opinion," acknowledges Addis, '' on the contents
of J and E considered separately: the problem becomes
more difficult when we pass beyond Genesis to the later
books of the Hexateuch, and to a great extent the problem
may prove insoluble."' The close interrelation of the
several narratives is not less perplexing. This interrela-
tion appears all through — e.g,, the very first words of Gen.
XX., " And Abraham journeyed /rom th&nee,*' counect with the
preceding narrative ; the difficulties of chap. xxi. 1-7 (birth
of Isaac), in which J, E, and P are concerned, can only be
got over by the assumption that "all three sources, J, E,
^ Of. hia Der I'^niai&ueh, pp. 10, 62-58. On EkMtermann, aee ftnrther
below, pp. 227-29, 845.
* Introd. p. 126 ; of. p. 18 : ''Other phraseological oriteri* (beiides the
namee) are slight.'' Ct Colenso, qaoted aboye, p.l99 ; and Hnpfeld, below,
1^ 284. Dr. Driver himself speaks on the dnality of the doooments with oon-
siderable reserve, though "he mnst own that he has always risen flrom the
■tndj of JE with the oonviotion that it is comporite ** (p. 116).
' The notes Xq Ki^nti^h and Sooin's anafysis of Gfenssii are here very
instniotiye.
^AsBLp. 64, ^iM,p.l44. *^SAp. ZXllT.
220 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
and P seem to have contained the account of the birth
of Lsaao"'^ — ^but it is at its maTimnm in the history of
Joseph.* Illustrations will occur as we proceed' The usual
way of dealing with these difficulties is by assuming that
sections in J parallel to E, and sections in E parallel to J,
once existed (so of P), but were omitted in the combined
work. This, if established, would immensely strengthen the
proof of parallelism — ^would, in fact, practically do away with
the necessity for assuming the existence of two histories ; but
the hypothesis, to the extent required, is incapable of proof »
and its assumption only complicates further an already too
complicated problem.^
5. Finally, the argument for unity is confirmed by the
violent expedients which are found necessary to make the
opposite hypothesis workable. We have specially in view
here the place given, and the functions ascribed, to that
convenient, but most unsatisfactory, appendage of the critical
theory — the Bedaetor. The behaviour of this remark-
able individual — or series of individuals (E^, E*, E* etc)—
is one of the most puzzling features in the whole case. At
times he (B) puts his sections side by side, or altematee
them, with little alteration; again he weaves them
together into the most complicated literary webs ; yet again
he "works them up" till the separate existence of the
documents is lost in the blend.* At one time, as Kloster-
mann says, he shows an almost "demonic art"' in com-
bining and relating; at another, an incapacity verging on
imbeolity. At one moment he is phenomenally alert in
smoothii]^ out difficulties, correcting mistakes, and inter-
polating harmonistic clauses; at another, he leaves the
most ghtring contradictions, in the critics' view, to stand
1 Ozf. Rex. ii. p. 29 ; see below, p. 852.
* Gf. Addis ana DiUmami above.
' CH, e,g,, on the analysis of Gen. nil, and Gen. zxYiii. 10. tL, below,
pp. 284-85.
^ Ct below. Chap. X. pp. 848, 848-9, 862.
* It is oostomary to speak of the Hebrew writers as if they were
sorupolonsly careful simply to reproduce the material at their disposal —
comhinkiff, re-arranging, but not re-ufriting. That, if the critics are right,
can only Ee aoceptea with mnoh qualification. P, on Wellhausen's theory,
must hare re-written the history. Aocording to Kuenen, the "legends"
haye " been worked up in one way by one writer and another by another
• . • so often as to be notably modified, or even completely tFansfoxnied.—
Seat. p. 88 (on the process in Joshua, cf. p. 158).
* AtUatwch, p. 86.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 221
Bide by side. Now he copies J*b style, now IXs, now P'a*
A serviceable, but somewhat unaccountable personage I
y. The Pboblbm oi the Divine Names in J and E
The erux of the question of the distinction of documents
lies, it will be admitted, in the use of the divine names in
Genesis, and this problem, so far as it concerns J and E —
P stands on a somewhat different basis' — must now
seriously engage our attention.
1. The first thing to be done is to ascertain the facts,
and here, once more, we believe, it will be found that
the case is not quite so simple as it is ordinarily represented
to be. The broad statement is not to be questioned that
there are certain sections in the narrative attributed to
JE in which the divine name "Jehovah" is preponder-
atingly used, and certain other sections in which the name
** EloMm *" (Qod) is chiefly used. It is this which constitutes
the problem. We must beware, however, of exaggeration
even here. When, e^., Dr. Driver says that in the
narrative. Gen. zii 10-20, '' the term Jehovah is uniformly
employed," ' it would not readily occur to the reader that
** uniformly " in this instance means ordy once. Hie truth
is, as we soon discover, that no absoltUe rule abatU the nee 0/
the namee can be laid doicn. Even eliminating those
instances in which the "redactor" is invoked to interpolate
aad alter, there remains a not inconsiderable number of cases
to show that the presence of the divine names is not an
infallible test Euenen himself says — and the admission
is striking — " The history of critical investigation has shown
that far too much weight has often been laid on agreement
in the use of the divine names [it is the pillar of the whole
hypothesis]. ... It is well, therefore, to utter a warning
against laying an exaggerated stress on this one
phenomenon." * There are grounds for this warning.
(1) There can be no doubt whatever that the name
"Elolum" is sometimes found in J passages. In the
narrative of the temptation in Gen. iii (J), e.g., the name
1 Of. DOlmann, Oenuis, p. 21 : " The redactor R often writes the Ungiuun
of A [-TV «to. See later on " imiUtions " of D, P, etc.
* See below, p. 226. ^Introd, p. 18 ; Gfmiiis, pw zL
«AtB.p.81.
s
222 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
'^ Jehovah'' is not pat into the mouth of the serpent, but,
instead, the name ''Mohim":^ "Yea, hath Elohim said,"
eto. Similarly, in the story of Hagar's flight (J), the hand-
maid is made to say : " Thou Elohim seest me." * In such
cases one can easily see that a principle is involved. In
the story of the wrestling at Peniel, again, in Gren. zxxii.
J), we have ** Elohim" in vers. 28, 29. In the life of
^oseph. Gen. xxxix. is assigned by Dillmann, Kuenen,
Kautzsch, and most to J (as against Wellhausen), despite
its ^linguistic suggestions" of E, and the occurrence of
"Elohim" in ver. 9 ; and Kuenen writes of other passages :
" Elohim in chaps. xliiL 29, xliv. 16, is no evidence for E,
since Joseph speaks and is spoken to as a heathen until
chap, xlv." •
(2) Examples of the converse case of the tue of Jehovah
hy E are not so numerous, but such occasionally occur.
Addis, indeed, says roundly: "The Elohist . . . always
speaks of Elohim and never of Yahweh, till he relates
the theophany in the burning bush."^ But Dr. Driver
states the facts more cautiously and correctly. ''E," he
says, " prefers Qod (though not exclusively), and Angd of
&od, where J prefers Jehovah and Angel of Jehovah."*
E.g.^ in Gea xxii 1-14 (E) " Angel of JehovcJi " occurs in
ver. 11, and "Jehovah" twice in ver. 14 Similarly, in
GeiL xxviii 17-22 (E), Jacob says: "Then shall Jehovah
be my G^d."^ When the use of the divine names is taken
from the former exclusive ground, and reduced to a " pre-
ference," it is obvious that new possibilities are opened.
We ask that it be noted further that isolated Elohistic
sections occur after Ex. iii,'^ e.g,, in Ex. xiii 17-19, xviii
— a singular fact to be afterwards considered.
(3) We would call attention, lastly, to the lengths
which criticism is prepared to go in acknowledging the
principle of discHmination in the use of the divine names.
Kuenen, with his usual candour from his own point ol
1 Qen. iii. 1, 8, 6. * Gen. zyL 18.
* Rex. pp. 146-46. ^ ffegs, L p. liy. Thus most critica.
* Oensris^ p. ziU. Gf. Inirod. p. 18.
* Ver. 21. A redactor is here Droaght in, as elsewhere, but nnwarrant-
ablj. What caprice should lead a redactor to change these particalai
expressions, when so many others are left untouched f
^ But note the use of "Jehovah " io this chapter he/an the reyelatiofa
(tws. 2, 4).
L THE JE ANALYSIS 223
view, allows to this principle considerable scope. "The
original distinction between Jahwe and Elohim/' he says,
" very often accounts for the use of one of these appellations
in preference to the other." ^ (Dr, Driver allows it
"only in a comparatively small number of instances,")'
He gives in illustration the following cases. "When the
God of Israel is placed over against the gods of the heathen,
the former is naturally described by the proper name
Jahwe (Ex. zii. 12; xv. 11; xviiL 11). When heathens
are introduced as speaking, they use the word Elohim
(Gen. xIl 39). ... So, too, the Israelites, when speaking
to heathens, often use Elohim, as Joseph does, for instance,
to Fotiphar's wife. Gen. xxxbc. 9 ; to the butler and baker.
Gen. xL 8 ; and to Pharaoh, Gen. xli 16, 25, 28, 32 (but
also in vers. 51, 52, which makes us suspect that there
may be some other reason for the preference of Elohim);
so, too, Abraham to Abimelech, Gen. xx. 13 (where Elohim
even takes the plural construction). Where a contrast
between the divine and the human is in the mind of the
author, Elohim is at anyrate the more suitable word
{e.g., Gen. iv. 25; xxxii. 28; Ex. viii. 15; xxxii 16, etc.X"*
2. What now, we go on to inquire, is the eaplanatian of
these phenomena ?
(1) We have already seen the difficulties which attend
the critical solution of distinct sources in the case of docu-
ments so markedly similar and closely related as J and K
There can be no objection, indeed, to the assumption
of the use by the writer of Genesis of an older source,
or older sources, for the lives of the patriarchs; such,
in our opinion, must have been there. But such source,
or sources, would, if used, underlie both J and E sections,
while the general similarity of style in the narratives shows
that, in any case, older records were not simply copied.
It may be further pointed out that the supposition of two
or more documents (JEP, etc.), combined by a redactor,
does not in reality relieve the difficulty. We have still
to ask — On what principle did the redactor work in the
selection of his material? What moved him, out of the
several (parallel) narratives at his disposal, here to choose
J, there to choose E, in another place to choose F, at other
times to weave in stray sentences or clauses from t.hig
» Sex, p. 5G. • IiUrod. p. 13. " ffex. pp. 5$-59.
224 DIFElCULTffiS AND PERPLEXITIES:
or that writing ? Did he act from mere caprice ? If he
did not, the difficulty of the names seems only shifted
back from the original authors to the compiler.
(2) Shall we then saj^ sustaining ourselves on such
admissions as those of Kuenen above, that the alternation
of names in JE narratives in Genesis is due to the fact
that these names are always used diacriminatively 1 This
has been the favourite view of writers of a conservative
tendency,^ and there is assuredly a deep truth underlying it,
though we do not think it can be carried through to the full
extent that these writers desire. It is the case, and is gener-
ally admitted, that there is a difference of meaning in the two
names of God, — " Elohim and Jah/weh!' as Dr. Driver puts
it, "represent the divine nature under different aspects,
viz., as the God of nature and the God of revelation re-
spectively," * — and it will also be allowed that to some extent
this is the principle governing their selection in particular
passages. But is it tne principle of distinction throughout ?
In this connection it is necessary to consider the
important fact, on which the critics rightly lay much stress,
that in the case of E the distinction in the use of the divine
names ceases (not wholly, as we saw, but generally) with the
revelation in Ex. iii What does this fact mean? The
critical answer is simple : a new name of God — the name
Jehovah — ^is here reveiUed, and with the revelation of the
new name the use of the older name is discontinued. This
explanation, however, as a little reflection shows, is not
quite so satisfactory as it seems. For, firsts it is not a
distinction between E and J that the one knows of a
revelation of God to Moses by His name Jehovah, and
the other does not Both, as we find, are aware of, and
describe in nearly the same terms, the commission to Moses.
In both Moses was to tell the children of Israel that
"Jehovah, the Gkxi of [their] fathers" had sent him, Ex.
iii 16 (E) ; 16 (J) ; iv. 6 (J). And, second, while it is E
who records the words of revelation "I Ak that I Am"
(ver. 14), it is not E, but P, who later has the declaration :
''I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob,
as El-Shaddai, but by My name Jehovah I was not known
to them."' There is thus no indication that E regarded
iJRflf., HengstenbenL KeQ, Green, Rnpprecht, etc.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 225
the revelation to Moses in any other light than J did:^
therefore, no apparent reason why E, any more than J,
should draw in his narrative so sharp a distinction between
the period before and that after the revelation in Exodns.
Nor» in fact, did he ; for we have seen that Elohistic sections
are found later in the book, and many able critics hold the
view that originally the E document had this name Elohim
till its close.*
The general sense of the revelation to Moses is evidently
the same in all the three supposed sources, and this helps
us in determining the meaning of the words above quoted
from P — '^ By My name Jehovah I was not known to them.**
Do these words mean, as most critics aver, that the name
Jehovah was up to that time absolutely unknown f Was
the revelation merely a question of a new vocable ? Or, in
consonance with the pregnant Scriptural use of the word
'< name," — ^in harmony also with the declarations of J and
E that the God who speaks is " Jehovah, the Gkxl of your
fathers,"' — is the meaning not, as many have contended,
that the God who in earlier times had revealed Himself in
deeds of power and mercy as El Shaddai, would now reveal
Himself, in the deliverance of Israel, in accordajice with
the grander character and attributes implied in His name
Jehovah — ^the ever-abidins, changeless, covenant-keeping
One ? ^ For ourselves we nave no doubt that, as this is the
deeper, so it is the truer view of the revelation ; any other
we have always felt to be a superficialising of it^
There is, therefore, good ground for laying stress on the
distinction of meaning in the divine names. This, probably,
^ £, in point of &otdo€8, as we saw, oooasbnallY use " JehoTah" in Genesis.
* Gt, e,g,, Dillmann, Nwil-Job. p. 617 ; Addis, Hex, L p. liy. See
below, p. 226.
' That the name JehoTah was probably really older, as J, certainly, and
probably both J and B» assome, is shown in Note B to Ohap. V. above.
«The "name" denotes in general the reyelation-side of God's being.
Jehorah, as we nnderstand it, cbnotes the God of the Govenant as the One
who remains eternally one with Himself in aU that He is and does : the
Self'&nsUfU and therefore the Sel/-C<mai$tetU One. Kantcsch takes the name
I meanin^the "eternal and constant."— ZXct qfJBihU (Extra Vol.), p. 826.
* It is interesting to notice that Golenso, who at first tenaciously resisted
lis Tiew. came round latterly to regard it as admissible— eren sugnests it
as an explanation of how J might use the sacred name in Genesis wiuiout a
this Tiew. came round latterly to regard it as admissible— eren suggests it
xplanation of how J might use the sacra
sense 01 discrepancy with P. "Whereas," he says, "if it means (as some
explain it) that it [the name Jehovah] was not fully under$tood or rmUwd,
the contradiction in terms would disappear altogether," ets.— ^JM. vl.
ppi 682-88.
IS
226 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
far we go with the critics, — ^is the real reason of the
piedominatmg usage in the P parts prior to Ex. vi The
usage in this writing is mled bj the contrast of two stages
of revelation, which the writer desires to emphasise. Still
we think that, while this explanation of discriminatiye use
is perhaps not impossible for JE, and often has real place,^
it is highly improbable that the same author should designedly
change the name in so marked a fashion through whole
chapters, as is done in this narrative, without more obvious
reason than generally presents itself. Only, as formerly
remarked, the critics themselves cannot wholly get away
from this difficulty. If not the author, then the redactor,
must have had some principle to guide him in choosing,
now a Jehovistic, now an Elohistic section. He is too
skilful a person to have worked at random ; the distinction
of names in his documents must have been as obvious to
him as to us; he is supposed to have often changed the
names to make them suit his context ; it is difficult, therefore,
to think that he had not some principle or theory to guide him.
3. This leads to another, and very important question —
Is it so certain that in the case of JE there has been no
change in the names ? The question is not so uncalled for
as it may seem. We do not need to fall back on the redactor
of the critics to recognise that the Pentateuch has a hidory
— that, like other books of the Bible, it has undergone a
good deal of revision, and that sometimes this revision has
left pretty deep traces upon the text The dififerenoes in
the Hebrew, Samaritan, and LXX numbers in Gren. v. and
xi are a familiar example. But in the use of the divine
names also suegestive facts present themselves. It has
been mentionea above as the conjecture of certain critics
that the E document had originally " Elohim " till its dose,
and was designedly changed to "Jehovah" after Ex. iii
(but why then not wholly ?). A plainer example is in Gen.
ii-iiL (J), where the two names are conjoined in the form
"Jehovah Elohim" (Lord God). It is generally allowed
that this is not the original form of writing,^ and that the
^ As in Qen. iii. abore, p. 222. Cfl also below, pp. 284-36. As analogooL
the usage in the prologue and close of the Book of Job may be oompared
with that in the body of the book.
* Gnnkel, however, following Badde, actually thinks that we have hen
also the working together of two stories of Paradise— an Elohistio and a
JdiOTii>tic.^-6^0nenf, p. 4.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 227
names are intentionally combined to show the identity of
the " Elohim " of chap, i (P) with the " Jehovah " of the
Bubsequent narratives. If we may believe Klostermann,
the ancient Hebrews could never have used in speech such
a combination as "Jehovah Elohim/' and would read
here simply "Elohim."^ The LXX is specially instructive
on this point, for it frequently reads " God " simply (chap, ii
5, 7, 9, 19, 21), where the Hebrew has the double name.
So in chap. iv. 1, for " I have gotten a man by the help of
Jehovah," the LXX reads "God" (conversely in vet. 25,
for ** God " in the Hebrew it reads " Lord God ") ; and in
ver. 26, for « call on Jehovah," it has " Lord God." This
raises the question, more easily asked than answered — ^Did
this combination of the names stop originally with chap, iii ?
Or if not, how far did it go ? The LXX certainly carried
it a good way further than our present text — at least to the
end of the story of the flood*
There is, however, yet another class of phenomena bear*
ing closely on our subject — ^which has, in tact, furnished
Klostermann with the suggestion of a possible solution of
our problem well deserving of consideration. We refer to
the remarkable distribution of the divine names in the
Book of Pmlms, It was before pointed out that in the first
three of the five Books into wmch the Psalter is divided,
the psalms are systematically arranged into Jehovistic
and Elohistic groups: Book L is Jehovistic (Davidic);
Book II., Elohistic (sons of Korah, Asaph, David) ; !Book III.,
Jehovistic (sons of Korah, etc.).* Here, then, in the
Pentateuch and in the Psalter are two sets of phenomena
sufficient^ similar to suggest the probability of a common
'cause. What is the explanation in the case of the psalms ?
Is it^ as Colenso thought, that David wrote Elohistic psalms
' PmvkUeuA, p. 87. " Only in the temple, aocording to Jacob (ZeiL d.
AUUst, fFiuentchcfi, 1898, p. 158), was the sacred name JHYHprononnced."
— Kirkpatrick, FialmSj p. 57.
' The compound expressions "Jehovah, God of Shem " (Abraham, etc.),
Gen. iz. 28 ; xzir., eto., also deserye conoderation. Is it, besides, certain
that the diWne names in the oldest script were alwayB written in fuU, or
as words, and not represented by a fiign t Dilimann, it may be observed,
thinks that, conversely, £lohim in E is fteqnently changed into Jehovah
{Nwn.~Jo8. p. 52), a statement which proves rather the nnoertainty of his
hypothesis tioan the necessity of the change.
^ Cf. above, p. 197. For details see W. B. Smith, loc cU. ; Kirkpatriok,
Th€ Fiulnu, pp. Ivff., eto.
228 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
at one period of his life, and Jehovistio psalms at another f
Few critics at the present day would accept this solution ;
besides, it does not explain the phenomena of the other
^ups. The real key, it is generally allowed, is famished
in the fact that, in a few cases, the same psalms (or parts of
psalms) appear in different groups — ^in one form Jehovistic»
in the other Elohistio. Thus P& liiL is an JElohidic re-
cension of the Jehovidie Ps. xiy.; Ps. Ixx. is an MohdsUe
recension of the Jehovistie Ps. xL 13-17 (in the remaining
case, Ps. cviilsPs. Ivii 7-11, and be 5-12, both versions
are Elohistic). As the psalmist cannot well be supposed
to have written the psalm in both forms, it is dear that in
one or other of the versions the name has been designedly
changed. This also is the nearly unanimous opinion of
modem scholars.^ Facts show that there was a time, or
were times, in the history of Israel, when in certain circles
there was a shrinking from the use of the sacred name
Jehovah,' and when, in speech, the name ^'Elohim" or
" Adonai"' was substituted for it. Not only was the name
changed in reading, but versions of the pselms apparently
were produced for use with the name written as it was to be
read — ^that is, with Elohim substituted for Jehovah.*
Klostermann's suggestion, in brief, is that precisely the
same thing happened with the old Jehovistic history-book
of Israel, which corresponds with what we call JE. There
was an Elohistic version of this work in circulation along-
side of the original Jehovistic — a recension in which the
divine name was vnitten " Elohim," at least up to Ex. iiL,
and possibly all through. When the final editing of the
Pentateuch took place, texts of both recensions were
employed, and sections taken from one or the other as was
thought most suitable.^ In other words, for the J and E
^Qt W. B. Smith, O.T, in J, (7., p. 119; Drirer, Ifiifod. p. 872;
Kirkpatriok, PaaZms^ as above, Libnjvry <f O.T,, p. 89; Kloetennanii,
Pentateiichf p. 36 ; Ebnig, ffauptprobleme, p. 28, eto.
* Cf., e,g., Eeelesiastes, and the preference for "Elohim" in ChronioleiL
"The compiler of Chronicles," says Driver, "changes conversely Jehovah
of his original source into God," etc. — Introd. p. 21 ; cf. p. 872.
* It is well known that the Jews change " Jehovah " in reading into
"Adonai" or "Elohim," and that the vowels of "Jehovah" itself are
roaUy those of " Adonai." The name, we have seen, is properly Jahweh.
^ Of. Elostennann, as above.
' Evidently on this theory the need remains of finding a reason for th«
preference of the divine names as much as ever. This brings us haok, as at
\
\
L THE JE ANALYSIS 229
documents of the critics, Elostermann substitutes J and E
recensions of one and the same old work} To him, as to us,
the piecing together of independent documents in the
manner which the critical theory supposes, appears
incredible. If hypothesis is to be employed, this of
Klostermann, in its general idea, seems to us as good as
any.*
YL LmouisTio akd other allegied Gbgundb iob
Separation
It has been shown that the strongest reasons exist,
despite the distinction in the divine namep, for believing
that J and E never had currency as separate documents ;
it is now to be asked whether these reasons are overborne
by the remaining grounds ordinarily alleged to prove
that J and E were originally independent The lone
lists of marks of distinction adduced by DiUmann and
other critics* have at first sight an imposing appear-
ance. On closer inspection, however, they reduce them-
selves to much scantier dimensions. They were, for the
most part, not obvious to the earlier critics, and, as proofis
of independence, can be shown to be largely illusory. Such,
e.g., are all the marks, formerly adverted to, supposed to
show a superior interest of E in Ephraimitic localities and
in the house of Joseph. It turned out that J displayed at
least as warm an mterest in Northern places, while E
dwells also on Beersheba, the one Southern locality that
comes prominently into the part of the history he nar-
rates. Indeed, "the South country" is adduced as one of
his favourite phrases.^ The chief remaining grounds of dis-
least the main reuon, to the feeling of a superior appropriatemeaB of one
name rather than the other in a given context.
1 Cf. PmtotmuA, pp. 10, 11, 27 ff.
* We do not nther that Klostermann sappoeei his Elohistio xecenafon
to he necessarily late— the same causes raohaoly operated at earlier periods
— or to he inconsistent with a nnion of J]B with P. His own theory is that
SQch a nnion goes far hack {PenL p. 185). The fault of Klostermann'e
treatment is toe excessive scope he allows for variations of the text in
course of transmission. The well-marked physiognomy of the JB and P
text is an anrnment against such wide chanfl».
* Qt Dillmann, xfymL-JoB, pp. 817 vL ; more moderately, Driver,
Introd, pp. 118-19. OtnesU, p. xui.
^ £ mentions also Hebron (see above, p. 210), and, if his hand is really
pfesent^ as some suppose, in Gen. xv. he must have had an account of the
230 DIPFICUI-TIES AND PERPLEXITIES :
tinction are alleged linguistic peculiarities, distinctive modes
of representation, dupucate narratives, etc. Let us look at
these.
1. On the subject of Unguisiie peculiarities, Dr. Driver's
statement was formerly quoted that 'Hhe phraseological
criteria " distinguishing J and E are *' slight'' ^ They are
slight, in &ct, to a degree of tenuity that often makes the
recital of them appear like trifling. In not a few cases
words are fixed on as characteristic which occur only once
or twice in the whole Pentateuch, or which occur in bath J
and E, or in contexts where the analysis is doubtful, or
where the reasoning is of the circular order which first
gives a word to J or E, then assigns a passage to that
document leeatue the word is present in it Here are a few
examples : —
E is credited with " what may be called an antiquarian
interest,"' on the ground, among other things, that he once
uses in Genesis (xxxiii 19), in narrating a purchase, the
word Kesitak (a piece of money) — ^found elsewhere in the
Bible only in Josh. xxiv. 32 (E ?) and Job xlil 11.
" Land of the South," above referred to, occurs only three
times in the Pentateuch — ^in Gen. xx. 1 (E), in Gton. xxiv.
62 (which Delitzsch says cannot be referred to E), and in
Num. xiiL 29 (doubtful) ; and once in Josh. xv. 19 (J).
The phrase "after these things," said to be a mark of E
(WelL), is found first in Gen. xv. 1 (J) — E's presence in this
context is contested, and the analysis is declared to be at
best ''only probable" — ^then in three passages given to E
(Gen. xxiL 1 ; xL 1 ; xlviii 1) ; but also in two J passages
(Gen. xxiL 20 ; xxxix. 7), and in Josh. xxiv. 29 (possibly P,
as giving an age).
The word Koh (in sense of ''here") in Gen. xxiL 5,
assigned as a mark of E, is found elsewhere once in Genesis
(xxxi 37 E), in Kum. xxiii 15 (mixed), and besides in
Ex. ii 12, assigned by Wellhausen to J, and in Kum. xL 31,
given by Kuenen to J.
When we turn to instances which may be judged more
important, we are in hardly better case. One observes that
oorenant with Abraham at Mamre. If otherwise, it ia not easy to see bow
E can be expected to speak of localities which belong to a period before his
own narratiye begins.
^ Inirod, pp. 18, 126 ; see abore, p. 219. * Addis, Hex, i. p. It.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 331
where other writers indulge in the customary ^ always ** and
•'invariably/* Dr. Driver frequently uses the safer word
** prefers." ^ The following are a few principal examples, and
the extent of the " preference " may be gauged from them : —
** The Jahvist," we are told, " calls . a female slave or
concubine Shiphhah, the Elohist invariably Amah."^ Dr.
Driver says in the case of E, "prefers" — and prudently.
Amah is used by E some half-dozen times in Qenesis (xx. 17 \
XXL 10, 12, 13 ; XXX. 3 ; xxxi. 33), but Shiphli^ih occurs nearly
as often in E or in inseparabl/interwoven contexts (Gren. xx.
14 ; xxix. 24, 29, assigned to P ; xxx. 4, 7, 18).« Whether
Amah is used by E or J in Ex. ii 5, xx. 10 (Fourth Com.),
xxi. (Book of Covenant — repeatedly), depends on the
accuracy of the analysis which assigns these parts to E, and
on this critics are quite divided.^ Ex. xxi.~xxiiL, «.^., are
given by Wellhausen, Westphal, etc., to J,
We are told again that " the Jahvist speaks of ' Sinai/
the Elohist of 'Horeb.' E's usage reduces itseU to three
passages (Ex. iii 1 ; xviL 6 ; xxxiiL 6) — the last two deter-
mined mainly by the presence of the word ; J employs Sinai
solely in chaps, xix. (cf. ver. 1 ; xxiv. 16, P) and xxxiv. 2, 4,
in connection with the actual giving of the law.'^ The
related expression " mountain of Gk>d " seems common (Ex.
iii 1,E; iv. 27,J; xxiv. 13?).
''The Jahvist," it is said, "calls the aborigines of
Palestine 'Canaanites/ the Elohist 'Amorites/" This,
on examination, breaks down entirely. E has no monopoly
of " Amorite " (cf. Gen. x. 16 ; xiv. 13 ; xv. 21),« and the
^ Oerusii, p. ziii.
* AddiB, i p. ItL The quotations that follow are also from Addis^ pp.
Ivi, Ivii.
' It 18 pure arbitrariness and circnlar reasoning to change this sfngle
word in chap. xx. 14 and xxx. 18, on the ground that "the regular word for
women slaves in E is Amah" and that "J on the other hand always
employs ShifhJ^ " (Oxf. ffex. ii. pp. 20, 45)— the yery point in dispute.
In chap. XXIX. 24, 29, the yerses are cut out and given to P ; chap. xxx.
4, 7 are similarly cut out and pyen to J {p. 45).
^ Ex. ii. 5 is confessedly given to £ because "the linguistio conditions
in vers. 1 and 5 [f.s., this word] point to £ rather than J " (Oxf. Aeb. ii.
p. 81). Jiilicher, however, eives the verse to J. The assignment of the
Decalogue and the Book of tne Covenant are matters of mu<3i oontroyersy.
Delitz^ remarks on the latter: "Such words as Amah ... are no
marks of E in contradistinction to J and D." — OenesiSf i. p. IRL
* Possibly Horeb is a wider designation.
* Oxt Mex. itself says : " Otherwise in lists." Cf. Euenen on Glen, x.,
ffeao. pp. 140, 149.
232 DIFFICUI/riES AND PERPLEXITIES:
two instances assigned to him in Genesis (xv. 16 ; xlviiL 22)
are in passi^s of most doubtful analysis.^ Similarly with
the few instances of * Canaanite ' in J (G«n. x. 18 ; xiL 6 ;
xiiL 7, etc.; cf. xv. 21, ''Amorite and Canaanite/' given
toBX
One other instance must suffice. ^'The Jahvist oalls
Jacob in the latter part of his Ufe ' Israel'; the Elohist
retains the name 'Jacob.'" Dr. Driver more cautiously
says " prefers " ; Kuenen says^ " generally." • Here, again,
the case is only made out by tearing asunder the web of what
is evidently a closely-connected narrative, and by liberal
use of the redactor. It will be observed that it is only in
the " latter part " of Jacob's life that this peculiarity is said
to be found. J had recorded the change of name from
Jacob to Israel in chap, xxxii. 24-32,* but from some
eccentric motive he is supposed not to commence his use of
** Israel " till xxxv. 21. Tet, as the text stands, " Jacob " is
found in a J narrative later (chap, xxxvii 34), and " Israel "
in a lojig series of E passages (Gen. xxxvii 3 ; xlv. 27, 28 ;
xlvi. 1, 2; xlviii 2, 8, 10, 11, 14, 21). There is no reason
for denying these verses to £ except thcU this name is found
in them. The logician could find no better example of the
eirculus vitioeuB than in the critical treatment of Gen. xlviii
It may be noted that in Exodus J has " the God of Abraham,
of Isaac, and of Jacob " (chap, iii 16), and E in both Genesid
and Exodus has '' sons of leraeV'
2. Connected with these alleged peculiarities of language
are others which turn more on general style, " tone," mode
of repreeentation of God, and the like. E has a more
elevated idea of God; J is more vivid and anthropomorphic,
etc Much depends here on subjective impression,^ and on
the view taken of the relation sustained by £ to J — whether
^ Gen. XT. 16 ia attribated by WeUhauMn, Bndde^ Enenen, «to., to
another hand (not to E).
* "At present we oan only say that in the B sections after Gen. zzzii.
the patriaroh is generally oalled ' Jaoob,' whereas the J passages generally
speaK of Israel," bnt " in onr mongrel state of the text nnmerons ezceptiona
occur" {Hex. p. 145).
' If, with some critics, as Dillmann, we assign Gen. zzxii 24-82 to B,
we haye, as Dr. Green points out, '*thi8 curious circumstance/* that "P
(xxzY. 10) and E (xzziL 28) record the chan^ of name to Israel, bnt nerer
use it ; J alone makes use of it, and, accoiding to Dillmann, he does nol
record the change at all." — Oenesie, p. 450.
* Gf. the illustration given on p. 211.
L THE JE ANALYSIS 233
earlier or later. Two examples may be selected of these
alleged differences, and one or two illnstrations given of the
analysis of i>assages resulting from the theory.
We take examples universally accepted. " The God of
whom he [E] writes/' we read, ''appears in dreams, or acts
through the ministry of angels."^ "His angel calls out of
heaven.*** The "dream" criterion is one much insisted on,
and for various reasons deserves attention. As the " dream "
is a lower form of revelation, and is generally employed in
connection with secular personages — Abimelech, Laban,
Joseph (dreams of secular pre-eminence), the butler and
baker, Pharaoh, etc. — ^it is not wonderful that it should
commonly appear in passages of a prevailingly Elohistic
cast. But the attempt to make out this to be a peculiar
criterion of £ proves, on inspection, to be an exaggeration.
The passages adduced in its support, indeed, frequently
prove the contrary. Thus, Gen. xv. 1, ^ven by Driver, is
on the face of it Jehovistic.' Gen. xx. 3, and most of the
other instances (Abimelech, Laban, Pharaoh), fall under the
above rule of fitness, and in some of the cases are assigned
to E simply because a "dream" is recorded. Gen. xxviiL
10-22 — Jacob's vision at Bethel (cf. chap, xlvi 2) — ^is divided
between £ and J (arbitrarily, as shown below), but the dream
is implied in both. In E, Jacob sleeps and dreams (ver. 12) ;
in J, he awakes (ver. 16). In J also G^ reveals Himself to
Isaac in a night vision (chap, xxvi 24: cf . E passage above,
xlvL 2). Further, it is not the case that in E God reveals
Himself only in dreams or by angels, as on the theory He ought
to do. Grod speaks directly with Abraham in chaps, xxi 12
(contrast with case of Abimelech), xxiL 1 ; and with Jacob in
chap. XXXV. 1. He " appears " to Jacob at Bethel in E, chap.
XXXV. 7, just as He does in P (ver. 9). Finally, Wellhausen
himself concludes from chap. xxxviL 19, 20 that the " Jahvist"
also must have related Joseph's dreams;^ and Professor
Bennett, who adduces this very criterion of E,'^ follows suit and
* Addis, i. p. It ; et Drirer, Oenetis, p^. zx, xzi ; McFadven, Me$8, nf
Bui, ; " In the Eloliist He nsoalljr appean in a dream " (p. 19).
' Driyer, ibid. p. xzi ; cf. Addis, 1. p. 86 ; MoFadjen, p. 19, etc
* There is certainly no agreement tiiat chap. zy. 1 is E's. This refatea
also the ezdusiye right of £ to a "coming " of God in a dream (Driyer)—
twice elsewhere in Genesis. Wh^, it may he asked, if the dream la so
peonliar a mark of B, is it not earned into the other hooks t
* Cfamp, d. Abb. p. 64. * (TfiMm, p. 81.
234 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
eays : " Perhaps J had also an account of Pharaoh's dream." ^
So falls this hypothesis of " dreams " — ^itself a dream.
The argument based on the calling of the Angel of God
"out of heaven" is not more successful The expression
occurs once in an £ passage, in Gen. xxL 17, then tvnce in
chap. xxiL (11, 15), but in both the latter cases in a Jehovistic
form, '' the Angel of Jehomh called out of heaven." Even
if the redactor be called in to change the word to *' Elohim "
in ver. 11, because of the E context, this is inadmissible in
the second case, where the context is Jehovistic. There is,
in truth, no warrant for changing it in either casa Yet on
this infinitesimally slender basis an argument for the dis-
tinction of E is reared.
This leads us to say that no stronger proof for the
inadmissibility of the partition hypothesis in the case of J
and E could be desired than the two passages just referred
to— Gen. xxii 1-19 (the sacrifice of Isaac), and (Jen. xxviii
10-22 (Jacob at Bethel). We would almost be willing to
stake the case for the unity of the allied documents
on these narratives alone. Each, on its face, is a single
story, which needs both the parts ascribed to E and those
ascribed to J to constitute it in its completeness, and for
the dividing of which nothing of importance but the
variation in the divine names can be pleaded. The E and
J portions, on the other hand, are unintelligible, if taken
by themselves. Even on the basis of the divine names, the
analysis presents great difficulties, and critics are far from
a^ed in their ideas of it. Thus, in Dr. Driver's scheme,
^n. xxiL 1-14 is given to E, though " Jehovah " occurs in
ver. 11 and twice in ver. 14; in Gen. xxviii 21, "Jehovah"
occurs in the E part, and has to be forcibly excised. The
unity of the story in both cases is destroyed by the partition.
In Gen. xxii vers. 1-14 are given, as said, to E, vers. 15-18
to J (others give vers. 14-18 to a Jehoviatic "redactor"),
ver. 19, again, is given to E. But each of these parts is
evidently complementary to the others.' If we break off
^ Genesis, p. 29.
' Hnpfeld, to whom la dae the 2nd Elohist, has a remarkable admission
of this. " I cannot conceal the fact," he says, " that the entire narrative
seems to me to bear the stamp of the Jehovist ; and certainly one would
never think of the Elohist, but for the name Elohim, which here (as in part
of the history of Joseph) is not supported by the internal phenomena, and
embarrasses criticiion {Qwllen, p. 178). Knobel also says : ** Apart from
L THE JE ANALYSIS 235
with E at vers. 13 or 14 (still more, with the older critics, at
ver. 10), the sequel of the story is clearly laddng. It is the
same with Gen. xxviiL 10-22. £ be^ns with vers. 10-12 ;
vers. 13-16 are given to J; vers. 17, 18 again tah to E;
ver. 19 is credited to J ; and vdhL 20-22 are once more Ks.^
Is such a patchwork credible, especially when ^ redactors "
are needed to help out the complicated process ? ' It is dear
that both documents must have had the story, yet neither,
it appears, is able to tell it completely. Jacob, as already
pointed out, falls asleep in the one document, and awakes in
the other. Even as respects the names, it is difficult not to
see an appropriateness in their distributicm; whether that is
supposed due to an original writer, or to a later editor
combining Elohistic and Jehovistic recensions. In both
narratives the story begins on a lower level and mounts to
a higher — ^the " crisis " in each case being marked by the
change of name. Hengstenberg/ but abo £nobel, DeUtzsch,
and others,^ have pointed this out in the case of the sacrifice
of Isaac. " Elohim " tempts Abraham, and the name
continues to be used till the trial of faith is complete ; it
then changes — ascends — to '* Jehovah" with tiie new
revelation that arrests the sacrifice, and confirms the
covenant promise. So in Gen. xzviii 10 ff., Jacob, leaving
his father's house, is practically in a state of spirituu
outlawry. As befits this lower level, he receives his revela-
tion in a dream (" angels of Elohim ascending," etc.) ; but
"Jehovah" appears to him above the mystic ladder, and
renews the covenant It was a revelation of grace, wholly
' undeserved and unexpected, designed to set Jacob on his
Elohim nothing in this narratiTe reminds ub of the Elohist ; on the oontrarj,
everything speaks for the Jehovist " (quoted by Green, 6^m«sis, p. 488).
^ There are variations among the critics here as elsewhere, sevwal, e.g,,
giye'rer. 10 to J.
' OrelH says : " Gen. xxviiL is nrobably Yahwistio, at least the splitting
up of the narrative is in the hignest degree arbitrary." — 0,T, Prophecy,
p. 105.
*€fen, qfPerU, i. p. 848.
^ Knobel, who gives the whole narrative to J, says : " We have to assume
that the Jehovist here nses Elohim so long as there is reference to a human
sacrifice, and only introduces Jehovah (ver. 11) after setting aside such a
sacrifice, which was foreign to the religion of Jehovah" (as above). The
change to the divine name, savs Delitzscli, " is in its present state significant,
the (iod who commands Abraham to sacrifice Isaac is called ' (Ha)-alohim/
and the divine appearance that forbids the sacrifice, 'uie Angel of
Jehovah.' "^Omuw, n. pp. 90-91.
236 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
feet again, and make a new man of him. Only the higher
name was suited to such a theophany.
3. One of the strongest of the evidences — ^because not
dependii^ on single words — ^relied on to prove the distinc-
tion of J and £, and the validity of the documentary
hypothesis generally, is the occurrence of ''duplicate''
narratives of the same event ("doublets"), and to this
subject we may now finally refer. Duplicates, or what are
held to be such, are pointed out in the case of JE and P, as
in the two narratives of creation. Gen. i-ii 3 (P), iL 3 ff.
(J), and the twice naming of Bethel, Gren. xxviii 19 (J),
XXXV. 15 (P), cf. ver. 7 (E) ; but also between J and E, as in
the twice naming of Beersheba, Gen. xxi 31 (E), xxvi 33
(J), the two flights of Hagar, Gen. xvi. 4-14 (J), xxl 9-21
(E), and specially in the stories of the denials of their wives
by Abraham and Isaac, Gen. xii 10-20 (J), xx. (E), xxvL
6-11 (J).^ Similar duplications are thought to be found
in the Mosaic history. The presence of such differing
and so-called contradictory accounts is held to prove
distinct sources.
On these alleged ^duplicate" narratives the following
remarks may first be made generaily : —
(1) Narratives of the same event may be different in
point of view and detail, without being necessarily, as
is constantly assumed — ^"contradictory" or "discordant"
(creation, flood, etc.*).
(2) Similar acts may be, and frequently are, repeated
under new circumstances. Kg., in the cases of Bethel and
Beersheba above, the second narrative expressly refers back^
to the first (Gten. xxxv. 9, cf. on E below; xxvi 15, 18).
This close interrelation of the different parts of the narrative
(JEP) is one of the most striking facts about it.
(3) It weakens the argument that " duplications " do not
always occur in different documents — as on the theory they
ought to do — but in no inconsiderable number of cases fall
within the limits of the earns document Thus E has a
second visit to Bethel as well as P (Gen. xxxv. 6, 7); J
has two denials of wives — see below ; alleged duplicate
accounts of the Eorahite rebellion are found in Kum. xvi
> See a list of duplicates in Euenen, ffex. pp. 88 ff. De Wette laid great
stress on Hob argument in Mb IrUroducUon,
* See below, pp. 846 ff. •
L THE JE ANALYSIS 237
3-10 (Py eta CritioiBm is driven here to farther dis-
inteffrations.
(A) This sugcests, lastly, that, even were the similarity
of incidents as clear as is allied, it would not necessarily
prove different authorship. The same author might find
varying narrations in the traditions or sources from which
he drew, and might himself reproduce them in his history.
Suppose, to take a favourite instance, that the ' narrator
of the life of Joseph found the merchants to whom Joseph
was sold described in one of his sources as Ishmaelites and
in another as Midianites, is it not as likely that he would
himself introduce both names (Gten. zzxviL 27, 28, 36;
XTnriT. 1), as that a later " redactor " should weave together
the varying histories of J and E ?* Even this hypothesis is
not necessai^, for we have independent evidence that
''Ishmaelites was used as a wide term to include
"Midianites'' (Judg. viii 24^ In Hagar's flights (in
second case an expulEdon), — one before the birth of Ishmael,
the other when he was erown up to be a lad, — ^it seems
plain that tradition had preserved the memory of tvH>
incidents, connected with different times and occasions, and
each natural in its own place.'
Without delaying on other instances, we may take, as
a test-case, the most striking of all these ** doublets " — ^the
denial of their wives by Abraham and Isaac — and subject
t^t, in closing, to a brief analysis. The results will be
^ Ct, €,g,, MoFadyen'i Mm^ qfffid* p. 7» wImto this cue la founded on.
See below, pp. 858-69.
'The ontioB evolTe from the namtiTe two diaorepant hiatorlea of
Joaeph, aooording to which, in the one oato (E), Joaeph ia, unknown to the
brotnera, taken out of the pit by paaaing Midianites^ and aold to Potiphar,
captain of the guard, in Egypt ; in the other (J) he ie aold by the brothers
(no pit) to a oompanj of iSmaelites, who aeU him in turn to an unnamed
Eerptian (no Potiphar). The "they" in tot. 28 ia referred to the
ludianitea. In chap, zzziz. 1, indeed, Potiphar ia expressly said to have
bought him from the Ishmaelitea, but this la ezoiaed as an interpolation.
The whole thing seems to us an exercise of misplaced incennity, rernted by
the narratiTe, which hangs together aa it ia, but not on this theory.
* A difficulty is oreatM arout the o^ of Ishmael in the second story.
The critics adopt the reading of the LXZ for chap. xzi. 14, *' put the child on
her riioulder," and find a discrepancy with the representation of him aa a lad
of some fourteen years of age (or. Addis, Hex, L p. 84). But the story itself
deacribea him as a "Ud" (yen. 12, 17, 18, 19, 20), and the "mocldng'' of
laaac (ver. 9) impliea some a^. Colenso, for once, ia not stumbled 1^ the
" carrying," ana citea a cunoua Zulu parallel (quoted in Quanr, Q/fmsie,
n. 456). The LXX readins haa no claim to aupersede the Hebr^ (cf.
t)elit28ch, in loe.). See furtEer below, p. 852.
238 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
instmctiye, as throwing light on critical methods, and as
showing how hx from simple this matter of "* duplicates *
really is.
(1) We have first, then, to observe that what we have
here to deal with is not tioo, but three incidents (not dupli-
eates, but triplieaUsy^one denial in Egypt (Gen. xiL
Abraham), and two in Qerar (chap. xx. Abraham, xxvi.
Isaac). Of these narratives, two are classed as Jehovistic
(Gen. ziL xxvi), and one is classed as Elohistic (chap. xx.).
In strictness, therefore, on the duplication theory, we seem
bound to assume for them, not two, but three authors ; and
this, accordingly, is what is now commonly done. It is
allowed that " tibe narrative in chap. xiL shows the general
style and language of J," ^hU ^ it can hardly be supposed
that the story of Abram passing off Sarai as his sister at
Pharaoh's court, and that of Isaac dealing similarly with
Sebekah at Gerar, belonged originally to the same series of
traditions." * The former story, therefore, must be given to
some later representative of the J ''school"* We have
here the critical process of disintegration in a nutehelL
(2) We have next to look at the phenomena of the
divine names. In Gen. xii 10-20, Dr. Driver, in words
formerly quoted, teUs us that " the term Jehovah is uniformly
employed."^ In point of fact, it is employed only once
(ver. 17\ and, strikingly enough, it is employed onee also in
the Elohistic narrative (chap. xx. 18) in a similar connection.
In the third narrative (Gen. xxvL 6-11), the divine name
does not occur (U all, though the context is Jehovistic (vers.
2, 12). So uncertain, indeed, are the criteria, that, according
to Dillmann,^ Wellhausen actually at first gave G^n. xii
10-20 to E (same as in chap. xx.). Now, he gives the
section, as above hinted, to a later writer on the ground,
for one thing, that Lot is not mentioned as accompanying
Abraham to Egypt (Lot's presence, however, is plainly
assumed, cf. chap. xiiL 1). As respects the third narrative
(QexL xxvi), so far from there being disharmony, the opening
verse of the chapter contains an express reference to the
going, down of Abraham to Egypt in the first narrative
(Gen. xii 10) ; but the whole text of this passage (vers. 1-6)
^ Gftrpenter, ffex, ii p. 1ft. * Ibid, L p. lOS.
* See WellliaiiBen, below. * Oenuii, p. xi.
* Ghnetii, L p. 17.
I. THE JE ANALYSIS 239
is made a patchwork of by the critics.^ Finally, in chap.
zz. it remains to be explained how a Jehovist verse comes
to stray into the story of E at ver. 18. It is easy to say
** redactor " ; but one desires to know what moved a redactor
to interpolate into his £ context the mention of a fact for
which he had no authority, and to employ in doing so a
divine name out of keeping with his context
(3) The facts as they stand may be summed up thus.
All three scenes are laid in heathen courts. In the first
and third stories, the divine name is not used in the bodv of
the narrative (in tiie third is not used at all) ; in the first
and second, the name ** Jehovah " is used towards the dose
(chap& xiL 17 ; XX. 18) in connection with the divine action
in ii&icting penalty. As two of the narratives are allowed
by the more moderate critics (e.g^ Dillmann, Driver) to be
by the same writer (J), there is no need, on the mere
ground of duplication, to assume a different writer for
the third story. All three stories may well have belonged
to the original tradition. Kor do the conditions require us
to treat the stories as simply varying traditions of tiie same
incident There are resemblances, but there are also great
differences. From bodi chaps. xiL and xx. it appears that
it was part of Abraham's settled policy, when travelling
in strange parts, to pass off Sarah, still childless, as his
sister (chap. xiL 13; xx. 13: on the half-truth by which
tins was justified, cf. chap. xx. 12).* Tins of itself implies
that the thins was done more than once (cf. ''at every
place,'' etc.) ; u, indeed, chap. xx. 13 is not a direct glancing
back to the former narrative. What Abraham was known
to have done, Isaac, in similar peril, may well have been
tempted to do likewise. In the story about Isaac there is,
in fact, as above noticed, a direct reference to his father's
first visit to Egypt (chap, xxvi 1)}
1 Of. Ozf. ffex, inloe, * See above, p. 100.
* It woald obviooBly be eaay, on afanilAr lines to the abore, to make out a
■eiiee of "demonttralue" duplioatee in, say, British histoxy, as in Spanish
wafs, Chinest waii^ Afghan wan^ mad Mnllahs, eta : io ia history
generally.
APPENDIX TO CHAPTEE VII
The Histobigitt of the Book of Joshua
The historical character of the Book of Joshua is assailed,
partly on the ground of discrepancies in the narrative, as
in the chapters on the crossing of Jordan (chaps, iii, iv.),
where two accounts apparently blend ; but chiefly because
of an alleged difference in the mode of representation of
the conquest. On the so-called discrepancies we have no
need to deny the use of separate sources,^ if these are not
held to be contradictory. In the above instance, Kohler
remarks that the notices of the two monuments (of twelve
stones, one in Jordan, the other at Oilgal), while belonging
to distinct sources, do not exclude each other, and are both
to be held fast : ' so in other narratives.
As regards the conquest, it is urged that, according
to one representation, that derived from the Deuteronomio
redactor and the still later P, the conquest under Joshua
was rapid, continuous, and complete; while older notices
in separate passages,* and in Judg. i, show that it was
in 'reality only adiieved gradually, by the efforts of the
several ^bes, and never completely. There is, however,
if the book be taken as a whole, and allowance be made
for the generalising tendency peculiar to all summaries, no
necessary contradiction in the different representations of
the conquest,^ while the circumstantiality, local knowledge,
and evidently full recollection of the narratives, give con-
fidence in the truth of their statements. On the one hand,
the uniform assumption in all the JE history, from the
^ Probably not^ however, the J and E of the preyioiu books. See above,
p. 214.
'.See his Bib. Gesckichte, I pp. 478-74.
* Kg., chaps, xiii. 18 ; xr. 18-19, 68 ; zvL 10 : xvii. 12 ff. ; zriii 2 ff.
'Gf. Konig's oritioism of Badde in his article on Jadges in Diet, of
BibU, ii pp. 818-19.
HISTORICITY OF THE BOOK OF JOSHUA 241
original promise to Abraham of the possession of the land
to the actual conquest, in the Deuteronomic discourses, and
generally in the tradition of the people, is, that the tribes
under Joshua did take effective possession of the land ; and
this is borne out by the fact that in Judges it is not the
Canaanites chiefly by whom they are molested (an exception
is the temporary oppression by Jabin^), but surrounding
and more distant peoples {e,g. Chushan-rishathaim, king
of Mesopotamia,' Moab,' Ammon,^ Midianites,^ Philistines^^
With this agrees the picture given of the conquest, begin*
ning with the taking of Jericho and Ai, advancing to the
defeat of the confederacy of the kings at Bethhoron, and
destruction of their cities,^ then to the defeat of the greater
confederacy in the Korth under Jabin, and conquests there,^
afterwards, in more general terms, to further campaigns
in the middle, South, and North of Palestine, till the whole
land has been overrun.^ The course of conquest is what
might have been expected from the terror described by
Bahab ( JE ?),^^ and accords with the retrospect of Joshua
in his last address (E ?).^ On it the division of the land,
described with so much topographical minuteness, naturally
follows."
On the other hand, the Book of Joshua itself gives many
indications that, notwithstanding these extensive, and, as
respects the main object, decisive conquests, there still
remained much land to be possessed, which the tribes
could only conquer gradually." Much detail work had
to be done in the several territories; and there is no
difficulty in the supposition that, after the first sweeping
wave of conquest, the Canaanites rallied, and regainea
possession of many places, e,g.^ Hebron, from which they
had been temporarily expelled. An instance of this we
have in Jerusalem, which had been taken by the IsraeUtes,
Uadg.iT. • Judg. iU. 8 it
* Jndg. iii 12 it « jDdg. z. 7 ff.
• Jndg. Ti 1 ff. •Jndg. ziii 1 ff.
^ Joeh. z. * JobC zi. 1-14.
> JoBh. zL 16 ff., ziL ^ Joeh. iL 9 ; oi: tw. Si.
u Josh. zziy. 11, 18.
" Ghapa. zil, ff. On the historicity of this, see helow, pp. 879-^0, and o£
Kdni^ on Judges in Diet, nf BHOe, iL p. 820. It is noted below (p. 242} that
a division of the land is implied in Jndg. L, as Budde himself admiti (of.
Konig, loe. cU,),
^ Josh. ziii. 1, 2 ; see passages cited on p. 240.
i6
242 APPENDIX TO CHAPTER VU
aad burnt with fire, and the population destroyed,^ bat
which the Jeboaites r^ained, and held till the time of
David.* These tacts do not really contradict the other
narrative:' indeed, it is hard to see how a Deuteronomic
redactor could have incorporated them unchanged in his
narrative, if he believed they contradicted it The langoage
in Joshua about the conquest is not more sweeping than
that in the Tel el-Amama tablets about the Ehabiri. In
the letters of Abdi-Khiba, king of Jerusalem, e.^., to
Amenophis iv. of I^ypt, we have such expressions as the
following: ''The cities of my lord, the king, belonging to
Elimelech, have fallen away, and the whole territory of the
king will be lost . . . The king has no longer any
territory. ... If no troops come, the territory of my lord,
the king, is lost" ''Bring plainly before my lord, the
king, these words: 'The whole territory of my lord, the
king, is going to ruin."' "The Khabiri are occupyinff the
king's cities. There remains not one prince to my lord, the
king: every one is ruined." "The territory of the kii^
has fallen into the hands of the EhabirL" ^
There is no feature in the conquest better attested than
that Joshua was the leader of the tribes in this work, and
that they advanced and acted under his single leaderdiip
till the first stages of the conquest were completed. This
was not a thing done at once, but probably occupied several
year& Eittel, who defends in the main the truth of the
historical recollections in the narrative, and emphasises this
point about Joshua,^ thinks that a pcurtition of the land
(which he finds implied in Judg. L, etc.^) must have taken
place before the conquest began, and supposes that, after
the general crossing of Jordan. under Joshua, and captoze of
^ Jndg. i 8 ; of. JoaIl x.
* 2 Sam. T. 6-8.
* K5nig Bays : " It is a groandlais aasertion that the reoord of Jadg. L
• flxdndes^ the narratiye of the Book of Joehiia" (p. 820).
«See Bennett's Boc^ of Joshua ("Polychrome Bible"), p. 66. The
Khabiri are sapposed by some to have been the Hebrews. See fbrther
below, Ohap. Xi. p. 421.
* EimL }f ffebi. i. p. 274. He points out that the Tiew of Meyer, Stade,
eto., that J did not khow Joshna, is impugned by Knenen, DiUmanny and
Bodde.
*The snmmaiy in Jndg. L, he says, begins with the qnestion, "Who
shaU begin the fight ! " andthe territory of each tribe is called its ** lot "—
'* two facts which clearly enough presappose a preyious common agreement^*'
efte. Ibid, p. 276.
HISTOBICITY OP THE BOOK OP JOSHUA 243
Jericho, Judah and Simeon separated from the main body to
act for themselves in the Bonth. Joshua was thereafter leader
of the Joseph tribes alone.^ The view seems artifioial, and
no improyement on that in the book. The course of events
is, we maj bdieve, correctlj represented in Joah. ziiy.
>jniC^JMasp.i7a-77.
CHAPTER VIII
S)fincuItfe0 an^ perplesftles of tbe Crftfcal tyspo-
tbesfs : Zbc (Stuestion of 2>euteconoms
• •
**TIm Book of Dontaraiioiiij in and te HmV teMlk« nothing Mir.
How oonld JoiiAh haTo been so terrified beoanae the pnsoriptioiia of this
book had not been obaenrad by the &tliaza, and tlie people had thecebj
incurred the wrath of Jahweh, if ho had not been awaxa that thaae
oommaiida wore known to them t " — Gbai;
**l am stiU oertain that the finding of the book of the law in tho
eighteenth year of Josiah is neither meant» nor ia^ to bo ondentood of tho
flnt appearance of the Book of Denteronomj, originating aboal that tfrna."*
— DsLmacH.
"Our review of aooroea has oonvineed na that it [Deutetonomy] drawa
fWnn old Moaaio tradition, which in ikot in many plaoea goea baek
demonatrably into the Moeaio time, and par $Boe$Om^ee to tho pefaon of tho
lawgiver. It goes so far aa to incorporate andh ofdinanoea aa no longer
soited the writer^s own time, bat only salted the tima of tiia oqb|BmI and
settiament in Canaan."— Obttuu
** Leaving out of aoooont isolated paasages^ espeelally tho eloae^
nomy ii a whole prooeeding Ihnn one and the same hand." — Rmm.
OHAPTEE VIII
DIFFICULTIES AND PEBPLEXITIES OF THE CRITICAL
HYPOTHESIS : THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY
The qnestioiiB we have been engaged in discoficdng with
relation to J and E, while interesting as an object-lesson in
critidsm, and, in their bearing on dates, important, are
secondary in comparison with those which yet await in-
vestiffation — the age and origin of Deuteronomy and of the
so-caUed PriesUy Code. It will be remembered that the
Graf-Wellhausen school does not pretend to settle the age
and relations of docnments or codes by critical considera-
tions alone. Criticism is to be guided, and its conclusions
are to be checked, at every stop, by history. A parallel, it
is alleged, can be traced between the course of the history
and the successive stages of the l^islation. Up to the time
of Josiah, it is held, no trace can be discovered of the ex-
istence and operation of any body of laws but that of the
Book of the Covenant in Ex. zx.-xziiL With the finding of
''the book of the law'' in Josiah's reign,^ there enters a
manifold influence of the spirit and teaching of the Book of
Deuteronomy, strongly reflected in the later literature—
for instance, in Jeremiah ; but no sign is yet shown of the
peculiar institutions of the Levitical Code. These first
begin to be visible in the sketoh of the restored temple and
ito ordinances in Ezekiel (chape. zL ff.), and emerge as a
definitely completed system in the law-book whidb Ezra
brought with him from Babylon, and gave to the post-exilian
community in Jerusalem.* Thenceforth they rule the life
of the nation. The ingenuity of the new scheme is un-
doubted, and the acceptance it has won is sufficient evidence
* 2 Kings zxii.
' Ezra TU. ; Neh. TiiL For a popular ftatement of the theory of the
three Codes see Proresaor W. B. Smith's 0,T, in J. (7., Leots. Tlii, ix.
•<7
248 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
of the skill with which it has been expounded and defended.
But is it really tenable? Many reasons — ^not the least
cogent of them derived from the course of criticism itself —
convince ns it is not. We shall deal in this chapter with
the application of the theory to the Book of Deuteronomy.^
L Stats or the Questiok and Oxneral View
The Book of Deuteronomy, in its main part, consistSy it
is well known, after a slight introduction, and with some
connecting notes, of three hortatory discourses purporting
to have been delivered by Moses in the Arabah^ of Moab,
shortly before his death (chaps, i 6-iv. 40, v.-xxviii ; xxix. 2-
zxz.). To these discourses are appended an account of
certain closing transactions of Moses (chap. zxzL), the Song
and Blessing of Moses (chape, xxxii., xxxiiL), and a narrative
of Moses' death on Mount Nebo (chaps, xxxii. 48-52 ; xxxiv.).
The longest of the discourses (chaps. v.-xxviiL) embraces a re-
hearsal (chaps. xiL ff.), in the form of popular address, of the
principal laws given by GU>d to Moses at Horeb, as these
were to be observed by the people in their new settlement
in Canaan. There is general agreement that the laws to
which reference is made in this recapitulation are chiefly —
though, as will be seen after, by no means exchuvodjf — ^thoee
contained in the Book of the Covenant (Ex. xx-xxiiL);
but they are handled by the speaker, not literally, but
in free reproduction, with rhetorical amplification or
abbreviation, and occasionally modification to suit new
circumstances.
Deuteronomy is the one book of the Pentateuch which
might seem on the face of it to make claim to direct Mosaic
authorship. "Moses," it is declared, after the rehearsal is
completed, "wrote this law."* This view of its origin
modem criticism decisively rejects ; will hardly allow even
^ Graf makes the Book of Denteronomy bis startinff-point. His work
opens : "The composition of Deuteronomy in the a^ of Josiah is one of the
most generally accepted results of the historical criticism of the Old Testa-
ment, for all who do not simply ignore these results." — OtBcMM, Bikher^
p. 1 ; ef. p. 4.
' "That is, the deep yalley running north and south of the 'Dead Sea"
^V.). Usually (in F) Arboth^ the steppes or plains of Moab. See an
interestinff descnption in an article on Ths Suppea t^Modb, by Professor 0» B.
Gray in JBogoosUor, January 1905.
' Deut. zxxi. 9, 24-26 ; see below, pp. 262 ff.
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 249
to be discussed.^ It was De Wette's achievement in criticism,
as we saw, that he relegated Deuteronomy to the age of
Josiah ; and in this judgment the great majority of critics
now follow him, only that a few carry back the composition
of the book a reign or two earlier — ^to the time of Manasseh
or of Hezekiah. Views differ as to how the book is to be
regarded — whether as a pseudograph (''forgery"), or as a
free composition in the name and spirit of Moses without
intention to deceive ; but it is generally agreed that, in its
present form, it is a production of the prophetic age, and
has for its leading aim the centralising of worship at the
sanctuary at Jerusalem. The reasons given for this view
are its prophetic tone and standpoint, its obvious connection
with the work of reformation, the irreconcilability of its law
of the central sanctuary with the older history, incon-
sistencies with earlier legislation, etc. A main objection of
the older critics was its alleged incompatibility with the
Levitical legislation, then believed to be in substance
Mosaic:' but the newer criticism has taken the ground
from this objection by putting the Levitical laws still later
than Deuteronomy — in the exile.
What weight is to be allowed to these opinions is con-
sidered below. The composition of a book of exhortation or
instruction in the form of addresses by MoQps — provided
this is only literary dress, with honest motive in the writer
— is not a priori to be ruled out as inadmissible, or incom-
patible with just views of Scripture.' The only question is
whether Deuteronomy is a book of this character, or, if it is
so, in what sense and to what extent it is so, and to what
age it belongs. On the other hand, we cannot shut our eyes
to certain far-reaching consequences of the acceptance of
the critical view. If Deuteronomy is a work of the age
of Josiah, then, necessarily, everything in the other Old
Testament books which depends on Deuteronomy — the
Deuteronomic revisions of Joshua and Judges, the Deutero-
^ Cf. Graf, abore. Wellhaiuen aa^ : '< About tbe origin of Denteronozny
there is still len dispute ; in all circles whe^e apjpreciation of scientifio
resalts can be looked for at all, it is recognised that it was composed in the
same age as that in which it was discoyered, and that it was made the rule
of Josiah's reformation, which took place abont a generation before the de-
stmction of Jemsalem by the Chaldeails." — ffitt, o/Israelf p. 9.
* OL Bleek, IrUrod. I pp. 828 ff.
* Bcolesiastes, $.g.f ^t mto the month of Solomon, is generally admitted,
sren by oonseryatiye cntios^ to be a work of this kindl
2SO DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
nomic allusions and speeches in the Books of Kings,^
narratives of facts based on Deuteronomy— e^., the blessingB
and cursings, and writing of the law on stones, at Ebal,* idl
must be put later than that sjgd. If, again, it be the case
that the Levitical laws are later than Deuteronomy, this
requires the carrying of these down to where the critics
place them — at or near the exile. The very gravity of
some of these conclusions is our warrant for raising the
question — Is the critical view correct? The course of
criticism itself, as just hinted, despite the apparent
unanimity, forces this question upon us. For, as we soon
come to discover, even on the subject of Deuteronomy, the
critical school is rent within itself by divisions which raise
the greatest doubts as to the soundness of the original
premisea The mania for disintegration — the appetite for
which seems to grow with what it feeds on — ^has been at
work here also. In the Oxford HexcUeueh, e.g,, — so far to
anticipate, — the unity of Deuteronomy with which criticism
started — ^that even of the Oxle in chaps. xii-xxvL — ^is lost in
a sort of dissolving view.' There are, however, in our judg-
ment, other and far stronger reasons for scepticism than
even these critical vagaries. We hear much of the reasons
for putting the book late, many^of them, we shall find, sadly
overstrained ; but we hear little or nothing of the enormous
difficulties attaching to the critic's own hypothesis. These
are either ienored completely, or are toned down and
minimised tiU they are made to appear trifling. We are
content, when the case has been presented, to let the reader
judge on that matter for himself. The time, at all events,
we venture to think, has fuUy come, when a halt should be
called, and the question should be boldly put for recon-
sideration— Is the Josianic origin of Deuteronomy a result
^ JB,a., Solomon's prayer, 1 Eingi TiiL, or Amariah's sparing the ohildren
of maiderers, 2 Kings ziy. 6, 6.
• Josh. viii. 80 fl^
* OC Hex, i. pp. 92-96 ; ii. p. 246. On the Code it is said : " The
Code and its enyelopmepts, homiletic and narratiye, hortatory or retro-
spectiye, must thns be regarded as the prodact of a long ooarae of literary
activity to which the yarious members of a great religions school oontributed,
the affinities with the language aud thought of Jeremiah [not Jeremiah's
affinities with Deuteronomy] being t>artioularIy numerous." To this groups
jt is added, " other additions were made from time to time, inyolving rarther
dislocations"; to these again final additions when JED were united
with P (iL p. 802).
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 25 1
'of sdentifio oriticism which the impartial mind is bonnd
toaooept?
n. UimT AHD Sttlb or Dsutebokomt
Ab dealing the way for the discussion of date, a few
words may be said, first, on the subject of imity and ttyle.
1. No book in the Bible, it may be safely affirmed, bears
on its face a stronger impress of unity than the Book of
Deuteronomy. It is not disputed that, in the form in which
we have it, the book shows traces of editorial redaction.
The discourses are put together with introductory and
connecting notes,^ and the last part of the work, with its
account 01 Moses' death, and in one or two places what
seem tmmistakable indications of J£ and P hands,* points
clearly to such redaction. This suggests the possibility that
such archaeological notices as occur in chap, ii 10-12, 20-22,
and perhaps slight annotations elsewhere, may come from the
same revisional hand. But these minor, and in general
readily distinguishable, traces of editorial labour only throw
into more commanding relief the general unity of the book
in thought and style. The most ordinary reader cannot
peruse ito chapters without perceiving that, as one has said,
"the same vein of thought, the same tone and tenor of
feeling, the same peculiarities of thought and expression,"
characterise it throughout. Accordingly, up to a compara-
tively recent period — till Grafs time — the unity of Deutero-
nomy, as respects the discourses, was recognised on nearly
every hand as one of the surest results of criticism.' It
^ Th«M, howerer, differ little in style from the rest of the work.
* Ohap. xxTJi. 48-52 is cenenlly ^yen to P, and chap. xzxL 14, 15, 28,
to JE ; both are found in <map. zzziy.
* << By far the greater part," eaya De Wette, " belong to one author."—
Iniirod. iL p. 181.
"These" (the diaoonraes), aaya Bleek, "are so homogeneoos in their
langoage and whole oharaoter that we may assume as certain— and on this
point there is scaroelj a conflicting opinion — they were on the whole com-
posed in the shape in which we now hare them, 1^ one and the same
author."— Jntrmj. i p. 820.
In 1864 Colenao wrote: "There can be no doubt that Deuteronomy is
throughout the work of the same hand, widi the exception of the Isst
chapter . . . the book is complete in itaslf and ezhiMts a perfect unity of
style and subject."— PinU., Pop. edit p. 185. By 1871, in Pt ▼! of his
lam work, he had come to beHeye that that which admitted of " no doubt "
earlier was wrong, and that the original Deuteronomy began with chap, t.
252 DIFFICULTIES AND FERPLEXITIES:
was not doubted that the book found in the temple and'
read to Joaiah was substantiallj the Deuteronomy we possess.
This can no longer be afiSrmed. The fine art of distinc-
tion acquired in the dissection of the other Pentateuchal
" sources " soon led, as it could not but do — as it would do
with any book io existence— to the discovery of abundant
reasons for dividing up Deuteronomy also, first, into a
number of lareer sections of different ages, then into a
variety of smaller pieces,^ tiU, latterly, as indicated above,
the unity tends entirely to disappear in the fiuz of the
labours of a ''school" Kuenen, who, in this point, is
relatively conservative, extends the length of what he calls
** the Deuteronomic period, which b^an in the year 621[21
Ra, and which called the additions to D^ into existence,'
beyond the beginning of the Babylonian captivity.* Broadly,
however, two main opinions on division may be distinffuished,
in regard to which we are happy in being able to leave it
with the critics to answer each other. (1) There is the
view of Wellhausen, Comill, and others, who would limit
the original Book of Deuteronomy (its ''kernel'*) to chaps,
xii-xxvi ; but this, as Dr. Driver justly says, " upon grounds
which cannot be deemed cogent"' Even Kuenen contests
the reasons of Wellhausen on this point, and upholds the
unity of chaps, v.-xxvi^ He gives also chap, xxviii to the
author of these chapters, as aeainst WeUhausen.^ (2)
Kuenen, however, following Gra^* here draws a new line,
and, " with the majority of recent critics," says Dr. Driver,
"declares chaps. L-iv. to be the work of a different hand."^
The resemblance of style cannot be denied, but, says
Kuenen, " the great similarity of language must be explained
as the result of imitation."' To Dr. Driver himself there
seems " no conclusive reason " for questioning the unity of
^ See Note A on the Breaking np of Deuteronomy.
* ffex, p. 226. * VeuL p. Ixy.
^ffex. pp. 118 ff. • Ibid. pp. 126 ff.
* Ot Graf, OeschiehL JBCdh&r. p^ 4. 6. It is interesting to notioe the
reasons ffiyen by Graf, as a pioneer in this division. He does not base it on
style. He thinks, indeed, that in parts a ^ater ''diflrnseness" may be
detected, but this "may perhaps seem too subjectiye." His objective reason
is tiiat through the first four chapters, Deuteronomy is *'olosely bound
"witk tne preoeding books," even as "ihe last four chapters contain the
oonlinuation of the historical narrations of those books.' This does not
suit his hypothesis that the Pentateuch as a whole did not exist in Joeiah's
day.
^Dmt, p. Izvii ;or. Kuenen, Bw, pp. 117 ff. * Atn. p. 117.
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 253
chaps. L-iiL with the body of the work, and he doubts whether
" the only reason of any weight " for questioning chap. iv.
1-40 is conclusive either.^ Oettli, another witness, says on
chaps. L-iv. : ^ The usage of speech is the same as in chaps.
V.-XL *
For ourselves, the broad argument from unity of thought,
language, and style throughout the book seems overwhelimng
against all these attempts at disintegration. Dr. Driver is
mainly with us here. He points out bow '' particular words,
and phrases, consisting sometimes of entire clauses, recur
with extraordinary frequency, giving a distmdive colouring
to every part of the work." ' Almost more important is his
statement that " the majority of the expressions noted occur
seldom or never besides; others occur only in passages
modelled upon the style of Deuteronomy, and representing
the same point of view."^ As respects the opinions of
other critics, Dillmann, Westphal, Kittel, Oettii, Delitzsdi
and others, defend, like Dr. Driver, the general unity of
Deuteronomy. Dillmann and Westphal, however, have
hypotheses of transpositions, etc, which Dr. Driver, with
good reason, rejects as ''intrinsically improbable."'^ The
unity of Deuteronomy, it may be concluded, is likely to
survive the attacks made upon it.
2. An interesting question arises here, with considerable
bearings on later discussions — How does the style of Deutero-
nomy stand related to that of the other Pentateuchal books,
and to those passages said to be '' modelled " on it in other
Old Testament writings? There are marked differences
between the Deuteronomic and the JE and P styles, but it
is important that these should not be exaggerated, and that
affinities also should be noted.* Delitzsch, in hiis Oefum^
^ DevL p. Izzii * Chm. <m DmL p. 9.
' DwLji, Izxyii. Dr. DriTer^a worda on ohaps. T.-zxri., xxviii are wortii
SuotiDg: "There ia no saffioient reason for aonbtinff that the whole of
beae onapters formed part of the law-book found by Hilkiah ; all are
written in the aame at^le, and all breathe the aame apint, the only material
diiferenoe being that, from the nature of the case, the parenetic pnraaeology
ia not 80 wduiMy predominant in chapa. zii.-zzvi., zzviii. aa it ia in ohapa.
T.-zi. . . . Chapa. y.-zzvi. maythnabe conolnded, without hesitation, to be
the work of a amsle author ; and chap, zzyiii may be included without
aerioua miagiyinga. — ^Pp. Izy, IzyiL
^ Ihid. p. Izuy.
* Ibid, p. Izzy. Kittel aympathiaea with Dillmann and Westphal. Bet
Y^HiaL^HAs, L pp. SSffT
* See Iff ote B on tSsnteronomio and Prieetly Stylea.
254 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
made an interesting attempt, from comparison of the
Decal(^e and Book of the Covenant with Deuteronomy
(which he took to be Mosaic in kernel), to arrive at an idea
of the mode of thought and language of Moses* He found
many Deuteronomic assonances in the above writings, and
concluded that there was " an original Mosaic type," which
he termed ^ Jehovistic-Deuteronomic." ^ It is at any rate
certain that comparison with the other Pentateuchal books
reveals some curious relations. Of all styles, that of the so-
called P is furthest removed from Deuteronomy; yet in
Lev. zxvL, which is of the P type, the language rises to a
quite Deuteronomic strain of hortatory and admonitory
doquence. The resemblance is in fact so remarkable that
it is commonly allowed that a close relation of some kind
subsists between Lev. zxvi. and Deuteronomy, whether of
priority or dependence on the part of Leviticus remains yet
to be considered.* The affinities of Deuteronomy with JE
are much closer.' Such are clearly traceable in the Deca-
logue and Book of the Covenant,^ whether we ascribe the
latter, with some critics, to J, or, with others, to E'^ More
SBneraUy, " there are," says Dr. Driver, " certain sections of
E (in particular, Gen. zxvL 5 ; Ex. xiii 3-16 ; xv. 26 ; xix.
3-6; parts of xx. 2-17; xxiii. 20-23; xxxiv. 10-26), in
which the author (or compiler) adopts a parenetic tone, and
where his style displays what may be termed an approxima-
tion to the style of Deuteronomy ; and these sections appear
to have been the source from which the author of Deutero-
nomy adopted some of the expressions currently used by
him."* Not, it will be observed, borrowed from Deutero-
nomy,— « proof, surely, of an early Deuteronomic typa
1 OeneHs, pp. 29-82.
* Of. Ck>len8o, Pent,, Pt. vi. pp. 4 ff. ; and Me on Law of Holiness below,
Chap. IX. pp. 808 fL On P phrases in Deuteronomy, see below, p. 277.
^Some older otitics, as Stahelin, even attributed the composition of
Deuteronomy to tiie Jehovist De Wette writes of Deuteronomy: *'By
far the sreater part belongs to one author, and, at it appears, to the
Jebovistio, of whidtiithas numerous characteristic marks." — Intirod. ii. p. 181.
^ Cf. Delitzsch abore. Wellhausen—Dillmann also—explains the refer-
ences by a " back-current *' from Deuteronomy. But the Decalogue, whether
provided with *' enlargements " or not, must in its present form, as incorpor-
ated in the JE historj, have been older than Deuteronomy (on critical date
of that book). So witii the Book of the Covenant.
* See above, p. 281 ; below, p. 276.
* Deut, pp. Izxyii-lxxviii ; cf. pp. Ixxxy-yL Delitzsch also finds
Deateronomio traces occasionally in Cfenesis (e.^., chap. xxvi. 6)« Oolenso
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 255
Still more interesting in this connection are certain
passages in Joshua, Judges, and Samuel, described by
Dr. Driver as *' pre-Deuteronomic " ({.«., pre-Josianic), and
''allied to E," jet which have affinities in thought and
expression to Deuteronomy.^ And a last interesting and
curious fact^ as bearing on the allied ''modelling'' on
Deuteronomy, is that, if Dr. Driver is correct, the purity
of the Deuteronomic revisers' style seems to diminish as
we recede further in the history from the Mosaic age.
It is, he tells us, most "strongly-marked" in Joshua and
Juo^es, hardly appears in Samuel at all, is mingled with
other forms of expression in £ings. " It is interesting to
note," he observes, "what is on the whole an interesting
accumulation of deviations from the original Deuteronomic
type, till in, e,g.^ 2 Kings xviL it is mingled with phrases
derived from the Book of Kings it^U, Judges, and
Jeremiah." * The inference we are disposed to draw from
these facts is not quite that of the learned author. Tliey
appear to us to point to a much earlier dating and influence
of Deuteronomy than he would allow.
IIL DurjHOULTiEs or Cbitigal Thieobt on Aos
AND ObIGIN
We now approach the central problem of the age and
origin of the book. Was the Book of Deuteronomy, as the
critics, with nearly united voice, allege, a production of the
age of Josiah, or of one of his immediate predecessors ? If
not, what were the circumstances of its origin? It is
extremely important to observe that for most of the
ditios this question is already settled before they begin.
Deuteronomy is universally allowed to presuppose, and to
finds the hand of the Denteronomist tnoeable from Genaeii to 2 Kings
(FnU,, TtyL'p, 2S). He finally finds 117 Deateronomic Tenes in Genesis,
188| in Szodns, and 1661 in Numbers (Pt yii pp. I-tI ; App. pp. 146 ff.).
Knenen points oat that WeUhansen approaches the positions of Stl^elin
and Colenso " when, from time to time, he notes a relationship between JE,
i.e. , the redactor of the two works J and £, and the Book of Deuteronomy,
UM even asks whether JB may not haye been revised by a deuteronomic
redactor. "—JTtfSB. p. 187.
^IM. p. Ixxzvi OL IfUrod, pp. 106, 107, etc Such pasttges are
parts of Josh. zziy. 1-26 ; Judg. ti. 7-10 ; z. 6-16 ; 1 Sam. iL 17-86 ;
parts of 1 Sam. yiL-viii. ; x. 11-27, etc
*/M(i.p. xoii
\
2S6 DOnCULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
be dependent on, the laws and history contained in JE^
and, these writings being brought down by general con-
sent to the ninth or eighth century B.C., a later date for
Deuteronomy necessarily follows.^ We decline to bind
ourselves in starting by this or any similar assumption. It
may well be that the result of the argument wiU rather
be to push the date of JE farther back, than to make
Deuteronomy late. Seasons for the late date are found
in the narrative of the finding of "the book of the law''
in 2 Kings xziL, in statements of Deuteronomy itself, and
in the character of its laws, compared mth the earlier code,
and with the history.* It seems to us, on the other hand,
that, under these very heads, insoluble difficulties arise,
which really amount to a disproof of the critical theory.
Beversing the usual procedure, it will be our aim, first,
to set forth these difficulties which call for a revisal of
the current view, then to weigh the force of the considera-
tions adduced in its support
1. Investigation naturally begins with the narrative of
Hhe finding of "the hook of the law" in the eighteenth year
of the reign of Josiah (b.c. 622), which criticism holds to be
the first appearance of Deuteronomy. The story, in brief,
is that, during repairs in the temple, Hilkiah the high
priest found a book, identified and described by him as
''the book of the law." He announced his discovery to
Shaphan the scribe, who, after reading the book himself,
presented and read it to the king. Josiah was extra-
ordinarily moved by what he heard, confessed the guilt
of the ''fathers" in not hearkening to the words of this
book, sent to inquire of Jehovah at the prophetess Huldah,
finally, after the holding of a great assembly, and the renewal
of the nation's covenant with Gtod on the basis of the book,
instituted and carried through the remarkable " reformation "
^ " Of oonne," nmttrks Dr. Driyer, " for those who admit this [(Yiz., that
JE is long sabseqnent to Mooes)], the poet-Moeaio authorahip of Deuteronomy
follows at once ; for, as was shown above, it is dependent upon, and oonse-
qnently later than, JK" — DetU, p. zliL Thus one part of the theory roles
another.
* Dr. Driver again says : " As a work of the Mosaio age, Deuteronomy,
I must own, though intelligible, if U stood perfectly cUone, — i.s., if the
history of Israel had been other than it was,— aces not seem to me in-
telligible, when read in the light shed upon it by other parts of the Old
Testament" — Ibid, Pref. p. xii. This seems to show that it is the hidor§
(or view taken of it) which really decides the late date.
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 257
connected with his name.^ There is no reason to doubt that
the book which called forth this reformation, embraced, if
it did not entirely consist of, the Book of Deuteronomy.*
The critical theory, in its usual form, is, that the book was
composed at or about this time, and was deposited in the
temple, with the express design of bringing about just such
a result. Is this credible or fikely ?
(1) Now, if anything is clear on the face of the narrative
above summarised, it surely is, that this finding of the book
of the law in the temple was regarded by everybody con-
cerned as the genuine discovery of an old lost book, and thai
the " book of the law " of Moses. This is evident as well
from the terms in which the book is described (" the book
of the law,*** "the book of the covenant,"* "the law of
Moses " % as from the profound impression it produced on
king and people, and bom the covenant and reformation
founded on it Hilkiah, who announced its discovery in the
words, " I have found the book of the law in the house
of Jehovah,"* the king, who was vehemently distressed
"because our fathers have not hearkened to the words of
this book,"^ Huldah the prophetess, who confirmed the
threatenings of the book,^ bad no other idea of it. There
is not a whisper of doubt regarding its genuineness from
any side — ^from priests at the temple, iraose revenues it
seriously interfered with, from prophets, on many of whom
it bore hardly less severely, from the people, whose mode
of life and religious habits it revolutionised, from priests
of the high places, whom it deposed, and whose wordiip
it put down as a high crime against Jehovah. The critics
1 2 Kingii zziL, zzifl. ; of. 2 Ghron. zzziv., zzzr. The eredenoe aoooided
to tfaia namtiye in 2 Kings by the oritios oontrasts aingulArly witii their
free treatment of other parts of the later history of Kings, e.g., the reforms
of Hezekiah (2 Kings zyiiL 4 ff.) questioned by Wellhausen, Stade, fihnend,
etc.), and the deliyeianoe from SJannaoherib (ohap, zix.; o£ H. P. Smith,
O.T. HisL p. 246).
' The nsnatlTe in Kings ^erslly does not require, though at points it
suggests, more ($.g., chap, zxiii. 21) ; the Ghronioler's aooonnt of toe great
Passoyer implies the Mosaio ordinance.
* 2 Kings xxii. 8. « Chap. xzilL 2. • Chap. zziiL 24, SB.
' Chap. xziL 8.
'Chap. xzlL 18; of. Jer. zxxIt. 18 ff. Professor W. B. Smith ooold
persnade nimself that " it was of no conseqnence to him f Josiah] to know the
exact date of the authorship of the book"~O.T. in •/• O. Hot Hi
daU^ perhaps, but its antiquity t
■ Chap, zzli 16.
258 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
themselyes do not dispute, bat freely allow, that it waa
taken for a genninelj Mosaic book, and that it was this
fact which gave it its authority. The last thing, we may
be certain, that would enter the minds of Josiah or of
those associated with him, was that the book whidi so
greatly moved them was one newly composed by prophetic
or pnestly men of their own circles. This was a point,
moreover, on which we may be sure that king and people
would not be readily deceived. People at no time are easily
deceived where their own interests or privil^es are con-
cerned, but in this case there were special difficulties. A
new book, after all, does not look like an old one ; and if
hi^h priest, scribe, king, prophetess, were misled into
thinking that they were dealing with an old Mosaic book,
when tibe parchment in their hands was one on which
the ink was hardly dry, they must have been simpletons
to a degree without parallel in history. On the other
hand, assume the book to have been old, mouldy, de-
faced, and what are we to say of its recent origin ? Did its
authors, as Oettli asks, disfigure the book to make it look
old?i
(2) To these objections, there is but one plain answer, if
the Joeianic origin of the book is to be upheld, and that is
an answer which the more influential leaders of the new
school do not hesitate to give — the book was a result of
pious frauds or of a deliberate intention to deceive. It was
a " pseudograph " ; in popular speech, a "forgery." This,
without any disguise, is the view taken of the matter by
Beuss, Graf, £uenen, Wellhausen, Stade, Comill, Cheyne,
eta,* as by Colenso,' and many older critics. Many
believing scholars, to their credit, repudiate it, but their
scruples are treated by the real masters of the school as
the result of timidity and weak compromise. Yet, as
£lostermann says, in criticising it^ '' What a swallowing of
^ D&uL Introd. p. 19.
' One of Beuss' propositioiis (endorsed by WellliMiflen) is : " Deuteronomy
is the book which the priests prettnded to haye found in tiie temple in the
time of Josiah." — Wellhausen, HitL of latcui, p. 4. For the yiews of other
scholars, see Note 0 on Deuteronomy as Fraua Pia.
* Golenso, who thinks it likely that Jeremiah was the faUouriuSt writes :
'* What it [the inner yoice] ordered him to do, he would do without hesita-
tion, as by direct command of Qod \ and all considerations of morditr or
immorality would either not be entertained," etc. {Penl, Pop. edit 1864,
p. 201 ; of. pp. 196 ff.).
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 259
camels is here I "^ It is a view which, despite the excuse
attempted to be made for it by talk about the '' less strict "
notions of truth in those days,* shocks the moral sense, and
is not for a moment to be entertained of a circle to which
the prophet Jeremiah, with his scathing denunciations of
lying and deceit, and of the " false pen of the scribes " that
''wrought falsely,"' belonged. Not that even on this
supposition the difficulty of the transaction is removed.
Hilkiah might be a i>arty with prophets and priests in an
intrigue to palm off a " book of the law " on the unsuspecting
king; * but how should he be able to use such language to
Shaphan as, " I have found tJie book of the law " ? or how
should Josiah speak of the disobedience of the "fathers"
to commandments which he must have been aware were not
known to them? Is it not apparent that, though ''the
book of the law " had long been neglected, disobeyed, and
allowed to become practically a dead letter, men still knew
of the existence of such a book, and had sufficient idea of
its contents to be able to recognise it when this old temple
copy, which had evidently been left to lie covered with its
dust, one does not know how long, in some recess, was
suddenly brought to light. It is nothing to the point to
urge, in answer, that, had Deuteronomy existed earlier,
there could not have been that long course of flagrant
violation of its precepts which Josiah deplores. The whole
condition of Jerusalem and Judah at this time, as described
in 2 Kings xxiii, was in flagrant violation of far 'more
fundamental statutes than that of the central sanctuary in
Deuteronomy. Let one read, e,g., the account of the state
of things under Manasseh, or in Josiah's time, alongside
of such a sentence as the following from Dr. Driver:
"Now if there is one thing which (even upon the most
strictly critical premises) is certain about Moses, it is
that he laid the ereatest stress upon Jehovah's being
Israel's only God, who tolerated no other G^ beside Him,
and who cladmed to be the only object of the Israelite's
^ PmU. p. 97.
t Kuenen, Bel. oflBrasif iL p. 19. See Note 0.
* Jer. Yin. 8 ; of. ohape. y. 80, 81, yi. 8-8, eto. See below, tk 294
^ The extreme improDability of Hilkiah being a party to the forgery of
a work which (on the theory) seriously infringed on the priyilnras of the
JeroBalem priesthood, is pointed oat by many writers (W. S. Smith,
Dillmann, &ittel, Driyer, etc.)*
26o DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
all^iance/'^ And are there no parallels in history, both
to the condition of neglect into wluch the book of the law
had fallen, and to the startling effect of the timely re-
discovery of a book long forgotten?*
(3) Li light of these facts, it is not a little singular that
Dr. Driver, in repelling the charge that ''if the critical
view of Deuteronomy be correct, the book is a 'forgery,'
the author of which sought to shelter himself under a great
name, and to secure by a fiction recognition or authority
for a number of laws ' invented ' by himself " ' — should not
make it clearer than he does that this opinion — ^represented
by him as a groundless " objection " of opponents — ^is, so far
as the pseudographic character of the work is concerned,
precisely and explicitly that of the heads of the school with
which " the critical view " he defends is specially associated.
It is the theory also, we cannot help agreeing, to which we
are logically brought, if it is assumed that Deuteronomy is
really a product of the age of Josiah, in which it was founds
Dr. Driver himself, however, and, as already said, most
believing scholars, separate themselves from this obnoxious
hypothesis of deceit, and, to explain the "discovery" of the
book by Hilkiah, commonly suppose that it belongs to a
somewhat earlier period^ — e.^., to the reign of Manasseh,
or that of Hezekiah, or the age immediately before Hezekiah.^
>I>m<.p. liz.
* The general nqgleot of the Soriptnres in the age before the Bafbnnatloii,
and the effect on Cither's mind and work of the diaooTerr of a oomplete
copy of the Bible at Erfturt, offer a partial illustration. For a remarKable
instance of the total oblivion of a noted oode of laws in tiie Middle Ages, see
Note D on Obliyion of Oharlemagne's Code.
* 2MuL p. Ixi. Dr. Driver refers to the plot theorv on p. Ht. Even as
regards " inyention," it may be noticed that tMs was uie view of De Wette,
who first set the baU a-rolling. The book maj be proTed, De Wette
thought, '* to rest entirely on fiction, and indeed so much so that, while the
preceding books amidst myths oontained traditional data, here tradition
does not seem in any instance to haye supplied any materials." — BeUrdg$^
ii. pp. 885 ff. ; cf. i. p. 268.
« Of. Eittel, Hist, of Hebrewi, i pp. 64 ff.
* Dr. Driyer says that " the narratiye of the disooyeiy certainly supports
the yiew that the book which was found was one which had beoi lost for
some time, not one which had just been written " (p. liy). His own mind
leans to an origin in the thildhood of Josiah. But does this answer to the
idea of a book *' lost " for some time, and, apart from fraud, what would be
the appearance of such a book f
*So Ewald, Bleek, W. B. Smith, Eittel, Eantzsoh, etc (Manasseh);
Delitzsch, Biehm, Westphal, Oettli, E5nig, Klostermann, eto. (Haiekiah or
before).
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 261
The moral qualms which lead to these theories are to be
respected, but those who adopt them now labour under the
disadvantage that, having cut themselves away from the
age of Josiah, they have no fixed principle to go by, and,
apart from a jmori assumptions in r^ard to the course of
development, there is no particular reason why they should
stop where they do, and not carry the date of Deuteronomy
much higher still. They find themselves exposed also to
the attacks of the advocates of the Josiah date, who point
out the unsuitability of Deuteronomy to Manasseh's gloomy
reign (''the calm and hopeful spirit which the author
displays, and the absence even of any covert allusion to the
special troubles of Manasseh's reign " ^) ; but, above all, urge
what Kuenen calls "the great, and in my opinion fatal
objection," '' that it makes the actual reformation the work
of those who had not planned it, but were blind tools in the
service of the unknown projector."* It would, indeed, be
strange procedure on the part of anyone composing a work
in the spirit of Moses, yet not desiring to pass it ofi' as other
than his own, to deposit it secretly in the temple, there to
lie undiscovered for perhaps a century — ^finally, in the irony
of history, on its coming to light, to be accepted as a work
of Moses, and continuously regarded as such by the Jewish
and Christian world for over two millenniums! "Fatal"
objections thus seem to lie at the door of all these hypotheses,
and we are driven to ask whether some other explanation is
not imperative
(4) It may be added that the critics are seriously at
variance on another point, viz., whether the author of
Deuteronomy in Josiah's — or an earlier — age is to be sought
for among the prophets or the priests. It seems a curious
question to ask, after starting with the view that
Deuteronomy was a ''prophetic" programme; yet it is
one of no small importance in its bearings on origin, and
the reasons against either view, on the critical premises,
seem extremely strong. If a prophet, why, umike the
practice of other prophets, did he adopt this device of
clothing his message in the form of addresses of Moses,
^ i>Mit. p. liii
* ffex, p. 21 9. Enenen adds : '* The rdf« ladnied to D himself ie almust
eqnallT improbable ; for he Ib made to commit nis aspiratioiui to writiiig,
urge their realisation with intense fervour— and leave uie result to chance^'
(p. 220). OL Oarpenter, ffex. i. pp. 96-97.
262 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES;
and whence the strength of his interest in the sanctuary^
its worship, and its feasts ? As Kuenen, who favours the
view of the priestly origin, points out : " It is obvious from
Deut. xxiv. 8, and stiU more from chaps. zviL 18, xxxL 9,
that the Deuteronomist had relations with the priesthood
of Jerusalem. In chap. xiv. 3-21 he even incorpors^tes a
priestly torah on dean and unclean animals into his book
of law."^ But then, on the other iiand, if a priest,
how account for the remodelling of the older laws in a
direction inimical to the prerogatives of the Jerusalem
priesthood?' The last thing one would look for from a
priest would be the concocting of ordinances which meant
the sharing of his temple perquisites with all Levites who
chose to claim them. The idea, again, of a joint composition
by prophets and priests is not favoured by the conditions of
the age, and is opposed to the unity of style and spirit in
the book. This apparent conflict of interests, so dimcidt to
harmonise with the time of Josiah, seems to point to an
origin far nearer the fountainhead.
2. The next natural branch of inquiry relates to ths testi-
mony of the look itself aa to the circumstances of its own origin.
To the ordinary reader it might seem as if no doubt whatever
could rest on this point. The book woidd appear in the
most explicit fashion to claim for itself a Mosaic origin.
Not only are the discourses it contains affirmed to have
been delivered by Moses in the Arabah of Moab — ^this might
be accounted for by literary impersonation — but at the dose
there are express attestetions that Moses wrote his law,
and delivered it into the custody of the priests for safe
preservation. ** And Moses wrote this law," we read, ** and
delivered it unto the priests, the sons of Levi • . . When
Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in
a book, until they were finished, Moses commanded the
Levites, which bare the ark of the covenant of Jehovah,
saying, Take this book of the law, and put it by the side of
the ark," etc' In view of these declarations, one does not
well know what to make of the remarkable statement of
Dr. Driver that, " though it may appear paradoxical to say
> Sex, p. 278. It IB to be remembered that Hilkiah wu a priest
' Of Eautzech, in critioiBm of this yiew, Lit, ofO.T,, pp. 64-65.
* Dent. xxxi. 9, 24-26. The Song and the Blessing of Moses are alao said
to be from Moses— the fonner to have been written by him (ohaps. xnL 22,
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 263
80, Dmteronomy does not daim to he written hy Moees."'^
The paradox Dr. Driver defends is, at all events, not one
accepted by the leaders of the critical school, who lay stress
upon the fact that the writer obviously intended his book to
be received as genuinely Mosaic, and in that way sought to
gain authority for its teachings.' It was undoubtedly as a
genuine work of Moses — subject, of course, to any necessary
revisional processes — ^that it was received by Josiah and his
oontemporaries.
There is, however, the possibility of a mediating view,
which must in justice be taken account of, though it is not one,
it seems to us, which greatlv helps the newer critics. First,
we should say, as respects the scope of the above testimony,
we entirely agree that the words, " Moses wrote this law,''
cannot, in the connection in which they stand, be fairly
extended, as has sometimes been attempted, to cover the
whole FentateucL' On the other hand, we see no fitness
or probability in confining them, with Delitzsch ^ and many
others, to the ^* kernel " of the Mosaic law in chap& xiL-xzvi
The word torah must be taken here in its widest sense as
covering the hortatory and admonitory parts of the book,
not less than its strictly l^al portions.' The godly of later
times, who found their souls' nourishment and delight in
> IiUrod, p. 89. The fact that the abore statements are made In the third
person does not alter their purport. Dillmann's explanation of the notice
of authorship is singularly ronndabont and Inme. "The statement,"
he says, ' ' is satisfactorily explained by the fact that the writer was oonTinoed
of the antiquity and Mosaic character of the law [represented as] ezponnded
by Moees, and it was precisely for one who wished to give out the old
Mosaic law in a renewed form that an express statement of the writing down
and preaeryation of that law was indispensable." — yum.-^Toi, p. 601.
" Indispensable " to assert that as a fact which eadsted nowhere bot in his
own imagination !
* De Wette says : " The author of Deuteronomy, as it appears, would haye
us regard his whole book as the work of Moses." — Introd, li. p. 159. Oomill
instances Deuteronomy as "an instructiye proof that only under the name
of Moses did a later writer belieye himself able to reckon on a hearing as a
reliffious lawgiyer." — SmUU, p. 87. \
'Thus Hengstenberg, Hayemick, etc
^Chnesis, i. pp. 86-87.
* Of. chap. i. 5 : " began Moses to declare this law." There is little force
in the objection drawn from the command to write the law on plastered
stones on Mount Ebal (Dent, xxyii. 8). The recently discoyered Code of
Hammurabi shows what was possible to ancient times in the way of writing
on stones. It is stated by Dr. Oreen that " the fiimous Behistun inscription
of Darius in its triple form is twice as long as this entire Code (Chaps, xii.
xxyi), besides being caryed in bold characters on the solid rock, and in a
position difficult of access on the mountain side." — Motes and Fropkei t, p. 68
264 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
the " law of Jehovah " (of. Pss. L, xix. 7 ffi, cxix., eta), had, we
may be sure, other material before them than the bare legal
precepts of either the Deuteronomic or the Priestly Code.^
The notice can only fairly foe understood as meaning that
Moses put in writing, and delivered to the priests, the
substance, if not the letter, of what he had just been saying ;
and such a statement, once and again repeated in the book
(cl in addition to the above, chap, xvii 18), must, for those
who recognise its honesty of intent, always have the greatest
weight. But, this being granted, the question remains
whether the words "this law" necessarily apply to the
discourses precisely as we have them, i.«., in their present
literary form. Assuming that Moses, as Delitzsch coniectures,
"before his departure left behind with the priestly order
an autograph torah to be preserved and disseminated,"*
may we not reasonably suppose that, in the book as we
possess it, we have, not a literal transcription of that torahy
but a "free literary reproduction" of its contents, in the
form best adapted for general instruction and edification,
with occasional developments and modifications suited to
the time of its origin ? So again Delitzsch and not a few
others think. "The Deuteronomian," he says, "has com-
pletely appropriated the thoughts and language of Moses,
and from a genuine oneness of mind with him reproduces
them in the highest intensity of divine inspiration." '
There will be little doubt, we think, as to the admissibility
of this "reproduction" theory, if the circumstances are
shown to require it It implies no purpose to deceive, and
stands on a different footing from theories which, under the
name "development," assume the attribution to Moses of
ideas, laws, and institutions, not (mly unknown to him, but, if
the critical hypothesis is correct, actually in conflict with his
genuine legislation. Perhaps, also, in a modified d^ree,
' See below, pp. 876-77. * Oenens^ L p. 86.
*llnd, Ct also art in Lnthardt's ZeUsthrift, 1880, pp. 503-^. For
related viewa, cf. Oettli, DeuL Introd. pp. 16-18 ; Ladd's DocL of Sac Scrip-
ture, i. p. 627-29 ; Robertson, Early Religion^ etc., pp. 420-26. Dr. Driver
approximates to this yiew. *' Deuteronomy, " he sa}nB, ** may be described m
tYiQprophetic reformulaJtvm^ and adapUUicn to new needs, of an older legitikUiUm,
It is probable that there was a tradition, if not a written record, of a final
leeislative address delivered bj Moses in the steppes of Moab ; tbe plan
followed by tiie author would rest upon a more obvious motive, if he thus
worked upon a traditional basds ** (p. Izi). This too much ignores the strong
positive testimony that Moses did write his last disconraes.
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 265
some recasting in fonn and langaage, in the sense of this
hypothesis, must be admitted, if we suppose — what is very
probable — that the script which Moses used was other
than the ancient Hebrew, or grant that the discourses were
written out rather in substance than in full detail — Cleaving
it to the transcriber or interpreter to fill out, and give the
living impression of scene and voice. If this was done (as
we believe it must have been) when the remembrance or
tradition of Jfoses and his time was still vivid and reliable,
it would give us a book such as we have in Deuteronomy.
On the other hand, if so much is admitted about Moses, the
question which must always recur regarding this theory, even
to the very limited extent indicated, is — Cui Ixmo / If , as
Delitzsch supposes, the contents of Deuteronomy are sub-
stamtially Mosaic, — ^^f Moses really delivered testamentary
discourses, and in some form wrote them down for posterity,
—whence the necessity for this literary " double " to re-write
and improve them ? Why should the form in which Moses
spoke and wrote them not be substantially that in which we
have them? Shall we suppose that the actual discourses
were less grand and sustained in style — ^less tender, glowing,
and eloquent — than those we possess, — that they contained
less recitation of God's dealings,^ less expostulation, exhort-
ation, and affectionate appeal, — or were less impressive in
their counsels and warnings ? Or that Moses, when he came
to write them down — ^"tiU they were finished," says the
text — was not able to make as noble and powerful a record
of them as any inspired man of a later date ? We, at least,
have a less mean idea of Moses, the man of God, and of his
literary capabilities. We have a fuU and vivid picture of
him, and specimens of his style of thought and pleading, in
the history ; we can judge of his lofty gifts, if the Ode at the
Bed Sea, or the Song in Deuteronomy,' are from his pen ;
and we may well believe that, of all men living, he was the
one most capable of giving worthy literary form to his own
addresses.' If the book, in substence, is from Moses, very
>If 80, what dealings f Those in the JE history f It is to be
lememhered that, whereyer we place Denteronoxny, the JE history, in
substance at least, stands behind it.
'Nothing necessitates os," says Delitzsch, "to deny the Song to
Moses."— Luthardt's Zeitschrift, 1880, p. 606 ; cf. Oenesia, 1. n. 46.
* "In presence," says Delitzsch, "of the E^grptian ana Babylonian-
Assyrian written monuments, which likewise contain great oonneoted
266 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
cogent reasons must be shown for patting it, even in its
literary form, at a much later data
In reality, however, so far as critics of the newer time
are concerned, such a hypothesis as we have been consider-
ing is wholly in the air. Possessed of quite other ideas of
wniat mtut have been, these writers will hardly entertain
even the possibility, either of Moses having written these
discourses, or of his being able to write them. For them
the Mosaic age is literally, as Duhm says, "wiped out"^
Underlying t£eir refusal of Deuteronomy to Moses will
generally be found the denial that we know anything
definitely at all about Moses, or of his literary capabilities,
or that he delivered any testamentary discourses, or that
any of the laws or institutions ordinarily attributed to him
— «ven the Ten Commandments — are actually of his age.*
In that case, Delitzsch's hypothesis, with other mediating
views, falls, and we are brought back essentially to the old
alternative. The thorough-paced critic vh31 have nothing
to say to a hypothetical or traditionary basis for a book
admitted to belong in its present shape to the age of
the Mngs.' Kuenen will allow no alternative between
" authenticity " and " literary fiction." *
3. When, finally, from the external attestation, we turn
to the internal character of the book — and it is here the
strength of the critical position is held to lie — we find a
series of phenomena which, so far from supporting, throw
very great, if not insuperable, obstacles in the way of its
ascription to the age of Josiah. On these the minifying
end of the critical telescope is persistently turned, while the
■
oratoiioal pieoM, and represent a form of speech which remained essentially
the same dniing 1000 years, one need not be disturbed by the high antiquity
of a written production of Moses."— Luthardt's ZeiUehrifl, 1880, p, 606.
See his testimony to Moses as a poet in OmesiSt i. pp. 44-45.
^ Theol, d. Jrpph. p. 19. See below, p. 286.
' It 18 not advanoed writers alone that fall into this arbitrary style of
reasoning. Such a reason, e.g,, as that assigned even by a beUeving oritio
like Riehm for refusing the Deuteronomic discourses to Moses — "the
spiritual apprehension of the law, as seen in the demand for a circumcision
of the heart " {EiTdeiL i. pp. 245-46)— belongs to the same a priori, subjectiTe
mtem of judging of a past age, which soientifio inyestigation is inoreasini^y
discrediting.
* "Theopiniont** said De Wette lon^ ago, "that these latter passagea
(Deut. xzzi. 9, etc.) refer to a short treatise which has been wocked otv in
Deuteronomy is quite arbitrary." — IiUrotL ii. p. 159.
* Etm. p. 219.
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMr 267
magnifying end is brought to bear in its full power on any
difficulties that seem to tell against an earlier data We
have to remember that the bow, on the critical view, was
composed with the express desim of callins into being such
a reformation as that which followed its ''discoverj" in the
reim of Josiah.^ The proof of its origin in that age is held
to be its suitability to the conditions of the time, and the
stress it lays on the demand for centralisation of worship.
When, however, we open the book itself, we are forcibly
struck by the aisence of clear evidence of any such design
on the part of the author, and by the numerous indications
of tfnsuitability to the age in which it is believed to have
been composed. The book and the history, in a word, do
not fit each other.
(1) It is extremely doubtful if " centralisation of worship,''
in the critical acceptation of that phrase, was the dominani
motive in Josiah's reformation at alL The idea of the un-
lawfulness of worship — even of Jehovah — on high places
need not have been absent ; it had, we believe, been in the
background of men's minds ever since the founding of
Solomon's temple. But it was not that which so strangely
moved Josiah to alarm and action. His reformation from
bq;inning to end was a crusade against the idolatry which
had everywhere infected Church and state — central sanctuary
included,' — and the " high places " were put down as part of
this stem suppression of all idolatrous and heathenish
praotice& Of a movement for unity of worship as such the
narrative gives not a single hint. On the other hand,
when we look to Deuteronomy, we find little or nothing
that points directly to a consuming zeal against the ** high
places" — ^in Josiah's time the crying sin, because the
chief centres of idolatry, in Judah. There are warnings
against foiling into the idolatries and other abominations of
the Canaanites, when the land should be possessed,' and in
chap& vii. 6, 26, xii. 2-4, injunctions to " utterly destroy "
the sanctuaries, altars, pillars, Asherahs, and graven images
of these former inhabitanta But there is notlung peculiarly
^ " It was not by aocident," Kuenen says, ''bat in accordance with tfaa
writer^s deUberate purpose, that it became the foundation and norm of
Josiah's reformation.'*— JTiBiB. p. 215. C£ WeUhausen, ffitt, qf Israel,
p. 88.
«Cf. 2 Kings zziiL 4, 7, 11, 12, eto.
* Of. espedaUy ohap. zyiiL 9 fL
268 DUTICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES;
Josianic in this — ^it is all there already in the older Book of
the Covenant.^ Still farther, while Deuteronomy gives
prominence to the idea of the centralisation of worship at
the sanctuary, it is far from correct to say that this is the
dominating idea of the book — the one grand idea which
inspires it.' It has its place in chap, xii, and recurs in the
regulations for feasts, tithing, and priestly duty; but the
preceding discourses have nothing to say of it, and in the
Code it appears with a multitude of other laws, some of
them more fundamental than itself. The bulk of the laws
in the book, as will appear below, are taken from the Book
of the Covenant ; others are from a priestly source yet to
be investigated.
(2) Here already is a puzzling problem for the critics —
to account for the relevancy of this wide range of laws,
many of them dealing with seemingly trivial matters, in a
book assumed to be specially composed to effect a reforma-
tion in vxyrMp} The irrelevancy of the greater number of
the precepts for such a purpose is obvious at a glance. But
the incongruity of the Code in structure and contents with
the supposed occasion of its origin appears in other respects.
The most favourable view of the book is that it is a corpus
of old laws reproduced in a hortatory setting with special
adaptation to the circumstances of a late time. Yet in
> Ex. zz. 8 ff. ; zzii. 18, 20 ; zziiL 18, 24, 82, 88 ; of! zzziv. 14-17.
The ezoeption ia the Ban, moon, and "host of heayen" in Dent iv. 19,
zYiL 8, foanded on bj Riehm (i p. 245) and othen. Bat the wonhip of
san, moon, and other heayenlj bodies goes far baok beyond Moees, ana is
alladed to in the Old Testament long before the time of Josiah (Isa. zviL 8,
B. V. ; Amos y. 26). Of. Beth-shemesh in Jolh. zy. 10, eto.
s Oettli says : '' It rests on an onasaal onesidedness in the moda of
consideration, if, as now mostly happens^ the aim of Deateronomj is
restdcted to the centralisation of the ctutas, and the ordinances of wonhip
connected with this. That is one of its demands, bat it is neither the most
original nor the weightiest, bat only an oatcome of its deepening of the
thoaghtof thecoyenant" — Deut, Introd. p. 21.
* This is in fact made the starting-point by the newer oiitios for their
hypothesis of "gradual accretion." "There is no apparent appropriate*
ness," we read, "so far as the programme of the Denteronomic refonns is
concerned, in the historical retrospect, 1. 6-iii. Bat neither is there, for
ezample, in the laws which re^galate birds*-nesting or parapets upon a roof
in zzii. 6-8. With what feelings [one may well ask it] coald Josiah haye
listened to these details f ... It is plain tnat the contents of the Oode, at
least in its later portions, are yery Tniscellaneoas." — Oarpenter, JETeoB. L
p. 98. Bat then, instead of recasting the theory of "profframmes " which
thas has the bottom taken oat of it, the law-book of JosilA is xadaoed
practically to chaps. ziL-ziz. (p. 95).
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 269
Glint of foim everything is thrown back into the age of
06e& The standpoint of the speaker is the East of Jordan,^
with the prospect of the people's immediately entering
Canaan ; Israel is treated in its unbroken unity as a nation
('* all Israel "), <^d there is not a hint anywhere of the great
division that, centuries before Josiah's time, had rent the
kingdom into twain, and had ended in the destruction of
one of its branches (Ephraim). What is even more remark-
able, the laws frequently are, not only long obsolete, but of
a character ludicrously out of place in a reforming Code of
the end of the seventh century. We need not dwell at
length on these anachronisms of the Code, which have been
so often pointed out,' — the law, 0.^., for the extermination
of the Canaanites,' when no Canaanites remained to be
exterminated; the injunction to destroy the Amalekites;^
the rules for military service (inapplicable to the later
time),' for besieging of foreign cities,' for arrangements in
the camp;^ the warnings against choosing a foreigner for a
king, and causing to return to Egypt,' the friendly tone
towards Edom,' so strangely in contrast with the hostile
spirit of the prophets ; ^' and the Cke. These things may
seem as the smsJl dust of the balance to the critic,^ but
they may not appear so insignificant to others. Dr.
Driver's answer, that the injunctions against the Canaanites
and Amalekites are repeated from the older legislation, and
''in a recapitulation of Mosaic principles addressed ex
hypothesi to the people when they were about to enter
Canaan, would be naturally included," ^ only corroborates
1 On the ezprMdoQ "the other side Jordan," see below, p. 281.
* Cf. DelitESoh, Genuit, p. 8S ; OettH, JkuL Introd. pp. 11, 12, 17 ft
* Chape. Tii. 1, 2, zz. 10-18.
^ Chap. zzT. 17*19. Dc Qreen speaks of these izgnnctions as being as
utterly out of date as wonld be at the present day *' a royal proclamation in
Great Britain ordering the ezpnlsion of the Danes." — Moaea and Uie Prcphets,
p. 68.
* Chap. zz. 1-9. * Chap, xx, 9-16, 19, 20.
^ Chap. zziiL 2-9. Imagine these provisions in a Code seyen centuries
after Moses.
* Chap, zrii 15-16. See Kote E on the Law of the King.
* Chap, zziii 7, 8.
^ Jer. zliz. 17, 18 ; Obadiah ; Joel iii. 19 ; Isa. IziiL 1-6.
" Gt Kuenen, Sex. pp. 218-19. Euenen has no difficulty, because he
frankly attributes to the author the desi^ to deoeiye.
^ Aut, p. Ini Dr. Driver's suggestion that the* iigunctions against the
Canaanites wonld have an indinet value as a protest against heathenish
praotioei in Judah is without rapport in the tezt, which evidently
270 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
our point, that they were suitable to the times of Moses,
but not to those of JosiaL The difficulty is not touched
why a writer in that age should go out of fals way to include
them, when the^ did not bear on his purpose, and had no
relevancy to existing conditions. But even in the matter
of reformation of worship, it is important to observe that
the laws in Deuteronomy were not of a kind that could be,
or were, enforced by Jouah in their integrity. In l^e Code,
$.g^ it is ordained that idolaters of every d^ee, with all who
secretly or openly entice to idolatry, are to be unsparingly
put to death.^ Josiah, it is true, slew the priests of the
high places of Samaria upon their altars. But he did not
attempt any such drastic measures in JudaL He brought
up, instead, the priests of the high places to Jerusalem, and
aUowed them to '' eat of the unleavened bread among their
brethren."* It is one of the most singular instances of
the reading of a preconceived theory into a plain text, when,
in face of the law ordaining death for aU idolatry, these
" disestablished priests " of the high places are regarded as
the Levites of Deut xviiL 8, for whom provision is made
out of the temple dues.' Of course, there is not a syllable
hinting at ^ disestablished priests " of the high places in the
Crisions of Deuteronomy for the Levites. The latter,
des, were permitted to minister at the sanctuary, while
Josiah's priests were not.
IV. Cbitigal Bsasons for Latb Dating of thb Book:
Validitt of these
It is now incumbent on us, having indicated the
difficulties which seem to us decisive against a late dating
of Deuteronomy, to consider the reasons ordinarily adduced
in fttvour of that late dating, or at least of the origin of the
book in times long posterior to Moses. We have ah*eady
seen that, of those who reject the substantially Mosaic
maaoB them to be taken quite aeriooBlyy and doee not applj to the
Amaleldtee, eto.
^ Dent ziiL * 2 Kings xziiL 9.
* Thns Dr. DriTer oonneete — as if it were a matter of oonise — ^Deat.
zriiL 8 with " Josiah's proTision made for the sopport of the disestablished
priests ont of the temple dues." — Deut, p. zIt. Cf. Wellhansen : "He (the
Denteronomist) provides for the priests of the suppressed sanctnaiies,"
etc.— JTiM. oflsradt p. 88.
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 271
origin of the book, a few place the book earlier than
Hezekiah, wtm put it in the reign of Manasseh, mo^ put it
in the reign of Josiah. It may be found that several, at
least, of the reasons for this late dating turn, on examina-
tion, into arguments for the opposite view.
It cannot be too constantly borne in mind, what was
before said, that, with the majority of critics of the Graf-
Wellhausen school, the really determining grounds for the
late dating of Deuteronomy lie outside the region of
properly critical discussion altogether, viz., in the com-
pletely altered view taken of the age of Moses, and of the
subsequent course of the religious history of Israel If the
accounts we have of Moses and his work are, as Kuenen
says, " utterly unhistorical," — ^if it is inconceivable that he
should have had the elevated conceptions or the prophetic
foresight attributed to him in these discourses, — then it
needs no further argument to prove that Deuteronomy must
be late. The date of Deuteronomy is, in this case, no longer
merdy a literary question, and the critics are not wrong in
spealong of it, as they have sometimes done, as the pivot of
the Fentateuchal question. It does not, indeed, follow, as
we formerly sought to show, that the Mosaic history and
religion are subverted, even if a late date is accepted for the
present form of the book. But very important conclusions
certainly do follow, if the book is admitted to be early. If
Deuteronomy, in its present form, be even svbstarUially
Mosaic, — if it conveys to us with fidelity the purport of
discourses and laws actually delivered by Moses to the
people of Israel before his death, — then we must go a great
deal further. For Deuteronomy undeniably rests in some
d^ee on the JE history embodied in our Fentateuch ; on
the Code of laws which we call the Book of the Covenant,
incorporated in that history; as well as on priestly laws
from some other source. The effect of the acceptance of an
early date for Deuteronomy, therefore, is to throw all these
writings back practically into the Mosaic age, whatever the
time when they were finally put together. We should like
to be more sure than we are that it is not the perception of
this fact which is at least one motive in leading the critics
to put down Deuteronomy as far as they do, in the age of
the kings.
1. It is important, in this connection^ to obsenre how
zyz DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
much is wnMdeA by the more moderate advocates of the
critical hTpotbesis themselvas. These concessions are very
considerable — so extensive, in &ct, that they really amount,
in our view, to the giving up of a large part of the critical
case for the late datii^. We have seen how Delitzsch
postulates written "testamentary discourses" and laws of
Moses ; but critics like Oettli ana Driver also go a long way
in allowing, in the words of the latter,^ '' a continuous Mosaic
tradition," reaching back to Moses' own time, and ^ embrac-
ing a moral, a ceremonial, and a civil element." When,
particularly, the object is to vindicate Deuteronomy against
the charge of '' forgery " and ^ invention," stress is stronglv
laid on the fact tlutt the great balk of the legislation is ola,
and that the few laws which are really new are but ** the
logical and consistent development of Mosaic principle&"'
So far, indeed, is this insistence on the antiquity and
genuinely Mosaic character of the l^islation carried — in
striking and favourable contrast with the more radical
tendency to deny alX l^islation to Moses — ^that one b^;ins
to wonder where the contradictions with earlier law and
practice come ^ which are to prove indubitably that the
book eantioi be Mosaic^ Thus we are bid remember " that
what is essentially new in Deuteronomy is not the maJUer^
but the form'*^ Dillmann is quoted as testifying that
''Deuteronomy is anything but an original law-book."^
"The new element in Deuteronomy," it is said, ''is not the
laws, but their parenetie setting. . . . [The author's] aim
was to win obedience to laws, or truths, which were already
known, but were in danger of being forgotten."^ "It was
felt to be (in the main) merely the re-affirmation of laws
and usages which had been long familiar to the nation,
though in particular cases they might have fallen into
neglect"^ Most significant of all is a sentence quoted from
Beuss: "The only real innovation . . • was the absolute
prohibition of worship outside of Jerusalem."'
Here at length we seem to come to a definite issua
The " only real mnovation " in Deuteronomy is the law of
the central eanettiary. We are not unjustified, therefore, in
lai gronnas. — Liutnarars iseuscnrm,
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 273
regarding this as the fundamental piUar which upholds the
case for the late dating of Deuteronomy. Even this
law, moreover, it is conceded, is only " relatively " new ; it
was a genuine development from Mosaic principles, and
focalising of tendencies which had long been in operation.^
The natujral /inference one would draw from this is, that it
cannot be really incompatible with the law in Ex. xz. 24,
with its supposed permission of unlimited freedom of
worship.* The subject was discussed in an earlier chapter,
to which it is sufficient here to refer.' The conclusion there
arrived at was that there is nothing in this Deuteronomic
law essentially at variance with the altar-law in Exodus, or
with the later religious practice, if allowance is made for
times of religious backsliding and neglect, and for the
complete disoi^anisatio^ of an age like Samuel's, when
ecclesiastical and every other kind of laws were necessarily
in large part in abeyance. One fact which should lead
criticism to pause before living too narrow an interpretation
of the law is that, as before noted, in Deuteronomy itself a
command is given for the building of an altar for sacrifice
on Mount Ebal, in harmony with the law in Exodu&^ We
marked also a tendency in the newer criticism itself 'to break
with the Wellhausen '' dogma " of an absolute centralisation
of worship in Deuteronomy, and a consequent conflict with
the older law in Exodus.'
2. If this fundamental prop of the Wellhausen theory
gives way, as we are persuaded it does, most of the other con-
siderations adduced in favour of the late date of Deuteronomy
may fairly be treated as of subordinate importance. They
resolve themselves, partly into alleged discrepancies between
the Deuteronomic laivs and those of the Book of the
Covenant, and of the Levitical Code; partly into alleged
> DetU, p. M, * See aboTe, pp. 178 A
» Chap. VI. pp. 178 ff. « Deut xxvii. 6-7.
* See above, Chap. VI. pp. 174, 176. Fries, in hia Modems VordeUvngm
der OeschiehU Israels, speaks of this " dogma " as playing well-ni^h the same
part in the Wellhausen critieism as did formerly *' the opposition between
Jewish and Pauline Christianity in the school of Banr in the Kew Testa-
ment domain" (p. 15) ; and Van Hoonacker, in his X< Sacerdoee LMtique,
says : "The whole historical and critical system of the school of Wellhausen
rests in effect on the pretended first promulgation of the principle of the
unity of the sanctuaiT in the seventh oentuiy ' (p. 14). This wnter points
out that the unity of the sanctuary is not so much enacted upretuppassd
in Deuteronomy (p. 18).
i8
274 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
discrepancies with the history of the preceding hooks ; and
partly into a few expressions in the book thought to imply a
later date than that of Moses. On none of these classes of
objection will it be found necessary to spend much time:
a few typical examples may be examined.
(1) The subject of laws may be glanced at first In a
previous chapter we endeavoured to show that there is
nothing in Deuteronomy necessarily incompatible with the
Aaronic priesthood and Levitical arrangements of the
middle books of the Pentateuch ^ — arrangements now held,
however, by the critical school to be later than Deutero-
nomy; and we shall see as we proceed that, while it was
no part of the design of the speaker in these farewell
addresses to dwell on details of ritual, chiefly of interest to
the priests, yet Levitical regulations are presupposed, and
in some instances are referred to, in his recital' As to the
Book of the Covenant, it is allowed on all hands that the
bulk of its provisions are taken up, and reiterated and
enforced in the discourses.' In such hortatory recapitulation,
where much is left to be understood by the hearer, points of
difficulty in comparison with other Codes may be expected
to arise; but, considering the number of the laws, the
seeming discrepancies must be pronounced very few. In
some cases it may be that we do not possess all the.
elements for a complete solution, but there is no reason to
suppose that, if we had them, a solution would not be
forthcoming.
A chief example of discrepancy between Deuteronomy
and the Priestly Code — ths chief, perhaps, after that of the
priests and Levites ^ — ^is in the tithe-laws in chap& xiL 6,
17-19, xiv. 22-29, xxvL 12-15, which certainly present a
different aspect from those in Kum. xvui 21-31.^ In
the latter case the tithe is devoted in fixed proportions to
the maintenance of Levites and priests; in the former, it
is used by the worshippers for two years out of three in
^ Of: Chap. YI. pp. 180 ff.
* See below, pp. 811 ff. On the reUtioii of Deateronomj to the so-oaUed
** Law of Holiness," see next chapter.
* Lists of oomparison of the laws in the Book of the Oovenant and in
Deuteronomy may be seen in Driyer (DeuL pp. iy ff.), Weetphal, Oettli, or
any of the text-books.
* See aboTe, pp. 184 ff.
' Of. OB the discrepancy, Knenen, Jlex, pp. 28, 29 ; Driver, IMuL pp^
168 £
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 275
feasts at the sanctuary, to which the Levites cu*e invited, and
on the third year is given up wholly, at home, to the
Levites, orphans, widows, and strangers. Apart, however,
from the fact that the Levitical provision seems clearly
(indeed, verbally) referred to in chap, zviii. 1, 2} it appears,
if better solution does not offer,' a not imreasonabie ex-
planation that, in accordance with later Jewish practice, the
festal tithe of Deuteronomy is different from, and additional
to, the ordinary tithe for the maintenance of the Levites (a
" second tithe '').' We may perhaps venture the suggestion
that it is reallv this Deuteronomic tithe which was the old
and traditional one, and the Levitical tithe which was the
second and additional impost The tithe devoted to
Jehovah probably goes back in pious circles to remotest
times (cf. Gen. xiv. 20 ; xxviiL 22), and then can only be
supposed to have been used in a religious feast, or in charity.
This was the old and well-understood voluntary tithe ; the
Levitical had a different object But if the Deuteronomic
tithe creates difficulty, what is to be said of the counter-
theory of the critics ? Is it really to be credited — for this
is the alternative supposition — that a tithe-law for the
maintenance of the Levites, unknown in the days of Josiah,
first came in with Ezra, yet^ though previously unheard
of, was unmurmuringly submitted to by everybody as a law
given in the wilderness by Moses ? '
Minor examples of discrepancies, as those which relate
to firstlings (chap. zv. 19, 20 ; cf . Num. xviiL 17, 18), to
priestly dues (chap. xviiL 3, 4), to the treatment of bond-
* See aboTe, p. 187.
* Van HooDftcker haa here an iogenions, but, as it eeems to na, nntenaUa
theory, baaed on the ezproesion in Dent. zxri. 12, ''the third year, whioh
ii the year of tithing," compared with Amoa iy. 4, that the Levitioal tithe
of Nnm.* zriiL waa not an annual, but a triennial one, and that the Yearly
festal tithe of Deuteronomy waa a secondary and less strict taxmg of
produce, whioh only improperly got the name tithe {Le Saeerdoa^ pp.
884 if.).
* Thus in Tob. L 7 ; Josephus, Antiq. iy. 8. 22 ; LXX in Deut TXfL If.
The explanation doea not remove all difBculties, especially the absence of
allusion to the primary tithe. It is to be noticed, howeyer, that the speaker
ii here eyidently alluding to a custom already establiihed, not (aa Dr.
Driyer haa it), institntlng a second tithe for the nrst time.
^ See below, pp. 296, 819. Seeinff that in Deuteronomy also the tribe of
Levi is set aside for sacred serrice, ana has therefore no inheritance with the
other tribes, is it conoeirable that no proyision should be made for the triba
but tiieae rare feasts at the sanctuary, or eyery third year t Dof^^ ^^P* xyiii
I, 2 not suggest a different yiew f
276 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
servants (chap. xv. 12 ; ofl Ex. xxL 1-6), to the law of carrion
(chap. xiv. 21 ; cf. Lev. xviL 15), seem capable of reasonable
explanation.^ A few modifications on older laws are made
in view of the altered circumstances of settlement in Canaan,
notably the permission to kill and eat flesh at home (DeuL
xii 16), in room of the wilderness requirement that all
slaying for food should be at the door of the tabemade (cf.
Lev. xviL 3 fit).
(2) There are alleged, next,certain Aisforieo/ discrepancies,
some of them, we cannot but think, instructive examples
of that Widerqyruchsjclgerei — ^'hunting for contradictions'' —
which Delitzsch not unjustly ascribes to the school of Well-
hausen.' The opponents of the unity of^Deuteronomy find
numerous inconsistencies in the different parts of the book
itself (e^., between chaps, v.-xi and xii-xxvL, or between
chaps, i-iv. and v.-xxvi) ; but these the critical defenders of
the unity find means of satisfactorily explaining.' A slight
extension of the same skill, we are persuaded, would
enable them to dispose as satisfactorily of most of the
other& On the general relation to the preceding history,
it is agreed on all hands that the retrospects in Deuteronomy
presuppose the narratives of JE, and reproduce them with
substantial fidelity.^ The Wellhausen school, in accordance
with its principles, denies any similar dependence on the P
sections of the history ;^ but this it is difficult to maint>ain
in view of the considerable number of references to par-
ticulars, and turns of expression, found only in P. Only in
P., e.g,, is there mention of Moses and Aaron being debarred
from Canaan as a punishment ; ' of '' seventy ** as the number
who went down to I^pt ; ^ of " twelve " as the number of the
^ See Note E on Minor Disorepanoiea in Lawi.
* Lnthardt's Zeittdirift, 18^0, p. 628.
* Gf. Enenen (against Wellhannan), Aok pp. 118 fL ; DilTer, IkuL pp.
Ixyiii ff. eto.
* DriTer represents the general view in saying that Deuteronomj "is
demonstrably dependent npon JS " (p. xiz ; at p. xr). Some assume a
closer dependenoe on E than on J, but this depends on what ii attributed to
E, and ^at to J. Westphal, e.^., as before noticed, giyes the Book of the
OoTcnant to J ; Dillmann and Euenen give it to E. Dulmann, on the other
hand, gives the story of the golden oalf (Ex. xxxii.) to J ; Westphal and
others siye it to E.
* Und, p. xvL
* Num. XX. 12 ; xxvii. 18 fL ; Dent xxxii 50 if. Cf. Dent L 87 ; iii
26 ; iT. 21.
^ Gen. xlyi 27 ; Ex. L 6. Cf. Deut z. 22.
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 277
spies ;^ of the makiiig of the ark of acacia wood.' The
words, ''Since the day that God created man upon the
earth/' in chap. iv. 32, seem a verbal reference to Gen. L 26,
27 ; and there are numerous phraseological assonances with
P in this fourth chapter, — ** belonging usually to P/' says
Carpenter, — ** su^esting occasional contact with the school
that produced P,"' — and later, as "horses and chariots,"
" hard bondage/' ** stretched-out arm," etc. (only in P).* In
no case, however, is there slavish dependence on the letter
of the history.^ The speaker deals with his materials with
the freedom and intimate knowledge of one who had been a
chief actor in the events he recounts ; amplifies, abbreviates
supplies fresh details; groups according to subject rather
than time ; passes by sw^ association to related topic& It
ia this which in a few instances gives rise to the appearance
of what the critics are pleased to call ''contradictions/'
Instead of telling against the genuineness of the book, they
constitute, to our mind, one of the most convincing internal
evidences of its genuineness. For what later composer,
with the JE history before him, would have allowed himself
these freedoms, or have wilfully laid himself open to the
charge of " contradiction " of his sources ? ^
But what, taken at their utmost, do these "contra-
dictions " amount to ? We shall glance at a few of the chief
cases. It is to be borne in mind that the question here is
not, whether Moses wrote personally the J£ or P sections
of the Pentateuch, but whether there is such contradiction
with these as to forbid us ascribing the discourses in
Deuteronomy to Moses as their sp^iker. We do not
disprove, e^., the Mosaic character of the discourses by
1 Num. ziu. 2-10. Gf. Deut i 28. See below, p. 279.
* £x. xxjyiL 1. Gf. Deat. x. 8. The oritlcftl view la that JE also had a
itoiy of the making of the ark.
*ffex. 11. p. 254.
^ Dent xL 4 ; zzyL 6 (cd Ex. L 14) ; It. 84, eto. Gf. Driyer, JMul. ppi
xyu, Izxi.
' Graf oondadea from the freedom of reprodaotion that the author draws
from oral tradition and not from written aonroea. OuMM, BUehtr,
p. 18.
* TJnleaa, indeed, the reader ia prepared to accept for the Denteronomirt
the patroniiing apology of Golenso : " He treats them [the stateinents of
the older narratiye) often with great freedom, and aometimes in a way which
shows that, though generally familiar with that document, he was not ao
thoroughly at home with it aa a derout English reader of the Pentateoob
would be. '^—Peni. Pt. vi. p. 27.
278 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
showinff, e^., that the P sections are not directly, or at aU
from Moees' pen.
A first instance of discrepancy is, that in Deuteronomy
(L 9 ff.) Moees reminds the people how, with their consent,
he appointed judges over them; in Ex. xviii we are told
that this plan was originally suggested to Moses by Jethro.
We submit that there is not here the shadow of a real
difficulty? Can it be supposed that the composer of the
book, whoever he was, imagined that there was any conflict ?
Yet this is one of two " discrepancies " which. Dr. Driver
allows ''are not absolutely incompatible"^ with Moses'
authorship. The other is, that in Deuteronomy (L 22, 23)
the people cuk that spies be sent to search the land, while
in NuuL xiii 1 (P), Jehovah gives the order for the mission.
** Not ahtolutdy incompatible " I
As an example of a discrepancy held to be vrreconcUabU
with Mosaic authorship, we take the passages relating to
Jehovah's anger against Moses, and the prohibition to
enter Canaan. " In Num. xx. 12 (of. xxviL 13 ff. ; Deut xxxiL
50 ff.)," we are told, " Moses is prohibited to enter Canaan on
account of his presumption in striking the rock at Kadesh,
in the thirty-ninth year of the Exodus; here (Deut L
37, 38 ; iiL 26 ; iv. 21), the ground of the prohibition is
Jehovah's anger with him on account of the people, upon an
occasion which is plainly fixed by the context for the
second year of the Exodus, thirty-seven years previously."'
We invite the reader to compare carefully the passaees, and
judge for himself whether there is any real basis for this
assertion. In three places in his address, Moses refers to
his exclusion from Canaan, and in one of them tells of his
pleading with Jehovah (fixed in the fortieth year, chap. iiL
23) to have the sentence reversed. The narrative of this
exclusion is given at length in Numbers, with the rebellion
of the people that led to it, and the permission to view the
land alluded to in Deut iiL 27 (cf. Num. xxviL 12, 13X
It is surely only the hyper-acute sense of a critic that can
see in the words ''for your sakes," which evidently refer
to the provocation of the people that occasioned the
offence of Moses (Num. xx. 2 ff.), a "contradiction" of
the statement that he, with Aaron, personally sinned at
Meribah (Num. xx. 10); while the assertion that the
1 Diui. p. xzxTii. ' Thid. p.
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 279
incident is *' plainly fixed " in Deut. L 37 in the Becond year
of the Exodus is a '' plain " misreading of the text Moses
is speaking in the context of the exclusion of that older
generation from Canaan, and by a natural association he
alludes in passing to how the rebellious spirit of the living
generation had brought a similar sentence of exclusion on
himself. The discourses are full of such rapid transitions,
determined not by chronology, but by the connection of the
thought Cf., e^., chap. L 9, where the discourse turns back
to events a year before the command in ver. 6 ; chap. iL 1, 2,
where there is ja leap over thirtynseven or thirty-eight years ;
chaps. ix.,x., where x. 1 resumes, with the words "at that time,"
the transactions at Horeb, left far behind in chap. ix. 22 ff
The mission of the spies, alluded to above, is itself a
fruitful source of "contradictions," occasioned, however,
mainly by the merciless way in which the narrative in
Numbers is torn up.^ The incident will be examined in
detail in a future chapter;' only the main point, therefore,
need be anticipated here. Deuteronomy, it is said, follow-
ing JE, knows nothing of Joshua as one of the spies, and
represents the search party, in contrast with P, as pro-
ceeding only as far as Eshcol (chap. L 24, 25). Yet Deutero-
nomy knows of the choosing of "twelve" spies, "one
of a tribe," as in Num. xiiL 2 (P), where Joshua is included
in the list (ver. 8) ; and the statement in Deut. i 38 that
Joshua (as well as Caleb, ver. 36) would enter the land,
connects most naturally with the promise given in Num.
xiv. 30.' If the letter in JE is pressed to mean that
Caleb only was to enter the land, it would seem to
exclude Joshua, not only from the number of the spies,
but from Canaan, which cannot be the meaning. In the
JE narrative also it is clearly implied, as will be afterwards
^ The critical analytia of Num. ziii.-ziv. certainly resolta in a maas of con-
tradictioDB (see below, pp. 866 ff. ). Addis says of tne JE parts : '* Attempts
hare been made to separate the component documents. . . . But the tw
seems to be hopeless, and there is nothing like agreement in raniltL" —
Sea^ i. p. 166.
* Cf. Chap. X. p(L 866 ff.
* Dillmann and Kittel take Joshua to be included among the spias in
the J narratiye, bnt not in the E narratiye — a distinction that falls, if JS
are one, and at any rate is an acknowledgment of the inclusion of Joshua
in the combined JE story. Cf. Dillmann, Nwn.^oi. p. 69, and on
Num. xxyi 66 ; zzjdi 12, pp. 177, 196 ; Kittel, Eist. qf HAb. p. 301.
See below, p. 867.
28o DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
seen, that the spies, or some of them (for there surely were
several parties ; they did not all march in a hody), went
through the whole land (Num. ziiL 28, 29).
The last-named instance is one of several involving the
qoestion of the possibility of an acquaintance of Deutero-
nomy with the P history. The denial of such acquaintance
is founded in part on the mention of Dathan and Abiram,
and the silence about Korah, in chap, xi 6.^ Here, it is
concluded, the mention of Korah is omitted because he
had no place in the JE narration. This, however, we
would point out, does not necessarily follow- Apart from
the question of "sources" in Num. xvL, it is evident that,
in the combined uprising there narrated, Dathan and
Abiram represented the general spirit of murmuring in
the congregation (ver& 12-15), while Korah stood for the
Levites, in their aspiration after the privil^es of the priest-
hood (ver& 8-1 1). This of itself is sufficient reason why Moses,
in his address to the people, should refer only to the former.*
A more definite ''contradiction" — ^hkewise implicated
with intricate questions of analysis — ^is in the brief notice
of Aaron's death, and of the joumeyings of the people in
chap. X. 6, 7, as compared with the notice in the list of
stations in Num. xxxiiL In Deuteronomy, Aaron is stated
to have died at Moserah, while his death is placed in
Numbers (ver. 38) at Mount Hor ; in Deuteronomy, four
stations are mentioned in the joumeyings (Bene-Jaakan,
Moserah, Gudgodah, Jotbathah), but in Numbers (vers.
31, 32) die first two are named in inverse order. Moserah,
however, as we discover from comparison, was in the
immediate neighbourhood of Hor, and there is evidence
in the list in Numbers itself that after wandering southwards
to Eziongeber, at the Bed Sea, and turning again north-
wards, the people returned in the fortieth yea^ f ronv Eadesh
to the district of Mount Hor, where Aaron died (vers. 35-39 ;
cf. Num. XX.). The old camping spots would then be
revisited, as stated in Deuteronomy. The mention of
these places may thus be regarded rather as an un-
^ On this incident, see below, pp. 858-9.
* It must be allowed that great suspicion attaches to the danser-" of
Korah, Dathan, and Abiram "—in Num. zvL 24, 27, in the connection in
which it stands with mithkcm fdwellinff), which eyerywhere else in these
narratives is the designation of the tabernacle (not of an ordinary tent).
Cf: Strack, in loe.
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 281
designed oorroboration of the accuracy of the list in
Numbers.^
Finally, a word should perhaps be said on the alleged
"contradiction" between the law in Ex. xxL 12-14,
and the Denteronomic appointment of three cities of
refuge (chap. iv. 41-43 ; ci xix. 1 K), The asylum in the
older law, Wellhausen argues, is the altar ; now " in order
not to abolish the right of asylum along with altars [mark
the change to the plural], he [the Deutoronomist] appoints
special cities of refuge for the innocent who are pursued
by the avenger of bl<XKL"' It is a little difficult to under-
stand how anyone could hope to persuade the people of
Josiah's age that three cities of refuge had been appointed
by Moses (three more afterwards) when, ex hypothm, they
knew perfectly well that up to their day no such cities
existed. The whole objection, however, is largely a creation
of the critic's fancy, as shown by the fact that the future
appointment of a place of refuge for the manslayer is
provided for in the very law of ]^odus to which appeal is
made (chap. xxL 13).'
3. For the above reasons we cannot allow that a case
has been made out on the ground of discrepancies in laws
and history for denying the Deuteronomic discourses to the
great lawgiver with whose name they are connected
When these are set aside, there remain as proofs of post-
Mosaic origin chiefly incidental expressions, as "other side
of (or beyond) Jordan," "unto this day," and the lika
The first of these expressions — "other side of Jordan" —
is much relied on, as showing that the standpoint of the
author of the book was the Western side of Jordan.' If we
have not hitherto taken notice of this favourite argument,
it is principally because, after the fairest consideration we
^ The nipporition that, according to JE, the Israelites stack immovably
like limpets on a rock to Kadesb for thirtv-eight years, is against common
sense, and can only be made oat by tearing the narratiye to pieces. Even then,
the command to tbe Israelites in JE, "Tarn ye, and get yoa into the
wilderness by the way of the Red Sea " (Nam. zir. 25), implies interyening
wanderings, as in Nam. xxxiii. In the beginning of the fortieth year (not
the third, as Bleek), the Israelites are foand again at Eadesh (chap. zz. 1 ;
o£ DiUmann, tn loe» ). Criticism rejects the thirty-eight years* wanderings, bat
in contradiction to all the soarces, J E D P. Cf. Sittel's remarks, JuisL qf
ffOi. i. pp. 281>82.
* Bisl. qf Israel, p. 83 ; cf. W. B. Smith, O.T. in J. 0.s p. 854.
* Cf. Driyer, DiyU. pp. zlii ff.
282 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
have been able to give it, it seems to us to have extremelj
little force. So far as the expression occurs in the frame-
work of the book {e.g., chap, i 1, 6), it occasions little
difficulty, but it may appear to be different when it is found
in the discourses themselves. It does occur there, but (as
also in the framework) with an application both to the
JSastem (chap, iii 8), and, more commonly, to the Western
(chaps. iiL 20, 26 ; zL 30), sides of the Jordan.^ Very generally
there is some determinative clause attached, to show which
side is meant — " beyond Jordan, toward the sunrising " (chap,
iv. 41, 46), " eastward " (ver. 49), " behind the way of the
going down of the sun '* (chap. xL 30), etc. It is most natural
to conclude that the phrase ** beyond Jordan " was a current
geographical designation for the Moabite side of the river ;
but that, along with this, there went a local usage, deter-
mined by the position of the speaker.' Far more reasonably
may we argue from the minute and serious care of the writer
in his geographical and chronological notices in the intro-
duction to the discourses and elsewhere, that he means his
book to be taken as a genuine record of the last utterances
of the lawgiver.
It may be serviceable at this stage to sum up the
conclusions to which the discussions in this chapter have
conducted us.
1. The discovery of " the book of the law " in Josiah's
day was a genuine discovery, and the book then found was
already old
2. The age of Manasseh was unsuitable for the com-
position of Deuteronomy, and there is no evidence of its
composition in that age. The ideas of Deuteronomy no
1 Kum. xzzii. 19 is a remarkable case of the nee of the phrase in both
senses in a single verse. Dr. Driver explains the passage, not very con-
yincingly, by an '' idiom " ; and accounts for Dent. iii. 20, 25 by the assumed
position of the speaker, which, he thinks, by a lapse, is forgotten in yer. 8,
where the real situation is betrayed. We may, howeyer, pretty safely clear
the writer of Deuteronomy from the snspioion of subh unconscious ** be-
trayals " of his position.
" When Dr. Driver says: "It is of course oonoeivable that this was a
habit of the Canaanites, but it can hardly be considered likely that the
usajge suggested by it passed from them to the Israelites, before the latter
hadset foot in the land," etc. (p. xliii), he seems to foreet that the fathers
of the Israelites had lived for at least two centuries in Ouiaan, and that the
traditions and hopes of the people were all bound up with it (ot their words
for " West," etc).
THE QUESTION OF DEUTERONOMY 283
donbt lay behind Hezekiah's reformation, but there is no
evidence of the presence of the book, or of its composition, at
or about that time. Had it been newly composed, or then
appeared for the first time, we should have expected it to
mt^e a sensation, as it did afterwards in the time of Josiah
The question also would again arise as to its Mosaic claim,
and the acknowled^ent of this by Hezekiah and his circle.
3. From Hezekiah upwards till at least the time of the
Judges, or the immediately post-Mosaic age, there is no
period to which the composition of the book can suitably
be referred, nor is there any evidence of its composition in
that interval Traces of its use may be thought to be found
in the revision of Joshua, in speeches like those of Solomon
(1 Kings viiL), in Amaziah's action (2 Kings xiv. 6, 6), and
in allusions in the early prophets.^ But tins we do not at
present urge.
4 The book definitely gives itself out as a reproduction
of the speeches which Moses delivered in the Arabah of
Moab before his death, and expressly declares that Moses
wrote his addresses (" this law "), and gave the book into
custody of the priests.
5. The intenial character of the book, in its Mosaic stand-
point, its absence of reference to the division of the kingdom,
and the archaic and obsolete character of many of its laws,
supports the claim to a high antiquity and a Mosaic origin.
6. The supposition that Deuteronomy is '^ a free repro-
duction," or elaboration, of written addresses left by Moses,
by one who has fully entered into his spirit, and continues
his work, while not inadmissible, if the facts are shown to
require it, is unnecessarv, and, in view of the actual character
of the book, not probabla The literary gifts of Moses were
amply adequate to the writing of his own discourses in their
present form. This is not to deny editorial revision and
annotation.
7. There are no conclusive reasons in the character of
the laws or of the historical retrospects for denying the
authorship of the discourses, in this sense, to Moses.
8. It seems implied in Deut. xxxL 9, 24-26, that
Deuteronomy originally subsisted as a separate book. It
may have done so for a longer or shorter period, and separate
copies may bftv^ continued to circulate, even after its union
' See below, pp. 828 ff.
284 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
with the other parts of the PentateucL^ It was probably
a separate authentic copy which was deposited in tihe temple,
and was found there by Hilkiah.
9. It is possible, as some have thought, that the J£ Penta-
teuchal history may originally have contained a brief account
of the testamentary discourses of Moses, and of his death
(cf. the fragment, chap. zxxL 14, 15, 23). This would be
superseded when Deuteronomy was united with the rest of
the Pentateuch.
10. The historical laws and narratives which Deutero-
nomy presupposes must, in some form, have existed earlier
than the present book, if not earlier than the delivery of the
discourses. These also, therefore, are pushed back, in
essentials, into the Mosaic aga They need not, however,
have been then completed, or put together in their present
shape ; or may only have furnished the basis for our present
narratives.
The relation of Deuteronomy to the Priestly Writing has
yet to be considered.
NoTB. — StetLemageFs Theory of DetUeronomy: A word
should perhaps be said on the novel theory of Deuteronomy
expounded by 0. Steuemagel in his work, DetUeroTwmium urid
Jostta (1900). Discarding, with much else (as the depend-
ence of Deuteronomy on the Book of the Covenant), the
view of a division of the Book into hortatory and legal
portions, Steuemagel contends for a division, as it were
transversely, into sections, distinguished respectively by the
use of the singular ("thou," "thy," etc.) and the plural
(" ye," " your," etc.) numbers (Sg and PI). These sections
(PI being itself highly composite) were united in the pre-
Josianic period, and subsequently underwent extensive
enlargements and redactional changes. It is difficult not
to regard this theory as another instance of misplaced in-
genuity. The use of singular and plural affords no sufficient
ground for distinguishing different authors. The nation
addressed as " thou " was also a " ye," and there is a free
transition throughout from the one mode of speech to the
other, often within the limits of the same verse or para-
graph (cf., e^., Deut. L 31 ; iv. 10, 11 ; 25, 26 ; 34-36 ; vi
1-^; 17, 18; viiL 1,2; 19, 20; ix. 7; xi 12, 13, etc).
* See below, p. 876.
CHAPTER IX
S)ftDciiItfe8 anb l^erpleiftfes of tbe Crftfcal Dppo<
tbeste: Tn>e prfestli? Wrftfttd. i. XTbe Co^e
" Nothing in &ct is simpler thm the Gfaralian hypotiietis : it needs only
the tnuisference of a tingU wwru — ^the oolleotion of laws named oommonly
the Qrwndu^hfHft^ by others the Book of OriginB, the Writing of the Older
Elohist^ or of tiie Annalist, whioh we wonld call the Book of PriesUy Law
or BeligUm — ^into the post-exilian time, into the period of Esra and
Nehemiahy and at one stroke the ' Mosaio ' period is wiped out" — Dumi.
"I haye specially drawn attention to the ftct that one result of these
criticisms mnst inevitably be that, for all those who are oonvinoed of the
substantial truth of the above results, the whole ritualistio system, aa a
system of divine institution, comes at once to the ground. . . . The whole
support of this system is struck away, when it is once ascertained that the
Levitical legislation of the Pentateuch is entirely the product of a very
late age, a mere figment of the post-captivity priesthood." — Colekbo.
''But, if we place at the head of their whole history [the Hebrew
nation's] a great positive act of the will, a legislation by which the natural
development is forestalled, and its course prescribed, we acoount for the rise
of that discrepancy [the sense of guilt, consciousness of departure from the
known will of God] and the peculiar tone of the national character among
the Hebrewi."— Ds Wsttb (against Yatkx).
'* Bat again the qnestioning spirit revives when one is asked to believe
that Moses is partiy at least a historio figure. Alas I how gladly would one
beUeve it I But where are the historical elements ? ... No one can now be
found to doubt that Sargon is a historical personage with mythic aooretiona.
But can one really venture to say the like of Hoses t" — Ohstni.
CHAPTER IX
DUnCULTTES AND PERPLEXITIES OF THE CRITI-
CAL HYPOTHESIS: THE PRIESTLY WRITING.
L THE CODE
It was indicated in our sketoh of the oiitioal development
that the greatest revolution in Pentateuchal criticism up
to the present has been the acceptance by the majority of
scholars of the Graf-Wellhausen contention that the legisla-
tion of the middle books of the Pentateuch, instead of beii^g,
as was formerly all but universally supposed, the oldest,
is in reality the very youngest of the constituent elements
in that composite work — ^not, as it professes to be, a creation
of the work of Moses, but a production of priestly scribes
in exilian and post-exilian times. Up to the appearance of
Graf's work on TAe Historical Boohs of the Old Testament in
1866, as was then pointed out, though earlier writers like
Yon Bohlen, George, and Yatke had advocated the idea,
and Reuss, Grafs teacher, had been inculcating it in his
class-room at Strassburg,^ the hypothesis of a post-exilian
origin of the law had met with no general acceptance. De
Wette repudiated it;' Bleek declared it to be ''decidedly
false to hold with Yater, Yon Bohlen, Yatke, and George,
that Deuteronomy, with the laws it contains^ is older than
the forgoing books with their legislation*';' even Kuenen,
in 1861, pronounced its grounds to be " not worthy of refuta-
tion." ^ Since the pubucation of Graf's book, the tide has
' On Beuu, see below, p. 288.
^IrUrod. ii. p. 148. Similarly Ewald.
* Com, on Deui., Introd. p. 107.
* See quotation from Kuenen in full in Note A. Nearly the only writer
who aeems to have had a glimpee into the possibilitiee of George*8 view was
Hengstenberg, who wrote: "The view maintained by De Wette, that
Deatoronomy was the latest of all, the topetone of the mythical stoncture,
which at one time seemed to haye won nniyersal acceptance, begins now to
yield to* the exactly opposite opinion, that Deuteronomy is tiie most andent
288 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
dedsiyely turned, and the previously rejected theory has
now become the dominant (though by no means the
uniyersally-accepted) hypothesiB among critical scholars.
There are many reasons, apart from the skill and
plausibility with wMch its case has been presented, which
account for the fascination of this theory for minds that
haye already yielded assent to the previous critical develop-
ments. It is not without justice, as we shall by and by see,
that the claim is made for the WeUhausen hypothesis that
it Is the logical outcome of the whole critical movement
of last century. A chief value of the theory is that, by the
very startlingness of its conclusions, it compels a halt, and
summons to a reconsideration of the long course by which
its results have been reached.
L Graf-Wkllhausen Theobt of the Pbiestlt Couz
> We shall best begin by sketching more fully than has
yet been done the Giaf-Wellhausen position. The problem
relates, as said, to the age and character of that la^e body
of laws found in Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers, which
forms the kernel of the writing described by the critics
as the Priestly Code. Whereas formerly this Levitical
legislation was held to be at least older than Deuteronomy,
and probably in its main parts Mosaic,^ the newer theory
supposes it to be the work of scribes in the exile, or after.
It is not, indeed, contended, as we shall find, that everything
in the Code was absolutely the creation of that time.'
There had been, of course, a temple, priesthood, religious
institutions, sacrificial ritual, priestly rules and technique.
Still the law, as elaborated in the exile, was practically a
new thing. What belonged to the practice of a previous
age was taken up, transformed, had a new meaning put into
it, was brought under new leading ideas, was developed and
ammig aU the books of the P6iitatenQli."^6^ €f Pent. i. p. 68 (herafen
to Goorgo't work).
* Thus, #.^., Bleek, Introd. L pp. 212 ff.
* Cf. Onf, as aboYO, p. 98 ; Enenaii, Sa. of Israel, ii. pp. 96, 192. (Bnt
see below, p. 291.) Reuss, on this point, does not go so far as some of his
aaooesson. He says: ''It is self-evident that the existence of a Levitical
tradition in relation to ritual, as early as the days of the kings, cannot be
denied ; we cannot speak, however, of a written, official, and sacred oodez
of this kind."— ^0Sc^ie;Us<i«r Bm^. JkhH/Un A. T. I p. 81 (in Ladd, L p. 680).
See below, ppu 800 ft
THE PRffiSTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 289
enlarged by new rites and institintionB. Above all, in order
to clothe it with a Mosaic character, and secure for it the
necessary authority, old and new alike were thrown back
into the age of Moses and the wilderness, and were represented
as originating and being put into force thera This Mosaic
dress was a fiction. The elaborate descriptions of the
tabernacle and its arrangements, the dispositions of the camp
in the wilderness, the accounts of the consecration of Aaron
and his sons, of the choice and setting apart of the Levites,
of the origin of the passover, etc. — edl was a " product of
imagination."^
The idea of the Code was not wholly original The first
conception and sketeh of a Priestly Code was in Ezekiel's
vision of the restored temple in the closing chapters of his
book.' The scheme of the scribes, however, was not that
of Ezekiel, but was independently wrought out. A chief
feature borrowed from the prophet's programme was the
idea of the Levites as a class of temple servants subordinate
to the priests. It will be seen below' how, in Ezek. xliv.,
the law is laid down that the priests who had gone
astray into idolatry were to be degraded from their priestly
office, and made servants in the sanctuary. Only the
Zadokites, who had remained faithful, were to retain their
priestly dignity. This, according to the theory, is the origin
of the class of Levites. The priests thus degraded were, it
is contended, the " disestablished priests" of the high p%ies,
for whom some sort of provision had to be made. We are
called to trace here a development Deuteronomy had, it is
alleged, allowed such "disestablished priests" the full
rights of priesthood when they came up to the temple:
Ezekiel degrades them to the rank known afterwards as
Levites: now the Priests' Code gives them a permanent
standing in the sanctuary, and represents them as always
having had this secondary position, and as having been
originally honourably set apart by Jehovah for His service
in the wildemesa The Israelites being thus organised as
a hierarchy — ** the clergy the skeleton, the high priest tho
head, and the tabernacle the heart " ^ — ^liberal provision is
1 Ofl Knenen, Ba. qf Israel, iL pp. 171, etc
* Ezek. xl. etc. * dee below, pp. 816 fl.
* WelUkansen, Hitt, cf Israel, p. 127. Cf. p. 8 : " The Mosaic theoeraoj,
with the tabernacle at its centre, the hiffh priest at its head, tiie priests
and Levites as its organs, ths legitimate omtuB as its popular twiatia^^
If
290 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES :
made for the sacred body.- Tithes, hitherto unknown for
such a purpose, are appointed for the support of the priests
and Levites, and the priestly revenues are otherwise greatly
enlarged. Forty-eight cities, with pasturages,^ are — only,
of course, on paper — set apart for the Levitical order. The
sacrificial system, now centralised in the tabernacle, is
enlarged, and recast in its provisions. Sin- and trespass-
offerings (the sin-offering is held by Wellhausen to appear
first in Ezekiel)' are introduced; a cycle of feasts is estab-
lished, with new historical meanings; an annual day of
atonement — ^previously unheard of — ^is instituted. Sacnfice
loses its older joyous character, and becomes an affair of the
priesthood — a ritual of atonement, frith associations of
gloom.'
Still better to facilitate the introduction of this novel
scheme, a history is invented to suit it. In its preparatory
part in Genesis, this history goes back to the creation, and
is marked in the patriarchal period by the rigid exclusion
of all sacrfices;^ in the Mosaic part, there is the freest
indulgence in the invention of incidents, lists, genealogies,
numbers, etc. All this, if we accept Wellhausen's view,
was, some time before the coming of Ezra to Jerusalem in
458 B.a, put together in Babylon ; was afterwards combined
with the previously existing J£ and D, which knew nothing
of such l^islation, and indeed in a multitude of ways
contradicted it ; finally, in 444 B.a, as related in Neh. viii,
wa^ produced and read by Ezra to the people, was accepted
by them, and became thenceforth the foundation of poet-
exilic religion. Precisely at this crucial point, however, a
serious divergence of opinion reveals itself in the school
According to Wellhausen, it was the completed Pentateuch,
substantially, that was brought by Ezra to Jerusalem, and
read by hun to the people;' according to perhaps the
majority of his followers, it was only the Priests* Code that
was then made known, and the combination with JE and D
^ The Levitical cities are held by Wellhaaaen to be a tranaformation of
the old bamoth or high places.— 7^ pp. 87-38, 162.
• IMd, p. 75.
* Ibid. p. 81 : " Ko greater contrast could be oonceiyed than the monoto-
noos seriousness of the so-called Mosaic worship." Delitzsch and others haye
shown the groundlessness of this allegation.
4 R»Q aboye. o 1,56
' "Subetantuklly at least Ezra's law-book must be regarded as praotioallj
identical with onr Pentateuch."—/^, p. 497. Cf. p. 404.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. I. THE CODE 291
did not take place till later, after new redactions and
developments of the Code.^ Wellhansen, who retains his
opinion, argues convincingly that^ the narrative (cf. Keh.
ix.) clearly requires that the book should be the whole
Pentateuch;' the others as triumphantly ask how Codes of
laws, which ex hypothesi were in flat contradiction of each
other, could simultaneously ^ brought forward with any hope
of acceptance I We agree that neither set of critics succeeds
in answering the others' reasons.
Such, in barest outline, is the nature of the scheme
which is to take the place of the '' traditional " view of the
Mosaic origin of the Levitical legislation. It will, we
venture to predict, be to future generations one of the
greatest psychological puzzles of history how such a
hypothesis, loaded, as we believe it to be, with external
and internal incredibilities, should have gained the remark-
able ascendency it has over so many able minds. It is a
singular tribute to the genius of WeUhausen that he should
have been able to secure this wide acceptance for his theory,
and to make that appear to his contemporaries as the
highest wisdom which nearly aU his predecessors scouted
as the extreme of folly. His feat is hardly second to that
of Ezra himself, who, on this new showing, succeeded in
imposing on his generation the belief that a complex system
of laws and institutions had been given by Moses, and had
been in operation since the days of that lawgiver, though,
till the moment of his own promulgation, notlung had b^n
heard of them by anyone present I '
^ For a sketch of these soppoeed developments after 444 B.O., ofl Knencn,
Bex. pp. 802 if. ; Professor W . Bobertaon Smith, 0, T. in J. O. , Note F. Pro-
fessor Smith differs again in thinking that ''the Priestly Code has far too
many points of contact with the actus! situation at Jerusalem, and the actual
usage of ^e second temple [f], to lend plausibility to the new that it wai
an abstract system evolyed m Babylonia, by someone who was remote ftom
the contemporary movement at Jerusalem ; but, on the other hand, its author
must haye stood . . . outside the petty local entanglements that hampered
the Judaan priests" (pp. 448-49). He holds that to conjecture " that Soa
was himself the author of the Priests' Code is to step into a region of
purely arUtraiy guesswork" (p. 449). Thus the theories eat np Mdi
other.
* Professor H. P. Smith gets rid of Ecra and the narratiye altofsthtf.
Cf. below, p. 295.
* " They were not," says Knenen, ** laws which had been long in ezistanoi^
and which were now proclaimed afresh and accepted by the people, after
haying been forgotten for a while. The priestly oroinances were maae known
and imposed upon the Jewish nation now /or the first <ims. As we haye
292 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
II. Initial Inobedibilities of ths Thbort
There are, it seems to us, three huge ineredSnlUies which
attach to this theory of the origiQ of the Levitical Iqpslation,
and to these, at the outset, as iliuBtrative of the dimoulties
in which the modern criticism involves itself, we would refer.
1. There is no mistaking in this case the serious natuie
of the moral issue. In the case of ** the book of the law "
brought to light in Josiah's reign, there is at least always
open the assumption of a literary artifice which involved
no dishonest intention on the part of the writer. Here^
on the other hand, there can be no evading of the meaning
of the transaction. What we have is the deliberate con-
struction of an elaborate Code of laws with the express
design of passing it off upon the people in the name of
Moses. It is not a sufficient reply to urge that much in
the law was simply the codification of pre-exilian usage.
A codification of ancient law — ^if that were all that was
meant — even though it involved some degree of re-editing
and expansion, is a process to which no one could reasonably
take exception, provided it were proved that it had actually
taken place.^ But though this notion is, as we shall see, a
good deal played with, the Wellhausen theory is assuredly
not fairly represented, when, with a view to turn the edge
of an objection, it is spoken of as mainly a work of ** codifica-
tion." The very essence of the theory, as Kuenen and
Wellhausen expound it, is, that in all that gives the Priestly
Code its distinctive character, it is something entirely new.'
There never, e,g., existed such an ark or tabernacle as tJiie
Code describes with minute precision. The tabemade is
seen, no written ritnal leaalation yet existed in Ezdders time^** etc. — JSeL
0/ Israel, ii. p. 231. Cf. W eUhansen, Hist, of Israel, p. 408.
^ Few of tne critics of the Wellhausen hypothesis object, within reasonable
limits, to a theory of oodifioation, bnt treat it as a qnestion of endenoe. Ct
Robertson's Early Religion of Israel, p. 894. It already goes beyond codi-
fication when the object is to stamp pre-existing nsage with a divine
sanction.
* According to Wellhansen, the Ckxle was not only not in operaticm, bnl
"it did not cYcn admit of being carried into effect in the conditions that
prevailed preyious to the exile. " — Hist, <jf Israel, P* 12. ** The idea that the
Friests' Code was extant before the exile," says Kautzsdh, "could only be
maintained on the assumption that no man knew of it, not eyen the spintoal
leaders of the people^ such as the priests Jeremiah and EseUel.'' — LiL tf
O.T.^ p. lie.
THE PRIESTLY WMTING. L THE CODE 293
a pure fiction, obtained by halving the dimensions of the
temple, and making it portable.^ There never was a choice
of Aaron and his sons to be priests, or a separation of the
Levites to be ministers to the priests. There never was a
tithe system for the support of priests and Levites ; there
never were Levitical cities; there never were sin- and
trespass-offerings, or a day of atonement, such as the Code
prescribes; there never were feasts having the historical
origin and reference assigned to them in the law. These
institutions were not only not Mosaic, but they never
existed at all; and the eonstmetors of thds Code knew it, for
they were themselves the inventors. This cannot be evaded
by saying, as is sometimes done, that it was a well-recognised
custom to attribute all new legislation to Moses. For first,
apart from the singular problem which this raises for the
critics who attribute no laws to Moses, such a custom
simply did not exist;' and, second, this is not a case of
mere literary convention, but one of serious intention, with
a view to gaining a real advantage by the use of the law-
giver's authority. The nearest parallel, perhaps, that
Buggests itself is the promulgation in Europe in the ninth
century of our era of the great collection of spurious
documents known as the Isidorian Decretals, carrying back
the loftiest claims of the mediaeval Papacy to apostolic men
of the first century. Ko one hesitates to speak of these
spurious decretals, which gained acceptance, and were for
long incorporated in the Canon law, by their rightful name
of '' forgeries."' * Can we help giving the same designation
to the handiwork of these exilian constructors of a pseudo-
Mosaic Code?^ It is futile to speak, in excuse, of the
^ See above, pp. 165 ff.
* H.g., Ezekiel did not attribnte his laws to Moses ; the Chroniclgr did
not attribnte the elaborate ordinances in 1 Chron. xxiii. to Moses bnt to
Dttvid ; Szra and Kehemiah themselves did not attribnte their modified
arrangements to Moses. Circumcision was not attributed to Moses, eta
We do not know of any laws being attributed to Moses which were not
helieved to be Mosaic.
* Hallam says of these in his Middle Ages : ** Upon these spurious
decretals was built the great &bric of papal supremaor over the different
national Churches ; a fabric which has st<Kxi after its foundation crumbled
beneath it ; for no one has pretended to deny, for the last two centuries,
that the imposture is too palpable for any but the most ignorant agsa to
credit" (SMMuPe ffalkm, p. 295).
^ " Such procedure," says Biehm, "would have to be called a fraud."—
MUHL i. p. 217.
294 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES-
different standards of literary honesty in those days. It
is not overstepping the mark to say, as before, that men
like Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Ezra, were as capable of dis-
tinguishing between tnith and falsehood, as conscious of
the sin of deceit, as zealous for the honour of God, as
incapable of employing lying lips, or a lying pen, in the
service of Jehovah, as any of our critics to-day.* We
simply cannot conceive of these men as entering into such
a conspiracy, or taking part in such a fraud, as the
Wellhausen theory supposes. For it was undeniably as
genuine Mosaic ordinances that it was meant to pass off
these laws upon the people. Let only the effect be imagined
had Ezra interpolated his reading with the occasional ex-
planation that this or that principal ordinance, given forth
by him as a law of Moses in the wilderness, was really a
private concoction of some unknown priest in Babylon —
perchance his own !
2. Besides the moral, there confronts us, in the second
place, a historical incredibility. We do not dwell on
the peculiar taste of these exilian scribes, of whose very
existence, it must be remembered, we have not a morsel of
evidence, who, out of their own heads, occupied themselves
with tireless ingenuity in elaborating these details of
tabernacle, encampments, and ceremonial, planning new
laws, festivals, and regulations for imaginary situations —
devising everything with such care, and surrounding it with
so perfect an air of the wilderness, that, fts Wellhausen
owns,' no trace of the real date by any chance shines
through. Keither do we dwell on the singular unity of
mind which must have pervaded their ranks to enable them
to concert so well-compacted and coherent a scheme as, on
any showing, the Levitical law is.' We shall assume that
some peculiarly constituted minds might delight in evolving
these fanciful things, and might even, at a sufficient distance
of time, get their romance by mistake accepted as history.
1 See aboye, p. 259. Cf. Jer. viii. 8 ; ziy. 14 ; zziiL 82 ; Ezek. ziii. 6,
7, 19, etc.
* "It tries hard to imitate the costame of the Mosaic period and, with
whateyer saoceas, to disguise its own. ... It guards itself against all
reference to later times and a settled life in Canaan. ... It keeps itselt
oarefolly and strictly within the limits of the situation in the wilderness.^ —
Sitt, </ Israel, p. 9. Riehm says: "Nowhere are any anachronisms foand
in the Leyitioal legislation."— j^'n^. i. p. 217.
* Of: Note B on Unity of the Law.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. I. THE CODE 295
The thing which needs explanation is, how the scheme, once
conceived, should be able to get under weigh as it did, in
the actual circumstances of the return from the exile. That
problem has only to be faced to show how incredible is the
critical solution.
* We turn to the account of the production and reading of
the law by Ezra in Neh. viii, as before we did to the narrative
of the finding of '' the book of the law " in 2 Kings, and are
there presented with a plain, unvarnished tale, which bears
upon its face every mark of truth. We read how the people
of Jerusalem, gathered "as one man into the broad place
that was before the water-gate/' asked "Ezra the scribe " to
bring the book of the law of Moses, which Jehovah had
conmianded to Israel"^ Ezra, who before has been
described as ''a ready scribe in the law of Moses, which
Jehovah, the Grod of Israel, had given,"' and as coming
from Babylon with the law of God in his hand,* now, at the
people's request, produced the book, and from an improvised
''pulpit of wood" read its contents to the congregation
"from morning till midday," while others who stood by
" gave the sense." ^ This was repeated from the first to the
last day of the feast of Tabernacles in the seventh month.^
Everything in the narrative ia plain and above board. There
is not a hmt that anything contained in this " book of the
law" was new,* though the knowledge of much that it con-
tained had evidently been lost The entire congr^tion
listen to it with unquestioning faith as " the law of Moses."
They hear all its enactments about priests and Levites, its
complicated regulations about sacrifices, about sin-offerings,
1 Neh. Tiii. 1. * Ezra tU. 6.
» Ezra Tii. 14. * Neh. Tiii. 2-8.
* Vers. 8, 18. Professor H. P. Smith, nnlike Wellhausen and Knenen, who
found upon it, discredits, as before intimated, the whole story, and donhts
the very ezistenoe of Ezra. His account is worth quoting, as a specimen of
a phase of criticiBm : " During the century after Nehemuii the community
in Judah was becoming more rigid in its exolusiveness and in its devotion to
the ritaal. Ezra is the impersonation of both tendencies. Whether there
was a scribe named Ezra is not a matter of fntit importance. Very likely
there was such a scribe to whose name tradition attached itself. Ftrsty it
transferred the favour of Artazerxes to him from Kehemiah. Then it made
him the hero of the introduction of the law, and finally it attributed to him
the abrogation of the mixed marriages. . . . The wish was &ther to the
thought, and the thought gave rise to the story of Ezra. Ezra was the ideal
scribe, as Solomon was the ideal king, projected upon the background of an
earlier age. "—0.7. ffi8t.m, 396>97.
• OfTkittel, Hist. o/ffAs. L p. 104.
296 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
about tithes, but do not laiae a question. Nothing, on the
premises of the theory, could be more surprising. Tithes
of com and oil, not to say of cattle, for the support of the
Levitical order, had never before been heard of,^ but the
people submit to the burden without dissent They hear
of a day of atonement, and of the solemn and elaborate
ritual by which it is to be annually observed, but it does
not occur to them that this institution has been unknown
in all the past of their history. The Levites, descendants,
on the theory, of Ezekiel's dq;raded idolatrous priests— of
whose degradation, however, to this lower rank, histoiy
contains no mention — show no amazement when tbey
learn for the first time that their tribe was specially set
apart by Jehovah for His service in the wilderness, and had
then a liberal provision made for their wants; that cities
even had been appointed for them to dwell in. Many
of the more learned in the gathering — men versed in
genealogies and priestly traditions — must have been well
aware that the most striking of the ordinances which Ezra was
reading from his roll, were unhistorical inventions, yet they
take it all in. There was, as the Book of Nehemiah itself
clearly shows, a strongly disafTected party, and a religiously
faithless party, in the city, — a faction keenly opposed to
Ezra and Nehemiah,' — but no one raises a doubt. Priests
and people, we learn from Malachi, were alike shamefully
remiss in the discharge of their obligations,' yet they never
question the genuineness of any article in the Code. The
very Samaritans — the bitterest of the Jews' enemies in this
period — receive not long after the whole law at the hands
of the Jews as the undoubted law of Mosea^ Is anything
in the ''traditional" theory more astounding, or harder to
believe, than all this is?^ There is another fact Ezra's
^ WellhanBen savB the tithe was introdnoed by Ezra, ffid, qflgrael^ p. 166.
*0t Neh. yL 10-19; TiiL etc W. B. Smith even says: "All the
historical indicationa point to the priestly aristocracy being the chief
opponents of Esra." — 0, T. in J, (7., pi 448. This makes matters still more
inexplicable.
•MaL i. 6-14; lii 7-16; Neh. ziii. 10 flf: Ot W. B. Smith, as above,
p. 446.
* See below, Chap. X. p. 870, and Note there.
' Wellhaosen says : '' As we are aooostomed to infer the date of the com-
position of Denteronomy from its publication and introdnotion by Josiah« so
we most infer tiie date of the oomposition of the Priestly Code from its
publication and introduction by Ecra and Nehemiah."— flffaC qf Immei,
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 297
reading of the law was in 444 b.c. But nearly a century
earlier, in 636 B.C., at the time of the first return under
Zerubbabel, we find no inconsiderable part of the law already
in apercUian. Priests and Levites are there ; the high priest
is there ;^ a complete organisation of worship is there,
morning and evening sacrifices are there, set feasts are
there, eta' Even if details are challenged, the central facts
in this narrative, e.^., the presence of priests and Levites,
and of an organisation of worship, cannot be overthrown.'
3. There is yet, however, a third incredibility arising
from the fmmUabilUy of the Code itsell We found the
Code of Deuteronomy to be in many respects unsuitable to
the age of Josiah. But the unsuitability of Deuteronomy
is slight compared with the lack of agreement in the
Levitical Code with the state of things in the days of Ezra
and Nehemiah. From the point of view of the theory, the
Code was designed to be put in force after the return from
the exile. The return, therefore, even in the exile, must
have been confidently expected. Yet, when the Code is
examined, nothing could seem less suitable for its purpose.
The whole wilderness framework of the l^islation was out
of date and place in that late aga The sanctuary is a
portable tabernacle, whereas the circumstances of the time
demanded a temple. Many of the laws, like that requiring
that all sacrifices should be offered at the door of the
tabernacle, with the reason for this rq^ulation/ were quite
out of keeping with the new conditions, had, indeed^ no
relevancy from the time when the people entered on a
settled life in Canaan. Suitable in its place, if it precedes
the relaxing rule of Deut. xiL 16, it is unintelligible after.
Other parts of the Code had to be dropped or cmanged, as
inapplicable to the post-exilian order of thinga There was,
e.g.^ no ark, or priestly Urim or Thummim, in the second
p. 408. We contend, on the oontrary, that the narratiye of thia introdnotion
u a oonclnnye di&prot^ of Wellhanaen'B view of its date.
1 Gf. ^h. ui. L
*Sznm.2fL
* Delitssch Bays : " It is a fact as credibly attested as pooible that the
distinction of ranks of priests and Levites existed already in b.o. 586, and
long before B.a 444 ; and indeed so uncontested, so thoroughly established,
so strictly maintained, that it most be dated back beyond the exile, in which
it cannot hare originated, as one regulated by law and eostom in the pr«*
exilian time."— Luthardt's 2MMvrifi, 1880, p. 268.
« Lev. xTii. 1-4. See below, p. 814.
29S DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
temple. The tax imposed by Nehemiah was a third part of a
shekel, instead of the half -shekel of the law.^ The law, in one
place, prescribes twenty-five years as the age for the Levitee
entering on service, and in another place thirty years.' We
find, however, that, after the return, neither of these laws
was adopted, but, in accordance with a rule ascribed in
Chronicles to David, the Levites commenced their duties at
the age of twenty.' A more striking example of unsuitability
to contemporary conditions is found in the tithe-laws, declared
to be a direct creation of the exila The Levitical law in
Numbers is based on the assumption of a large body of
Levites, and a relatively small body of priests. The tithes
are to be paid directly to the Levites, who are then required
to give a tenth of what they receive to the priests.^ But
these provisions were absolutely unsuitable to the times
succeeding the exile, when, as we see from the Book of
Ezra, the number of Levites who returned was very small,
while the number of priests was large.^ Instead of ten
Levites for every priest, the proportion may have been about
twelve or thirteen priests for every Levite. This rendered
completely nugatory the arrangements of the Code, and
made readjustment inevitable. Wellhausen calls this
discrepancy '' a trifling circumstance,'' ' but fails to explain
why a law should have been promulgated so entirely un-
suited to the actual situation. The history, besides, has no
mention of the tithing of cattle under Nehemiah as pre-
scribed by the law — only of tithes of field produca^ Ab if
to render the contrast more striking, while we have in the
Code these rules about tithes, so absolutely unsuiteble to
the circumstances of the exile, with its numerous prieste
and handful of Levites, we have, on the other hand, mention
in the history of an extensive personnel connected with the
service of the temple — ^porters, Nethinim, children of
^ Ex. xzz. 11-16 ; c£ Keh. z. 82.
' Nnm. iv. 28, 80, etc ; of. Tiii 24. The LXX lOAkes both passages
thirty years. This is one of those unessential variations in laws.*whioh, if
the orainanr harmonistio explanation is not acoepted, viz., that the one law
(Num. TiiL; refers to the lighter servioe of the tabemaole itself the other
(Num. iy.) to the harder work of transportation, points to a liberty of
varying the strict letter of the law, provided its spirit or principle
adhered to. See above, p. 179.
* Ezra iu. 8 ; of. 1 Chron. xziiL 24, 27.
< Num. xviii. 24-26. • Ezra iL ; viU. 15 ff.
• ffiaL t^Iarad, p. 167. ' Neh. x. 89 ; xiii. 5.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING, L THE CODE 299
Solomon's servants, singing-men, and singing-women^^— of
which, eurionslj enough, the law, supposed to be drawn up
specially for this community, knows nothing.' How is this
to be rendered natural or conceivable on the critical
anumption of the date of the CSode ?*
in. Thb Abquhxnt vbom Silknob m rrs Beabikgb
ON THB Cods
We pass now from these initial incredibilities to the
examination of the paaitive foundations of the critical
theory; and here, if we mistake not, the impression pro-
duced by the above considerations will be more than con-
firmed. The argument for the exilian or post-exilian dating
of the Priestly Code may be said to have two main branches :
(1) the alleged silence of pre-exilian history and literature
as to the peculiar institutions of the Code; and (2) the
alleged iucompatibilLty of the sanctuary and ritual arrange-
ments of the pre-exilic time — ^mirrored to us in the history,
the prophets, and the Book of Deuteronomy — ^with the
Levitical r^ulations. We shall under the present head
consider the general value of tins argument from silence ;
we shall then inquire whether the silence regarding the
laws and institutions of the Priests' Code is as unbroken as
is alleged; finally, we shall endeavour to show that the
critical theory itself breaks down in its attempt to explain
these institutions — this with special reference to the
Ezekiel theory of the origin of the distinction of priests and
Levites. The ** incompatibility " argument has already
been in considerable part anticipated, but will be touched
upon as far as necessary.
The argument from mere silence then, to begin with
that, is proverbially precarious ; in a case like the present
it is peculiarly so. It is easy to understand why a ritual
law, which, all down, must have been largely an afiGur of the
^ Ezra ii 41, 65, 58, d5, 70. The memben of some of these guilds were
probably Levitioal (1 Chron. zziii ; of. Delitzsch, ZeOtehrift, 1880, p. 287),
thongh the name "Leyite" was specially appropriated to those directly
ministeriiig to the priests. This would increase somewhat the proportion
of retundng Leyites.
'Delitssoh, Dillmann (irum.-Jot. p. 671), Baudissin ("PHesU end
Levites" in DieL <^ Bible, iy. p. 88), etc., urge this point
* For additional instances of unfuitability, ct Kittel, HitL ^ Ate. i
p. 106.
300 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES :
priests, should not frequently obtrude itself upon the view :
when it does, as in the Books of Chronicles, it is set down as
a mark of untrustworthiness. Particularly, the fact that
the Levitical laws are, in their original form, adapted to a
tabemade, and to wilderness conditions, precludes the
possibility of much reference to them in that form, after the
people were settled in Canaan, and after a temple had been
built. AflBuming the sanctuary and sacrificial ordinances of
the Code to have always been in the most perfect opera-
tion,— and it is certain that in many periods they were
not, — ^it would still be unreasonable to expect that they
should be constantly thrusting their heads into the story,
and foolish to argue that, because they did not, therefore
they had no existence. We take, however, broader groxmd,
and propose to show, with the help of tiie critics them*
selves, that, notwithstanding the sUence, a large part of
the Code may have been, and indeed actually was» in
operation.
1. On the showing of the Wellhausen theory itself, it is
not difficult to establish that the argument from mere
silence is far from conclusive. We f6Jl back here on the
admission freely made that everything in the Priestly Code
is not new. It is allowed, on the contrary, that mcUeriaUy
a great part of the Levitical legislation must have been in
existence before the exila Especially, as before in the case
of Deuteronomy, when the object is to free the hypothesis
from the aspect of fraud, remarkable concessions on this
point are frequently made. If, at one time, we are told by
Dr. Driver that " the pre-exilic period shows no indications
of the legislation of P as being in operation,'' ^ at another
time we are assured that ** in its main stock, the legislation
of P was not (as the critical view of it ia sometimes
represented by its opponents as teaching) 'manufactured'
by the priests during the exile; it is based upon pre-
existing temple usage!* ^ We do not defend the consistency of
^ IfUrod, p. 186.
* Ibid, p. 143. See below, p. 812. Similarly the qaotations from Knenen
ftnd Wellhaoaen on pp. 291-92 above, may be compared witih the following
Arom Knenen: "The deorees of the priestly law were not mad$ and
iMwUd daring or after the exile, but dravm up. Prior to the exile, the
mieets had already delivered yerbally what — ^with the modifications that
had become necessary in the meantime — they afterwards committed to
writing." — Rd, oflmult i^- P* ^6. "I have already drawn attention to the
probability that disconneotea priestly ordinances or tordha were in dreola*
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 301
these statements ; the ona is, in fact, as we shall immediately
see, destructive of the other. The tendency in writers of
this school is, in reality, to a kind of see-saw between these
two positions; the one that the Priestly Code was in the
main a simple '^ codification" of pre-exilic usage — a com-
paratively innocent hypothesis; and the other that the
characteristic institutions of the Priestly Code— ark,
tabernacle, Aaronic priests, Levites, tithes, Levitical cities,
sin-offerings, day of atonement,** eta, were, one and 6J1, the
free creation of the exilic period — were then, despite Dr.
Driver's disclaimer, " manufactured " ^ — and were absolutely
unknown earlier. If the latter proposition cannot be
maintained, the whole hypothesis goes to earth. Here
again we are entitied to say that the critics must really
make their choica They cannot well be allowed at one
time to employ arguments which are of no force unless on
the assumption that the Levitical law is, as a whole, in
matter as well as in form, new; and at another, to use
arguments based on the contention that the bulk of the
le^slation is, in practice, dd.^
Let us, however, accept, as we are glad to do, the state-
ment that ** the main stock " of the legiSation of P is " based
jipon pre-existing temple usage," and see what follows. The
observance of this ''main stock" before the exile either
appears in the history, or it does not If it does not, what
bea)meB of the argument from silence against the other
institutions? If it does, what becomes of Wellhausen's
statement that ''no trace can be found of acquaintance
with the Priestly Code, but, on the other hand, very clear
indications of ignorance of its contents ? " ' It is nothing to
the purpose to reply, as is commonly done, that before the
exile there was indeed praxis — usage — but no written
tlon before the ezHe, eren though a ajsteia of prieetly legulation was
wenting at that time " (p. 192).
^We may take in illustration the law of the passoyer in Exodus,
referred to farther below, pp. 820-21. Oraf treats Ex. xii. 1-28 as a pure
oreation of the time of the exile, and deduces from the fact of its agreement
with the priestly and saoriiicial laws of Levitious, that these must be
exilian or post-exilian also (CftBehichL BUeher, pp. 84-86). Wellhausen's
Tiew is that the law has undergone a transformation which inverts the
relation of oause and effect It was the Israelitish oustom of offering the
firstiings which gave rise to the stoxy of the slaying of the firstborn in
Sgypt, not vice v9nok,—HuL oflarau, pp. 88, 100, 102, 852.
* Gf. Robertson on Wellhausen, Eovtly Beligian, etc, ppi 898-94.
qf l9ra$l, p. 59.
302 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
Priestly Code, or Code of ritual law attributed to Moses.^
For (1) the very grownd an which the existence of a written
Code i$ denied %$ that there is no proof of the practice ; and (2)
if the practice is allowed, who is to certify that a written
law, regulating the practice, was not there ? Against the
existence of a written law, we have only Wellhausen's
dogmatic (lie^ttm, repeated by other critics, that, so long
as the cultuB lasted, people would not concern themselves
with reducing it to the form of a Code.' It was only when
it had passed away that men thought of reducing it to
writing. That, however, Wellhausen certainly cannot prove,
and his view is not that of older and of a good many
recent scholars.* Nor has it probability in itself. Are
written Codes — especially in the light of modem knowledge
— so entirely unknown to antiquity as to warrant anyone in
saying a priori that, even where an elaborate ritual is
acknowledged to be in operation, a Code regulating it
cannot have existed ? ^
2. There is an admitted "pre-existing temple usage,"*
constituting '' the main stock '' of the priestly law ; reflection
may next convince us that this ''pre-existing usage must
have covered a much larger part of the Levitical Code than
is commonly realised. There existed at least a splendid
temple, with outer and inner divisions; a sacred ark;
temple furniture and utensils; a hereditary priesthood.
The priests would have their sacred vestments, prescribed
duties, ritual lore, their technique in the manipulation of
the different kinds of sacrifices, their recognis^ rules for
the discernment and treatment of leprosy, their rules for
ceremonial purification, their calendar of sacred festivals,
etc. These things existed ; assume the laws relating to them
^ Ibid, ; of. Knenen, as above, p. 96. * Ibid.
*Cf. Bleek, Introd. L pp. 221 fil; Dmrnann, Exod.-Itw, Pref. p. viii
(see above, p. 160) ; p. 886.
^ Analogy and diiiooyery famish strong eronnds for believing that Israel
would have a written law. Eittel says on tius point : ' ' Israel oame out of,
and always continued to be connected with, a oonntiy where . external
preeoriptions and rales played their ^art in all ages. As in S^gypt, so in
Babylonia and Asmia, rules were laid down for sacrificial worship at an
early period. The Marseilles Table of Offerings has brought the same hot to
light as regards the Phcenicians. Is it to Be believea that with aU this
scrupulosity on the part of the surrounding priesthoods, a primitive
informalism, of which there is no other ezaTnple, prevailed in Israel alone
until the days of the restoration T "—ffist. of ffebs. L p. 1 18. Ct Dillmaan,
Jf«m.-/o9. p. 647.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 303
to be written down, what ground have we for supposing that
they would have differed greatly from the laws preserved to
us in Leviticus and Kumbers ? Yet how little of all this
obtrudes itself in the history ? Nothing, we have again to
point out, is gained by the substitution of praxis for written
hw ; for it is not the written law, usually, but the practice,
that history takes cognisance of, and, if silence in the history
is compatible with the practice^ it must also be compatible
with tjie existence of any Code that r^ulates it How far
this reaches will appear more clearly if we look at specific
instances.
Wellhausen speaks repeatedly of the splendour and
elaboration erf the pre-exuic cultua There was a cultus
"carried on,'' he tolls us, ''with the utmost seal and
splendour "^^ — ^"splendid sacrifices, presumably offered with
all the rules of priestly skill" ' ** Elaborato ritual may have
existed in the great sanctuaries at a very early period."'
He correctly infers *' that Amos and Hosea, presupposing as
they do a splendid cultus and great sanctuaries, doubUess
also knew of a variety of f estiv^" ^ But he has to add,
** they have no occasion to mention any one by nama" To
the same effect Isaiah is quoted : ** Add ye year to year, let
the feasts go round." ^ But where shall we look in history
for any notice of these feasts ? It is allowed that the three
feasts of the Book of the Covenant were observed from early
times; yet, says Wellhausen, ''names are nowhere to be
found, and in point of fact it is only the autumn festival
that is weU attested, and this, it woidd appear, as the only
festival, as tlu feast" ^ Still the critic heis no doubt that
" even under the older monarchy the previous festivals must
also have already existed as well" ^ As particular examples,
let the reader take his concordance, and note the exceeding
paucity of the 6Jlusions in the historical books to such
mstitutions as the sabbath, the new moon, or even the rite
of circumcision. How easy, on the strength of this silence,
would it be to say in the familiar way : "Joshua, Judges,
the Books of Samuel, know nothing of the sabbath!"
Drop one or two incidental references, which might easily
1 EitL iflimO, p. 56. * Ibid. p. 55.
*i5ul. p. 54. ^Ib(d.f,U. •Ibid.
' Ibid. It is not the cam, lioireT«r, taat no other feasts are named, flee
below, pp. 821-22.
viU9:p. 06.
304 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
not have been there, and the evidence in the history for the
above, as for many other institutions, disappears altogether.
Does it follow that the sabbath, or a law of the sabbath,
had no ejdstence ?
3. The test may be applied in another way. It is urged,
e.;., that there is no olear reference in pre-ezUian literature
to the existence of a class of Levites as distinct from the
priests. It has already been seen that this is not altogether
the case,^ and, at least, as pointed out, the Levites appear
quite distinotly at the return, nearly a century before the
Priestly Code was promulgated by Ezra. But what of post-
exilian literature? Apart from Ezra and Nehemiah, and
the Books of Chronicles, how many references to the Levites
could be gleaned from exilian and post-exilian writings?
The second Isaiah (assuming the critical date), the prophets
Haggai, Zechariah, Joel (if he be post-exilian), Malachi,* the
Psalter-— declared to be the song-book of the second temple
— aU are sHerU, with the possible exception of Ps. cxxxv. 20.
The Priests' Code generally finds little reflection in the
Psalter. Even in the Priestly Code itself, it is surprising to
discover how large a part contains no allusions to the
Levites. In Leviticus — the priestly book par excellence —
with the solitary exception of chap. xxv. 32, 33, they are not
so much as named.' Equally remarkable is the silence of
the New Testament on the Levites. One stray allusion in
the parable of the Gk)od Samaritan;^ one in the Fourth
GkMspel;* one in Acts, where Barnabas is described as a
Levite* — ^that is alL The Epistle to the Hebrews, even,
has nothing to say of theuL Priests everywhere, but
Levites nowhere. Tins, surely, is a sufficiently striking
object-lesson in silence. Yet it is on the ground of a
similar silence to this that we are asked to believe that
there was no pre-exilian observance of the day of atone-
ment.^ Doubtless there is no mention in the history of this
yearly day of expiation — any more than there is of the
1 8w aboTe, pp. 168. 189.
* llie Leyitet in Malaohi are the priesti.
* Ot Kittel, ffiti, </ ffebt. L pp. 120-21. Kittel shows that fin large oarta
of the Priestly Oode "there is no oontrast between priests and Levites,^
« Luke X. 82. ^ John i. 19. • Acts iy. 86.
^ We are aware that it is argued that its observance is on certain oocasiona
precluded by the narratiye. But see Delitzsch's article, Luthardf s Zeiitekrifi^
1680, pp. 178 ff.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CX)DE 305
sabbatical year,^ the year of jubilee,' ancl many other
institutions which we have good reason to believe were
known, even if they were not always faithfully observed.'
But the argument from silence in the case of the day of
atonement proves too much; for, as it happens, iMM^-ezllian
^ literature is as silent about it as pre-exiliajL Important
^ solemnity as it was, it is not mentioned by Ezra, Nehemiah,
'^ Chronicles, or any of the post-exilian prophets. The first
^' notice of its observance is in Josephus, who tells us that, in
? 27 B.C., Herod took Jerusalem on that day, as Fompey had
•' done twenty-seven years before.^ The QospelB and Acts
P contain no reference to the day of atonement; yet we
^ know from the Epistle to the Hebrews that it was observed,
^ and that its rites were familiar.^
lY. Pkoof of Earldsb Existbncb of Pbibstlt
Legislation
Thus far we have proceeded on the critics' own
assumption of the silence in pre-exilian times regarding
the laws and institutions of the Priestly Cloda But was
the silence really as unbroken as is alleged ? We shall now
endeavour to show that it was not l£e opposite can onlv
be maintained by the process of circular reasoning which
explains away every testimony to the contrary by the
assumption of late date or interpolation of the notice, or by
the convenient distinction between Code and usage. We
go on the contrary principle that praxis^ as a rule, is a
testimony in favour of Code ; but we hope to do something
to prove the presence of Code also.
In an earner chapter we sought to establish the existence
in pre-exilic times of many of the characteristic institutions
> Ex. xziii 10 ; Lot. zxt. 2 ff.; xzri. 84, 85. The fint mentUm of the
sabbatical year ia in the time of the Maocabeee (1 Haoo. tL 68).
> Ley. ZXT. Of. Isa. IzL 1, 2. Knenen admits that Ssekisl knew the
jubilee year {JRel. qflsraely ii. p. 191).
' The Welihansen school deny the obsenranoe^ but withont good rstMW
(ot Dillmann on Ley. xxt. 7, p. 608).
« ArUiq. xir. 16. 4.
* Heb. ix. 7 ff. The list of silenoes might easQy be extended. Tlie
feast of weeks, «.^., is not mentioned by Szekiel, who speaks of the
pasBOYer and the feast of tabernacles. It is allnded to only once in the
whole history before the exile (1 Kings ix. 26 ; 2 Chnm. TiiL 18). Neither
does Ezekiel allude to the evening sacrifice.
ao
3o6 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES :
of the Levitical Code, e,g., the ark, the tabernacle, the
Aaronic priesthood, the high priest, etc.^ It adds to the
weight of the argament that in many instances we are
indebted to quite incidental allusions for a knowledge of
faults and observances whose existence might not otherwise
have been suspected. ^ It is, e^., only by accident that we
came on the notice of ''the shewbread" in the sanctuary
at Nob in the reign of SauL' Again, from 1 Sam. i, iL, we
might hastily conclude that there were at Shiloh no priests
but Eli and his two sons ; as from chap. xzL we might infer
that there was at Nob only the single priest Ahimelech. Yet
Saul's massacre after David's flight discovers to us the pres-
ence at Nob of eighty-five priests that wore a linen ephod.'
If it be replied that the references to ark, tabernacle, priest-
hood, shewbread, and the like, do not prove the existence
of the detailed representations of the Priestly Code,^ this
may be granted, and is only to be expected. But they
show at least that these thin^ were there to be legislated
for, and annul the presumption against laws whidi have
this for their object. It is a curious state of mind that can
see a propriety in the codification of laws, 6^., about
parapete and fringes,'^ but supposes that everything about
sanctuary and sacrifice was left to drift on without
authoritative regulation. It is now necessary, however, to
come to closer quarters, and to ask whether there is any
direct evidence of the existence of priestly laws in written
form in pre-exilian times.
1. We turn first to the Booh of Ezekiel, and specially
to chaps. xL-xlviiL, which Wellhausen says have been not
incorrectly called " the key of the Old Testament," ^ and
between which and the Priestly Code, at any rate, it is
1 Of. above, Chap. YI. ' 1 Sam. xzi
> 1 Sam. zxiL 18. Wellhausen allows that there mnst have been a
oonsideiable establishment at Shiloh. "The temple of Shiloh," he saya,
" the priesthood of which we find officiating at Nob a little later." '*T1ie
iffioe u hereditaxT, and the priesthood already very nnmerons." — Bttt, qf
braeLyy. 19, 128.
« Thos Dr. Driver, ItUrocL p. 142. See above, p. 171. The regalatlons
for saoh an establishment most have been pretty detailed, if they existed
at all.
• Dent zziL 8, 12.
* EUt. qf Iwrad. p. 421. (Of. p. 25 aboye.) Smend also says : " The
decisive importance of this section for the criticism of the Pentateach was
first recoffnued by George and Vatke. It has been rightly called the key
of the Old Testament. In fiust it is only intelligible as an intermediate
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 307
allowed on all sides that there exists a close relation.^
What is the nature of that relation ? Is it, as the world
has till recently believed, the Levitical Code, with which
as a priest he was necessarily &miliar, which furnished
Ezekiel with suggestion and guidance in the framing of his
sketch of a new theocracy, in which older institutions are
freely remodelled and changed?' Or is it, as the newer
critics allege, that no written priestly laws as yet existed,
and that Ezekiel's sketch was the first rough draft —
''programme" — on the basis of which exilian scribes
afterwards worked to produce their so-called Mosaic Gode.^
The latter view is necessary to the Wellhausen hypothesis,^
yet it is one against which a powerful note of dissent is
raised by an influential company of scholars, many of them
weU-nigh as "advanced" as Wellhausen himself.* It is
pointed out, surely with justice, that the vision of Ezekiel
IS only conceivable as the product of a mind saturated with
the knowledge of temple law and ritual ; that the parallels
with the Priestly Code are not confined to chapa xL-xlviiL,
but go through the whole book;^ that much is simply
alluded to, or left to be understood, which only the Priestly
Code can explain;^ above all, that the sdieme of the
Levitical Code deviates so widely in conception and detail
from that of Ezekiel as to render it unthinkable that its
]]nk between Deateronomj and the Priestiv Code, and it thenoe followe
that the latter ia exilian or ooet-ezilian." — m$ehielj p. 812.
1 '< On one point," aays Daudiann, " there can be no doubt, namely thifl,
that the affinity between the law of Ezekiel and the PriestB* Code is bo
great that it can be explained only by the dependence of one of tfaeae upon
the other."— iXrf. o/BibU, ir. p. 86.
' It aeema obvioas that the yidon is a, work of prophetio imagination,
and is not intended to be taken as a literal prognmme for ftitore realisation.
One has only to read the virion of the waters, and the direction for the
division of the knd in dhap. zlvii to see that they belong to the region of
tha ideal— not of fact.
> Ct Knenen, Bel. tf Iwmtl^ ii. p. 116.
^ One of the theses on which, from 1888, Benss based his lectures was this :
" Ezekiel is earlier than the redaction of the ritual code, and of tiie laws,
which definitely organised the hierarchy." (Of. Wellhausen, ExA, p. 4.)
See above, p. 200. Since the time of Graf, Delitzsch says, **the Book of
Ezekiel has become the Archimedean point of tlie Pentateuchal criticism."
— Luthardt's ZtiUdwifl, 1880, p. 279.
' Among critics of the theory may be mentioned Delitadhy Biehm,
Dillmann, Schrader, Ndldeke, Baudissin, Eittel, Oettli, eto.
* See below, pp. 808-9.
'JR^., the sin- and trespass-offerings, chaps., xl. 89; xUv. 29. See
Note 0 on Ezekiel and Earlier Law and Observance.
308 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
authors took the temple-vision of Ezekiel as a pattern.
How, indeed, if they viewed the vision of Ezekiel as a
prophetic revelation, should they presume to ignore or
contradict it so directly as they do ? ^ We are aware that
the objection is retorted: how should Ezekiel presume to
alter a divinely-given earlier Code?' But the cases are
quite different Ezekiel is not putting forward a code in
the name of Moses. He is a prophetic man, avowedly
legislating in the Spirit for a transformed land and a
transformed people in the f utura Not only, however, does
the prophesying of Ezekiel presuppose an older law, but the
references with which his pages are fiUed to ** statutes and
judgments," or " ordinances " of God,* which the people had
transgressed (in their ''abominations" at the sanctuary
among other things), show explicitly that he had such laws
habitually before him.
2. But the subject admits of being brought to a nearer
determination. There is at least one importarU section of
the Priestly Code which, it is allowed, stands in the closest
possible connection with EzekieL We refer to ''that
peculiar little collection of laws," as Wellhausen calls it,^
embraced in Lev. xviL-xzvi (with, according to most,
extensive fragments elsewhere), which modem writers,
following Klostermann, usually name "The Law of
Holiness." ^ The resemblances with Ezekiel here, particu-
^ ''It 18,** says Delitzsch, " inoompreheDsible how Ezra and Kehemiali
could dare to pablish a law-book whose ordinances oontradict those of
Ezekiel on all sides, and which still, in matter and form, shows itself well
acquainted with the latter." — Zeitschrift, p. 281. The aystematio character
of Ezekiel's law, as compared with the tmsystematio character of the
Leyitical Oode, shows that it is not the latter which is dependent on the
former, bnt vice versa,
' Thus Qraf, Kantzsch, etc. Professor Bobertwn remarks : '* Well, on the
ciitlcttl hypothesis, the Deateronomio law at least existed as authoiitatiye,
and yet Ezekiel deviates from it"Sarly Beligion, pp. 482-88. Dr. A. B.
Davidson points out : '' Inferences from comparison of Ezekiel with the
Law have to be drawn with caution, for it is evident that the prophet
handles with freedom institutiona certainly older than his own time.**-^
Exekielf Introd. p. M.
' Eask. V. 6 ; zL 12, and pauim.
^HiwL qflvrael, p. 61 (cf. pp. 75, 86, 876, 884).
' Elost^mann gave it this name in 1877 in a searching srtlole afaica
reprinted in his Der Penlateuch^ pp. 868 ff. "The principle," says Dr.
Driver, "which determines most conspicuously the character of the entire
section is that of holv^esB — ^partly ceremonial, partly moral — as a quality
distinguishing Israel, demanded of Israel by Jehovah." — Introd, p. 4£
Characteristic of it is the phrase " I am Jehovah.*'
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 309
larly in Lev. zxvi.,^ are so numerous and striking that no
one doubts the reality of some kind of dependence, but
opinions have widely differed in critical quarters aa to the
nature of that dependence. At first it was confidently
maintained, as by Graf, Eayser, Oolenso (in part), etc., that
JBzekiel himself must be the author of these sections.
" Amidst all the peculiarities," wrote Graf, " by which these
passages, and especially chap, xxvi., are distinguished from
the other portions of tlie Pentateuch, there is exhibited so
strai^ an agreement in thought and expression with
Ezekiel, that this cannot be accidental, nor can be explained
by reference to the sameness of the circle within which
Ezekiel and the writer worked, but leads necessarily to the
assumption that Ezekiel himself was the writer." ' Subse-
quently, when this theory was effectually disproved, on the
basis of a wider induction, by E^lostermann, Noldeke, and
Kuenen, the view was adopted that the writer was some
one a>cquaifUed with Ezelnel^ who, in Euenen's words,
"imitated him, and worked on in his spirit"' This,
however, is too evidently a makeshift, and does violence
also to all probability; for how should an ''imitator" be
supposed to have picked out just these isolated expressions
of Ezekiel, and inserted them into a Code presenting
throughout such marked peculiarities ? " That the Law of
Holis^ is formed after the model of Ezekiel's speech," says
Delitzsch, "is, to unprejudiced literary criticism, a sheer
impossibility." ^ The only view which simply and naturally
meets the case is that favoured also by Dr. Driver ^ — ^viz.,
that the prophet tvas acquainted with and uud the law in
question^ which, therefore, is older than himself.
^ For listB of pttFalleli ct ColeiiBo, Pmt Pt tL pp. 5-10 ; Drivvr,
InirodL p. 147 ; Carpenter, Htx, i- P(>* 147--48, eto.
' OuchichL BUchsr, p. 81 ; of. GoleDBO, ts aboYe, chapa. L,tii.
* Hex. p. 276. See below, p. 889.
4 Lathardt's ZeU9ckr\ft, 1880, p. 619.
*I>r. Drirer says: ''Hib [EEekiers] book appears to oontain clear
•Tidence that be was acquainted with the Law of Holineei. ... In
each instance he expresses himself in terms agreeing with the Law of
Holiness in such a manner as only to be reasonablT explained by the
sapposition that it formed a body of precepts with which he was fiuniliar,
ana which he regarded as an anthoritatiTe basis of moral and religions life."
— IntrocL pp. 145-46 ; of. p. 149 : "It may further be taken for granted that
the laws of U — at least the principal and most characteristic laws — are prior
toEsekiel." So Ryle, Oiamon, pp. 72 if. Dillmann says : *' Ezekiel lires and
moves in the precepts of the Law of Holiness." — Nvm.-Joe. p. 646.
3IO DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
Thia yields at once certain important condudona. It
demonstrates, in the >Er^ place, the fallacy of the statement
that no priestly vrritten law existed before the exile— for
here is at least one important Code of priestly law; and,
second, it opens up large vistas of possibility as to the
extent of this written law, and casts valaable light on
the pre-exilian existence of many disputed institutions.
Critical ingenuity, indeed, is amply equal to the fresh
task of dissecting the Code it has discovered — of dis-
tinguishing in it a P^ and P*, even an H^, H^ H', and of
rel^^ting to later hands everything which it thinks un-
suitable.^ Thus Baentsch, a recent writer, distinguishes
between chaps. xviiL-xx. (H^) as post-Deuteronomic, but
prior to Ezekiel, and the group later than Ezekiel, chaps.
xxi-xxiL (H^), and finally chaps. xviL and xxvi (H*).'
On the whole, however, the tendency of critical opinion
has been to enlarge the scope of this ''Law of HoUness"
rather than to contract it ' — ^the expansion, when the assump-
tion of late date gives the critic a free hand, assuming
sometimes quite remarkable proportion&^ Even if some
degree of redaction is admitted, it remains certain that
in these chapters of Leviticus with which Ezekiel shows
himself so closely in rapport, laws are embedded relating
to the most contested points in Israel's religion. This
Code is, in fact, in a very real sense, the quintessence of
Leviticid law. We find in it, to adduce only main instances,
' Xofliien Iajb down aomewliat niiTtly the foUowins canon for identifying
the fragments of P^ : *' We may assign to P with Y&h probability (a) the
eeotions which obTionaly are not a pert of P*, with its later amplificationa,"
etc.— AsELp. 277.
• Da$ BiaigMUft9tia, 1898.
' With, anin, llie nenal wide dlveigenoe. " Thna," sayi Garpenter,
" Driver asonbee to this doonment Ex. yi. 6-8 ; zii 12 ; zxzi. 18-14 ;
Lot. z. 9a. 10 ; zi 44 ; Nam. zr. 87-41, while Addie allows only Lev. zL
48-45, and Nnm. zr. 87-41."— JETess. L p. 146. See nezt note.
^The foUowing from Carpenter will iUnstrate: " Other aoholan^ «gun,
like Wnrster, Oomill, Wfldeboer, fnrther propoee to inclnde witfain it a
oonaiderable group of Levitical laws more or lees oognate in enlyect and
s^le. • . . Are ail these [passagee included by Driver] to be regarded aa
relios of P^ t In that ease it must have oontained historical aa weU aa
legislatiye matter on an eztensiTe scale. It must have related the oommia-
sion to Moses, the death of the firttbom, the eatabliahment of the dwellings
and the dedication of the Lerites to Tahweh's service. Eren if the lattsr
passages be denied to V^, the implications of £z. yL 6-8 suggest that the
document to which it belonged comprised an account of the Ezodua, the
ffreat religious institutions, and the settlement in the land nromiaed to tha
forefathers," etc. — Sex, p. 145. The vista, indeed, is widenmg I
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 311
the Aaronic priesthood/ the high priest/ sin- and trespass-
offerings * the day of atonement,^ the thiee historical
feasts/ the sabbatic year/ the year of jubilee/ the Levitical
cities,* eta We shall think twice, and require strong
evidence, before surrendering all this, at the bidding of
critical theory, to poet-exilian hands.
3. Accepting it as established that the Law of Holiness,
and other Levitical laws, were known to Ezekiel, we mav
now carry the argument a considerable way higher, with
fresh confirmation of the result already reached. It is
essential to the Wellhausen hypothesis to prove that the
Levitical Code is posterior to Ezekiel; it is still more
indispensable for its purpose to show that it is later than
Deuteronomy. But is this really so ? The assertion is, no
doubt, oontmually made ; but on this point, once more, the
critical camp is keenly divided, and there appears the
dearest evidence that^ as the older scholars all but
unanimously maintained, the author of Deuteronomy is
familiar with, and in his legislation actually embodies or
alludes to, many provisions of the Levitical Code. Here
again Dr. Driver will be our witness, though this time,
perhaps, against his own intention. At first sight, indeed,
this careful scholar seems altogether against us. "The
pre-exilic period,'' he tells us, '' shows no indications of the
legislation of P being in operation. . . • Nor is the l^;is-
lation of P presupposed in Deuteronomy."^ Ere long,
however, we discover that here, also, alter the critical
fashion, we have to difltingin'sh two Dr. Drivers (Dr.^ and
Dr.^ shall we say?)— a first, who contends unqualifiedly
that the pre-exilic period ''shows no indications of the
legislation of P," and a second, who admits that it is
o^y *' the eomplded Priests' Code ** that is unknown before
the exile, and that "the contradiction of the pre-exilic
literature does not extend to the whole of the Priests'
Code indiscriminately."^^ Citation is made of Deut xiv.
> L0T. zrii 2 ; zzi. 1, 17, 21, eto* * Chap. zxi. 10-15.
* Ohaps. ziz. 21, 22 ; xxiii 19. « Chaps, xziii. 27-32 ; xzr. 9.
* Chap, xziii. * Chap, xrr, ^r-l. f Cha^. zzr. 8 ff.
' Chap. xzr. 82, 88. The notice of the cities is the more yaluaUe that
it oomes m ineidentallj in connectioii with a different snbject.
* IfUTod» pp. 186, 187. Cf. aboTe, p. 800.
^ Ibid, p. 142 (italics are Dr. D.'s). As statements so discrepant within a
short compass can hardly be supposed to come from the same pen, we are
312 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
4-20, but in the remarks that follow there is a slight yaria-
tion between the first and the revised editions of the
Introduction which deserves attention. We quote the first
edition, as better representing the facts, and give the revised
form below.^ " Here," it is said, " is a long passage virtually
identical in Deuteronomy and Leviticus; and that it is
borrowed by D from P — or at least from a priestly collec-
tion of toroth — rather than conversely, appears from
certain features of style which connect it with P and not
with Deuteronomy. ... If so, however, one part of P was in
existence when Deuteronomy was written ; and a presump-
tion at once arises that other parts were in existence also.
Now the tenor of Deuteronomy as a whole conflicts with
the supposition that all the institutions of the Priests' Code
were in force when D wrote ; but the list of passages just
quoted shows that some were, and that the terminology
used in connection with them was known to D."' The
" list'' referred to gives in parallel columns a long catalogue
of passages of Deuteronomy corresponding " with P (includ-
ing H),' with note of some peculiarities in the mode of
quotation.' On another page it is said : " In Deuteronomy
the following parallels may be noted," with list again given *
These are significant admissions, and completely dispose of
the unqualified statements first quoted. Beduced to its
real dimensions, Dr. Driver's argument only is that some
of the cJiaraeteristic institutions of P — e,g., the distinction
of priests and Levites^conflict with the tenor of D;' and
even this contention, resting largely on the argument from
silence, cannot be allowed the weight he attaches to it. As
he himself says : " That many of the distinctive institutions
of P are not alluded to — the day of atonement, the jubilee
year, the Levitical cities, the sin-offering, the system of
driyen back, on critical principles, upon the supposition that the work is
really the composition of a Driver ** school " whose members vary slightly in
their standpoints — a hypothesis which other indications support.
^The 7th edition reitMls: "Here is a long passage m great measure
verbally identical in Deuteronomy and Leviticus, and a critical comparison
of the two texts makes it probable that both are divergent recensions of a
common original, which in each case, but specially in Leviticus, has been
modified in accordance with the spirit of the book in which it was in-
corporated. It is thus apparent tnat at least one collection of priestly
toroth, which now forms jwrt of P, was in existence when Deuteronomy
written," etc. (p. 145). The rest as above.
" Ibid. pp. 137-88 (Ist edit). » Ibid. pp. 73-76.
^Ibid, p. 144. •iWd. p. 187.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. I. THE CODE 313
Bacrifices prescribed for particular days — is of less import-
ance: the writers of these [historical] books may have
found no occasion to mention them." ^ The argument from
silence applies nearly as much to the parts of the law
which he admits to have existed, as |to those which he
thinks did not exist ; and as much to praxis as to Code.^
However the matter may appear to Dr. Driver, it is
certain that to many able critics,^ looking at the facts from
a different point of view, the evidence seems conclusive
that Deuteronomy toas acquainted with the laws of P.
"The Deuteronomic legislation/' says Eiehm positivelv,
"presupposes acquaintance with the Priestly Code.' ^
Dillmann puts the Priests' Code earlier than Deuteronomy,
and the Law of Holiness, named by him S [= Sinai], in the
main earlier still.^ He says : ** That D not merely knows
priestly laws, but presupposes them as well known, appears
from many passages of his book." ^ " It is just as certain
that D presupposes and has used other laws (S) which now
lie before us in the connection of A [ = P]."^ Oettli says :
** Here certainly such laws as now lie before us only in the
codification of P appear as well known and in validity."*
He agrees with Delitzsch and the others quoted that
Deuteronomy shows itself acquainted with the priestly
laws.^ Baudissin also puts the Law of Holiness before
Deuteronomy.^^ These judgments of leading critics, which
might be largely multiplied, are not based on slight grounds.
The proofis they offer are solid and convincing. We can as
before only give examples, but these will sufficiently indicate
the line of argument
* Introd. p. 187. The author, accordingly, faUa back on "the dififerent
tone qf Reeling, and the different spirU " of the historical boolcs ; and allows
tiiat "it is not so much the institutions in themselres as the system with
which they are associated, and the principles of which in P they are made
more distmctly the expression, which seem to bear the marks of a more
adyanced stage of ceremonial observance " {ibid, p. 152). Thus the matter
tends to get refined away. Cf. Dr. A. B. Dayidson on the argument from
silence, q[uoted in Note 0 aboye. »
* Dr. Driyer makes a point of the difference in the mode of quotation in
Deuteronomy from, or reference to, JB and P respectiyely {ibid, j>p. 76, 187).
But his statements need qualification. See Note D on Quotations from JB
and P.
> £.g, Dillmann, Delitzsch, Riehm, Kittel, Oettli, etc.
« EtfOeit. L p. 218. * Num^'Joa. pp. 644-47» 660.
* iMd. p. 606. . ' Ibid. * Dmt,, Introd. p. 14.
•Ibid. p. 16. ^ Did. cf BibU, ir. p. 82.
314 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
Deut. xiv. 4-20 (on clean and unclean animals) is, as Dr.
Driver admits, "^ in great measure verbally identical " with
Lev. XL 4-20.
The permission to kill and eat flesh at home in Deut.
ziL 15^ 20 ff., presupposes and modifies (in view of the
entrance into Canaan, ver. 20) the stringent law in Lev. xviL
1-3, that all slaying was to be at the tabernacle door;^
and the reiterated prohibitions of eating the blood (vers. 16,
23-25) rest on the enactments in P on the same subject
(Lev. zviL 23-25; c£ Qea. iz. 4; Lev. liL 17; viL 26,
27, eta).
In Lev. XL there is a law relating to the eating of things
that die of themselves (vers. 39, 40 ; cf. chap, xvii 16, 16) ;
in Deut xiv. 21 there stands a law which, with some modi-
fication, presupposes the former. This is marked by the
use of the word ** carcase " (Heb.). The discrepancy aU^ed
to exist between the laws probably arises from the prospect
of altered conditions in Canaan.'
" The year of release *' in Deut. xv. 1 ffi glances at the
Sabbatic year of Lev. xxv. 2 ff.
The law of the Passover in Deut. xvL 1 & presupposes
throughout the law in Ex. xiL (P), and modifies it in the
important respect that the Passover is to be no longer a
domestic festival, but is to be observed at the central
sanctuary (vers. 5, 6). This implies the earlier family
observance, while it is inconceivable that a law ordaining
the home observauce should arise after Deuteronomy.
The references to uncleanness in Deut xxiiL 9, 10, imply
a knowledge of laws of ceremonial impurity, as in Lev. xv.
Deut. xxiv. 8 expressly affirms the existence of a Mosaic
law of leprosy given to the priests (cf. Lev. xiii, xiv.).
Deut xxiL 30 certainly does not intend to limit the
crime of incest to this one case, but, as Delitzsch says,* has
in view the whole series of enactments in Lev. xviiL 7 ff.
It has before been pointed out that in Deut xviiL 2 we
have a verbal reference to the provision for the Levites in
Num. xviii. 20 ff. In the same chapter we have parallels
in vers. 10, 11 to Lev. xviii. 21 ff., xix. 26, 31, etc.
^ Ka«nen by a peculiar logie will havo it that the oommand in DentflM*
nomy €xelwU§ &e law in Levitioas; why, OettlisayB, ia "nneifiiidlioh''
(IkuL p. 14).
* Gl p. 276 above and Note there.
* Gmiuii^ I p. 42. See Delitzaoh's whole liat, pp. 41-42.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. I. THE CODE 315
It will be Been, even from this selection of instances,
that the references more or less explicit to priestly laws in
Deuteronomy cover large sections of the Levitical legislation,
«^., Lev. XL, xiii., xiv., xv., xviL, xviii, xix.; Num. xviiL 20 ff.
eta If, with Dr. Driver, we fall back on the assumption
of ''old laws," then these old laws must have been so
extremely like those we possess in Leviticus, that it is
hardly worth disputing about the differences, and the
argument against the pre-exilian existence of the Levitical
laws goes for nothing.
The Icfflslation of P, therefore, is in manifold ways
implied in Deuteronomy. On the other hand, thepecuiiaritiei
of JDeuUronomy are not in any degree reflected in the Levitical
law. There is allusion to the priestly law in Deuteronomy,
but the Priestly Code is apparently ignorant of Deuteronomy,
and certainly does not depend on it^ What conclusion can
we draw from such a fact but that the Priestly Code is the
earlier of the two ?
y. DiFFicuLms OF THE Cbitigal Thxobt Of
iNsnxunoNB
An important part of our argument remains, viz., to
show the untenableness of the ri^ critical explanation of
those institutions for which a poet-exilian date is claimed.
The institutions in any case are there in post-exilian times,
and have to be explained. If the account which the Old
Testament itself gives of them is not the true one, how did
they originate ? On this constructive side, as palpably as
anywhere else, the critical theory breaks down. We begin,
as a chief example, with the Esekiel theory of the ori^ of
the Levitical order, then shall pass to the consideration of
feasts and other institutions.
L A chief part of the argument on institutions relates
to the fundamental question — already so often referred to —
of the dietincHon of priests and Zevitee, That distinction,
in the view of the critics, did not exist when Deuteronomy
was composed in the reign of Josiah: it is a prominent
feature in the Priests' Coda How was the transition
^ Ot DiUmAim, Num.'-Joi. p. 668. See list of ioftanoes whidh x«xider
at least probable, in his yiew (as respects law in B certain), dependence of
Deuteronomy on the Priestlj Code, pp. 606-7, 610.
3i6 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
effected? The answer given to this — ^hinted at by Graf,'
developed by Kuenen ' and Wellhausen,* and now a cardinal
article of faith in all sections of the school^ — is, through
the degradation of the idolatrous priests, i,e., the ''dis-
^ established priests " of the high places, on the lines sketched
by Ezekiel in chap. zliv. 4 ff. In Kuenen's view the man
, who is not prepared to accept this explanation is only
deserving of pity.^ Wellhausen indicates his estimate of
; ' the importance of the contention in the remark : " The position
f of the Levites ia the Achilles heel of the Priestly Code.**^
We agree, in the sense that it is the most vulnerable part
' in the new schema
f The Ezekiel theory of the critics is bound up with so
many subsidiary hypotheses, and involves so many question-
begging assumptions, that it is not easy to disentangle it in
its simplicity. Its comer-stone, e.g.^ is the assumption that
the Levites for whom provision is made in Deut. zviiL 6, 7
are " the disestablished priests " of the hamoth — an assumption
which we r^ard aS baselesa When we turn to Ezekiel
zliv. 4 ff. itself, what we find is that the prophet denounces
the house of Israel for having permitted strangers, un-
circumcised in heart and flesh, to perform the subordinate
services of the sanctuary (vers. 7, 8) ; that he forbids this to
be done in the future (ver. 9) ; that he degrades to the rank
of servants in the sanctuary those priests who had turned
aside, and had caused the people to turn aside, to idolatry
(vers. 10-14) ; and finally, that he confines the priesthood
in his new temple to the sons of Zadok, who alone had
remained faithful (vers. 15, 16). There is certainly in these
verses degradation of priests to that lower rank of service
which the Priestly Code assigns to the Levites ; but this is
very far from proving that we have here the origin of the
order of the Levites, or from explaining the representa-
tion of the Priestly Code, which diverges as widely as
it is possible to do from the lines of Ezekiel's ordinance.
There are admittedly difficulties in the interpretation
of Ezekiel's vision; but the difficulties in the way of
> OesehiM, BCeher, p. 46.
* J20/. qf Israel^ ii. p. 168 ; Sex, pp. 298 ff.: o£ p. 205.
* ffiaL <fl9rad, pp. 122 ff.
^ Easter, Smend, KAutzsch, W. B. Smith, Driver, etc (Eonig agiect witii
the critioB here).
* Sw, p. 20S. * Hist, oflsraa, p. 167,
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 317
accepting this reading of its meaning are to our mind
insurmountable.
(1) That the temple service prior to the exile was in a
dephrdbU condition — that both in and out of the temple the
priesthood had largely fieJle^^nto abominable idolatries— all
indications show.^ Irr^utmties abounded, and the prophet
is sufficient witness that the place which the law gives to
the Levites had been mostly usurped by uncircumcised
strangers.' But the first point evidently which claims
notice here is, that this very ministry of the uncircumcised
the prophet denounces as an iniquity, a violation of God's
covenant, and the setting up by the people of keepers of
His chaise in His sanctuary for themselves (vers. 7, 8).
This ministry, therefore, was not, in his view, a lawful
thing, but a breach of law, an abomination like the idolatry
itself. What, then, in the prophet's mind, was the lawful
order? who, prior to the degradation of the idolatrous
priests, toere the lawful keepers of the charge of the
sanctuary ? Not the priests themselves, for the services in
question were subordinate nunistries — ^the very ministries
ascribed elsewhere to the Levites (ver. 11 ; cf. Num. xviii
3, 4). Is not the inference ver^ plain, though the critics
generally ignore it, that, in Ezekiel's view, there did already
exist a law on this subject, which in practice had been
wantonly violated ? * It can hardly be mistaken that the
only properly official classes recogmsed by the prophet in
the service of the temple are Levitical, and that these are
distinguished into a higher and a lower class — the keepers
of the charge of the house (chap. xL 45), and the keepers of
the charge of the altar (ver. 46). The unfaithful priests
are punished by being degraded to the lower rank.^
(2) The next point to be borne in mind is, that this
programme of Ezekiel was, and remained, a purely ideal one.
It was probably never intended to have literal realisation ;
it was at least never actually put in force at the return, or
* Gf., €.g., Jer. viL, tUL ; Bzek. TiiL
* On the Tiew adrooated, e.g., by W. B. Smith, 0. T. in J. C, pp. 262-8,
that these already are the goards of the sanotaarr in the reign of Joaah
(1 Kings zL), cf. Van Hoonacker, Le Saoerdoee LMHque, pp. 98 ff.
* Of. Delitnoh, Luthardt's Mtsch^ 1880. pp. 279 ff. ; Van Hoonacker,
Le Saeerdoee LMAque^ np. 191 ff. The nrophet would seem to be familiar
with the name " Levites for the lower oraer distinotiuely (Ezek. zlviii 18 —
« And answerable to the border of the priests, the Levites shall have,** etc.).
^ See Kote B on Levites in Szekiel.
3l8 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
at any earlier time. The degradation it depicts was never
historically carried ont; therefore could not affect the state
of things subsisting after the exile. Scholars have indeed
pleased themselves with pictures of " vehement struggles "
(adumbrated in the story of Koiah) on the part of Ezekiers
degraded priests to r^ain their lost privileges ; ^ but these
^struggles" exist nowhere, so far as we know, but in the
critics' own imaginations, 'for there is no trace in history
that any such degradation ever took place. On the other
hand, we have seen that the distinction of priests and
Levites was already known, and universally recognised, at
the time of the return from exile. The Books of Ezra and
Nehemiah assume it, but in no sense create it. If, there-
fore, this distinction was not made by Ezekiel's law directly,
as little can it have been called forth by the Priests' Code
founded on that law, for the Code did not make its appear-
ance till Ezra's time, long after. It follows, in agreement
with what has been said, that it can only be understood as
an inheritance from pre-exilian times.
(3) Still more decisive, perhaps, is the fact that the
Code, when it did come, by no means corresponded with
Ezekiel's picture, on which it is presumed to be based, but
in many respects stood in direct contradiction with EzekieL
There is, as already said, nothing in the Code to suggest
** disestablished priests," degradation as a punishment, sub-
stitution for uncircumcised strangers, or any of the other
ideas of Ezek. zliv. On the contrary, the Levites are
represented as set apart by Jehovah Himself in Ae
wilderness for His peculiar service, and their position from
the first is one of privilege and honour.' Again, in the
^ Eautzsch, e,ff,f savs : "Again in the narratire of the revolt of the
Eorahites, now blended in Nam. xvi with an older acoonnt of a political
revolt of the Reubenitee, we have a clear reflection of the vehement straggles
(snhsequently burled in deep silence [I]), occasioned by the didike tiie
non-Zadokites felt to the manner in which they were employed in religions
services. " — Lit. <^0.T,, p. 117. It is thus he accounts for the fewness of
the Levites at the return.
'Eautzsch says: "According to Ezek. zliv. 10 ff., the sentence which
reduced the former priests of the high places to the inferior services of the
sanctuary was a deserved ]>uni8hment ; according to the Priests' Code the
service of the Levites, by virtue of a divine appointment, is an honourable
office of which they may be proud " {Und, p. 117). Eautzsoh's theory is, that
the revolts of the non-Zadokites above referred to compelled the priestly
didles "to find another ground for the position of the Levites" (pp.
117-18). Again a pure imagination of the critic
THE PMESTLY WHITING. L THE CODE 319
Code, the priesta are not ''sons of Zadok" only (a vital
point in Ezekiel), but the ''sons of Aaron" generally.
Ezekiel can be conceived of as having modelled his picture on
the bams of the Code by limiting the priestly dignity to the
2^okitee ; the Code can never be explained as a construc-
tion from his ideas.
(4) Yet, apparently, this Code, so discrepant with
Ezekiel, harmonised with the people's own recollections and
traditions, since we find that they vmhesitatingly received
it. This simple fact, that, according to the history, the
provisions of the Code'^were received without questioning
by priests, Levites, and people alike, is of itself sufficient to
overthrow the theory that the distinction was a new one,
due to the initiative of EzekieL How possibly oovld such a
thing as the critics suppose ever have happened ? Had the
Zadokites nothing to say about the loss of the exclusive
position given them by Ezekiel ? Were the Levites content
that certain families of their number — the non-Zadokite
Aaronites — should have the priestly prerogatives which
£2ekiel had denied them, while others had not? If the
records do not deceive us, both priests and Levites knew
something of their own past They had many links with
that past by genealogies and otherwisa If the Levites or
their fiithers had been disestablished priests of high places,
they must have been perfectly aware of the fact. Yet the
Levites assent to have a position given to them which
agrees neither with their own recollections, nor with the
rights of priesthood alleged to be accorded to them in
L^uteronomy, nor with the degradation theory of Ezekiel —
whidi is thus condemned on every side as unhistorical.
That such a patent make-believe should have succeeded is
on the face of it incredibla Even had priests and Levites
been willing to acquiesce in the new mock status, the
people on whom the fresh and heavy tithe-burdens fell
would not have been likely to do so. The longer, in fact,
the theory is pondered, the more untenable it must appear.
2. What applies to the critical explanation of the dis-
tinction of priestQ and Levites applies with not less force to
the explanations offered of other instittUians, whose pre-
exiUc existence is called in question. We take a few of
the more typical instancea
(1) There are the three great featU of the nation —
320 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
pasBOver, or unleavened bread, the feast of weeks, and
the feast of tabernacles : these are robbed of their historical
reference, and declared to be mere agricultural observances^^
locally observed till the age of Josiah, when Deuteronomy
centralised them. The ceremonial character, in particular,
stamped on them hj the Priestly Code is held to be wholly
post-exilian. But no tenable account is given of this
sadden rise of agricultural festivals into historical signifi-
cance, and of their unquestioned acceptance as feasts having
this historical meaning, in the age of Ezra. Special assault
is made upon the Biblical account of the institution of the
passover, and of its association with the Exodus. Tet we
have seen that the law in Ex. xiL 3 ff. is unintelligible, as
framed for a domestic observance of the passover, unless
it is placed before the centralisiug ordinance in Deutero-
nomy; while the latter by its use of this name pesach
(passover),^ its reference to the month Abib (chap, xvi 1),
and its djjstinct historical allusions (vers. 3, 6), as clearly
presupposes the older law. The three feasts appear from the
first, in all the Codes, as national (not local) feasts ; ' and in
every instance, with but one exception, the passover, or feast
of unleavened bread, is directly connected with the Exodus,
lliat one exception, Strang to say, is the most instructive
of all as a refutation of the critical theory. It is the
priestly law of Lev. xxiii 4 ff. ; yet it alone (1), as said, lacks
a reference to the Exodus; (2) contains the regulation
about presenting a sheaf of first-fruits which gives the feast
any agricultural character it has ; while (3) neither in it,
nor in the law for passover offerings in Num. xxviii 16 ff.,
is mention made even of the paschal lamb.' So that we
have this curious result, in contradiction of the critical
theory, that the historical reference comes in at the
Uginmng, and the agricultural at the end of the
development !
How, now, on the other hand, do the critics explain
the name '' passover" and the historical reference attached
to this feast ? Only, it must be replied, by again arbitrarily
blotting out the history we have, and indulging in con-
' Wellhaiuen says thia word "first oooors In Denteronoiny/' a statement,
of oonrse, whioh (1) begs the qnestion as to the date of Ex. ziL, and (2)
Ignores Ex. xxxiv. 26.
* Ex. Txm. 14-19 ; xxxiT. 18-26 ; Ley. xxiii. ; Dent xri. I-IT.
* See Note Tf on AUeged Contradictions in the PassoTer Laws.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 321
jectures of their own, about which there is no agreement.
Wellhausen, e.g,y will have it that the Exodus was, in the
tradition, connected with the demand to be permitted to
observe a spring festival, a chief feature of which was the
offering of firstlings. Cause and effect became inverted,
and instead of the festival being the occasion of the
Exodus, it came to be regarded as occasioned by it. Out
of this grew — hew we are not told — the storj of the slaying
of the firstborn in Egypt Even so the meaning of the
name ''passover** is allowed to be "not clear." ^ As the
history stands, both the passover rite, and the dwelling
in booths which gives the feast of tabernacles its name
(Succoth),* find their appropriate explanation; but it is
impossible to conceive how, in the full light of history,
these meanings could come to be imported into them at so
late an age as Ezra's.
The notices of the feasts in the history are, it is allowed,
scant. But they are more numerous than Wellhausen
admits, and, such as they are, unless again we arbitrarily
reject the narratives, they contradict his theory, and are in
keeping with the law. At the head of the series stands
the ol^ervance of the passover in Ex. xii, and the
wilderness obbervance in Num. ix. 4, 6, which gives rise to
a supplementary ordinance. Then comes the oj^ervance of
the passover under Joshua at Gilgal in Josh. v. 10, 11.
Passing the yearly feast of Jehovah at Shiloh (tabemades ?
Judg. xxi. 19 ; 1 Sam. L 3, 7, 21), we have a general reference
to the three feasts in Solomon's reign (1 Kings ix. 26 ; cf.
2 Chron. viiL 13), and special allusions to the feast of
tabernacles in 1 Kings viiL 2, 65, 66 ; xii 32, 33. Hosea
makes allusion to the dwelling in tents at this feast
(chap. xii. 9). The Chronicler records a great observance
of the passover under Hezekiah in a narrative too detailed
and circumstantial to be the work of invention.* Then we
come to the great passover of Josiah, of which it is said
that the like of it had not been held ''from the days of the
Judges that judged Israel"^ The returned exiles under
Zerubbabel observed both the feast of tabernacles and the
1 Hist, cf Israel, pp. 87-88. • Ler. xxiii 81M8.
* 2 Chron. xxx. The Chronicler may he held to " improTe " for homiletio
purposes an existiDg narratiye, but a history like this, withoat any
foandatiou for it, womd be an absolute fraud.
« 2 Kings zziii 21-28 ; of. 2 Chron. xxzr. Iff.
21
322 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
pasBOver according to known laws^^ and the reading of the
law by Ezra was the occasion of another great observance of
the feast of tabernacles, with special reference to the
requirements of Lev. xxiii Here again it is declared
that such a feast had not been observed "since the days
of Joshua the son of Nun/'' It is a straining of these
passages in Kings and Nehemiah, and a contradiction of
their own, testimony, to make them affirm that there had
been no observance of the feasts named in earlier times;
the allusion is evidently to the enthusiasm, spontaneity,
and scrupulous attention to the law, with which the feasts
were observed — ^in the latter case with special regard to
the "booths."*
(2) As a second example, we may glance at the case
of the sin- and trespass-offerings, of which it is allied that
the first mention is in EzekieL^ Sin- and trespass-offerings
were in their nature occasional, and we might readily be
tempted to suppose that they had fallen largely into disuse
in pre-ezilic times. Yet even this would be a rash infer-
ence from silence. It is to be observed that Ezekiel writes
of these offerings, not as something new, but as quite
familiar to his readers;^ they are found also in the Law
of Holiness,' which, we have seen, precedes Ezekiel, and is,
from all indications, very old. Nor is it true that no earlier
trace of them exists. Ps. xl. cannot be put later than the
exile, and is probably earlier, yet in it the sin-offering is
spoken of as a customary sacrifice (ver. 6). Isa. liii. 10
declares that the soul of Jehovah's Bighteous Servant
is made a " guilt- (trespass-) offering.'^ Kuenen allows that
the *' sin-offering " is not unknown to Hosea (chap. iv. 8),
though he fails to find a distinction between the sin- and
the trespass-offering.^ Yet in 2 Kings xii. 16 a clear
reference is made to " trespass-money " and " sin-money,"
which, as Kuenen again grants, must have had a certain
> Ezra iiL 4 ; tL 22. * Neh. yiii. 11 ff.
*Ho8. ziL 0 may suggest that usage has substituted "tents" for
literal "booths."
^ "Of this kind of sacrifice," says Wellhausen, "not a single trace
occurs in the Old Testament before Ezekiel." — Hist, qf Israel, ja. 73.
« Ezek. xL 89 ; xlii. 18 ; xUii. 19 ; xUv. 29 ; xlvi 20. Cf. Dr. A. B.
Davidson, Ezekiel, Introd. p. liv. Cf. Note C.
• Lev. xix. 21, 22 ; xxui. 19.
7 Hex. i>. 210 ; cf. Kittel, Hist, of Hebs. i. p. 114. Even in the Uw
the distinction is not very rigorously kept.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 323
eoxmection with the Levitical offerings.^ Eyen if it be
snppoBed that a custom had grown up of commutation of
the sacrifices by "pecuniary nnes/' the sacrifices and the
law requiring them are still presupposed. The idea of a
trespass-offering was present in some form to the minds
of the Philistdnes in the time of the Judges :* a fact which
shows it to be old. No proper explanation is given of the
when, where, or how, of the introduction of these sacrifices,
on the critical theory.
(3) One of the most daring strokes of the Wellhausen
criticism is the denial of the existence of the incenae-offeriv^
in pre-exilic times, and, as involved in this, the denial of an
altar of incense, not simply in the supposed imaginary
tabernacle, but even in the Solomonic temple. Wellhausen
goes still further, and, in face of the express statements in
1 Mace. L 21 ff. ; iv. 49, that the golden altar and golden
table were both carried away by Antiochus Epiphanes,
and renewed at the feast of the dedication, casts doubt on
the existence of an altar of incense even in the second
templa' The chief ground for these denials is the fact
that, in Exodus, the command for the making of the altar
of incense does not appear where we might expect it, in chaps,
xxv.-xxix., but at the commencement of chap. xxx. How
arbitrary the procedure is, is shown by the clear testimony
of at least four passages of the history (1 Kings vi 20^ 22 ;
viL 48 ; ix. 25 ; cf. 2 Chron. iv. 19) to the construction and
presence of the golden altar in the temple of Solomon.^
The critical theory of the tithe-laws, of the Levitical
cities as transformations of the Bamoth, and other matters,
have already been referred to.*
3. In conducting the above argument, we have laid little
stress on incidental words or alivMons in either the historical
or the prophetical books which might seem to indicate
acquaintance with the Levitical legislation. These allu-
sions, though not decisive in themselves, are more numerous
^ Hex. p. 211 ; of. Dditzaoh, Lnthardf 8 ZeUichrift, 1880, p. 8.
« 1 Sam. Ti 8. » Hist, of laraa, ©p. 64-67.
* Delitzach admirably showB the groundlessness of Wellhansen's general
reasonings, and ^rticularly of his assertion that " the golden altar in the
sanctuary is originally simply the golden table " {Hist, p. 66), in his article
on the subject in Zeit8ehr0, 1880, pp. 113 ff. Ezekief, whom Wellhausen
eitss in his laTour, is shown to be really a witness against him.
* See aboTe, pp. 276, 290, etc.
324 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES.
than the critics are wont to allow, and, when a pre-exilian
origin of Levitical laws is independently rendered
probable, acquire enhanced importanca Joel, e.^., which
used to be regarded as one of the earliest of the prophetiod
books, has many allusions which suggest the ritual code —
the sanctuary and its altar in Zion, priests, blowing of
trumpets, fasts, solemn assemblies, meal and drink-offenngs,
etc^ — and is now, largely for this very reason, regarded by
the Wellhausen school as post-exilian.* Yet we question
if the allusions in Joel are more definite than those of the
earlier prophets, or would, on critical principles, sufBce any
more than these, to establish a knowledge of the written
law, which is yet allowed to have been in existence when he
wrote. Not to dwell on Amos (e.^., chap. v. 21, 22), we may
cite such a passage as Isa. L 13, 14 : *' Bring no more vain
oblations ; incense is an abomination unto Me ; new moons
and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, — I cannot away with
iniquity and the solemn meeting. Tour new moons and
your appointed feasts My soul hateth," etc. (cf. ver. 11;
chaps, iv. 5 ; xxxiiL 20 — " the city of our solemnities "). The
vocabulary of this passage — "assembly'' (convocation),
" solemn meeting,'' '^ appointed feasts," etc. — and the allusions
to festivals and sacrifices, are entirely suggestive of the
Levitical law (cf. Lev. xxiii. ; Num. xxviiL ; cf. Deut xvi 8).
Beference was before made to the allusions in the prophets
to a cycle of feasts, of which little or nothing is said in the
history. Thus, Isa. xxix. 1 : " Let the feasts come round " ; or
Nah. i 15 : ** Keep thy feasts, 0 Judah, perform thy vows."
It cannot be overlooked, further, that the prophets
constantly assume the people to be in possession of " statutes,"
or " statutes and judgments " ' — ie., of fixed laws — evidently
of considerable extent, and, we must suppose, written. That
1 Joel L 9, 18, 14 ; iL 1, 15-17, etc
*Dahm, who led the way here, said in his Theol. der PrqpK (1875)
that at that time scholars almost unanimously put Joel early (p. 71). His
own proofs are mainly a hogging of the question of the post-ezilian origin of
the Law. He descrioes Joel as an " epigon/' with a great gift for form,
but not mucli burdened with thoughts. The theory is oombated by
Delitzsoh, Orelli, Reuss, Professor J. Bobertson, Eirkpatrick, and others.
Delitzsch said of it : '' The bringing down of Joel into tne post-exilio stfe by
Duhm, Merx, Stade, and others, is one of the most rotten fruits of the
modern criticism."— 0.7. ffist. of Redemption, p. 118 (E.T.).
* Amos ii. 4 (lUY.) ; Jer. zliy. 10 ; Ezek. y. 6, zi. 12, eto. Qt Ltr.
zyii-zzri., and Denteronomy (constantly).
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 325
such " statutes " were covered by the word torah (instruction,
law) we see no reason to doubt. Here comes in that much-
debated passage, Hos. viil 12 : ** Though. I write for him mj
law in ten thousand precepts (RY. marg,^ " wrote for him
the ten thousand things of my law "), ^^^Y ^'^^ counted as
a strange thing." ^ If this does not point to written law of
considerable compass, it is difficult to know what form of
words would. Smend, at an earlier stage, foimd, as was
before shown,* Hosea and Amos impregnated with
Levititmus {e,g., Hos. iz. 3-6). It may be observed that
Hosea has also, in the view of many, unmistakable assonances
with Deuteronomy.' When to these indications in the
prophets we add what was before said of allusions in the
historical books to ark, tabernacle, Aaronic priesthood, high
priest, ephod, shewbread, etc., and of the evidence which
these books afford of a knowledge of festivals, of sacrifices
(burnt - offerings, peace-offerings, meal - offerings, drink-
offerings, probably sin-offerings as well), of ritual of worship,
of laws of purity, of clean an^ unclean food, of leprosy, of
consanguinity, prohibitions of eating blood, etc. — we may
begin to feel, with Dillmann, that the allusions in history
and prophecy are well-nigh as numerous as we had any
right to expect
Of the law itself, we would only say in closing, in
opposition to the purely secular, and often unworthy, views
of its or^in we have been discussing, that it is pervaded by
a spirit of holiness, and, in its aim and structure, is as
unique as all the other parts of the Jewish religion.
^ Wellliaiiten renders thiB passage : " How many soeyer my instructions
may be, they are oonnted those of a stranger." — Hist. 0/ Israel, d. 67. This
leaves oat utogether the word of chief importance— " write." Delitcsch
thinks that passages like Hos. iv. 6 ; viii. 1 ; Amos ii 4 ; Isa. L 11-14 show
" that a codes of the Mosaic law was already in existence in the time of tiie
prophets of the eighth centniy," and says : " with the last passage we may
compare Hos. yiii. 12, which should be translated, ' were I to write for him
the myriads of my law, they would be regarded as strange,' that is, a stiU
more extensire Torah would have the same fate as the ezisthig one." Then,
afte quoting Smend's translation, '' I wrote for him myriads of my law,"
he says : "These words of Hosea certainly indicate, as eyen Sohrader
acknowledges, the existence of a divinely obligatoiy law in the fonn of a
eodez."— IfdM. JPrcpheeies (E.T. 1880), p. 11.
a Aaa aboye n. 169.
* 01 Hos. L 8, xiii 8, zui. 6, with Dent, yii 18, yiu. 7-20, zi. 14-16 ;
Hos. yiii 11, with Dent. zii. ; Hos. zii 18, with Deut. zviii. 18 ; Hos. iy.
4, with Deut. zylL 12 ; Hos. yiii 18, ix. 8, with Deut. zxyiii. 68 ; Hos.
zi 8. with Deut. zziz. 28 ; Hos. zii. 7, with Deut. zzy. 18-16« etc
326 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
^ Whateyer the formal resemblances, the Levitical law had
nothing essentially in common with heathen ritnal, but
rested on a basis of its own. No heathen religion had a
system based on the idea of the holiness of Gk>d, and
Svemed by the design of restoring and maintaining
ilowship with Gk)d, and the peace of conscience of the
worshipper, by the grace of atonement. For this was the
real nature of the levitical system. It was designed in all
its parts to impress on the mind of the worshipper a sense
of the separation which sin had put between hun and the
holy God, and provided a means by which the people,
notwithstanding their sin, could have access to Grod, and
enjoy His favour.^ There is nothing in this, if the Bible's
own view of the course of revelation is accepted, incom-
patible with its early origin. It is one of the groundless
assumptions of the newer theory that the idea of expiation
by sacrifice was foreign to the pre-exilian, and earlier
Israelitish, mind. One sufBcient proof to the contrary is
furnished in 1 Sam. ui 14 : " Therefore I have sworn unto
the house of Eli, that the iniquity of Eli*s house shall not
be purged (" atoned for," the Levitical word) with sacrifice
nor offering for ever/'
YI. Tiifs OF Obigin of thb Lsvitioal Law
To sum up our argument thus far : we have sought to
show, on both moral and historical grounds, and by positive
proof to the contrary, that the Graf-Wellhausen theory of a
po8t-:exilian origin of the Levitical Code cannot be upheld.
Its main stronghold is the argument from silence ; but that
silence ia neither so complete as is alleged, nor are the
inferences drawn from it warranted. By a similar argument,
if Deuteronomy were left out of account, it might be proved
that the Book of the Covenant also, as a written Code, was
not known before the exile. Tet Deuteronomy shows how
erroneous would be such an inference.
If, however, the Priestly Code is not a post-exilian
production, when did it originate? Here we pass over
unreservedly to the standpoint of Wellbausen as a^inst
those mediating critics, who, with more or less admission of
antiquity in parts, assume the law as a whole to have taken
^ OL Heb. ix., x. On Unity of th« Law see aboye, p. 294.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 327
shape in the hands of the priests about the ninth century
Ka, or between that and the time of Deuteronomy — ^but
still only as a quasi-private document, — a '* programme"
struggling for recognition and very imperfectly attaining
it, — and receiving changes and additions as far down as the
exile. Such, in gener^ statement, is the midway theory
advocated by critics like Noldeke, Dillmann, Kittel, and
Baudissin, and against it the more compact and internally
consistent hypothesis of Kuenen and Wellhausen bears
down with irresistible force.^ Such a theory is strong,
indeed, in its proof, as agciinst the Wellhausen contention,
that the Levitical law is older than Deuteronomy, no trace
of whose existence it betrays, while Deuteronomy very
evidently shows traces of its influence, but it is weak as
water in arguing for the existence of a Code which embodies
the idea of the unity of the sanctuary a century or two
before Deuteronomy was heard of, while yet holding, with
the De Wette school, that this idea first came to recognition,
or at least to influence, with the publication of Deuteronomy
in the reign of Josiah. Kuenen is fuUy justifled in protest-
ing against this " idea of the passive existence of these laws
for ages before they had any practical influence."' A
theory which, like that of the older scholars, carries back
the bulk of the laws to Mosaic or immediately post-Mosaic
times, or, again, a theory which, like WeUhausen's, brings
them all down to times subsequent to Deuteronomy, —
which means, practically, to the exile or after, —
can be understood: there is coherence in it But this
intermediate theory, which ascribes to the laws an un-
acknowledged existence — suspends them, as it were, iii the
air — ^in the days of the kings, and supposes them to have
remained inoperative for centuries, is impotent against the
assaults of its energetic opponents.' It encounters all the
difficulties of the older theory, arising from the supposed
> On Kdldake's yiews, of. Wellhanfleii, SibL qf Itraa, pp. 46-61 ;
KiMneD, Eos. Introd. pp. xxxri ff. ForNblddce also tiie tabernade is "a
mere oreatare of the bimin." On the theoiy generally, see Note G on the
Mediating View of the PriesUy Code.
* As aoove, p. zzxL
' Wellhansen ridionles those ** who in blind faith hold fast, not to the
Chnroh tradition — there woold be sense in that — bnt to a hypothesis which
is bnt two decades old, yis., De Wette's discoTeiy that Deuteronomy is more
recent than the Vii&Bta^ Oode,*'^ GekhiefUe Israels, p. 173 fist edit : the
passage is dropped in ProUg,),
328 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES :
silence of the history and conflict with Deuteronomy, and
has none of its compensating advantage& For the la^'
presents in no sense the aspect of a private priestly pro-
gramme, struggling, without success, for recognition and
acceptance. It rests on very definite principles and ideas,
gVes itself out in all seriousness as a Code of wildemeBS
gislation (why, it may be asked, should ninth century
priests throw their "programme" into this form?), and
presents not the slightest trace of hesitation or doubt
in its demands. It ascribes its legislation in obvioas good
faith to Moses, or, more correctly, to Grod through him.
We agree, therefore, that this middle theory of a ** trance-
like" existence of the Levitical Code in the ninth or
eighth century, to the priestly circles of which it owed its
origin, cannot stand before the rigorous logic of the newer
criticism. It is such theories which give the Wellhausen
criticism its "case." We reckon it, indeed, one of the
greatest services of the Graf-Wellhausen scheme that it
effectually cuts otU this mediating, but logically helpless
view which weakly contests the ground with it, and leaves
us fairly face to face with the ultimate alternative — a post-
exilian origin of the law, which many reasons show to be
untenable, or a real antiquity of the law answerable to its
own profession.
It is involved in what has been said that it is the latter
alternative which we adopt, and so come back to the older
position of a substantially Mosaic origin of the laws. It is
not necessarily implied in this that Moses wrote all these
laws, or any one of them with his own pen ; or that they
were all written down at one time ; or that they underwent
no subsequent chaises in drafting or development ; or that
the collection of them was not a more or less gradual
process ; or that there may not have been smaller collections,
such, e.g., as that lying at the basis of the Law of Holiness —
in circulation and use prior to the final collection, or
codification, as we now have it. There ia much plausibility
in Dillmann's conjecture that the Law of HoUness (Lev.
xvii.-xxvL), with its Sinaitic signature (chap. xxvL 46), its
constantly recurring formula, " I am Jehovah your God,*' and
its references to deliverance from the bondage to Egypt, in
its original form stood after the Book of the Covenant in
Ecodus (cf. chap. xxiv. 12), as a summary of the priestly
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. L THE CODE 329
legislation of SinaL^ However this may be — and we lay no
stress upon it — there appears no good ground for assuming
that the general codification was not completed at a very
early date, possibly before the relapse in the time of the
Judges, and probably not later than the early days of the
monarchy. There is nothing we can discover which points
to a later date ; though it does not follow that there may
not have been minor modifications and adjustments after.*
1 Dillmaim, Ex,-Lev, pp. 261, MM.
* See further below, pp. 872 ft
CHAPTER X
DffRcnlttes and perplesf ties of tbe Crfttcal t>i?|)o«
tbcsta : TTbe prfestls TRarf tfno. H. Ubc S>octi«
ment
"A raallj yiTid picture of the mumer in which the dooomenti
interworen cannot be given by merelj stating the nnmben of the
And it is jnst as impossible to state wiUi each dngle Terse or section whether
it is assigned to the dooament in qneetion by all investigators or bj the
minority or only by a few. In the Pentateuch and in the Book of JoehoA
it is only with regard to P that something like unanimity has been reached."
->KaUTZ80H.
" In the present state of Hexatenbh criticism the weightiest qnestiom 1m
not, how mnbh of the Pentatench, as it oomes to ns, has Moses himself
written • • • bat this is the Mtf question i Does the Priestly Writing
contain tmstwortby acconnts of the time and work of Moses, or is eTerything
narrated in it» as the modem 'science' maintains, only defitcement, ikstion,
yea, ' the merest Action,' and foU of oontradictions with the (so^iaUed) alona
old tradition offered by J and E f I ventore to say that in many oases the
alleged contradiction is not present ; elsewhere the word of Angostine holds
good, Distingue tempora et eotieordabU ecripiura ; and in yet other pUoes the
difficulty is occasioned through glosses of other readers— fosses £ar which
we cannot make the redactor or redactors responsible." — Stbaok.
'* I suppress my regret that Wellhansen has still not advanoed to the
point of recognising in the firmly-defined writer Q [bP], whose namtiTe
is compoeed with regard to JE, and enclasps* this element^ as taking the
place of the inner content lacking to itself the evezywhere son^t for and
nowhere found B."— ELOsraucAVir.
OHAPTEB X
DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES OF THE CRITI-
OAL HYPOTHESIS: THE PRIESTLY WRITING.
EL THE DOCUMENT
In nothing are criticfl of all schools more at one than
in the recognition of a writdng, partly historical and partly
legislative, running through the Pentateuch and Joshua,
which, from its linguistic and other traits, has heen
variously described, in the course of opinion, as the Elohist
document, the Orundschrift (primary document), the Ist
Elohist, the Priestly Writing, the Priests' Code, or simply
P.^ Yet the history of opinion on this Priestly Writing,
as on other parts of the documentary theory, has been
a slow development, and has been marked by at least
four critical stages, the general nature of which has already
been indicated.
1. With reference to the compass of the writing, it
has already been seen that all Elohistic matter, or matter
agreeing with the Elohistic in character and style, was
originally assigned to this assumed fundamental document.
Even here, indeed, it was soon found necessary to make
distinctions and multiply parts, but these variations may at
present be disregarded. The first critical point was reached
when, on the ground of its greater affinity with the Jehovist,
Hupfeld removed a considerable part of this Elohistic matter,
and set it up as a separate document, thenceforth known
as E, or the 2nd Elohist. Previously much stress had
been laid on the unity and completeness of the Elohistic
document, as giving " a connected narrative of the theocracy "
from the creation to the settlement in Canaan.' Now,
' WeUluMuen uses the symbol Q (QMa<«or— Book of th« Four CoTeoAata) ;
DOlmum and others nee A for thie document.
> Of. Bleek, InProd, L p. 290.
334 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES :
howeyer, that the 2nd Elohist was cut out of it,
extremelj little, as will be shown, was left to the older
writer in Genesis after chap. xviL, and it was felt
to be curious that the 1st Elohist should become so
extremely fragmentary just where the new writer came
in.
2. In respect to the ag$ of the document, we have seen
how, originally, the Elohistic document was all but uni-
versally recognised as the fundamental part, or Orvmdschrift^
of the Pentateuch, while the Jehovist was viewed as
supplementary.^ A change was prepared for here also bj
Hupfeld's contention that J and E were independent
lu8tbrie& Then came the Graf-Wellhausen upturning,
by which the supposed Orundschrift was lifted from the
beginning of the literary history, and carried down bodilj
to its close. Graf, however, as was formerly mentioned,
did not at first contemplate so great a revolution. He
brought the Levitical laws down to the exile, but was
content to leave the Elohistic history in its old place — ^prior
to Deuteronomy. Subsequently, in deference to Knenen,
he renounced that view, and accepted the late date for
both.* It is carefully to be observed that it was not
critical reasons, but a dogmatic consideration — ^the supposed
necessity of keeping history and laws together — ^which led
Graf to this tour deforce as respects the P history.
3. A difference next emerged in respect of the tiub-
pendence of the document. In putting the Priestly
Writing late, Graf felt that the ground was taken from
the older view that the Orundschrift was an independent
document, complete in itself, and he sought to show, as
Kuenen states it, " that its narratives not only presuppose
those of the Yahwist, but were intended from the first
to supplement them, and to constitute a single whole with
^ See above, p. 201.
* See above, p. 200. Oolenso, in F0iii, Pt tL pp. 679 ff., adhend to, and
contended strongly for, Grafs onmnal view of the lustoiy : thus also in
Pt. yii Carpenter says that " he finally aoqniesced in the modem yiew."—
H9X. i p. 69. If he did, Cheyne does not seem to have known of the
change (Pounders qfCrU. p. 208), and Enenen only says : ** He subsequently
came to the conclusion that he had been at least to some extent mistaken."
—Hex. p. 70 (with reference). We are very certain that whether, under
pressure of the opinion of others, Colenao changed his view or not, he nerer
refuted his own arguments against the late date. A chanffe of thia Vit)^
would mean the collapse of the reasoning of a great part of hu Yolumea.
THE PRIESTLY WMTING. IL DOCUMENT 335
them.''i In this, as we shall seek to show^ Graf proved
himself more logical, and took up a sounder position, than
Kuenen and Wellhausen, who held to the old assumption
that the Priestly Writing originally subsisted by itself.
4 With respect, finally, to the unity of the writing,
a great change has latterly been brought about (1) by the
splitting up of the P document into a P, P*, P', etc., and (2)
by the abandonment of the idea of a single writer for that
of " schools," whose activity extended over a long period.*
This change also strikes a blow at the idea of the P writing
being a complete and independent history, as was at first
imagined.
It will already begin to appear that the problem of the
Priestly Writing is by no means so simple as it is apt to
seem in the neat statements of the text-books. The
difficulties inherent in the current view will, we believe,
only become clearer on nearer inspection.
L Is THBBB A PbDESTLT WbITINO IK BIBTIKOnON
FROM JE?
The initial question is as to the rigJU to speak of
a Priestly Writing,' or style of writing, at all in the
Pentateuch, in distinction from J£, already considered.
Here it is at once to be admitted that the case stands
somewhat difierently from what it did with JK It cannot,
we think, be reasonably disputed, and only a few critics of
the present day, even among the more conservatively
disposed,^ would be prepared to deny, that the sections
ordinarily attributed to P have a vocabulary, and a
^ Hex. pp. zxz, zzzi. See below, p. 841.
* Graf also originally explained in thia way the resemblance of the e^le
of the Levitical laws to the P sections in Genesis. Thus on Gen. zvii. :
"We can only conclude that thia older law of droomoision senred as
a model in formnlatinff laws during the exile and after it, with an aim
at antiquity ... or that these fonnnla were generally at aU times usual
in oertam curoles of priestly legislators, from whom the composition of that
law proceeded."— (7eMAic^ BUektr, p. 98. ^
' In using this onstomary designation we by no means commit ourselves
to the position that the authors are necessarily j?riM(c Golenso vigorously
oombate the idea that the Elohistio sections in Genesis are priesUy, of. Pent.
Pt vi pp. 681 ff. ; App. pp. 126 ff.
^ Thus the late Principal Gave, as already mentioned, in his Ifupiration
qfthsO.T,, distinguishes an Elohistio and a Jehovistio writing in QenesiS|
inclining to attribute both to Motet.
336 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES :
stylistic character, of their own, which render them in the
main readily distinguishable. The case for the distinc-
tion, indeed, is often enormously overdriyen. The long
lists of words alleged to be peculiar to P admit of great
r^uction, many of the marks assumed for the document
are no sure criteria, the skill that distinguishes a P^ P', F*,
P* is continually to be distrusted, some of the descriptions
of the P style are little better than caricatures.^ Yet on
the whole it is a distinct style. It is a style stately and
impressive of its own kind ; in such a chapter as Gten. L rising
to sublimity, iu narrative often exhibiting a grave dignity,
as in Gen. xxiii, occasionally, again, as in the story of
Gen. zxxiv., not readily distinguishable from that of JR'
It is a style, however, less flowing, lively, picturesque,
anthropomorphic than that of JE; more formal, circum-
stantial, precise. We should speak of it in the Book of
Genesis as less a priest-like than a lawyer-like style; the
style of a hand trained to work with laws, genealogies,
chronologies, to put things in r^ular and methodical shape,
to give unity and exactitude to looser compositions. It
is marked by general adherence to the name " Elohim " till
the revelation of the name Jehovah in Ex. vi 2 £F.
We have referred to the limitations with which the
statements often made as to the vocabulary, and other
supposed marks of the P document, are to be received,
and, to form a just idea of the writing, these also need to
be remembered. In sifting the lists of words and phrases
put forth as signs of this document,' we are speedily struck
with the fact that many of them occur only once or twice
^ Wenhansen ezhansta the Tooabulaiy of oontempt in conTeying his idea
of the pedantry, Terboseness, inraflferable tedionsnesB, and barrenness of the
Fnesw Code. " Art-products of pedantry. . . . One would imagine that
he was ffiving specifications to measurers for estimates, or that he was
writing for carpet-makers or upholsterers. ... Of a piece with this
tendency is an indescribable pedantry, belonging to the yer^ being of the
author of the Priestly Code. . . . ifor is it any sign of originality, rather
of senilily/' etc.— ^is^. of Israel, pp. 387, 848, 850, 858. Addis consider-
ately grants that the "intolerable pedantry" of the Priestly Writer in
Ex. zxziy.-zl. is due more to "the successors of the Priestly Writer
and his school " than to the Priestly Writer himself. — ffex, i. p. box.
' What most critics ascribe to P in this narratiTe, Colenso gives to J.
See further below, p. 852.
' The lists may be seen in detail in Dillmann, DriTcr, Carpenter, West-
£hal, etc. The reader will do well to note how small a proportion of tttrnm.
I carried on to Joshua.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. II. DOCUMENT 337
in the Book of Genesis, or in the whole Pentateuch ; that
some belong to particular passages from the nature of their
subject^ and are not general in P, or elsewhere ; that some
are found also in JE ; that other examples are doubtful ( JE
or P) ; that within the limits of P itself the language varies
greatly, and in very few cases are the words uniformly
distributed through the sectiona This statement may be
briefly illustrated. There are few better examples of the
words and phrases of P than the following: '-After his
(their) kind," "be fruitful and multiply," "male and
female," "swarm," "establish (give) a covenant" (JE has
" cut " = make), "self-same day," "possession," "create,"
"expire" (A.V. "die," Gen. vi 17, etc), "substance," etc.
Yet of these, "kind," "swarm," "male and female," occur in
Genesis only in the narratives of the creation and flood.
"Eand" occurs elsewhere only in the laws of clean and
unclean food, Lev. xi (P) and Deut. xiv. (D) ; " swarm " in
the same laws, but also in Ex. viii 3 (JE); "male and
female" three times in ritual passages in Leviticus.
"Create" (bara) occurs only in Gen. i-ii 4; v. 1 (P),
and chap, vi 7 (J), with Deut. iv. 32 (D). " Substance "
occurs five times in P passages in Genesis, but also in
Gen. xiv. (five times), and chap. xv. 14 — ^which are not
P ; elsewhere twice in Numbers. We are probably not un-
warranted in regarding such formula as "be fruitful and
multiply," "establish My covenant," preserved in Gen. i, ix.,
xvii., etc., as very old, and belonging to pre-Moeaic tradition
of covenant and promise.^ It is thus evident that many
of the alleged marks of P are absent from the greater part
of the P writing just as much as from JE ; * too much stress,
therefore, should not be laid on them. The significant thing
is that where they do occur, and are repeated, it is mostly
^ P yarieB the formaU about multiplTing, §,g,t in Bz. L 7 ; and the JE
passages that follow in Ex. L haye olear yerhal referenoea to Fs language
(yer^. 9, 10, 12, 20— in Heb.).
' We cannot follow the late Dr. Green in his denial of a distinct literary
hand in P, but that able scholar is surely justified in pointing out that
*'only two words or phrases noted as charaoteristio of P in chap. L occur
again in Genesis after chap, ix./' and that " after the ooyenant with Abraham
(chap. xyiL), which recalls that of Koab (chap, ix.), almost eyeiy mark of P
in the preceding part of Genesis disappears entirely. Scarcely a word or
phrase that is reckoned charaoteristio of P in chaps, zyii or xxiii. is found
in later chapters of Genesis, except where the transactions of the latter are
explicitly referred to, or the promises of the former are repeated." — OwMrig^
p. 558.
338 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
in P passages. The wide statements one meets with on
this subject need, in fact, constantly to be checked. Mr.
Addis, e.g,^ writes : " He (the Priestly Writer) says * Paddan-
Aram,' not, like the other vyriters, * Aram of the two rivers.' " *
Yet this latter designation ( Aram - Naharaim) actnallj
occurs only once alt^ether (Gen. xxiv. 10). "Destroy,"
sometimes claimed as a P word, occurs, outside the
narrative of the flood (Gen. vL 13, 17 ; ix. 11, 15), onlj
once in P (Gen xix. 29), while it is found repeatedly in
JE passages Many of ^he other criteria of distinction
of P from JE are equally insecure, or depend on false
assumptions. Wellhausen, e.g., finds in P the idea of
''sin, as the root of ruin, explaining it, and capable of
being got rid of," in contrast with J, who is marked " by
a peculiar sombre earnestness . . • almost bordering on
pessimism ; as if mankind were groaning under some terrible
weight, the pressure not so much of sin as of creaturehood" '
Yet P, we are often told, has no knowledge of the fall,
while J has. Elsewhere, also, it is P who is represented
as gloomy, monotonous, and seriou&' Kuenen makes it a
fault of P that he is '' completely dominated by his theory
of a graduated progress alike of the history of mankind
and of the divine revelation," ^ as iiC this were not equally
true of JE.*
II. Question of the Unitt and iNDEPENDSNcaB
OF THE Priestly WRiriNG
When the existence of a P writing, or quality of writing,
in the Pentateuch has been ascertained, we are still only at
the beginning of our investigation. Is this alleged document
a unity ? Had it ever an independent existence ? How is
it related to JE ? Of these questions the most funda-
mental is that which relates to P's existence as an
independent document, but it will clear the way for dealing
^ ffex, p. Izxiii (italics ours).
^Eiai, ofltrael, pp. 814-15. DiUmanii, on the other hand, dedaret
of J that '* especially of all the three narrators does he show the deepest
knowledge of the nature, origin, and growth of sia." — O&nesia, i. p. 15.
Neither r nor E, aooording to these writers, have any account of the
faU.
* SitL of Israel, p. 81. ^ Hex. p. 801.
" See ahr>\ ^ 62.
THE PMESTLY WRITING. IL DOCUMENT 339
with this to consider briefly, first, the question of its nnity
and homogeneous character.
1. The old idea of P was that, whatever its date, it
was essentially a eonneeted narrative from a single pen,
though naturally working up older materials. We have
seen that the case is fundamentally altered when the
individual writer is transformed into a '"school" With
the assumption of a series of priestly writers, belonging to
yet wider ''circles," the later members of the succession
inheriting the vocabulary and methods of the earlier and
continuing their work, unity of composition tends to
disappear. It is now open to account for resemblance of
style by "imitation." As in regard to Deuteronomy we
have a D*, who successfully "imitates" the ideas and style
of D\ with numerous Deuteronomic revisers of historical
books later;^ so we can now speak of a F*, P*, etc, who
"imitate" the style of P^ of an author of the Law of
Holiness who "imitates" Ezekiel,' of a P writer in the
Book of Joshua who "Imitates" the P of Leviticus,' etc.
On this new basis it can no longer be urged that similarity
of style means necessarily sameness of author, or pleaded
that the author who drew up the Levitical laws must be
identical with the author of the P sections in Genesis.
There is no longer anything to preclude the supposition of
Delitzsch, formerly referred to, that the literary activity of
the Elohistic pen may reach back to times nearly approach-
ing those of Moses; ^ or even the belief, if one is disposed
to entertain it, that its earlier models go back beyond the
time of Moses.' The protocol style characteristic of this
writing was certainly not the invention of the people of
Israel, nor its peculiar property ; there are, besides, marked
features distinguishing the Mohist in Genesis from the
^ Ct Eaenen, as quoted aboye, p. 262 : "The great similari^ [of Dent.
L-ir. to the rest of the book] miut be explained as the result of imitation." —
ff^ex L p. 117. "It hardly seems possible to ascribe the Denteronomio
reoension [of Joshna] to a single author ; nor is there anything against our
supposing seraal huids to haye been at work on the same lines " (p. 181).
^See aboye, p. 809. The explanation, says Euenen, of the reUtion
between Ezekiel and P^ is found " m the supposition that P^ was acquainted
with the priest-prophet, imitated him and worked on in Mb spirit • . • It
foUows that in Ley. xxyi, where P^ coincides with Ezekiel, he is Imitatliig
him— sometimes word for word." — Und, pp. 276, 287.
* See aboye, pp. 214 ff. ^ Oenesie, I p. 48. See aboys» p. 207.
*Oen. xiy. snows traoes of this P style, though probably an dd
independent source.
340 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
Levitical writer or writers in the middle books. Colenso,
e.g., in support of this distinction, draws attention to the
curious fact that ''the peculiarities of expression which
distinguish the noTi-Elohistio portions of Genesis, — and
which the Elohist never employs, — appear, almost all of them,
in the Levitical laws or in EzekieL" ^ Colenso himself
supposes that the original Elohistic writing ends with
Ex. vi 2-5.' What is more to our purpose, Wellhauaen,
on his part, finds that after Exodus "the independent
main stock of the Priestly Code more and more gives way
to later additions, and ceases alt<^ther, it appears, at the
death of Moses."' He excludes from it the priestly
portions of the Book of Joshua.^
We do not require to adopt any of these theories to
admit that the &cts just noticed with regard to the
differences of vocabulary and style in different parts of the
P writing give probability to the idea, within, however,
narrower limits, of a process of composition, rather than of a
single author. With this strikingly accords the altered
relations which the P writer is found to sustain to JE in
GenesiB, in the middle books of the Pentateuch, and in the
Book of Joshua, respectively. In Genesis, as is universally
admitted, P furnishes the systematic ''framework" into
which the remaining narratives are fitted.^ In the middle
books the systematic arrangement disappears. The parts
(JE, P) appear as co-ordinate, and are more closely fused
together; the narrative in the mam follows a simple
chronological order ; ^ the laws are interspersed, singly, or
in masses^ as occasion offers. La Jodiua, finally, it is the
> PmL Ft. tL pw 588 (itaHot hia). We shoold prefer to nj, "idmit
of them." OolcDBO makes large nae of this prinoiple of "imitatioii.^
Acoording to him, Uter writers ** ejected the langaage" of the Elohist
(p. 586): "The foUowing [in Ley. xxvi] appear to be imitatioiia of
expresdons in Deuteronomy' (App. p. 8): *' We oaa only oonolnde that
the resemblanoe in question has ansen from a deUberate attempt of the
Levitical writer to imitate the phraseology of the Elohist " (Aj^ p^ 128) ;
though he can on occasion rebuke Kuenen for hii use of it (App. p. 144).
Similarly Gra^ Oeseh. Bikher, p. 98.
* Ibid., p. 576 ; App. pp. 116 £ ; of. Ft T. pp. 197-211.
* Bid, 0/ Israel, p. 857. « Ibid. See above, p. 218.
" "It actually forms," says Kautnoh. "(at least in (Jeneeis) the frame-
work in which the united whole is fitted.'^— Xit. qjT O.T,, p. 88. Ot DriTor,
Chneais, Introd. pp. ii, iii, vi ; Dillmann, OeTiesis, i. p. 16.
* This formea the eround on which Principal Gave baaed his ** Journal"
theory of the origin of these narratiyes. —/tmHr. cfO.T., pp. 280 £» 289 &
THE PRIESTLY WRITING, tt DOCUMENT 341
JE narrative which furnishes the basis, while the priestly
parts appear as supplementary or filling in.^ The sig-
nificance of this important fact will appear as we proceed.
2. We come now to the principal question of the
independence of the Priestly Writing? Was P ever a
distinct or self -subsisting 'document? Here Graf, as we
saw, severed himself from his fellow-critics, and surely with
good logical reason. For once that (1) the supplementary
theory was abandoned, and J was erected into an inde-
pendent history; (2) £ was cut out of the Ortmdaehrift,
thereby reducing the latter after Gen. xvii to the smallest
dimensions; (3) the unity of the Priestly Writing was
piecemeal surrendered ; and (4) P was removed down to the
exile, long after JE had attained a recognised authority,'
nearly every tenable ground for maintaining the inde-
pendence of the document was taken away. The most
convincing reasons, however, against the independence are
those drawn from the character of the writing itself, and
from its relations to JE^ This must be look^ into with
some care.
(1) The etructnre of the writing speaks in the strongest •
way against the theory of its original independence.
Reference has already been made to the claim that P, taken
by itself, furnishes us with a connected and nearly complete
narrative from the creation to the conquest Kuenen,
speaking for the critics, assures us that the P history in
Genesis ''has come down to us nearly, but not quite
complete " ; ' and we are frequently told, as by Colenso, how
its narrative "forms a continuous and connected whole
almost from beginning to end."^ It is not easy to under-
stand how, if it was, as we were then equally assured, a
" connected whole " in the days of Tuch and Bleek, be/ore
the excision of the extensive sections now assigned to E, it
can be so still, after these have been removed. This
completeness of the P history, however, is a matter on which
the ordinary reader is nearly as competent to judge as the
critical scholar, and we can fancy the astonishment with
^ WeUhansen, BttL pp. 867, 886. See above, p. 216.
* Cf. Eautzsoli, quoted below.
* E$x. p. 66.
^ Pent, Pt vi. p. 682. Gt Dr. Drirer, O&nnU, p. iy : *' If read con-
■eontively, apart m>m the rest of the narratiTe, it will be found to tonn, a
nearly complete whole»'*
34i DIFHCULTIES AND PERPLEXniES:
which, after looking into the matter for himself, suoh a
reader will regard the above dicta. In truth, anything more
fragmentary, broken, incomplete, or generally unaatis&ctory
as a connected narrative, it would be difficult to imagine.
As Wellhausen correctly says of it : '* As a rule nothing
more is aimed at than to give the mere links and articula-
tions of the narratives. It is as if Q («P) were the scarlet
thread on which the pearls of JE are hung/'^ Or, as
Kautzsch says, the Priests' Writing gives us the pre-
liminary history ''in such extremely scanty outlines as to
be only comprehensible when we think of the detailed
representation in J and E as universally known."' Yet at
times its mere thread of history widens out into complete
and detailed narration, as in the story of creation (Gen. L),
part of the narrative of the flood (chaps, vi-ix.), the covenant
with Abraham (chap. xviL), the burial of Sarah (chap, zxiii.),
the story of Dinah (chap, zxxiv.), Jacob's second visit to
Bethel (chap. xxxv. 8-15). Hiatuses abound,' as will be seen
more clearly after. From chaps, xi. to xviL all that ia told of
Abraham is comprised in some eight verses, or fragments of
verses ; after that, till the death of Sarah (chap. zxiiL) in
some six verses, or parte of verses. The gaps are most con-
spicuous after the entrance (in chap, xx.) of the 2nd Elohist, to
whom, as above said, is transferred most of what was formerly
assigned to the primary document. Thus, in chap. xxv. 19,
we have the headii^, " These are the generations of Isaac,"
but of the life of Isaac thus introduced nothing is given,
i^ter ver. 20, but the concluding sentence of ver. 26 : '* And
Isaac was threescore years old when she bare them"
(whom?), the notice of Esau's marriage, and the sending
away of Jacob (chaps, xxvi 34, 35; xxvii 46-xxviiL 9).
Jacob is sent to raddui- Aram to teke a wife, but of his long
residence there, with the exception of two interpolated
verses (chap. xxix. 24, 29), not a syllable is breathed, and we
hear no more of him till he ia found returning, rich in goods
and cattle (one verse, chap. xxxL 18). The patriarch fares,
^ Hid, ^ Israd, p. 882 ; of. p. 7 : "For the most part the thread of
narratiTe la eitremely thin." For the complete itory ofP after chap. xii.
aee p. 827.
'jDft.i^O.r., p. 107.
* Dillmami thinka the doaamentla preaerred nearly complete tfll chap^
xi 26, after which great gaps oconr. — 0en$9i$, pp. 16, 17. It wiU be
below that there are gaps enough in the early part as welL
THE PMESTLY WRITING, n. DOCUMENT 343
if possible, still worse in his later history. Gen. zxzviL 2
reads, ''These are the generations of Jacob/' but there is
not a scrap more from P till we reach chap. xlL 46 : "And
Joseph was thirty years old when he stood before Pharaoh/'
and the descent into Egypt in chap. xlvL 6 ffi Joseph's
birth had been mentioned (chap. zxxy. 24), but we hear
nothing further of him till suddenly he stands before Pharaoh
as above.^ This is certainly an unexampled specimen of a
connected and ''nearly complete" document! The answer
giy^ as before,* by the critics is, that no doubt P had
originally brief notices of the events in the lives of Abraham,
Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, etc., where these gaps occur, but the
" redactor " has omUted thexa to make room for the more
copious narrations of JE.' This, in the first place, it must
again be replied, is pure hypothesis — the buttressing of one
critical assumption by another, and does not, besides, as we
shall immediately see, meet the difBculties arising from the
relations of the narratives. But, afflnming it to be true,
why still speak of the narrative as we have it as "nearly
complete," and how explain the arbitrary procedure of the
redactor in sometimes leaving the two narratives side by
side, sometimes intimately blending them, sometimes pre-
serving a stray verse like Gen. xix. 29, which simply repeats
what has gone before^ — but here so largely deleting 1
(2) The alleged independence of the document is further
discredited when we consider it mcUerially — i,e., in the relation
of its subject-matter to that of JE For here the striking
fact which immediately confronts us is, that the parts of the
history which are lacking in P are precisely those which are
^ Oolenflo sayes himself a liitU by borrowisff a few oonneotiiig pMsagw
from JE in the lives of Isaac and Joseph, bat these tiie later ciitiot aisaUow
to the ElohiBt
' See above, p. 2^0.
* To see how far this "omitting" theorr is carried— «o also with JE^
"mutual mutilations," as Bilhnann calls them — one would require to go
over the chapters in detail. See some examples in Euenen, Hex. p. 67.
^ Euenen extols the "conservatism " of the redactor, who " sorupnlonslj
inserts even the minor fra^ents of P in the places that seem best to fit
them, when the more detailed notices of the older documents miffht have
seemed to a less zealous disciple to have rendered them superfluous. — IbUL
p. 820. How then explain the deleting t This redactor figures in Euenen's
scheme as R*, but it is explained that he is really " a collective body headed
by the scribe who united the two works, etc. . . . For the most part we
shall have to club them together, and may indicate tiiem by the dnflle
letter E»" (p. 816).
344 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
given us in JE. The converse of this is equally true, that
the elements which are lacking in JE are supplied by P.
Ihns, P alone records the making of the ark (Gen. vL 9—22),
and the i^ges and deaths of the patriarchs. The story of
Hagar in Gen. xvi has neither banning nor end without P,
who alone mentions Ishmael's birth (ver& 15, 16).^ The
elements in the narratives are thus materially united in the
closest fashion. But the intimacy of the relation between P
and JE admits of yet closer determination. So long as the
Jehovist was regarded as a mere supplementer of the Elohist^
it was impossible to assume any kiiowledge of his narrative
by the latter. Now, however, that the Priestly Writer is
regarded as the later, there is found no difficulty in
admitting, — ^rather, as furnishing a proof of his posteriority,
the fact is insisted on, — ^not only that the Priestiy Writer is
acquainted with JE, but that his narrative is throughout
parallel with the other.' The effect of this change in the
point of view, in its bearings on the relations of tbe
narratives, seems even yet hardly to be fully realised. Not
merely, as formerly shown, are J and E in the fullest sense
parallel narratives, but P, in turn, is parallel with ihenL
'' The priestly author,'' says Kuenen, ** builds on JE through-
out" ' " That P* and JE run parallel, even in details, is
undeniable ; and hence it follows that they did not spring
up independently of each other. P* is either the basis of JE
or an excerpt from it"^ The latter, of course, is the
alternative he adopts.' Wellhausen, in language before
^ The same aammption ii made here aboat JE as above about P, ▼».,
that in all these cases JE had the relevant narrative in his histoiy, bat B
has left it out, and, for some reason, substituted P's (see above, p. ii9). It
is possible that in some instances omissions ma^ have taken placis, but they
are for the meet part as problematical in J E as in P.
* Gonkel stands nearly alone in denying that P need JE in Qenesii (of.
his OenesiSf p. bcviii), but he admits that the source of P was one to which
JE ** was manifoldly related/' But why then not JE, which P most hare
known ! Dillmann makes P dependent in ^art on E (his oldest dooiunent)i
and says of its relationship to J : '* Certainly the relationship in matter
between the two is so great, that of necessity one writing must presuppose
the other." He supposes P to be dependent in part on J or J's sources, but
J in the main to be dependent on P. — Num.-^os. pp. 656-57. The in-
security of such combinations is evident from the fact that the newer
criticism rejects most of them.
* Sex, p. 299. ^ Jbid, p. 801.
* In this sense it is allowed that P is not independent. In an article he
wrote in reply to Gra( Kuenen says : "We can deny the independgnc4 of
the priestly passages, and at the same time recognise tnem aBtel/^tubnitimg,
THE PRIESIXY WRITING, H. DOCUMENT 345
quoted,^ lays great stress on the parallelism and material
identity of the narratives. " The I^estly Clode/' he teUs us,
''runs, as to its historical thread, quite parallel to the
Jehovistic history ** ; and, in a note, ** The agreement extends,
not only to the thread of the narrative, but also to
particulars, and even to expressions."' Afiain: ''In the
history of the patriarchs also, the outlines of the narrative
are the same in Q ( = P) and in JK" ' Here, then, are very
practical admissions that the substance — and more than the
substance^— of the two narratives is the same, and we have
seen how closely related and interdependent the narratives
are in their present form. P, in Genesis, we have also seen,
is really not a complete work, but supplies the frame in which
the other narratives are set. Does not the onus of proof
rest on those who maintain that it was ever intended to be
anything else? Is not the hypothesis which the facts of
interrelation and mutual dependence suggest rather that of
eoUaiaration in some form, than of entirely independent
origin?*
The principal proof, however, that P cannot be regarded
as an independent document arises when the P writing is
considered texttuxUy — t.e., in its inseparable textual inter-
weaving with the JE narrative. This is a subject of
sufficient importance and intricacy to be considered under
a separate heading.
i.«., as frAgments of a book which onoe existed in separate form" (Theol,
Tijd. Sept 1870). Bat did it! Orafs later view on this point may be
stated in nis own words. He says : ' ' These narratives [of the Orundsdkr^}
imply everywhere the connection of the circnmstantial J narrative ; whereas
they themselves, except a few longer sections, appear only as notices more
or less abrupt, inserted into the narrative " (in Knenen, as above).
1 See Chap. IV. above, p. 107.
* JBiat. o/Iwnul, pp. 295-96. 01 his illnstrations.
* Ibid. p. 818. Ct Eautzsch, above, p. 342.
^ It is interesting to note the additional testimony borne by Knenen
that the Denteronomic history also consists of recensions of prophetic narra-
tives, "in part of more independent compositions, which, however, still
run parallel, in almost every case, with J£, and are dependent on it." —
ffeoD, pp. 168-69. The siMaTUial agreement of the histoiy in the various
sources could hardly be more strongly expressed than in the above
quotations.
'This is substantially the view taken by Elostermann in his Der
FmUaUuehf pp. 9, 10. 8es Note A on Klostermann on the Relation of JG
and P.
346 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES :
IIL Textual Intxbbslations of thi Fbdestlt
WBinNa Ain) JE
The mterweaying of P with JE in the actual histoiy
of the Pentateuch is so intimate that it is only by the utmost
critical violence that the different elements can be rent
asunder. To illustrate this fully would cany us much
beyond our limits, but, the point being crucial, it is
necessary to bestow some little pains on its elucidation.
We begin with the patriarchal period and the Book of
Genesis; then glance at the Mosaic period. The diffi-
culties of the critical hypothesis will reveal themselves in
both*
L We look, first, at the P and JE narratives in Genesis.
The general relation of P to JE in this book, as already
said, is that of ** framework" The following, in order of
the book, are examples of the closeness of the textual
relations.
(1) With regard to the beginnifi^ of thififfs^haw con-
stantly is it alleged that ''we have two contradictory
accounts of the creation'' ^ It is certain that the narratives
in Gen. L-iL 4 and chap, ii 4 ff. are quite different in character
and style, and view the work of creation from different
standpoints. But they are not "contradictory"; they are,
in fact, bound together in the closest manner as comple-
mentary. The second narrative, taken by itself, begins
abruptly, with manifest reference to the first: *^ In the day
that Jehovah Elohim made earth and heaven" (ver. 4).
It is, in truth, a misnomer to speak of chap. IL as an account
of the ^ creation " at all, in the same sense as chap. L It
contains no account of the creation of either earth or
heaven, or of the general world of vegetation;' its interest
centres in the making of man and woman, and everything
^ Of. Addis, Hex, i. p. zlviii ; Eaenen, Hex, p. 83, etc
* Dillmann says here : " We now expect before or after tot. 7, intimatioii
of the bringing forth of the plant world and of the finishing of the constnio-
tion of the world. But nothing of the kind is found. Such a gapoas
scarcely haye existed originally. It rather seems as if something had beec
left out by B, either because it appeared a needless repetition alongside of
ohap. i., or because it seemed too little in accordance with chap. L (This
latter reason should haye led to the suppression of much more.)— 6^«iiesis,
p. 116. What appears in the narratlTe is simply the pluiting of a garden
In Eden as an aboae for man (yers. 8, 9).
THE PRIESTLY WRITING, IL DOCUMENT 347
in the narrative is regarded from that point of view.^ The
very union of the divine names — ^in chaps, ii., iii — indicates
a designed connection of the two narratives which it is
arbitrary to refer to a redactor, instead of to the original
composers of the book.'
We have next, in P, the bare thread of genealogy in
chap. V. (with, however, universal death) to con<kict ns from
the creation to the flood, when the earth, which God made
''very good" (chap. L 31) is found, without explanation,
"corrupt before God," and "filled with violence" — ^"for all
flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth" (chap. vL
11, 12). Yet we are asked to believe that P, who is
admittedly acquainted with the J£ history, " builds " upon
it, and produces a narrative "parallel" with it, "knows
nothing of a fall' Much more natural is the supposition
that P, who furnishes the "framework" for JE, pre-
supposes the JE narrative which it enshrines, and which
in Gen. vi 6-7 contains predsely similar intimations of the
corruption of mankind — ^proceeding from the fall Here
for once we have Wellhausen as an ally. "In JE," he
says, " the flood is well led up to ; in Q [sP] we should be
inclined to ask in surprise how the earth has come all at
once to be so corrupted, after being in the best of order, did
we not know it from JE."^ A fact which shows quite '
clearly how f ar P is from being complete, and how necessary
JE is to ite right understanding.
(2) The story of the flood (Gen. vL-ix. ), which comes
next, is the classical proof of the distmction of the
^ On the age and origin of them histories, see Chap. XI. pp. 402 ft
* See aboye, pp. 226-27. We have here the nsaal yanety of oritioal
theories. Most ascribe the combination to the redactor ; Reuss postulates a
sjpecial doonment distinct from J and P ; Bndde and Gnnkel suppose a com-
bmation of two documents, one nsing Jeiioyah, the other Elohim, et&
* Thns, e.g,f Carpenter : " He knows no Eden, he relates no temptation,
he does not seek to ozphun the stem conditions of hnmaa labour or soffer-
ing."— ir«B. i. p. 122. Bat a few sentences ftirther on we read : "The
reader learns with surprise in chap. yi. 11 that corraption and yiolenoe fiUed
the earth.'* And on p. 182: "If the toUdholh sections do not describe
the origin of eyil and the enttr of sin and soffering, thej are not indifferent
to them, rather does the method of Oen. y. presappose them, and ohan.
yi 18 record their conseqnenoes." Which destroys the " knows nothing.
^ HitL qf Itrael, p. 810. WeDhansen finds many other indioations of
dependence of P on jR, £,g,, "If in spite of this he (the first man) Is
oalled simply Adam (Gen. r. 2), as if that were his proper name, the onfy
way to acoomit for tU^ |8 to pnppose a reminiwjenoe of (3ea. IL, IIL, etol
O 809).
348 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
two souTceB P and J; but we must claim it also as an
illustration of the impossibility of separating these elements
in the narrative into two independent histories. The sub--
stcmce of the story is allowed to be the same in both. " In
chaps, vii, viiL/' Kaenen says, ** two almost parallel narratives
are combined into a single whole." ^ Since the discovery
of the Babylonian accomit of the deluge, it is recognised
that both writers drew from very old sources,' and, more-
over, that it needs both J and P to yield the complete
pandlel to the old Chaldean versicm. P, e.ff.^ in Grenesia,
gives the measurements of the ark, but lacks the sending
out of the birds — an essential feature in the Babylonian
story. J has the birds, and also the sacrifice of Noah,
which P, again, wants.' In not a few passages the criteria
curiously intermingle, and the services of the redactor have
to be called freely into requisition to disentengle them.
Kg., in chaps. viL 7-10, 23, viii 1, 2, where there is clearly
literary fusion of some kind.^ Above all, the parte of the
narrative fit into each other in a way that makes it im-
possible to separate them. We have just seen how the
" corruption" of chap, vi 11, 12 (P) implies the Jehovistic
story of the falL From the sudden mention of Noah in
chap. vi. 8 the J story passes abruptly to chap. viL 1 : '^ And
Jehovah said unto Noah, Come thou and all thy house into
the ark." But it is P who mentions Noah's sons, and
narrates the buildmg of the ark (chap, vi 6-22). The
Jehovistic clause, " And Jehovah shut him in " (chap, vii 16),
stends isolated if teken from the P connection in which it
stonds. J, as stated, records Noah's sacrifice (chap, viii 20),
but tells us nothing of his going out of the ark. That is
left for P (vers. 15-19).
It is easy, as before, to assert that all these lacking parts
1 ffgx. p. 67. Gf. Wellhanflen, p. 206.
' On age, see below, CHiap. XI. p. 404.
' " Noah offers no sacrince," says Carpenter. — Bex. L p. 123. But this
is really a p-oof of the unity of the history, for the sacrmce — an essential
part of the Babylonian stoiy, which P must have known — is found in J.
^ Euenen says that in chaps, vii., viii. the narratives ** are combined into
a sinele whole, and consequently the analysis does not always yield very
certain results. We find distinct traces of P in chaps, vii. 6, 7, 8, 9, 11, 19,
14, 15. 16a, 18-21 ; viii. 1, 2a, 2>6, 18-19. But the verses have ben
worked over by some later hand. ... It is evident from these indications
that when the two texts were woven together a certain process of mwjwiilii-
tion took place." — ffex, p. 67.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING, n. DOCUMENT 349
of J and P were originally present, but were omitted by
the redactor, but it is impossible to prove it, and the
hypothesis is superfluous, because the missing parts are
there in the other narrativa Besides, what in that case
becomes of the "completeness-' of the P narrative? If
''omission'' is postulated to the extent required, the two
narratives become simply duplicates, and the ground for
the assertion that P "knows nothing" of this or that is
destroyed. If there has been replacement of parts, as
here and there is not impossible, it may be more simply
conceived as the result of one writer collaborating with
another, or working upon, and in parts re-writing, the
materials furnished him by another, in view of a plan, and
with a common aim.
Agunst tiiis view of the unity of the narrative, it is
customary to urge the repetitions and alle^d inconsistencies
of the several parts. On this it may suffice at present to
observe that the P writer does not shun repetitions, even of.
his own stittements, where these serve his purpose, — they
are in fact a mark of his style,^ — and that at least the
greater number of the inconsistencies arise from the
very evil of the hypothesis we are criticising — the
pitting of one part of the narrative against another as if
each was complete in itself.* The most plausible example
in the present case is the alleged discrepancy as to the
dwration of the flood. J's numbers, it is said, yield a much
shorter duration for the flood (40+21 = 61 days) than the
year and eleven days assigned to it by P.' It is not
explained how P, with the J narrative before him, should
gratuitously invent numbers hopelessly at variance with
^ The nme applies to J, fhoiuth not to to great an extent P repeats
freely where emphasis is wanted, where he reoapitolates, where he com-
menoes a new section, eto. S,g,f the birth of Noah's sons and their names
are several times repeated (chaps, r. 82, Ti. 10, ix. 10, 20, x. 1). The
oomiption of the earth is thrice affirmed in chap. yL 11, 12 ; the entrance
into tne ark is thrice mentioned in one section (chap. yii. 18, 16, 16), eto.
J repeats the "repenting " of Jehovah (chap. vi. 6, 7).
^B,g,t it is not a real contradiction if in one place TGen. tL 19, 20) the
general role is laid down that the animals shaU enter in pairs ("male and
female "), and in another (chap. viL 2, 8) that clean beasts and fowls shall
go in by sevens (also "male and female"). Cf. chap, yii 8, 9, 14. Both
statements may have been fonnd in the old sonroes.
' Of. DiUmann, Driver, eto. Delitzsch concedes the discrepancy, nn-
necessarily, as we think. The joltj of the narrative is npfaeld oy &9hler.
Bih. OuMehU, I pp. 58-69.
350 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
his authority and with the common tradition. Bat if the
narrative be taken a* a whole there need be no discrepancy.
Fb longer period is of itself more in keeping with the
magnitude of the catastrophe, even as described by J ; and
the assumption of the critics that J meant to confine the
actual flood within forty days caif be shown by the text
itself to be unwarrantabla For (1) forty days is expressly
given by J as the period when ** the rain was upon tiie
earth,** i^., when the cataclysm was in process (chap. viL
12, 17); and (2) is separated from a second forty days
(chap. viiL 6) by the mention of an interval of gradual sub-
sidence of the waters — '' the waters returned nrom off the
earth continually '' (chap. viiL 2, 3 ; also J) — ^which P in the
same verse dates at one hundred and fifty day& J's second
forty days, therefore, with the three weeks spent in sending
out the birds, equate with Fs interval of two months
between chap, viii 5 and chap, viii 13, which covers the
same period, and the discrepancy disappears.^
In further illustration of the divisive methods employed
in this part of the history, it may be mentioned that
WeUhausen, Kuenen, Budde, Gunkel, etc., distinguish a
<P and J*, and suppose that J^ (cf. Gen. iv. 16-24) had
no knowledge of a flood, which, therefore, it is held, does
not belong to the oldest tradition; neither does Gen. xi
1-9 look back, it is said, to a flood.' It is even contended
that in Gen. ix. 18-27 the names of the three sons of Noah
must have been originally Shem, Japheth, and Canaan —
this on the ground that in ver. 25 the curse is pronounced
on Oanaan ' — a notion which, in its direct defiance of the
text, DelitzBch justly cites as ^'a specimen of what
emulation in the art of severing can accomplish.''^
^ The oritios aro not agreed whether J has two periods of forty days, or
onl^ one ; and differ, besiaea, in man^ details of the analysis. Eantaon and
Sooin, Bndde, etc., even give ohap. Tii 17a — "the flood was forty days npom
the earth "~to P, but strike oat the forty days. Thus disorepanoies are
ffuuSf.
*0f. in reply EOniff^ SMUU. pp. 198-99. If Gen. iz. 18, 10 b
allowed to J^ as by Addis, eto., then the oyeispreading of the earth Ikom
the sons of Noah is directly afflrmed. Others give these ferses to P.
* Kantssdh says positiyely : "At Gen. iz. 20 ff. the sons of Noah, who
itQl dwell with him in one tent, are called in the original text Shem«
Japheth, and Canaan."— 2^ (tf 0. T., p. 88. The " origin J text " states the
preeise eontrary (yen. 18, 22), only tiie clansea naming Ham are expunged
•• interpolations. Dillmann, Delitzsch, K5nig, etc, ndect the theory.
« Cfm$$U, i. p. 291.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. IL DOCUMENT 351
(3) The oriticB have admittedly difficulty in dividing
np tiie table of nations in Gen. x. " Such being the relation
of the two documents/" comments Kuenen, ''it is easy to
understand that chap. z. (always excepting venu 8-12) has
been included in P by some critics, and excluded from it
by other&" ^ Tuch, Hupfeld, and Kayser gave the chapter
to J; Noldeke, with most critics of his time, to P (ex-
cepting vers. 8-11); most critics now divide it between
J and P. But the J part, as usual, begins abruptly at
ver. 8 ; has no heading for the descendants of Ham ; omits
those of Japheth altogether ; and, on the other hand, alone
gives the descendants of Mizraim and Canaan, previously
mentioned by P (ver. 6). The entire table is needed to
restore the unity. An incidental proof of the unity is the
fact that it is constructed on tlie principle of seventy
names.
(4) We pass to the history of the patriarchs, some
points in which have already been touched on. The
different parts of this history are again found to be in-
separably connected textually. Difficulties begin with the
life of Abraham. After many variations of opinion, the
critics have settled down to give Gen. xL 28-30 to J, and
ver. 27, 31, and 32 to P ; beyond this only chaps. xiL 4&, 6,
and xiiL 6, lib, 12 are assigned to P in chaps. xiL, xiil
But this yields some remarlotble results. In chap, xi 28,
the J story begins quite abruptly, without telling us who
Terah, Haran, Abram, and Kahor are ; i.e., it needs ver. 27
for its explanation. The residence of the family is placed
by J in Ur of the Chaldees (elsewhere given as a P mark),
and nothing is related of the migration to Haran (cl P,
vers. 31, 32). Tet this migration is apparently assumed
in the call to Abraham in Gen. xii 1.* In ver. 6, Abraham
is said to have ^passed through the land into the place
of Sichem," but we are not told what land. It is P alone
who tells of his departure from Haran, and coming to the
land of Canaan (ver. 4^, 6). But this very fragment in
P assumes the departure from Haran as a thing known
(ver. 4tb), and so needs the first part of the verse, given to
J. In other words, the story, as it stands, is a unity;
divided, its connection is destroyed.
Gen. xiv. — the Chedorlaomer expedition— is, it is well
1 JTeflk p. 67. ' Sm above, Chap. lY. p. 108.
352 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
known, a literary crux] so unlike is it to P, yet so many
P marks are found in it.^ As P is made post-exilian, our
critics are under the necessity of putting this chapter still
later.* On the very difiTerent verdict to which archaeology
points, we shall speak in next chapter.' In the Hagar
episode, chap, xvi, instructive examples of critical division
are furnished. The first half of ver. 1, together with ver. 3,
is given to P; then the J part begins without explanation —
" And she had an handmaid, an Egyptian, whose name was
Hagar/' The promise of Ishmael is given in J (ver. 11);
it is left for P to record his birth (vers. 16, 17).* It is the
"dry pedant" P who relates Abraham's touching inter-
cession for Ishmael (chap. xviL 18); afterwards, however,
several chapters latier, J, who was silent on the birth, suddenly
introduces Ishmael as a grown lad, mocking Isaac (chap, xxi
9). In chaps, xviii. to xx. the solitary indication of P is the
isolated verse, chap. xix. 29, which presupposes the destruction
of the cities of the plain — ^intelligible, perhaps, if regarded
as a recapitulatory statement, intended to introduce the
succeeding narrative, but utterly superfluous as the in-
sertion of a redactor.^ Chap. xxi. 1-5 is again a fine specimen
of critical dissection. The second half of ver. 1 is given to
P, despite the fact that Jehovah occurs in it (similarly in
chap, xvii 1) ; ver. 2 is likewise split between J and P.
Fs narrative, as stated earlier, after the introduction
^"Gen. ziy. is admitted on every hand," says Carpenter, "to show
many peoaUarities. . • . The margins show affimties of style with hoth
J and P. . . . These phenomena would point to a writer acquainted with
the linguistic usage of ooth J and P." — nex, i. pp. 155-66. Addis writes :
** The unknown author must have read the Pentateuch much as we have it.
His lauffuaee, as shown aboye, betrays the influence of P, while his facts
are partly drawn from the Jahyist. He must haye belonged to Judah, for
he exalts the sanotnuj of Jerusalem, and its sacred ri^t to tithes" I~
Hex, ii. p. 212. Cf. Kuenen, Sex. p. 824.
* Professor Bennett says " the narratiye may be partly based on information
deiiyed from Babylon, possibly by Jews of the Oaptivity." — Genesis, p. 19.
* See below, pp. 410 ff. The reyolutiooary effects of admitting an early
date of composition for this chapter are eyident from the aboye.
^ See aboye, p. 844.
* Oolenso, arguing against Kuenen, says : " Is it credible that afber the
lonff oiTOumstanual account of Jehoyah's yisit to Abraham, and conyersation
witn him, and of Lot's being rescued out of Sodom in chap. xyiiL 1-zix. 28,
a later writer would think it necessary to insert the perfectly superfluous
statement in chap. zix. 29 ? *' — Pent, Pt. yi. App. p. 121. Carpenter says :
"When the 'oyerthrow' is mentioned in chap. zix. 29, it is apparently
assumed that its cause is known." — ffex, L p. 128. But why tnen mmt-
tionitl
f_
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. U. DOCUMENT 353
of the E writer, becomes largely a blank. Apart from Gen.
xxiiL and later references to the same (chaps, xlix. 29 ff.,
1. 12, 13);^ a few other incidents (chaps, xxvil 46-xxyiii.
9; XXXV. 9-15; cf. xlviL 6-11; xlviii. 3-7); and some
genealogies and lists, it is absolutely confined, assuming
that even they belong to it, to such disconnected verses,
or parts of verses, as those formerly enumerated — ''And
Isaac was threescore years when she bare them " (chap. xxv.
266), Zilpah and Bilhah given as handmaids (chap. xxix. 24,
29), " And all his goods that he had gotten, the cattle of
his getting," etc. (chap. xxxL 18), " And Joseph was thirty
years old when he stood before Pharaoh'' (chap, xli 46).
Chap, xxxiv. — the story of Dinah — ^is cm exception, for here
a P narrative is blended with a JE one, but so intimately,
and with such peculiaritiee of style, that the critics do
not well know what to make of it, and are at sixes and
sevens in their analysis.* A similar perplexity attaches
to the list of those descending to Egypt in chaps, xlvi 8-27.
" The general evidence," we are told, " points to a writer
familiar with P, but also acquainted with other documents
besides."' WeUhausen, the Oxford analysts, and others,
accordingly, treat the P parts of both chaps, xxxiv. and
xlvL 8-27, as belonging to a later and secondary stratum.
Other phenomena in Genesis, e.;., the fact that it is P
alone who records the deaths of the patriarchs, have already
been noticed.
It is needless to do more than draw attention to the
results which thus &r stand out clear from our review.
They are : (1) that the book, as we have it, is a unity ; (2)
that the unity is destroyed by breaking it up into separately
existing JE and P documents; (3) that the unity is too
close to be the work of a redactor piecing together such
separate documents; (4) that to secure the unity we do
not need to go beyond the book we have, ie., what P lacks,
^ OoleiiBo, however, gives dhap. L 12 to J, and Iwies an aignment on it
[Pent, Pt yi., App. p. 122).
' The Oxfoid writen say of this chapter : "The lingnistio affinities of
the first story dearly ooxmects it with tf. . . . Equally clearly the various
marks in the second story bring it within the scoi>e of P. But it is so
different in kind from P's other narratiyes of the patriarchal ase, as to make
it highly improbable that it eyer belonged to the Toledhothiodk ... as
the mterlaoing is yery close the assignment of some passages must be
doubtfuL"— JTfiB. ii pp. 52-58.
* Oxford AsB. ii p. 72: on Gen. zlyi 8£ see below, pp. SMft
354 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
J supplies, and vice versa. In brief, whatever the number
of pens employed, the phenomena would seem to point, not
to late irresponsible redaction, but to singleness of plan, and
co-operation of effort, in the original production.
2. When we pass from the patriarchal to the Mosaie
period, though P no longer possesses the marked character
of " framework " which it luul in the Book of Genesis, but
appears rather as eo-crdinaie with JE, and eyen| in the
legislative parts, as an inserted content, we discover that the
union of narratives is not less close than in the earlier book,
and the impossibility of separating them into independent
documents equally great.
(1) Not much is given to T? in Exodtu before chap, vl,
but what little ia given ia bound up inseparably with its
JE context. From the mention, e.^., of the increase and
prosperity of the Israelites in Egypt (chap. L 7), P passes
abruptly to their bondage (vers. 13, 14), and the intervening
verses are required to give the explanation. The language
used in chap, ii 23-25 (P)— " cry," " heard," « saw," « knew "
(in Heb.) — ^has its verbal counterpart in chap.* iii 7 (J).^ In
chap. vL 2, the narrative of the revelation of the name
begins with the words, " And God spake unto Moses " ; but
nothing has yet been said in P of either Moses or Aaron.*
The information necessary is supplied by JE Chap, vi itself
presents many peculiarities, with traces of J, which are
a perplexity to the critics.' Vers. 13-20 of this chapter,
embracing the genealogy, are roundly declared to be a
" later amalgam," * or probably " an insertion by a very late
hand."^ Then follow in chaps. vii-xiL, the narratives of
^ OolenBo, acoordinglj, with bia view of the earlier date of the Elohisti
sees In chap, iii 7 (and m Deut zzvi. 7) a " plain aUiuion " to chap. iL 23-
25. It shonld be noticed also that chap, ii 24 allndee to Ood's covenant
with lioac, mentioned only by J (Gen. zxri. 2-5, 24).
'To obyiate thia dimoulty many ingenioua methods are employed
(assumed omissions, transpositions, etc), which in other hands woold be
described as " harmonistic expedients."
> G£ Oxford SaxUeueh and Addis, in Ice.
^ Oxford Sex, ii p. 87.
* Addis, Sex, ii. p. 286 ; so Enenen. Van Hoonacker points ont an
interesting harmony between this table and the Jfi history. In yer. 28
Nadab aod Abihn are mentioned as the two eldest sons of Aaron. The
names recur in Ex. xxir. 9 (J R). Farther, P relates how these two were
destroyed for the sin of offering strange fire (Ley. x. Iff.). In perfect
harmony with this the line of Aaron is yiewed in the historical books as
continned in descent from the remaining sons, Eleazar and Ithamar (yer.
28), and Nadab and Abihn are no more heard of. — Le Scieerdoee, pp. ISa-SO.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. II. DOCUMENT 355
the plagues, about which many difficultieB are raised. Not
reckoning the death of the firstborn, F, it is said, knows only
of four of the plagues ; J£ only of seven. Other differences
are pointed out In P the miracles are wrought by Aaron
and his rod ; in J£, either without human instrumentality
(J),or by the agency of MasesB,ndhiBxod(Ey It may readily
be shown, however, that these differences are greatly over-
driven, where they do not turn round into a new proof of
the unity of the narrative. It is the case, as stated, that
JE has seven of the plagues, or, including the firstborn, eight ;
while P baa only two peculiar to himself (lice and boils^
But it results from the new form of the critical hypothesis
that P cannot have been ignorant of those recorded in JE ;
therefore, cannot have intended to ignore or contradict
them.' Accordingly, where the narratives touch, they are
closely interwoven. In the plague of frogs, for instance, J
records the threatening (chap, viii i-4), but P narrates the
execution of the threat (ver& 6-7). Without P this part of
the story would be a blank. Conversely, J alone narrates
the judgment on the firstborn (chap. xiL 29, 30), which is
announced in the passover law of P (ver. 12), but is not
described by P. ^Diis further curious result follows from
the critical partition, that, while in P Aaron is appointed to
be a prophet to Moses, and to speak for him to Pharaoh
(chap. viL 1, 2), in none of the P sections does either Moses
or Aaron ever utter a word. All the speaking is done in
JEb As respects the mode of working the miracles, it is
not the case that P invariably represents Aaron as perform-
ing the wonders with his roid ; in the plague of boils (one
peculiar to P), Moses is the i^nt (chap. iz. 10), and in the
aestruction of the firstborn Jehovah fiimself executes the
judgment (chap, xii 12). But in JE also, even where the
fact is not expressly stated (as in P), we are entitled to
assume that the same rule applies to the acting as to the
speaking, viz., that Aaron is regarded as the agent of
Moeea' This, indeed, is the rule laid down in JE itseU.
> Thia tnin Is mads a bub of distinetloii •• bctwMn J and 1| aid fraak
InoonaiateDaea are eTolvad.
* On the plagnea, ot E5hler, Sib. €fe9ek. L pp. 185-86.
' It is to D6 obserred that in Ez. iv. 2-6 (J£) Moses reoelTes tha dgn of
the rod ohangsd into a serpent to be, with other wonders, displayed before
Fhanhoh (tsts. 17, 21) ; but in dhap. Til. 8 ff. (P), Aaron performs the wonder
3S6 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
Thus in chap. iv. 30 (J) we read: * Aaron spake all the words
which Jehovah had spoken unto Moses, and did the signB
in the sight of the people " ; and in chap. xL 10 (E) : " And
Moses and Aaron did all these wonderb before Pharaoh."
The two are regularly conjoined throughout the history.^
(2) The narratives of the vrildemess joumeyimgn show
even closer interweaving than those of the Exodus; bat we
shall content ourselves with two typical instances from the
Book of Numbers, viz., the mission of the spies (chap& xfii,,
xiv.), and the rebellion of Korah (chap. xvi). These have
already been before us in connection with Deuteronomy;*
it is desirable now to look at them from the point of view
of P. There are evidences, we think, of distinct sources in
these narratives, but the histories, as we have them, are
nevertheless firmly-compacted and inseparable wholes.
First, as respects the mission of the tpiea^ it is admitted
that the narratives we have to deal with are substantially
parallel, but it is held, as before seen, that they conflict in
several important particulars. Thus P makes the spies
traverse the whole land, in JE they go only as far as
Eshcol, near Hebron ; P includes Joshua with Caleb among
the spies, JE knows only of Caleb ; P makes the spies bring
up an evil report of the country, but says nothing of the
inhabitants, while in JE the explorers describe the land as
fruitful, but give terrifying accounts of the inhabitants.
But now, to make out these discrepancies, which would
hardly occur to the reader of the story as it stands, the
narrative has first of all to be torn to shreds.' The JE
contribution, e.^., begins in the middle of a verse: 'And
said unto them, Gtet you up this way by the South " (chap,
xiii. 17b); its commencement is supposed to be lost. But
the proper commencement is there in P, with his list of the
spies, if we will only accept it Again, the second half of
ver. 21 is singled out,^ and given to P, with the result that
JE reads: "So they went up, and they went up by the
South" (ver& 21a, 22). But this now is an obvious
for Moeai. So iho threat of the frogs (J) la ezeonted through Aaron (P) in
e ap. viii
<0h8. T. 1, 4, 20; Tiii. 5, 12, 25; ix. 27; z. 8, 8, 16, eto.
* See aboye, pp. 279 ff.
* We follow the analysis of the Oxford ffexcUeueh, whioh agrees In most
points with that of Dillmann, Wellhausen, etc
* Or the whole verse acooraing to others.
b:
li
f
(
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. U. DOCUMENT 357
^^ ** doublet/' and forms the basis of a new division between
L J and E (bat what of the sense of the redactor, who so
united them ?). Similarly, the first half of ver. 26 is given
^ to P, and the second half to J£, though the connection is
' close, and the second half has a marked P phrase.^ The
^ way is now clear for declaring that JE knows nothing of a
! searching of the whole land. Tet it seems very evident to
the unprejudiced reader that, both in the commission to the
searchers (vers. 17-20), and in the report they bring (vers.
27-29), in JE itself, an exploration of the whole country is
implied We go on to chap, ziv., the first verse in which is
divided up among three writers : ** And all the congregation
lifted up their voice " (P), " and cried " (E),« " and the people
wept that night'' (J). In P, Addis tells us, ''no mention
is made of the inhabitants, who are indeed treated as
non-existent "(1)' — as if this absurdity was not of itself
sufficient to condemn his schema But this, like P's ignor-
ance of the fruitfulness of the land, disproved by Caleb's
words in ver. 7, is only made out by separating vers. 8, 9
from their dose connection with ver. 7 — ^reserving for P
only the words in the middle : '' only rebel not ye against
' Jehovah." Even the all^ation that JE knows nothing of
i Joshua as one of the spies, seems, apart from its connection
^ with the list in chap. xiii. 1-6, to break down on examination.
I Most critics are now disposed to ass^ chap. xiv. 30-33 to J,
( or a related writer,^ and in it Oaleb and Joshua are united.
It happens also that we have yet another rehearsal of this
nussion in Num. xxxii 7 fP. — a section admittedly based on
JE;^ and there, too, the names occur in like connection
^ "Unto all the eonareffotion** — ^bmded over to a redactor.
* The second verb <mAiiges to masc plur. ** they cried," from the taau
tiog. of first olaiifle. Bat thoughts ftrs not always rigidly bound to
grammar.
* ffex. ii. p. 408.
^ Cf. Dillmann {IfunL-Joa, vip. 69, 78 ; J In oontradistinotion from E) ;
Wellhausen {Compos, p. 102) ; Oettli, Eittel, eto. Addis adopts this yiew
in his vol. ii. p. 408— "probablythe Jahyist."
* Cf. Dillmann, ^p. 198 ff. Wellhausen {Comp, pp. 118 ff.) assigns yen.
1-15 to a source which takes a ** middle position between J and Q («?)»"
and is most nearly related to the Deuteronomist Its narratiye is giyen as
farallel to JE. Dillmann, EitteL and others admit that J (not E) reckoned
oehua amon^ the spies. Of. also Eohler, Bib. Ouch, L p. 806. This
Numbers zxxii is one of the most disconcerting chapters for the diyisiy*
hypothesiB. * * All attempts hitherto at diyision of sources, " says DiUmann,
"go widely asunder " (p. 198).
358 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
and Older (ver. 12). The critics, clearly, have still a good
deal to do before they break up the unity of this story.
The Korah Episode (chap, zvi), to which we next tmn,
is perhaps a yet more signal example of the perplexities
in which the diyisive hypothesis of the critics, when
oanied ont to its issues, involves itself. We start with
the assertion — ^for which there is some basis — ^that there
are traces in the narrative of two movements— one, headed
b^ Korah, which aimed at securing for the Levitee the
rights of the priesthood (ver& 4-11) ; and the other, headed
by Dathan and Abiram, a revolt of the general congregation
(laity) against the authority of Moses and Aaron 6rer8.
13-14). The two movements, supposing them to have
existed, were no doubt blended in fact, Us they now^ are
in the narrative — Whence the inextricable difficulties which
attend the attempt to make two independent histories out
of theuL^ In the first place, the narrative of P itself
presents perplexities from this point of. view; for mth
Eorah are united, in vers. 2, 3, as many as two hundred and
fifty princes of the congregation, ''men of renown," who
evidently represent the laity in theu- uprising against
Moses and Aaron;' t.e., are in the same cause as Dathan
and Abiram.' WeUhausen, the Oxford critics, and many
more, therefore, find it necessary to resolve this part of the
P history into two, and even to deny that, in tiie original
form of the story, Korah was a Levite at alL Dillmann
and others defend the unity of P in this place; while
Kuenen, like Graf earlier,^ sees in the Levitical parts
rather the late work of a redactor.' But the J£ narrative
^ Eohler nys : " There are no floffioient gronndB for the oontentum that
in the namtiye as it liea before ua, two qnite distinct hiatorie*— the hiatuy
of an npriaing of the Lerite Korah againat the exdnsiTe priesthood of Aaron,
and the history of a rerolt of the &nbenitea, Dathan and Abiram against
the snpremac^ of Moses over Israel— have been blended together. "-^M^
CMk,jf. 807.
* Tnis, s.^., is one of the "oontradiotions'* adduced by McFadyen, in
his M$89ageB ofiht Eigtcriaiu, p. 7.
* Dathan and Abiram throughont the storr decline to fiuse ICosas and
Aaron (vers. 12 ff.). Their absenoe at the mterview. Ten. S ff., need,
therefore, occasion no surprise.
* Graf seems to admit that in the original form of tha stoiy Koiah,
Dathan, and Abiram were united. — Ge»chuhL BUeher, p. 89.
* From the Graf-Wellhausen standpoint it is of oonrae impoeriblo to
admit that the Korah episode had any foundation in ftot^ or was earlier
than the exile. Hence the theory, referred to in last chapter, that it
reflects the conflicts of EzekieVs d^aded priests (Levites) for restoration
THE PRffiSTLY WRITING. 11. DOCUMENT 359
is equally recaloitiant, for it, in turn, makes it clear that a
rdigums claim entered as well into the popvlar movement
of Dathan and Abiram. As the Oxford HextUeuch baa it :
" Dathan and Abiram defy the authority of Moses on the
ground that he has failed to fulfil his promise, and he
replies by entreating Tahweh to pay no attention to their
offering. The basis of ver. 16 is clearly some religions
act, culminating in sacrifice, and having affinity rather
with Korah's protest than with the rebellion of Dathan
and Abiram."^ It is necessary, accordingly, to find two
narratives here also, as well as in P, and still further
complications are involved in working the whole into shape.
The simplest solution is that the error lies in the original
assumption of independent narratives, and that pro^bly
the events took place as they are actually described.'
lY. Allbgid Ingonsistbncies and Hibtobigal
OF THE PBIESTLT WbITINO
Frequent references have been made in the course of
these discussions to the inconsistencies, contradictions,
duplicate narratives, incredibilities, and the like, which are
said to prove that P is a distinct writing from JE, late in
origin, and historically untrustworthy. If our contention
is correct, it would be truer to say that it is the assumption
that the documents in question are independent, and each
complete in itself, which gives rise to most of the appear-
ances of inconsistency and contradiction.
1. It was before iudicated that only thus can it be made
to their ftiU prieBtly dignity. Ab there pointed oat, these poet-Eiekiel
conflicts of a party of demded priests bave no foundatioii in hutoiy ; aie,
in fact, a pure creation of the imagination.
^ Hex. ii. p. 212.
' As a ftuther iUnstration of the diffioolties involyed In the divislTe
hypothesis, we might hare referred to the critical treatment of the story
of the bringing of the water from the rock at Merihoh (Nam. n. 1 ff.).
Of this stray, Addis savs : '* Here we hare one of the few (!) instances
in which the docoments of the ' Oldest Book of Hebrew History ' haye been
inextricably entangled, not, as is often the cose, with eaob other, bat with
the narratnre of the < Priestly Writer.' "— JETaa;. i. p. 169. It is pointed oat
that here the writer departs from his osnal practice of idealiring ms heroes,
in admitting that Moses and Aaron were giiilty of great sin. The reason
nven is an ezoellent example of the methyl. "He does so," we are told.
*' becaose the foot that Moses and Aaron did not enter the promised lend
was too fixed and conspicuous in tradition to be gainsaid, and U had to h§
Meinimied/or"^ffex. il p. 419.
36o DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
out, e,g.y that P ** knows nothing" of a fall, or of sacrifices
of the patriarchs,^ or of incidents derogatory to the
patriarchs — his narrative being, as Kuenen says, one
'' from which every trace of hostility between Abraham and
Lot, Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Esau, Joseph and liis
brothers, has been carefully removed.''' Is it credible, on
the principles of the critical hypothesis itself, that P, with
the JE history in his hands, and founding upon it, should
have supposed his readers unacquainted with the fact that
the patriarchs built altars and offered sacrifices, or should
have intended to " make sacrifices to the deity b^in with the
Mosaic age " ? ' One might as well argue that J, on his part^
" knows nothing " of the deaths of the patriarchs ! Again,
if P gives only a ''thread" — "the mere links and articu-
lations " — of a narrative, and records practically nothing of
the lives of Isaac and Joseph, where is the room for the
assertion that he "carefully removes" this, or ''avoids"
that ? Especially when the knowledge of the fuU patriarchal
history is throughout presupposed.^ If P, e.g,^ gives us no
life of Joseph at all, how can it be alleged that he has
removed " every trace of hostility between Joseph and his
brothers"?^ Can inferences be drawn from that which
does not exist? On the other hand, as we have sought
to show in the narratives of the flood, of the plagues in
Egypt, of the spies, of the rebellion of Korah, when the
narratives are taken in their completeness, nine-tenths of
the allegations of inconsistency and contradiction fall of
their own accord.
^ Seeaboreyp. 166 ; o£ E«itZ8oh, LU, nf 0,T., p. 110 ; Drivar, OmutiM^
p. zxii, eto.
' Sex, p. 801. Carpenter says : " The extent to which the figures of
the prinieyal histoir were already snrrounded, in view of the Priests* Writ-
ing, with a kind of saintly aureole, is seen from the obyiously intentional
omission of all the traits wnich seem to lower the dignity of the patriarchs."
— Hex, i. n. 801. Probably, on the same principle, P intends throwing an
" aureole round Sodom and Gomorrah, since, ss Carpenter says : " S^en
when Lot settles in the cities of the 'circle,' the writer refrains from
commenting on their characters" (p. 128).
* Knenen, Hex. p. 801. Cf. Colenso in reply to Kuenen, quoted aboTSi
p, 166.
* Carpenter says : ** Again and again does the breyity of tha narrative
imply that the author reUes on the preyious aoquaintcoioe of his readen
with the facts."— Fob. i. n. 128 : of. above, pp. 844 ff.
* Kuenen^ ss above. It was shown earlier that it is P alone who records
the sin of Moses and Aaron that excluded them finom Canaan (of. i^Te» p.
276). *^
E
L
1
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. JL DOCUMENT 361
2. It is not greatly different with alleged duplicate
narratives, some of which, as the stories of the creation and
the flood, and the denial of their wives by the patriarchs, have
already been dealt with. It was found earlier that several
of the alleged duplicates fall within the limits of the same
document, as the denials of their wives by Abraham and Isaac
in J (Gen. xii ; xxvi 6 ff.), and two Korah stories, according
to Wellhausen and others, in P (Num. xvL 2 ff.), and may
therefore reasonably be supposed to have belonged to the
original tradition. By far the greater number of instances
we should deny to be " duplicates " in the proper sense at
all — i.e., divergent traditions of the same incidents The
redactor (not to say the original authors) can hardly have
regarded them as such, or he would have omitted one, or
sought to combine them in his usual harmonistic way.
We said before, in speaking of JE, that there was no good
reason, as it appeared to us, for identifying the flight of
Hagar, in Gen. xvL (J), with her expulsion by Sarah in
chap. XXL (E), or even Abraham's denials of his wife at
Egypt (chap. xiL J) and at Gerar (Gen. xx. "E)} So there is
no good reason in the nature of the case for identifying
the two revelations at Bethel — one before Jacob's going to
Paddan-Aram (Gten. xxviiL 10 ff. JE), the other on his
return (chap. xxxv. 9 ff. P) ; or the two revelations to Moses
— one at the burning bush in Midian (Ex. iii. 1 ff. JE), the
other in Egypt (chap. vL 2 ff. 1?), etc. On the contrary, in
most of these narratives there are plain indications that the
incidents are distinct, and that the later implies the earlier.
In Gren. xxl, e^., Ishmael is already bom, and old enough
to '^mock" Isaac; but only in Gen. xvL 15, 16 (P) is Us
birth narrated. The second vision in Bethel is connected
with the first by the word " again " * (Gen. xxxv. 9), and is
led up to by the revelations in chaps. xxxL 13, xxxv 1 (E),
summoning Jacob back from Paddan-Aram, and recalling
him to Bethel — ^histories admittedly known to P. Ex. vL
2 ff. introduces Moses and Aaron abruptly, and the earlier
JE history is implied, explaining who Moses was, and how
he came to be connected with the children of Israel and
^ See above, pp. 286 ff.
* <* The editor," say the Oxford critics, " has inserted the word ' again.' "
— ffex, ii. p. 66. Bat why ? Since P admittedly knew the earlier stories,
what motive coidd he have for ignoring them, and inventing a new on« ia
a different connection t
362 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
with Pharaoh in Egypt ^ — a history again presumed, on
the newer theory, to be known to P.' Indeed, on the
''omission" or ''mutual mutilation" hypothesis of the
critics, what right have we to suppose that in all these
cases both stories were not found in the documents con-
cerned, and that, as in so many other instances of parallel
narratives, the suppression of one is not due to the redactor ?
3. The " historical incredibilities " freely imputed to the
Priestly Writing, as to other parts of the narrative of the
Pentateuch, can only here be briefly touched on, though
they form the real ground of much of the criticism directed
against that work.' There is, in truth, in this department,
extremely little — ^hardly anything — with which those who
have had to do with the subject have not been familiar since
the days of the Deistical controversy, or which was not
pressed home with skill and cogency by the earlier sceptical
writers of last century, as Yon Bohlen, etc. Only in thoee
days it was not called " believing criticism ** of the Bible, but
destructive attack upon it! In modern times the writer
chiefly relied on as having irretrievably shattered the
historical credibility of the narratives in the Pentateuch —
especially those proceeding from the Priestly Writer — ^is
Bishop Colenso. The arguments of this authority are taken
over practically en Hoc by modern critical scholars, and
treated as irrefragable demonstrations that the stories in
Gnosis, but particularly those of the Mosaic period, are
throughout utterly unhistoricaL^ On this subject, while we
^ Of. EShler, Bib. Quck, L pp. 182-88.
' It is in the light of saoh oonsiderations that we tee how leTolntioiuuj
for the critioal theory ie the admisaion that P knew, and sappoaed his
readers to know, these earlier histories. To take one other example from
Genesis. "The promise of a son to Sarah," says Dr. Driver, ''is twice
described. "—6^0n«iiiff, p. iii. Bnt how is the matter manded if the author
of chap. xriL knew of chap, zviii.! The promises are really distinct-Hnte to
Abraham, the other in hearing of Sarah.
' Thus Enenen : ' ' The representations in the later books of the Pentateooh
simply defy the conditions of space and time to which every event is snbgeet,
anaby wmoh, therefore, every narrative may be tested. The Ezodns^ the
wandering, the passage of the Jordan, and the settlement in Canaan, <w Cftsy
aan deaonbid in iht Mexateuthf simply could not have happened." — Hex,
p. 48.
* " With one single exception, ** says Enenen, " the twenty ehapters of his
book (Pt i.) are devoted to an absolutely pulverising criticiBm of the data of
the Orvndaehrift" He speaks of the difficulties as " massed tether and
set forth by him with imperturbable Mn^/roii and relentless thoroughness."
-^Hex. Introd. pp. xiv-xvii, p. 46. Wellhausen says : " Colenso is properly
Oa
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. IL DOCUMENT 363
have no intereBt in arguing for a sapematnral aoooraoy in
ohronological or historical matters in the Biblical nairatayes
beyond what the soundness of his information enabled the
sacred writer to attain, vet, as having lived through the
Golenso storm, and read pretty fully into the literature
it esUed forth, we desire to dissociate ourselves entirely
from these extravagant estimates of the success of the
Bishop's destructive work. Colenso's courage, honesty, and
loyalty to truth, as he understood it, we shall not seek
to dispute. But his work lacked from the commencement
the first condition of success, — ^insight into the meaning,
and sympathy with the spirit, of the books he was working
with, idle distinction between a supernatural and a purely
natural history was one to which he allowed no weight-— did
not seem able even to appreciate; many real difficulties
he emphasised, which others, perhaps, had passed over too
lightly, but many more were the creation of a mind working
in narrow arithmetical grooves, and bent on applying to a
historical writing the canons of a rigorous litemism, which
would be more justly described as " intolerable pedantry "
than the work of the Priestly Writer to which it was
applied. His book was keenly scrutinised, and manifoldly
replied to, at the time ; and those are widely mistaken who,
oif the sixength of the laudations of the critics, persuade
themselves that the victory was altogether his. We shall
best show this by a rapid glance at lus criticism.
(1) It would be unpardonable to resuscitate — ^were it not
that itiej must be presumed to belong to those demonstra-
tions of contradiction of the ''universal laws of time and
space'' which Kuenen speaks of — the extraordinary com-
putations by which Bishop Colenso proves to his satii^Eaction
that ''aU the congregation" of Israel could not assemble
at the door of the tabemade, or that the Levitical laws could
not be observed in their entirety in the wilderness. Who
that has read his book will ever forget his wonderful calcula-
tions to show that, even excepting ex grtUia such as may
have been detained by sickness or other necessary causes,
''the whole congregation" of nearly 2,000,000, could not
entitled to the eredit of having fint torn the web asunder." — Hist, ofbrad^
p. 847. Addia says; "One has only to read the first two Tolnmea of
Colenao to see what abanrditiea are involved if we take the Pentatenoh as it
stands, and treat it as one book. There is no end to the ehronologica]
monstrositiea which meet ns at ereiy tarn.**— Aa:. i. p^ L
364 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES :
have been squeezed into the court of the tabernacle, and,
standing as closely as possible, in rows of nine, not merely^
at the door^ but (another concession) at the end of the
tabernacle, would have reached — the men alone for nearly
20 miles, all the people for nearly 60 miles I Or his
reasoning that the Levitical law required the officiating
priest " to carry on his back on foot " the carcase of the
bullock of the sin-offering to *' a clean place " without tiie
camp — on one reckoning a distance of about f of a mile, on
another reckoning about 6 miles! Or his proof that the
three priests in the wilderness could not have offered — ^not
to say eaten — the 90,000 pigeons annually, or 88 per diem
apiece, required by the law for the 250 cases of child-birth
daily I ^ Some least grain of common sense might be con-
ceded to the Priestly Writer, who, whatever his faults,
certaioly did not mean to pcdm off upon his readers such
crude absurdities as these. Most people will feel that the
force of his language is abundantly satisfied by large and
representative gatherings of the people at and around the
tabernacle on solemn occasions ; ' and will remember that,
"according to the story/' to use the Bishop's phrase, the
priests had a whole tribe of Levites to assist them in their
menial duties — though these, as formerly noticed,' strangely
enough, from the critical point of view, never appear in tie
laws in Leviticus. If the pigeons were not, as the Bishop
says they would not be, obtainable in any large numbers in
the wilderness, they would not be there to bring or eat;
but the objection overlooks that the sacrificial system had
specially in view the future settled habitation of the people
(cf • Num. zv. 2 ff ), and that in point of fact, it is represented
as having been largely suspended during the years of
wandering.*
(2) No thoughtful reader will minimise the very real
difficulties inhering in the Biblical narratives of the Exodus
— the remarkable increase of the children of Israel in
1 PenL Pt. i. See referenoes and qootatioiiB in Note A on Bishop Golen«>*8
Nnmerical Objections.
* Publloly-callcd meetinn of "the inhabitants" of lar^ towns or oitiei
are frequently held in halls of Terr moderate dimensions. Ecclesiasti-
cally, the wnter has been present at dnly-sammoned and formally-minuted
meetings of a Church PresDytery of several hundred members, for purposes
of ordination, where the members present were accommodated on a railed
^tform of a few feet square. Colenso could prove it impossible.
> See above, p. 304. ^ Josh. ▼. 6 ; of. Amos v. 25.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. IL DOCUMENT 365
Egypt,^ the drcmnstances of the Exodus itself, the passage
of the Bed Sea, the care of the people in the wilderness and
provision for them, etc lliese facts, at the same time, are
predselj among the best attested in the history of Israel ;
and, in dealing with them, justice requires that we treat
them from the Bible's own pomt of view, as events altogether
exceptional in the history of that people, and, indeed, of
mankind, accomplished by divine help, and, as respects the
Exodus, under the hignest exaltation of religious and
patriotic consciousness of which a nation is capable. Many
elements, also, which do not appear upon the surface of the
narrative, have to be taken into account, 0^., that the
patriarchs who went down to Egypt did so accompanied by
extensive households* Colenso, in the work referred to,
however, will admit none of these relieving considerations
(nor even the "households''), insists on bringing every-
thing to the foot-rule of the most ordinary experience
— ^the birth-rate of London, $.g., or a lower rate,'^ — eliminates
wholly the supernatural element, founds upon the Biblical
data where these suit his purpose, but rejects other state-
ments which throw light upon the former ; very often by
his grotesque literalism creates difficulties which are not in
the Biblical narrative at alL Thus, e,g.y he will have it that
"in one single day, the order to start was communicated
suddenly, at midnight, to every single family of every town
and village, throughout a tract of country as laj^e as
Hertfordshire, but ten times as thickly peopled"; that
" they then came in from all parts of the land of Goshen to
Bameses, bringing with them the sick and infirm, the young
and the aged; further, that since receiving the summons,
they had sent out to gather in all their flocks and herds,
spread over so wide a district, and had driven them also to
Barneses ; and lastly, that having done all this, since they
^ It is nndesirablcL on the other hand, to exagsorate the diffioullr. The
writer has personal knowledse of a family the neads of which celebrated
their golden wedding in 1880. In that 50 years the original conple had
moltiplied to 69 (there were two deaths). If the r^der will reckon the
resolt of a similar rate of increase for 800 or 400 years, the figures may
snrprisehinL
' This is no doubt the uniform representation in Genesis, of., €,g,, Qen.
zir. 14; zzri. IS, 14; izzii. 4, 5, 10, etc. Colenso dings to the literal
seyenty souls.
* He prefers to take his rate from the slow growth in the lifetimes of
Abraham and Isaao,
366 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
were roused at midnight, they were started again from
Barneses that very same day and marched on to Succoth,
not leaying a single sick or infirm person, a single woman
in child-birth, or even * a single hoof ' behind them." " This
is undoubtedlj,'' he avers, ** what the story in the Book of
Exodus requires us to believe (Ex. xii 31-41, 51)."^
" Incredibility,'' truly I But the picture is a creation of the
objector's own imagination, of a piece with his persistence
(in whidi many modem critics support him) that the
passover is represented as taking place on the night of the
same day in which the first command to observe it was given.
Both objections Ml together in view of the fact that the
text on which the above assertion is based: "I will pass
through the land of Egypt this night " (Ex. xiL 12),* occurs in
a law which expressly ordains that the lamb of the passover
is to be chosen on the 10th day of the month, and kept
till the 14th (vers. 3, 6) ; which, therefore, must have be^
given still earlier in the month, perhaps near its b^inning.
(3) We do not propose to re-thresh the himdred tin^
threshed straw of Colenso's long catalogue of "incredibilities'*
— most of them retailed by others — but confine ourselves to
two examples, which perhaps will be admitted to be fairly
typical
The first is the very old difficulty about Hezron and
Hamul, the sons^ of Pharez, whose names are included in
the list of threescore and ten who went down with Jacob to
Egypt (Gen. xlvL). A simple reckoning shows that Pharez,
the father of this pair, cannot himself have been more than
three or four years old at the time of the descent;' his
sons, therefore, must have been bom, not in Canaan, but in
Egypt. Dr. Driver, like Bishop Colenso, finds here ** a grave
c^onological discrepancy between P and JE."^ Yet the
^ PmL Ft L pp. 61-62. The ptasage is partly from E, partly from P.
* In TW. 12 as in ver. 8, etc, tne worda " this night " rerer to the ni^t
Soken of, not to the night in which the worda are spoken. The Ozwrd
exaUuch translates "that oight" (IL p. 06).
* Judah was about forty-three years old at the descent, and as his sons
Br and Onan had been married and were dead a year or two before tiie birth
of Pharez (Geu. xxxyiii.), the latter cannot haye been more than the age
staled at the descent.
* OtnuiSt p. 865. On the contrary, the reference to Er and Onan in
Ter. 12 is a clear allasion to the J£ story in chap, xxxviii., as also is the
ijace giyen to Hezron and Hamnl in the list why nhould P, who knew
ihs JB story, wantonly oontradict it f
THE PRffiSTLY WRITING. 11. DOCUMENT 367
I ordinary solution, viz., that Hezron and Hamul are
I
here introduced (Colenso failed to observe, in a separate
clause) as the legal representatives and substitutes of Er
and Onan, who are said to have died in the land of Canaan,^
seems not only perfectly admissible, but even required by
the peculiar construction of the passaga The story in 6^1.
xzrviiL, forbidding as it is, adequately explains the ground
of this substitution. On genealogies generally it is to be
remarked that they are commonly constructed on more or
less technical principles, and have to be construed in that
light This table of seventy persons, e.g., is evidently one
of heads of families, and includes in its enumeration, not
only Jacob himself and his daughter Dinah, but Er and
Onan, who died in Canaan (represented by Hezron and
Hamul), and Joseph's two sons, who, though expressly
mentioned as bom in the land of Egypt (ver. 20), are
embraced in ''the souls that came with Jacob into
Egypt."*
Our second example is one usually regarded as among
the most formidable — the number of the (male) firstborn in
Israel as compared with the total number of males. The
firstborn males are given in Kum. iii 43 as 22,273 (a
number whose accuracy is checked by comparison with
that of the Levites). Assuming now the toted numb^ of
males to be 900,000, we have a proportion of one firstborn
to 42 mitles, which is interpreted to mean that '' according
to the story of the Pentateuch every mother in, lerasl must
have had on the average 42 sons!"' It may again occur
that the Priestly Writer, who had at least a genius for
manipulating and systematising figures, could hardly have
^ BMkoning Jacob, either Er and Onan, or Hesron and Hanrnl, mnat be
omitted to make the number 88 in ver. 15.
*Gf. DelitzBoh, Genena, L pp. 887-40; Hengstenbezg, Pent ii pp.
290 ff. Knenen regaida this list as a natchwork pnt together from Knm.
zzyi {Mex. p. 68) ; Bennett thinka it '^may be an abatrMt of the chapters
in Ohionicles" (t), and says "the 66 (in rer. 26) is a correction of an
editor" {Cfen, pp. 878, 882). Dr. Driyer also brackets "Jacob and his
sons" (ver. 8), and the " threescore-and-siz " of ver. 26, and aU yer. 27,
bat ** threescore and ten " as additions to the original text (€fenesi$, p. 868).
There is no authority for any of these assertions or chanjpea. which create
difBcolties, and remove none. Even in Dr. Driver's rensed text, Ibr and
Onan, who never were in Egypt, and Joseph's two sons, who never were in
Canaan, are needed to make np the 70 ".that came down with Jacob to
fl^gypt " (vers. 26-27).
^FuU,, People's edit. p. 49.
368 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
been anaware of a discrepancy which has been so obvionB
to his critics from the beginning ; and that the more likelj
explanation is, that he and his critics are proceeding on
different principles in their reckonings. Nor is it hard,
perhaps, to see where at least the main part of the solution
lies ; the solution is, in fact, as old as the difficulty itself.
In the first place, it must be observed that the firstborn in
a family would be as often a daughter as a son ; this at once
reduces the number of sons to each mother by one half.^
In the next place, it is on every ground unlikely that
persons who were themselves married and heads of families
would be reckoned as ** firstborns." It is more reasonable
to suppose that the reckoning was confined, as it has been
expressed, ** to the rising generation — those who were still
children in the houses of their parents " — and that it did
not include all who had ever been firstborns in their own
generation ; fathers, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers, if
still alive. That this was the real nature of the reckoning
seems established, among other considerations, by the analogy
of the firstborns in E^pt, where certainly fathers, grand-
fathers, and more remote ancestors are not regarded as
included in the judgment* This again practically limits
the firstborns to those xmder twenty.' These may have
formed about a third of the total number, or, if regard be
had to the longer ages of these times, may have beej> nearer
a fourth.^ Instead of 42 sons to each mother, there-
fore, we are now brought down to nearly 5 ; and account
has still to be taken of cases in which the firstborn of a
family was dead, of polygamous marriages, or concubinage,
where possibly only the firstborn of the house was reckoned,*
and of a probable diminished rate of marriage in the last
years of the oppression, and in prospect of deliverance.
* Oolenso ingenaoiul j ohaerrea that this does not rid ns of the difficulty,
hat only ''changes the form of it, for each mother has still 42 children"
(ibid, p. 60). Bu^ with all respect, the daughters are there in any case,
and have to he accounted for.
' Pharaoh, e.^., was himself probahly a firsthom, hat was not slain.
On Colenso's view, in most houses there would be more than ''one dead"
(Ex. xU. 80).
* Colenso says that the text does not prescribe any such limit. Bat the
text does not state at aU on what principle the reckoning was made.
* Gf. EOhler's discussion, Bib, Oeach, pp. 288-89.
*In a ftunlly like Jacob's, e.a.f how many "firstborns*' would ho
reckoned ; Reuben, whom Jacob ctJls "my firstborn" (Oen. xlix. 8), or all
Iho firstborns of the sereral wiyes f Cf. the law, Deut. xxi 15, 17.
b:
c
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. II. DOCUMENT 369
These are not "harmonlstic expedients/' but ezplanatioDS
that lie in the nature of the case, and are obyiouslj
suggested by the reckoning itself.
llie conclusion of our inquiry, therefore, brings us back
to the point we started from — strong confidence in the unity
of the narrative, and in its essential historical credibility.
y. Genebal Bebults: MosAicirT of the Fentateuoh
To what result — we must now ask — does our whole
investigation conduct us on the origin of the Priestly
Writing, and the age and composition of the Pentateuch
generally. We b^an by leaving it an open question
whether, or how many, separate documents were employed
in the compilation of that work, and if so, what were the
ages and mutual relations of these document& To what
conclusions have we now been led?
For one thing, it is first to be said, not to the conclusion
that Moses himself wrote the Pentateuch in the precise
shape or extent in which we now possess it ; for the work,
we think, shows very evident signs of different pens and
styles, of editorial redaction, of stages of compilation. As
before observed, its composition has a history^ whether we
are able ever to track satisfactorily that history or not.
On the other hand, next, very strongly to the view of the
unity, essential Momicity, and relative antiquity of the
Pentateuch. The unity which characterises the work has
its basis mainly in the history, knit together as that is by
the presence of a <ft veloping divine purpose ; but arises also
from the plan of the book, which must have been laid down
early, by one mind, or different minds working together,
while the memory of the great patriarchal traditions was yet
fresh, and the impressions of the stupendous deliverance
from Egypt, and of the wonderful events connected with,
and following it, were yet recent and vivid. In the collation
and preparation of the materials for this work — some of
them, perhaps, reaching back into pre-Mosaic times — and
the laying of the foundations of the existing narratives, to
which Moses by his own compositions, accordmg to constant
' tradition, lent the initial impulse, many hancu and minds
may have co-operated, and may have continued' to co-
operate, after the master-mind was removed ; but unity of
24
370 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES.
purpose and will gave a corresponding unity to the prodnoi
of their labours. So far from such a view being obsolete, or
disproved by modern criticism, we hold that internal in-
dications, external evidence, and the circumstances of the
Mosaic age itself, unite in lending their support to its
probability.
1. It is in favour of the view we defend that it is in line
with the Bible's own constant tradition of the Momidty of
the Pentateuchal books, which the modem hypothesis
contradicts at every point. The Biblical evidence on this
subject of Mosaic origin is often unduly minimised, bat it ia
really very strong and pervasiva Apart from the assmnp-
tion of the existence of a ''book of the law of Moses" in
passages of the historical books,^ and the implication of its
existence in passages where it is not expressly mentioned ; '
apart also from the firm belief of the Jews in the days of
our Lord and His apostles — a belief which our Lord
Himself shared' — there can be no question: —
(1) That all the thrte Codes — the Book of the Covenant,
the Deuteronomic discourses, and the Levitical Ck)de —
profess to come from Moses, and the first and second
profess to have been vniUenhj him.*
(2) That the Deuteronomic discourses imply the existence,
in substance and in part in written form, of the JS Mstory^
and that the F writing, likewise, presupposes the JE history,
with which, in its narrative psirt, it is parallel*
(3) That king Josiah and the Jewish people of his day
received DevUro^nomy as a senuine work .of Moses, and that
the nation ever after regarded it as his.^
(4) That the Jewish people of Ezra's time similarly
accepted the whole PerUateiLch — including the Levitical
legislation — as gentdnely Mosaic.^
(5) That the Samaritans received the Pentateuch at the
hands of the Jews as an xmdoubtedly Mosaic book.^
To these firm strands of tradition we may with
much confidence attach ourselves, without feeling that
1 Joah. i. 7, 8 ; Tiii. 80-85 ; zziy. 26 ; 2 Kings ziy. « ; el 8 Chron.
xzY. 4, eto.
* B.g., 1 EiDgi Tiii 4 ff.
* See Note B on onr Lord's Testimony to Moses.
^ Cf.'aboye, pp. 99, 152, 262. • Cf. aboye, pp. 107, «to.
* Gf. aboye, pp. 257 ff. ' E^ra yi. 18 ; Keh. zilL 1 ; of. MaL It. L
* See Note Con the Samaritan Pentateuch.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. H. DOCUMENT 371
"traditionalist/' in such a connection, is any term of
reproach. As has happened in the case of the Kew
Testament/ so, it may be predicted, it will prove also in the
case of the Old, that greater respect will yet come to be
paid to consentient tradition than it is now the fashion to
accord to it.
2. It is not, however, tradition merely which supports
the idea of an essential Mosaicity of the Pentateuch. A
strict application of critical methods leads to the same
conclusion. We may sum up here the chief results at
which we have arrived.
(1) We have found no good reason for separating the
J and Eot the critics, and regarding them as independent
documents ; and as little for placing their origin as late as
the ninth or eighth century. We attach, as formerly said,
no importance to the supposed mirroring of later events in
the narratives, on which the argument for a late date is
chiefly founded.* Ghmkel, we saw, can find no trace in the
tradition in Genesis, apart from the reference to Edom
(chap, xxvii 40), wldch looks beyond 900 B.C.;* and the
bulk of the JE narrative may well go back to Mosaic or
immediately post-Mosaic times. The older scholars did not
feel the need of bringing it, at latest, below the days of the
undivided kingdom, and there is no new evidence.
(2) We have been led, on historical and critical grounds,
to reject the theory of the Josianic origin of Deuteronomy ^
and, in accordance with the claim of the book itself, to
affirm the genuineness of the Deuteronomic discourses,
substantiidly in the form in which we have them. But
Deuteronomy, as repeatedly shown, attests the existence
and Mosaic character of the Book of the Covenant,^ founds
upon the JE history, and involves at least the presence of a
measure of Levitical legislation.^
^ Of. Harnftck, Chrcn, d, Aliehrist, LU., p. Tiii
' See aboTe, pp. 111-12. Kuenen saj^s : " Beferenoes to historioal facti,
8i:ch as might giTe a due to the dates of oompottition, are extremely rare in
the 'prophetic narratiyes of the Hezateuch. — Sex. p. 287. StUI he finds
a few, as he thinks, in Edom, the wan of the Syrians, etc. In P there are
none saoh.
* Omusis, p. IziL See above on Edom, pp. 112, 209 ; also below, p. 878.
^ Dilfanann puts the Decalogue and Book of the Coyenant **in, tno first
days of tilie possession of the land, at latest in the days of SamneL"— ilTmii.-
Job. p. 644. He finds a few traoes of later revision.
* See above. Chap. VIIL
372 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES:
(3) We have found that there are the strongeet mtical
reasons for denying that the P wrUvng (the peculiarities of
which are acknowledged) ever subsisted as an independent
document, and for regarding it, especially in Qenesis, as
mainly a ''framework" enclosing the contents of TR}
though it has also, at certain points, its original, and, in
parts, considerable contributions to bring to the history.
We found ourselves compelled to reject the post-exiluui
date assigned to the laws in this writing by the critics ; but
equally (here in agreement with the Wellhausen school)
the mediating view of those who regard the Ck>de as a
private document originating in priestly circles under the
monarchy.' There remains as the only alternative to the
post-exilian date the view — ^which was also that of the
older scholars — of the substantially Mosaic origin of the
laws.' It has been seen that these contain no anachronisms,
but keep strictly within the limits of the Mosaic age.^ I^
however, the laws are early, there can be no good reason for
doubting the antiquity of the history with which they are
connected, for it was simply the assumption of the late date
of the laws which led, for consistency's sake, to the putting
of the history late.^ Further, from the close relation
subsisting between P and J£ in the narratives, we are
compelled to assign both, as elements in a composite work,
to practically the same age.
3. Taking the Book of Oenetis by itself, we may con-
fidently affirm that, apart from the few words and phrases
commonly adduced, as "The Canaanite was then in the
land,"' '' Before there reigned any king over the children of
Israel,"^ there are no indications which point necessarily
beyond the Mosaic age,' and even these do not point latcor
than the early days of the kingdom — ^if they do even thi&
1 See earlier in chapter, pp. 940 ft * See aboTe, Ohap. IX. pp. 826 it
' Cf. pp. 828>29 above. * See aboTe, p. 2294.
' See above, pp. 200, 884.
* Gen. zii. 6 ; xiii. 7. The proper meaning of these panaM seemi to
OB to be that the Ganaanites— oomparatiyely recent settlers (of. Gen. ziv.
6-7 ; Dent. ii. 10-12, 20-28 ; see below, p. 529)— were already in the land
when Abraham entered it. No Jew needed to be informed that uie Oanaanitei
had not then been dispoaeeased.
' Gen. zzztL 81.
' Whether as part of the original text, or a reyiser's note, the wofda
naturally suggest that when they were vrritten kings were reigning in
Israel The fist of Edom's kings, on the other hand, does not neoesssrily
i
m
i
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. IL DOCUMENT 373
''The Book of Genesis,'' says Euenen himself, in words
ahready quoted, "may here be left out of account, since
the picture it contains of the age of the patriarchs gives no
unequivocal indications of the period at which it was
produced."^ On the other hand, there are not a few in-
dications in the book, as well as references to it in other
books, which implj a high antiquity — this, also, espedaUy
in its Mohistic parts. There is reason for bdieving that the
narratives of the creation and the flood in the F sections are
very old,' The Fourth Commandment in Exodus is based,
both in chap. xz. II and chap. lood. 17, on the sabbath-
rest of God in Gen. iL 1-3 — a fact doubly significant if, as
Graf allows, ** the Decalogue in the form in which it appears
handed down in Ex. xx. is manifestly older and more
original than that in Deut v."' Deut iv. 32 seems to be
a dear reference to the Elohistic account of the creation,
with its characteristic word bara ('Mn the day when
Elohim created man upon the earth"). The list of the
eight kings of Edom in Gen. xxxvi, which stops with
Hadar (ver. 39), apparently a person still living, points to a
date considerably earlier than Saul or David, when the inde-
pendence of the kingdom ceased.^ Colenso, who is our ally
here against the post-exilian theory of the F narrative, pointo
out quite a number of other expressions which look back
to Grenesis.^ He mentions, e,g., the phrase in Deuteronomy,
"Unto them and to their seed after them" (chaps, i 8,
iv. 37, X. 15), in which there seems allusion to the re-
1 cany qb beyond the Mosaic age, and can hardly be extended to the time of
Sanl (see below). Delitzsch says on the passage : "It does not neoesBarily
follow that the writer liyed till the time of the Israelite kingdom, though
i it looks like it."— Qenesii, ii. p. 247.
. ^ JTiKB. p. 42. Cf. aboTe, p. 111. Dr. Driyer says on the above allnsions :
"These are isolated passages, the inferences natarally authorized by which
I miffht not impossibly oe neutralized by the supposition that they were later
additiona to the original narratiye, and did not consequently determine by
I themselTes the date of the book as a whole." — G^mmt, p. xy.
* See next chapter, pp. 402 ff.
> Cfeschieht, JSiUher, p. 19 ; cf. Delitzsch, Cfenuia, i. pp. 80-81 ; Colenso,
I PeiU. Pt yi p. 584 ; App. pp. 124 ff.
«£dom was under kings in Moses' time (Num. xx. 14), and it if
I poisdble that Hadar may be the king then referred to ; at least no stretcdi
I of re^s can easily brin^ Hadar down to the time of SauL Delitzsch says :
"There is nothing agamst the supposition that Q [=P] is here communi-
cating a document whose original author was a contemporary of Moaei^ and
) survived to the entry into the promised land."— 6^sfiesi«, ii p. 249*
i " FisnL Ft. yi., as above.
374 DIFFICULTIES AND PERPLEXITIES :
cnrring P formula in Gren. xviL 8 ; xxxv. 12 ; xlviii 2 ; cf.
ohaps. ix. 19, xviL 7, 10, 19 ; the words in Deut. xxix. 13,
** that He may be to thee an Elohim/' which seems distinctly
to refer to Qen. xvii 7, 8, where alone we have such a
promise under solemn covenant ; the declaration in Isa. liv. 9
(at least not pos^-exilian), '' I have 9wom that as the vxUers
of Noah should no more go over the earth/' eta, which
refers to the P phraseology and covenant in Glen. ix. 11.
[Hie cumulative effect of these allusions, as against the
modem theory, is very great
4 We have not attempted to go into detailed argument
on the history of the' language} nor to rebut objections,
more frequency heard earlier than now,* on the supposed
ignorance of the Hebrews in the Mosaic age of the art of
writing. The discussion of the language lies beyond our
province ; and discovery, as already seen, has thrown such
riemarkable light on the existence, and wide diffusion of
writing, in antiquity, specially among the peoples with
whom the Hebrews were brought most closely into contact
(Babylonia, Egypt, Palestine),' as to place the possibility
of such literary labours as we have been supposing beyond
reasonable doubt Few, therefore, now found on the
assumption that writing was unknown, or not practised,
among the early Hebrews ; ^ less even is heard of the un-
likelihood of an ** undisciplined horde " of nomads possess-
ing a knowledge of letter&^ Every indication shows that
the Hebrews, as they came up out of Egypt, were not a
people of this character, but had a good knowledge of the
arts and ways of civilised life.^ The Pentateuch, we saw
^ Of. the fifen$ral aignment in Ohap. III.
* The argament was formerly Terj often urged, as by Yon BoUen,
Hartmann, eto. , and is still ooeasumaUy met with. Gf. Reuse, e.g,j CfesehiohU
des A,T., p. 96. Even DiUmann thinks it against the Mosaio com-
position of the books that writing was not generally practiBed in the
beginning of the people's history {Nwn,'^o$, p. 504). Later disooTOiies
would probably have altered his opinion.
* Gf. abore, pp. 78 ff. ; see further in next chapter.
^Kuenen (quoted by Vos) saj^s: "That the Israelites possessed an
alphabet^ and knew the art of writing, in the Mosaic age, is not subject
to reasonable doubt, and is now almost uniyersally admitted." Eautzsch,
we haye seen (p. 76), allows that Judg. yuL 14. (B.V.) proTes that "the
art of writing had been gradually disseminated among the lower people." —
La,ofO.T,,^. 10.
'Thus Von Bohlen, etc. Most older soholan, howcTer, i.|r., Bleek,
upheld the Mosaio use of writing. So Colenso.
* See above, pp. 79, 104, 164.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. 11. DOCUMENT 375
before, assumes a knowledge of the art of writing;' and
if such knowledge was possessed by Moses, and those about
him, there can be little doubt but that it would be used.
There seems, accordingly, no bar in the way of the supposition
that in the age of Moses the main features of the language
as a vehicle of literary expression were already establish^,
and, in some form of script, the use of writing may go back
much earlier.* On tins point Dr. Driver says : '' It is not
denied that the patriarchs possessed the art of writing";
but he thinks that the use of documents from the patriarchal
age is '' a mere hypothesis, for the truth of which no positive
grounds can be alleged.'' * Even if it were so, it would be
in no worse case than much in the critical view itself,
which, if anything in the world ever was, is hypothesis
built on hypothesis.^ The value of a hypothesis is the
degree in which it explains facts, and, in the silence of
the Book of Grenesis,* we can only reason from general
probabilities. But the probabilities, derived from the state
of culture at the time, from the fi^ed and circumstantial
character of the tradition, and from the archaeological
notices embedded in the book,^ are, we think, strong, that
the Hebrews, even in the patriarchal age, were to some extent
acquainted with books and writing. If so, we may believe
that at an early period, in Egypt under Joseph, if not before,
attempts would be made to set down things in writing.^
6. We have used the term ^collaboration" and ''co-
operation" to express the kind and manner of the activity
which, in our view, brought the Fentateuchai books into
their present shape,^ less, however, as suggesting a definite
theory of origin, than as indicating the labour of original
composers, worldng with a common aim, and towards a
common end, in contrast with the idea of Late irresponsible
redactors, combining, altering, manipulating, enlarging at
^ See aboye, pp. 80 ff.
*The qaestion of the acript need In earlj Hebrew writing (old
Fhoeniciiii, eimeiform, 'Mineanf) ia one of great difSculty, on wliioh
opinions an mnoh divided. In the view of some the nse of the PhoBnidan
alphabet by the IsraelitiBS does not go baok beyond about 1000 B.a Bat
this is unlikely. See Note D on Early Hebrew Writing.
* Cfenesitf pi zliL * See Note E on Hypotheses in Critioism.
* The sUeiuse most not be pressed too far. See aboye, p. 80.
* See aboye, pp. 78 ff. ; and of. next chapter.
* Cf. Hommei, Aneieni Eebrew TradUion^ pp. 277, 290.
* See aboye, pp. 216, 854.
376 DIFFICULTffiS AND PERPLEXITIES:
pleasiira It has been shown how the critical theory itself
tends to approximate to this idea of ** co-operation in the
production of the Hexateuch,^ though at the other end of
the development What it puts at we enc^ we are dispoeed
to transfer to the b^inning*
Beyond this we do not feel it possible to go witii an j
d^ree of confidence. It may very well be — though every-
thing here is more or less conjectural — ^that, as already
hinted, the original JEF history and Code embraced, not
simply the Book of the Covenant, but a brief summary of
the Levitical ordinances, analogous, as Dillmann thinks, to
the so-called Law of Holiness ; possibly also, as Delitzsch
supposes, a short narrative, in its proper place, of the last
discourses of Moses, and of his deatL* We have seen
that Deuteronomy, in its original form, was probably an
independent work ; the priestly laws, also, would be at first
chiefly in the hands of tiie priest& Later, but still, in our
opinion, early — ^possibly in the times immediately succeeding
the conquest, but not later than the days of the undivided
kingdom — ^the original work would be enlarged by union with
Deuteronomy, and by incorporation of the larger mass of
Levitical material In some such way, with possible re-
vision by Ezra, or whoever else gave the work its final
canonical shape, our Pentateuch may have arisen.
It is difficult, however, to suppose that this hurge work,
assuming its origin to be as early as we have suggested,
ever had, in its completeness, any wide circulation, or was
frequently copied in its entirety. As in the Christian
Church, before the days of printing, it was customary to
copy out selected books and portions, as the Psalter, or
the Gospels ; so, it may reasonably be presumed, the parts
of the Pentateuch copied out for general use, and in more
common circulation, would ordinarily be those to which we
still turn as the more interesting and edifying — the story
of the patriarchs and of Moses, the history of the Exodus
and the wanderings, the Book of Deuteronomy, short digests
of laws, etc The detailed Levitical Code would be Wt to
the priests, and would be known mainly through the praxis,
^ See Note F on the idea of ** Co-operation" in Critical Theoir.
* See aboTe, p. 284. SimUarly, in plaoe of the present detailed de-
■oriptionfl, there may have been ahorter aoconnts of the making of the ark
andtabernaole.
THE PRIESTLY WRITING. IL DOCUMENT 377
or hj oral instruction at the sanctuary. The "law of
Jehovah/' of which we read so much in the Psalter, by
which the piety of the godly in Israel was nourished, which
enlightened, converted, directed, warned, comforted, cleansed,
made fruitful, the souls that delighted in it, was assuredly,
as before remarked,^ something very different from the dry
Levitical regulations. The versions of these books in
circulation would also have their vicissitudes; would
undergo the usual textual corruptions ; may have received
unauthorised modifications or additions; may have had
their Jehovistic and Elohistic recensions. But the sense in
pious minds that it was Jehovah's " law "—embodying the
" words of His lips " * — which they were dealing with would
check rash freedoms, and the means of correction would
never be wholly lost God's people had a "Bible" then,
and, as it comes to us from their hands, we may cherish
the confidence that it has suffered no change which unfits
it for being our Bible also.*
* See above, pp. 268-64.
* Pa. XYii 4 ; of. Pat. L, zriiL 21, 22, xix. 7-11, xzr., eta
' The itatementi made as to the libeitiee taken with the text of the
Hebrew Scriptarea in pra-Ghiiatian times are often mnch too sweeping.
See Kote 0 on the State of the Hebrew Test
APPENDIX TO CHAPTER X
The Lateb Historical Books
It is not proposed to discuss at length the problems con-
nected with the age, authorship, and credibiUtj of the later
historical books of the Old Testament. Incidentally the
history in the later books has been defended in the pre-
ceding chapters, and will receive further illustration in the
chapter on archaeology. The Pentateuchal question is, as
everyone acknowledges, the fundamental one in Old Testa-
ment criticism. If that stone can be dislodged, the critics
have shaken the edifice of the Old Testament to its basa
If the attack on that foundation is repelled, the succeeding
history has not much to fear from assault. It will be
sufficient here to indicate the bearings of the results already
arrived at on the composition and authority of the latcar
books.
.
I. We may briefly indicate, first, the bearing of tbe
acceptance of the erUieal theory on the age and value of
the books in question.
1. If the P eUmerU in the Pentateuch is of exilian or
post-exilian date, then necessarily all assumed P sections
in the Book of Joshua must be post-exilian also, and, on
the theory, destitute of historical worth. This condemns,
e.g., the whole account of the division of the land in the
second half of Joshua.^ Similarly, all passages or allusions
in later books, which imply the existence of r or its institu-
tions must (or may) be held to be late. Everything of this
nature, therefore, — ^tent of meeting, Levites, high prie^, etc., —
is usually struck out as interpolation. The Levitical
representations in the Books of Chronidee are a priori
discredited, and put out of court as worthless.
1 Ot belowjpp. 879-60.
THE LATER HISTORICAL BOOKS 379
2. In the same way, if DeuUrwMy/Mf is a coinposition
of the age of Josiah, l^en all Deuteronomic sections, or
revisions in the D style, of the historical books,
must be later than Deuteronomy, and cannot be taken as
genuine history. Large sections of Joshua — the reading
of the law on Mount Ebal, 0^., chap, viii 30 ft — and of
Judges, are thus discredited as the unhistorical work of
a D^ or D*, etc.^ The Books of TSAnm are a late com-
pilation from a Deuteronomic point of view, and exhibit
a revision of the history in a l)euteronomic spirit which
amounts, in its effect, to a falsification of it* llie mystery
is why this Deuteronomic revision has left nearly untouched
the Books of Samuel,' and, in view of most, the narratives
of the Pentateuch.^
3. If the JE narratives belong at earUest to the ninth or
eighth centuries, a presumption is created, in the opinion
of the critics, in favour of th^ legendary character, and
all additions or redactions of members of the *' school " must
be later, and less trustworthy, stilL As Deuteronomy rests
on the JE histories, the late date of that book is held to
be confirmed.
IL The matter presents itself in a very different light
when looked at from the apposite point of view.
1. If the F sections in the Pentateuch are no< of post-
exilian date, but go back to early times, there is no need
for putting the F sections in Joshua late ; or for expungine
the allusions to priestiiood and tabernacle in the historiccu
books ; or even, on this ground, for discrediting the state-
ments of the Books of Chronicle&^ Delitzsch, e^., pre-
cisely inverting the usual style of argument, finds his
conclusion that *' the literary activity of the Elohistic pen
reaches back to ancient times nearly approaching those
of Moses ** actually " confirmed by the Book of Joshua,*" with
its account of the division of the land ** Modern criticism,"
he says, " indeed greatly depreciates the historical authority
^ Gf. Wellhaiiseii, EiO. qflnael^ p. SSfiL
* llfid, pp. 228, 274, 281, eta
* Kautaoli finds a few traoee of Deateronomlc nviiian in Samuel (LU,
<^ O.T., pp. 06-96, 288); Driyer apparently (with Badda) fewer (ItUrod.
pp. 178, 188).
^ ''OomparatiTely inf^aenf ** (Kwtadh, p. 95).
* See below, pp, (88-91^,
38o APPENDIX TO CHAPTER X
of the priestly narrator in matters relating to the history
of the conquest; but the priestly narrator wrote also the
main bulk of the account of the division, and this may
lay daim to documentary authority. For that this history
of the division is based upon written documents may be
conjectured from its very nature, while the ^her (book)
of the commissioners entrusted with the task of describing
the land (chap, xviii 9), shows that the division of the land
was carried out with legal accuracy. ... It is therefore
quite an arbitrary assertion, at least with respect to the
history of the division, that the priestly narrator of the
Book of Joshua was of more recent times than the Jehovist
and the Deuteronomian, and it is certainly possible that
the Deuteronomian himself composed and formed the Book
of Joshua from Jehovistic and Elohistic models."^
2. If DetUeronomy is not late, but early, and if the
discourses contained in it are in substance really Mosaic,
then the reason faUs for discrediting the D sections and
colouring in Joshua, Judges, and Xings. A good deal, we
shall see below,* is taken for granted in speaking of
'* Deuteronomic " revision. In any case, assuming such to
be present, it neither, on the view we uphold, argues late
date nor unlustorical presentation. There is no longer
ground, e.g., for questioning the genuineness in substance
of such speeches as Solomon's at the dedication of t^e
temple (1 Xings viiL), or the justice of the condemnation
of the toleration of high places; or for regarding these
'' Deuteronomic " speeches as compositions of an exilian
compiler. We do not deny that there may be a measure
of freedom in the reproduction of the speeches, but they
need not on that account be late, or untrue to the occasion
on which they were delivered.
IIL The eritieal treatment of the historical books is
itself a strong argument for the second of these views
rather than the first Not only does the critical hypothesis
imply invention and falsification of history on an unpre-
cedented scale, but it results in a disintegration of the
^ Gfenuis, p. 49. See abore, p. 242, and of. EQnig, art "Judges," is
Hastings' DieL of Sible, who shows that the partition is implied in the
"lot"of Judg. i.(il. p. 820).
* See also BboYe, p. 256.
THE LATER HISTORICAL BOOKS 381
books in a fashion as oomplicated and bewildering as in
the Pentateuch analysis, and often, as the radical disagree-
ment of critics shows, as assumptive and arbitrary.
The Book of Joshua has already been referred to. A
few remarks may be made on the others.
In general, it is not denied that the historical books
are compilations, for the most part, from older writings,
which criticism is quite within its rights in endeavouring
to distinguish if it can. It is the foot that the books
embody old and authentic material which gives them their
value. The narratives incorporated in the Book of Judges,
e.g.^ must in many cases have taken shape not long after
the events which they relate, — the Song of Deborah is
practically contemporary,^-4^nd the sources of the Books
of Samuel are, in like manner, very old. There seems no
ground for doubting the view, borne out by the notices in
the later books, that the prophets themselves — ^from Samuel
on — acted as the sacred " historiographers '" of their nation,
and that it is to narratives composed by them that we owe
the greater part of the material embodied in our canonical
writings* (hence the name ''former prophets'' applied to
Joshua — 2 Kings, excepting Ruth). What is objected to is
not a cautious discrimination based on the clear phenomena
of the books, but the assumption of the ability to dissect
a historic book into its minutest parts, and distribute out
the fragments to writers of widely separated ages, with
frequently a wholesale impeachment of the integrity of
the oomposer&
L We take the Booh of Judges as a first example. In
^ Sea abore, p. 76. Saoh annaons, «.^., m those to Jenualem and Gezer
(ohap. L 21, 29), point to a date before the monarchy, though the book as
a wnole implies that it was compiled when the kingdom was settled
(dhaps. xriL 6, zriii. 1, ziz. 1, eto.).
^Ot Eirknatriok, Dwim4 Library qf O.T., pp. 18 ff. (so in Introd. to
Samnel); Otuej, Atpeda cf 0,T,f p. 146, eto. ; of older writers, Bleek,
IiUnd. i. pp. 176 ff. ; 8. Dayidson, IfUrod, toO.T,, ii. pp. 68-69, 682 ff., eto.
Otilej says: "There is little reason to doubt that the docnments whidi
form the sabstratun of the Books of Samnel and Kings were official notices
of political eyenti, and nearly contemporary narratiyes, some of whidi may
authors, of the works referred to." In some cases the fiict is ^tent
that the work is a history by the person nsmed ; the presumption is it was
so in aU. C£ S. Dayidson, Iniirod, ii pp. 68-69; Zookler, Ohronielu
("Langji"),.pp. Uft^etc.
382 APPENDIX TO CHAPTER X
Xautzach, who is by no means the extremest of the critics,
we have the book parcelled out into a great number of
element& We have W-, an older stratum of Hero-Stories,
constituting the nucleus of the book ; H*, Hero-Stories from
the early kingly period; ri, framients of a list of Judges
from the later kmgly period; Ki, the first Deuteronomic
compiler; N and W-, pre-Deuteronomic compilers of the
narratives in the appendix (** chaps, xx., xxL originally came
from this source, but have been thoroughly revised by a
hand related to the Priests' Code ") ; B, the post-exilic editor
or editors of the present book. In addition there are ''later
glosses" and '* passages of doubtful origin" (Jephthah). As
showing the minuteness of the analysis, we may give the
parts attributed to N^— "xvii. 2-4, 6, 12 ; xviiL la, 2» 7*
106, 14», 15», 18», 20» 30." ^ The asterisks mean worked
over by redactors. Does criticism here by its very minute-
ness not destroy confidence in itself ? *
It is the Deuteronomic editor of Judges who, we
are told, has supplied the introduction and xmlustorical
''scheme" of the book, representing the alternate declen-
sions and repentances of the people, with their corre-
sponding experiences of oppression and deliverance. Tins
is declared to be doubly uciiistorical : (1) As picturing the
people as a imity, " actmg together, sufieriug together, re-
penting together, ruled over as a whole by one judge at a
time," whereas " up to that time the Hebrew tribes had no
such sense of unity";' and (2) as crediting them with a
religious knowledge and ideal of duty they did not possess.
" There is no conception of spiritual worship or moral duty
in the book."^ On which representations three things, in
reply, may be said : —
(1) Is it perfectly clear — ^Eonig at least thinks not ^ —
iJWfcijrO.Tl, pp. 284-86.
* See the searching oritioism of the analysis and arguments of Badde and
others by Eonig in art. ''Judges," in Did, of Bihh, A good conspeetos oi
the agreements and differences of oritioal opinion is given in the tables in
the introduction to Nowack's Commentary on Judges and Euth (" Uand-
kommentar"), pp. zziv ff.
'Thatcher, Judges {*' Cent, Bible"), p. 6. So Driver, Moore, Nowaek,
etc., after Wellhausen, Oamgpoi. d, ffex. pp. 229-80 ; JTtsC. oflnrael, pp. 281,
288-85.
« Ibid, p. 28.
> « Judges " in Diet, qf BibU, ii. pp. 812, 816 ; of. 3inUU. pp. 251-54.
Moore thinks there is not suffideut ground for identifying this Deuteronomio
author of the prefaoe and framework of Judges ''with anyone of th«
THE LATER HISTORICAL BOOKS 383
fchat the introduction and framework are Deuteronomic in the
sense intended ? But whether they are or not, it is still to
be shown that the representation of alternate declension and
deliverance given as the interpretation of the history is false
to the facts. Professor Bobertson points out very pertinently
that the summary in Judges gives precisely the same picture
of the people's behaviour as the prophets give af ter.^ It is
not the Book of Judges simply, but Israel's whole repre-
sentation of its history — early and late-— that is challenged.
(2) It is at least an exaggeration to say that Israel had
no sense of its imity. There are the best grounds for
believing that -Israel, in the initial stages of the conquest,
acted as one people under Joshua,* and even when the tribes
settled in their various regions, this sense of unity was never
wholly lost.' A consciousness of unity is already very
strongly expressed in the Song of Deborah, and in chaps, xx.,
xxi., which for that very reason (as by Thatcher) ^ is made
post-exilian. A critic like Konig says : " The assertion that
in the time of ttxe Judges * a common acting on the part of
the twelve tribes of Israel is excluded ' (Budde on chape, xix.-
xxi) is quite ungrounded. ... If in the period of the Judges
one could not entertain the notion that a common danger to
Israel could not be warded off by the common action of all
the tribes, one could not have blamed those tribes which
kept aloof in the struggle against the northern Canaanites
(Judg. V. 15-17)."* "It is not only in prose," says Dr.
A. B. Davidson, " that this mode of speech prevails, in which
it might be due to later conceptions, and to a point of view
taken after the rise of the kingdom; the same manner of
Deateronomio writers in Deuteronomy or Joshna, or with the Deuteronomic
author of Kingf" {Judffes, "Intemat. Crit Com." p. zvii). He puts him
later than the sixth oentu^ B.c.
^ £d, €f Israelj pp. 116-17 (see ahove, p. 40). "This summary of
the period might have heen written by Hoeea himself, or by Amos ; and if
there is any truth in what they say about prophets before them, anyone
from the days of Samuel might nave written it " (p. 117).
> See above, p. 241 ; of. K5nig. << Judges," ii pp. 814, 819.
* Cf. the "all Israel" in EU^b time (1 Sam. u. 14 ; iii. 20 ; see above,
p. 171).
^ Judges, p. 17. On these chapters, see below.
• "Judges," in Diet, of Bible, ii. p. 816. Cf. pp. 814, 816, 819. On
chaps. xz."Zxi he says : " The present writer believes that there are more
traces of the unity of ancient Israel than are wont at present to be recognised
by some scholars. . . . Hence the judsment of the present writer is that
not the section chap, xx.-xzi. 14 as a wnole, but only single elements in it
(s.^., the round numbers), bear a secondaxy character (p. 819).
384 APPENDIX TO CHAPTER X
speaking appears in the Song of Deborah. • • • In spite of
actual msintegration, the conception of an Israel forming a
unity, the people of Jehovah, appears everywhere."^
(3) It IS a still greater exaggeration to say that there is
* no conception of spiritual wordiip or moral duty " in the
book. Higher religions and moral conceptions, mingling
with the ruder elements, are imphed,* not simply in the
recurrent narratives of repentance, and in the lofty strains
of the Song of Deborah,' but in the admitted fact that the
conditions hieul in them the germ of the '' spiritual and ethical
worship"^ to which the people afterwards attained, and in
the possibilitv, even, of such a religious revival as we find
under Samuel^ We do not envy the reader who can see
no evidences of a spiritual faith in the history of a man like
Gideon.' Is there not through all the history a vein of
recognition of obligation to Jehovah, of a law of righteous
providential requital,^ of the heinousness of wanton cruelty'
and unrestrained licentiousness?' The beautiful family
history of Buth also has to be relegated to the region of
post-exilian fiction before the utter la^k of spiritual religion
can be made out^'
The alleged P element in Judges is found in redactional
notes, but chiefly in the alleged working over of an older
narrative (so most think : not Wellhausen) in chape, xx., xxi^
It is this section also (the story of the Levite and his conou-
^ O.r. Prephiey, pp. 88, 84. On the looal ohaimoter of the Judges,
K5nlg says : " If tn ezplanatioii of the local origin of these Judges is to be
sought for, it is most nstonl to find it in the droumstsnoe that the hero
sprang up from the tribe whioh felt most the weight of the invader's oppres«
^n"(p.815).
* or again Kdnig, pp. 816, 821 . * See aboTe, pp. 180-81.
* Thatoher, p. 2i.
* 1 Sam. TiL That Samuel effected a reviral of religion eren an extreme
aoepticiflm must admit. Tlds throws back Hght on the repentanoes under
the Judgss.
* Judg. tL, TiL ^^'9't Jiidg- i 7 ; ix. 24, 66.
*Judg. ix.24, eto.
* Jndg. ziz. 28, 24, 80 s zz. 6 S: Of. Eonig, p. 816.
M Ct Kdnig, JBinUd^ang, pp. 287 ft Eonig sees in Ruth an exilian re-
cension of an old writing of the aee of the sources of Samuel and Kings.
Driver calls it "pre-exifio" (/fi<ro3. p. 455). Benss, Oettli, Strack, etc.,
also reject die exiHan and post-exilian dates.
" Driver, Moore, Thatcher, etc., divide chap. xix. from chape, xz.,
zzL, reoQgniiAag the homogeneity of chap. xix. with what apea before ;
Wellhausen apparentlj treats chap. xix.-xxi. as a whole (uompoi, pp.
229 ft), and does not admit duplication in chap. xx. (ot Budde, Biild,
Mwi Sam, p. 889 ; Moore, p. 406).
THE LATER HISTORICAL BOOKS 385
bine, and of the war with Benjamin, chape. zix.-xxi 14) which,
in the eyes of the critics, lacks most dearly in credibility,^
though a historical kernel is sometimes recognised. Besides
the unity argument, and linguistic phenomena thought to
betray a later age (dependent on the assumption about
P),* stress is laid on the apparent exaggeration of numbers.
Such exaggerations, assuming them to exist, may grow up
in far less time than the critics allow, and may be pressed
too far.' Dr. Driver, in turn, exaggerates when he reads into
the text that on the first two days of battle *^ not one of the
25,000 + 700 of the Benjamites teH" ^ We are hardly dealing
here with head by head counts ; besides, ''fell," ''smitten," "de-
stroyed," do not necessarily mean that every man was " slain."
There seems to us no convincing ground, apart from the
reasonings on D and P, for placing the Book of Judges later
than the period of the undivid^ kingdom. There is no
trace of Jerusalem as capital, or of the temple. The
expression " until the day of the captivity of the land " in
chap, xviii 30, is naturally the equivalent of " all the time
that the house of God was in Shiloh" in ver. 31.^ It is
precarious, at least, to build an argument for a later date
on this verse alone.
2. A next example cit critical procedure is afforded by
^ ''The historicftl ohanotar of dh*pB. zz., zzL 1-14," uju Moon,
"win hardly be aerioiudj mamtained : in the whole description of the war
there U hardly a semblanoe of reality " (p. 405).
* Cfl K5mg, as above. In treating of the relation to the Pentatendh
sonroes, K5nig allades to "the impossibility of makins tnie progress in
critical sdenoe if a nadber of results are assnmed as already proved, and
one makes it his main object always to pile up higher stores on the building
of the literaoy criticism of the Old Testament" (p. 811).
* On the use of round numbers, see below, p. 890. The 400,000, as a
number for the whole armed force of Israel (chap. xx. 2, 17), is not out of
keeping with other enumerations (Ez. zii 87 ; 2 Sam. zzIt. 0), though it
is certainly improbable and perhaps is not meant, that aU took part in the
war at Gibeah (c£ chap. zz. 9, 10).
* IiUrod, p. 169. Dr. Driver unnecessarily changes the 26,000 of dhap.
zx. 16 into 26,000, after Ood. A of the LXX. The ordinary LXX text has
28,000, desrly a mistake, and there may be other conftuioni in the
nnmbera. Cf. E6hler, £ib. Cfuch. ii. p. 64.
* Bleek, who regards the Book of Judges as pre-Deuteronomio, and in
substance early, takes this view of the passage. ''The context shows Mfmtlj
that nothing cdse can be meant by tne t&rmiMU ad fttem . . . thui the
time indicated in ver. 81 " {Ifdroi L p. 884). Bleek, Riehm, KSnk, eto.,
think that " land ** is a corruption for the (in Heb. resembling) word '^ark " ;
Strack puts the book in the flourishing days of the kingdom, and tliinks
this clause to be a later addition (EinUU, p. 66).
386 ' APPENDIX TO CHAPTER X
the Books of Samuel. Kautzsch here admits old and valuable
sources — a " Saul-Source," a " David-Source," a " Jerusalem-
Source/' dating from times immediately after Solomon, with,
of course, later and less reliable, but still eighth century,
narratives, and "redactioncd additions of various kinds,"
some of them post-exilian.^ Dr. Driver also makes the
work as a whole "pre-Deuteronomic"* A^ considerably
different view is taken by Professor H. P. Smith. In his
Commentary on Samuel this critic distinguishes a work
which he calls SI, written soon after the death of Solomon,
embracing a brief life of Saul, an account of David at the
court of Saul and as outlaw, and a history of David's reign.'
With this was united a second — divergent and theocratic —
account, denoted by him Sm, which contained narratives of
the early life and doings of Samuel, and of the early life,
adventures, and part of the reign of David. This he
supposes to have originated, with incorporation of older
matter, '* perhaps in or after the exile." ^ In details also
the analysis is far from agreeing. There is tolerable
agreement that chaps. ix.-x. 16, xi, xiiL 2-xiv. 46 belong
(mainly) to an old ''Saul" source, which represents a
different type of narrative from that in. chaps. viL 2-17,
viiL, X. 17-25, xii., xv. ; but otherwise there are important
differences. Dr. Driver, e,g,^ connects chaps. L-iv. la, as a
"somewhat later" introduction, with chaps, iv. IJ-vii 1;
and divides this whole section from chaps, vii 2-17 C^of
later origin"), viiL, etc. — the "theocratic" story (^Sm).
But H. P. Smith puts chaps. L-iiL into his (exilian) Sm
story, and assigns to Sm also, from older sources, the other
parte up to chap. viL^ Dr. Kautzsch divides still more
minutely, and in 2 Samuel makes a separate source (his
"Jerusalem-Source") of 2 Sam. vi, ix.-xx., which H. P.
Smith, again, includes in his Sl.^ All, however, happily,
make this long narrative quite early. The chief point is
that H. P. Smith carries down to the exile a long narrative
(Sm), beginning with 1 Sam. i-vi, which the others take
to be at least not later (apart from redactional touchings)
than the eighth century.^ But then in an Appendix Professor
^ Lit of 0,T., pp. 286 ff. ; of. pp. 27 ft
* Jntrod, p. 177. ' Samuel, p. 408.
* Jhid. p. XX. • Ibid, p. xix. • Ibid, p. 408.
^ On the wide differences of the critical schools see in detail KShiw,
Bib, Cksch, ii. p. 136.
THE LATER HISTORICAL BOOKS 387
H. P. Smith has to contend against a new writer, Dr. M.
Lohr (1898)/ who discards Sm for fragments inserted into
81 at different dates.*
All this is bewildering enongh ; but, even with different
sources, the attempt to break up the nnity of the book, and
establish for the different narrators opposite and irrecon-
cilable points of view, is vastly overdone. The " theocratic "
view is presumed to be a later gloss upon the history, and
the earUer account, which is said to represent Samuel as
''the seer of a small town, respected as one who blesses
the sacrifices and presides at the local festival, but known
only as a clairvoyant, whose information concerning lost
or strayed property is reliable," ' is accepted as the really
historicjEil version. Thus Samuel gets* effectively stripped
of any false glory a pious imagination has invested him
with ! It is, however, the imagination of the critic chiefly
that is astray. Dr. Ihiver, who is not extreme here, divides
chaps. i.-vii. 1 from what follows expressly on the ground
that " hitherto Samuel has appeared only as a prophet ; here
(chap. viL ff.) he is represented as a 'judge.' " * Yet cM these
chapters, as shown above, Professor H. P. Smith gives to his
"theocratic" narrator (Sm) — the same who represents
Samuel as a "judge." The charge of "partisanship," again,
often brought against the "Saul" and "David sources
(both mostly included in H. P. Smith's ST) is fittingly dealt
with by Dr. Kautzsch. " But the partisanship," he says, " of
the one source for Saul and of the other for David, which
used to be so frequently assevted, cannot really be proved.
. . . After all, it is by no means impossible for both sources
to have come from one hand."^
The Books of Samuel, it appears to us, may well be based
on such nearly contemporary narratives as are referred to
in 1 Chron. xxix. 29,^ and the date of their composition need
^ A very fiill comparative Buryer of modem yiewB is giyen in panllel
ooliimns in Ldhr'a Samuel^ pp. xiv-Izy.
' Ibid, pp. 409 if. Lohr 8 work, thoagh advanced in critician, is more
conservative than most in respect of text (cf. pp. vi, xc).
* Jhid. p. zvi Kautzsch pats this more moderately (p. 29).
* Introd. p. 174.
^ Lit of O.T., pp. 27-28. Kautzsch, however, still finds the sources
" freely inlaid with passages taken from a ^uite different source (SS., eighth
centuiy = part of Sm), and with redactional additions." This also, we
believe, examination would show to be precarious, and pushed needlessly far-
* See above, p. 881.
388 APPENDIX TO CHAPTER X
not be carried much lower than where Ewald puts it, some
twenty or thirty years after the death of Solomon.^
3. We glance finally, briefly, at the Books of Chronicles.
These are, it is well known, the veritable i^ noire of the
critic& The Levitical prooUvities and representations of
this writer— only, however, be it said, in certain parts of
his work,* for in the greater portion of it the parallelism
with the older texts is close — are a constant irritation to
them. De Wette made the first vigorous onslaught on the
(nubility of Chronicles;' Graf returned to the (marge with
new arguments ; ^ and Wellhausen, &x>m the standpoint of
the post-exilian origin of the law, has elaborated the attack
with unsparing scorn and severity.^ Yet un&irly — and
unnecessarily.' Let all be granted that can be fairly
alleged of the Chronicler's predominant Levitical interest^
of his homiletical expansions, as, e.^., in the speech of
Ab\jah (2 Chron. ziii 4 S.y of his dropping the veil on
the sins of David and Solomon,' of his occasional exaggera-
1 Cf. Bleek, InfyrotLLy. 400. BleekhlniBelfthiiiks" probably later," bat
ttfll, on the baeis of older records (p. 406), and before the destmctioii of the
kingdom of the Ten Tribes. Eirkpatriok am ** there are no cogent roaooni
for referring the conization of the Book of Samuel to a late dat^" and findt
the primary aathoritiee for large parts of the historr in Samnel and Kinjn
in "the narratiTes of oontemporaiy prophets " {The DMm Library nf O^T.^
pp. 14, 16 ; of. his Introd. to Samuel).
* The most notable examples are tiie aoooont of Dayid's bringing up of
the ark, and his sabsequent organisation of the Levites (1 Qiron. zy. ff. ;
zziii.-zzviii.) ; Solomon's Dedication of the temple (2 Chron. v. 4, 5, 11-14) :
Ab^ah's speech (2 Chron. ziiL) ; the proclamation of Joash (2 Chron. rxili.) ;
the reformation of Hezekiah (2 Chron. zziz.-xzzi.) ; and the Passoyer of
Josiah (2 Chron. xzxy.)— nearly all temple matters. See Van Hoonac^er
below.
* In his SeUrdge (1806). * CfekMM. £iUh$r, Pt iL
* Hid. oflsnul, pp. 171 it
* How far the last word is from having been spoken on the eredibility of
the Chronicles in relation to Samuel and Kings may be seen from the foil
and able discussions (with bearing on the sections noted above) in Van
Hoonacker's Le Saeerdoee LMtious, pp. 21 ff. Cf. also Klostermann's art.
** Chronik " in the new SealencyBqpSate, iv. pp. 84 ff.
T Even Keil admits an element of free roproduction in the speeches
(Chronides, pp. 40, 41), whether due to the Clm>nicl6r himself or foand in
his source.
' It is to be remembered that the Chronicler does not aim at giving a
complete histoiy, but only excerpts bearing on the progress of the theocracy,
and throughout assumes that the older history is snown (cf. Dillmann,
"Chronik," HerzcMfs MeaUneyk, iii n. 221). There is nothing, e,g,, of the
early life of David, there is a leap from tiie death of Saul to David's pro-
clamation as king of all Israel at Hebron, the Northern Kingdom is
disregarded, etc Wellhausen allows that ''the Chronicler indeed knows
THE LATER HISTORICAL BOOKS 389
tion in numbers — whether his own or a oopyist's^ — the
gravamen of the charge against him still lies in the assump-
tion, wholly unfounded, as we believe, that the Levitical
system was not in operation before the exile. If it ivas,
there is no a priori objection to the representations of the
Chronicler. On the other hand, the supposition of Well-
hausen, that all the Chronicler's elaborate descriptions, lists
of names, details of arrangements, are pure inventions of
his fancy, is weighted with the heaviest improbabilities, and
cannot be reconciled with the integrity of the writer, which
some are still anxious to uphold. We find it hard to
imagme, for instance, how anyone can read the long and
circumstantial account of Hezeldah's great passover,* or
even the elaborate descriptions of David's sanctuary
arrangements,' and not feel that the writer is reproduc-
ing bona fide — if in some places in his own fashion —
documentajry information that has come down to him.^
The critics, on the other hand, will allow him no other
sources than our existing Books of Samuel and Kings — a
view which not only his own references, but many
phenomena in his book decidedly contradict' — and set
down all else to sheer wantonness of invention. The
evidence points in a quite different direction — to the use
of older sources dealing with these matters from the point
of view of the temple,^ in which case his narratives afford
a valuable positive eorrcbcration of the results already
obtained.
While, therefore, it is freely admitted that Chronicles
can only take secondary rank as a historical authority in
comparison with Samuel and Kings, we have no reason to
them all well enough, m is dear from incidental ezpreaslona in ohapa. xL
and ziL" {HiaL of Itrad, pp. 172-78). What then was he to gain from his
silenoe T He records Davias theocratic sin of nmnberinff the people (1 Ghron.
zzL), and narrates impartially the sins of Asa^ Joasn, Amaziah, etc. (not
in Kings). See farther below.
^ See below, p. 890. * 2 Ohron. zzz.
* 1 Ghron. zziii ff. Cfl on this, Elostermann, 0€9ehiclU$d, VoLkealnud,
p. 161.
^ The Inmafidu of the Chronicler in the nse of his sonroes is upheld by
Dillmann, Klostermann, Van Hoonacker, etc See below.
* It is questioned by hardly any that he knew and used the Books of
Samuel ana Kings, but these were not his only sources.
' Till recentiy, this was the general view. Cf. Bleek, Keil, S. Davidson,
Zookler, Dillmann, eto. It is yigorously upheld by Klostermann (art.
dtad) and Van Hoonaoker, Le Saeeiiioee, pp. 70 ff. uidpattim.
390 APPENDIX TO CHAITER X
doubt the perfect good faith of its author,^ the value of much
of his Levitical information, and, in general, the credibility
of his book. In special points in which its accuracy has
been impugned — ^as in the captivity of Manasseh in Babylon*
— discovery has brought to it valuable corroboration. Apart
from the numbers, which, taken literally, are indeed in some
cases " incredibly large,'' Zockler goes so far as to say that
''the only nearly certain example of error on his part,
arising, apparently, from geographical ignorance, is the
explanation of the Tarshish slups of the Bed Sea as being
designed to trade to Tarshish " (2 Chron. ix. 21 ; xx. 36).^
Even in regard to the numbers he says : ** If we except this
one passage, all else of an erroneous nature in the text is
most probiEibly to be reduced to errors in copying, that
either existed in his sources, or were introduced into his
text." ^ That may be too unqualified also.^ Possibly, as Eeil
suggests,® such excessive numbers as we have in 2 Chion.
xiiL 3, 17, 800,000 fighting men for Israel, 400,000 for
Judah, 500,000 of Israel slwi, are, if not corrupt, meant to
be taken only as round numerical expressions for the whole
or half of the respective forces (d 2 Sam. xxiv. 9). It is not
to be overlooked, moreover, that sometimes it is Chronicles
that gives the smaller number (cf., e,g.^ 1 Chron. zL 11, with
2 Sam. xxiiL 8 ; 2 Chron. ix. 26, with 1 Kings iv. 26), and
in some cases the numbers are undeniably corrupt.' 0^ the
^ " It is now reoognifled," wrote Dillmann (refSBrring to the attaeks of De
Wette and Graf) ** that the Chronioler has worked aocording to souroes, and
that there can be no talk in regard to him of intentional febrications or
nuarepreaentationa of the hiatory " (''Chronik," Herzog, iii p. 228). Gt
the remarka of Prof. Robertaon, roeiry and JBeligion ofths Pwifna^f^ 92 ff.
* *'The aocount," aaya Dr. 8. Davidaon, ** awakena grave donbta of the
fidelity of the Chroniat, " and he concludea that the narratiye ia '' nnhiatorical "
(Introd, ii. pp. 97-100). See below, p. 427. Alao on Shishak, p. 426.
' ChronieleSf p. 26. Moat admit that the Chronicler haa here miaonder-
atood hia aource (cf. 1 Einga x. 22 ; xxii 49) ; at leaat it ia highly improb-
able that ahipa made voyagea round Africa from the Bad Sea to Tanhiah
(but aee in Zockler, p. 28).
* Dillmann, however, may be quoted again : " So far aa we can judge
from Chronidea itaelf^ we have no reaaon to auapect the trustworthineaa of
the aouroea ; a maaa of differencea between Chroniclea and the Booka of
Klnsa in namea, numbera, expreasiona, are aatiafactorilv explained by
aoddental oorraptioDa of tiie text, be it in Einga, in Chronicles^ or in
the booka which are their aourcea " (aa above, p. 224).
' Chronicles, pp. 860-65.
^ A ourioua illuatration of the facility of error ia afforded by the fact that,
in the very act of atating the largo number of Jeroboam'a army in 2 Qhion.
THE LATER HISTORICAL BOOKS 391
whole there is abundant ground for the moderate and
sensible judgnfent of an older critic like Bleek: ''If we
only possessed this work alone as an historical source for
the tunes and circumstances treated of in the Ohronides,
the latter would in no way afford us a complete and exact
picture of them ; but, together with the other books, it gives
us very valuable and important additions to the accounts of
the latter, and a crowd of important details, which serve
to make them complete both in general, and in special
point&" ^
xJiL 8, In Smith's Diet, of SiUe, i. p. 118, the 800,000 is misprixited
800.000.
^ Inirod, i. p. 442. The wtrona words of Elostermann may be cited in
closing this discussion. "Grants he says, "that the imsge conoeiyed by
the Chronist and his predecessors, e.g,, of the development of the onltns,
totaUy contradicts that which the modem theology, with ignoring of their
accounts, has sketched on the basis of tiie extraordinarily sparse, imcon-
nected, and ambignons casnal intimations of some of the older writings and
prophets, and, ss stsnding outside the current of tradition, with l£e aid
of inyentiye fancy ; even so, the traditional materials from which the picture
of the former is obtained, are not mere imaginations, and have not been
designedly distorted or changed contrary to uieir original intention. The
attempts made of late to fiffure the narrative in Chronicles, s.p., about the
be^rinnin^ of David's reign, in details, as the result of a calculated selection
and manipulation of passMes from the Book of Samuel — apart from the
craft and stupidity wluoh ^is supposes, especially in one addressing himself
to readers of the Book of Samuel—leave on the mind the impression, not of
a Judge, who seeks to secure that an accused person gets bis rights, but
of a prosecuting attoniey, who sees in every accidental trifle, a new proof of
an already pMSomed gieat erime." — **Chronik," in Hauok's MeaUneyk,
ir. y, 97.
CHAPTER XI
Brcba^olods ant> tbe ®lt> tTedtament
*' Speak to the earth, and it shall teaoh thee. "— Job.
"There haye been made other and even greater disooyerlee in Asiyrian
and Babylonian minB sinoe Botta'a far-reaching exploration of the monnds of
Ehorsabad, bnt there nerer has been aronaed again anoh a deep and general
interest in the ezcavation of distant Oriental sites as towards the middle of
the last oentary, when Sargon's palaoe rose suddenly oat of the ground, and
ftunished the first fitithftd pioture of a great epoch of art which had yaniahed
completely from human sight" — H. Y. Hilpkscht.
"The more I inyestigate Semitic antiquity, the more I am impressed
with the utter baselessness of the yiew of Wellhausen." — Fb. Hommsl.
"The result is sufficiently surprising; Meyer himself does not conceal
the fact. The documents preeeryed in the Books of Ezra and Nehemiah
are (substantially) genuine official documents, and the chronology of the
Chronicles is correct in eyeiy particular.'* — I^t A. B. S. Kxnnsdt, on
Bd. Meyer,
"The systematio historical description, the acoount of the wanderings
which JB as exact geographically as it is historically, and in which we find a
number of small details that would haye been yalueless and unknown to
later writers, and aboye aU else the accurate dating by the sacred lunar
periods of an early age, appear to demand as their original basis the existence
of written documents contemporaneous with Moses himself — ^Dr. DlTLKW
NixuoM (Danish arch»ologist|.
CHAPTER XI
AECH^OLOQY A2JD THE OLD TESTAMENT
In the Wellhaasen schooli as we have seen, literary criticism
of the Old Testament came under the control of the history
of religion and institutions; contemporaneously, however,
with the development of this school, a new claimant to be
heard has put in its voice in the science of archaeology,
which bids fair, before long, to control both criticism and
history. It is its witness we are now to hear.
L Oenkbal Beabings of Modebn Abch^eologigal
DiSCOVEBT
Nothing in the whole course of last century is more
remarkable than the recovery of the knowledge of ancient
civilisations through the labours of explorers and the
successful decipherment of old inscriptions. The early part
of the century witnessed the recovery of the key to the
ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, and the middle and close of
the century saw the toiumph of skill in penetrating the
secret of that equally strange and difficult system of writing
— ^the cuneiform.^ When in the palace of Assurbanipal at
Nineveh, brought to light by Sir Henry Layard,* syllabaries
and other aids to the knowledge of the language were
obtained, rapid progress in the decipherment was assured.
Scholars are now struggling with imperfect means to
wrest their meaning from the puzzling characters on the
Hittite monuments. Excavations in Crete are yield-
ing new surprises, and carrying knowledge back to a
* For a ftill and readable aooonnt of these decipherments see Vigouronz's
La Bible et U» D^eouvertes Modemes, L pp. 115-69 ; ef. Sayce, Fresh
Light from Anetent MonumsnU, chap. L ; Hilpreoht's ExploratioM^ pp.
28 ft, 629 ff. etc
' See below, p. 899.
396 ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
dvilisation in its bloom in the second millennimn before
Ghrist^
Such discoveiy might conceivablj have taken place, and
abundant light have been thrown on the arts, language,
institutions, and religions of such lost civilisations as those of
Babylonia, Assyria, and Egypt, and yet little direct illumina-
tion have been shed on the Bible. It must be accounted a
wonderful providence of Gk)d that, at a time when so much
is being said and done to discredit the Old Testament, so
marvelk>us a series of discoveries, bearing directly On
matters contained in its pages, should have been mada
Few, indeed, who have not given the matter special study,
have any idea of how extensive are the points of contact
between these explorations and the Bible, and how manifold
are the corroborations of Scripture which they afford. In
this as in every new study, of course, there has been much
to unlearn as well as to learn. Many rash theories and
baseless conjectures have been propounded, and not a few
supports sought for the Bible have proved to be illusory.
But the area of positive knowledge has always been widen-
ing, and there is to-day a mass or material available for the
illustration and confirmation of Holy Scripture for which we
cannot be sufficiently grateful
Attempts are made, indeed, to minimise this signal con-
tribution of archeology to faith, and to turn its material
to uses hostile, rather than helpful, to revealed religion.
Already a great change can be perceived in the attitude
and tactics of rationalistic critics in relation to these
discoveries. Formerly Israel was looked upon as a people
belonging to the dim dawn of history, at a period when,
except in Egypt, civilisation had hardly begun. It was
possible then to argue that the art of writing did not exist
among the Hebrews, and that they had not the capacity for
the exalted religious ideas which the narratives of their early
history imply. Moses could not have given the laws, nor
David have written the psalms, which the history ascribes
to them. This contention is now rendered impossible by
the discovery of the extraordinary light of civilisation which
shone in the Tigro-Euphrates valley, and in the valley of
the Nile, millenniums before Abraham left Ur of the
Ghaldees, or Moses led his people out of Egypt The
^ See The Quarterly Review, Oct 1904, pp. S74 fL
-ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 397
transfonnation of opinion is revolutionary.^ The entire
perspective is altered, and it is felt that Israel is now rather
to be r^arded as a people on whom the ends of the earth
had come in respect of civilisation. The world was already
old in the times of Jacob and Moses, and the tendency is
now to see in the religious ideas and institutions of Israel an
inheritance from Babylonia, and to bring in Babylonian
influences at the beginning of Israel's history, rather than
at its dosa The gain is appreciable in the breaking up of
older critical theories, but the attempt to ignore the dis-
tinctive features of the Biblical reli^on, and to resolve the
latter into a simple compound of the ideas of other religions,^
ia bound to fail, and is being met with an effective protest
from critical scholars themselves.'
Unquestionably the most remarkable result that has
accrued from the discoveries in Egypt, Babylonia, and
Assyria, has been, as just said, the astonishing revolution
wrought in our views of the character and literary capabilities
of the most ancient civilisations. It had long been known
that Egypt was a literary country as early as, and far earlier
than, the time of Moses. Now that the books and monu-
ments of that ancient people have been disinterred, and the
writing on them made intelligible, our wonder is tenfold
increased at the brilliance of their civilisation as far back as
the days of their earliest kings/ Still more astonishing is
^ The eflfeot has been most marked on archieologiets themselTes. Sayoe,
Hommel, Hal^vy, all formerly adrooates of the critical view, have abandoned
it. Dr. Driyer having stated that Hommel agreed with WeUhansen's
analysis of the Pentateuch {Eamos. Times, Dec. JL896), Hommel replied (to^
the late Professor Qreen) that the citation was from an earlier publication,
and that he no longer held these views, but was increasinffly impressed with
" the utter baselessness " of the view of Wellhausen. It lias been the same
with Professor Sayce. Hal^vy, at a meeting of the International Congress at
Paris in 1897, made a strong defence of the essential truth of the Mosaic
hJstoiy, as against the Wellhausen school, with which he had been identified.
> Thus Fried. Delitzsch, Babel wid Bibel ; Winckler, etc
'Cf. Budde, Das Alts Testament wnd Die Ausgrdbungen (against
Winckler) ; Qunkel, Israel und Babylonien (against Fried. Delitzsch) ; and
the abundant literature called forth in the "Babel and Bible" controversy
(see below, p. 409).
^ See below, p. 418. The oldest known MS. in existence (dating from
twelfth dynasty) is that of the "Precepts of Ptah-hotep,'^ a classical
EfQrptian work of the fifth dynasty (e, 8000 B.a). Ptah-hotep lived under
King Assa, was himself of royal descent (Brugsch thinks "the son of the
kin^'), and was very old when he wrote, but he appeals to the ancients.
Bn^^sch, ffist, of Bgypt, i pp. 92 if. ; Renouf, Bdtgion of Egypt, pp. 75,
100, etc.
398 ARCHAEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT.
the light oast by the monuments on the condition of ancient
Babjfonia* Here» in the Hammurabi age — which is that of
Abraham — and long before, we find ourselves in the midst
of cities, books, and libraries ; of letters, arts, and laws, in a
hiffh state of development; of a people among whom not
oxuT a knowledge of letters existed, but a taste for books
and reading was widely diffused^ — ^in short of a highly
advanced and capable literary people. Babylonia had by
this time its dynasties of great kings, some of whom were
distinguished as founders of libraries and patrons of letters.
Surgon L, e.^., whose date is usually put at 3800 B.O., founded
a funous library at Accad. The French excavator De
Sarzec brought to light a few years since (1893-6) the
remains of a ^reat library (30,000 tablets) at Tello, in S.
Babylonia, which already existed in the reign of Oudea,
about 2700 RO.* More recently the Pennsylvania explorers
have disinterred the temple library at Nippur, the ancient
Calneh. Not only so, but in excavating the foxmdations of
the temple, they came on the abundant remains of an older
civilisation, which, from the depth at which the relics were
found — 25 to 35 feet below the pavement of Sargon L and
Naram-Sin — must, it is thought, be as old as 6000 or 7000
years B.a' Even if less time should suffice, their antiquity
IS stiU immensely remote.
It is beyond our province to enter minutely into what
may be called the romance of the rediscovery of ancient
Nineveh and Babylon ; but one illustration may bring out
how from the first light has been shed on the Bible by
exploration. In 1843, Emil Botta, French Consul in the
district, struck into the mounds of Khor8abad,a little to the
north of Nineveh, and soon, to his own surprise, was standing
in the midst of an immense palace, which proved to be that
of Sargon, the conqueror of Samaria. This was a remarkable
discovery. In Isa. xx. 1, we read that ''Sargon, king of
^ It has been c^rgued that reading and writine were probably confined to
the npper and omoial olaases. The extent and variety of the Uteratore,
the fact of published laws, and the use of writing in business (banking
aooounts, etc.), above aU, the lesson and exercise books of young pupils,
point to a different conclusion ; cf. Hilprecht, EaeploraHons^ |). 405 : ''found
them to be the school exercises of a Babylonian child living in Uie fifth pre-
Christian millennium " (at Nippur) ; pp. 525 ff.
' Some of these tablets are olaer than 4000 B.a ; of. Hilpreoht,
£amloraUcnSf p. 249.
> Cf. Hilprecht, pp. 891 ff., 542 ff. ; Peters, Nijfpur, ii. pp. 24e 1L
ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 399
AssTria, sent his Tartan (or commander-in-chief) to besiege
Ashdod." But who was Sargon ? This is the only place in
which his name occurs in Scripture^ or in all literature.
Ancient writers knew nothing of him. He was a mystery :
some did not hesitate to deny that he ever existed. Yet
the first important discovery made was the palace of this
very Sargon.^ It contained his name and portrait ; its walls
were covered with his sculptures and inscriptiona Sargon,
after being forgotten for twenty-five centuries, is now again
one of the best known kings of Assyria. He was the
father of Sennacherib. His annals recount the siege of
Ashdod mentioned in Isaiah. This first discovery was
followed by others not less brilliant. In 1847 Mr. Layard
began work at the mounds of Nimroud and Kouyunjik — the
site of Nineveh itself. At the former place he unearthed
four large palaces, and at the latter, the palace of Sennacherib,
rebuilt by his grandson Assurbanipal, in the cUbris of which
were found the remains of the richly-stored library already
referred to.'
IL Babylonian LsaENDs and ths eablt Chaftebs
OF Genesis
Beginning with the origins, a first question we naturally
ask is — Do the early chapters of Genesis really preserve for us
the oldest traditions of our race ? There are two reasons
entitling us to look with some confidence for an answer to
this question to Babylonia. The first is, that in Babylonia
we are already far back into the times to which these
traditions relate; and the second is, that these traditions
themselves point to Babylonia as their seat and centre.
Eden was in Babylonia, as shown by its rivers Euphrates
and Tigris; the land of Nod, to which Cain and his
posterity betook themselves, was to the east of Babylonia;'
the ark was built in Babylonia, and it was on one of the
mountains N. or N.K of Babylonia that it ultimately
rested ; from the plain of Shinar (Sumir) in Babylonia was
the earth repeopled. If, therefore, the oldest traditions of
^Cf. George Smith, Assyrian Discovsriss, pp. 2 ff. ; Hilpraoht^
Explorations, pp. 76, 84 ff.
> Assyrian iHseaosriss, pp. 4, 101, 144 ff., 418, 462 ; HilprechL pn.
104 ff.
> Gen. ir. Id.
400 ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
the race lingered anywhere, it should be in Babylonia.
And now that we have in our hands the records of that
ancient people, dating back to very early times, it is
possible to compare the Bible traditions with them, and see
how far they correspond. It may be claimed that the
tablets and inscriptions which have been deciphered do show
that the first chapters of Genesis are indeed what we have
assumed them to be--a record of the very oldest traditions
of our race. We shall look first at the facts, then at the
explanation.
1. Though out of chronological order, we may begin
with a statement in that old and much-discussed chapter in
Gtenesis — the clccoutU in chap, x, of the divisions of men after
the flood. This " table of nations," as it is called, we look
on as one of the oldest and most precious documents of
its kind in existenca^ In vers. 8-12 of this chapter we
rc»d : " Cush begat Nimrod : he began to be a mighty one
in the earth. . . . And the beginning of his kingdom
was Babel, and Erech, and Accad, and Calneh, in the land of
Shinar. Out of that land he went forth into Assyria [or,
went forth Asshur] and builded Nineveh, and Behoboth-Ir,
and Calah, and Besen between Nineveh and Calah: the
same is the great city." The very names of these cities take
us back into the midst of the ancient Babylonia unearthed
by exploration. But more particularly, the passage makes
three statements of the first importance. It affirms (1) that
Babel and the other cities named existed before Nineveh ;
(2) that Assyria was colonised from Babylonia ; and (3) that
the founder of Babylonian civilisation was not a Semite,
but a Cushite — a descendant of B^am.' Each of these
statements, till the time of the Assyrian discoveries, was
confidently disputed. The received tradition put Nineveh
before Babylon,' and the Babylonians, like the Assyrians,
were held to be Semites. The monuments, however,
confirm the Bible in all three points.^ It is no longer
^Eantabh says: "The so-cftUed table of nations remains according
to all resolts of monnmental exploration, an ethnomphio origin^
doonment of the first rank, which nothing oan replace.' — Die Bh&ntU
BedeiUtmg de$ AlUeaUumenta, p. 17. On critical qnestions, see above, p* 851.
> Of. G. Bawlinson, Eist. lUustralioiu qftM 0,T,, pp. 29 ff.
' The anthori^ for this was the fable of Semiramis in Ctesias, reported
by Diodoms Siculus (ii. 1-20).
* Cf. Schrader, Cun, Itucr^, L p. 76, on Gen. x. 10: "This coincides
ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 401
questioned that the Babylonian kingdoms were the older ^
— the antiquity ascribed to some of their cities {e^g.^ to
Nippur 8=3 Calneh) is almost fabulous. It is no longer
doubted that Assyrian civilisation was derived from
Babylonia.* Strangest of all, it is now known (for though
there are rival theories, we state correctly the prevailing
view),' that the founders of the Babylonian civilisation, the
inventors of its alphabet, laws, arts, the founders of its
libraries, were not Semites, but people of a different
stock — ^Turanian or Hamitic (the Accadians).^
Another instance may be given from this chapter. In
ver. 22 !EIam is mentioned as the oldest son of Shem. But
the Elam of history was not Semitic, but Aryan. On the
ground of its language even Hommel wrote recently : " The
Elam mentioned here as one of the sons of Shem cannot
with aU that we otiierwiae know respecting the relation of Aajxia to
Babylonia,'' etc.
^The first Babylonian diywuty^ that to which Hammurabi belonged,
began about 2200 b.o. (some date it a century or two earlier), bat the eity
of Babel is of unknown antiauity. A recent writer says : « The oldest
history of Babylon is still unsnown. ... It is certain that Sarson
fSSOO B.a) raised Babylon to a leading position. From this time Babj^on
forms with Borsippa a double dt^." — Jeremias, Dob A.T. im LiekU da
alien, OrimUi, p. 160. The antiouity of Erech, Acoad, Calneh, is very
great. Inscriptions of kings of £reoh, Lagash, and other places, wore
found at Nippur of a date at early as 4000 B.a (Peters, Nippur, ii
p. 160).
* The Assyrian Nlneyeh (for there seems to haye been a Babylonian oitr
of the same name) is likewise old. An inscription of Dungi, the secona
king of Ur (c 2700 B.O.), has been found in it (Jeremias, p. 166). Of.
MoCnrdy. History , Prophecy, and the Monumenie, L p. 68 : ** Before the
union [of Babylonian kingdoms] was effected, emigrants from amons those
Babylonians settled along the Middle Tigris, founded the city of Asshur,
and later stiU the group of cities known to history as Ninereh.
> See for counter yiew, art " Accad," in Diet, ef Bible, i. p. 21, with
qualifjnng editorial note.
^ Gunkel says : ** But the centre of the Orient is Babylonia : there from
an unthonght-of antiquity has flourished an amaringly high culture, which
already about 8000 B.a stands in fUl bloom : this culture originates from a
non-Semitic people, whom we name Sumerian, and is then taken oyer and
carried forward by Semitic emigrants." — lerael und JBahulenUm, p. 6.
(Continentol scholars generally speak of "Sumerian," Bngliah writers of
"Accadian.")
Pinches says : " During the period immediately preceding that of the
d^asty of Babylon there is a gap in the list of kings, which f^resh ezcaya*
tions alone can fill up. Before this gap, the records, so far at we know
them, are in the Akkadian lancrnage. After this gap they are in tiie
Semitic-Babylonian tongue." — O.T, w Light qf Sist, Jteeorde, etc, p. 162.
See now, howeyer, Jeremias on the disooyeries at Lagash and Kippor
(p. 2).
3«
402 ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
possibly be identical with Elam proper."^ The work of
exploration of the French expedition at Susa, the capital of
Elam, has, however, resulted in the remarkable discovery of a
civilisation older than any yet known in this region. More
striking still, it is found that the inscriptions on the oldest
bricks are written in cuneiform characters, and not in the
language of later Elam, but either in Semitic Babylonian, or
in Accadian. Thus Elam is proved to be, after all, " the son
ofShem."*
A still wider result from these explorations, in their
bearings on our subject, is the growing conviction that " the
plain of Shinar'' (chap. xL), or Southern Babylonia, was
really the centre of distribution of the families of mankind.
Babylonian civilisation is carried back by the discoveries at
Nippur to a period so much earlier than that of any other
known civilisation, that the inference seems irresistible that
it is the source from which these other civilisations are
derived. It has been seen that this is true of Assyria. It
is beginning to be assumed by leading Egyptologists that
the same is true of Egypt.' Learned books have been
written to show that it is true of China.^ Probably it will
be found to be true of Crete, eta The Biblical account of
these matters, in short, is found to rest on far older and
more accurate information than that possessed by any
scholars prior to the new discoveries.
2. The stories of the Creation and the Flood in Genesis
have been so often compared with the corresponding
Babylonian legends that it is hardly necessary to bestow much
space upon them. Among the tablets found in Assurbanipal's
palace were some which proved on examination to contain
^ AneUrU ffeb. TradUicn, p. 294.
' Dr. Driver says in his Otmesia, inloe» i " It is trae inscriptionB recently
discovered seem to have shown that in very early times Elam was peopled
by Semites . . . bnt the fact is not one which the writer of this veriie is
liKely to have known " (p. 128). The carious fact is, however, that he did
know it, while modem scholars did not. Is it not more likely that Dr.
Driver's theory of the writer's age, and of the extent of his knowledge, is
wrong!
For farther illostration, see Note A on Ethnological Relations in Gen. x.
» Of. art. "Egypt," in Diet, of Bible i. p. 666 ; Budge, SisC ^ Bgyp^
I. pp. 89-48 ; Sayce, JSarly Israely p. 155 ; Nicol, BeegrU Arehcuiogy aiii the
BibUy pp. 92, 819 ; art. in Kew Tork InieprndejU (1897) on discoveries and
views of De Sarzec, Mauss, etc.
^ See an interesting article in Quarterly Beview, July, 1882 ; Boaeawm,
Chambgf^i Journal, July 1896 ; 0. J. Ball, in Pinches, p. 121.
ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 403
an account of creation, resembling in certain of its features
the narrative in Gen. i. The contrasts, indeed, are much
more apparent than the likeness.^ The Babylonian story is
debased throughout by polytheism — begins, in fact, by
recounting the birth of the great gods from the chaotic
ocean. This is followed by a long mythological description,
abounding in repetition, of the war of Merodach (god of
light) with Tiamat (the primeval ocean), the conflict issuing
in the woman being cut in two, and heaven being formed
of one half, and earth of the other. The order of the
creative works, however, seems to bear some resemblance to
that in Gen. L The fifth tablet narrates the appointing of
the constellations, and another fragment the making of the
animals. A trace of an older conception may, perhaps, be
discerned in the fact that in the latter (if it reiJly belongs
to the same series, which ia doubtful) the work of creation
is ascribed, not to Merodach, but to " all the gods " together,
thus:
** When all the gods had made (the world),
Had created the heavens, had formed (the earth)»
Had brought forth living creatures into being,
The cattle of the field, the (beasts) of the field, and
The oree^ng things (of the field). '^*
Inscriptions show that both Babylonians and Assyrians
had a species of seventh-day sabbath. The word sahaUu
itself occurs, and is defined as " a day of rest for the heart'' '
It differed, however, from the Jewish sabbath, in that the
reckoning b^an afresh each month — 7th, 14th, 21st, 28th, —
while the Jewish went on consecutively. On it ordinary
works were prohibited, at least to king and high offidala^
^ These are acknowledged by nearly eveiy writer. Gunkel says : ** Any-
one who oomparee this ancient Babylonian myth with Gen. i. will perceive
at first hardly anytiiing else than the infinite distance between them ; there,
the heathen gods, inflamed against each other in wild warfare, here the (hie,
who speaks and it is done." — Itrael wnd Bdbylonien, p. 24 ; cf. Oenetis, pp.
118, 118; Oettli, IMr Kcmwf vm Bibel und Bahel, pp. 9ff. There is
another ancient Babylonian legend of creation which has greater afllnity to
the Jehovistio aoconnt in Genesis (chap. ii.). Ct Pinches, as above, pp.
89 ff. etc.
' Ring, Bab. SeUgion, p. 81.
' It seeihs forced, despite parallels, to explain this as a day when the godi
rested from anger, i.«., a day of propitiation (Jastrow, Driver, etc).
^ Difficulties arise from the nict that the word aabaUu is not ezpieasly
applied to the seventh days, and that the prohibitions of work mention
only king, angor, physician. There seems little donbt, however, that
404 ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
Abundant material exists for the illustration of the
narratiye of Paradise. On the other hand, no clear account
of the fall of man has jet been recover^. But that the
Babylonians had some story resembling that in Qen. iii is
rendered probable by the representation' on an ancient seal
in which a man and a woman are depicted as seated on
either side of a tree, and reaching out their hands to pluck
the fruit, while behind the woman a serpent rears itself, and
appears to whisper in her ear. Scholars are divided in
opinion as to the identification;^ but to most people the
picture will seem to speak for itself.
No doubt, at least, can rest on the parallelism between
the Biblical and the Babylonian stories of the Deluge. The
Babylonian story, inserted as an episode in a longer epic
poem, must be older than the latter ; we may safely pla(» it
as early as 3000 B.C. Though defaced, like the creation
story, by a gross polytheism,* it presents in its general
structure, and in many of its details, a striking resemblance
to the account in Genesis. It relates, in brief, how the
Babylonian Noah' was commanded to build a ship for
the above-mentioned days, with some others, fall under the category of
** sabbaths," and possibly the prohibition of work is intended to be general
Gf. Gunkel, OeMsts, pp. 106 ft, ; Itrcul und Bab, pp. 27, 28 ; Jeremiaa, as
above, pp. 86 ff. ; Driver, Oenetis, p. 84, and art. "Sabbath" in DieL <if
Bible f IV, p. 319; Sohrader, Sayce, etc. Gonkel says: "Name and
institution of the sabbath are quite surely of Babylonian oririn " (p. 108).
The narrative in Exodus assumes the sabbath to be already Known to the
Israelites (Ex. zvi. 22-80) ; and in Gen. iL 8 ; Ex. xx. 11, its appointment
is traced back to the creation. [See Kote at end of Ohapter.]
^ The male figure is horned, which some take to be a sign of diviniW ;
but this is questioned. Of. Pinches, as above, p. 79. Schrader, Budde,
Kittel, Gunkel, Jeremias, Driver, etc., declare the interpretation donbtftiL
G. Smith, Sayce, F. Delitzsch, and many others, uphold it
'The contrast is again emphasised by Gunkel, as by other writers.
Gunkel says: ''The polytheism which obtrudes itself in the Babylonian
tradition m the strongest way has in the Israelitish wholly disappeared.
' The gods of the Babylonian storr are genuinely heathenish in their lying
and sanction of lying, in their greed at the sacrifice, in their actions, in their
caprice, in their dealings with men, and in the alternation of their humoun.
How far removed from this is the God who permits a judgment to come on
men in His rifffateousness, who must justify Himself to man's conscience 1 '
(Holzinger). The last point is specially very important ; of the profonnd
knowledge of sin with which the Hebrew bows before God there is not a
trace in the Babylonian story." — Genesis, p, 66.
'The name is variously given as Par-napishtim, Pir-impiatim, Ut-
napishtim, or in its Greek form Xisuthros. The last is a form of the name
Atra-hasis (sveij clever), also given to the hero. The fuU aoconnt may ba
seen in Sayce {jSigher Oritieism, and Barly Israsl) ; Pinches, as above ;
Driver's O&nesis, pp. 104-6, etc.
ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 405
thd saving of liimeelf and of the seed of life of every sort ;
how, when the ship was built and smeared with bitumen,
he took into it his household and the animals (the sun-god
Samas commands: "Enter into thy ship, and close thy
door"); how the flood came and destroyed mankind; how
the slup rested on the mountain Nizir (E of Tigris) ; how
after seven days he sent forth in succession a dove, a
swallow, and a raven, the last of which did not return ; how
he then sent forth the animals, and offered a sacrifice, to
which the gods ''gathered like flies"; how the bow was set
in the heaven (?), etc. The hero is ultimately, like Enoch,
translated to the abode of the gods without dying. It was
before mentioned that the parallel with the Babylonian
story requires for its completeness both the Elohistic and
the Jehovistic narratives in Genesis — a fact with important
bearings on the critical analysis.^
3. There can be no dispute, therefore, as to the close
relationship of the old Babylonian traditions with the early
narratives in Genesis,* the question which remains is, How
are these similarities to be explained ?
(1) The favourite hypothesis in critical circles up to the
present is that of horromng on the part of the Israelites from
the Babylonians ; and, as the Babylonians are undeniably the
older people, this view may seem to have much to commend it.
The Biblical writers, it is thought, or, before them, the nation,
adopted the legends in question, purifying them, perhaps
gradually, from polytheistic elements, and makhig them
the vehicles of the purer ideas of their own religion. Then
the further question arises — ^At what period did this borrow-
ing take place? and here we encounter wide divergences
of opinion. In accordance with the date they assign to the
Priestly Writing, the tendency in the Wellhausen school
is to represent it as taking place in the exile, or later.'
To this view, however, an increasing band of scholars, liurgely
influenced by archaeology, raise objections which seem in-
* See above, p. 848.
* Gheyne says that " a partictilar oritical theory, viz., that the nanrative
in Qen. i. is the product orthe reflection of a late priestly writer, is no doubt
refuted." (He refers to Wellhausen, Hid. vf Imul, p. 298.)— Oxford
H0xaUwh, L p. 165.
' Gunkel says : " It suits the peculiar tendency of modem Old Testament
science to place this borrowing, assuming it conceded, as late as possiUe."—
OeMM, p. 117.
406 ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
Bupeiable.^ How extremely improbable that anj Israelite,
of the time of the exile, should dream of taking over these
grossly poljtheistie stories from a heathen people, and of
placing them, in purified form, in the forefront of his Book
of the Law 1 ' The purification itself, assuming it to have
taken place, is not so easy a task as is supposed, and can
only be thought of as a long process.' The same objection,
nearly, applies to the borrowing of the Babylonian myths
in the age of Ahaz, or in the reign of Solomon. A new vista
of possibility, however, opens itself with the Tel el-Amama
discoveries — on which more below — which show Oanaan
to have been, in the fifteenth century B.a, penetrated with
Babylonian influences and culture. May we not assume
that the Israelites borrowed these legends, with other
elements of their civilisation, from the Canaanites, after
they had come into possession of the land ? ^ To anyone
who retains the least faith in the Biblical picture of the
Mosaic age, or of the relations of the Israelites and
Canaanites after the conquest, the improbability of such
borrowing will appear as great as in the exilian theory.
This is the difficulty of the ^process" — how is it to get a
start? For at some point the legends must have been
taken over in their grossly polytheistic form: nay, must
long have retained that form in the bosom of Jehovah-
worshipping Israel^ Is this likely, or is there any proof
^ Thus Sohnder, Oonkel, Winokler, Ziiiunem, Oettli, Eittel, eto.
* Of. Qonkel, OeneHs, p. 117.
^Ibid. p. 118 : "The two reoenaioiif fof the creation story) an ao
immenaely different, that we must necessarily assume a long history and a
ffreat length of time for the mythological so entirely to vanish and the
Babylonian to become so completely Isnelitised." Eittel says: "There can
be no question that such a rejection or complete transformation of mytho-
Ic^cal ideas would involye a fiur more pregnant and original act ofgenioa
than that inyolyed in their first conception.*' — Bib. JEaoeaw, p. 46. Of. fiiver,
AvthorUu and ArehoBology, p. 16 : " It is incredible that the monotheiatio
authoaof Gen. L, at whatever date he lived, could have borrowed any detaiL,
however slight, from tiie craaily polytheistic epic of the conflict of liarduk
and Tiamat : the Babylonian myth must have been for long years trans-
planted into Israel, it must there have been gradually divested of its
polytheistic features," etc.
^ This is the view favoured by Onnkel {Omuis, pp. 68, 118), Sayoe^
Winokler, etc
* Dr. Driver truly says that this view ** is consistent only with a critical
theory of the authorship of the Pentateuch, not with the traditional view,"
for that Moses, who "set his face sternly and consistentiy against all inter-
course with the Canaanites, and all compromises with polytheism, should
hare gone to Oanaan for his cosmogony, is in the last degree improbablo "
ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 407
of it? There is one other possibility — ^that the Hebrews
brought these traditions with them in their original migration
from Ur of the Chaldees.^ But once this is admitted, we
come in sight of an alternative hypothesis, on which some-
thing will immediately be said.
An objection urged to this view of the antiquity of the
Biblical traditions is the absence of all allusions to them in
the pre-ezilian writings. '^ With regard both to the Creation
and to the Deluge stories,** says Dr. Cheyne, ** if they were
in circulation in early pre-exilic times, it is di£Bcult to
understand the absence of any direct aUusion to them in
the undoubted pre-ezilic writings."* This is once more
the argument &om silence, so often shown to be incon-
clusive.' But the argument in this case proves too much :
the silence, besides, is not so complete as the objection
represents. The Deluge is part of the Jehovistio story,
which most critics place in the ninth or eighth century B.a
It is referred to also, as before shown,^ in Isa. liv. 9, in a
way which implies pre-exilian knowledge. The creation
narrative, again, forms the basis of the Fourth Commandment
in Ex. XX. 11 ; seems alluded to in Deut iv. 32 ; and is the
foundation of Ps. viii and civ. To put all these references and
psalms late becauge Gen. L is assumed to be post-exilian, is
to beg the question.
(2) We do not say that the hypothesis of the borrowing
of Babylonian myths, and of their purification by the spirit
{AvihorUif and Areheeoiogy, p. 16). Bnt patting traditioxial riews aside,
does Dr. Driyer think &t the Mosaic religion at any time sanctioned
interconrse with the Ganaanites or "compromises with polytheism"! If
not, what becomes of his own yiew that *'the cosm<M;ony of Oen. i. pre-
sapposes a lon^ period of nataraliaation in Israel, during which the old
legend was stripped of its pagan deformities" (p. 17). How was the
naturalisation of tne pagan myth effected?
^ This is the view of Schrader and others. (See below). "I am led,"
says this scholar, "to the obvions condnsion that the Hebrews were
niiainted with this (flood) legend at a mnch earlier period, and that it
we from impossible that they acquired a knowledge of these and the
other primitiTe myths now under investigation as far back as in the time
of their primitive settlements in Babylonia, and that they carried tiiese
stories wiUi them from Ur of the Ohsldeet." — (hmefflifrm Imar^^HoM, L
p. 64.
' Oxf. SexaUueh, P^ 166 : so F. Delitzsch and others.
' Onnkel says : "That the legend of the flood is mentioned to late in
the part of the literature preserved to ns proves nothing at alL"— 6^iies<f^
p. 67.
^ See above, p. 874.
4o8 ARCHAEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
of revelation in Israel^ in such wise that they become the
vehicles of higher teaching, is abstractly inadmissible ; but
we do not think it is the conclusion which most naturally
follows from the comparison of the Biblical and Babylonian
stories. The former, it is allowed, possess a character of
sobriety, monotheistic elevation, and purity of religious and
ethical conception, altogether absent from the latter; the
contrasts vastly overbear the resemblances ; and it is hard
to understand how, from legends so debased, and foreign to
the whole genius of the Israelitish religion, could arise the
noble products of a purer faith which we have in our Bible.^
The differences are so great as to lead many scholars to
seek the explanation of the resemblance along another line
altogether — ^in a relation of cogncUeness, rather than one of
derivation.^ On this view, the Biblical stories are not late
and purified versions of the Babylonian, but represent an
independent related version, going back to a common origin
with the Babylonian, but preserving their monotheistic
character in the line of revelation, when the others had
long sunk under the corrupting influences of polytheism.
Or, if purification is to be spoken of, it is puntication on
the basis of an older and less debased tradition. Such a
view harmonises with the Bible's own postulate that the
light of a true knowledge of God has never been wholly
extinguished among men, and that from the first there has
been a line of pious worshippers, a seed of blessing and
promise, on the earth.
(3) In the discussions which have arisen on the connection
of Israel with Babylonia, it is not surprising that attention
should latterly have become f ocussed on the question of how
far the old Babylonian religion, among its other elements,
included a monotheistic strain, and whether it is from this
source that Israel derived its monotheistic conception.
This is the question peculiarly agitated in what — from the
title of the lecture of Fried. Delitzsch which inaugurated it
^ ** These differences," says Eittel, '* show that we are on entirely different
ground, and that even in instances where the words ma^ be the same,
another and altogether different spirit breathes in them. Vfe are in a sphere
differing toto cobIo from that of Babylon — ^it is quite a different world ; there
it is the sphere of a heathen nature-worship, with all its concomitants,
here it is that of a revealed and monotheiBtic religion."— ^id. Exeavs. p. 42.
' Thus Dillmann, Eittel, Hommel, Oettli, etc. See their views in Note
B on the Oognateness of liabylonian and Hebrew Traditions.
ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 409
— ^has been called the ''Babel and Bible" controversy.^
The truth, it seems to us, lies midway between those who
affirm, and those who deny, a monotheistic substratum in
the Biabylonian religion.* That Israel borrowed its idea
of the one God from this source is another matter. The
name JA'U — corresponding with Tahweh — may or may
not be found, as alleged, on tablets of the Hammurabi 1^
Beading and meaning of the inscriptions are still under
discussion.' But this, though interesting in its bearings
on the age of the name, proves nothing as to its Babylonian
origin. F. Delitzsch himself does not take it to be a native
Babylonian name of God^
IIL The Abkahamto Aor— thi Chedoblaomib
Expedition
Archaeology throws new and valuable light upon the
patriarchal age. The patriarchs themselves, whom it was
proposed to resolve into tribal personifications, are found to
bear personal names with which their age was perfectly
familiar. A name Abe-ramu, almost the same as Abraham,
appears on a contract-tablet of the second reign before
Hammurabi.* Other contract-tablets of that age exhibit
^ Fried. Delitzach in this leotnre argues that Israel owes its monotheistio
conception, and the name Tahweh, to &hj\omE.^BdbelundJB^f pp. 69 ff.
* See aboye, p. 128. Winckler does not inexactly express the matter
when he says : ^ The character of the Babylonian religion reyeals itself at
the first gluce. It is a star-religion — ^moon, son, and stars play in it the
chief r6le. But it would be to mistake its essence to suppose that in the
doctrine the heayenly bodies were the Godhead itself. The stars are rather
in the Babylonian doctrine only the chiefest reyelation of the diyine Power ;
that reyelation in which its rule and designs can be most dearly obseryed.
For the rest, all being, aU that is yisible or inyisible, is in the same way an
emanation or part of the diyine essence. There are many, nay numberless
gods ; but they are onl^ reyelation-forms of the one great diyine might,"
eto.— D^ Babylon. KiUtwr^ p. 19 (slijB^htly abridged).
' F. Delitzsch, Hommel, oayoe, Pinches, etc., uphold the reading ; E5nig
{Biba und Babel, pp. 46 ff.) contests it ; Jeremias (Daa A, T. im Lichie de$
AU. Orients, p. 211) affrees with Hommel. Zimmem, and most others,
as Budde, Qunkel, Oettli, Eittel, either reject the reading, or regard it as
extremely questionable.
^ Driyer also says : " The names [yis., those containing this element] are
not Babylonian, and must therefore haye belonged to foreigners — ^whether
Canaanites, or ancestors of the Hebrews." — Oenesvi, p. xlix.
• Gf. Pinches, 0. T. in LigU of Rid. Becordi, p. 148. Abu-ramn f Abram)
was the name of an AsBTTrian official in the reign of Esarhaddon {wtL), It
may be noticed that "the field of Abram" has been deciphered on a
monument of Shishak (Pal. Explor. QuaH. Statement, Jan. 1906, p. 7).
410 ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
the names Jacob and Jacob-eL^ The names Jacob-el and
Joseph-el appear on a monument of Thothmes m. of l^ypt
(about 1500 B.C.) as place-names in Palestine. In other
ways the whole period has been lifted up into new and
commanding importance. It is generally accepted that
the Hammurabi of the inscriptions is no other than the
.^jnraphel of Qen. xiv. 1 ; and the discovery V)f the Code of
this able ruler has given his name an idai it can never
again lose.* The discovery was made at Susa in Jan. 1902,
and the Code itself, the most complete and finished of any
in antiquity, shows the height of civilisation to which the
Babylonia of Abraham's day had attained.' The discovery
bears directly on the possibility of such codes of law as we
find attributed to Moses in the Pentateuch — t.g.^ the Code
in the Book of the Covenant, — and particular provisions
prove the minute fidelity with which the patriarchal history
reflects the customs of that early time. Such, as formerly
shown,* is the law providing that the childless wife may
give her maid to be a concubine ; and directing what is to
be done should the woman afterwards have a dispute with
her mistress because she has borne children !'
One of the most striking instances of the confirmation
of the historical accuracy of the patriarchal narratives is
that connected with the expedition of Chedorlaomer in
Gen. xiv. The events recorded in this chapter are very
remote, going back, most probably, to about 2100 B.a^ The
1 Johns, DudM and Doeumenis, pp. 164, 167. Kittel uys : *' We now
know that in anoient times Jaeoh was an ordinary peisoxial name, and
nothing more." — Bab. Baootvw, p. 81.
' Gfl art by C. W. H. Johns on *< Code of Hammnrahi *' in Did, cf
Bible (Extra VoL) ; or his Oldest Code cf Latm in the World. Gnnkel says :
"And this law was codified abont 2200 B.O.; it originates firom a time one
thoosand years before there was any people of Israel. It is removed from
Moses as far as we are fh>m Charlemagne ! " — Israel and Bab. p. 7 (the
interval was probably less — see below).
* Sayoe goes so far as to say that the Babylonia of the age of Abraham
"was a more highly ednoated conntiy than the England of George ni." —
Monument Fiacte, p> 86.
^ See above, p. 115. ■ Ct Code, arts. 145, 146, etc
* On the nnoertainties of the chronology, see Hommel, AneierU Seb. Trad,
pp. 120 ff. Two data are important. An inscription of Assurbanipal states
that the conquest of Babylonia by the Elamites nappened one thousand six
hundred and thirty-five years before his own conquest of Elam, or in 2280 B.a
How long the Elamitic mle lasted we cannot tell, but Chedorlaomer was the
last representative of it. More definitely, Nabonidns states that Bumaburias
reftored the temple of the son at Lana seven hundred years after EUmnm-
ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 411
historical relations also are intricate, and in part singular.
They are such as floating tradition could neither have in-
vented nor preserved. It is implied in the story that a
king of Elam, Chedorlaomer (a strange name), at that time
held sovereignty over Babylonia; that, with the vassal
kings, whose names are given, he made an expedition against
Palestine ; that a second expedition was undertaken fourteen
years later to crash rebellion. The chapter further tells
how Lot was carried away prisoner, and how Abraham
organised a pursuit, and rescued hiuL The historical
character of this narrative was widely discredited — as by
Noldeka^ How could a late Israelitish writer possibly
know of such events ? How could such an expedition take
place ? How could such a rescue be effected ? The story
was declared to be a complete fiction. Strange as it is,
however, it has now, as respects its historical framework,
been singularly confirmed. It has been established by
indubitable evidence that Babylonia was at this time under
Elamitic suzerainty; we have even the name and date (e.
2280 B.a) of the kmg who overran it It was found, further,
that the known names of the kings of this Elamitic dynasty
began with the word "Kudur," meaning "servant" — thus
Kudur-Nankhundi, Kudur-Mabug. It was discovered that
there was an Elamitic goddess named *' Lagamar," so that
Kudur-Lagamar (Chedorlaomer) was a name of genuine
Elamitic formation. It was found that these kings claimed
sovereignty over " Martu " (the west), or Falestina It was
ascertained that Kudur-Mabug had a son — ^Eri-aku (also
called Bim-sin), king of Larsa : there can be little doubt, the
Arioch of EUasar of this chapter. Amraphel was identified
with Hammurabi* Finally, it was announced that the
imbL The date of the kiog referred to (ct Homme], art ''Babylonia,"
DieL qf BitiU, L p. 224) is about 1400 B.a, which yielda 2100 B.a for
Hammurabi, the Ainraphel of this expedition.
^ Wellhansen speaks of fiuth in the historicity of this nanadve as having
receiyed its "deathblow" firom Noldeke, and pronounces Koldeke^
criticism to be " unshaken and unanswerable " {Compo$, d. Hex. pp. 811-12).
On earlier attacks on the historicity, see DiUmann, Oenuis, ii pp. 82-88,
and Delitzsoh, Genesis, L pp. 896-98.
' For details, reference may be made to Schrader, i pp. 120 ff. ; and
specially ii pp. 296 ff.; and to the works of Sayce, Hommel^ Finches,
Driver, Gnnkel, Kittel, Jeremiss, etc. Gunkel says : " A narrative which
knows how to speak of so many very ancient names and relations makes first
the impression of the highest antiquity. For very andent sJso, so far as we
ean see, are all the fol}owin|; names (in vers. 1 ff.): they are almost entirely
412 ARCHAEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
name of Chedorlaomer himself had been found on a late
inscription. The identification is qaestioned, and we need
not press it ; bat it is significant that three leading specialists.
Dr. Pinches (the discoverer), Professor Hommel, and
Professor Sayce, still express themselves satisfied of the
correctness of the reading.^ In any case, it seems abun-
dantly made out that the aathor of this chapter is not
romancing, but writes with a clear knowledge of the
historical conditions of the times to which his narrative
relatea For the rest, the Tel el-Amama tablets testify to
Uru-Salim as an ancient Oanaanitish name for Jerusalem,
and even Gunkel is disposed to accept Melchizedek as an
historical person.*
All this, it is now to be owned, makes not the slightest
impression on most of the critics. Even Dr. Driver can
write : '^ Monvmentxd evidence that the narrative is historical
is at present entirely lacking."* It does not matter that
the historical setting of the story — even in the points
that were formerly ctuUlenged — is proved to be surprisingly
correct ; it is held sufficient to reply that there has not been
found on the mdhuments any direct mention of Abraham
and his rescue of Lot. As if this had ever been claimed, or
was a reasonable thing to expect What is claimed is, that
the writer of this chapter is proved to have his feet on firm
historical ground in these remote times; that he knows
what he is writing about, and is not romancing; and that,
when we find his narrative trustworthy in a multitude of
difficult points where we can test it, we are entitled to give
him credit for like fidelity in the parts we cannot test This
would seem to be the common-sense way of looking at the
matter ; yet the critics prefer to believe that the emptor is
an " unhistorical Midrash " of the time of the exile, or later,
names of peoples and cities whioh in the time of Israel bad long absolutely
disappeared, and wblob the aathor needs to explain by glosses to his oon-
temporaries." — Cfetu9i$, p^ 256. He combats the post-ezilian origin of the
storr (p. 268).
'See their respective works. Professor Sajce, in a personal oommnnioa-
tion, June 10, 1902, says : " Hommel, Pinches, and myself still adhere to
the reading of the name of Chedorlaomer in a tablet discorered by ICr.
Pinches."
* Genesis, pp. 261-62 ; of. Jeremias, ui supra, p. 218.
* Omesis, p. 172. Dr. Driver will only co so far as to ooncede that
"the oatline of the narradve may stiU be h&torical." Of. also AnfharUff
amd Archcsologif, pp. 44, 46,
ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 413
drawn up by someone who had chanced to fall in with a
fragment of old Babylonian history, and pleased himself by
weaving into it these traditions or fables of Abraham and
Lot ! ^ How interesting the combination of accurate archseo-
logii^ and romancing fabulist which this theory presents ! —
a theory for which, we are justified in affirming, there is
no evidence whatever, and which is opposed to every con-
sideration of probability. One feels, in reading the narrative,
that it is of a piece throughout in its archaic character, and
must be taken as a whole, or left as a whola^ As Honunel
well remarks: "Even assuming Gen. xiv. to be nothing
more than a very late narrative of a Midrash character,
belonging to post-exilic times, how came its author to
introduce into it a whole host of ancient phrases and names,
to which he himself is obliged to add explanatory glosses, in
order that they %Lay be better understood ? . . . Are we to
assume that he did this intentionally in order to invest his
story with an air of greater antiquity ? In that case, all we
can say is, that no similar example of literary ^Ttess^ can be
found throughout the whole of the Old Testament"^ It
need not be added that many critics of more positive
tendency put much greater value on the narrative, and
ably defend its historicity.^
IV. Joseph m EavPT
With Abraham first, and afterwards with Joseph, the
patriarchal history quits Canaan, and transports us into
the midst of Egypt. Abraham went down to Egypt to
escape famine, and was there received with honour by the
reigning Pharaoh;' but it is with the history of Joseph
that we pass definitely into the full blaze of Egyptian
civilisation. On the remarkable fidelity of the E^rptian
* See Kote 0 on the Alleged Midrasli ohancter of Gen. xiy.
* Kuenen, who holds the chapter to be a poet-ezilian Midraeh, itill
allows that "the stoiy is in its proper place, for it presapposee Lot's
separation fh>m Abram, and his settlement in Sodom." — ITex. p. 148 (of.
p. 824).
* AneierU ffeb. Trad. pp. 168-64.
^ See the defence of the historioity in DiUmann, Oenens, ii. pp. 82-88.
Delitzsoh, L pp. 396-98 ; Kitte]^ ffist. of ffebrews, L pp. 175 ff. (with con-
cession of revisions). So Kdnig, Klostermann, etc. Cf. also Tomkimi,
Abraham and His Age (1897), chap. xiii.
* (jlen. zii. On the Egyptian relationSi of. Tomkins, as above.
414 ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
colouring of the narrative of this part of Genesis nearly all
scholars may be said to be agreed.^ The colouring is so fresh
and vivid, the portraiture of manners so exact, the allu-
sions to customs and institutions are so minute, that it
would be endless to dwell on thent We have the slave-
market ; Fotiphar^s house, with its Egyptian arrangements ;
the prison; Pharaoh's butler and baker, the latter with his
baskets of conf ectionerj ; Pharaoh's dreams, so Egyptian in
their character; Joseph as prime minister, buying and
selling com ; the divining-cup, the chariots, the waggons sent
to Jacob ; we have Egyptian names, sitting at meals, shaving
the beard, embalmmg the body, sacred scribes, priests,
physicians, other state functionaries; in short, we find
ourselves veritably on the banks of the Nile, with Egyptian
social and court life in full movement around us.
It is perhaps more to the purpose to remark that it is
precisely the points in the history of Joseph which were
formerly challenged which have received clearest illustration
and confirmation from the monuments. Thus it was denied
by Yon Bohlen and others, on the authority of Herodotus,
that the vine was cultivated in Egypt ; it was denied that
flesh was an article of diet among the upper classes of the
Egyptians ; the free manners of the women were alleged to
conflict with Oriental privacy; the elevation of a young
Hebrew to the position of prime minister was thought to
savour of romance; the presents of Pharaoh to Abraham
were objected to because they included sheep and oxen,
which were objects of hatred in Egypt, and did not include
horses, which, in Joseph's day, were common. These objec-
tions have disappeared with fuller knowledge, but serve to
show the impossibility of anyone in a later age composing
a narrative of this kind without falling into serious errors.
The monuments, it is well known, show the process of wine-
making in all its stages ; * they reveal that, in the words of
Bawlinson, ''animal food was the principal diet of the upper
* The proof on this labject is so abundant that we most refer to the
books for detaiU. Some of the chief are, Ebers, AegypUn und DU Backer
Mom, i. pp. 295 ff., and art. *' Joseph " in Smith's DieL of Bible, I (189S) ;
Driyer, art ''Joseph," in DieL of Bible, ii, and in Autharityjmd ArcKceol,
and Oenesii ; Tomkins, L^e and Times of Joseph (1891) ; Vigonronz, La
Bible et les D^oouvertes Modemes, iL ; Rawlinson's Eistorieal lUvstralicmSt
ppi 88£; Sayoe, Eigher OHHcism, pp. 207 ff.
• OL Kbers, Smith's 2>. qfB, I p. 1795.
ARCHJEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 415
classes *" ; ^ tbej illustrate the freedom allowed to women ;
they furnish representations of sheep and oxen ; while the
absence of horses in Abraham's time proves to be a mark
of truth in the narrative, for horses seem to have been
unknown in the twelfth and earlier dynasties, and were
first introduced under the Hyksos. There, in Joseph's time,
accordiugly, they appear.* In the story of Saneha, of the
twelfth dynasty, we have a close parallel to the excQtation of
Joseph ; ' while on the tombs of Beni-Hassan, of the same
dynasty, we have a picture of the reception of a company
of Amu, or Semites, so remarkably resembling the case of
Jacob and his household, that at first it was thought to be
a representation of that patriarch's descent into lEgypt^
Beference cannot be omitted to the Eg3rptian story, " The
Tale of the Two Brothers," which embodies an account of
the temptation of one of these brothers by the wife of the
other, so strikingly (in parts almost verbally) parallel to
the temptation of Joseph by his mistress, that the two can
hardly be independent. As the Egyptian tale belongs to
the nineteenth dynasty '^ — ^many centuries after Joseph —
the story of Joseph may be presumed to be the original^
A picture, so full and faithful, of Egyptian life and
manners could only, one would think, take its origin on
Egyptian soiL It is not a sufficient reply to say, with
Dr. Driver, that Egypt was not far distant from Canaan,
and that the intercourse between the countries during the
monarchy made it easy for a Hebrew writer to gain a
knowledge of Egyptian customs and institutions.^ The
hypothesis, in the first place, is gratuitous, for there is no
reason to suppose that the narrative of Joseph's life, with
its Egyptian characteristics, was not a possession of Israel
from the beginning;^ and next, it is inadequate, for it is
^ HitL lUutU, p. 60. Of. on these points Wilkinson's Ancient EgypiianB^
fMusim.
* Gen. xlvii. 17 ; of. Haspero, Egfi/pt and Aasyrta^ pp. 81, 82.
* Cf. Canon Ck>ok, essay at end of Spedker^M Ccm, on Exodus, p. 446.
< md. Cf. Ebera, D, ofB, 1. p. 1793.
* See the story in Sayce's Higher Criticism, pp. 209-11. It was written
for Sett II., the successor of Meneptah, of the nineteenth dynasty.
* Of. Ebers, as above, p. 1796. ' Oeneeis, pp. 1, k.
* The influence of oiitical theory is weU seen in Dr. Driver's (stiU reason-
ably oonseryatiye) treatment of the history of Joseph. It cannot be said, he
allows, that there are serious historical improbabilities in the substance of the
history ; but the matter, he says, assumes a different aspect '* when account
is taken (1) of the fact that the narratiyee about Joseph are plainly not the
4i6 ARCHAEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
contrary to analogy that a writer of one country should be
able 80 to transpose himself into the midst of a foreign —
even if a neighbouring — civilisation, as to produce a picture
so marvellously true to its life and conditions. Are we to
understand that the problematical J or E imdertook a
special tour to Egypt — as the modern novelist might do —
in order to acquaint himself by personal study with the
customs and antiquities of that nation? Or (Ud the two
writers do so? Even so, we have only to think of a
Frenchman, e.g,f attempting to depict British or American
life or manners ; or of an Englishman or American writing
miautely about Paris ; or of a Londoner trying to describe
Scottish characters and institutions, to see how imperfect
such a picture would necessarily be. We do not attach
much importance to the objections that the narrative does
not give the personal name of Joseph's Pharaoh, and that the
types of names which appear in it — Potiphera, Zaphenath-
paneah, Asenath — do not become frequent till the later
dynasties (twenty-second, twenty-sixth).^ It may strike us,
indeed, as peculiar that, in the lives of Joseph and Moses,
the proper names of the Pharaohs are not given; still,
comparison proves that the title " Pharaoh '^ (simply) was
that commonly employed by Hebrew writers for the king
of "Egyft, even when the personal name was quite well
known;' while the very occurrence of the other names
work of a contemporary, but were in all probability only oommitted to
writinff 700-800 years afterwards ; and (2) of the farther curions h/nt that
'Joae]^* (like many of the other patriarchal names) is also a tribal
name," etc "The first of these facts/' he declares, "at once destroys aU
ffnarantee that we possess in the Joseph-narratiyes a literal record of the
uots." — DieL qfBibh, 11. p. 771. Maj not the character of the narratiyes
rather be a proof that Dr. IMyer's dating, which has no sure basis, is wrong t
See aboye, pp. 77-78. It was pointed out earlier, also, that Joseph does not,
strictly, giye his name to a tribe (p. 89).
KittePs treatment shows likewise the biassing effect of theory. There is,
e.ff., not a fnin of foundation for sach statements as "when he (Joseph)
emigrated into Egypt his tribesmen were certainly with him," etc — ITist. qf
Heb%. L p. 187.
In a striking oommnnioation to the Bx^^otXlofy Tttnea, September 1899,
Professor Sayce argues strongly that the history is substantially a work of
the Mosaic age, based on an Egyptian original, though written in Palestine.
^ Driyer, O&nesis, p. li ; Diet, of BibU, ii. p. 775 ; of. Ebers, as aboye,
p. 1798.
> Rg., 1 Kings iz. 16, 24 ; zi. 1, 18, 21 (of. xi. 40) ; 2 Kings xyiiL 21 ;
Isa. xix. 11 ; xxz. 2, 8 ; Jer. zliii. (cfl zliy. 80) ; zlyi. 17 ; xlyu. 1 ; Ezek.
xxzi. 2, 18 ; xxxii 2, etc. Cf. Assyrian usage in Schrader, i pp. 140, 162 ;
ii.p.88.
ARCHEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 417
ff
shows how easy it would have heen for the narrator to
decorate his story with names of kings and places, had he
wished to do so. The alleged lateness of particular names
rests, again, on the argument from silence, which may be
upset at any moment,^ and fails to take account of the fact
that the Hyksos period, to which Joseph belonged, is well-
nigh a monumental blank. It is doubtful, besides, whether
all the names have been rightly interpreted.*
Y. The Mosaio Pebiod — ^Thbee Gbiat Discoysries
We come now to the Mosaic period, but, to make the
bearings of recent discoveries on this period intellijpible,
it is necessary, first, to say a few words on the general
course of Egyptian history and on the more important of
these discoveries.
Three great periods are commonly distinguished in the
history of Egypt — the Old, the Middle, and the New
Empires. The Old Empire embraces the first eleven
dynasties of Manetho; the Middle Empire extends from
the twelfth dynasty to the seventeenth ; ^ the New Empire
runs from the eighteenth dynasty to the thirtieth, after
which (340 KO.) Egypt loses its independence.
Of the Old Empire, the fourth and fifth dynasties have left
their memorials in the great Pyramids ; but of the first three
dynasties nothing was known till recently from the monu-
ments but the names of kings ; the period from the seventh
to the tenth dynasties was (and remains) hardly less obscure.
The founder of the first dynasty bore the name of Menes ;
but scholars were disposed to regard this king, and the
first dynasties genersJly, as mythical. Maspero, in his
Davm of Civilisation^ treats Menes as purely mythical, and
gives an elaborate explanation of how the myth arose.*
1 Cf. Sayoe, JEtighsr OriL pp. 212-18 ; TomUiu, Joitph, pp. 188-^.
There is an example of a name of the Potiphera ^pe in the eighteenth
dynasty (Tomkins, p. 185 ; Driyer, p. 845, and Did, ^ BibU, ii p^ 775),
and it oannot be DeUeved that it stood alone. "Those of the ^ype of
Asenath are fonnd now and then earlier" (Drirer, Did, p. 775).
' This is true both of Zaphenath-paneah and of Asenath. The latter Is
explained as Kes-Keit, "belonging to Keith" ; but Bmgsch wrote: "The
name of his wife Asnat is pnre Egyptian, and almost confined to the Old
and Middle Empire." — Sist. cf£gyptf i. p. 265.
* Some begin the Middle Empire with Dynssty XI.
^Dawn ^ Civilisation, pp. 238-84. Menes, aooording to Maspeio,
«7
4i8 ARCHAEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
As lately as 1894, Professor Flinders Petrie could write:
'* The first three dynasties are a blank, so far as monumental
statements are concerned ; they are as purely on a literary
basis as the kings of Bome or the primeval kings of
Ireland. . . • We cannot regard these dynasties as any-
thing but a series of statements made by a state chrono-
grapher, about 3000 years after date, concerning a
period of which he had no contemporary material."^
The judgment thus passed on the early dynasties has
been suddenly reversed, largely by the brilliant explorations
of Professor Petrie ^limseU. The actual tombs of Menes
and his successors have been discovered, with many valuable
objects belonging to them, and the first two dynasties have
been clearly proved to be historical Civilisation, and the
hieroglyphic system of writing, are carried back into pre-
dynastic times.* The result is a striking object-lesson —
one of many in recent years — on the unrenableness of what
the discoverer calls " the criticism of myths."*
In the Middle Empire, the period from the thirteenth
dynasty to the seventeenth is again one of confusion and
uncertainty. This was the time when Egypt was ruled by
the Hyksos, or Shepherd £ings, under one of whom Joseph
was taken down to Egypt,* soon to be followed by Jacob
with his household. With the overthrow of the Shepherd
" owes bia existence to a popular attempt at etymology " (p. 284). Sren
Dr. Birch wrote that Menes ''must be placed amonff those founders of
monarchies whose personal existence a severe and emightened criticiam
doubts or denies." — Egypt, p. 25.
^ Hist, ofEgypty L pp. 16, 19.
' On the nature and oearings of ''pre-dynastio'' discoveiies, see Budge,
Hia of Egypt, i. chap. L
* In an address to the Egyptian Exploration Fund, Kot. 6tb, 1901,
Professor Petrie is reported to have said : ' ' The continuous order of seventeen
kings had been established, and the very foundations of Egyptian history
had been settled in a manner which had hitherto seemed beyond hope. . . .
The criticism of myths had told them that Mena, the founder of the
Egyptian monarchy, was but a fonn of Manu, the lawgiver of India, and
of Minos, the hero of Crete, and to hope for tangible monuments of his
time was but seeing castles in cloudland. Now the long line of a dozen
kiuffs back to Mena was clear before them ; thev had seen and handled the
gold, the crystal, the ivory with his name and enp^vings. . . . Ko such
complete materialisation of history had been obtained at one stroke from
any other country or age." See further Note D on the Resurrection of
Myths.
^Joseph's elevation is traditionally connected with Apophis (Apepi).
With the view of the chronology indicated below, we are disposed to piaoe
it under Apepi l (0. 1880 B.O.), not Apepi 11.
ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 419
Kings came the founding of the eighteenth dynasty nnder
Aahmes, and the beginning of the New Empire, Under
the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties we reach, perhaps,
the period of greatest splendour in Egypt It is a period of
the greatest interest to the Biblical student, for it is under
one or other of these dynasties, undoubtedly, that we are
to seek for the Israelitish oppression, and for the Exodu&
The prevailing opinion among scholars has been that the
Pharaoh of the oppression was the great ruler Barneses n.,
and that the Pharaoh of the Exodus was his son Meneptah,
or one of his immediate successors. Much may be said
for this identification. Especially does it seem to be
indicated by the mention in Ex. i 11 of the building of
the store cities Pithom and Baamses, both of which
are directly connected, the one (Pi-tum, discovered by
M. Naville in 1883 ^) by its bricks, the other by its name,
with Bameses n.' Yet three great discoveries in recent
times have again thrown more than doubt on the
identdfication*
1. First in order was the astonishing discovery, in 1881,
of the mummies of the Pharaohs themselvea In a gallery
given off from a pit, 35 feet deep, in a mountain gorge
a few miles from Thebes, some tlurty-nine mummies were
found, which proved on inspection to include amongst them
the most renowned kings and queens of Egypt uom the
seventeenth to the twenty-first dynasties. "At the first
report of the discovery," wrote one, " the boldest held his
breath, so astounding is the list, which includes almost
every name most renowned in the annals of Egypt." The
list embraced Aahmes, founder of the eighteenth dynasty ;
Thothmes m., and other kings of the same dynasty;
Bameses L, Seti L, and Bameses n., of the nineteenth dynasty.^
* Gf. his Stort City qfPWum and the BtntU qf th$ 3xoduM (1885).
' On the historioity of theae notices, cf. Kittel, HUt, if ffeb$, L pp.
254-66. He shows the difficulties of the snp^sition that the Hebrew writer
" obtained information respecting the boildmg of Pithom and Rsamses by
means of scholarly inTsstigation, and then attached to this the national tradi-
tion of the Israelites" (p. 256). It will naturally occur that a writer who
oould name these cities could also hare named the Pharaoh had he chosen.
The problems about the dtv Raamses, howeyer, are not yet satisfikotorily
solyed. See Kote E on the Identification of Raamses.
* Our notice is based on oontemporary reports. A popular aoooont is
given of this and of NaviUe's discovery in The Pharaohi (^the Bandage and
the Baoodus, by Chas. S. Robinson, D.D., New York (1887). See also
Kiool, Recent Arehmology and the Bible, pp. 16, ff.
420 ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
A subsequent discovery of the tomb of Amenophis IL,
in 1898, added seven other mummies to the list One of
these, taken at first for that of Amenophis n., was found
later to be the mummy of Meneptah, the supposed
Pharaoh of the Exodus.^ To whatever period the Exodus
is assigned, it is beyond reasonable doubt that we have in
our possession the actual mummy of the Pharaoh who
oppressed the Israelites, and from whose face Moses fled.
2. This first discovery was eclipsed, in 1887, by a second,
still more extensive in its bearings. Tina was the discovery,
already repeatedly referred to, at Td el-Amama (a place
on the eastern bank of the Nile, 180 miles south of
Cairo), of a mass of inscribed tablets, some three hundred in
number, forming part, as it proved, of the official corre-
spondence of two of the later kings of the eighteenth dynasty
— ^Amenophis ni. and Amenophis IV.* This latter king {e.
1380 B.a), otherwise called Khu-n-aten, was a ** heretic king."
He sought to introduce, and compulsorily to enforce, a new
worship — that of the solar disk (Aten). The opposition
he encountered led him to leave Thebes, and found this
new capital, whither he removed the court records of his
father and himself. The remarkable thing about the
correspondefice is that the tablets are written, not in
Egyptian hieroglyphic, but in Babylonian cuneiform — a
fact of the utmost importance as showing that the Baby-
lonian language was at that time not only widely known,
but was the medium of official communication between E^ypt
and other countries, as Frehch is to-day in Europe. The
letters reveal the wide political relations of Egypt, and are
particularly valuable for the light they throw on the state of
culture in Palestine, and on the events transpiring in that
country, about 1400 B.a They include, as will be after-
wards seen,^ many letters from the king of Jerusalem and
other rulers in Canaan.
3. The third discovery is stiU more recent, and bears on
^ Cf. Niool, as aboTe, p. 820. The ooirection was annoanced by Pro-
fessor Sayce in 1900.
' Good aoconnts of this discoyeiy may be seen in Sayoe's Higher Onlidmikt
pp. 47 ff. ; Bennett's Booh of Joshua, pp. 48 ff. ; Pinohes, 0,T, in Liaht of
Mist, Records, ohap. Yiii., eto. The most Talnable complete translatloii ia
Winckler's (1896).
* See below, ^ 424. Next in impoitanoe to the letters of tho king of
Jerusalem, in their bearings on the Ehaoiri (below, p. 424), is the long series of
Rib-Addi of Gebal (Winckler, pp. 124 ff.).
ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 421
the questioii often asked — Is there way merUion of Israel
on the E^ptian monuments? Identifications with the
Hebrews have been repeatedly sought, as, e.g., in the aperiu
mentioned in some of the inscriptions;^ but it was not
till 1896 that the name ** Israel" was actuallj found by
Professor Flinders Fetrie on a stela of Meneptah, belieyed,
as above said, to be the Pharaoh of the Exodus. The
inscription on the monument^ however, it was soon found,
created more difficulties than it removed. It recoimted
the victories of Meneptah over various peoples in and about
Palestine, and apparently included Israel in the list
" Israel is spoiled," it reads, " it hath no seed." ' But if
Israel was in Palestine in the time of Meneptah — and
there seems independent evidence that at least Asher,' and
perhaps Judah,^ was — ^it is clear that Meneptah cannot,
in consistency with Bible history, be the Pharaoh of the
Exodus. This at once raised a new question — ^Is the usucd
assumption that Bameses n. was the oppressor, and .that
the Exodus took place under Meneptah, or later, a correct
one? The question is one which it is now necessary to
consider.'
^ Tha objeotioii to thii identification is that aperiu are still found, in
both noble and servile positions, at dates mnoh later than the Ezodns.
Thns there is mention of 2088 aperiu as eettlers in noble positions in
Heliopolis in the reign of Barneses in., and 800 aperiu are employed
in Slavs labour in the reign of Rameses 17. (ot CSook, who aooepts
the identification of CQiabas, Speaker's Cam. Exodus, p. 466 ; SayoOi IMi
lAghtt p. 71 ; Hommel, Anc Eeb, Trad, p. 259 ; Driver, Auih, and Arck.
p. 66). Or did some colony of Israelites remain in Egypt t (Ebers, Dwrek
Qceefi^ p. 621). Cook regards the aperiu of Bameses in. as also " captives "
— ''prisoners of war."
'There are considerable variations in the translation given, bnt generaUy
the meaning is the same.
* Thns W. Max Miiller, Aden wkd Swropa, p. 286 ; c£ Hommel, Anc
Heb. Trad, J. 228.
^Thns Jastrow, who finds "men of Jndah," on the Tel el-Amama
tablets {Jour, cf Bib. Lit. 1898). There is another inscription of the
reign of Menentah which speaks of Goehen as '* abandoned since the time of
the ancestors. Naville infers from this that it was not inhabited (" The
Bonte of the Ezodns," Trans, cf Fiet. Institute^ voL zzvi. 1892-98).
* For a fnller discussion of the Egyptian traditions and other ancient
notices in light of Professor Petrie's oisooveiy, see art by the anther in
&poeUor, April 1897, "Israel in l^pt and the Exodus.**
422 ABCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
YL Israel and thb Ezodxts
There have always been scholars who doubted the
current theory of the date of the Exodus,^ but, while the
majority, probably, still adhere to the old date, the effeot
of Professor Fetrie's discovery has been to lead many to
revise their previous opinions,* and to create hesitation in
the minds of more. An almost insuperable difficulty in the
way of the Bameses-Meneptah theory is the ehrandogiad.
The steady tendency in Eg^tian study has been to lower
the dates of the Pharaohs of the nineteenth dynasty.
Professor Flinders Fetrie, e,g.^ puts the accession of Meneptah
as late as 1208 B.O., and the Exodus in 1200 B.a' This,
however, leaves little more than 200 years for the interval
between the Exodus and the building of Solomon's temple
(c. 975 B.a)^ — a period into which it is impossible to crush
the wanderings and conquest, the times of the Judges, and
the reigns of Saul and David. At the other end, the
period from Abraham (e. 2100 B.G.) to the Exodus is far too
long, about 900 years — some make it longer. Even if the
date of Barneses n. is raised by half a century, the difficulty
is only very partially removed. If, on the other hand, we
take a date which the Bible itself gives us for the Exodus,
viz., 480 years before the building of the temple,^ as
approximately correct, we are taken back to about 1460 B.a,
just at the close of the reign of the powerful ruler Thothmes
m., of the eighteenth dynasty.^ This date corresponds also
with the interval from Abraham. On this view, the Exodus
would fall in the first years of the reign of Amenophis IL,
^ Ot the in fcereBtmg Essay of Canon Cook, Speaket^s Com, Ezodiu, pp.
464-56 ; also Eohler, Bib. Gfesch. I pp. 237-45.
'Professor Petrie himself Sayce, Driver, Eittel, eto., adhere to the
ordinary yiew; but leading Continental scholars, as Steindorff, Zimmem,
Hommdy etc., with W. Max MtlUer, Colonel Conder, and others, inoUne to, or
adopt, an earlier date. Hommel, who took the ordinary view in his Ane.
Heo. Trad., gives the reasons for his change in I!3c^>ository Time», February
1899.
< ffiaL cfBgyvt, I pp. 250-61.
^ Thio is the date approximately fixed by the Assyrian synohronisnis.
* 1 Kines vl 1. The LXX has 440 years. This is fonnd. howeyw, in
none of the remaining versions. The number 480 is fonnd in Aqnila,
Symmaohos, Peshitta, etc (cfl Kohler, Bib. Gfeach. i. p. 242 ; ii pp. 86, 89).
* The years of his sole reign are given by Petrie, after MKhlery ss
1481-1449 B,o.^mtL qf Egypt, u. pp. 165^7.
L
ARCHAEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 423
son of Thothmes m., in whose reign Professor Hommel now
also places it.
It is next to be observed that, on the supposition of this
earlier date, the eanditians are in every Moay a$ mitdbk as on
the Barneses theory — ^perhaps more suitable. The argument
in favour of Sameses n. from the store cities loses much of
its force when we find that, as might be shown by examples,
it was a habit of this monarch to appropriate the work and
monuments of his predecessors, and give his name to them.^
On the other hypothesis, the oppressor becomes the great
ruler, conqueror, and builder, Thothmes m., whose character,
length of reign (fifty-four years), and oppression of his subjects,
entirely corresponds with the description in Exodus.* To
his reign belongs the well-known picture of the brick-making
by captives^ so often used to illustrate the bondage of the
Israelites. If the new hypothesis is correct, it need not be
a mere illustration, but may be a pictm'e of the bondage
itsell As in Exodus, over the slaves stand overseers with
their rods, and the words are put into their mouths, *' Be
not idla" ' There is another curious agreement. Thothmes
IIL was preceded by Thothmes n., and he by Thothmes i.,
whose daughter Hatasu (Hashop) was one of the most re-
markable women in Egyptian history. She was associated
with her father in the government ; she married her brother
Thothmes n., and shar^ his throne ; she was regent in the
minority of Thothmes m. It is at least a singular coinci-
dence that, on the theory we are expounding, Moses must
have been bom just about the time this ** bold and clever"
princess ^ was rising into power. The temptation is great
to connect her with the ** Pharaoh's daughter " of the story
in Exodus.'
One other coincidence of much importance remains to
be noticed. This takes us back to the Tel el-Amama tablets.
1 The '* Cleopatra's Keedle" on the Thames Embankment, London, was
originally an obelisk of Thothmes iii. ; Pi-Bamessu was the reboilding of an
older city ; this seems to haye been the case also with Pithom. In this case
the nse of the name Baamaes wonld seem to show that the narratU>e at least
is as late as Bameses 11. But it must still be donbtful whether the Bismses
ofEx. i. 11 is a dty boUt by this king. See Note E.
"Ex. ▼.
* Of. Bmgsbh, Sid, qf Egypi^ L pp. 875-76 ; see BmgMh on the whok
reign.
* Ibid. p. 296 ; of. her history in Petrie, ffisL q/Sgypif ii pp. 79-96.
» Ct Ex. ii. 5 ff.
424 ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
These, as was stated, include many letters from Palestine,
and reveal an extraordinary state of things in that countrj.
The land, especially in the south, was overrun by a poople
called the Khabiri, who had come up, apparently, from Seir,
and were carrying all before them. The tone of all the
letters that mention them, as Colonel Conder says, ''is a
despairing cry for help to Egypt, but none of them record
that any help was sent, though eagerly expected They
relate no victories over the Khabiri"^ Specially piteous
are the lamentations of Abdi-Khiba, king of Jerusalem.
''The Khabiri have devastated all the king's territory" —
"The Khabiri are occupying the king's cities" — ^" There
remains not one prince to my lord, the king ; every one is
ruined" — " If no troops come, the whole territory of my lord,
the king, will be lost" ' This is the reign of Amenophis iv.
(c 1380 B.C.), which is seen ending in defeat and disaster.
If, however, the Exodus is placed where the new hypothesiB
suggests, or possibly a reign later, under Thothmes rv. (the
Thummosis of Manetho), their invasion synchronises very
closely with the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites, and
many leading scholars, accordingly, now seriously propose an
identification of these Khabiri with the Hebrews' The
subject is still under discussion, but it is easy to see how
interesting are the possibilities it opens up.
VIE. Empibb of the Hittitbs — ^Pebiod of the Kings
It remains to indicate in the briefest survey the light
cast by archaeology on the relations of Israel to the great
powers with which, in so many ways, it was brought into
contact, after the settlement in Canaan.
1. And first may be mentioned the remarkable corro-
borations of Scripture in its references to the existence and
^ BibU and iKe East, pp. 40, 41, 106-7.
' Of. in Winckler, letters 179-85 (pp. S08-15). The letters are also girsn
bj Sayce in Eoflrly Israel^ App. pp. 287 ff. The desoriptions in the letteis
meet the objection that the conquest could not have taken place at this time,
because Canaan was subject to Egypt. If the Khabiri could in tlua way
OTerrun Palestine, certainly the Israelites could do so.
'Zimmem, Winckler, etc., favour this identilication ; Hommel now
accepts it. One of the best defences of it is by H. Billet in the DtuUck-
Evangel. Blatter, No. 7. Professor Hommel wrote the author in February
1899 : "I see in them the first onset (Vcrslosa) of the twelve tribes." See
also Benzinger, in Hilprecht's Ea^orations, p. 620.
ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 425
power of ths HiUiies. In the Books of Joshua and Kings
are found various references which imply the existence of a
great and formidable Hittite empire or confederacy north of
Palestine, and this long after, as well as before, the Israelites
had obtained possession of Canaan. Thus, in Joshua L 4 :
"From the wilderness and this Lebanon, even unto the
great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites/'
In 1 Kings x. 28, 29, we are told of chariots and horses
being brought from Egypt for '' all the kings of the Hittites."
Still later, in 2 Kings viL 6, we read of a flight of the
Syrians occasioned by the belief that the king of Israel had
hired aeainst them 'Hhe kings of the Hittites and the
kings of the Egyptians."^ As, however, no ancient writer
knew anything about such a power, these Scriptural allusions
to them were, as usual, treated as unhistorical, or as mere
rhetorical flourishes. ''The unhistorical tone," wrote Mr.
Francis W. Newman in his Hebrew Monarchy, ** is far too
manifest to allow of our easy belief in it " (the flight of the
Syrians), adding that the reference to the Hittites "does
not exhibit the writer's acquaintance with the times in a
very favourable light"* Now, it will hardly be diiqputed
that the statements of Scripture on this subject are con-
firmed to the letter.' Alike from Egfrptian and from
Assyrian inscriptions we leam that this Hittite people were
for nearly 1000 years a great ruling power in Syria and
Western Asia, extending their influence eastwards as far as
the Euphrates. They had, in short, an empire hardly less
great than Egypt and Assyria themselve& The kings of
the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties in Egypt conducted
extensive campaigns against them, the events of which
constitute a considerable part of their annals.^ But beyond
this their own abundant monuments, inscribed with a
hieroglyphic which scholars are still busy attempting to
decipher, now discover to us what manner of people they
were, and testify to the wide range of their supremacy. It
> Of. Jtidg. L 26, *< anto the land of the Hittites."
* JBfeb. Monarchy, pp. 184-85.
* Cf. the works of Sayoe (Fresh Light, Higher OrUiettm, Early larad,
etc.) ; Wright, Empire jg the Hittites ; Driver, A%UhorUy aid Arehceology,
pp. 83-87 ; Jenseo, in Hilprecht's Explorations, pp. 755 ff.
^ Cf. the treaty of Rameses 11. with the Hittites in Bmgsch ; also in Sayoe,
Early Israel, pp. 297 ff. The Hittites are prominent also in tiie Tel el-
Amama tablets. Ct Pinohes, as above, pp. 806 fL
426 ARCHiEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
is already known that the Hittite language was not a
Semitic, but an Aryan, tongue, and Jensen has thrown out
the conjecture that the Hittites of the monuments were the
ancestors of the modem Armenians.^ It seems evident that
the Biblical books in which these references to the Hittites
occur must have been written when the power of that
people was yet in the ascendant, else the writers would have
blundered in regard to them like others.
2. Space would fail to toll of the long series of dis-
coveries minutely illustrating and corroborating the narra-
tives of the historical books of the Old Testament in the
period of the hinge. It is a striking fact that there is
hardly a single point of contact with foreign powers in this
period which does not receive illustration from the monu-
ments; while the Assyrian synchronisms and notices in
the Eponym Canon' afford valuable aid in rectifying the
Bible chronology. Only to glance at outstanding instances —
the walls of the Hall of Kamak give Shishak's own boast-
ful account of his invasion of Israel and Judah in the time
of Behoboam;* Mesha, king of Moab, set up his stone at
Dibon to conunemorate the nreeing of his country from the
yoke of Israel ; ^ the Bible informs us that Ahab at the end
of his life made a covenant with Benhadad of Syria,'^ and, on
the Assyrian side, we have a notice of Ahab as present with
Benhadad at the battle of £[arkar, 864 B.a, when the
Syrians were defeated by Shalmaneser n. ; this apparently
brought Israel under tribute to Assyria, and Jehu's servants
are next pictured on Shalmaneser's black obeUsk as bearing
tribute to that monarch ; the relations of Israel and Judah
with Tiglath-pileser, or Pul (shown by the listo of kings to
be the same person) are circumstantially confiimed;
^ Jensen, as above, p. 777.
* A list of the rotation and saocession of officers (analogous to the arohona
of Athens and the consuls of Rome). Of. article b^ the author on " Assyrian
and Hebrew Chronolo^ " in the PretlbyUTicM, Bemew^ Jamuarj 1899.
' 2 Ghron. zii This is one of the narratiTes in Chronicles not found in
Kinffs, and proves the use of special and authentio sources.
*2 Kings i. 1 ; iii 4 ff. The inscription may be seen in fuU (original and
translation, with notes) in Driver's Samuel, pp. Izxxv ff. ; and Bennett's art
" Moab " in Diet, of BiJbU, iU. pp. 408 ff. Dr. Driver is dearlv mistaken in
makinff the revolt to be already "completed in the middle of the reign of
Ahab, and finding therein a discrepancy with Scripture. Mesha's "forty
years " from Omri reach down to Jehoram's time, as in 2 Kings. Pooibly
Ke is the son of Omri intended. Omri's own reign was a short one.
' 1 Kings zz. 84 ; zzii. 1.
ARCHiEOLOG Y AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 427
Menahem, Fekah, and Hoshea appear in this monardh's
inscriptions as on the Bible page ; ^ Hoshea's rebellion, and
the carrying away of the people by Sargon, after the fall of
Samaria, are described;* Sargon's own palace was, as
formerly mentioned, one of the first Kinevite discoveries ; '
Sennacherib's version of his expedition against Hezekiah,
his siese of Lachish, and the other events of his reign, may
be read from his own annals;^ his murder by his son, and
the accession of Esarhaddon, are duly recorded ; ^ Tirhakah
appears as ** king of Egypt and Ethiopia.'' *
The captivity of Manasseh, his repentance, and his
restoration to his kingdom, are, like the invasion of Shishak,
recorded only in QironielesJ The narrative has very
generally been pronounced unhistorical on the double ground,
apart from the silence of the Book of Kings, that we have
no mention of the supremacy of the Assyrians at this time
in Western Asia, and that the king is declared to have been
carried to Babylon, not to Nineveh. Both objections, as
Schrader shows, " lose their force in presence of the inscrip-
tions."^ Manasseh's name occurs in the list of tributaries
of both Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal (" Manasseh, king of
Judah ") ; ^ and, as kings of Babylon, the sovereigns some-
times held their court in that city.^^ The release of
Manasseh has a parallel in the case of Pharaoh-Necho. He
was brought to Nineveh, as Manasseh was to Babvlon, " in
' iron chains," yet Assurbanipal, a little later, allowed him to
return to Egypt and resume his power.^ Schrader sums up
the results of a careful examination by saying *' that there
is no reason to cast any suspicion on the statement of the
Chronicler, and that what he relates can be satisfactorily
1 2 Kings XY. * a Kings xvii 1-6.
* See aboye, p. 898.
* 2 Kings zviu. 18 ff. Sennacherib, as was to be ezpeeted, is sflent alont
the disaster to his vrmy, which yet is needed to aoooant for the raising of the
siefle*
* 2 Kings zix. 87.
* 2 Kings, ziz. 9. Cf. Schrader, (hm. InmHMnu, ii p. 10.
V 2 Ohron. zxziii 11-18.
' Cun, InaerigpU. ii. pp. 64 ff.
* Gf. Pinches, as above, pp. 885-88.
^ Schrader, p. 65 ; Sayoe, Higher OrU. pp. 468-60. Eyen H. P. Smith
concedes: "The mention of Babylon which formerly made a diffionll^does
so no longer, becanse we know that Ashnrbanipal spent a great desl of time
in that city. "— a r. Hitt, p. 258.
" Sayce, as above, p. 461.
428 ARCHAEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
acoounted for from the oircninstances that existed in the
year 647 RO." ^
VIIL Thk Book of DAinra,
There is something approaching to a consensus of
opinion among critical scholars that the Book of Daniel, as
it lies before us, is a production of the Maccabsean age; only
that, while a majority will have it to be composed wholly in
that age, others, like Delitzsch and Orelli,* think that it
rests on a basis of genuine history and prophecy, and is at
most revised, and adapted to the circumstances of the
Maccabsean age, as a book of comfort to the confessors and
martyrs in their persecution' Without entering into the
critical question, we would point out that the sweeping
statements often made as to the unhistorical character of
the book need to be received with great caution. With the
progress of monumental discovery, the objections that have
been heaped up against it tend, not to increase, but to
disappear. The startling evidence, «^., that has come to
light of the early date and wide diffusion of a high Oreek
civilisation, and of the continuous intercourse of the Greeks
with other countries from remote times,^ renders nugatory
any objection based on the alleged names of Greek instru-
ments in the account of Nebuchadnezzar's music. Beaders
^ Own, Iiuoripts. iL p. 69 ; of. Sayoe, Early Israei^ pp. zvii ff.
> Cf. Delitzwrn, Meas. Prcphedes (1891), pp. 298 ff. ; Orelli, O.T. Pirppheqf,
pp. 454 ff.
'The view in question is stated thus b^ Orelli: "Neither of the
narratives of Dan. i.-yi., norof theyislousyii.-zii., can we allow that they owe
their origin to the Maocabean age. As to the former, we are of opinion that
they contain history handed down from the time of the exile, and were merely
compiled b^ a late author, who to all appearance, especially according to
lin^pistio indications, belonged to the Maccabnan age. We come to a
simdar conclusion in respect to the apocalyptic visions. . . . We think that
even here traditional Tisions of the real Daniel, renowned for his prophetic
keenness of sight (Ezek. zxriii. 8) form the real kernel, but that theee
visions were not merely collected and redacted by an author living under
Antiochus, but also set by illustrative explanations in intimate relation to
the oppression of that age." — Prophecy ^ pp. 465-56. See further below,
p. 458.
^Active intercourse existed between Greece and Egvpt, Canaan, and
other lands, from the Telel-Amama times, and even earlier. The pottery
found at Mycens is said to belong to the age of the eighteenth and nineteenth
dvnasties of Eig^pt ; conversely, Flinders Petrie found Mycensan potterv
at Tel el-Amama. The tablets already mention Tivcma or Javan. Cf.
Sayce, Highmr CrUicism, pp. 18-20 ; Eittel, Bih. Exeavs. pp. 14-18, etc.
ARCHAEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT 429
of Professor Flinders Petrie's Ten Ytari Digging in Egypt
may think they find, in connection with the discoveries at
TahpahneSy^ what seems a sufScient answer to that objection.
The picture of Nebuohadnezzar, again, given in the book, is
in fullest accord with the idea of him obtained from his own
inscriptions and works. It must at least be allowed that
discovery has proved the historical reality of one personage
whom criticism had persisted in regarding as mythical, viz.,
Belshazzar. Belshazzar appears in Daniel as *' king of the
Chaldeans,"' but his name is not found in any ancient
historian. The last king of Babylon was called Nabonidus,
ai^d no room seemed left for another. It is now discovered,
however, from inscriptions and contract tablets, that
Nabonidus had a son who bore this name Belshazzar, and
who, to judge from the prominent place he has in the
inscriptions, was in some way associated with his father in
the government.' This would explain Belshazzar^s promise
to make Daniel the thvrd ruler in the kingdom, or, as some
understand it, one of '' a board of three.'' ^ It would seem,
further, from the Babylonian account, that ** the king's son
died" on the night in which the city was finally captured.'
In other respects discrepancies are alleged to exist between
the account of the taking of the city in the inscriptions of
Cyrus and the statements in Daniel We are confident that
most of these will disappear with more accurate reading and
interpretation. In the Babylonian account the dty is
described as taken ''without fighting." It is, however,
carefully to be noted that in the Chronicle a considerable
interval elapses between the first peaceful entrance into the
^ Ten Twiri Diffging^ pp. 64 ff. : " Here then was a reedy aonrce for fhe
introductioii of Qreek words and names into Hebrew, long before the
Alexandrine age ; and even before the £U1 of Jenisalem the Greek names of
murioal instniments and other words may haye been heard in the courts of
Solomon's temple" (p. 64). Cf. Professor Petrie's Tanis, PL ii. pp. 49, 60
(4tii Mem. of Pal. Ezplor. Fond). Dr. Gheyne takes Professor i^etrie to
task for aooonnting in tnis way for the Greek names of instniments in Daniel
(Origin qf Footer, V, 10).
* Dan. Y. 80.
* Gf. Pinches, p. 414. AooordiDg to Dr. Pinohe^ Belshazzar was " the
real raler," but not so officiaUy. Professor R. D. Wilson, of Princeton, who
has made a special stndy of we royal titles of this period, claims that the
bearing of the title ''king" by Belshazzar is in harmony with the usage of
the time. See Kote F on Belshazzar and Babylon.
* Dan. V. 7.
* Gf. the ** Babylonian Ghronible," given in Pinches, pp. 416-16 ; Dzirw,
Daniel, p. zxiz-zxz ; Sayce, Sigher Cril, pp. 602-8.
430 ARCHJEOLOGY AND THE OLD TESTAMENT
city and its final falL The first entrance is made in the
month Tammuz (July), but the completion of the capture,
and the death of Belshazzar, do not take place till
Marcheswan (November) — ^four months later.^ The pro-
babilities are that Nabonidus commanded the forces in the
field, while Belshazzar held the city within. Nabonidus
was defeated, ftnd taken captive in Babylon, and, as we read
it, the outer part of the city fell into the hands of Gobryas,
the general of Cyrus, and his soldiers. The inner part,
however, held out for some months, when Cyrus, in some
unknown way, became master of it.* Belshazzar was slain
on the night of its capture — again in agreement with DanieL
Not improbably, also, the Gobryas of the inscriptions, whom,
we are told, Cyrus made governor, and who "appointed
Svemors in Babylonia," is the long-sought-f or ** Darius the
ede/' who ^ received the kingdom," and reigned for two
years.'
Non. — Ths Satibaik : The strongest reason for doubting
that the Babybnian Sabbath was a day of general rest
(o& ppi 403-4) is furnished by Professor K D. Wilson, in an
art. on ''Babylon and Israel" in The Princeton TheoL
Beview for Apnl 1903. Dr. Wilson shows, on the basis of
a large induction, that contracts were freely drawn up on
the Sabbaths as on other day& Cf. also Konig's Die Baid'
Bibd-Frage, p. 22.
^ See the Babylonian Ohroniolek ae aboye.
* Of. Pinohes, p. 418 ; Driver, Darnel, p. zzzL In a yeiy important
note (Higher OrU, p. 622) Sayce shows that contraotB in Babylon oontinued
to be dated by the year of '' Nabonidas king of Babylon '* after the capture
in Jnly np to*NoYember. These are noted as drawn np in "tiie oity of the
king's paiaoe, Babylon," while one dated in Deoember "in tiie aocession
year of Cyrus " is simply inscribed " Babylon."
*Oobiyas had alreadybeen describea as "governor of Gutium." The
remarks of Prof. B. D. Wilson on the use of the title "king" apply to
Darius also. See, on whole subjeet» the valuable note of EiUuflr in B^
€f€9di, iii. pp. bZi^l*
CHAPTER XII
p0alm0 an^ propbete : Ube pvogtCBSl^ncBB ot
VlcvclBtion
"How Tariied ind how splendid the wealth which this treumiy [the
Psalter] oontains, it is difficult to describe in words. . . . This Book, not
unreasonably, I am wont to style an anatomy of all parts of the soul, for no
one will disooTer in himself a single feeling whereof the image is not
reileoted in this mirror. "—-Galyik.
** After busying myself with the Old Testament in its original text
for OTsr forty-eight years, I can bear witness with fullest truth, that what-
ever deayes to the Old Testament of imperFeotion, yea, perhaps, of oflenoe,
in a word, of ' the form of a servant,' has from year to year for me ever the
more shrivelled up into nothingness, with an ever deepening penetration
into the overmastering phenomenon of prophecy." — Katttzsch.
"Kuenen has designated his investigation of prophecy strictly im-
partial ; but it is not to be mistaken that his arrangement is controlled by
the motive of reducing faith in a divine inspiration of the prophets to
absurdity. "^GiE8SB£X0HT.
"When I come to such psalms wherein David ourseth his enemies, oh !
then let me bring my soul down to a lower note, for these words were made
only to fit David's mouth."— Thomab Fullxb.
** It is evident, then, that a progressive revelation — if the idea of such
a revelation is onoe admitted— must be judged by its end and not by its
beginning. . • . According to any rule of judging in such cases, the
morality of a progressive dispensation is not the morality with which it
starts, but that with which it oondudes. The test is not the oommencementi
but the refult."— MozuET.
OHAPTEB XII
PSALMS AND PROPHETS ; THE PROGEESSIVENESS
OF REVELATION
If the history is the body of the Old Testament religion,
the psalms and prophets may be said to be its soul. It is
not our purpose in this concluding chapter to enter upon a
full discussion of either the Psalter or prophecy. It will
be enough to confine attention to two problems in regard
to these — first, the place of the psalms in the history of
revelation, and specially their connection with David ;^ and
second, the place and function of the predictive element in
prophecy, with certain canons of interpretation which arise
out of the consideration of that subject. Our discussion
may then close with some reflections on the progressiveness
of revelation, in its bearings on what are called the ** moral
difficulties " of the Old Testament.
Pabt I
David and the Psalter
In one point of view, the spiritual teaching of the
Psalter — its power of help and inspiration — ^is indepen-
dent of any views we may form as to the place and time of
its origin. The psalms by which our faith and hope are
nourished are the same, whoever were their authors, or in
whatever age they were composed. They deal with
relations of the soul to Grod which are above time, or are
the same in all time ; and if, instead of being largely pre-
exilian, as has been commonly supposed, all of them were
proved to be post-exilian, they would not lose a jot of their
^ On the stractare of the Psalter, see ahoTe, pp. 197, 227.
28
434 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
essential spiritual valua Yet the question of the age of
the psalms is, in another respect, far from being one to
which we can afford to be indifferent. The psalms are
lamps brightly illuminating the religious conditions of the
age in which they had their origin: and if any of them
belong to the pre-exilian age, their aid is of the first
importance in determining the real character of the religion
of that age. It is this, in fact, which makes it necessary for
the newer criticism to put the psahns down into the post-
exilian period. Their earlier existence will not harmonise
with the views put forth as to the stages of the religious
development. If even eight or ten of the psalms be allowed
to David, it is not too much to say that the critical
hypothesis of Kuenen and Wellhausen — at least their
theoiy of the religion — ^is blown into the air. It is part of
our problem, therefore, to inquire what the truth is in this
matter.^
L Theobt of the Post-exilian Obioin of the Psalter
It has now become almost a dogma in the Wellhausen
school that the Psalter is wholly, or with minute and
doubtful exception, post-exilian in origin. Wellhausen lays
it down that, ** as the Psalter belongs to the Hagiographa,
and is the hymn-book of the Church of the second temple . • .
the question is not whether it contains any post^xilian
psalms, but whether it contains any that are pre-exilian.''*
This question he answers for himself in the n^ative. The
psalms, he says, are ''altogether the fruit" of the post-
exilian period.' Beuss had preceded him in this judgment ;
and Stade, Duhm, Cheyne, and the greater number of this
1 Delitzsob observes : ** Sohaltz, in his AlUesL Thed. (2nd edit 187S)»
acknowledges at least ten psalms as Davidic. The consequences which foUow
for the reoonstraction of tne history of Israel from the recognition, whether
it be of ten or more genuine Dayidio psalms, are so important, that the
endeavour of some recent writers to bring down all the psalms to the time
after the exile is oomprehensible as an attempt to paralyse these conse-
quences."— Com. on PsalfM, i p. 11. With nis later <mance of critical
stuidpoint, Schults f^ve up even the ten ^Ims, and oonuuded "that
perhaps only Ps. zviIl can be ascribed to David with anythine like absolute
certainty." — O.T, Theol. i. p. 64. We shall see, however, mat much lies
even in the admission of A, zviii. ; it, too, accordingly, ii now generally
denied to David. See below, p. 416.
> Wellhausen's Bleek, MnleU,, {1S7^), p. 507; Psalms (<'Poly. Bib.''X
p. 168. ' Hist, qf Israel, p. 601.
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 435
school, echo the opinion.^ A more moderate position is
taken by Dr. Driver, who allows that several of the psalms
^-especoally those which allade to the king — may be pre-
sumed to be pre-exilian ; but thinks that '* very few of the
psalms are earlier than the eighth century kc/** Well-
hausen's opinion of the peakns, it may be observed, is not a
high one. In one of his latest works he says: *" There is
nothing analogous to the psalms in pre-exilian times.
They are prayers of quite another kind irom those known
to antiquity : they rest on the despair of Jeremiah and the
confidence of the Great Anonymous " (Isa. xL ff.). And in a
note: ''They certainly are only to the smallest extent
original ; are for the most part imitations, which illustrate
the saying about much writing: often they are not real
prayers at all, but sermons, and even narratives in the form
of prayers. One sees how prayer becomes an art and
species of literature." '
On this theory we remark;
1. This dictum, that the psalms are all, or mostly, of
post-exilian date, neitAer is, nor can "be, proved. There are,
no one doubts, post-exilian psalms ; ^ it is an open question
whether there are not a few Maccabaean psalms.^ Calvin
admitted the possibility of such, and, till recently, opinion
was divided on the subject — to some extent is so still —
generally, however, with a leaning to denial* But only an
* Tor the bistoiy of opinion on the pealmi^ see Boberteon, Foetrv amd
BMgiionqfthe Pwlnu, pp. 40 ff. ; Eirkpatrick, The /Vi^ffw, pp. zzxru ff. ;
Beewgen, Cheyne, etc. Keois Bays we hare " no deoisiTe proon^ of peafans of
the period of the kingdom {GeteMehL d. HeU, Sehrinen, p. 866 ; ofT p. 197).
Dahm denies that a single psalm is pre-exilian. The discussions of W. R.
Smith {O.T, inJ.C, Ist edit pp. 197 ff.) and of Driver (/nfnxf. pp. 878 ff.)
are nn&Tonrable to the positiye ascription of any psalms to David : m his 2na
edit. W. R. Smith discards Davidic psalms alto^dther, and makes fbs whole
Psalter, with alight exception (p. 220), poet-exman {jiL pp. 218-25).
* Inirod. p. 884.
^Ima. vmd JUd, OucMOOm (1897), p. 197.
^ Such, ca.,manifestlv (exilian or post-exilian) are Pss. ciL, oxxir., exxrLt
oxxxYiL, and others in the 4th and 6th Books of the Psalter.
' The most striking of the psalms claimed for this period are Pss. xUt.,
Ixxiv., Ixxix.
* Hitag and Olshansen were the main advocates of Maocahiean psalms :
Oesenias, Hnpfeld, Ewald, Bleek^ Dillmann, etc, refused to acknowledge
them : so Hengstenberg, Havermck, Eeil (of. Delitzsch, PBalma, i p. 15) :
Delitssoh admits the possibility. Bleek (Introd, ii. p. 289) and DiUmann
(Jdhr, d, deutteh. Thiol, iii pp. 460-62) hold that there is no good ground
for placing any psalm later than Kehemiah's age. Of more recent writers,
Dahm, Baisthgen (iVo^m^n, p. xxviii), Eirkpatrick, etc., r^ect Macoabmui
436 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
anti-traditional bias, combined with assomptionB as to the
line of development of Israel's religion, can claim to regard
it as established that all, or even the bulk of, the psalms
are post-exilian compositions. Grant all that is said of the
nntrustworthiness of the titles, and of the difficulty of
proving that a single psalm is from the pen of David — a
S)int to which we shall return later, — the assumption of
avidic psalms has at least behind it a firmly-fixed Jewish
tradition, dating from times when the Canon was still in
process of formation: the assertion that none — or hardly
any— of the psalms are pre-exilian has neither documentary
nor traditional support, and is not borne out by considera-
tions of internal probability. As a question of evidence,
everything that is urged as to the impossibility of proving
that David wrote any of the psalms can be retort^ with
equal force against the unsupported assertion that the
psalms in question are post-exilmn.
2. In judging of the assertions frequently made as to
the marvellous literary productivity of the post-exilian age»
it is important to bear in mind that the greater part of that
period is an cAsoltUe blank to our Imowledge. This is
hardly always realised as it should be. We speak of the
"connection" of the Old and New Testaments, but it is
really not in our power, up to the time of the Maccabees^ to
write a history of the period after the return at alL There
is " a great cap " from Nehemiah to Antiochus Epiphanes,
i.e., from 400 B.a to 175 B.a, which even Josephus can fill
up with only a few legendary notices.^ Of the century
between Artaxerxes Longimanus (466-326 B.a), Josephus
chronicles nothing, and ms history is in great confusion
otherwisa What we do know is that, from the time of
Ezra, the nation set before itself as its religious ideal the
strict and conscientious observance of the law of Moses.
Hence the development of the order of the scribes, and the
legalistic stamp on the piety of later Judaism. When the
curtain Uf ts again in the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, we
psalma. See the grounds olearlj stated in Eirkpatriok, Pso/ms, pp. xli^ff.
Professor W. B. Smith reasons against Maooabean psalms in Books L-IIL
of the Psalter (0.1*. in J. C, pp. 207, 487 ff.), but finds some in later Books
(p. 211).
^ Of. Schlirer, JEKO. of Jeirish PeopU, I p. 86. Plrofessor W. B. Smith
says : " It must be admitted that we know but little of the history after the
time of Kehemiah."— 0. T. in J, O.
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 437
find ourselves in a new atmosphere of Hellenism, and the
three parties of historical note — ^the Pharisees, the Sadducees,
and the Essenes — are, in germ at least, already in existence.^
This age of stiffening l^alism, of priestly ascendency, of
scribism, of cessation of the prophetic spirit, is not that to
which we should naturally look for the creation of such a
book as our present Psalter. Our very ignorance about it,
no doubt, makes the period a convenient receptacle for all
sorts of critical hypotheses ; * but it cannot be too strongly
borne in remembrance that these hypotheses rest, for the
most part, on unverifiable conjecture. When, e^.. Professor
Bennett says : ** The exilic, Persian, and Greek periods were
specially rich in psahns," * he makes a statement which he
no doubt believes to be true, but for which there is no
historical evidenca When, again. Professor Gheyne writes
of ** the time when the temple with its music was reorganised
and the Psalter re-edited by Simon,'' ^ he must be aware,
indeed elsewhere admits,^ that history knows nothing of
such transactions. They are simply imaginations of his
own, transformed into facta
3. It must appear strange, surely, that an age assumed
to be one of such extraordinary Uterary activity should
have left, among its numerous products, no record of itself.
Ezra and Nehemiah wrote of their own times ; the Chronicler
recalled and glorified the past ; but not a pen, apparently,
was found, after Nehemiah, to record contemporary events.
Does this look Uke a golden age of psalmody ? That the
return from captivity should give rise to a group of peakns,
celebrating that great event, is only what might be expected.
But the post-exilian psalms, for the most part, are easily
recognised, and they constitute a relatively small portion of
the Psalter. The great majority of the psalms — especially
those in the earUer books — ^have nothing peculiarly post-
exilian about them. They are written in pure and vigorous
^ Joseplms mentioiu the three partiei as in ezistenoe in the time of
Jonathan the Maocabee, aboat l&O B.a {AfU, xiii. 5. 9). The Phariaeea are
no donbt correctly identified with the Aseideana (Chaddim) of 1 Maoo. iL
41 ; yiL 12 ff. Ot SchOrer, Hist, <f Jewish PecjOe (Diy. ii), ii. pp. 26 it
* In one of the last oonversatioBs the writer had with the late A. B.
Davidson, he commented in his pnngent way on the nee made of this blank
period. " A free oonp," he said, nsing the Sootch phrase applied to places
granted for the free emptying of mbbish.
■ Primer, p. 100.
* Origin qfPmit^ p. 458. •Ibid. p. lU
43& PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
Hebrew.^ They are personal and spiritual in tone, touching
the deepest and most universal chords in religioii6'
experience. They show no traces of post-exilian l^alism, or
of the ideas of the Priestly Code. On the other hand, many
of the psalms suit admirably the conditions of an earlier
time, where they do not contoin features which necessitate,
or at least are most naturally explained by, a pre-exilian
date. Such, especially, is the not inconsiderable series of
psalms that make mention of the ''king,"' which cannot
be brought down to a post-exilian time without extreme
forcing. Such, to our mind, are those that contain allusions
to the "tabernacle " (tent),' to the ark and cherubim,^ to the
temple as a centre of national worship,' to conquests of sur-
rounding peoples,' and the like. In a few of the later psalms we
find such expressions used of Jehovah as ** among the gods/'
" above the gods," " God of gods," " before the gods," ^ which
is not what, on the newer theory, we naturally look for from
the strict monotheism of post-exilian times. Alternatively,
will the critics grant us that the use of such expressions
does not imply, as is sometimes argued for pre-exilian tunes,
that monotheiBm is not yet reached ?
4 This raises the larger question of the general history
of psalmody and of the connection of psaimody with David.
We touch briefly on psalm-collection after,' and meanwhile
look only at the indications of pre-exilian psalmody, and at
the Davidic tradition. Lyric poetry, as Delitzsch reminds
us,' is of very early date in Israel. When, in addition, one
^ Some psaImB, as Pa. ozxzix., bear marks of lateness, but most an
written, as aenaB admits, in good, pure, classical Hebrew. C£ Boberteon,
F»alfna, p. 64.
'Snob are Pss. ii, xviii., zz., zxL, zzriii., zzziii., zIy., Izi., IziiL,
IzziL, d., cz. Dr. Cbejne's attempt to explain these psalms from tiie
Maccabflean or Greek age (Jadas, Simon, Ptolemy PbUadelphns), is justly
characterised by Baethgen as "a complete fftilnre.*' Cf. his JPrnlmen^ pp,
zxir-zzv.
' See below, p. 447.
^ Pss. Izzz. 1 ; zciz. 1 ; czzzii 8. As there was no ark in the seocmd
temple, it seems most natural (though " cherubim " might refer to the
heavenly temple) to regard these psalms as pre-ezilian. Cf. DeHtaoh smd
Perowne, in loe.
' E.g», Pss. zM., zlviii, Izzziy. * E,g,, Ps. Iz. 6 ff.
^Pss. Izzzvi. 8 ; czzzv. 5 ; czzzvi 2 ; czzzviii. 1. The "liturffioal*'
character of these psalms does not necessarily prove them " post-ezuian,'*
but some of them appear made up from earlier passages, and may reasonably
be reunurded on that account a.s late.
' See below, p. 448. ' PMlmSf i. p. 9.
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 439
remembers the deep religious foundations dn which the life
of Israel as a nation rested, the signal manifestations of
Qod*B presence and power in its history,^ and the powerful
workings of His Spirit in individuals and in the community
in other directions, it is a priori to be expected that sacred
hymnody would not be lacking in the public and private
worship of pre-ezilian times. That religious song antf music
did exist under the old temple seems abundantly attested
by the place given to ''singers" in the narratives of the
retum»* and by what is said of their functions,' and is
further directly evidenced by the taunt addressed to the
exiles at Babylon by their captors to sing to them "the
songs of Zion" — ^''Jehovah's songs." ^ Express reference
is made to the praises of the first temple in Isa. Ixiv. 11 :
** Our holy and beautiful house, where our fathers praised
Thee " (cf. chap. xxx. 29). In regard to particular psalms.
Professor W. B. Smith allows that rs. viii is the foundation of
Job's question in chap, vii 17, 18 ; ^ and there is what seems
to be a dear quotation of Fs. i — ^by no means one of jbhe
earliest of the psalms, and apparently the preface to a
collection of Davidic psalms — ^in Jer. xvii 8.^ It has been
seen that many other psahns — e.g., those relating to the
king — can only be put in pre-exilian times : even Prof. W. R
Smith admits this of Pss. xx., xxL^ Pre-exilian psalmody is
thus established; and that a firm and constant tradition
traced back the beginnings of this psalm-composition to
David — ** the sweet psalmist of Israel " ' — ^is not less evident
from the ascription of so large a body of psalms to David
by their titles,^ and from the fact that in Chronicles the
^ Thia aigamsnt if admirably worked out in detail b^ Professor Bobertson
in bis F^)etry and Bdigion ufVUt F9alm$^ cbaps. tIL, yiii.
* Em iL 41, 85 ; Yii 7, 24 ; Neb. x. 28, 29.
* Ezra iii 10, 11 ; Keh. zi 22, 28 ; zii. 46-47.
« Pa. ozzzrii 8, 4. • 0,7. f» /. (7., p. 220.
* See below, p. 460. Tbe altemative anppoaitiona tbat tbe psalm is based
on tbis passage m Jeremiab, or that both have a common soorce, bare little
probability. " It is tbe custom of Jeremiab," says Delitzscb, *' to reDrodiire
predictions of bis predecessoTS, and more espeoiallj expressions found in tiie
psalms, in tbe flow of bis own discourse, and to transfonn tbeir style into
bis own." — FwabrnM^ i. Gf. Perowne, L p. 106 ; Eirkpatriok, p. 1 ; Baetiigen,
p. 1. See also Xaek. xlviL 12.
* As above. * 2 Sam. xxiii. L
* Tbe wbole of Book I. of tbe Psalter is ascribed to Dayid, witb ^e excep-
tion of Pss. L and ii (preparatory), x. (part of ix.), and xxxiii. ('' the first
book, tberefore, is a formal collection of psalms ascribed to David." — W. R.
440 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
whole organisation of the service of song and mnsic in the
sanctuary is traced back to him.^ It is futile, as "was
formerly seen, to dismiss such statements as mere inventions
of the Chronicler.' That writer must be presumed to be
drawing in good faith from older sources, and to be express-
ing wnat, at the time when these sources were composed,
was well-established belief. Such consentient tradition
ought not to be lightly set asida Instead of rejecting it
on the ground that many of the titles in the psalms are
conjectural and untrustworthy — ^which admittedly is the
case — ^we shall act more wisely in using it as a clue for otir
guidance where facts do not show that it is clearly at fault.
Before proceeding further, we shall look at what is to be
said in favour of, and what in opposition to, this view that
David is the author of many of tiie psahns.
IL The Histobigal Position of David as Psalmist
In opposition to the Biblical tradition, the position
taken up by the critics is, that the historical David is not
an individual to whom compositions like the psalms can
with propriety be attributed:' and, generally, that the
psalms imply a stage of religious development far in advance
of that of the Davidic age.^ We do not go back on the
question of the religious development, further than to remind
the reader that, till lately, critical experts felt no difficulty
on this point, but would here ask whether the accounts we
have of David are such as to negative his authorship of
many of the psalms. We assume that the accounts we have
rest on good prophetic nariAtives, when the memory of
David's personality and reign was still fresh, and when his
virtues and failings were recorded with equal fidelity.'
Smith, p. 197) ; eighteen psalms in Book IL ("so again, in the 2nd Book,
the psalms asoribedto David . . • form a oonneoted ffroup," ibid,) ; one in
Book IV ; and several in Book Y. — seyenty-three in all.
^ Cf. 1 Chron. zxiii 6 ; zzv. eto.
* See ahoye, p. 890 ; and ol the remarks of Fh>fessor Bohertson, iVoZms,
pp. 92 ff.
* Thus Benss, Wellhansso, Cheyne, W. B. Smith, more mildly Driver,
etc See Note A on The Critical Estimate of David.
^ G£ Gheyne, Orifyin of Psalter, pp. 192 ff.
* See ahove, p. 881. Ot Bobertson, PsalmM, p. 848. See his whole oha^
ziii. on " David the Psalmist " : also Terowne, Psalmt, Introd. ohap. i.
" David and the Lyrio Poetry of the Hebrews" ; and Hargolionth, Lmu cf
DtftTiM qfthsBiUieal lUvelaHon, pp. 194 ff.
THE PROGBESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 441
1. We begin with a brief survey of David's career.
(1) It wiU not be denied that, in the history, David's
character as ayowng man is as free from blemish as anyone
could wish. He is chosen by ^amuel above the other sons
of Jesse on the ground that " man looketh on the outward
appearance, but Jehovah looketh on the heart" ^ Saul's
servants attest regarding him that ''he is cunning in
playing, and a mighty man of valour, and a man of war,
and prudent in speech, and a comely person, and Jehovah
is with him." ' His character comes out at its best in his
encounter with Goliath.' Here we see the whole man
revealed — his dauntlessness, his faith in Gk)d, his unening
skill with the sling, his quiet modesty and decision of
character, the energy that slumbered behind. The women
who came out to meet him with chants and music only
echoed the universal feeling that in this stripling lay the
makings of the kingliest man in Israel^
(2) In his life at tJu court of Sard, David's character is
equally admirable. As a populiu: hero he had no rival ; he
was fast friend to Jonathan ; he was set over the men of
war; he ate at the king^s table, and soon became Saul's
son-in-law. But honours like these did not make his brain
whirl, or his feet slida His record at court is a strictly
honourable on& He ''went out whithersoever Saul sent
him, and behaved himself wisely ; and Saul set him over the
men of war, and it was good in the sight of all the people,
and also in the sight of Saul's servants." * Another record
about him is — and this is after the tide of &vour had turned,
and he had become the object of Saul's deadly jealousy:
"And David behaved himself wisely in all his ways, and
Jehovah was with him. And when Saul saw that he
behaved himself very wisely, he stood in awe of him. But
all Israel and JudcJi loved David; for he went out and
came in before them."^ David's position, we see from the
narrative, soon became a very difficult ona Jonathan was
with him, but Saul had become his bitter enemy. His life
was sought, both openly and by plot and intrigue, and, with
the change in the king's mood, envious, rancorous tongues
would not be wanting to shoot their shafts at him. But,
amidst all, as David showed no vanity or pride in the day <rf
^ 1 Sun. XTJ. 7. * Sun. zri. 18. * 1 Sun. zriL
« 1 Sun. XTiiL 7. * 1 Sun. xrilL 6. * 1 Sun. ziriiL li-lt.
442 FSAT.MS AND PROPHETS-
hiB prosperity, so now he makes no attempt, by oonnter-
intrigne, to retaliato upon, or overthiow his enemies in
the Saj of adyersity. Saul deals wrongly towards him, bnt
he behaves with onimpeach^ble fideUtj towards SanL His
life at court maintains the promise of his boyhood.
(3) Dayid is next beheld in another lights as dki^
of a hand of outlaws, maintaining a precarious ezistenoe
among the caves and fiistnesses cl Southern Judea. The
position was not one of his seeking, but, driven into it, he
made the best of it a man oould. His first task was to reduce
this band of broken, desperate men — many of them, probably,
like himself, the victims of miseovemment and oppressioii^
— into something like order and discipline, and in this, it is
evident, he admirably succeeded. His next task was to
find for them useful employment The term ** freebooter*
is sometimes applied to David at this period of his career;'
but if by ''freebooter" is meanta chief subsisting by lawless
plunder, nothing could be further from the truth. The
employment David found for his men was of a difGarent
order. Fart of it» as we see from the case of Nabal,consiBtod
in acting as a kind of armed police, protecting the flocks and
herds of the districts in which they lived from the raids of
the Philistines, or of the robber-tribes of the desert ** Hie
men," said Nabal's servants, '' were very good unto us, and
we were not hurt, neither missed we anytmng, so long as we
were conversant with them, when we were in the fields ; they
were a wall unto us both by night and by day, all the while
we were with them keeping the sheep.** ' The other part of
their employment lay in direct war against the Philistines,
when the latter came out on their marauding expeditions.
The relief of the town of Keilah is an instance.^ A man
would have been more than human had he made no slips,
committed no mistakes, in such straits ; but such as David's
were, e.g., his deception of Ahimelech and flight to Achish * —
an initial failure of faith — ^they are imparticdly recorded, and,
taken as a whole, the tenor of his life in this period iasingulaily
to his credit. He was at the time the object of unremitting
persecution by SauL Against this one man, innocent of
^ 1 Sua. zxiL 2. OC Maorioe, Pnphet and JS^^Hfi, pp. 49 if.
* Oheyne apeski of him m " tlie Tenstile eandoUun, ohiiftdii, and
\djut.'*--'0rigin <tf P9aUgr, p. 21L
'ISam. zxT. 16, IS.
MSuiLzziiL M8ua.zd.
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 443
crime, with his 6U0 followers, Saul was not ashamed to bring
into the field an army of 3000, hunting hm from rock
to rock, and district to district, setting a price upon bis
head, and gladly availing himself of information treacher-
ously given by those with whom David was in hiding.'
In light of these facts, it is di£5cult to exaggerate the
nobleness of David's conduct Not one act did he do, through
all these years of persecution, which might be construed
into rebellion against Saul ; and when twice, in the heat of
Saul's pursuit of him, that monarch's life was at his mercy,
twice, against the wishes of his followers, he magnani-
mously spared him.' It was another false step, but probably
prompted by the same desire to avoid collision with Saul,
when, in a mood of despair, he betook himself a second time
to (jath, there, by acceptance of Ziklag, to become a vassal
of the Philistines — an act which involved him in a course of
evasion impossible to justify, and led to complications that
nearly proved disastrous.'
(4) At length the discipline of trial came to an end, and
David is seen firmly planted on the throne as ruler. Saul
was slain on Oilboa, and in deep-toned and affecting strains,
remembering not the evil, but the good that was in the
fallen king, David poured out his soul in touching lament
for him and Jonathan. The way was now dear for David
to ascend the throne, and he did so, first at Hebron, as
king of Judah, then, seven years after, at Hebron again, as
king of all Israel^ EQs great powers were now to be dis-
played to full advantage Saul% reign, begun with promise,
had ended in darknefls and disaster. H^ death left the
kingdom in disunity and disorganisation, a prey to Philistine
oppression ; religion was trampled under foot, and there was
no security for person or propertiy. In no long space of
time, David had cleared the country of its invaders, had
restored to it its independence, had united its tribes, had
re-established its liberties upon a just foundation, and had
done much to revive the waning influence of religion. With
true soldierly instinct, he fixed his eye on the rock fortress
of Jebus as the natural capital of the nation, and one of his
first steps was to possess himseU of this stronghold.'
' Gt 1 Sun. xziiL 7 ft; zxiv* 3 ft * 1 Sam. xzir., zxvL
• 1 Sam. xxrii , zziz. ft « 2 Sam. iL 4, 11 ; r. 1 ft
' 2 Sam. y. 1-10.
444 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
next care was to bring up the ark of God, and reorganise the
worship of JehoYah at Zion.^ Powerful confederations having
been formed to crush his rising power, he called out his forces,
and struck a succession of blows, which not only delivered
him from the danger, but made him overlord of the whole
country from the river of Egypt to the Euphrates.' He had
even in contemplation the building of a temple; but this
the divine voice forbade, while rewarding his intention with
the promise that his seed should sit upon his throne for
ever.*
Such were some of David's services to his o/gd; survey-
ing them impartially, we cannot wonder that his memory
should be embalmed with lively gratitude in the minds
of the Israelites as that of their first great and god-
like king. Over against these services are to be placed
the blots on his private life and reign: his polygamy —
no sin, however, by the then existing code — ^lus over-
indulgence to his children, some acts of severity in war, but,
above all, the one great, black crime of his adultery with
Bathsheba and the murder of her husband Uriah.* Nothing
can palliate this crime; yet even here, while condemning
David, it is necessary to try to be just. For a Pharaoh,
a Nebuchadnezzar, a Xerxes, or other Oriental monarch to
covet the wife of a subject, and give orders for the death of
her husband, would have seemed to most ancient historiana
a venial enough fault, and they would probably not have
occupied half a dozen lines with the relation.^ It is the
Biblical history itself, by the bold relief into which it throws
this shameful incident, — by its impartiality in narrating,
in denouncing, and in declaring the pimishment of this sin
of David, — which makes it bulk so largely in our minds,
and inspires us with such just horror in regard to it. But
it is not to be forgotten that the same book which tells us of
i2Sam«TL «2Sam.ym.
* 2 Sun. Tii ^2 Sam. zi.
* Of. the remarks of Margolioath in Yob Lines qfDrfenee qf ih$ BQfUeal
EemliUion, pp. 209-10. He says : " If the worst act of DaTid's life, the
painfol storjr of Bathsheba, be considered, the imderlying character which
Dayid exhibits is much better than that displayed by most men in any age.
Max Dnncker remarks that the crime which caused David so mach penitence
and contrition was one of which, probably, no other Oriental monarch would
haye thonffht anything, and, if there be any truth in history, it would have
occasionea few soniples to most defenders of the &ith." See tha wkok
paMaga.
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 445
David's fall» tells also of his bitter and anguished repentance
for the fall,^ and of the sad and heavy strokes of retribution
hj which it was avenged. The story of Absalom's rebellion
is a long drawn out oonmientary on the words in which
Nathan announced to David the sorrow that woidd fall upon
his house ;' but it is also one of the finest revelations in the
history of the piety and submissiveness of the man who is said
to be '' after QoA'b own heart." ' David's sins were great, but
we may trust a Carlyle or a Maurice for a just estimate of
his character/ rather than the caviller whose chief deUght
is to magnify his faults.
2. In this varied, many-sided, strangely-chequered life,
with its startling vicissitudes, its religious aspiration and
endeavour, its heights and depths of experience of good
and evil, — ^with its love of music and gift of lyric song, —
with the incitements to the use of that gift springing from
the companionship of prophets like Samuel and Nathan,
from the promises they gave, and the hopes for the future
of the kingdom they inspired, — can anyone say that there
is not abundant mtxUrial far psalm-composition, or sufficient
m^otive or skill to engage in it ? Had the anointing to be
kinff, the trials at Said's court, the vicissitudes of the
wilderness persecution, the bringing-up of the ark, the
promises of Nathan, the rebellion of Absalom, the sin with
Bathsheba itself and the penitence that followed, no power
in them to draw forth such psahnody? It is with these
very occasions that the psalms ascribed to David in the first
booKB are traditionally connected. Can we permit ourselves
to believe, without convincing evidence, that tradition was
all wron^ about this, and that, as Professor W. R Smith and
others will have it, David's religious muse found utterance
rather " in sportful forms of unrestrained mirth," ^ so that
even in the time of Amos, David appears " as the chosen
model of the dilettante nobles of Ephraim, who lay stretched t
on beds of ivory, anointed with the choicest perfumes, anjl;
mingling music with their cups in the famil^ir. manner of,
Oriental luxury."^ Let those beUeve this who can: we
1 2 Sun. ziL « 2 Sun. zii 10-12. > 1 Sam. ziii 14.
^Oulyle, EtroMt p.. 72; Manrioe. Proph/fUmndKing*, pp. 60 ft Ot
Stanley, JtnoUk Cfhurdi, L pp. 97 ft
•o.r.f»j:a,p. W6.
* Ibid. This ia a aweeping inferanoa to draw from the statement in
J^9S yi 6r th%t tk^ npblea of Saiparia inyented inatrns^enta of miiaiq "Hkf ^
446 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
oannot David's hifltorj, whether we gather it from ''Saul-
Source," or " David-Source," or Jerusalem-Source," ^ presents
no resemblance to this picture of dandified frivolity. Are
we to suppose that wheu David left Nathan after receiving
the promises of 2 Sam. viL,' it was to give expression to
his adoring feelings in sportful ditties — or that Amoa
thought he did?
In asking whether David actually wrote psalms, we
seem to find firm foothold in one composition, the genuine-
ness of which it is difficult to dispute — ^Ps. xviii There
are two recensions of this psalm, one in the Psalter, the
other in 2 Sam. xxiL, and both ascribe the authorship to
David. Internal evidence so strongly bears out the dairn^
that, till recently, few were bold enough to challenge it*
Certainly, if any psalm is David's, it is this one/ and some»
as Schultz, who latterly allowed him no other (earlier he
had conceded ten),^ make exception of this. The psalm
is interesting in many ways ; not least by its strong asser-
tion that Jehovah alone is God (ver. 31). Its spiritual
strain in such expressions as, ''As for Qod, His way is
perfect" the allusion to a ''word of Jehovah" which is
"tried" (ver. 30), the reference to the promises to David
and his seed (ver. 50), eta, are stumbling-blocks in the
way of the modem theory, which compel resort to a
later dating. Yet, if this psalm is given up, it is difficult
to see what reliance can be put on any nation's recollections
of its great authors or poets. If, however, David wrote this
long and virile psalm, the probabilities are enormous that
he wrote others : the question only is, how many ? Baethgen
is not sure of more than three (Ps. iiL, iv., xviiL) ; Ewald,
who had a good feeling for style, gave him eleven, with
fragments of others; Hitzig, fourteen; Bleek, "no in-
considerable number"; while Delitzsch extended the
David," and sorely as nnwarrantable as sweeping. See the remarks of
Professor Robertson in Poetry and lUligion of the Psalms, p, 889. Professor
Robertson points out that the David of the prophets is jnst the " traditionml "
David (idealised) {pp. 886 ff.). Besides, as pointed out above, the image of
David had by that time been long fixed in the history.
^ On these see above, pp. 77, 886.
* This chapter is supposed by the critics to have received Deateronomio
revision, but its fundamental features can hardly be contested.
' It is hardly necessary to mention names, for the psalm has been given
to David by nearly aU writers from De Wette downwaras.
^ See above, p. 484. Cheyne will not allow Ps. zviii. to be older than Josiah.
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 447
number to over forty.^ In the nncertaintj attaching
to the titles, it is doubtful if any definite conclusions
as to number can be reached; though we are disposed
to allow more weight than it is now customary to do
to the titles of at least the first and secona books,
which seem to have formed originally (with exclusion of
the separate collection, Pa xMi-L) a collection of Davidic
psalms.' In any case we are probably warranted in holding
that the number of Davidic psalms is not small, and includes
most of those which have, with reasonable unanimity, been
ascribed to the royal singer. Besides psalms which reflect
the writer's personal experiences — ^under persecution, in
penitence, in flight from Absalom, in gratitude for de-
liverance—there are others evidently composed for special
occasions, as, e,g.^ the bringing up of the ark to Zion
(Ps. xxiv.). Most naturally, idso, as has been already
suggested, those psalms which mention the "tabernacle"
on Zion (Pss. xv., zxviL) may be referred to this reign.'
Be the number of Davidic psalms, however, greater or
smaller, the inference as to the level of religious belief
and practice is not much affected. As anyone can see
in reading the psalms, practically the same elevated idea
^ Bwmldaaoribes to David Pas. iii., iy., tu., Tiii., zi., zr., zviii., ziz. 1-6,
xziT., xziz., xxziL, d. eto. ; Biehm most of the aboye, with Psb. zziii.,
li eta ("ICanY of those pealms," he aajs, "which bear David's name,
can be aaoribed to him with foil certainty."— jE^miMX. xL p. 190) ; Bleek
a number more, aa Pes. Iv., Ix., Izi, Ixiii. etc.
*Gi: W. B. Smith, 0,T. t» /. C, pp. 197-201, 214. There is the
possibility of nnderestimating as weU as overestimating the titles. Of.
HargoUoath's spirited remaru in his Li/ihe$ qf Drfenee, with illustrations,
pp. 199 ff. Tms writer makes an iDgenious use of the argument from
"dlenoe" in the psalms, which may be commended to those who are
disposed to boUd much on that ai^pmient (pp. 182 ff.). Mr. Gladstone's
snggestive section on the Psalms in his ImpregnabU Eoek may also be
compaied.
'The word "temple** in Pss. v. 7, zxvii 4, is bv no means decisive
affainst Davidio anthorship. Ood's honse at Shiloh is already called
"temple** (see above, p. 172). We can understand a sacred tent which
has some dwree of permanence, and is regarded as the stated abode of
Jehovah, and the place of His worship, being called a " temple " ; bat it is
difficult to think of a temple like Solomon's being spoken of as a " tent."
In Ps. zxvii. the words are used together (vers. 4, 6, 6). If it is said that
the word "tent" is applied to the temple with a reminiscence of the older
Ubemade, this implies the reality of that older tabemade, as contended for
in a previous chapter (Chap. VI.). It is to be remembered also tiiat the
proper temple of Qod is thouffht of as in heaven (Ps. zi. 4). In Ps.
Izzziv. 1 the word renderea " tabemades ** is different ("dwelling*
places'*).
448 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
of God, the same zeal for righteousness, the same spirit
of trust and confidence in Jehovah, the same religions
aspirations and affections, are present in alL The fact
affords a valuable corroboration of our previous condusiona
m COLLECnOK OF THE PSALICS AND PLACE IN CaKOK
The conclusions we have reached as to the existence of
Davidic and pre-eziUan psalms seem to us borne out by the
facts knovm as to the history of the Psalter, and the place
which the psalms hold in the Canon. The periods to which
psahn-composition is chiefly referred hy those who recognise
pre-exilian psalms are, after David, the reigns of Jehoshaphat
and Hezekiah.^ Several psalms are with much confidence
connected with the great deliverance from Sennacherib in
the latter reign (Pss. xlvi., xlviiL eta). However this may
be, it is not disputed that the process of the collection of
psalms was a gradual one, and that at one time separate
collections, as of Psalms of David (cf. Ps. Ixxii 20), of
Korahite and Asaphite psalms, etc., were in circulation'
Then, with the addition of later psalms, came, at a
subsequent date, the division of the whole into five books,
after the model of the PentateucL' To the Psalter,
thus completed, a leading place was assi^ed among the
Hagiographa, or Sacred Writings — the third part of the
Jewish Canon*
When were these collections, or the earlier of them,
made ? And when was the Canon of the psalms completed ?
The modem view, we have seen, relegates all to the period
after the exile; but, as respects at least the Davidio
collections — probably also the Korahite and Asaphite
collections — ^in their original form, this cannot be proved,
^ Thus Delitzsoh, Perowne, etc.
* See W. R. Smith, u ahoye. It ia Bignificftnt that we haye no tnoe of
the Korahites as siiigers nnder the second temple, as we have of the
Asaphites (cf. Neh. zL 22). Professor W. B. Smitn's supposition that the
Korahites were developed after Nehemiah's time (of which there is no proof),
and were again ohsolece as sinsers hj the time of the Ohronider (p. 204), is
far-fetched, and depends solely on the assumption that the Korahite col-
lection is post^zilian. The fact mentioned is rather a proof that it was not
' As mentioned earlier (p. 197) the five hooks are Ps. L-zli. ; xlii.-
Izzii. ; 1 rxiii.-lzzzix. ; zo.-cTi ; cyii.-cL
« On the subject of the collection of the psalms, and the dosing of the
OiDon, cf. Kirkpatriok, PseUmSjVp, xlv. if. ; Robertson, ^isC. and Mdigitm
^th§ JhtUmt, onaps. iT.-Ti. ; W. tt. Smith, as above ; Driver, sto.
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 449
(ktid many considerationB speak to the contraiy. We touch
only on single points.
1. At the lower end, the Books of Maccabees presuppose
the Psalter. The first book (about 100 &a) quotes freely
P& Ixxix. 2, 3 as from Scripture (1 Maca vii 1.7); and tiie
second book speaks of the writings in the third division of
the Canon loosely as " the works of David/' showing that
the psalms then held a leading place in this division (df.
Luke xxiv. 44).
2. The Psalter was admittedly complete, and divided
into its five books, at the time of the Septuagint transla-
tion, which, it is aUowed, cannot be placed lower than the
second half of the second century B.a n)efore 130 aa),
and may possibly be a good deal earlier.^ It is evident that
the Psalter must already have been recognised as part of
the Canon for a considerable time in order to its being
included in this translation. An important testiihony to
the antiquity of many of the psalms is afforded by the fact
that certain of the musical and liturgical headings — e.g,^
the common one, ^For the Chief Musician''^ — are imin-
telligible to the Oreek translators.
3. We have indubitable evidence in the Prologue to
the Greek translation of the work of Jesus, the son of
Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), made by his grandson, 132 ao., that
the Canon in its three divisions was substantially completed,
not only in the translator's own time, but in that of bis
grandfather, the author of the book (about 200 aa), and
the work itself gives internal evidence of the use of the
psalms. This is borne out by the recovery of portions of
the Hebrew text*
^ The LXX translation of the law was made about the middle of the
third oentury B.O., but there is no dear eyidence as to when the work
was completed by the translation of the Hagiographa. The language of the
grandson of the son of Sirach, however, implies that a translation already
existed in his day, and other facts support this oonclusion. Ehrt, in his
work on the subject (quoted by Robertson, PsaimSf^ 87), beUeres that the
9figinal work of Ben Sirach implies the use of the LaX yenion of the psslms.
* This heading is prefixed to fifty-fiye psalms, of which fifty-two are found
in Books I.-III., and three only in Book Y. (elsewhere only m Hab. iii. 19).
It is misunderstood by the tranBlator8,aDd had evidently long passed outof use.
* The grandson refers in his Prologs to "the law, and the prophecies,
and the rut cf the books" {i.e., a definite number), and speaks of his grand*
father's acquaintance with the same. This ii a strong point with those who
argue against Haocabseau psalms («.^., Riehm, Baethgen, Kirkpalaick). A
oorroboration of the statement is aJQTorded bj the reooveiy of pcnrtions of the
2g
450 PSALMS AND PROPHETS-
4. The Books of Chronicles (not later than about 330
B.G.) know the Psalter, and, 6ks before seen,^ carry back
psalmody and the musical arrangements of the sanctuary
to the time of David. In 1 Chron. xvi 7-36 is giren a
long psalm as illustrative of the kind of praise offered at
the bringing up of the ark to Zion. This piece is found on
inspection to be composed of passages from Pss. cv., xcvi.,
and cvL, and concludes with the doxology at the end of Pa.
cvi which marks the close of Book lY. of the Psalter.'
The inference is natural that the division into books was
already made in the time of the Chronicler.
6. The Book of Jonah, which Professor Bobertson places
provisionally in the fifth century KC, and which, in any case,
is earlier than the close of the prophetic Canon, contains a
prayer of Jonah (chap. iL 2-10), sulmittedly based on passages
from different parts of the Psalter.' This implies some
collection of these psalms.
6. It was shown that Jeremiah (chap. zviL 8) xmrnistak-
ably quotes from Ps. L, which is generally acknowledged to
be an introduction to the first collection of Davidic psalms
(cf. Ezek. xlvil 12)> This collection, therefore, is pre-
sumably earlier. Further, the formula of thanksgiving in
Jer. xxxiiL 11, " Oive thanks to Jehovah of hosts, for Jehovah
is good : for His mercy endureth for ever," is found only in
psalms included in Books lY. and Y. of the Psalter.
7. It was seen likewise that the musical arrangements
of the second temple were an inheritance from the period
before the exile.* It is reasonable to suppose that the
liturgical use of the psalms was so also.
^e conclusion is not overstrained that the basis of the
Psalter was already laid before the exile — how much earlier
it is impossible to tell, but the Davidic collections may go
original text of Boolesiasticaa. Dr. Scheohter holds that the allanona
to the pealms in the work extend oyer " all the books and groups of the
psalms." "The impression prodaoed ... is that of reading the work of
a post-canonical autnor, who already knew his Bible, and was continnaUy
quoting it " (in Kirkpatrick, Ptalms, p. zlviii).
^ S^ above, p. 440.
* Professor W . R. Smith argues that the doxology is an orighial part of
the psslm, and does not carry with it the inference tiiat the Psalter waa
already formed. Hs thinks that doxologies were appended only to the first
three books (p. 196), but admits that " the migonty of mooem aoholaiB
are a^ninst him in this opinion " (p. 194).
* Gf. Bobertson, pp. 103 if. ^ See aboye, p. 489.
' See above, p. 489.
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 451
baok a long way — and that the psabns, especially in the
earlier books, may fairly be used as evidence of the type
of piety in godly circles in Israel from the days of David
dovmwards. The witness they bear in no wise agrees with
the Wellhausen representation.
Part n
The PBSDionvs Element in Pbophxot
Hebrew prophecy will be acknowledged by most to be
a perfectly unique phenomenon in the history of religions.
TVliatever the etymology of the name {Nabi)} the prophet
himself stands clearly out as one who is conscious of receiv-
ing a message directly from Jehovah, which he is com-
missioned to impart to men.' In its beginnings prophecy
goes as far back as revelation,' but the founder of the
prophetic order in the stricter sense is Samuel.^ We may
pass over the development of prophecy in the intervening
period — over even the great figures of Elijah and Elisha,
who are, however, acting rather than teaching prophets, —
and come at once to the full bloom of prophecy in the age
of the writing prophets. Here, plainly, the nature of
prophecy can be studied to best advantage.
It is not denied that genuine prophecy presupposed in
the person exercising the prophetic function a special natural
endowment, or that it was psychologically conditioned. Its
natural basis was a species of genius, which we are still not
slow to recognise in those who possess it, enabling them to
see deep into the heart of things, where others only behold the
surface, and to speak the word necessary for guidance, where
others grope and stumble (cf. Ps. Ixxiv. 9). While, how-
ever, this gift of " geniality," of insight, of divining intuition,
^ Gesenins, Kaenen, Oebler, etc, deriTe the word from % root mfluung
" to bnbble" ; others explain differently.
* Angnatine calls the prophet enunciatcr verbcrtmi dei KomMbuB,
* All the sreat reyelation-figures (Abraham, Jacob, Moses) are represented
as prophesymg, and Abraham and Moses are designated prophets. In
Mosaic times, ofl the interesting episode of Eldad and Medad and tha
seyenly elders in Knm. zL 24-29. Under the Judges Deborah was a
prophetess. Cf. A. B. Davidson, 0,T. Prophecy, pp. 17 ff.
^ 1 Sam. UL 19-21 ; ix. 9, To Samnel belongs, apparently, the iattl-
tntion of the prophetic guilds.
4S2 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
belong to the prophetio endowment, it is far from oonr
stitutmg the whole of iV- The genuine prophet is conscioizff
of being laid hold of hj the Spirit of Gtod as otW men are
not ; of receiving a message from Jehovah whioh he kno-ws ia
not the product of his own thoughts, but recognises as Gkxl'e
word coming to him ; which is imparted to him with perfect
clearness and overpowering certainty ; and which brings ^with
it the call and constraint to deliver it to those for whom it
is meant. The claim of the prophets to speak the word of
God was sustained hj the godliness of their character,' by the
self attesting power of their message, as a word instinct 'with
spirit and life, and fitted to the time and need for which it
was spoken, by its coherence with previous revelation, and,
finally, hj the sure fulfilment of their word, so far as it was
predictive.' This brings us to the special topic we axe to
consider — ^the predictive element in prophecy.
I. SXTPERNATUSAL PBXDICTION AN ELEMENT IN PBOFHXOr
It was certainly an error of the older apologetic to plaoe
the essence of prophecy, as was often done, m prediction.
The prophet was in the fiirst instance a man speaking to his
own tim& EQs message was called forth by, and had its
adaptation to, some real and urgent need of his own age : it
was the word of Grod to that people, time, and occasion.
It needs, therefore, in order to be properly understood, to
be put in its historical setting, and interpreted through
^ Apart from more natnnJistio wiiten^ this it the Tiew fityonred by
Oieeebieoht in his 2>j0 Ben^ffdbwng der JUtett, Pnmkttm^ pp. 82-86, 72-77»
etc {pL Prefaoe). Prediction (which in Bpeoial oases is admitted) is
ezplamed ''oat of a natural focolty with which God has endowed the
prophet " (p. 78)— « ' ' gift of Ahwwngsvermiligtns " (pp. 74, 76, 77, eto.). Bat
Giesebrecht ^^oes on to ascribe so mach to the ^'sapernatarar* action of
God's Spirit in heightening and directing this nataral faonlty for the ends
of revelation (pp. 77, 87, 97, etc), that his view oomes to differ little
in principle from that indicated above See below, p. 466.
* Giesebrecht says : ** Kaenen himself concedes to the prophets a sarpaas-
ing piety and moral earnestness. Intentional deception is in the nature
of the case completely ezdnded. The high state of their inteUigenoes, sod
the stage of dearest religions knowledge and finest moral jadffment attained
by them exdtes Knenen's admiration. Is it credible that uiese men were
self-decdved f " — ^As above, p. 16.
* On the sapematoral element in prophecy, see the works on propheqr hy
A. B. Davidson, Biehm, Dditssch, Orelli, etc, and Oehler, Theol. qfO. T,, iL
pp. 818 ff. Ct. also the striking remarks of Eantadi in his Das BUSbmie
Bedeutung df A.T.^ pp. 29 ff.
5
£
IT
«
E
I
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 453
that. It must be put to the account of modem criticism
that it has done much to foster this better waj of regarding
prophecy, and has in consequence greatly vivified the study
of the prophetic writings, and promoted a better under-
standing of their meaning.
On the other hand, the modem view, in its desire to
assimilate prophecy as much as possible to the utterances
of natural human genius, does palpable violence to scriptural
teaching in denying, or malang light of, this element of
[ prediction. Not, indeed, that, up to a certain poiat,
prediction is altogether denied. The prophets, it is allowed,
had a peculiar — some would perhaps concede supernatural —
insight into the character of God and the laws of EQs moral
government, and, in the strength of their assurance of the
divine righteousness, did not hesitate to draw what seemed
to them the necessary deductions,^ announcing chastise-
ment and ruin as the result of national transgression, and
proclaiming the certainty of the ultimate triumph of God's
kingdom.' And, beyond question, they did this. But it is
just as certain, if we are to do justice to the full nature of
Biblical prophecy, that we must recognise a great deal I
more. The prophets do more than simply give forecasts |
of the general course of God's providence which, as
deductions of their own mind, might easily be, and it is con-
tended very frequently were, mistaken. How much more i
they did give can only be seen by looking at the prophecies '
themselves.
It was, in tmth, in a sense inevitable that prediction
^ Knenen, as shown in our first obapter, and with him most of the
modems (Wallhansen, Stade, Dnhm, etc), deny the snpematural character
of prophecy altogether (Prophets and Propheey, pp. 4, 94-^, 227, etc See
above, pp. 12, 1 8). Kuenen denies eyen the troth of the prophetic conception
of the ai?ine righteousness, and the predictions based thereon. ''While
paying homage to the earnestness of the prophet's .conception of Jahyeh, we
must positiyely deny its truth, • • • The prophetical prediction of the
future now presents itself to us as the neconiarily incorrect conclusion
drawn from premises which themselyes were only half oozrect " (pp. 854, 859).
' Ewald represents perhaps the high-water mark of this way of reffard-
ing prophecy. "What the prophet can/' he says, "with |»erfect right,
announce as the word of his God, is in its contents nothin^^ but the
application of some general diyine truth to a giyen moral condition, or a
clear contemplation as to the confusions or uneyennesses of moral life before
him, springing out of the clear light of the Spirit What belongs to it £1^
within the proyince of the nurer, i,s., the diyine Spirit ; and if a pronhet
knows anything more, and can (^ve answers to other questions, tms is
something accidental. *'--Z>i0 Prcplieten, i. p. 12 (E.T. p. 19).
454 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
should enter into Buch prophecy as we have in Scriptnra
I he prophet spoke, indeed, to his own time, but his message
had of necessity an aspect of warning and promise for the
future. It contained a declaration of what Grod would do
in the event of disobedience or obedience. Its oogency
depended on such announcements as it gave being reliable.
Prophecy was occupied, moreover, not simply with the
immediate temporal consequences of the nation's conduct.
Its supreme interest was in the kingdom of God, and its
eye was ever directed to the ultimate triumph of that
langdom. Whatever promises it gave, or hopes it held
out, had all reference to that ultimate consummation. It
could not, therefore, in the nature of the case, ignore the
future.^ It had statements to make regarding it, growing
out of the peculiar exigencies of the time, which would
have had little worth had they been simply forecasts of the
prophet's own mind. Their whole value depended on their
having on them the seal of true divine revelation. This
is the simple and complete answer to those who meet the
contention that Biblical prophecy contains prediction by
saying that such a view puts prophecy on a level widi
''soothsaying.'' This is in no wise the case. Prediction
is never introduced as a mere wonder, or on its own
account, but always in connection with, and with a direct
bearing upon, the kingdom of God.' Soothsaying, on the
contrary, has no moral root, and subserves no wider moral
purpose; but is the result of a mere curious prying into
the future, and involves the use of superstitious, and
generally irrational means, to attain that end. Its chief
value is the testimony it bears to the inextinguishable
* Gf. Dr. A. B. Davidson, 0,T, PropTieey, p. 294 : " It is now a oommoo-
place that prophecy did not, even in the main, consist of prediction. The
commonplace is tnie, if predictions of mere contingent occurrences of a private
nature are meant. Prophecy was occnpied with the destinies of the king-
dom of God. But the essence of prophecy is prediction— prediction not
only of the far distant consummation and glory of the kingdom, but also
of the nearer steps necessary to this, the downfall of the state, and the
instruments who shall accomplish it " Cf. pp. 89, 96-98, etc. : Theol. qfO.T.,
p. 177.
* Ct Kautzsch, Das BleibentU Bedeuiung, (l 31. The distinguisking
mark, he says, by which Hebrew prophecy is raised high as heaven above
all those heathen phenomena is : " This prophecy stands in the servioe of a
divine plan of salvation, and indeed in a service from which it cannot with-
draw itself." It is the more singular that Kautzsch should speak aUj^t*
ingly of prediction (p. 80).
THE PllOGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 455
craving of men's hearts for some kind of revelation of God
and the future.^
II. Skalitt of Sufsbnatubal Pbbdictign
Many are the straits to which rationalism is reduced, as
Kuenen's large volume testifies,' in its attempt to eliminate
the predictive element from prophecy. So deeply inwoven,
however, is prediction into the texture of Scripture, that
try as the critics may, they cannot altogether get rid of
ttus unwelcome proof of the presence of the supernatural
We vividly recall the impression made upon our mind
by the first reading of the book so often referred to in
these pages — ^WellhiEiusen's History of larad. The book is
an attempt to give a thoroughly rationalising account of
Israel's history, but the effect it produced was to make us
feel as never before the impossibility of every such natural
explanation. The supernatural was constantly thrusting in
its head, notwithstanding all the critic's attempts to keep
it out Was it, e.g,, the Exodus from Egypt ? The people
were led by Moses round by the Bed Sea, but by a singular
coincidence — a marvellous piece of good fortune— the sea
dried just in time to let them through. " His design," we
are told, ''was aided in a wholly unlooked-for way, by a
marvellous occurrence quite beyond his control, and wluch
no sagacity could possibly have foreseen."^ Was it the
deliverance of Jerusalem from Sennacherib ? Isaiah alone
of all the people retained his confidence in God's help, and
gave Hezekiah in the name of Jehovah the most explicit
assurance that the city would not be taken — that the
enemy would not shoot an arrow into it, nor bring up
a shield against it.^ He predicted this in words of scornful
exultation, and staked his prophetic reputation on the result.
''And thus," says Wellhausen, "it proved in the issue.
By a still unexplained catastrophe, the main army of
^ In party m Dent. xyU. 10 ff. shows, propheoj was j^ven to satisfy the
need for which an iUegitimate satisfaction was songht in heathen mantic
On the contrast with heathen and other forms of prediction, of. Orelli,
Prophecy, p. 28 ; Eaatzsoh, an above, pp. 80, 81.
^ Cf. the severe criticism of Kueneirs work in Giesebrechti pp. 8-6.
' ffisL of Iwradt p. 488. Others, as before shown, dispose of the miiadt
by denying the &ot.
« Isa. zzzvii. 26-86.
4S6 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
Sennaoherib was annihilated on the frontier between
Egypt and Palestine, and Jerusalem was freed from
danger/'^ Is it the prediction of the downfall and
captivity of Israel by Amos? This prophet, Wellhansen
admits, ^prophesied as dose at hand the downfall of the
kingdom, which jnst at that moment was rejoicing most in
the consdonsness of power, and the deportation of the
people to a far-off northern land."* We have bat to
contrast this nniform tone of certainty of the Hebrew
prophets with the language, e.^., of a John Bright during
the progress of the American civil war, to see how great is
the difference between prophecy and political perception^
even when the latter is quickened by the most intense
consciousness of the righteousness of a cause. ^ What the
revolt is to accomplish," said Mr. Bright, ** is still hidden
from our sight; and I will abstain now, as I have always
done, from predicting what is to come. I know what I hope
for — ^what I shall rejoice in — ^but I know nothing of future
events which will enable me to express a confident opinion."*
These instances would be remarkable enough if they
stood alone ; the disconcerting thing for the newer theory of
prophecy is that they do not stand alone. The Bible is fuU
of cases of the same kind. This can be maintained notwith-
standing all theories of the critics as to the dates of the
books. It was when Idngs and nobles were lying on beds of
ivory, and indulging in every species of dissipation and
amusement, that Amos, as just mentioned, wrote : ^ There-
fore will I cause you to go into captivity beyond Damascus,
saith Jehovah, whose name is the Qod of hosts." ^ It was
a century and more before the captivity of Judah that
Micah foretold: "Therefore shidl Zion for your sake be
ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps. • . .
^ Bid, oflBTOii, p. 488. Eaenen admits the oracle to be indaUtaUj
Snaine, bat attempts to undermine the fulfilment (pp. 229 ff.). PhifoMor
. P. Smith has more than doubts about both oracle and histoij.
^Ibid, p. 470. Oieaebreoht says: "They [the predictionsj hays oftm
for the^ content ooourrences of wnioh at the time of the prophet no oiis
could have any idea: so Amos, in a peaceful, nay, seemingly iUustriou
time, predicts the Assyrian campaign, tiU then unheard of "(p* 78). Thii
writer, as before stated, finds the explanation of these predictions (whidi
were not a/trays fulfilled) in the divine quickening of a natural fiteulW of
divination or presentiment, of which sporadic examples are found alsewMn
(pp. 78-76).
* Speech, June 80, 1868, ^ Amos r. 87.
THE PROGBESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 457
Be in pain, and labour to bring forth, 0 daughter of Zion,
like a woman in travail ; for now shalt thou go forth out
of the city, and shalt dwell in the field, and shalt come even
unto Babylon" — even this is not all, but — ^" there shalt thou
be deHvcored; there shall Jehovah redeem thee from the
hand of thine enemies." ^ Jeremiah's prophedee belong to
the last years of the kingdom of Judah, but it is impossible
to erase from them bhe prediction of the seventy years of
captivity — ^fulfilled to a year from the date of the first
deportation (606-536 B.O.).* '' This whole land shall be a
desolation, and an astonishment, and these nations shall
serve the king of Babylon seventy years. And it shall
come to pass, when seven^ years are accomplished, that I
will pimish the king of Babylon, and that nation, saith
Jehovah, for their iniquity, and the land of the Chaldeans ;
and I will make it desolate for ever" * The second portion
of Isaiah is assigned to the exile ; but it is not in the second
portion, but in the first, a hundred and twenty years before
the exile (contemporarv with Micah), that we find this
remarkable prediction or the captivitv : ** Then said I, Lord,
how long ? And He answered. Until cities be waste with-
out inhabitant, and houses without man, and the land
become utterly waste, and Jehovah have removed men far
away. . . . And if there be yet a tenth in it, it shall again
be eaten up : as a terebinth, and as an oak, whose stock
remaineth, when they are felled : so the holy seed is the
stock thereof."^ And again, when Hezekiah had showed
his treasures to the messengers of the king of Babylon:
" Behold the days come, that all that is in thine house, and
that which thy fathers have laid up in store until this day,
shall be carried into Babylon : notninff shall be left, saith
JehovaL" * Even accepting the view that the second part of
^ Mio. iiL 12 ; ir. 10. There leemf no ground, except fhe propheoj
itself, for ohaUenging the fleanineneee of these passages. Ot MTidson,
O.T. Proph^qf, p. 264 ; Omli, iffnor JProphetg, p. 206. See below, p. 464.
* There wonld be no objeetion to taking the nmnber as a ronnd number,
bat, reckoning from the initial deportation under JehoiaUm in 606 B.o.
(of. 2 Eingi zzir. 1 ; 2 Ohron. zzzVi 6il. ; Dan. L 1 ft), it seems to be
exaet
» Jer. xxy. 11, 12.
« laa. Ti 11-18. Gf. the R. V. margin of rer. 18 : " Bat vet in it shall
be a tenth, and it shall retam, and shaD be eaten up." See ihe remarks of
Professor O. A. Smith, laaiah, i pp. 40a-4.
' Isa. zzziz. 6-7. These passa^ show that too mach weight most not
be laid on Isaiah's sapposed belief m the inTioUbilitj of Zkn.
458 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
Isaiah (chaps. xL-lxvi) is post-exilian — though we think thia
extremely doubtful at least for portions of it ^ — ^we do not
thereby get rid of prediction. Cyrus may already, as the
phrase is, have been " above the horizon '' when the prophet
wrote, pursuing his conquests in the north ; but the most
brilliant part of his career was yet to come. Mighty Babjlon
had not yet fallen,^ nor had Israel been restored. But it is
these things which form the burden of the prophecy. We
cannot, moreover, but be struck by the fact that it is pre-
cisely in this second part of Isaiah that the fulfilment of
prophecy is insisted on as the clearest proof that Jehovah is
the true and only God.* Daniel is a book keenly assailed by
the critics, and undoubtedly presents difficulties on the view
that it was written in its present form in Daniel's own age.^
Yet, on any theory of date, one cannot but feel that it is
only by forced and unnatural shifts — such as would not be
tolerated for a moment in the ** traditional ** apologist — that
an interpretation of the "four empires" can be got which
does not include the Boman,* or that makes the " seventy
weeks," or four hundred and ninety years, of Daniel^ end
in the age of Antiochus Epiphanes (171-164 B.C.).* On the
other hand, it is the case that, reckoning from the decree ot
Artaxerxes and the mission of Ezra (458 B.a), the sixty-nine
weeks that were to elapse till '' the anointed one (Messiah)
the prince" (Dan. ix. 26), run out in 29 A.D., the year of
Christ's entrance on His public ministry. If to these be
^ The qaestion of the aathorsbip of this second jpart of Isaiah is one
which, as Professor G. A. Smith tnily says, " can be looked at calmly. U
touches no dogma of the Christian faith." — Isaiah, i. p. 402. The qnestion,
however, becomes more complicated when the second part also is broken np,
and it is recognised that there are at least some sections of the latter wldeb
cannot, with anyplausibility, be placed in the exile {e,g., chaps. Ivii., Iviii*
IzY. etc.). See x9ote B on the Unity of Second Isaiah.
* Isa. ziii., e.g,, is a limelight prophetic picture of that catastrophe, hot
it is not suggested that it was written after the event.
» Isa. xli. 21-28, 26-28 ; xliii. d-12 ; xliv. 7, 8, 26-28 ; xW. 11, 19, 21 ;
xln. 9; xlviii 8-7, 14-16. Cf. A. B. Davidson, O.T. Prophtey, pp.
07, 294.
^ See above, p. 428. The chief diMculty is the extremely detailed
character of the prediction in chap, xi., which, on so large a scale, is out
of harmony with the analogy of prophecy elsewhere, and may point to later
redaction.
• Dan. ii. 81 ff. ; vii. 1 ff.
' Dan. ix. 24 ff. On the divergent views on these prophecies, of. Driver,
Daniel, pp. 94 ff. ; 148 ff.; Pusey, Damid, pp. 91 ff., 171, 197-217. See
Note C on the Prophecies of Daniel.
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THE PROGKESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 459
added the prophecies about the nations, which fill so large
a space in the books — the prophecy of Nahum against
Nineveh, e.g.f or the prophecies against I^pt, Babylon,
Tyre, and other surrounding kingdoms^ — above all, the
predictions respecting the captivities and future of the
Jewish nation, their scattering through all lands, yet preser-
vation as a distinct people, with promises of latter-day
^ restoration* and blessing — we have a mass of prediction,
not soothsaying, but all of it standing in strictest subordina-
tion to the ends of the kingdom of God, which, taken
together, is absolutely unique, and wholly inexplicable except
imder supernatural conditions. The element of prediction
is not less conspicuously present in the New Testament.
Many of the parables, announcements, and discourses of
Jesus are predictive — we instance only the great discourse
on the destruction of Jerusalem and the last things ; ' pre-
diction is interwoven with the narrative of the Acts ^ and
with the Epistles ; ^ the Apocalypse is a book of prediction iu
symbolic form.* If everything of the nature of predictive
prophecy is expunged from the Bible, it will astonish us to
find how much has gone with it
Allusion was made in an earlier chapter^ to what is
distinctively known as Messianic prophecy, and, in con-
nection therewith, to the firm assurance which the prophets
entertained that their religion — the religion of Jehovah —
would become the religion of the whole earth. This faith
they held fast when everything was against them — when
their own nation, with which the promises were boimd up,
was sinking in ruin, or was in exile. Yet this unprece-
dented thii^ has been fulfilled, so far, at least, that Israel's
religion, in its New Testament form, has now become the
religion of all the great civilised and progressive nations of
the world, and is spreading itself ever more widely in heathen
^ Kaenen and others contest the fulfilment of some of these pTediction&
See Note D in Euenen on UnfalfiUed Prophecies.
* It will be seen below (p. 464) that nothing can now be inferred as to
the precise form in which these prophecies wul be fal611ed. See a dis-
cussion of the subject in Dr. A. B. Davidson's 0, T, PtopJiscy, pp. 468 if.
*]dbtt. zxiy. Dr. Davidson says : '* So far as we see, prediction was
actually an element in the activity of most of the prophets, even in that of
the prophet of Nazareth " — 0. T. Prophecy, p. 89.
« Kg,, Acts XL 27-80 ; zzi. 10, 11 ; zzvii. 10, 21, 22.
* E,g,, Rom. sd. 23, 24 ; 2 Thess. ii. 1-10.
* fiev. i. 1-8. "* Gf. above, p. 34.
4fio PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
lands. On Messianio prophecy in the stricter sense it is
worth while quoting some striking sentences from Professor
B. Flint. After remarking on the " marvellous unity, self-
consistency, and comprehensiveness " of the Old Testament^
and pointing out that "it is at the same time a system
which is not self-contained, but one of which all the parts
contribute, each in its place, to raise, sustain, and guide
faith in the coming of a mysterious and mighty Saviour — a
perfect Prophet, perfect Priest, and perfect King, such as
Christ alone of cJl men can be supposed to have been,"
Professor Flint goes on to say : ^ This broad general &ct —
this vast and strange correlation of correspondence — cannot
be in the least affected by questions of the ' higher criti-
cism' as to the authorship, time of origination, and mode
of composition of the various books of the Old Testament
• . . Answer all these questions in the way which the
boldest and most rationalistic criticism of Oermany or
Holland ventures to suggest; accept in every properly
critical question the conclusions of the most advanced
critical schools, and what will follow? Merely this, that
those who do so will have, in various respects, to alter their
views as to the manner and method in which the ideal of
the Messiah's Person, work, and kingdom was, point by
point, line by line, evolved and elaborated. There will not,
however, be a single Messianic word or sentence, not a
single line or feature the fewer in the Old Testament.'' ^
IIL HuBCAK CoKDinoNiNa OF Pbopheot— Oakonb ov
Iin*ERPRETATION
Prophecy, if it has its origin in Grod, has, nevertheless,
its human side. It comes to us through the mind, faculties,
speech, of particular individuals, living at a particular time,
and variously conditioned by a peui^icular experience.
Keeping this human or psychological side of prophecy in
view, we can readily explain a difference which the atten-
tive reader must observe between predictions of events
belonging to the prophet's immediate future, — not giving
this phrase too restricted a sense, — and predictions that
stretch beyond this limit, and relate to events yet remote
> St Giles Lecture (Edinbm-ffli) on '' Christianity in Relation to otlier.
Religions." Cf. Di.. Pst. Vurh&an^.Jh^hscUt pp. 229 flL
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THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 461
and indefinable. Predictions of the former class might be,
and often were, quite definite and precisa Thus Isaiah
predicted the destruction of Sennacherib's army ; announced
to Hezekiah that God had added to his life fifteen jears.^
Jeremiah predicted the capture of Jerusalem bj the
ChaJdeans, the fates of Jehoiakim and Zedekiah, the seventy
years' captivity.* But it is difiFerent as the event recedes
into the future, loses its point of connection with the
historic present, above all, belongs to an order of things,
higher and more spiritual, for which the existing conditions
OTOr no sufficient analogy. Vision of the future is not
magically efiected ; the future is presented as an evolution
from the historically existing ; and, where that connection
fails, prediction must necessarily take on a more general
and ideal character. While, therefore, prediction of the
immediate future is relatively definite, the vision of events
more remote — especially of those belonging to the consimi-
mation of God's kingdom — becomes more general in form,
and greater freedom is allowed in shaping it in symbol and
metaphor. The idea becomes the main thing; the particular
form of the idea — ^the clothing of imagery or detail it
receives — is less essential There is even here, no doubt,
great difference of d^ree. Under the guidance of the
divine Spirit, prophecy is sometimes quite startling in the
individuality and denniteness of its prediction of even
remote events.* The general principle, however, is un-
deniably as we have stated it, and from it three things
follow which are of great importance as canons in the right
interpretation of prophecy of the future.
1. It follows from what has been said that, in the
1)rediction of distant events to which existing conditions no
onger apply, there is no alternative but that these should
be presented in the forma of the present. This is a principle
^ Isa. xxxviii. 5.
* Jer. zxii 18, 19 ; xxt, ; zzzriii 14 fL eto. OL the iDstances in Acts
aboye died.
* We oannct reckon it m accidental, $,g,, that O.T. prophe^ pointed
80 definitely to Bethlehem as the place of the Messiah's biixh (Mio. y. 2),
or to the peculiarity of His birth from a woman (Isa. yii. 14 ; Mio. r. 8).
C£ Dayidson,-0.jr. PropA«ey, pp. 869, 862 ; Dr. Pat Fairbaim, JPropheey,
pp. 230-81. Dr. Dayidson says: "When we consider that Christianity is
the issue of the prior Old Testament period, it is not improbable, ft is
rather to be expected, that hints should naye been giyen eyen of its gnateal
mysteries "(p. 869).
462 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
which runs throwh all prophecy where the future state of
the kmgdom of God is concerned. It would have served
no end, and is, under ordinary conditions, psychologically
inoonceiyable, that the prophet should have been lifted
out of all the forms of bus existing consciousness^ and
transported into conditions utterly strange and inappre-
hensible by him. Such a revelation woidd, in any case,
have been incommunicable to others.^ We have, in the
earthly condition, the same difficulty in picturing to our-
selves the conditions of a heavenly state. But, just as
supersensible realities cannot be conceived or spoken of by
us except under forms of symbol or figure drawn from
earthly relations, so prophecy of the future, or of a better
dispensation, must necessarily picture that future, or those
new conditions, in forms drawn from the present.' The
kingdom of God, e.^., in the Messianic age, is still figured
as a theocracy with Jerusalem* as a centre; the nations
come up to it to worship ; the enemies of the kingdom of
Qod are figured under the old names — Egypt, BiGibylon,
Edom, etc. ; the converted nations are these same powers.*
How fsur the prophet himself was able to distinguish the
symbol from the idea is a secondary questioa In some
cases, at least, the idea is clearly seen breaking through the
symbol, and transcending it.^
2. A second principle of interpretation relates to the
element of time in prophecy. Here the taxst to be remem-
bered is, that the one thing immovably certain to the
prophet— that with which he starts — is not the way by
which the goal of the kingdom of God is to be reached, but
^ Cf. Panl'i experience In 2 Cor. xlL 1-4. It is wrong to Tiew the
prophetio conecionsnesB as ordinarily a state of ecstasy.
^ Excellent remarks on this sobjeot will be found in the work abof«
noted, Dr. Pat Fairbaim's Prophscy, pp. 154 ff., 160 ff.
* Dr. A. B. Dayidson, therefore, pats the matter too sharply when he
says : " Such terms in the propheta are always to be taken in their literal,
natural sense " (p. 167). His own words furnish the necessaiy correction.
" Ko doubt, they oocasionaUy broke through the atmosphere of t^eir own
dispensation, and soared into regions higher and ^urer " (p. 167 ; cf. p. 891).
" When he sajs that Egypt shall be a desolation ana the like, he means
that the enemies of Ood'rkingdom shall certainly then, or ere then, be all
quite destroyed," etc. (pp. 180, 187).
^ E,g, , such statements as Isa. ii. 2 : " The mountain of Jehorah's house
shall be established in the top of the mountains," etc., are plainly poetie
Mad figuratire ; and the description of the flowing waters in EzekieVs vision
of the temple (chap, xlyii.) can hardly be intended to be taken litendly.
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 463
the goal itself. Whatever might betide in the interval,
there is no dubiety about tJuU; God's purpose shall be
fulfilled, His kingdom shall triumph, righteousness shall be
supreme, and shall fill the earth. Whatever opposes itself
to God's kingdom and resists it shall be shattered. How-
ever proud and powerful wiokedness maj be, there is '' a
day of Jehovah coming — a judgment-day, when Gknl's
righteousness shall be vindicated. On the other hand, the
steps bv which this consummation is to be reached are only
gradually unfolded, as the course of providence prepares
the way for the discovery of them. Hence arises the
feature so common in prophecy, that the consummation, or
some phase of it, is the immediate backgroxmd of the series
of events in which the prophet is himself involved : of the
Assyrian invasion, of the return from exile, of the Macca-
bsean deliverance, of the destruction of Jerusalem.^ That
is the one event which in prophetic perspective is always
near ; for which all events are preparing ; to which they are
hastening on. Hence the fact that in prophetic vision
extending into the distant future so little place is given the
element of time. There are exceptions to this rule — some-
times time-measures, as Jeremiah's seventy years, or Daniel's
seventy weeks, are very definite. But ordinarily time is a
quite secondary element. Events are grasped in their ideal
relations, in their implication with one another as conducing
to the final result, and not in their empirical succession.
Prophecy is not, as Butler described it, history written before-
hand, but the seizing of the inner meaning and the greater
stadia of things, and the presenting of future developments
in such graphic and pictorial forms as will best impress the
imagination and move the heart.
3. The third principle is that there is a eanditianal
element in prophecy. Expressed or implied, this element
is ever present, and ought not to be overlooked in the inter-
pretation of prophecy. The most explicit utterance of this
principle is found in Jeremiah : ''At what instant I (Jehovah)
shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom,
to pluck up and to break down and to destroy it ; if that
nation, concerning which I have spoken, turn from their
evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto
1 The same applies to, and in part explains, New Testament itpNsenta*
tions of the Paroutia (see below).
464 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
them. And at what instant I shall speak concerning a
nation^ and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it ;
if it do evil in my sight that it obey not my voice, then I
will repent of the good wherewith I said that I would benefit
them.**^ This obviously has an important bearing on the
time and manner of fulfilment. Often, as in the case of
Jonah's preaching to Nineveh, the object of the prophecy
is to Ofmi fulfilment. A striMng instance is given in the
Book of Jeremiah itself of how fulfilment of Micah's
prophecy against Jerusalem was delayed because of
Heze^Vs repentanca' Jesus, too, said of Jerusalem:
*'How often would I have gathered thy children together
• • • and ye would not I Behold, your house is left unto
yon desolate."' Human repentance may thus avert pre-
dicted judgment ; human intercession may delay or modify
it; human fidelity will hasten, as, on the other hand, human
unfaithfulness will retard, accomplishment of promise^ The
Slowing predictions of the prophets as to what Grod would
o for Ifirael— even those which were never literally fulfilled
— ^were not illusions. They held up truly what Grod was
wishful to do for Israel, and would have done, had the con-
ditions, on their part, been present It does not follow that
a day of fulfilment wiU not come, but when it arrives, it
will be under new conditions, and in a new form.* In a
deeply important sense the same applies to the New
Testament hope of the Lord's Coming. There is a human
conditioning even here. When the Church prays, "Thy
kingdom come,'' it implicitly acknowledges that it has a
certoin responsibility for the hastening or retarding of
that coming. Had the Church been more faithful — or
were it more faithful now — the consiunmation would be
» Jer. xviiL 7-10. • Jer. xxvi. 17-.19.
> Matt xziii. 87, 88.
* DeUtaoh has some remarks on this point in connection with Eiekieri
nhecies. "The condition," he says, ''remained nnfiilfilled, and so with
10 the prophecy. For the grace of God does not work magically, and
prophecy is no &te. It is with the promises as it is with the aims of God's
grace : they are too often shattered on the resistance of man ; as, on the
other hand, also, His threatenings are taken hack if the threatened antici-
pate theb itilfilment hy repentance ; for the free will of the creators is do
msn i^ow, and history no play of marionettes. The folfilment of many
prophecies moyes from the appointed time into the fritare^ and remains in
reserre for that: the fulfilment of others is oyertaken hy the adTanoing
histoiy of salvation, and for that reason hecomes impossible, at least in the
•ztemali^ of their content ''—Lathardfs ZeUtchrift, 1880, pp. 280-81.
,-'1
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 465
nearer ; we might not still have been askings ** Where is the
s promise of His Coming ?"^
I
Past m
ThB FrOGBXSSIYENESS of BeYEIATION — MOKAL
DiFFICULTISS
It would be unfitting to close this discussion of the
problems of the Old Testament without a glance at the
question of the progressivmess of reveUxticn, in its bearings
on those ** moral difficulties " which are a chief stumbling-
block to many in considering the claims of the revelation*
That revelation is progressive — has its less devdoped and
more developed stages — ^has been assumed throughout, and
is generally admitted. But the precise mode of application
of this principle of progressiveness to the solution of the
ethical difficulties is not always dearly apprehended, and
needs careful statement
L Natube and Obiqin of thb Moral Diffigultiks
There would be no difficulty, possibly, in connection with
the progressiveness of revelation, if the progress in question
were simply one of development in moral kncwUdge-^t
growth from a more or less childlike consdousnees of moral
truths to a stage of greater maturity. The matter becomes
more complicated when we observe that it is dso in part
the growth of a higher out of a lower morality, and that the
lower stages involve mudi which to the enlightened con-
science at the higher stage is positively eviL It is here
that ethical difficulties emerge. When we go back to tibe
earlier steles of Old Testament revelation— or even to the
Old Testament as a whole — we find, co-existing with the
knowledge and worship of the true Qod, with a high sense
of the general obligations of righteousness, and with what
we must recognise as great nobility of religious chaiiBi^ler,
Qiany things which perplex and stagger us. VI^f.'IbA
defects in the idea of duty, as measured by a later standSlt^'
the non-recognition of prindples of conduct which to us are
1 2 Pet iii 4.
30
*
466 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
self-evident, institutions and usages which the enlighten^
Christian conscience would not tolerate, things regarded as
permissible or right which we as emphatically pronoimce
wrong. For instance, there is in the Old Testament slaveij
and polygamy, there is blood-revenge, there is a low standard
— not in the law, indeed, but in individuals — of sexual
morality, there is the cursing of enemies, there is merciless-
ness in warfare, in the case of the Canaanites there is the
extermination of whole populations. It is possible, no
doubt, to set all this in an exaggerated and distorted light,
and this, as we shall see, is sometimes done. The "moral
difficulties " are no new discovery. They were worked for
all they were worth a century and a half ago in the
Deistical controversy, and many sensible and temperate
replies then appeared to the attacks on the Old Testament
based on them.^ Little can be said now which was not said,
with far keener edge, by a Chubb, a Morgan, or a Bolingbroke.
But when every allowance for exaggeration or animus is
made, we cannot but recognise that a very real problem
remains.
The difficulty even here, it is next to be observed, is not
so much that such lower stages of morality should exist, and
should need to be overcome — that is only to be expected
— as that the defects in idea and practice cleave to the
organs of revelation themselves, — that these share in, and
give expression to, the same views as their contemporaries,
— that they do this sometimes when speaking in the name
of God, — ^nay, that God Himself is represented by them as
implicated in, and as sanctioning, these lower forms of
morality. Thus Abraham receives from God a command to
sacrifice his son Isaac ; Deborah, a prophetess, pronounces
Jael blessed for her treacherous murder of Sisera ; the Mosaic
legislation provides for slavery, polygamy, and divorce ; the
command to exterminate the Canaanites is. represented as
coming directly from Qod, and the Israelites are even re-
proved for not executing it with sufficient thoroughness;'
David, or whoever was the writer, invokes curses on his
enemies, and prays for their destruction. It is, in these and
other eases, the apparent implication of Ood in the lower
1 Leknd's View of (he Deittiedl fTriten, and DMne AuOwrUy <^au OU
omd New TestamerU (in reply to Morgan ), may still be usefully consulted.
« Jndg. ii. 1-8.
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 467
morality, or seeming immorality, which oaxuses the difficulty.
The morality of man may and must progress ; the morality
prescribed by Ood should, we naturally think, be one and
the same throughout How, on the assumption of the reality
of the revelation, can we vindicate the divine action ?
IL Ebbonsous OB Inadequatb SOLUnONS
In facing this problem, our first duty is to beware of
solutions wluch are not really, or only very partially, such.
It is, for example, no solution simply to use this word
** progresdveness,'* as if that of itself removed the difficulty.
It is true that revelation must be progressive ; but it may
be felt that what applies to the taught need not apply to
the teacher — ^that God should not be implicated m any
form of sanction of what is wrong.
Again, we do not solve the problem by denying thai these
lofcer forme of morality were, for that age and stage of
development, really wrong, or did involve elements of evil
Evolution may be invoked to show that there are numerous
intermediate grades between no morality and the highest
morality; that society mtut pass through such and such
stages of growth; that the moral ideal is only gradually
developed, and that^ till it is developed, such practices as
slavery, polygamy, unchastity, mercilessness in war, etc,
are not really sinful ; that there can be no wrong, therefore,
in recognising and sanctioning them. This, like the whole
evolutionarv conception of a necessary development of
humanity through evil, is a dangerous line of defence ; is,
moreover, repugnant to the genuine Christian point of view.
Jesus did not, e.^., regard the Mosaic law of divorce as
per ee right even for the Jews. It was given them, He said,
for the hardness of their hearts, and He referred them back
to the purer primitive idea of marriage.^ Slavery, from the
Christian standpoint, is a contradiction of the true idea of
man, as QoA made him, and meant him to exist ;' is, there-
fore, something inherently wrong, under whatever cir-
cumstances, or at whatever stage in the history of mankind,
it occurs.
1 Matt zix. 8-9.
' G«n. L 26, 27 ; and tee the ground of the prohibition of shedding man'a
blood, Gen. is. 6.
468 PSALMS AND PROPHETS :
Shall we betake ourselves, then, to what may be called
t?ie critical solution — yiz,, the denying outright that God
had any implication in the matter, and the ascribing of
those laws and statements in the Bible which impute such
participation in evil to God to the mistaken notions of the
Biblical writers themselves ? Either the narratives are held
to be legends, or they are supposed to reflect only the ideas of
the writers ; in any case, the attribution of the laws and com-
mands which create offence to Jehovah as their Author has
no foundation in reality. What the leaders of Israel — a
Moses, a Joshua, a Samuel — or the writers of their histories,
ascribed to God of a nature which we think wrong, came
really from their own imperfect thoughts and feelings, and
G^d had nothing to do with it. Thus God is thought to be
exonerated from participation in everything that offends
the moral sense. Such a view may plausibly be held to be
a neceasary corollary from the LLsaion^f growth in
religion and moral ideas. For how, it may be asked, can a
writer avoid colouring his narrative in accordance with
the idea of God he himself possesses, representing Jehovah as
sanctioning or approving of those things which he thinks'He
must approve of, and as condemning tiiose things which he
— the author — reprobates? The writer's own standard of
religion and morality would seem to be the inevitable
measure of the representations in his history.
This method of treatment no doubt frees God from
responsibility for anything in the record which appears
objectionable, — Origen of old attained the same end by
"allegorising" all such passages, — but the solution has the
disadvantage that it is a cutting of the knot, not a loosing
of it, for it denies the chief factor in the problem — the
reality of the revelation. Neither do we, even in this way,
really get rid of the difficulty. We may relieve the earlier
history of laws and commands of God which offend us;
but it is only to roll the burden upon the shoulders of
prophets in an age when the higher morality is presumed to
be developed. The strongest injunctions, e.g., to destroy
the Canaanites are found in the Book of Deuteronomy — on
the theory of the critics, a prophetic work of the seventh
century B.a, and the most drastic accounts of the carrying
out of these injunctions are those put to the account of the
Deuteronomic revision of the Book of Joshua, the date of
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 469
which is still later. It is not the early Hebrews only, there-
fore, who hold these imperfect views of God ; but the prophets
themselves, who are assumed to represent the more advanced
stage of religion and morality, and to be the peculiar
exponents of the higher Old Testament revelation, share in
them, and put their imprimatur upon them. Gtod's Spirit
in the prophets, if not in the history, still seems implicated
in what is wrong.
Difficulties exist ; but it is a pity to add to them, as is
occasionally done, by xmnecessarily lowering the character,
and limiting the scope, of early Old Testament morality,
even if it be with the aim of magnifying the divine
leading in Israel in the evolving of. higher conceptions.
Here again comes in the tendency to exaggeration, as when
it is afi&rmed that early Israel had no sense of personal right
or responsibility, no feeling of humanity or mercy for those
outside its own circle, no compunctions about falsehood and
fraud, etc It could easily be shown that, despite all marks
of a lower stage, the moral standard among the Hebrews
maintained its unique, and, in ancient times, unapproached,
distinction.^ It is unMr, e^., to say with a recent writer,
that '' the Hebrews were bound by moral obligation and the
sanction of religion in their dealings with one another, but
were entirely free of these in their dealings with foreigners,"
and that *' in the latter case they were governed purely by
considerations of expediency."' This is not borne out by
the instances quoted, and is disproved by the recognition of
common principles of justice and morality by which all
men are judged. Where imiversal principles of moral
conduct are recognised, there arises of necessity the sense
of mutual obligatioii ; and such are found, not only in Israel,
but in all ancient nations.' It is the postulate of the whole
Biblical view of history that the world is under moral govern-
ment, and that individuals, communities, and nations,
everywhere, are judged and punished for wickedness. What
else is the moral of the narratives of the flood, of the
destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, of the judgment on the
Canaanites ? It was for their vices that the Canaanites were
^ See below, pp. 470, 475.
* Profettor 0. B. Graj, Ths Divine Diaciplim cflmUl^ p. 48.
' The ethical codes of Egypt and Babvlonis ahow that common prinoiplea
of right were always reoogni»ed ; that in fiMt. the world has always had a
great deal more moral light than it well knew how to make use of.
/
470 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
destroyed.^ The history is full of instances which show tha
recognition of principles of general obligation. Is it
credible, 6,g.^ in view of his own words (Gen. xxttiy. 9),
that Joseph m Egypt was raided in his conduct in hu
master's house, or towards his master's wife, by no higher
principle than '^ expediency " ? It was on grounds of common
right that the people of Israel protested against their harsh
treatment by Pharaoh.' Even Jephthah inyokes Jehovah,
as the Judge, to judge between Israel and Ammon.* It is
quite true that the Old Testament had not attained to Christ's
wide sense of the word " neighbour," and that the command
to love all, even enemies,^ would have sounded strangely in
the ears of the ancient Israelita But short of love there is
justice, and there is no reason for believing that duties falling
under that head were not recognised as applicable to Gtentiles
as well as to Jew&^ Too much, we would add, ought not
to be made of the imperfect conduct, or moral lapses, of
individuals, or even of the prevailing practice of a time, as
indicative of the religious and moral standard ; else it would
go hard with ourselves under a higher and purer dispensa-
tion.* The conduct of Judah ^ and Samson,* «.;., cannot be
held to determine the estimate of sexual relations in IsraeL
In letter, and even more in spirit, the Mosaic law stands for
a high ideal of sexual morality.* Of this we have the
^ Gen. XT. 16 ; Ler. xviiL 24 ff. ; Deat ziL 29 £ QL Brooe, OM^Etd
o/JUvekUionf pp. 189-40.
* Ex. Y. 16 ff. Jndg. xL 27.
« ICatt Y. 48-46 ; Luke x. 29-«7.
*If the Jews ftinwarrantablY) interpreted the precept "Then dull
love thy neighboor '' as entitling him to *^hate his enemy," and if deoeit uid
stratagem were regarded as lawful towards enemies in war (are they not
held to be so still f), it does not follow that foreigners, simply as mioh. wen
viewed as outside the pale of moral obligations. The Old Testament nowheie
inculoates, like Plato, " a pure and heart-felt hatred of the foreign nature *
(in his Menexemu), or makes it, as Seeley says of ancient nations, "almost
as much a duty to hate foreigners as to love fellow-citizens " (3x6 Scmo^
c^ap. xiv.). Isnel has, indeed, from the first, an aspect of UeMsing to
mankind.
* Are there no moral scandals, profanity, fraud, ennlng of enemies,
pravers for their destruction, etc, among ourselves t
^ Gen. xxxviii. * Judg. xvi
* The Mosaio law, which, it is to be remembered, is a code of Juris-
prudence, not of private ethics, surrounds female virtue with safegisudik
and 18 stem in the punishment of violations of it (^e.ff., Ex. xxi. 7 ff. ; xxiL
16, 17 ; Dent. xxii. 18-^0) ; is delicate in its provision for the treatment of
even captive women (Dent. xxi. 10-14) ; brands, as an abomination, tiie
prostitution of women at the sanctuary (Dent, xxiii. 17) — ^therefore, in
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 471
purest expression in the teachings of the prophets,^ who
here, as elsewhere, do not claim to be introcjmcing any-
thing new.
IIL Geniskal Iaws of Pbogbessiye Beyxlation
We shall perhaps get nearer the truth in this matter,
and conserve what is of value in the above explanations, if,
beginning at the other end, we assume the reality of revela-
tion, and ask how, and under what limitations, revelation
eotUd enter into such a history as man's. We shall not
assume that the development is normal ; on the contrary,
we shall allow it to be in many ways evil ; we shall take for
granted that slavery, polygamy, cruelty, etc., are wrong, and
that this must have been God's judgment on them then as
it is now. How then explain the apparent tolerance and
sanction of such evils ?
The full treatment of this subject would involve the
careful consideration of God's general relation to the evil of the
world. The truth is here acain Illustrated that there is no
difficulty in theology which does not emerge equally in
philosophy; or, as Butler pointed out, that there is no
difficulty in revelation which has not its counterpart in
God's ordinary providence. From the abstract or doctrinaire
point of view, it may seem a strange thing that God should
uphold, or have anything to do with, a world that has evil
in it at all; should permit, and be patient of, that evil;
should allow it to develop, and ovenrule it for His own
purposes; should seem, by His silence and seeming in-
difference, to connive at the crimes and iniquities of which
so large a part of the history of mankind is made up. The
sword of the Israelite is, after all, only a more acute form of
the problem that meets us in the providential employment,
in even more horrible forms,' of the sword of the Assyrian,
principle, all sncli oonduot. "To play the harlot" ia an ezpneBioii of
shame ereiywhere in Scripture. Of. Oen. xzzir. 7, 81 ; zzzTiii 24 ; Deut.
zzii. 21, eto.
^ Hoeea iy. may senre as ezample ; cf. specially yen. 2, 10-14. The
sin is literal as well as spiritual.
' One has only to look at the accounts and pictoies on the Aiqrrian
monaments of the barbarities and tortures inflicted by oonqneron on their
prisoners — the beheadings, impalings, flayines, blind ings, mutilations, etc
— to see how terrible a thing war ordinai^y was in these times. Such
eztremes of cruelty are not a feature of Jewish warfarc. The casee In
472 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
the Chaldean, or Boman, to inflict the judgment thTeatened
of God on Isiael itself.^ Yet only a little reflection is needed
to show that, if the world is to be upheld, governed, aud
judged, at all, it is only in some such way that even the
Holiest can govern and judge it. As Paul says, in repelling
the objection that Ood is unrighteous in taking vengeance
for sins which He has overruled for His own glory : " Gk>d
forbid ; for then how shall God judge the world ? " * Let na
see how this bears on the progressiveness of revelation.' «
1. One thing plain is, that, at whatever point revelation
begins, it must take man wp aithe stage at which itjinds him.
It must take him up at his existing stage of knowledge and
culture, and with his existing social usages and ethical idea&
Just as it was remarked above of the prophet, that it is
psychologically inconceivable that he should be lifted out of
all the forms of his existing consciousness, and transported
into conditions for which no analogy was found in the
contents of that consciousness; so it must be said of
historical revelation, that it could not at a stroke annihilate
existing conditions, and create a world of new ones. Re-
velation must begin somewhere, and must work patiently in
accordance with the laws of historical development ; ^ must
lay hold on what is better to counterwork and gradually
overcome what is worse; must be content to implant
principles, and bear patiently with much remaining evil, tiU
the good has time to grow, and to give rise to a new order
of things that will supplant the old. This is the true side
of the law of evolution, and it applies in grace, as well as
in nature. We see this law in operation even under
Christianity. There is not a word in Christ's teaching, e,g.j
any more than there is in Paul's, directly denouncing
slavery, or instigating to a revolt against it Yet nothing
whicli torture was inflicted (as in David's treatment of the Moabites, 2 Sam.
xii. 81) are happily rare.
^ This is the line of argmnent ohiefly used in a onoe popular book,
HeniT Rogers' Eclipse qf FaUh,
' Bom. iiL 6.
' We proceed on the same lines essentially as Mozley, Hessey, Bmoe, eto.
See references below.
^ This does not mean that in revelation the lowest type comes first. On
the contrary, in each new dispensation a start is made, and the foundation of
the new era laid, with a typical personality (Abraham, Moses, both stiU
relative to their age) ; in the case of Christianity with an absolute type of
God-manhood. Cf. Martensen, DogmatieSj pp. 249 ff. ; Doiner, Person ^
Okriti, y. pp. 196, 198.
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 473
is plainer than that Blavery is opposed to the fundamental
ideas and principles of Christ's religion, and that in mo-
portion as these prevail it is bound to be abolished. We
speak of the imperfections of the Old Testament ; but we
should remember how far, as already hinted, society is even
yet from being^able to conduct its business on the ideal
principles of Christ's religion.^ We have, e,g., to tolerate
and regulate houses for the sale of intoxicants; we use
oaths, which Christ says " come of evil " ; ' we sanction, and
occasionally even glonfy, war, which is as frightful a con-
tradiction of Christ's principles as it is possible to conceive.
We do not dispute that war— defensive war — ^is sometimes
a necessity; but this only illustrates what we mean, that
there is a distinction between principles and the possibility
of giving them complete effect at once. Christ condemns
war in no other way than He condemns slavery, i,e., the
fundamental principles of His religion contradict it ; but it
needs time to educate the public conscience to the point of
abhorring it as it should, and finally of replacing it by more
rational methods of settling international disputes.
2. Given this as a first principle, that revelation, where-
ever it begins, must take up man as it finds him, a second
will easily be deduced, viz., that revelation can be held
responsible only for ths new element which it iwtraducee —
not for the basis on which it works, or for everything in the
state of mind, or limited outlook, of the recipient, with
which it happens to be associated. Revelation does one
thing at once — ^implants a truth, constitutes a relation,
establishes a principle, which may have a whole rich con-
tent implicit in it, but it cannot convey to the recipient
from the first a full, all-roimd apprehension of everything
which that principle involve& On the contrary, such
applications must necessarily have adaptation to the stage
of morality or of social institutions then existing, and it is
only gradually that the principle can be clearly disengaged
from its temporary form. In the reception of revelation,
therefore, two elements have constantly to be distinguished
— ^the one, the form of consciousness, or state of view and
moral feeling, into which the revelation is introduced ; this
1 The imfortimate thing about sodety is that it does not always try to
nalise Ghriat'a ideals.
* Or *« of the evU one," Matt t. S7.
474 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
may be relatively low and undeveloped ; the other, the new
element of revelation itself, which is the positive and
germinal factor, and represents the real stage in the
advance. There need be no dubiety, or lack of clearness or
positiveness, in this new element ; it is a pure, original point
of knowledge or insight, but its authority extends only to
itself, and cannot be employed to sanction every other
element associated with it in the same consciousness. For
example, the days of the Judges are acknowledged to have
been in many ways rude and barbarous ; we have seen that
the Bible itself declares this. It is no argument, therefore,
against the reality of revelation in that age that the Spirit
or Qod came on men — as on Jephthah — ^whose modes of
speech and action (as in his ideas of God, or his vow about
his daughter)^ show many traces of the rudeness of the
times. So again, Deborah was a real prophetess, ie., she
possessed from God's Spirit the qualification necessary for
judging and rallying by her word the tribes of IsraeL' But
her song of victory, with its panegyric of Jael, shows that,
with all her inspired exaltation, she yet stood on the ground
of her age in her judgment of deeds which a purer stage of
enlightenment would condemn.' The same principle applies
to certain of the imprecations, and the frequent prayers for
the destruction of enemies, in the psalms— on which more
is said below. It is the course of revelation which alone
can correct these defects of its earlier stages, and, by re-
velation growing out of revelation, enable the world and the
Church to transcend the lower sta^ altogether.
3. A third principle followa As, in virtue of the fore-
going, revelation can be held responsible only for the new
element it introduces, and not for the basis on which it works,
or for everything in the state of mind of its recipients,
BO, conversely, it is the function of revelation to lay hold on
whatever better ekmenis there may he in that state of mind, in
order, by their means, to overcome the imperfections, and
create something higher. This is the edvcatumal function
in revelation, which can only reach its end by working with
such means as the imperfect state affords towards the pro-
duction of a more perfect. An illustration of the principle
^ See aboTe, pp. 181, 140. ' Jndg. iv. 4-6.
' Perhaps a complete view of the drcumstanoee would mitigate e^en our
judgment of Jael's action (cf. Motley, Riding Ideas, pp. 142 ff.).
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 475
in question is found in the command to Abraham to sacrifice
Isaac. In so tar as this command supposes as its background
the heathen custom of the sacrifice of children, it falls under
the two former principles that revelation takes up a man at
the stage at which it finds him, and is not responsible for
the basis on which it works ; but in so far as it uses this basis
j to elicit a singular proof of Abraham's faith, and actually
to put the stamp of divine condemnation on human sacrifice
in Israel, it falls under the third, or educative, principle.
For even in this most hateful form of heathen sacrifice, as
has often been pointed out, there was a nobler element
present This nobler element was the idea of the surrender
of the dearest and best to God, and it was God's will to
elicit and conserve this spiritual fruit, while rejecting as
abhorrent the form in which it was embodied.^ So the
usage of blood-revenge is one of the rudest methods of justice
in a tribal state of society ; yet, by limiting and regulating
this usage by the law of the cities of refuge, its worst effects
were checked, and the way was prepared for its ultimately
dying out altogether. The legislation on marriage and
divorce put salutary restrictions on polygamy, and the wanton
putting away of a wife, and, after the exile especially, mono-
gamy, though not universal, seems to have become the rule.'
The same principle applies in some degree even to what
jars upon us most — the apparent sanction given to the spirit
of revenge, or, as it may be better put, the restricted range
of the spirit of mercy. There is here, as elsewhGre on this
subject, great need for careful and balanced statement. It
is perfectly certain that the Mosaic religion, taken as a
whole, inculcated mercy with a decision and earnestness
that no other religion before Christianity ever showed ; ' it
is equally certain that hatred and revengefulness, as private
^ On the sacrifice of Isaac, see Stanley, JetoM Cfhwreh, L pp. 40 ff. ;
Mozlej, Biuling Ideas, Lect. II. ; Brnce, Chirf End 0/ BevekUian, pp. 98 £ ;
Ottley, Aspects qf 0,T,, pp. 177-78 ; Driver, Oenesis, pp. 221-22, etc.
*0f. Smith's Did. of Bible, art "Marriage," vol. ii. p. 246. The
contrast is apparent in Mohammedanism, in wnieh polygamy oontinnes to
flonrish. *■
* It is not too mnoh to say that the spirit of tenderness and mercy pervades
the laws of Israel (not to speak of the writings of theprophets) in a way to
which no other ancient code affords any psrallel. Tne poor, the widow,
the fatherless, the stranger, the homeless, the distressed, are Jehovah's
spedal care, and His law is fall of provisions for them. Of., e,g., Ex. y^^,
21-27 ; xxiii. 9-12 ; Dent 3?v. 7 If. ; wiv. 14-22, etc.
476 PSALMS AND PROPHETS:
paasions, are constantly condemned.^ But where enmity to
Grod, or antagoniBm to His cause, was concerned, the stage at
which we find ourselves in the Old Testament is one of un-
compromising hostility.' It is the principle of justice, in aH
its stem severity, not yet that of mercy, that rules ; * and littk
distinction is made between the transgressor and his siiL
The judgment falls unsparingly on the wrong-doer, and, in
the tribal stage of society, on all that are hia.^ Iliis
principle is applied, in the case of presumptuous or publk
transgression, as relentlessly vnthin Israel, and upon Israel^
as it is taUhout Israel The destruction of the CanaaniteB k
the most extensive, as it is the most awful, application of k,
but it is no more than an application.^ And even this stage,
with its inevitable defects, was one that had to be gone
through — as no one has shown more strikingly than Prof^sor
Seeley, in his Ecce HomoJ — ^if the higher result was to be
attained.
In general]^ then, we perceive that revelation, without
parting with anything of its reality or authority, is, in the
truest sense, an organic process — ^a growing from less to
more, with adaptation at every point to the stage of develop-
ment of its recipients — a light shining often in a dark place,
but still shining more and more unto the perfect day. Ita
h^her stages criticise, if we may so speak, its lower ; shed
off temporary elements; disengage principles from the
imperfect forms in which they are embodied, and give them
more perfect expression ; yet unfailingly conserve, and take
up into the new form, every element of permanent value in
^ See the remarkable precepts bearing on the treatment of an enemy, Sl
zxiii. 4, 6 (of. Dent. zzii. 1, 4). Gf. also Ps. yu. 4, with David's treatmat
of Saul (above, p. 448).
' Ps. oxxxiz. 21, 22 well expresses the spirit : *' Do not I hate then,
0 Jehovah, that hate Thee f . . . I hate them with perfect hatred ; I oonst
tiiem mine enemies." It is in this sense we are to understand most oriH
of the imprecatory psalms.
* Of., e,g,t Deut. xiii.; xvii 2-7,
^ E,g,, Achan (Josh. vii. 10 ff.) ; Eorah (Nam. zvi. 24 ff.). C£. Moikj,
pp. 115 ff.
* It is not to be forgotten, on the other side, that this stemnass applied
only to presumptuous transgressions (of. Num. xv. 80-81), speoial theocratk
sins, and offences against the criminal law, and that the religion ia throng
out nervaded with divine mercy and forgiveness (Ex. xxxiv. 6, 7).
* G£ the authors named above : Stanley, i. pp. 217-22 ; Mozley, Leet
IT. ; Bruce, pp. 187-44 ; and see Note D on Destruction of the Canaanitsa
V Gf. his chapters xix. (<'The Law of Mercy") and xxL (''The Law 4
Besentment " ).
THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF REVELATION 477
the old. Prophecy does not let fall one element that was of
permanent value in the law ; Christianity conserves every jot
and tittle of the spiritual content of both law and prophets.^
Thb Close
Fn^ressive revelation culminates in Christ Here, as
we began, so we end. In Christ the long development of
Old Testament religion — ^Abrahamic promise, Mosaic co-
venant, Levitical sacrifice, Davidic kingship, prophetic hopes,
Messianic ideals, strain of psalmist, redemptive purpose —
finds its fulfilment and point of repose. His Person clasps
Old and New Testaments into one. To understand the Old
Testament aright we must look to this goal to which all its
roads lead. Bespice finem. On the other hand, if faith has
firm srasp of Christ as risen and exalted, this will put all
the CSd Testament in a new light for us. It is this connec-
tion of Old Testament with New, of law with Gospel, of
prophecy with Christ, which gives the critical problems we
have been studying their keenest interest The tendency
of late has been to make too light of this connection.
The storm of criticism which, in the last decades, assailed
the Old Testament, was fondly thought by many to leave
intact the New Testament What mattered it about
Abraham and Moses, so long as Jesus and His Gospel
remained? That delusion is passing away. The fact is
becoming apparent to the didlest which has long been
evident to unbiassed observers, that much of the radical
critidsm of the Old Testament proceeded on principles, and
was conducted by methods, which had only to be applied
with like thoroughness to l^e New Testament to work like
havoc The fundamental ideas of God and His revelation
which underlay that criticism could not, as we set out by
affirming, lead up to a doctrine of the Incarnation, but only to
a nation of it The conceptions of Christ and Christianity
whitm have been its tacit presuppositions from the days of
Eichhom, De Wette, and Yatke, to those of £uenen and
Wellhausen, are Mo ccdo different from those of the believing
Church, and could not in time but work themselves out
to their logical conclusions. This, accordingly, is what we
see actually happening. The principles of a rationalistic
» Matt V. 17, 18.
478 THE PROGRESSIVENESS OF BEVELATION
criticism, having once gained recognition and approval in the
region of the Old Testoment, are now being transferred and
applied with increasing boldness and vigour to the New»
with the result that it is rapidly coming to be assmned that
only a Christ from whom all supernatural traits are stripped
ofT can be accepted as historical by the ** modem '' mind. Not
only do critics like Wellhausen and Ounkel, who, advandng
from the Old Testament, have entered the New Testament
field,^ take this ground, but a multitude of works on New
Testament subjects, recently issued and enjoying a consider-
able popularity in their own tongues and in translations,*
have the same as their underlying postulate. A grave peril,
growing out of a long train of conditions in the spirit of the
age, has thus arisen, which cannot be too early or too reso-
lutely faced. This at least is the conviction under which
the present book has been written. If it leads any who
have perhaps yielded too ready or indiscriminating an assent
to the positions of the modem critical movement to examine
more carefully the foundations of the theory of the Old
Testament to which they have given their adherence, its
end will be fulfilled.
1 WeUhaoflen translates and eritioally oommentB on McMew and Mmrit,
Ho simply leayes out the first and second chapters of Matthew, and begins
with the third chapter, without a word of explanation. Oonkel entitles his
TOodnotion, Zum BeUgiorugeaehuhUiehen Fentandniss de» N^eum TeslaimmUt.
He seeks to show tnat the evangelical narratives of the virgin-birth and
infancy of Jesus, of His temptation, transfiguration, resurrection, etc, boRow
fh>m foreign religions (through Judaism).
' We have in view wiiterslike B^viUe, Wemle, Wrede, Osoar HoltBunB,
Percy Gardiui^ and many mon. See in Ohapter L p» 7*
NOTES TO CHAPTERS
«•
NOTE TO CHAPTER I
NOTE A.— P. S
THl JiriBB OikNOir
Dr. DBiyXB begins his notice of the Canon {Inirod^ p. U)
the son of Siiaoh; we wonld prefer to begin lower down, with
the Kew Testament and Josephna The New Testament speaks
of a well-known collection of '' Scriptures," belieyed to be
divinely inspired, and follows the usual division into ^^the
law of Moses, and the prophets, and (from its chief part) the
psalms" (Luke zziy, 44). The passage in Joaephus, which in
his ftrii edition Dr. Driver does not mention, is as follows :
'' For we have not myriads of discordant and conflicting books,
but twenty-two only, comprising the record of all time, and justly
accredited as divine. Of these, five are books of Moses, which
embrace the laws and the traditions of the origin of mankind,
until his own death, a period of almost 8000 years. Er^mi the
death of Moses till the reign of Artaxerxes (465-425 B.a), the
prophets who followed Moses narrated the events of their time in
thirteen books. The remaiuing four books consist of hymns to God,
and maxims of conduct for men. Erom Artaxerxes to our own
age, the history has been written in detail, but it is not esteemed
worthy of the same credit^ on account of the exact succession of
the prophets having been no longer maintained" (Oonira Apion^
L 8 ; I^ver, p. ix ; see Noto H, p. 527 below).
This is an important testimony to the belief of the Jews in
the first century a.d. as to the number of the sacred books, their
divine inspiration, and the time, approximately, when the Canon
was completed. The four books which in Josephus's anange-
ment constitute the third division are the Psalms, Proverbs,
Ecdesiastes, and Canticles. Daniel, in this distribution, falls
among the thirteen prophets. The division into twenty-two books
(with slight variation of enumeration) is one followed in the Church
31
482 NOTE TO CHAPTER I
by Origen and Melito of Sardis (l)oth of whom received it
from Jews), and by Jerome, who, however, knew of and mentiona
the Babbinical division into twenty-four books. The Jewish
Palestinian division is into the three parte — ^five books of the
Law ; eight of the Prophets, subdivided into '* former prophets *
(Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings), and "latter prophets" (Isaiah,
Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and the Twelve Minor Prophets as one book) ;
and eleven Hagiographa (Chronicles, Psalms, etc.) — twenty-four in
alL Daniel in this case (as Jerome also testifies) was included
among the Hagiographa. The twenty-two of Josephua is
harmonised with the twenty-four of the other reckoning by taking
Buth with Samuel, and Lamentations with Jeremialu 2i£elito
reckons Buth, but omits Esther.
It is clear that Josephus regards the Canon as closing about {
the reign of Artazerxes, after which, he says, there was not an
exact succession of prophets (the same idea of the cessation of
prophecy is expressed m 1 Maca iv. 46, ix. 27, xiv. 41, and
elsewhere), and he represents this as the traditional belief of his
time. The same tradition in a more confused form is met with
in the spurious letter prefixed to 2 Mace: ''The same things
were also reported in the public archives and in the reoozds
relating to Nehemiah ; and how, founding a library, he gathered
together the things concerning the kings and prophets, and the
(writings) of David, and letters of kings about sacred gifts. **
When we proceed to test tlua tradition, we do not find it wholly
unworthy of credence.
The law was plainly of canonical authority in the days of
Ezra (see pp. 296 ff.) ; how far it is older is discussed in Chap. IX.
There is nothing against the collection of prophets in the time
of Nehemiah ; though earlier collections may well have existed,
analogous to the collections of Paul's Epistles in the early
Church. The third part of the Canon was more elastic ; whether
it remained open to receive contributions of a later date than,
say, the fourth century, depends on the view we take of Macca-
bnan psalms and of the age of Daniel (see Chap. XII.). But the
repeated assertion that the spirit of prophecy had departed is
a strong proof that books believed to be new were not admitted*
The treatment of the work of the son of Sirach (see p. 449) is
evidence of this. This author is acquainted with a threefold
division of the sacred books, but puts his own work on a quite
different level from them ; and his book, though highly esteemed,
was not received into the Canon. The impression given is, that
the collection of law, prophets, and other sacred books was already
old — a fact borne out by the LXX translation (see p. 449).
It is not an argument against this that Esther and Eodesiastes
NOTE TO CHAPTER I 483
were sulrjects of discussion in the schools, any more than the
existence of " disputed books " in the time of Eusebius (fourth
century a.d.) disproves that the Canon of the Kew Testament
was abeady practically fixed in the second century.
On the &cts, see, along with Driver, the works of Buhl and
Byle on the O.T. Canon, and the article ''O.T. Canon* in Diet.
qfBtHU. by Woods (roL iii).
NOTES TO CHAPTER II
NOTE A.— P. 81
THB BIBUB AND OTHER SAOBSD BOOKS
A FEW words of personal testimony may be quoted from Prof eaaor
Monier Williams on the comparison of the Soriptares with the
Sacred Books of the East : —
''When I began inyestigating Hinduism and Buddhismi I
found many beautiful gems ; nay, I met with bright coruscations
of true light flashing here and there amid the surrounding
darkness. As I prosecuted my researches into these non-
Christian systems, I began to foster a fancy that they had
been unjustly treated. I began to observe and trace out curious
coincidences and comparisons with our own sacred book of the
East. I began, in short, to be a believer in what is called the
evolution and growth of religious thought. 'These imperfect
systems,' I said to myself, ' are interesting efforts of the human
mind struggling upwards towards Christianity. Kay, it is
probable, that they were all intended to lead up to the one true
religion, and that Christianity is, after all, merely the climax,
the complement, the fulfilment of them alL'
" Now there is a delightful fascination about such a theory,
and, what is more, there are really elements of truth in it
But I am glad of this opportunity of stating publicly that I am
persuaded I was misled by its attractiveness, and that its
main idea is quite erroneous. . . • We welcome these books.
We ask every missionary to study their contents, and thank-
fully lay hold of whatsoever things are true and of good
report in them. But we warn him that there can be no greater
mistake than to force these non-Christian Bibles into conformity
with some scientific theory of development^ and then point to
the Christian's holy Bible as the crowning product of religious
evolution. So far from this, these non-Chnstian Bibles are all
484
NOTES TO CHAPTER U 485
deyelopments in ihe wrong direction. They all begin wiih some
flashes of true light, and end in ntter darkness. Pile them, if
you will, on the left side of yonr study table, but place your
own holy Bible on the right side — all by itself, all alone — and
with a wide gap between." — Quoted by Joseph Cook in Ood
in the Bible (Boston Lectures), p. 16.
Cf. Carlyle's judgment on the Koran in his Heroes^ Lect. IL
''The Hero as Prophet"; Max MtQler on the Hindu Brahmanas,
in San$mi LUerat. pp. 889£
NOTE B.— P. 45
XTTHOLOGT AND HISTOBT IN THB OLD TBSTAMENT
Bbyelation is historical, and it is a serious disserrice to religion
to depreciate the historical element in revelation, or to represent
it as immaterial to faith whether the history in the Old Testar
ment is true or legendary. Budde himself says : " God reveals
Himself not through words, but through deeds, not in speech, but
in action " {Das Alts Test, und die Ausgrahungen^ 2Dd ed., Pref.
p. 9). But if the ground is taken from the only facts we have,
what remains to yield the revelation f Is it not left in the air %
The peculiar combination witnessed in the Anglican Church
of acceptance of the results of the Wellhausen criticism with
zeal for every jot and tittle of a high patristic orthodoxy— of a
method which turns the bulk of the Old Testament history into
legend and invention, with stout defence of the historicity of
the Grospel narratives of the Virgin Birth, the Transfiguration,
and the Besurrection — ^is ono, we are convinced, foredoomed to
failure. One side or the other must give way. God, Ottley
says truly, "interposes" in miracle (Aspects 0/ O.T., p. 116; cf.
pp. 61 £f., 107 ff.). But if the actual miracles are taken away by
the narratives being regarded as late and legendary, what better ,
are we f Ottley refers, p. 108, to the " admirable remarks " on O.T.
miracle of Schultz, who had no place in his scheme for miracle
in the proper sense at all.
It is again a mistake to represent it as a matter of indifference
for the right understanding of revelation what theory we adopt
of its origins and course of development. What does it matter
how the thing came to be, it is said, if we have the result f
But in everything else it is recognised that a thing is only known
when its real history is known. Ko scientiBt would ever allow
that one account of origins is as good as another. It is a fint
486 NOTES TO CHAPTER U
principle of science that we can only understand a phenomenon
rightly when we accurately understand its antecedents and
genesis. It is this which gives its importance to the idea of
evolution. Why, among Bihlical critics themselves, the sbress
laid on getting hehind the so-called ** legends " to the real course
of the development, if not hecause it is felt that it is only when
legend is displaced hy fact that we have the true key to the
nature of the religion t But if the critic's understanding of the
history turns out to be a miranderetanding, that equally will be
a fatal obstacle to a rig^t comprehension of the result
Even legend, however, is not mjrthology, and, despite recent
attempts to revive a mjrthological interpretation of personages
and incidents in the Old Testament (see below, p. 488), there is
very general agreement that the Old Testament religion is non-
mythological This absence of mjrthology is ano^er marked
feature of contrast with other religions. We may, if we please,
speak of a tradition like that of Eden as "mythical," as otiien
may discuss whether it contains symbol or allegory. But " myth **
in this case must be distinguished from mythology proper, f.e.,
such weaving of stories about the gods in their relations to
each other and to the world as are found in other religions, and
have generally their origin in nature-phenomena (s.^^., sun-myths,
dawn-myths, myths of growth and reproduction, etc«). Vtom this
element^ as most scholars recognise, the Biblical religion seems
entirely free. See the remarln of Professor Robertson, Bofiy
Bdigion of laraek, pp. 188-9, 299. Professor Robertson quotes
from an interesting article by Mr. Andrew Lang in The New
Beview^ Aug. 1889; and also quotes Stade, Oeachiehie, i pp.
488-9. Ounkel may also be referred to, GenenB, pp. 118 & He
thinks traces of an original mythological basis are to be discovered,
but contends for the absence of mythology in the proper religioa
of IsraeL (On his theory, see below, p. 494.)
NOTE 0.— P. 50
nrapiBAnoN and thb matbrialb of tbe bxoobd
Inbpibation does not create the materials of its record, but works
with those it has received. It reveals itself in the insight it
shows into them, and in the use it makes of them. An interest-
ing illustration of this truth is furnished in a note of the old
commentator, Matthew Henry, on 1 Ghron. viiL 1-82. " As to
the difficulties,*' he says, ''that occur in this and the
NOTES TO CHAFER II 487
genealogioB we need not perplex onrselveB. I presume Eoa took
them as he found them in the books of the kings of Israd and
Judah (chap. ix. 1), according as they were given in by the
several tribes, each observing what method they thought fit
Hence some oacend, others c^Mcend }^ some have numben affixed,
others places ; some have historical remarks intermixed, others
have not; some are shorter, others longer; some agree with
other records, others differ; some, it is likely, were torn, erased,
and blotted, others more legible. Those of Dan and Beuben
weie entirely lost This holy man wrote as he was moved of
the Holy Ghost ; but there was no necessity for the making up
of the defects, no, nor for the rectifying of the mistakes of these
genealogies by inspiration. It was sufficient that he copied them
out as they came to hand, or so much of them as was requisite
to the present purpose, which was the directing of the returned
captives to settle as nearly as they could with those of their own
family, and in the places of their former readenct,"
NOTE TO CHAPTER III
NOTE A ^P. 59
ORITIGAL EXTBAYAOANOEB
In the Nineteerdh Century for December 1902, Canon Gheyne
commends to English readers the speculations of the latest school
of Biblical critics, according to which the Jewish literature is
largely a borrowed mythology. According to Dr. H. Winckler,
who represents this school, not only are Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob legendary heroes, whose histories are derived from astronom-
ical myths, but something similar must be said of Saul, David,
and Solomon. David, he holds, is a solar hero ; his red hair is
the image of the rays of the sun; and, if Saul and Jonathan
correspond to the constellation Gemini, David is the legendary
reflection of Leo, while Goliath corresponds to Orion. The
Canon chides the English ** sobriety " and '' moderation ^ which
rejects these fantasies I
Winckler's views are expounded in his new edition of
Schrader's work. The Cuneiform Inscriptions and the Old
Testament (1902) ; and are trenchantly dealt with by Budde in
his printed address. Das AUe Testament und die Ausgrabung^m
(1903). The real originator of the theory is K Stucken, in
his work Astralmythen der Hebrder, Babylonier und Xgypter
(vols. L Abraham, 1896; iL Lot, 1897; iii. Jacob, 1901;
iv. Esau, 1901). Abraham is the Moon-god, Lot the Sun,
Sarah is Ishtar, etc
This 'Mimitless Panbabylonianism," as Budde calls it, has
many modern developments. An instance is afforded in
Wildeboer's recent Commentary on Esther. The Book of Esther,
it appears, goes back for its basis to Babylonia and Elam.
Wildeboer gives the credit of the " solution " of the problem to
Jensen, wlio tb\is explains : '' Esther reminds us of Ishtar ;
Mordecai of Marduk. Esther b the cousin of Mordecai, as Ishtar
418
NOTE TO CHAPTER III 489
probably of Marduk. For the latter is a son of la, while Ishtar
is a daughter of AnxL But Anu, Bil, and la are presumably
yiewed as brothers. . . . Hainan reminds us of Humman (Homman),
the national god of the Elamites ; Yasti of Masti or Yasti of
the Elamite inscriptions — ^the name of a divinity with the
attribute Zana. . . . The history that underlies the story of
Esther must have dealt with a defeat of the Elamites or of an
Elamite king. So much appears certain ''1 (CI Eocpontory
Times, August 1898.)
In other directions, as in Canon Cheyne's own speculations
on ^'Jerahmeel'' in Eneydop. Bihliea and Oritica BiblicOy the
same tendency to extravagance displays itself. Commenting on
the theory. Professor J. Robertson says : " The * last word ' of this
criticism is Jerahmeel, which, being interpreted, means * Ood pity *
mbX** (Address, 16th April 1902). A last example maybe taken
from Siegfried's work on Ecclesiastes (Qoheleth), giving us the
latest theory of that portion of Scripture. The sagacity of the
critic has split the book up into its diverse elements. First, there
is the primitive author of the book, Q^, a Jew whose faith has
suffered shipwreck. He is improved on by Q', an Epicurean
Sadducee, who glorifies eating and drinking. Another glossator,
Q*, resented the depreciation of wisdom, and added a number of
passages which are enumerated. Still sharper opposition to the
denial of divine providence called forth Q^, one of the early
Phansees. This is not all, for thero is yet a number of others,
who are conveniently slumped under Q^ As to dates, Q^ may
have written shortly before 200 B.a ; Q^ Q^ Q^, Q^ at various
times down to 100 B.a The fact that one &ids all this retailed
with due gravity by author and learned reviewers suggests the
question whether the sense of humour is not becoming extinct—
at least in the department of criticism.
NOTES TO CHAPTER IV
NOTE A— P. 91
kSnio on the pbbsonifioation thsobt
A WMW sentences from KSnig^s discussion in his N&uetie Prineipiem
may not be ont of place. '^ParaHels," he says, "have again been
sought in features of the Greek and of the Israelitish traditton
(Seinecke^ CJomill). Speciallj it has been recalled that Qreek
tradition attributed to Lycurgus two sons^ Eunomus and
Euoosmus, f.s., Law and Order. . . . But is this a sufficient
basis for the conclusion that Ishmael and Isaac have in like
manner been ascribed to Abraham f What a difference there is
between the two pairs of names ! The Greek pair, Eunomus and
Eucoemus clearly represent personifications of ideas and of the
results achieved by the great lawgiver. . . . The two names
Ishmael and Isaac cannot be referred to any such design. . . .
How, if in the two names Ishmael and Isaac such personifications
lie before us, could all the particular traits be derived which are
related with respect to Ishmael and Isaac t Were there also
families in Sparta that claimed descent from Eunomus and
Eucosmus t
** It is further argued that the Hellenes traced their origin to a
tribal ancestor Hellen, who had two sons, Mohm and Dorus, and
two grandsons, Achaus and Ion. I willingly concede that 'it
will occur to no one to see in the bearers of these names individual
persons.' . . . [But] to draw a parallel between these Greek
names and the tribal fathers of Israel is a very hazardous opera-
tion. Have we any such histories of Hellen and the other four
names as Genesis contains about the tribal fathers of Israel!*
(pp. 42, 43).
One might remark also on the vague and fluctuating notices
of the supposititious Eunomus and Eucosmus. Eunomus, €.g,, is
generally given as the fafher of Lycurgus.
490
NOTES TO CHAPTER IV 491
NOTE B.— P. 100
VHS OOYBNANT WITH I8RAIL
KAtnnsoH has yaluable remarks on this subject In his art in
" The BeHgion of Israel" in Did. of BiiU (Eztia YoL p. 6S1).
He says :
''In all the Pentatenchal sotuceSy without exception, there is
a uniform tradition to the effect that the central place amongst
the incidents at Sinai is occupied by the concluding of a herith,
commonly rendered Covenant. ... Is all this now to be set
down as fiction, a carrying back of much later theological con-
ceptions and terminology, to a time for which no real tradition was
any longer extant f This is a view to which the present writer
cannot assent^ having regard to either extemij^ or internal
evidence."
After summarising historical evidence^ he proceeds: "Would
all this be conceivable, if the proclamation of Jahweh as the Ood
of Israel — the founding of the Jahweh religion — ^had taken place,
so to speak, fortuitously, by the incidental passing of the name
' Jahweh ' from mouth to mouth f Instead of any theory of this
kind, we get the strongest impression that the further develop-
ment of the religion of Israel during the period of the Judges
and of the monarchy was the result of some occurrence of a
fundamental kind of whose solemnity and binding force and
character the whole nation retained a lively recollection. And
this occurrence can have been nothiag but the solemn pro-
claiming of the God who had manifested Hifnself in wondroua
ways as the Helper and Deliverer of the people upon a definite
occasion, and in the binding of the people to do His will, and
to worship Him alone. Every one of the numerous allusions
(whether in the Pentateuchai sources, the Prophets, or the
Psalms) to the mighty acts of Jahweh at the Exodus, how with
a strong hand and a stretched out arm He brought the hosts of
Israel out of the house of bondage, held back the waves of the
Bed Sea from Israel, but plunged the chariots and horsemen of
Pharaoh into the waters, — every one of these allusions is at the
same time an allusion to the days of Sinai, when for the first
time these mighty acts of Jahweh were brought to the conscious-
ness of the people in their true greatness, and extolled accordingly,
and made the occasion of a solemn confession of Jahweh as the
Ood of Israel, and the solemn binding of the people to do His
wilL" Cf. also Giesebrecht on Die OesehichtHehksU dss Stnat^
bwidss.
492 NOTES TO CHAPTER IV
NOTE a— P. 104
fl!HI0BIS9 OF THS BZ0DXJ8
This Ib how Yon Bohlen dispoees of the Exodus: ''Here rin
Egypt], during the four following centuries, which the popular
traditions pass over with a prudent silence, the Hebrew family
increased into so powerful a nation, that they entered the field as
conquerors, and succeeded at length in establishing themselyee
among the native tribes of Palestine" {Oenesia, L p. 16).
Kuenen accords to Manetho's story of the expulsion of the
lepers a credence he is unwilling to give to the narrative in
Exodus, and thinks that the Israelites got help from the Hyksos.
''The Book of Exodus does not mention the aid given by the
Hyksos. . . .^But a few slight touches furnish us with proof
that the Israelites were supported by the nomadic tribes of
Arabia, that is to say by the Hyksos. . . . We may surely take
it for granted that the Israelites themselves were not passive
spectatora of the struggle [between Jahweh and the gods of
Egypt] ; that a conspiracy was formed among them ; that others
besides Moses and Aaron played a part in it But with regard to
all this the Book of Exodus is silent or confines itself to a few
hinte" (Bd. of Israel, i. pp. 120-21, 124). Of the Bed Sea
deliverance : " What actually took place there we do not know*
It is undoubtedly founded on fact. But it is veiy difficult to dis-
tinguish the actual circumstances of the occurrence from poetical
embellishments. We will not risk the attempt" {Ibid, p. 126).
Stade allows no value to the history in Exodus, and denies
that Israel as a people came up out of Egypt But something, he
grants, must have given occasion to tiie story. "It is very
possible that a part of those Hebrew tribes which afterwards
coalesced into the people of Israel, passing into Egypt^ lived
there, and fell under bondage to the Egyptians. With ^e aid of
the related nomadic tribes inhabiting the Sinaitio peninsula
outside the kingdom of Egypt^ they may have fought their way
to freedom under Moses" (Oeichiehte, 1887, pp. 129-30). In
the 1881 edition of his OesehichU, Stade is even more emphatic.
"If any Hebrew clan," he says, "once dwelt in £^ypt^ no one
knows its name" (p. 129).
Colenso adopts Kuenen's theories as "very probably the
basis upon which the Scripture story of the Ebcodus has been
founded." " No doubt," he says, " the Israelites on their march
to Canaan experienced formidable difficulties, perhaps in crossing
an arm of the Red Sea, and certainly in their passage through
NOTES TO CHAPTER IV 493
the wildemesg — the leminiBcencee of which may have been
handed down from age to age, and given rise to some of the
miracnlotiB stories in the narrative, while others are merely the
zesnlt of the natural growth of legendary matter, or are due to
the inventive genius of the writer or writers " (PerU. vL p. 601).
Budde accepts the Exodus by the help of God as an
incontestable truth, on the strength of IsraeFs own self -consciouB-
nesa. "All that can be considered doubtful is whether it was
the whole people of Israel that fell under the Egyptian bondage,
or Joseph alone (that is to say, the tribes of Ephraim and
Manasseh, including Benjamin) '' (Bd. of laraelf p. 10). No light
is thrown on the how of the deliverance which, in the tradition,
naturally " bears the stamp of miracle ** (p. 13).
See summary of WeUhausen's views in Bennett's art '* Moses "
in Diet. 0/ Bible, m. p. 445.
KOTE D.— P. 106
PATBTABOHATi GHBOlTOLOaT
Ebpioial exception is taken by Dr. Driver to the patriarchal
chronology "as it stands." One example may be given* Li an
article in the Chniemporary Review ^vii. p. 221), he instances as
a chronological impossibility in the life of Isaac that^ " according
to the chronology of the Book of (Genesis, he [Isaac] must have
been lying on his deathbed for eighty years." This, however,
supposes &at Isaac, at the blessing of Jacob and Esau (Oen. xxviL)
was only a hundred years old, and not, as ordinarily assumed, and
as the remaining data combine to show, a hundred and thirty-nine
(of. Oen. xli 46 ; xlv. 6 ; xlviL 9, etc.). Neither was he on his
''deathbed" all this while. The objection is an old one (Yon
Bohlen, etc^, and has frequently been replied to. On any
hypothesis, if Isaac did not die till after Jacob's return from
Mesopotamia (Oen. xxxv.), a long period must have elapsed between
the blessing and his death.
If the patriarchs were real persons, their lives span the
interval between the age of Hammurabi and the time of the
descent into Egypt ; with four hundred and thirty years added,
we get the intervid from Abraham to the Exodus (see p. 422). The
lives of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacobs must therefore have been as
long as the narrative represents. This cannot be pronounced
" impossible," since, even in modem times, instances of extreme
longevity, though rare, are still found. It would be wrong, how-
494 NOTES TO CHAPTER IV
eyer, to iraaflpoee oar modem conditions into times to which, prob-
ably, they did not apply. In Egypt, according to the authorities, a
hundred and ten yeais was regarded as the nnmber of a perfect life
rcf. Ebers, art ''Joseph" in Smith's Did. of Bible, L, 2nd ed.
(1893) p. 1804 ; Yigonronx, La Bible et U$ DScouvertee Modemes,
iL p. 182 ; Tomkins, Life and Times of Joseph, pp. 78, 135, etc).
According to some, the yenerable mortdist Ptah-hotep, of the fifth
dynasty (see below, p. 897), claims to be already tiiat age when
he wrote Ida book (Biroh, Egypt, p. 50 ; Tomkins, p. 135, etc).
Viis was the age of Joseph at his death (Oen. 1. 26).
On some striking modem instances of longevity, see Tomkins,
Joseph, pp. 77-8, and the list might readily be extended. Cf.
also Bensoh, Nature and the Bible, ii. p. 249.
NOTE K— P. 112
OTTVKIL's THIOBT of patriarchal HISTOSr
Ounkxl's own theory of the patriarchal history, it must be
allowed, is not less arbitrary and untenable than any which he
criticises. The ^'legends" which, according to him, compose the
Book of (Genesis, he holds to be no peculiar product of Israel, but
to be derived in the main from Babylonian and Canaanitish
sources. They originated separately, he thinks, wero long sung
or recited, and were finally written down singly ; only gradually
they coalesced, and became gathered round leading personages as
we find them. The theory might be described as an explanation
of the patriarchal history on the ancient principle of a fortuitous
concourse of atoms. To the analysis of verses he adds analysis of
personalities. The different names of Gh>d — Elohim, El-Shaddai,
Jahweh — denote originally different gods. Jacob and Israel are
different legendary persons. Noah is composed out of three
originally distinct figures; Gain originally out of three, etc.
Still the stories, he holds, are very old ; the legend-formation was
completed by the latter days of tiie Judges (e. 1200 B.a). See
his Die Sagen der Chnesis (Introd. to Commentary), pcusim.
What one fails to find is any explanation of how the monotheism
which is recognised as present in Genesis came to be developed
out of these casually coalescing legends, or any perception of the
deeper ideas in the Genesis narratives, or of their organic relation
with the rest of Scripture. In this respect Gunkel stands behind
many of those whom he criticises. On the other hand, with all
bis Babylonian leanings, he writes vigorously in his Istxul wnd
NOTES TO CHAPTER IV 495
Babylonien on behalf of the independence of the religioua
conceptions of Israel, as against Fried. Delitzsoh and others of
that tendency.
NOTE P.— P. 114
THl NAlll JXHOYAH Of THB FATBIABOHAL AOS
It seems to ns, apart from doubtful Babylonian speenlations
(see above, p. 409), that there are preponderating reasons for
regarding Jehovah (Tahweh) as really a very old personal name
of Qod in the patriarchal families. The J writer uses it freely,
but is far from putting it indiscriminately into the mouths of the
characters of his story. In Qen. iii, B.g.9 ''Elohim " is employed
in conversation. In Oen. iz. 26, we have the compound form,
*' Jehovah, Elohim of Shem" (cf. Gen. xiv. 22; and the similar
forms in chap. zxiv. S, 7, 12, 27, etc«). In Oen. zv. 2, 8,
Abraham addresses Qod as *'Adonai Jehovah,'' and in his
intercession for Sodom as ** Adonai " (chap, zviii 27, 31, 32). In
the middle chapters (zziv.-xxxiv.) ''Jehovah " occurs frequently
in connection with Laban, Isaac, Bebekah, Jacob, Bachel, etc
From chap. zxzv. to the end of the book it practically disappears
in speech (an instance in Jacob's blessing, chap. zlix. 18). It may
have become disused in Egypt See further on the antiquity of
this divine name, p. 497 below; and on the usage of the name,
cbap. viL pp. 221 &
NOTES TO CHAPTER V
NOTE A ^P. 128
XABLT IDSAS OF GOD
Hah's earliest ideas of Grod weie not^ as is commonlj assumed,
his poorest There is really no proof that man's religions history
hegan with fetishism, ghost-worship, totemism, or any of the
other superstitions with which "primitive religion" is nsoally
identified. Fetishism is admitted hy the hest anthropologists to
he a '^ degeneration " of religion, and an ahundance of anthro-
pological testimony could be adduced against the sufficiency of
each of the other theories in turn. No savage tribes are found
who do not seem to have higher ideas of God along with their
superstitions (cf . A. Lang's Making of Bdiffion), Man does not
creep up from fetishism, through polytheism, to monotheism,
but polytheism represents rather the refraction of an original
undifferentiated sense, or consciousness, or perception, of the
divine (cf. Bom. L 19-23).
In bistorical religions, accordingly, the general law, enunciated
by Principal Fairbaun, holds good : " the younger the polytheism,
the fewer its gods " (Studies in Phil of Bd. p. 22). In the
oldest religions, without exception, along with the polytheism,
we find a monotheistic background.
The oldest texts in £^ypt express a monotheistic belief
(cf. Benouf, BeL of Egypt, pp. 90-91 ; Budge, Egyptian Bdigum,
chap. L).
The Babylonian religion, it is coming to be generally admitted,
had a monotheistic strain (cf. Winckler, above, p. 409). The
discovery of the Code of Hammurabi; (cf. above, p. 410) haa
strengthened that belief. '* The position of Hu as supreme God,
at least in the ideas of Hammurabi," writes C. H. W. Johns, " is
certain, despite recent dicta that there is no trace of a supreme
El in Babylonia" {Eoqpo: Times, March 1903, p. 258).
406
NOTES TO CHAPTER V 497
ZQEoastrianiBm was formally dnaliatic, bat in the devatlon of
its idea of Ahuia-Maasda it approached, if it did not actually
attdn, a form of practical monotheism (ef. Eaopo$. Time$, Jan.
1905, pp. 185 fL).
Yedism had few gods, while later Hinduism has an incalcul-
able nnmber. Behind ike Yedic polytheism there stands the
name for Qod common to all branches of the Aryan family (Deva
-■Zens "■Dens), and the proper name of one Grod (Dyans Pitar
-i Zens Pater).
* China from the oldest times knew and reverenced Shang-ti,
the Supreme God, or Tien, Heaven (ef. Legge^ Bdigiom of
China),
The monotheistio strain in Oreece and Borne was never lost^
and comes out in the early simpler forms of belief and worship^
in the mysteries, in the dramatists and sages, in later Stoical and
Platonic teaching.
Behind the Arabian idolatry of Mohammed's time was the
conception of Allah (cf. Hommel, Ano. Heb, Trad. p. 292;
cf. pp. 82, 88). [
'Die idea Uiat the conception of one Gh>d was too lofty for the
Israelites to have attained i^ even through revelation, must there-
fore be abandoned as untenable. In Hommel's words: "It
becomes clearer every day that the Semites — and more particularly
the Western Semites — had from the beginning a much purer
conception of the Deity than was possessed by any of the other
races of antiquity, such as the Sumerians or Aryans'' {IbkL ppi
292, S08-10X
NOTE B.— P. 129
AimQUITT or THB NAME JXHOVAH
Thb following are a few indications of opinions of eritios as to a
pre-Mosaic use of the name Jehovah (Yahweh).
Kuenen says: "Moses can hardly be supposed to have
inoented the name * Yahweh ' ; in all probability it was already
in use, among however limited a circle" (BeL of Itrad^ L pp.
279-80).
Wellhausen says : *^ Jehovah is to be regarded as having been
originally a family or tribal god(f), either of the family to which
Moses belonged, or of the tribe of Joseph " {H%$t. of Israel^ p. 433).
Schults says :" It is in itself more likely that such a name
was not invented, but simply found by Moses" (0.2*. TheoL ii
p. 137).
32
498 NOTES TO CHAPTER V
Driver says : " The total absence of proper names compounded
with Tahweh in the patriarchal period makes it probable that^
though not absolutely new in Moses' time, it was still corrent
preyiously only in a limited circle, — possibly, as has been
suggested, in the family of Moses" (Osnem, p. xiz; d pp. xlru
and xlix, and references).
Many now trace the name back as far as Babylonia. CI
Driver, p. xlix, and see above, p. 409. The one thing not proved
is that it ever denoted in Israel a merely tribal god.
NOTE a— P. 139
PB0FB80B W. B. BMITH'B THKOBT OF SAOBIVIOI
This ingenious scholar develops lus theory of the totem-origin
of sacrifice in his Religion of the Semites (of. especially pp.
247, 257, 262-4, 266-7, 269, 271, 277). The theory resembles
some others in connecting the sacrifice with the idea of food for
the gods (pp. 207, 218), but it works from a dififerent basis, and
gives the act of iuuuifice a different interpretation. (1) The god,
in this theory, is conceived of as an animal, from whom the
clan derives its descent (p. 425). (2) The primitive mind, it is
assumed, does not distinguish accurately between gods, men, and
animals. The god, the members of the clan, and the animals of
the sacred species, are all viewed as of one blood or stock, or as
embraced in the bond of kinship (p. 269). (3) The form in
which kinship is declared, and the bond of fellowship sealed, is a
feaet (pp. 247, 257). (4) The peculiarity of the religioue feast,
however, is that in it an animal is sacrificed (p. 262). As Dr.
Smith says: ''A religious banquet implies a victim • • • the
slaughter of a victim must have been in early times the only
thing that brought the clan together for a sacred meal " (p. 262).
Conversely : ** Every slaughter was a clan sacrifice, f.s., a domestic
animal was not slain except to procure the material for a puUie
meal of kinsmen" (p. 263). (5) The last point is, that the fact
that the slaughter of such an animal was sanctioned for a religious
feast implies that it was a sacred, or totem, animal, and itself
belonged to the circle of kinship.
It is difficult to criticise a theory which reste so much on
hypothetical construction, and seems opposed to all the real
evidence we possess as to the Semitic ideas of the gods, and
their relation to their worshippers. It will need much stronger
evidence to convince us that the Semite peoples generally passed
NOTES TO CHAPTER V 499
ihiough a totem stage, and that the Ood of Israel was originally
a totem-deity, of ammal form, whose blood the tribes of Israel
were supposed to share. It is anything bat proved that the
early Semites knew nothing, as this theory asserts, of domestic,
but only of clan life ; that they knew nothing of individual and
domestic sacrifices (Abel, Noah, Abraham) ; that gods, animals,
and men, were at first all held to be of common kini^p ; that
<< unclean animals" were totem animals, f.s., those whose life was
sacred, with many more assumptions.
But^ to keep to the one point of sacrifice, it is pertinent to
ask — ^Where is the proof that the animals sacrificed had this
character of totems! (1) They were not *^ unclean" animals;
on the contrary, only "dean" animals were permitted.
(2) The victims were not confined to one class or species of
animals, as on the totem-theory seems necessary. Sheep, goats,
calves, bulls, pigeons, were all used as sacrifice ; but plainly all
could not be totems. Besides, how came many distinct tribes to
have one totem t (3) Why should the totem -animal, of all
creatures, be sacrificed t Ought not the principle of kinship to
have protected it t How should the god, or clansmen, be supposed
to find satisfaction in feeding on the flesh of one of their own
stock! The closer the bond of kinship is drawn, the greater
becomes the difficulty. (4) As explaining sacrifice in Israel, the
theory takes no account of those ideas on which the ritual of
sacrifice rests in this religion, which are as unique as everything
else about it. It gives no help to the explaining of the expiatory
or propitiatory aspect of the Jewish sacrifices, in which the
peculiar virtue of these sacrifices was believed to consist. The
theory seems to us to be baseless in itself, and to break down
whtnever tests from evidence can bo applied to it
NOTE D.— P. 141
BAGBIFiaB OT OHILDBBN IN GANAAV
Thi recent excavations at Gezer in Palestine afibrd the most
interesting illustrations yet obtained of the sacrifice of children
in Canaan. The site of Oezer was identified in 1871, and ex-
cavations were commenced by the Palestinian Exploration Fund
in 1902, imder the charge of Professor Macalister, of Cambridge.
The result has been that seven ancient cities have been imearthed,
one below the other till the last foundations have been reached.
The city, as historical notices also prove, is one of the most
500 NOTES TO CHAPTER Y
andent in Canaan. Its earliest inhabitants were caye-dweUers
of the neolithic age. After them came the Semitic Amorites,
about 2500 B.a, scarabs of the eleyenth dynasty of Egypt being
found among the remains. These were dupossessed about 1700
B.a by a second Semitic race — the Canaanites of the Tel el-
Amama letters and of the Old Testament The Israelites
conquered Qezer under Joshua, but could not keep it, and
remained there mingled with the Canaanites till the time of
Solomon (Josh, xvi 10). About 950 B.a the city was conquered
and burnt by the king of Egypt, and presented to Solomon's
wife (1 Kings ix. 16). It was rebuilt by Solomon (yer. 17).
The excavations bring to light painful testimony of the
custom of sacrifice of children. In tiie Amorite period (2500-
1700 B.a), the ground beneath the "high place" of the city
was found to be filled with large earthen jars containing the
bones of newborn infants. They were evidently '* firstborns"
who had been sacrificed to Astarte. Similar jars containing the
remains of infants were f oond beneath the walls of houses. The
sacrifice in this case was to secure good luck when a new building
was erected. This illustrates the statement in 1 Kings xvi S4
about the action of Kiel the Bethelite at his refounding of Jericha
The contrast in the religion of Israel is seen in the fact that
firstborns were to be dedicated to Jehovah (Ex. xxiL 29). The
practices above noted continue during the Canaanite period,
though lamps and bowls begin to be used as a substitute for
human sacrifice. After the Israelitish occupation of Canaan the
traces of infant sacrifice still further decline, though, as a
Canaanitish city, Grezer is still marked by this abomination.
Latterly the lamp and bowl deposits take its place. There is
nothing whatever in all this to implicate the Israelitish religion
in sacrifice of children. (See publications of the Palestinian
Exploration Fund, and an interesting article by Professor Lewis
Bayles Paton, Ph.D., Hartford, Director of the American School
of Oriental Besearch in Palestine, in the HomiUHe Smnew,
Dec. 1904.)
NOTE E— P. US
B. P. suns ON THB BRAZBN SSBPSffV
Thb remarks of this author on Hezekiah's destruction of Ae
brazela serpent of Moses (2 Kings xviii. 4) deserve quotation as
an illustration of critical methods : —
''The clause which Moses made refers to a well-known narra-
NOTES TO CHAPTER V 501
tiye in the account of the wildemess wandering. Here ve lead
that the people were bitten bj seipenta. Moees is therefore
commanded to make a copper serpent* and ndae it npon a pole.
Whoeyer is bitten and looks at the serpent is healed. It mnst
be clear that we have here a snrviyal from the primitiye totemism
of Israel. • • •
*' Why Moses should have made snoh an image for a people
notoriously prone to idolatry is a question that need not be
discussed. How such an image, if made by Moses, came into the
temple is also difficult to conceiye. We are tempted, therefore,
to suppose the words whUh Mosea made a later addition to the
narrative and not the expression of Hesekiah's belief or of the
belief of his contemporaries. In that case we must treat the
Nehushtan as a veritable idol of the house of Israel, which had
been worshipped in the temple from the time of its erection.
Serpent-worship is so widespread that we should be surmised
not to find traces of it in Israel. We know of a Serpent's Stone
near Jerusalem which was the site of a sanctuary (1 Kings L 9),
and this sanctuary was dedicated to Yahweh. This parallel
makes us conclude that the copper serpent of the temple was also
a symbol of Yahweh. If this be so, it may be attributed to Moses,
though in a different way from that taken by the Hebrew author ;
for Yahweh was introduced to Israel by Moses. Probably the
serpent was thought to be a congenial symbol of the god of the
lightning — and that in the desert days Yahweh was the god of
the lightning, or of the thunderstorm, seems well made out" —
Eia. of O.T. pp. 239-40. One does not know whether to
marvel most at tiie logic of this passage, or at the gnnmd$ of the
reasoning.
NOTE P.— P. 144
niUJCANN ON IXAOR-WOBSHIP
Thi following statement from Dr. Dillmann {Exod.~Leio. pp.
208-9) may be compared with those of Kautzsch and others
about image-worship in Israel : —
'*It cannot with good reason be maintained that such a
prohibition involving tiie idea of the possibility of making any
representation of God, as well as His invisibility and spirituality,
is too advanced for Moses' time, and his stage of knowledge, and
therefore cannot have been given by him, but must have been
just introduced into the DecaJogue at a much later date. Apart
from Ex. mrii., where the narrative attributes to Moses a dear
S03 NOTES TO CHAPTER V
perception of the tmkwfnlness of an image of Jehoyaby It is
certain, in the first place, that in the traditions of their fathers
a cnltns without images is ascrihed to the patriarchs; and,
secondly, that in the post-Mosaic period, it was a recognised
principle^ at least at the central sanctnazy of the entire people^
and at the temple of Solomon, that no representation was to be
made of Jehovah. The worship of the image of Jehovah at
Sinai (Ez. zxxii.), in the time of the judges, and in the kingdom
of the ten tribes, does not prove that the prohibition of images
was unknown, but only that it was very difficult to secure its
proper recognition by the mass of the people, especially of the
northern tnbes, who were more Canaanitishly disposed. Or
rather, it was for centuries an object of contention between the
strict^ and more lax party, — ^the latter holding that it forbade
only the images of false gods, the former that it likewise forbade
any image of Jehovah. Prophets such as Amos and Hosea, who
contended against the images of the calves, at Bethel and at Dan,
never announced the principle that no representation can be
made of Jehovah as anything new, but simply presupposed it as
known. However far we go bacdc in the post-Mosaic history,
we find it already existing, at least as piacticaUy carried into
effect at the central sanctuary; from whom then can it have
proceeded but from the legislator. Mioses himself t*
NOTES TO CHAPTER VI
NOTE A.— p. 158
OBJSOnONB TO MOSAIC OBiaiN OF DSOALOOUl
Tbb following IB a brief Bummazy of objectionB to the Decalogue
from Addis {Doe9, of Hex, L pp. 139-40j: —
*'It muflt have arisen long after the Israelites had passed
from a nomad to a settled life. • • • The sabbath implies the
settled life of agriculture. . . . Moreover, if the second 'word'
be an integral pifft of the whole, the Decalogue must have arisen
after the worship of Yahweh in the form of an oz was considered
unlawful To this mode of worship neither El^ah nor Elisha
seems to haye made any objection ft], and it is very doubtful
whether any protest was made agamst it before the reiterated
and energetics protest of Hosea. We may then conjecture that
the Decalogue arose in the eighth, or perhaps the seventh century
before Christ"
See in reply to this representation the statement by Dillmann
in previous note, p. 501.
NOTE R— P. 175
THB fOBOB OF BZODUB ZZ. 94
Am stated in the text. Professor W. B. Smith seems to Insist, in
opposition to Dr. W. H. Oreen, that Ex. zz. 24 can only bear
the meaning '*in all places," in the sense of a number of co-
ezistent sanctuaries {PrapJieU, p. 394). To this Pkofessor Oreen
replies : —
''The coUectiye use of the noun in such a construeUon is not
denied. But attention is called to the significant drcumstanoe
that where the conception is that of a coezisting plurality, ' all
504 NOTES TO CHAPTER VI
the placefl ' is expressed in Hebrew by the plural noim («.^.y Denl
xiL 2 ; 1 Sam. viL 16 ; zzz. 31 ; Ezra L 4 ; Jer. viil 3 ; zxiv. 9 ;
zzix. 14 ; xL 12 ; xlr. 5 ; Ezek. xzziy. 12) ; while in the other
two passages in which the phrase is used with a singular noun,
the reference is not to places viewed jointly, but regarded
successively (Oen. xx. 13; Deut. xL 24). The words are used
in a different sense, Gen. xviiL 26 " {Mo9e$ and Ptophst^^ p. 811).
NOTE C— P. 179
IBBXDOM UNDSB THB LAW
It is a mistake to regard the Law as a rigid, inflexible system,
which admitted of no modification of development in detaOs to
suit circumstances (thus W. B. Smith represents *' the traditional
view/' O.T. in J. C, pp. 227-8^. The law was made for man, not
man for the law, and the spirit at all times, in the eyes of God,
was above the letter (1 Sam. xv. 22). The psalmist most devoted
to the law "walked at liberty'' under it QPs. cxix. 45). There
was within the law abundant scope for development, and the
letter of the law itself could, where necessary, give place to the
spirit. Thus, the law for the age of service for the Levites was
modified (if the same kind of service was intended) from thirty
years to twenty-five (Num. iv. 23, 30, 35 ; viiL 24) ; and David
again modified it to twenty (1 Chron. xxiiL 24, 27). In Num.
ix. 6-12 a second passover was allowed for those who were unclean
or absent at the proper time. The shewbread at Nob (1 Sam.
xxL 1-6) was, as Christ points out (Matt xiL 3-7), given under
necessity to David and his men, though it was not lawful for
any but priests to eat of it In the observance of Hezekiah's
passover we have repeated infractions of the letter of the law —
noted, too^ in Chronicles (2 Chron. xxix. 34; xxx. 17, 19).
NOTE D.— P. 182
THB OSNXALOQT OF XADOK
On the genealogy of Zadok see 1 Chron. vL 8, 58; xxiv. 3;
xxvii. 17. Wellhausen denies to Zadok, however, an Aaronie,
not to say Levitical descent {Hist, of leradf pp. 126-43). His
NOTES TO CHAPTER VI 505
oonntor-theoiy is that Zadok was no Aaronite, but thati after the
setting aside of the honse of Mi, there came in a new hereditary
priesthood at Jerosalem — "at first paryenus and afterwards the
most legitimate o| the legitimate," and that the derivation of
Zadok ^m Aaron in 1 Chronicles is a fiction aiming at the
legitimising of the newcomers. This constmction Dditesch
characterises as '*a mannfactore of history (OeschiehtemacTterei)
which builds houses on deceitful fancies " (Luthardfs ZeiUehrift,
1880, p. 284). Cf. Kitted Hiei. of Hebs. L pi 124; iL p. 182 ;
Van Hoonacker, Sacerdoee LMUguey pp. 166 £
NOTE E.— P. 184
BATID'a SONS A8 FRUBSn
Thi meaning of the term "priest" in the three passages cited is
obscure. Delitssch says : " Only crass self-deception can under-
stand it of sacrificing priests, who have been mentioned just
before" (Luthardt's ZeU96krift^ 1880, p. 63). The common
view that "priest" is used here in some secondary or honorary
sense of royd officials (Ewald, Delitzsch, Klostermann, Baudissin,
Mbyersy etc.; S.Y. marg.\ is supported by the parallel
passage, 1 Chron. xyiii 17, which need not be set down to the
motiye of recognising none but Aaronic priests, but must
represent a general way of understanding the expression, and
by the LXX. Dr. Driyer, howeyer, positively rejects such
explanation (NcU$ on Samuel^ pp. 219-20, 293-4; so the
Wellhausen school generally) ; and there are certainly difficulties
ia proving this exceptional use. It is a case in wUch, as Van
Hoonacker argues, there is some ground (at least as regards
David's sons) for suspecting the text Inspection will show that
the four passages, 2 Sam. viii. 16-18; xx. 23-26; 1 Kings iv.
2-6; 1 Chron. xviii 15-18, are closely related: represent^ in
fact, the same list, with some changes of names under Solomon,
fiut it is also evident that there is some confusion and corruption
ia the copying. The order is not always the same : " Ahimelech
the son of Abiathar" in 2 Sam. viii 17 (and 1 Chron.) stands
for " Abiathar the son of Ahimelech " ; and ver. 18, in which the
words " David's sons " occur, is in other respects admittedly corrupt
(it reads, "Benaiah the son of Jehoiada, and the Cherethitee
and the Pelethites "). There is nothing about "David's sons"
in the corresponding passage in chap, xx., but instead, "And Ira
5o6 NOTES -I'O CHAPTER VI
also the Jairite was priest unto David'* (cf. ''Zabud the son of
Nathan was priest'* in I Kings iv. 5V In the transpositions
of the text, words or names may nave dropped out or got
changed, or "David's sons" may be a corruption of other words
altogether. This, of course, cannot be proved either.
NOTES TO CHAPTER VII
NOTE A.— P. 200
TBM WBJhCOnWMKOM OF OBITiai
Dmnrai speaks somewhere of *' the omnipotenoe which xesides
in the ink A a G^erman scholar"; and noiliing strikes one more
in the recent liteifttore of criticism than the unbounded confidence
with which the most disputable statements are made. Our pages
are full of illustrations. The peremptoriness of Wellhausen is
prorerbiaL E.g,, the Levitical cities are '^denunuirMy a
metamorphosiB of the old Bamcih (high places) ** {HitL of ImuH^
p. S^. '''House of Grod' is never anything but the house of
an image" (p. 130). The trick of style is one easily learned, and
has infected not a little of our own critical writing. It is not
dear, howevery why this peremptory tone should be affected in
cases where tiie critics manifestly disagree among themsdyes.
We may take one example from so useful a book as Byle's Oantm
of the Old TeitammL The author begins with the general state-
ment: ''Analysis of the Pentateuch ha$ thown eondmtivdy that
numerous collections of Israelite laws were made at different
times," etc (p. 22). After mention of the Decalogue and Book of
the Gorenant: "Another ancient^ and very distinct collection of
laws is incorporated in the section which has been called by
scholars 'The Law of Holiness' (Lev. xrii-zxyL). • • • It is a
fact^ which no tchdUsn haoe ventured to diepute^ that these
chapters contain extensiye excerpts from a collection of laws
whose fleneral character must ha^e closely resembled the Book
of the Coyenant, differing only from it in subject-matter so far
as it is occupied more generally with ceremonial than with civil
regulations'' (pp. 25-6). "Ezekiel shows unrnieUMUe signs of
acquaintance with a collection of Priestly Laws that we can
oertairUy identify " (p. 72). We agree (see pp. 808 ff ) ; but leading
critical sebolars do energetically dispute both these propositions.
•or
So8 NOTES TO CHAPTER VH
The "Law of Holinees" iB not by them generally pat before
Ezekiel. Dr. O. B. Gray, e.g»f says, on his side, as confidently :
" Lev. xix. 2 belongs to a code (known as the ' Law of Holiness ')
drawn up in the early part of the sixth century B.a'' (Divine
Ditdpline of laraelf p. 41). Further: "Modem Criticism has
probably ihown inconiroverUbly [if incontroyertibly, why prob-
ably t] that the period of the final literary codification of the
Priestly Laws can hardly be placed before the era of the exile.
It teaches, howeyer, no leu empJuUieaUy that the PriesUy Leuos
themedves hofoe been gradually developed from previouely existing
ocXUdvme of regulaiione affecting ritual and worahip ** Q). 27 ;
italics in last case anther's). If this be so, then Kuenen
and Wellhaosen must be excluded bou^ '* modem criticism,"
for both "emphatically'' deny that any written collections of
Priestly Laws existed before the exile, and affirm the contrary.
E.g,f "as we haye seen, no ritual legislation yet existed in
Ezekiel's time," etc. (Kuenen, Bel, of lerael^ il p. 231; cf.
Wellhausen, Hiet. of lerael^ p. 480). Besides, as shown in
Chap. IX., if this is allowed, the " incontroyertibly " disappears,
for the one grand reason for putting the laws in the sjole is
that they were new»
NOTE B.— P. 206
OOBMILEi's raOOMFOSITIOH OF 1
The following indicates the process by which Comill reached the
conclusion that the unity of the J document must be given up : —
"The first incentives proceeded from the Biblical primitive
history; in this both Schrader and Wellhausen marked con-
tradictions which made it impossible to maintain the literary
unity. Qen. iv. 16^ stands in sharp contrast with the im-
mediately preceding vers. 11-16*, since in these the ceasing
of that which in chap, iii 17 is a curse for all mankind, is
threatened as a punishment to Cain ; the unquestionably parallel
passages, chaps, iv. 7 and iii 16, iv. 15 and iv. 24, do not give
the impression of a free reproduction by the same writer, but
rather of imitation ; the same author cannot have written chap.
iv. 26 who abready in chap. iv. 1 permitted himself to use with-
out hesitation the name Jahve; chap. xL 1-9 is irreconcilable
with chap. ix. 19, where that appears as a self-evident natural
process which in the other passage is apprehended as the result
of a special punitive interposition of Jahve ; the Noah of chap,
ix. 20-27, the father of the three sons, Shem, Japhetfa, and
NOTES TO CHAPTER VH 509
Canaaiiy (,€,, the racial ancestor of tliree specific peoples, is not
Uie Noah of chap. ix. 18-19, who, through the three sons, Shem,
Ham, and Japheth, is the ancestor of the whole of mankind
after the flood. And this hrings ns to the weightiest and most
deep-going distinction in the primitive history; we have in it
still clear traces of a tradition which knows nothing of the flood,
which derives the three groups of the whole of humanity from
the sons of Lamech, chapi iy. 20-22, which traces hack all
"Nephilim,'' still existing in historical times, Num. xiii. 33, to
the marriages of the sons of God with the daughters of men.
Since all the passages cited are undouhtedly Jahvistic, while no
trace is found of £, which appears, rather, to have had no
primitive history, there remains no alternative bat to sunender
the homogeneity of J " {EMeUung, p. 52).
NOTE C— P. S06
ffHl VnW OF J AHD m AS ^SGHOOia*
Wb append a few utterances of recent writers on this subject : —
Budde says: "J and £ are throughout not to me persons^
but extensive schools of writers, running their course alongside
of each other " {Judges, p. xiv).
Ounkel says : " J and £ are not individual writers, nor yet
redactors of old single documents^ but rather schools of narrators *'
{Genesis, p, Iviii).
Dr. Cheyne says: ''The Yahwists were, in fact^ perhaps a
school of writers " {Founders of OHHcism, p. 30).
Dr. Driver says that P " seems, as a whole, to have been the
work of a school of writers rather than of an individual ** {Genesis,
p. xvi), and no doubt would apply the same to J and E.
Kautzsch says: "A close examination of its (J's) contents
showed long ago that here also we have to do with various strata,
and therefore with the work of a Jahwistic school " {Lit. of O.T,,
p. 37 ; similarly of E, p. 45).
McFadyen says : " More properly they (J and £) were the
work of a school, and represent a literary and religious activity
that ranges over a considerable period. ... The priestly
document . • • is, like the prophetic documents, not the work of
a single author, but of a school, and represents a movement"
{Messages of ike Proph. and Priestly Historians, pp. 22, 224).
The Oxford Hexaieueh, L p. x, tabular Contents, says: "J
represents a school rather than a single author."
NOTES TO CHAPTER VIII
NOTE A.— P. 252
Vmi BBXAKma up of DBinXBOKOlfT
Air «x»mple is fnmiBhed in a recent vork| The Book of <^
Ckfoonami m Mooib : A OrUieal Inquiry itiio the Origindl Form oj
DouUronomy^ by John Gullen, M.A., D.Sa (1903), which,
howeyer, the author admits '' differs radically &om that which
has come to be regarded almost as a tradition of criticisiiL" We
• cannot seCi however, that his theory differs much tn principle
from some of the other modern attempts. He splits up the book
into a greater number of parts than the more cautious critics have
done^ and seeks to assign to each its place in the total composi-
tion. The original appearance of the book he holds, with the
critics^ to have been in the reign of Josiah. He makes the book
begin with ehap. xxix. 1-4. He leaves out chaps. L-iv. 9, and
transfers chap» t. 2 to a position introductory to chap. iv. 10 fL
This original Deuteronomy extended (with omissions) to chap.
xL 28, boi had as its conclusion chapi xxviii. 1-45 (omitting
▼eis. 2-9); ehap. xxx. 11-20: Ex. xxiv. 4-8 (!), and Deul
xxxiL 45, 46. The Decalogue in chap. ▼. is excised as unsuitable
to the context^ and is relegated to a "Decalogue Edition,"
which appeared some time before the exile. The Decalogue in
Ex. XX. IB still later. Successive developments follow through
the additi<m of ''Law Code/' a ''First Combined Edition,"
a "Second or Decalogue Edition," a "Third or Minatoiy
Edition," an " ExiUc Redaction," " PoelrExilic Additions," and
a " P Redaction." If the able author is seriously persuaded that
any book under heaven was ever made by such a process, we feel,
with all respect^ that there is hardly any common ground for
argument
Oettli is a comparatively conservative writer, who defends
the unity of the main body of Deuteronomy, but even he is badly
610
NOTES TO CHAPTER VHI su
bitten when lie comes to the closing chapters. The following is
hia analysis of chape. zzviL-xzziy. {Deut p. 12) : —
xxviL 1-3, Dt ; 4, R; 5-7% JE; 7^ 8, R; 9^-13, Dt. ; 14-
26, R ; zxviiL 1-68, Dt. (with lesenre as to enlargements) ;
xzVili 6^xxx. 20, Dt (with redactional changes and trans-
positions); zxzL 1-13, Dt; 14, 15, J£; 16-22, introduction to
Moses' Song out of J£; 23, JE; 24-29, Dt; 30, R; ^xxii 1.
44, from JE; 45-47, Dt ; 48-52, P ; zzziii from JE; zxxiv.
lP,Dt JE; 2-4, JE; 51, 6, Dt; 7, P, JE; 8, 9,P; 10-12
Dt
There are elements of tmth in this analysis, bat it is assuredly
greatly OTerdone.
NOTE R— P. 258
mUTIBOHOMIO AND PBIBBTLT 8TTUBI
Lr a note to the first edition of his O.T. in J. O. (p. 433),
Professor W. R Smith cites as "a good example of the funda-
mental difference in legal style between the Levitical law and
the Deuteronomic Code," the laws about the cities of refuge
in Numu zzxv. and Deut xix. The case is worth considering as
"a good example'' also of the tendency to overdrive argument
Allowance in any case must be made for the difference between
a careful original statement of a law, and a later general rehearsal
of its substimce in the rounded style of free, popular discourse.
But what are the specific differences! ''In Deuteronomy the
word 'refuge ' does not occur, and the cities are always described
by a periphrasiB." But the Deuteronomist simply says : "Thou
shalt separate three cities for thee in the midst of thy land (chap,
xix. 2) ; " thou shalt separate three cities for thee " (ver. 7) ;
"then shalt thou add three cities more for thee" (ver. 9) ; and
there is no periphrasis. The phrase " that every manslayer may
flee thither " (ver. 3), " the manslayer which shall flee thither "
(ver. 4), is derived verbally from Num. xxxv. 11, 15. "In
Numbers tiie phrase for ' accidentally ' is bish'gaga, in Deut bib'li
da'at," Admitted, but the words convey Uie same idea, and
are only used twice altogether — in Nuhi. xxxv. 11, 15 and in
Deut iv. 42, xix. 4. " ^e judges in the one are 'the congrega-
tion,' in the other ' the elders of his city.' " But Deuteronomy
says nothing about "judges," and "the elders," who are once
referred to in chap. xix. 12, plaioly act in the name of the
congregation. "The verb for haie is different" Bather, "the
513 NOTES TO CHAPTER VHI
Terb for hcUe " does not occur at all in Num. zxzy., bat the noun
derived from it does (ver. 20), and is translated '' hatred,'' while
in Ters. 21, 22, a different term, translated " enmity," is employed,
which expresses nearly the same sense. Had these words
appeared, one in Numbers, the other in Deuteronomy, instead of
standing in consecutiye verses of one chapter, they would doubt-
lees have been quoted as further evidence of diversity. So ** one
aooount says again and again 'to kill any person,' tiie other 'to
kill his neighbour'" — a diiference surely not incompatible with
identity even of authorship. "Neighbour" is found repeatedly,
alternating with another word, in Lev. zix. (vers. 13, 16, 18 ; xz.
10— P), and " to kill a person " occurs in Deut xxvii 25. (Cf. the
Heb. idiom in the law itself, Deut. xix. 6, 11.) "The detailed
description of the difference between murder and accidental
homicide is entirely different in language and detail" But in
Deuteronomy there is no ** detailed description " of Ifhe kind referred
to. There i$ in Num. zzxv. 16-24 ; but Deuteronomy confines
itself to one simple illustration from concrete life, admirably
adapted, it will be admitted, to the speaker's popular purpose
(chap. xix. 5). The statement in Deuteronomy, it is evident^
presupposes the earlier law, and is incomplete without it, occupy-
ing only about a dozen verses, as compared with over twenty
in Numbers, while even of the dozen, three are occupied
with a new provision for the number of the cities being ulti-
mately raised to nine (vers. 8-10). When, further. Dr. Smith
points out that "Num. xxxv. 11-34 contains 19 nouns and
verbs which occur also in Deut xix. 2-13, and 45 which do
not occur in the parallel passage; while the law, as given in
Deuteronomy, has 50 such words not in the law of Numbers,"
he applies a numerical test which, considering the different
character of the two passages, is quite misleading. We have
before us the text of Mr. Gladstone's Home Bule Bill, and his
speeches made in introducing it to the House of Commons ; but
what havoc a similar enumeration would make of his title to the
authorship of the Bill 1 It is not contended that Moses with
his own pen necessarily wrote out all these laws, any more than
that Mr. Gladstone drafted his own BiU.
We have not^ in these remarks, taken any notice of Josh. zx.
8-6, where the language of Num. xxxv. and of Deut xix. is
blended. The Deuteronomic expressions are lacking in the
LXX (Vat), and it is possible they may be a later gloss.
NOTES TO CHAPTER VIU 513
NOTE C— R 258
DSDTSRONOlfT A8 FRAJTS PIA
Ons of Benss's piopositions, endorsed by Wellhanseii^ is: ''Dea-
teionomy is the book which the priests pretended to have found
in the temple in the time of Josiah" (Wellhansen, Hiei. of
leraely p. 4).
Euenensays: " It is certain that an author of the seventh cen-
turj B.a — ^f oUowing in the footsteps of others, e,g.f of the writer
of the Book of the Coyenant — ^has made Moses Mmself proclaim
that which, in his opinion, it was expedient to the real interests
of the Mosaic party to announce and introduce. • • • Men used
to perpetrate such fictions as these without any qualms of
conscience. ... If Hilkiah found the book in the temple, it
was put there by the adherents of the Mosaic tendency. C^ else
HiUaah himself was of their number, and in that case he pre-
tended that he had found the book of the law. ... It is true,
this deception is more uigustifiable still than the introduction of
Moses as speaking. But we must reflect here also that the ideas
of those times were not the same as ours, but considerably less
strict" (jKeZ. of lerael, ii pp. 18-19). We fancy that the ideas
of the author of Deuteronomy and of Jeremiah will compare
favourably in '* strictness" with those of the writer of the
above section.
Comill says : " We must recognise the fact that we have here
a pseudograph, and that this was known to the persons interested.
. • . The excuse for them must be that they saw no other
means of carrying through their work, planned in the spirit of
Moses and for the honour of Jahve" {EinleUung, pp. 37-8).
Golenso, as seen above (p. 258), thinks Jeremiah may have
been the fdUarius. *'It is obvious," he says, '^that very few
beside the writer may have been privy to the scheme, — ^perhaps
only the priest Hilkiah, and possibly Huldah, and one or two
others" CPent. Pop. edit p. 198).
Dr. Cheyne, after toying with, and half-adopting this hypo-
thesis in his JerenUahy in "Men of the Bible" series (pp. 76 it:
*'What he — Hilkiah — ^practised, however, was not deceit, not
cislusion, but rather tZlusion" p. 77), goes wholly over it in his
Founders of CriHeiem (pp. 267 ff.). "How is it that Hilkiah,
Shaphan, and Huldah display such imperturbability t The easiest
supposition is that these three persons (to whom we must add
Ahikam, Achbor, and Asaiah) had agreed together, unknown
to the king, on their course of action" (p. 267). '*I quite enter
33
SU NOTES TO CHAPTER Vm
into the dislike of leyerent Bible-readers for the theory of * pbna
fraud.' I think that dislike an exaggerated one. No student of
Oriental life and history could be surprised at a pious fraud
originating among priests. But I do not adopt that theory to
account for 2 Kings xxii." [this is simple casuistry^ (p. 271).
Hilkiah's conduct in imposing the book on Josiah is justified.
" Such conduct as that of Hilkiah is, I maintain, worthy of an
inspired teacher and statesman in that age and under those
circumstances. It is also not without a distant resemblance to
the course of Divine Providence, so far as this can be scanned
by our weak faculties. Indeed if "we rq'ect the theory of
' needful illusion' we are thrown upon a sea of perplexity. Was
there no book [Dr. Cheyne's ownl on JeremiidL bringing home
the need of this tiieory to the Cniistian conscience^ to which
Dr. Driver could have referred t" (p. 272). Our ideas in these
days are **more strict" I
NOTE D.— P. 260
OBiiTvioir OF ghablbmaonb'b oom
Dr. Chitns refers in his Jeremiah (p. 76), in illustration of
2 Kings xxiL, to an instance of successful forgery in the history
of England given in Maine's Ancient Law (p. 82). Dr. Green, on
the other hand, cites from Sir James Stephen an apposite case
of the loss of knowledge of a whole Code — that of Charlemagne.
''When the barbarism of the domestic government^'' says this
authority, ''had thus succeeded the barbarism of the government
of the State, one of the most remarkable results of that political
change was the disappearance of the laws and institutions by
which Charlemagne had endeavoured to elevate and civilise his
subjects. Before the dose of the century in which he died the
whole body of his laws had fallen into utter disuse throughout
the whole extent of his Gallic dominions. They who have
studied the charters, laws, and chronicles of the later Garlovingian
princes most diligently are unanimous in declaring that they
indicate either an absolute ignorance, or an entire forgetfulneas
of the legislation of Charlemagne " {Leete. on Higt* of JWmim^
Pi 94; Green, Higher OnHcwm^ p. 156).
NOTES TO CHAPTER VIH 515
NOTE E.— P. 269
IBl LAW OF fHB KINO IN DEIJT. XYIL 1411.
Db. Dbivxb and many critics allow the law of the king in this
chapter to be at least in kernel old. Delitzsch says: ''The
prohibition to make a foreigner king is comprehensible in the
mouth of MoseSy bat without motive or object in so late an age
as Josiah's, and generally during the period of the undivided and
divided kingdoms'' {Oeneiia, p. 38). He discusses the sulject
more fully in Luthardt's ZeiiichHft, 1880, pp. 564-6. We can
find, he says, "a suitable Mosaic basis for this law. It is on (he
face of it improbable that a leader and lawgiver coming out of a
monarchical country should not have foreseen that we people
would wiah to have a king. • • • The thought in ver. 16 that
the passion for horses would lead to a return of the people to Egypt
has hitherto foimd no satisfactory explanation from the circum-
stances of the time of the kings — ^this warning and threatening
bear still undeniably the character of a time in which'the renewd
of the newly lost relation to the kingdom of the Pharaohs was a
pressing alimiL" The law, it ib thought, is sketched in terms
borrowed from the court of Solomon. It is rather to be inferred
that the description of Solomon's court in the Book of Elings
(1 Kings X. 26-29 ; xL 1-4) is given in terms partly borrow^
from tMs law. The familiarity of the author of Kings with
Deuteronomy is imdoubted, and he draws up his account of
Solomon's luxury and splendour, particularly of his multiplication
of wives, in such terms as will impress the mind by its contrast
with this law.
NOTE P.— P. 276
mNOB DISGBaPANOnBS IN LAWS
MnroB examples of discrepancies are those in the laws
to firstlings (Deut xv. 19, 20; d Kum. xviiL 17, 18), priestly
dues (chap. xviiL 3, 4), the law of bondservants (chap. xv. 12 ff. ;
cf. Ex. xxi 1-6), the law of carrion (chap. xiv. 21 ; cf. Lev.
xviL 15), etc Reasonable explanations have been offered of
most of these difficulties, though a few points may remain unelaar.
In the case of the firsUings, Deuteronomy assumes the feast on
the flesh at the sanctuary, without denying that the usual
portions went to the priest; Numbers lays stress on the latter,
Si6 NOTES TO CHAPTER VHI
and perliapB means no more than that the sacrifices came under
the law of the peace offerings (cf. Van Hoonacker, Lt Saeerdooe^
pp. 405-6). Even if the priests leceived the whole in the first
instance, it may be presumed that, as in peace offerings generally,
the offerer had a sluure given hack to him. In chap. zviiL 8, 4, the
dues specified are prolwbly additional to those in Numbers. ''A
pitiful livelihood truly," as Hengstenberg says {Pent. iL p. 335X
if this were all I But the regular income is presupposed. (See
pp. 188, 276.) The mention of the Bebrewess in the law of bond-
service (chap. XV. 12) is not a contradiction of the older law ; while
the case of the bondmaid betrothed to her master or master's son
in Ex. xxL 7 ff. is special, and is not touched on in Deuteronomy.
The modification in the law of carrion (chap. xiv. 21) has probably
in view the conditions of settled life in Canaan (cf. Bissell, Pen^.
p. 176), but still IB not to be imderstood as dispensing with the
purifications of Lev. xviL 15, even for the stranger. Grenerally,
it may occur that it is hardly conceivable that the author of
Deuteronomy should alter or contradict old laws for no appannt
reaaoiL
NOTES TO CHAPTER IX
NOTE A.— P. 287
KUEKBn's BARLT VIBWB of the P08T-BXILIAN THflORT
In 1861 (five years before the publication of Grafs work)j
Kaenen thus expressed himself on the views of Von Bohlen,
George, and Yatke, who held, like Graf, that the legislation of
Deuteronomy was earlier than that of the middle books of the
Pentateuch : —
*'He (George) assumes that the historical elements of the
Pentateucn are the oldest, that Deuteronomy was written dur-
ing the reign of Josiah, whilst the greater part of the laws in
Exodufr-Numbers did not exist until after tne exile. His argu-
ments are partly external, partly internal, t.e., derived from a
comparison of the two legislations. (1) Jeremiah, who knows
Deuteronomy and makes frequent use of it, shows no acquaint
ance witli the laws in Exodus-Numbers, as appears from chap.
viL 21-23, where he appeals to Deut. vii. 6, xiv. 2, xxvL 18, but
ignores the whole sacrificial Thora. But Jeremiah could, as
Hosea, Isaiah, and other prophets before him, exalt the moral
commands of the law far above its ceremonial prescriptions, and
consider the former as the real basis of the covenant with
Jahveh, without the implication that a ceremonial code did not
yet exist in his time; ho could even pronounce his conviction
that the laws concerning burnt offering and sacrifice are later
than the moral commands, and still it would not follow from this
tljat Exodus-Numbers were committed to writing later than
Deuteronomy. (2) Internal evidence. The priority of Deutero-
nomy is argued on the ground of several strange assertions,
which are not worthy of refutation; to wit, that, before the
Babylonish captivity, there was no distinction between priests
and Levites, high priest and priests ; that the Mosaic tabernacle
never existed; that the spirit and tendency of Deuteronomy
M7
5i8 NOTES TO CHAPTER IX
indicate •& earlier period than those of Leviticos. Dent
14 is eoBsidered wholly arbitraiy as a later addition; xyiiL 2,
zziy. 89 are left ont of view. The view of George in ttds form as
presented by him has been almost nniversally rejected'' (qnoted
by O. Yos in Fmiiaieuehdl Codes^ pp. 173-4). Yos diaws from
the quotation some veij pertinent morals.
KOTE B.— P. 294
UKITT OF TBI L4W
Thb nnlqne eharacter^ and essential unity of idea and spirit of
the Mosaic law, are abundantly testified to by critical writers.
The following are examples : —
Ewald writes thus of the sacred seasons: ''You behold a
stmctore simple, lofty, perfect. All proceeds as it were from one
spirit^ and represents one idea, and is carried into effect 1^ what
resembles counters exactly matched strung upon one cord. . . .
Whoever has a thorough knowledge of ti^ese festivals, will be
persuaded that they have not arisen by slow degrees from the
blind impulse of external nature, nor fiom the history of the
people^ but are the product of a lofty genius" (quoted at length
by Oreen, Feasts^ pp. 50-1, from ZkUchrifi fSr die Kttnde dee
McTgenUmdee^ iiL pp. 411, 434).
Biehm says : " Most of the laws of the middle books of the
Pentateuch form essentially a homogeneous whole. They do not
indeed all come from one hand, and have not been written at one
and the same time. • • . However, they are all ruled by the
same principles and ideas, have the same setting, the like form
of representation, and the same mode of expression. A multitude
of .definite terms appear again and again. In manifold ways also
the laws refer to one another. Apart from isolated subordinate
differences, they agree with one another, and so supplement each
other as to give tiie impression of a single whole, worked out
with marvellous consistency in its details " {Eifdeitungf i. p. 202).
^ Schults, who holds that ''certainly it was only a later age
that created in detail the several institutions," yet says : "Every-
thing is of a piecci from the most trifling commandment re-
garding outward cleanliness, up to the fundamental thoughts of
tile moral law. Civic virtue is indissolubly linked to piety. . I. •
The whole is woven into a splendid unity, into the thoii^^t that
this people should represent the kingdom of God on earth, and
NOTES TO CHAPTER IX 519
realise In its national life the main f eatuies of the diTine Odder
of things" {O.T. Theology^ L p. 138).
Eautsschy after referring to U^e Tarions strata which he
thinks can be distingnished in the Priestly Law, says : ''Bnt as
regards the spirit which pervades them, and the fundamental
assumptions from which they starts aU the parts bear so homo-
geneous a stamp that we have contented ourselyes in the ' Soryey '
with the common designation P, ia.. Priests' Writing" ( LU. of
O.r., p. 107).
NOTE C— P. 807
■HKIXL and lABLIXB LAWS
Cf. Btlb'b observations in earlier Note, pp. 607-8 {Canon of O.T.,
pp. 72 fil). The following sentences from Dr. A. B. Davidson's
Introduction to his EMM (''Cambridge Bible") may be
compared with the text : —
"Inferences from comparison of Esekiel with the Law have
to be drawn with caution, for it is evident that the prophet
handles with freedom institutions certainly older than his own
time. The feast of weeks (Ex. xziiL 16 ; xxziv. 22) forms no
element in his ^endar j the law of the offering of the firstlings
of the flock is diispensed with by him ; thero is no gilding in his
temple, and no wine in his sacnfidal oblations. His reconstruc-
tion of the courts of the temple is altogether new; and so is his
provision in the 'oblation' of land for &e maintenance of priests,
Levites, and prince. ... It is evident that the ritual in his book
had long been a matter of consuetudinary law. He is familiar
not only with bumt^ peace, and meat offerings, but with sin and
trespass offerings (zlv. 17). All these are spoken of as things
customary and well understood (xiiL 18, xliv. 29-31) ; even the
praxis of the trespass offerings is so much a thing familiar that
no rules are laid down in regard to it (xlvi 20). The sin and
trespass offerings are little if at all alluded to in the andent
extra-ritual literature, but the argument from silence is a pre-
carious one, for Esekiel himself, when not precise, uses the
comprehensive phraseology 'burnt-offerings and peace-offerings'
(Tliii. 27). The people's dues to the priests are also so miKsh
customary that no rules are needful to regulato them (xliv. SO).
Eiekiel is no mora a 'legislator' than he is the founder of the
temple" (pp^ liii-liv).
520 NOTES TO CHAPTER IX
KOTE D— P. 818
quoTATiom nr dkutsbonomt from js asd r
Dr. Dbivbb makcB a strong point of the difference in the mode
of the references in Deuteronomy to JE and to P respectively
{Introd. pp. 76, 137), but his statements need qualification.
Dillmann, with others, points out that it does not belong to the
task of Deuteronomy to dwell on the priestly laws as it does on
those of the Book of the Covenant, and shows that by no means
all the laws in the latter (hardly anything of Eic. xxi-xziL 14)
are taken up into Deuteronomy, and what is repeated is for the
most part not verbally repeated, but is modified and expanded
{Nunu-^oi. p. 603).
NOTE K— P. 817
LEVITS8 IN BJUEKUEL
It is to be conceded that^ while Ezekiel uses ''LeviteB** as
apparently a well-known term for the ministers of the second
order (chap. xlviiL 13), the only "Levites" that come specifically
into his picture are tibe degraded priests (chap. xL 45). This
agrees with the scope of his representation, and is most naturally
explained by supposing that the Levites had been practically
ousted from the temple by the uncircumcised strangers, and the
degraded priests are viewed as taking their place. It is Ukely
also that, in the general declension, the Levites themselves had
very largely broken the bounds of their order, and had arrogated
to themselves priestly functions at the high places and elsewhere.
They had become by usage and common designation priests also
(cf. Dillmann, Exod.-'Lev, p. 461 ; Yan Hoonaicker, Le Sacerdoe^
pp. 194-6).
NOTE F.— P. 820
ALCBGBD OOMTRADICnONB HI IBB PA880VBB XiAWB
Thb assertion of Nowack, W. R Smith, Driver, and others, that
in Deuteronomy (xvi. 2) the choice in the passover is not limited
to a lamb^ as in P, but might be a bullock or a sheep (cf . Driver,
Deut. p. 191), confuses the passover sacrifice in the strict aenae
NOTES TO CHAPTER IX 521
with the feast that follows. This is not a deyfce of *' harmonists,"
but a plain dictate of common sense in comparing the laws.
Kuenen sees no contradiction with the lamb in Deuteronomy
{Bel. of Israel^ ii p. 93). Even in Ley. xziiL 4 ff., and Num.
zxyiii. 16 £ (P), no mention is made of the lamb. Does P,
therefore, not Imow of itt The freewill offerings are recognised
in Ley. xziii. 4-8, Num. xzix. 39; cf. 2 Ghron. zxxy. 7-9.
The "passoyer" in the stricter sense is alluded to in Deut. xvi.
5-7, as in £x. zxiii. 18, zxziy. 25. Neither can a discrepancy
be made out of the word used in Deut. xyL 7 for the cooking of
tiie lamb, as though it necessarily meant to ''seethe "or ''boil/'
8 Chron. xxxy. 13 is a decisiye proof to the contrary. The word
is there used in both senses — ^to roast with fire, and to seethe in
pots.
NOTE G-— P. 827
THS MBDIATIVG VIBW OF VHB FBUBTLT CODB
Ths following will indicate the general standpoint of the
mediating critics. Dillmann says: "The priestly writing was
and remained at first a priyate document, without royal or pubh'c
sanction, and for the most part propagated only in priestly circles "
{Num.- Job. p. 666). Eittel says: "The whole character of P
proyes it to haye been originally not a public ecclesiastical law,
but — ^though not merely a priyate document — a programme known
at first to the priests alone, and struggling long for recognition
till fayouring circumstances helped it to obtain this" (Hist, of
Hebs. L p. 102). Baudissin says: "The employment of Leyites
for this office [in the sanctuary] appears to be a matter of pure
theory on the part of the legislation, whose system elsewhere also
is based in large measure upon ideal construction " {Diet, of Bible,
iy. pp. 88-9). ^The tabernacle, f.0., the antedated single temple "
(p. 89).
NOTES TO CHAPTER X
NOTE A.— P. 345
KL06TBRMANH ON THE RELATION OF JS AND P
Thb Tisw indicated in the text is substantiAllj that taken hj
Kloetennann in hia Dor FMiateuehy pp. 9, 10, ete. Eloetermann
takea itto be one of the moat oonspicuoua proofs of the good taste
and feeling for the natural in Wellhausen that he has come to
see that the nanatiye of Q [■■ P], as criticism separates it ont^
has no independent snbsistenoei and is only to be explained by
reference to the Jehoyistio narration, and that the part of Q left
out by B [the redactor], and compensated for by an element
from JE, IS parallel to the latter, and presumably not much
different from it. He regrets that Wellhausen has not adyanoed
to the point of recognising in this sharply-defined Qi whose
narratiye is framed with reference to JE, and enclasps this element
as its inner content, the eyerywhere sought for but nowhere
found redactor himself.
KOTE B.— P. 364
OOLBNBO'B NUMlRiaAL OBJlOnONB
Ten following are a few specimens of the kind of reasoning ex-
tolled by Euenen and others as inefiagable. The instances are
those alluded to in the text : —
Firsts on the assembling at the tabernacle : the width of the
tabernacle being 10 cubits or 18 ft, then, ''allowing 2 ft in
width for each full-grown man, 9 men could just haye stood in
front of it • . . aUowing 18 inches between each rank of 9
men," they would haye reached ''for a distance of more than
100,000 ft— in fact nearly 20 mUsil or if we reckon the old
NOTES TO CHAPTER X 523
meiiy womeiiy and ohildien, for a distaiice of more than 60
m^ZM" (Pm^., People's edit pp. 30-31. CI Pt L p. SSX
On the priesfs duties: "In fact, we have to imagine the
priest haying himself to cany, on his hack onjboif from Si Paul's
to the outsk^ of the metropolis, ' the skin, and flesh, and head,
and legs, and inwards, and dnng^' eyen the whole bullock" {PmL
Pt. L p. 40). This absurd assertion is slightly toned down in
the People's edition (p. 33), though still with a dinging to the
idea that the priest did all the menial duties himself.
On the sacaifices after childbirth in the wilderness : '* Looking
at the directions in Ley. L, iy., we can scarcely allow lees than
5 mintdee for each sacrifice; so that these sacrifices alone [250
burnt offerings and 250 sin offerings jper diem], if offered separately,
would haye taken 2,500 minute!^ or nearly 42 hours, and couM
not haye been offered in a single day of 12 hours, though each of
the 3 priests had been employed in the one sole incessant labour
of offering them, without a moment's rest or intermission " (Peni.
Pt. i pp. 123-4). The truth is, that, supposing the whole 500
pigeons to haye been obtainable, and to haye been punctiliously
offered, the whole work could haye been done in a couple of
hours I As, howeyer, we read that the rite of circumcision was
suspended in the wilderness (Josh. y. 5) — a statement which,
at all eyents, is part of " the story " — it follows that the sacrifices
in question, which are prescribed to be offered 88 days after
circumcision, were not offered at all 1
KOTE C— P. 870
OBBIBI^ mmf ONT ffO TBI OLD TBBTiJCIIIT
Wn haye not in this argument sought unduly to press our Lord's
testimony, for we allow that His words may fairly be in part
explained by His acceptance of current yiews of authorship^ which
it was no part of His mission to pronoimce upon. We do not, by
quoting Homer or Shakespeare under these names, pronounce a
judgment on the literary questions inyolyed in the ascription of
certain poems or plays to these persons as their authors. Our Lord
naturally referred to the books He was citing as ''Moses" or
** Dayid," or '' Isaiah,'' and no more thought of giying an authori-
tatiye judgment on the history or mode of origin of these books,
than He had it in yiew to settle questions of modem science as to
the motions of the heayenly bodies, the age of the earth, or the
524 NOTES TO CHAPTER X
evolntion of species. But it remains the fact that our Lord did
constantlj assume the Mosaiciiy of the books of the law Ha
quoted; based on the reality of the revelation they contained;
knew in the stiength of His divine and human consciousness that
Qod's word was conveyed to men through them ; had even, if the
narrative of the Transfiguration is to be beHeved, supersensible
communion with Moses and £lias themselves. While refusing to
be '* a judge and a divider " in questions of merely literary interest^
He would, we may believe, have pronounced a very emphatic
judgment on some of the modem theories of Scripture^ had these
been brought before Him.
KOTE D.— P. 370
IBl BAKABITAN PSffTATBiraB
Ths Samaritan Pentateuch, written in old Hebrew ehaxaotei^
after being long lost to view, was brought to light again in the
beginning of the seventeenth century, since which time other
MSS. have been acquired. Various views have been taken
of its origin; but that which has most probability, and aeems
now generally accepted, connects it with the expulsion by
Nehemiah (chap. xiiL 28 fL) of one of the sons of Joiada, son of
Eliashib, the high priest, because he had allied himself in marriage
with Sanballat, the Horonite. Josephus {AfU, jL 7. 8) confuses
the chronology of this incident, and connects it with the founding
of the temple on Mount Qerizim, which he places a hundred
years later, in the time of Alexander the Great. The value of
the Samaritan text was at first greatly exaggerated; latterly,
especially since the exhaustive examination of (resenius, H^ has
lost nearly all credit in comparison with the Hebrew. Only
four readings were thought by Qesenius to be preferable to the
Hebrew (Qen. iv. 8; xxii. 13; xlix. 14; xiv. 14), and even
these are now rejected by most. On age and origin, see the
discussions in Hengstenberg, Peniateuchj L pp. 69 ff. ; a lucid
examination in Bleek, Introd. i. pp. 366 ff. ; Byle, O.T. Cbfion,
pp. 91 ff. ; and on the question of text, and generally, the
valuable article by Em. Deutsch in Smith's Diet, of BMe^ iii
pp. 1106 ff.; Bleek, iL pp. 371, 391 ff.; W. B. Smith, O.T. in
J. CX, pp. 61-62, eta
NOTES TO CHAPTER X 525
KOTE E— P. 875
■ABLT HIBIUiW WJUTINO
Tmi square Hebrew character (gradually introduced after the
exile) was preceded by the Phcdniciaii, the origin and early
hiatory of which is obscure. The oldest known example of
this writing is Mesha's inscription on the Moabite Stone (c. 860) ;
the oldest example in Hebrow is the Siloam inscription (reign
of Hezekiah). (CI Driyer on "Early History of the Hebrew
Alphabet" in Texi of Samuel^ pp. 11 £) A few old seals
(p^haps eighth century) haye inscriptions in this character, and
jar-handles found at Gezer (after Solomon) bear the words
"To the king^ Hebron" (or otiier place). It is thought by some
that the use of this character by the Hebrews, or in Canaan
generally, probably doee not date much before 1000 b.c.
Preyious to that tune, it is supposed, the script in use was the
cuneiform. The Tel el-Amama letters (e. 1400) are written in
ouneif orm, and cuneiform tablets haye been discoyered at Gkzer
and Lachiish. Professor Paton, Director of the American School
of Oriental Besearoh in Palestine, says : " There is no archfldological
eyidence that the ancient Babylonian cuneiform was displaced
by the so-called Phcsnician character before this date " {Horn.
Bev., Dec. 1904, p. 426 ; so Conder, The Firsi Bible, p. 76).
This, howeyer, is an inference from our ignorance, and seems
unlikely. The character on Mesha's Stone must haye been long
in use, and could not be unknown to the Hebrews. Something
depends on the origin of the Phoenician character itself. Doubt
is now caat on its deriyation from Egypt (Taylor's theory), and
connections are being sought with early MimBan (S. Arabic),
Hittite, and other characters. Much is conjectural, but eyidence
seems accumulating that an old closely-related alphabet was in
use in yery early times and was probably known to the Israelites
(ef. Hommel, Andefd Heb. Trad. pp. 77 ff., 276-7; Sayce,
Higher Orit, pp. 3d-44). Further discoyeries are no doubt yet
in store for the explorer. In pre-Mosaic times the Babylonian
cuneiform and Egyptian hieroglyphic (while in Eg3rpt) were the
likeliest scripts to be used, and cuneiform tablet-writing probably
in some measure continued after the settlement in Canaan. We
may assume that an alphabetic character was in use in Israel
from the dawn of literature. On connection of early Hebrew
with old Arabici cf. Margoliouth, art ^Language of O.T.," in
Hastings' Diet.of Bitie, iii pp. 26fir.
526 NOTES TO CHAITER X
NOTE P.— P. 875
HTPOTEOBBB IN 0BIT10X8K
WHnr 11 is mged that the assumptioii of early doeomeniuy
souioes in Isnel ie a '* meie hypotheoiB,** we have to ask — What
is the cnirent critical view itself but a congeries of hypotheees,
many of them of the most doubtful character t What^ e.g^ but
hypothesis — ^if not iiMre hypothesis — are the assumed J and £
writers, or schools of writers, of the ninth, eighth, and seventh
centuries b.o. and later; or the prolific P school of writers in
the exile; or the numerous hypothetical redactors and inter-
polators of the text; or the Judmn and Ephraimitic localisation
of J and E, eta t What but hypotheses are such statements,
with which critical writings abound, as that ''the narratiye of
Abraham and Amraphel in Oen. xiy. may be partly based on
information deriyed from Babylon, possibly by Jews of tibe
captivity^; or, ''we may naturally suppose that the stories
[connected with the Israelitish sanctuaries] were preserved at
these places, and that the authors of the PrmdtiYe and Mohistic
documents derived them from the priests, just as Herodotus
gathered information from the priests in E^oiypt and Babykm";
or that "it is probable that the Israelites might borrow or adopt
traditions of their other neighbours, e.^., the Phnftniciana,
Philistines, Ammon, Moab, and Edom " ; or that the stories in
Genesis may represent those "told long ago round the camp-
fires of the wandering tribes by mothers to their children, and
repeated by maidens at the wdl, by the guests at rustic merry-
makings, and in the evening gatherings of the peasants when
the day's work was done " (Burnett, OenestSf pp. 18-21). We
would only ask — Do such casually collected stories yield the
kind of history we have in the Book of Genesist Why may
we not in turn "suppose," with far greater probability,
that we have here carefully transmitted traditions of real persona
and events, and that these began to be written down in very early
times — s.^., in Egypt under Joseph t There are as many and
good grounds for Uie one class of statements as for the other;
NOTES TO CHAPTER X 527
NOTE G.— P. 876
VHB IDKA OF '' 00-OPXRATION " IN GRITIQAL THXOBT
It deserres remark how the critical theory itself approximates to
the idea of '' oo-operatioB " in its yiew of the production of the
Levitical kws, and other parts of the Pentateuch, in the exile
and after it, hy "schools'* of writers working more or less con-
temporaneously. Plainly the more its Js and Ps and Bs are
hrought down into exilian and post-exilian times, the nearer
it comes to a view of joint-production by minds animated by
the same spirit, and governed by one set of ideas (cf. p. 375).
DUlmann comes even nearer in his view of the "simultaneous
working up of the documents of the Pentateuch," by a single
redactor (Oenem, L pp. 18-21). "It seems,'' he says, "if one
takes Genesis into consideration by itself, that a simultaneous
working together of the three documents is not exdudedi but
rather recommended" (p. 21). Principal Cave also has interest-
ingly shown how the radical hypothesis of Yemes, and others of
the extremer school, works round to a practical contemporaneoos-
nees of author^p {Irupiraiion of O.T., pp. 173-5).
NOTE H.— P. 877
SVATS OP THX HSBBKW ISXV
That there is corruption in the Hebrew text^all existing MSB. of
which are understood to go back to a single archetype (possibly
of the first century a.d. ; cf. Driver, Teoct of Samuel^ pp. xxxviiff. ;
Bwete, Ifiirod. to O.T. Greek, p. 319), every scholar is aware, and
criticism is justified in applying its beet skill, with the aid of
versions, eta, to remove its defects. But the statements made as
to the freedoms taken with the text in earlier times are some-
times greatly exaggerated (Cf. W. B. Smith, O.T. in J. (7.,
pp. 90 £ ; above all, Cheyne.) Josephus and Philo testify to the
JMdouB care with which the Scriptures, specially the law of
Moses, was regarded, and their testimony carries us back a good
way beyond Uieir own day. "So long a period having now
elapsed," says the former, "no one has dared either to add or to
take away from them, or to change anything" (C. Apum, i 8) ;
and the latter testifies, "they change not even a word of the
things written by him [Moses J " (in Euseb. Frep. Evang. viiL 6).
528 NOTES TO CHAPTER X
Bnt^ apart from verdonB, often helpful, 1>at requiring to be used
with caution, we have interesting internal evidence as to the
general fideliiy with which the text has been preeerred, and (he
degree of corruption or change it has sustained. The purity and
beauty of style of the J£ narratiyes in Genesis sufficiently prove
that they cannot be seriously corrupted Specially, howeyer,
may appeal be made to the numerous parallel passages, of different
types, which furnish us with direct means of comparison.
Allowing for obvious mistakes, intentional changes, and, in the
case of Chronicles, occasional paraphrase and supplement^ we
have a large basis of identical matter, showing with what
accurate caie the text must have been preserved through long
periods. We may refer to Ex. xxv.-xxxL, with the parallel
redtals of execution of the work in chaps, xxxv.-xxxix. ; (he forty
or more sections in Chronicles parallel to others in &muel and
Kings (fi.g.f 1 Sam. xxxi with 1 Chron. x. 1-12; 2 Sam. vii.
with 1 Chron. xviL ; 1 Kings x. with 2 Chron. ix. 1-12); parallels
in Psalms, as Ps. xiv. with Ps. liiL ; Ps. xviii with 2 Sam. xxii. ;
PlB. cv. 1-15 and xcvL, with 1 Chron. xvi 8-33, etc When the
length of time and difficulties of transcription are considered, the
wonder is, in the words of Dr. Driver, " that the text of the Old
Testament is as relatively free from corruption as appears to be
the case" (Notei on Text of Samuel^ p. xxxviii). Cf. remarks in
Bleek, Iwtrod. ii pp. 391 ff.
As to versions, if there have been times when there has been
undervaluation of these, probably the present tendency is to
overvaluation of them, especially of the LXX (on which see
Bwete's Introductiofi)^ in comparison with the Massoretic text
Konig has some remarks on this in his art. ''Judges" in Did.
o/BMe (ii p. 809). In concluding on the condition of the text
in Judges, he says (with special reference to Mez on the Bible of
Josephus): ''Still this investigation has confirmed the present
writer's view that the traditional Massoretic text is the relatively
best source from which to ascertain the words of the Old Testa-
ment This judgment is also entirely substantiated by the
investigation into the text of Samuel, which Ldhr has carried out
in the Kvmg^. JShoeg. Handb. on Samuel, 1898, pp. bdxf^" CL
his "Introduction," pp. 114-6. (On the Samaritan Pentateuohi
see abovBi p^ 524.)
NOTES TO CHAPTER XI
NOTE A.— P. 402
BTHNOLOOIOAL RSZJLTIOMB IK GSH« Z
Ik addition to the notioes in the tezt^ a few woids may be said
«on the ethnological lelationB of the CanaaniteSy as indicated in
Qeru z. 6y 13-15 & All ancient writeis trace the Canaanites,
including the PhoBnicianSy to an original seat on the borders
of the Persian Gnlf. Thence they found their way westwaid
and northward into Palestine. Interesting questions that arise
are : (1) When did this emigration (or these emigrations) take
placet (2) How are the Canaanites to be classed ethnographi-
callyt (1) Biblical and eztia-Biblical notices lead ua to ze^ffd
the Phoenician settlements as the oldest (cl QeiL z. 15:
''Canaan begat Sidon his firstborn") Herodotus puts the
founding of Tyre about 2300 years before his own time (n, 14)^
or about 2750 aa, and he is probably not much too early. A
new note of time is furnished by the excavations at Oeser (see
aboYCi p. 500), which show that Oezer was taken possession of in
an immigration of Canaanites about 2500 aa Probably the
settlements in the south were still later. This brings us to a
time not much earlier than the Elamitic invasion of Gen. ziv.
All the Biblical notices show that before this Palestine was
peopled with other tribes, many of whose names are given, and
the conquest of whom was not completed till long after (Gen. ziv.
5, 6 ; Deut ii. 10-12, 20-23). (2) The second question is as
to the ethnographical connection. The Phoenicians and the
Canaanites generally spoke a Semitic language^ This is usually
supposed to imply that they were of Semitic origin. The Bible,
on the other hand, classes them as Hamites (Gen. iz. 18, 22 ;
z. 6). Canaan is said to be the brother of Cush, Mizraim, and
Phut (Gkn. z. 6). It is interesting to find that recent scholars,
on independent grounds, seem to endorse this relationshipi
34
530 NOTES TO CHAPTER XI
Flindera Petrie, e.^., in Yub History o/JSgypt, deriyes the dynastic
Egyptians from the same legion as the Canaanites, f.s., &om the
neighbourhood of the Persian Gull Thence they worked round
by Pan or Pont (akin to Ethiopia), at the south end of the Bed
SeSy into the NOe yalley, while another contingent preoaod north-
ward into the Delta to Caphtor on the Meditenanean coasts and
thence colonised Philistia and PhoBnida. *'We see," says Dr.
Petrie, ''the sense of the kinship stated in the tenth chapter of
(Genesis between Misraim (Egypt), Caphtorim (Keft-ur* greater
Phouiicia on the Delta coast), and Philistim (or the PhcBnidans
in Syria) " (HM. L pp. 12-15). It would be more correct to say
that Gen. x. 14 stops the movement with *the Philistines (cl
Deut. ii 2S; Jer. xlvii. 4; Amos ix. 7), and connects the
PhcBnidans (Sidon, yer. 15) with the Ganaanite branch, perhaps
in a separate immigration by a separate route. The question of
language presents less difficulty when it is remembered that the
Canaanites came from the Babylonian region, and that the
whole west from an early period was saturated with Bal^loniaa
influences. They may easUy have brought with them a
speech.
NOTE R— P. 408
00QNATENB88 OV BABYLONIAN AND HBBBIW TRADITIOHB
Ths relation of the traditions may be compared with that of
cognate branches of the same family of languages, s.^., Latin and
Greek.
Kittel says of the conceptions of the Creation and the Flood :
''They had long been known to Israel, for the simple reason that
they had existed as an immemorial heritage in the East, and the
Israelites had imported the substance of them from their andent
home. Everything tends to show that this material, whether
found in Babylon or in Israel, is very ancient, and the simplest
explanation of its subsequently distinctive forms in both countries
is to be found in the assumption that both go back to a common
origiual. • • • The Biblical conception of the universe, which
constitutes a part of our faith, and in so far as it does so, is for us
not a Babylonian conception, but extremely ancient Imowledge^
partly the result of experience, partly revealed by Gkxl and
preserved among His people" {Bab, Exccufs, and the BtbU^ pp.
48-50).
Hommel says that with the recognition of the monotheism of
Abraham — the " Friend of God," who migrated^rom the confines
NOTES TO CHAPTER XI 531
of Babylonia in Palestine, "we are put in possession of a new
light on Primitive Biblieal History. ... I now no longer hesitate
to say that the monotheistic concept of the Biblical text, and
specially of the * Priestly Code ' (Gton. L), dmst^ compared with the
Babylonian version, be regarded as the original" {Anc Heh. Trad.
pp. 808-10).
"In this,'' saya Oettli, "the possibility is conceded that the
Babylonian myth goes back upon a purer original form, and first
in the course of centuries became developed into the fantas-
tically variegated form in which we now possess ik"— (Z>er
Ka/nif mm Bibd und Babd, p. 16).
NOTE a— P. 413
ALLBOED "MIDRASH" GHABAOTEB OV OBlf. XIV
Wellhaubsn holds this chapter to be one of the very latest
(post-exilian) insertions into the Book of Genesis, and absolutely
without historical worth. He refuses even to acknowledge, with
Noldeke, the excellence in style of the narration (Oampoi. d. Hex.
pp. SI 1-3).
Kuenen thinks that in this chapter the redactor " has given
us a fragment of a post-exilian version of Abram's life, a Midra$h,
such as the Chronicler had among his sources" (Hex, p. 324).
He allows, however, that " the story is in its proper place, for it
presupposes Lot* s separation from Abram, and his settlement in
Sodom" (p. 143).
Kautssch says of this " remarkable " chapter " that it seems to
have been taken from a Midrash of the patriarchal history," and
regards it as an addition of the last redactor (Lit. of 0.71, p. 119).
Cheyne declares hi9 agreement with Wellhausen, Stade,
Meyer, Eautzsch, in the view that it is "a post-exilian Midrash "
(Ozf. Hex. i p. 168). E Meyer, quoted by him, thought that the
Jew who inserted it " had obtained in Babylon minute informa-
tion as to the early history of the land" (Oeaeh. dee AUertTiums,
L p. 166).
Addisasks: "To what does this proof amount 1 Simply to
this, that the writer had acquired some slight knowledge of
Babylonian history, as, doubtless, many a Jew in exile did" {Doee.
of Hex. u. p. 212).
H. P. Smith speaks of the " desperate attempts " which " have
been made of late years to rescue the historicity of this chapter^
on the ground of Babylonian literature" (O.T. HitL p. 37).
Si2 NOTES TO CHAPTER XI
Yel the '^Midraah" tihiu oonfidently assumed is nothing hat
a fiction erolyed from the critical imagination. Is it likely that
a Jew in Babylon wonld be found deyoting himself to the
deciphering of Assyrian eaneifomi inseriptixmst And when
ii the pioof of his ''slight'' knowledgef
KOTE D.— P. 418
WEE BBUBBaonOH OV MTTBI
Ths effect of discovery has been a wonderful resuscitation of flie
credit of stories and traditions long regarded as myths. We refer
in the text to the discoYeries affecting Menes and the early
I^ptian dynasties. It has been the same elsewhere. ''The
spade of Dr. Schliemann and his followers haye again brought to
light the buried empire of Agamemnon. Our knowledge of the
culture and power of the princes of Mycena and Tiryns in the
heroic age of Greece is no longer dependent on the questionable
memory of tradition'' (Sayoe, Higher Orit p. 18). " I well
remember," says Professor Eittely "in my student days how the
scorn of the whole body of the learned, and the ridicule even of
the comic papers, was poured on him (Dr. Schliemann) when he
came forward to announce his discovery of Priam's dty, his
palace, and his treasures. For in these days it was an artide of
belief with scholars that our knowledge of the history of ancient
Qreece practically began with Herodotus and the time of the
Persian wars" (Babyl, Excav$. p. 74).
The remarks of the same author on the Cretan ezcavations are
full of interest in this connection. He tells of "a learned friend
who was on his way back to Crete, and who had seen there the
excavations undertaken by Evans, and was able to boast that he
had sat upon the throne and in the palace of King Minos, a
monarch well remembered by us all at school, and universdly
regarded by us as the mere product of a myth " (p. 15). In a
note, he adds : " Minos has frequently been regarded as a Cretan
god, also a personification of Zeus, or again of the Phosnician
domination, and of Baal-Melkart or of Moon-worship, or even as
a Sun-god, " etc
Again : " Much that we previously held, and seemed justified
in holding, as mythical, is now coming into the li^t of history;
and, side by side with tiie already mentioned Minos, we have now,
through the latest discovered Assyrian inscriptions, eome to
accept tiie historical existence of King Midas of Phrygia, of whom
NOTES TO CHAPTER XI 533
we preyioasly knew nothing but the story of his ass's eais, but
who is now recognised as an actual and worthy ruler of the eighth
centuiy before Christ" (p. 16). He shows how Midas '^continues
at the present time to be described as an ancient divinity of the
Northern Greeks and Phrygians, more exactly as a 'Ueesing-
scattering nature-god' ^ . . in the form of an animaL • • • To
this ancient demon of yegetable life»" etc
NOTE R— P. 419
rai TDEBPnnoATioia or raiibhim Axm pithox
Tn problems about the city Baamses (Bameses) in Ex. L 11,
are not yet satisfactorily solyed. There would seem, in fact, to
have bean itvo cities of this name — one, of which we have
Egyptian accounts, the city of Zoan or Tanis, of the Hyksos, in
the Delta, which Bameses 11. rebuilt^ and called by his name ;
the other in the neighbourhood of Pithom, in Groshen (cf. Driver,
Authority and Arehaologyy p. 55). Sayce at first (with Brugsch,
etc) identified Bameses with Tanis {Fre$h Lights p. 65), then
dBtinguished two cities {Higher OriUeiim, p. 239), now again
appears to identify the Biblical Baamses with the Egyptian
Pi-Bamessu, but disconnects the latter from Tanis (''Baamses"
in Diet, of Bible^ iv. pp. 188-9 ; Monument Facts^ p. 90) ; so
Pinches (O.T. in Light of Hist. Becorde^ p. 305). Brugsch, also,
after the discovery of Pithom, gave up his earlier view of the
site of Bameses. It still seems to us more probable that the
" store city " $3 to be distinguished from the gay and splendid
Pi-Bamessu. On the possible greater antiquity of the liame, see
the valuable note in Canon Cook, Speaker^e Com., ''Exodus,"
p. 486.
The situation of Pithom is settled by M. Naville's discovery,
and inscriptions of Bameses n. show the connection of that
Pharaoh with it M. Neville, at the same time, "never had the
good fortune to find the king's name stamped on any of the
bricks" (Beport^ July 1883). The evidence, however, is very
abundant that Bameses u. habitually erased the names of his
predecessors, and substituted his own (cf. Cook, as above, p. 465).
Pollard, in his Land of the Monumemte^ gives a striking instance
from this very district. " A large sphinx in black marble is also
veiy interesting, as the name of the king in whose reign it was
carved,*and whose portrait it most probably bears, has been erased.
It belonged, unquestionably, to the period of the Hyksosi or the
534 NOTES TO CHAPTER XI
Shepherd kings. . • . The only name found on it aft present ia
that of Kameses the Great, who reigned aboat 1400 B.O. (f). It
was — ^most unfortunately for the records of Egyptian history —
the practice of this monarch to cut his name on almost every
object that presented itself. This would have been pardonable
enough had he allowed all previous names and titles to remain ;
but he seems to have desired to obliterate all records but those of
his own ancestors" (p. 18). In certain inscriptions^ however,
he effaces even the name of his father (Seti l), and substitateB
his own.
NOTE F.— P. 429
BIL8HAZZAB AND BABTLOV
Yaluabub confirmatory light is thrown on the Biblical statements
about Belshazzar in a full and interesting communication received
from Professor R D. Wilson, of Princeton, after the text of this
chapter was printed. Professor Wilson shows that the Aramaia
word for "king'' is the equivalent of the Assyrio-Babylonian
words, sarrUf malkUf pahatu^ bel pahate, and hazatmu. Each of
the bearers of these titles would also be a "ruler," and the last
three would be called "magnates of the king" (cf. Dan. v. 1.).
"Any one of these Assyrian words might be rendered into
Hebrew also by 'king.'" He shows how this will explain the
title " king " in the cases of both Belshazzar and Darius the Mede.
As to BelfiJiazzar's position in Babylon, he remarks, in agreement
with the view taken in the text : " From the above-account of the
course of events it is clear that for the national party that was
opposed to Cyrus, the son of the king, iLe., Belshazzar, must
have been de facto king of the part of Babylon which had not yet
surrendered, from the latter part of the fourth month, when his
father, or predecessor, Nabonidus, was captured, until the eighth
month, when the son of the king was killed in an attack made
upon him in the place where he was making his last stand, by
Gobryas, the governor of Gutium." Professor Wilson is disposed
to identify Gobryas with '^ Darius the Mede," and furnishes inter-
esting facts on his history, titles, the use of tilie word " provinces,"
eta When published in full. Professor Wilson's researches will
be of the greatest value. See his articles on " Boyal Titles " in
The Princeton Theological Review, 1904 (April, July), 1905
(January, April).
NOTES TO CHAPTER XII
NOTE A.— P. 440
ORITIOAL KSmfATI OV DAVID
In the critical view David is not a character to whom peahns can
suitably be attribated. Beuss, Kuenen, Wellhausen, Stade^
W. B. Smith, Cheyne, etc, agree in this ; more mildly Driver.
Thus, 0.^., Wellhausen (on Chronicles) : " See what Chronicles
has made out of David I The founder of the kingdom has
become the founder of the temple and of the public worship, the
king and hero at the head of his companions has become the
singer and master of ceremonies at the head of a swarm of priests
and Levites; his dearly-cut figure has become a feeble holy
picture, seen through a cloud of incense," etc {Hist, of Itrad,
p. 182).
In the first edition of his 0,T. in J. C, Professor W. R Smith
wrote : ^* It may appear doubtful whether the oldest story of his
life set forth David as a psalmist at all. It is very curious that
the Book of Amos (vi 5) represents David as the chosen model of
the dilettanti nobles of Ephraim, who lay stretched on beds of
ivory, anointed with the dioioest perfumes, and mingling music
with their cups in the familiar manner of Oriental luxury " (p. 205).
In the second edition, the passage is slightly modified, and more
prominence is given to the connection of David with the music
of the sanctuary — still, however, conceived of as '* borrowed from
the joyous songs of the vintage," and so as giving " the pattern
alike for the melodies of the sanctuary*and for the worldly airs of
the nobles of Samaria" (pp. 223-4).
Professor H. P. Smith says: ''Later times made David a
saint after their own ideal, a nursing father of the Old Testament
Church, an organiser of the Levitical system, and the author of
the PttltAT. It is this picture of David which has made the
686
536 NOTES TO CHAPTER XII
most difficulty for modem apologiBts, and which it is impossible
to reconcile with the one we have just considered '* {O.T. HitL
p. 155).
Gf. Gheyne, Origin of Psaiter, pp. 192-4, 211 ; Aid$ to the
Devoui Siudy of OrUieinn, pp. 16 ff.
NOTE B.— P. 458
THI UNITT or 8B0OND IBAIAH
It would take us too far afield at this stage to discuss the
complicated problems inyolved in the unity of Isaiah, nor is this
necessary for our purpose. There seems, however, increasing
reason for distrusting the poet-exilian origin of at least certain
chapters of the second portion of the book. We have referred as
esEamples to chaps. Ivii., Iviii., Izv. The theoiy that these and
similar chapters are jxM^^xilian is not in harmony with the
idolatry and other sins charged upon the people, and witii the marks
of Palestinian origin (chap. Ivii.). But then the unity of ideas and
style comes in as a reason against separating these chapters too
widely from others, and suggests that, even on critical principles,
a greater portion of Isa. zL-lzvL may be pre-exilian than it has of
late been customary to allow. It is certain, at anyrate, that the
didum of Dr. A. B. Davidson no longer holds good without
qualification : " The chapters Isa. xL-lzvi are all pitched in the
tone of the exile'' (0,T. Propheey^ p. 260). Of. tiie discussions
of Cheyne on Isaiah (in Ckna, and in Introduction, 1895), and
Professor G. A. Smith, art ^ Isaiah " in Diet, of BibUy u. ppu
493 ft
NOTE a— P. 468
VHB PBOPHI0IB8 09 DANUL
It is indispensable to the critical view to make the prophecies in
Daniel terminate in the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes, but to
effect this the most violent expedients have to be adopted. This
is specially the case with the prophecies of the four empires
(chaps, ii., viL), and of the seventy weeks. Dr. Driver says of
the latter : " When it is asked, which of the two interpretations
labours under the most serious objection, it can hardly be denied
NOTES TO CHAPTER XII 537
that it is the traditional one " {Daniel^ p. 150). To our mind,
nothing could exceed the violence to tiie text on the critical
view.
1. It is agreed that the four empires in Nebuchadnessar'g
dream in chap. iL are identical with the four kingdoms symbolised
by the four beasts in chap. viL Further, two of these empires
correspond with the ram and he-goat in chap. viiL, interpreted of
the Medo-Persian and Greek kingdoms. But what are the four
empires! The traditional view took them to be the Babylonian,
the Medo-Persian, the Grecian, and the Roman. On this view,
implied in Josephus {Ant. x. 10. 4; 11. 7), and seemingly in
Matt xxiv. 15, the description of the fourth empire — the Roman
— ^is strikingly exact. If, however, on the ground that prophecy
cannot reach so far, the Roman empire is omitted, how are the four
empires to be made out! Theories are legion, but everyone seems
forced and unnatural, and each refutes the others. Probably the
view most favoured is that which makes the Median into a separate
kingdom. The order then is — Babylonian, Median, Persian,
Greek. But the resort is a desperate one, for, as the critics
admits there never existed a separate Median kingdom, and the
Book of Daniel throughout views the Medo-Persian kingdom as
one (chape. vL 8, 12, 15 ; viii 20). To make out the Uxeory, a
separate kingdom has to be erected out of the two years' reign of
the obscure ** Darius the Mode," who exercised at best a delegated
authority (chap. v. 31 ; ix. 1). If anyone can seriously believe that
this brief reign answers to the description of the fierce, devouring
bear of Dan. viL 5— one of the "four great beasts from the
sea" (ver. 3)— argument is at an end. The fourth kingdom,
on this theory, is tiie Grecian. We have the Grecian kingdom
clearly portrayed in chap. viiL 5 ff., 21 fT., and again the picture
of the four horns of the he-goat, succeeding the one great horn,
and of the " little horn ** (Antiochus) growing out of one of these,
is marvellously exact But the fourth kingdom of the earlier
visions, though it also has a " little horn " ^[rowing out of ten^
chap. viL 8, 24), of which Antiochus may be viewed as the Old
Testament prefiguration, bears little resemblance to the picture of
the Grecian — in many respects is entirely diverse from it, — while
the third kingdom, symbolised by the leopard, with its four
wings and four heads (chap. viL 6), answers precisely to the
latter.
2. The seventy weeks in Dan. ix. present a still more difficult
problem— one, indeed, impossible of solution on the assumption
that the 490 years which they represent are to run out about
164 B.a or earlier. It may be assumed as self-evident that the
writer means the 7 + 62 -h 1 weeks of his prophecy to make up
538 NOTES TO CHAPTER Xn
the total 70, and that the reckoning cannot begin earlier, thoni^
it may do so later, than the decree of Cyrus in 636 b.g. But
the critical theory has to resort to such makeshifts as making the
7 years at the beginning synchronise with the first part of the
62| and dating the reckoning from J'eremiah's prophecy of the
70 years (606 B.a), or from later prophecies in 687 B.a This
is ''the commandment to restore and build Jemsalem." But
even so the reckoning will not sqaare with the history, and a
serious error in computation has to be assumed. The '' Anointed
One" of ver. 26 is different from the "Anointed One" of yer.
26, etc Much simpler, if predictive prophecy is admitted, is
the view which regards the reckoning as commencing with the
commission of Artaxerxes to Ezra (467 B.a), which inaugurated
the work of restoration, and was confirmed and extended by- the
permission to Nehemiah to build, 13 years later (444 B.O.). What
else than Messianic can be the promises of yer. 24, to which the
seventy weeks are viewed as extending!
On the conflicting views, see at length Pussy's Daniel^ Lects.
n., m, IV., and Driver's Daniel, pp. 94 ff., 143 ff.
NOTE D.— P. 468
KUINXN ON UNFULFILLID PBOPHIOIB
Thb ablest assault on the fulfilment of the prophecies it in the
work mentioned — Eueoien's Prophets and Prophecy in Israd.
Oiesebrecht, who himself, however, allows that some prophecies
are unfulfilled, subjects Euenen and his follower Oort to a
severe criticism in his Die Berufsgdbung der A Utest, Propheten (pp.
1-6), and describes Euenen's work as a '* tendency " production.
In this there is little doubt that he is correct. It might be
shown that the objections taken to the fulfilment of the
prophecies rest (1) on the ignoring of a laige mass of clear
and striking fulfilments; (2) in part on the misreading of the
prediction; (3) on claiming that a prophecy is not fulfilled
unless it is fulfilled in its completeness <U once; (4) on over-
looking the lack of perspective in distant prophecy, and the
conditional element in prophecy, with other peculiarities indicated
in the text. It is interesting that this work of Kuenen's was
ultimately recalled in its English form by Dr. John Muir, who
had been chiefly instrumental in its production, and contributed
a preface to it.
NOTES TO CHAPTER XII 539
NOTE E.— P. 459
im DBBiBUonoN or Tsn ganaaititb
Oh this sabject the words of the htte liberal-minded Dr. A. B.
Brace are worth reproducing : —
*' Before adverse jadgment is pronounced, it is necessary to
bear in mind all the Scripture says on the subject. The Scripture
representation is to the effect that while Grod has destined the
descendants of Abraham to inherit the land of Canaan, yet He
delayed the fulfilment of the promise for this reason, among
others, that the old inhabitants might not be dispossessed or
destroyed before their wickedness had reached such a pitch that
their destruction would be felt to be a just doom. • • . That story
in the nineteenth chapter of Qenesis explains what is meant
by the iniquity of the Amorite. . . . Here is no partiality of a
merely national God befriending His worshippers at the expense
of others, without regard to justice; here, rather, is a Power
making for righteousness and against iniquity; yea, a Power
acting with a beneficent regard to the good of humanity, burying
a putrefying carcase out of sight lest it should taint the air''
{Chief End ofBeveUxHon, pp. 139-41).
Ottley, who quotes part of the aboYe, adds: "After all, the
Ganaanites were put under the ban, * not for false belief, but for
Tile actions' (Westcott), a significant circumstance which plainly
implies that in the execution of His righteous purpose Almighty
God is guided by one supreme aim, namely, the elevation of
human character" (Aspects of O.T., p. 179).
On the general subject of the development of morality, in-
eluding this particular point, in addition to the authorities already
dted, the remarks of Dr. G. T. Ladd, Dodt. of Sac. Scrip. L
chap, vi., and of Dr. C. A Briggs, Introd. to Study of Holy Scrip.,
pp. 641-46, may be compared. The latter writer, however, is all
too indiscriminating. Such exaggerations as, e.g., that 'Hhere is
an entire absence of censure of the sin of falsehood until after the
exile," and that even the prophets " seem to know nothing of the
sin of speaking lies as such " (p. 308), are beyond the range of
comment (d above, p. 469). Equally groundless is the asser-
tion that Jephthah's sacrifice of his daughter, and the offering
up of children by fire, were acceptable to God — "the training
was true and faithful for the time " (p. 642). No '< traditional "
apologetics is so shocking as this. Not thus ii the revelation
in which Dr. Briggs believes to be defended.
INDEXES
INDEXES
Books Axm Editionb ohiiflt Bifibbid vo
IVnUu u^ere otherwim neeyUdy rrfertnees am to HU editions hore noted.
When Bnfiitik trtmdatione qf foreign hooks exists rtferenees aire usuaUy
to these.)
Addis, W. K :^
The Doovmonts <f the Rexatoueh
tranaUted and amoijMl in
Chronologioal Order, with In-
trodnotion «nd Notaa, toL L
1802 ; ToL iL 1808.
Baxthobh, F. :—
BeiMMegurSemttisehM Seligions-
ffesMehte, Jkr OoU ImuCs
wnd Die CfWor Jkr Eeidon,
1888
DU Fsalmen, in Nowaok's *' Hand-
kommentar," 1892.
Baudibsin, W. W. Graf. :—
Die OeeehiehU dee A Itteet. Prieeter-
tkume wUoreueht, 1889.
Art '*Prie8ta and Leritea" in
DkL ^<^ (!▼•).
Bmmrr, w. H. : —
A Primor qfthe BibU, 1897.
The Book of Joshwi, in ^'Poly-
dhrome Bible," 1899.
Cfeneois, in "Centary Bible."
Arta. <<Moab," ^'MoaeB,'* etc, in
DieLt^BibU.
Blssx, F. :^
An InirodueHon to the Oid Testa-
moid, 2nd edit 1866. S.T., 2
▼ola. Bohn'a lib., 1876.
Bruos, a. B.: —
The CfhUf End ^ Sevelation, 1881.
BsvosoH, H. K. :—
Sistory qf Empt under the
Fha/raohe^ E.T., 2 Tola. 1879.
BuDDX, Eabl : —
Beligion tf Israel to the SeUe,
1899.
Das Alte Testament wnd die Jus-
grabwnifen, 2nd edit 1908.
BmDOX, K A. Wallib :—
A Bistory of Egypt^ Tola, i., ii.
1902 (8 Tola, in all), in '< Books
on EJgypt and Ghaldea.**
BgiyMam Beligion, in do,, 2nd
MUt 1900.
Buhl, F.: —
Canon and Text qf the Oid Testth
mont, KT., 1892.
Cabpbmtbb, J. K:^
See below, Oxford ffeaBOteu^
Gate, A.:—
The Inspiration of the Old Testa-
fnont Inductively Considered
(Gongr^tional Union Lectures),
1888.
Ghbtnx, T. E.:^
Fowndors of Old Testament OriH-
oMfi, 1898.
The Origin and Sdigious Con-
tents ^ the Psalter (Bsmpton
Lectnres, 1889), 1891.
6a
544
INDEXES
Artii. inJRi^yv. BQMea; UaiakbL
"Polyohroiiie Bible"; nnmeroiu
other workt.
GoLBirso, J. W. :^
Th§ FmtaUuck and Book ef
JodwM OriHoaUy Baoamviui^
Parte L-TiL 1862-79.
Soma, People'8 Edition, Pti. L-T.
abridged, 1 toL 1871.
Oosnol, 0. R.:^
ThMBibUmnd Of Boat, 1896, and
Th§ Fk^ Bill>U, 1902.
OoiHiLL, 0. H.:~
3kd$iiimg in dot AUe TeitamerUf
1891.
Eitiory if Oe Bto^ if Imul,
1898.
Datumov, a. B.:^
(Hd Te$U»me$U PropKeqf, 1908.
Th$ Theology ^th$ Old Te$Ummi^
in " Inter. Theol. lib.,*' 1904.
BMkal tmd LiUrary Jl$aay9,
1902.
The Book qf ihe Prophet BuJM,
in "(honbridge Bible" Series,
1892.
Artei in BoBpoeUor^ and arta.
••Angel," "God," "Prophecy,"
eto., bi Dice <f Bible.
'Dm Wsm, W. M. L.:—
BeUrdge wwr BvnMltiiMg in ii«
AlU TeeUmentf 2 vols. 1806-7.
Introduction to (he Old Teetament,
1817, 8rd edit S.T. (1848),
BoeL, 1868.
DiLXTZSOR, F.:—
New Oommentofy on Geneeie, 2
Tols. E.T. 1888.
BUflieal Oommentmry on the
Fealme, 4th edit reTiaed.
E.T., 8 Tola. 1887-89.
Meetianie Propheeiee (Leotnrea),
KT., 1880.
MuHanU Proj^eeiee 4n Rietorieal
Sueeeeeion, S.T.. 1891.
Arts. "Pentateuch-kritiaohe Stn-
dien," in Luthardfa ZeOeehr^
for kirehliehe Wieeonaehufi,
1880, eto.
DXLITZSOH, Fbzbd.:^
Bohel and BiUe: a Leetwre on
the Signifieanoe ef Assyfiologieal
Beeeareh for BeligUm^ E.T.,
1902 (a large literatare growing
oat of this).
DlLLXAVK, A.;—'
Gommentariea <m tJiA "Hfli
teooh," Die Oonerie, 4tli edit
1882; Baoodm wnd Looitieue
fon basis of Knobel), 1880;
Nwnerif Beatoronomivm wad
JoouOf 1886.
Oeneeie OritieaOy and Baoegetieaily
Baanmnded, KT. of abore, 2
▼Ola. 1897.
ffandbu^ dor AltteetamenaidUm
Theologie, 1896.
Art "Ohronik"inHcraog'sJZM|.
oneye. (iiL).
Dritxr, S. B.:^
An Introduetion to (he Literatan
of the Old TeatamoiU, in "Inter.
Theol. lib.," 7th edit 1898
(1st edit 1891).
The Book qf Oeneeie, toith Intro-
duetien and Notee, 1904.
A Oritical and Baotffettcal Com-
mentary on Deuteronomy, in
« Inter. Orit Com." Srd edit
1902.
The Book qf Danid, with Intro-
duction and Notee, in •'Gam-
bridge Bible " Series, 1900.
Notee on ihe Hebrow Teat of ike
Booke if Sammd, wUk Introdue-
tion, 1890.
Other works, and arts. •• Joseph,"
etc., in Diet, qf Bible.
DuHM, B.: —
Die Theologie dor Prephetont 1876.
£bxb8, G. IC.:—
Aegypten und die BlUher Moeee,
ToL L 1868.
Art "Joseph" in Smith's DicL
(f Bible (2nd edit).
EwALD, G. H. A.: —
ffietory qf lorad, 8rd edit E.T.,
8 toIb. Tol. L 1867.
PrcpheUqfGu Old Teotamontt 2nd
edit E.T., 6 rols. ToL L 1876.
Fbifp, E. T.I—
The Composition <f the Book qf
Oenesie, with Bnglith Text and
Analyeie, 1892.
GnSSXBBSOHT, F.:—
Die Berufegabung dor AUtettek-
menUichen Prophetcn, 1897.
INDEXES
545
Obaf, K. H.!—
DU Oeschichaiehen BlUh^r, dea
Alien TestatMiUs, 1866. -
Gbay, G. B. :— . ^
ITumheht in '* Inter. Cnt. Oom./'
1908.
The DMne DUc^lim <f Jtrael,
1900. ^ ^^ .
Other works, ind arti. in JBqpon-
tar, eto.
Gbxsh, W. H.:—
Moses and the Frqphets, 1888.
The ffebrew Feasts, 1886.
The Higher CfrUicism cf ihs Psn-
tateueh, 1895.
Th4 VMy if (^ Book ff Genesis,
1895.
GtrNKBL, H. :—
SehOpfung wnd Chaos i» UneU
vnd EndeeU, 1895.
OenesiSy iibersetet wnd erkidrt, in
''Handkommentftr/' 1901.
The Introduction to this work
publi^ed separately under the
title, Die Sagen der Oenesis.
Israel und Babylonien, 1908.
Sum Beligiontieschichtlidien Fer-
st&ndnissdes Nemen Testaments,
1908.
HKKGBTENBUta, B. W.: —
Diesertations an Oie Genuineness
<f the Pentateuch, E.T., 2 toIb.
1847.
Hl£FBXOHT, H. V.!—
SoBploraUans in BihU Lands
dwring the Nineteenth CMufy,
1908.
HOMMEL, F.:<—
The Ancient Hebrew Tradition as
illustrated 6y the MomumenU,
B.T., 1897.
Arte. '* Babylonia," eto., in Diet.
of BUde; arti. in Saopository
Times, eto.
Vak Hoonaokxb, A.^—
Le Lieu du CfuUe dans la Ligisla-
tion rituelle dee HUneux, 1894.
Le Sacerdoee LMtigne dans la Loi
et dans VHittoire des ffUnwix,
1899.
Jbbxmias, a.: —
Das Alte Teetammd im LiehU dee
alten Orients, 1904.
35
Johns, 0. H. W.: —
The Oldest Code cf Laws vn tht
World; the Code qfLawsyro-
mulffated hy HatnmwraH, King
cf BalfyUm, 2285-2242 B.O.,
1908.
Aseyrian Deeds and DaemnmU,
8 Tols. (1898, 1901).
Art "Code of Hammurabi'* in
DicL cfBibU (Extra Yd.), eto.
Katttzsoh, IL: —
An OuUine cf Of EitAory cf (hs
Literature cf the Old Testaenent,
E.T., 1898.
Die Bleibende Bedeui/ung dee Alten
Teetam/smts, 1908.
/>M Gonsois miit Ausserer Unter-
scheidung der Quellenschr^^
(by Kautzsch and Sooin), 1888.
Art "Religion of Israel '^ in DicL
<gr^iU0 (£ztraToL).
KiHO, L. W.:—
BcAylonian Beligicn, in "Books
on Sgypt and Ghaldaa," 1899.
KiRKPATRIOK, A. F.:~
The Books cf Samuel, in "Gam-
bridge Bible" Series, 2 vols.,
1880-82.
Th4 Book if Psalms, with Intro-
duetion and Notes, in do.,
1902.
The DMno Library ^ the Old
Testament, 1896.
Other works.
ElTTKL, E.:—
A History cf Oe Eebrtfws, 2 toIs.,
1888, 1892 ; E.T. 1895.
The Bahylondan Excavations and
Early Bible History, £.T. 1908.
EL08TBBMAHV, A.:—
Der Pentateuch,lS9Z.
GesehiehU des Koikes Israel, 1896.
Arts, in Neue Kirchliehe ZeUechrift
(1897), and art *<Chronik"in
Hauok's Bealencye, (iv.).
KOhlxb, A.:~
Lehrbueh der Biblischen Gesehiekte
Alten Testamente, vol. i. 1875 ;
Tol. ii. 1884 ; vol. iii 1892.
Art "Abraham" in Hauck's
BeaUneyc (L), eta
EOmio, E.: —
Einleitung in das Alte Testament,
1898.
546
INDEXES
Die ffauplprMeme der aUiafxulUi'
$ehen BeligionsgeschiehtSf 1884.
NettuU Prinzipien dtr altiesta-
mentiiehM KrUOc, 1902.
B<bd wnd Babel, 1902.
Art " Judgee" in DieL <f BMe,
etc
KXTBNSN, A.:^
The PropheU and ProphMy <n
lerael, B.T., 1877.
TheBeligumo/IerueltotheFaUo/
the JewUh State, B.T., 8 vols.
1882-88.
NoHonaZ Beligiont and UwivencU
Beligioni (Hibbert Loctares),
1882.
The Origin and Composition qfthe
ffexaieuch, B.T., 1886.
Ladd, O. T.:—
The Doctrine ef Sacred Scrijptwre,
2 toIb. 1888.
MoFadtiv, J. B.:—
Hie Meeeagee of the Prophetic and
Priestly ffietorians, 1901.
MooKB, G. F.:—
Judges, in <« Inter. Crit Oom./'
1896.
MozLET, J. B.: —
Bulinig Ideas in Early Agee, 1877.
Orhlsb, G. F.: —
Theology of the Old Testament,
E.T., 2 iroU. 1874.
Obttli, S.:—
Das Deuteronomium und die BUeher
Joeua und Biehter, in Strack and
Zdokler'a " Enrzgefaester Eom-
mentar," 1898.
Der Kampf wn Bibel wnd Babd,
1908.
YonObblli, 0.:—
The Old Testament Prophecy qfthe
Coneummation cf Ooas Kingdom,
E.T.1 1886.
The Twelve Minor PrcpheiM, E.T.,
1898.
Gommentariea on Isaiah, Jeremiali,
eto.
Ottlst, B. L.:—
^AMcte qf (he Old Testament
(Bampton Leotaree), 1897.
A Short History qf the Hebrews,
1901.
Oxford " Hxzatbvor " : —
The ffexateueh according to ths
Bevised Version^ arranged in its
Constituent Documents by Mem-
bers of the Society of ffistorioal
Theology, Oxford. Edited, with
Introduotion, etc, by J. BsUin
Carpenter, M. A., and G.Harford-
Battersby, M.A. (Mr. Carpenter
writes the Introduotion), 1900.
Pbrowns, J. J. 8.:—
The Book of Psalms, 2 yols.. 2nd
edit. 1870.
PXTEBS, J. p.!—
Nippur. 2 vols. 1897.
PfTBIE, W. M. FlINDKBB ! —
A History of Egypt, toL I 1894 ;
vol. ii 1896.
Ten Yeari Digging in Egypt, 1898.
Other works, reports, and artidea.
Pinohs8,Th. 0.:—
The Old Testament in theLightiif
the Hietorieal Becords and li*
gends (fAstyria and Babylonia,
1902.
PUBBY, B. B.:—
Daniel the Pro]^et, Snd adit
1868.
Bbttss, B.:—
Geschichte dor heUigen Sckr^ten
Alton Testaments, 2nd edit. 1890.
L*Histoire sainU el la Lei, 1879.
BiBHM, D. B. : —
Einleitung in das Alte Testament,
2 vols. 1889-90.
Messianie Prophecy, B.T.. 1876.
BOBEBTSON, J.: —
The Early Beligion ^ hroA
(Baird Leoture), 1892.
Ths Poetry and the Beligim of the
Psalms (Croall I^tnres), 1898.
Eylb, H. K:—
The Canon qf (he Old TestammU,
1892.
Other works; arfei. In Diet^ qf
Bible.
Satob, a. H.:—
Fresh Light from the Ancient
Monwntnts,
Ths ''Higher Criiieiem" and Of
Verdiet qfthe Monumente, 1894.
Early Israel and the Surrounding
Nations, 1899.
INDEXES
547
MaMmmUFadstmdffigharOritieal
Faneie$f 1904.
NnmeroiiB other works and ar*
tides.
SOHKADSB, B.: —
The Cwns^ann J^McripUom and
ih€ Oid TettammU, 2nd edit.
KT.» 2 Tols., 1886, 1888.
SouuLTSi H*:~-
Old TettamaU Theology, 4th edit.
B.T., 2 Tols. 1892.
Smsnd, B.:—
Ltheineh dor AlUesiamerUlickom
SaigunumoehiehU, 1898.
Earlier works and articles.
Smith, W* R*:—
The Old TeetammU in the JewUh
Cfhmnh, 2nd edit 1892 (Ist
edit 1881).
The Prophete of UnUl, 2nd edit
1896 (let edit 1882).
The SeligUm qf the SemUee, 1889.
KinMp and Marriage 4n JSarly
AraUa, 1886.
Other works and artidei.
Smith, H. P.:—
The Booki qf SamiwZ^ in ''Inter.
Crit Oom.," 1899.
Old TedameiU Hitimy, in ''Inter.
TheoL lib.," 1908.
Adth, G. A.:--
ModemOrUMemandtkePnaMng
ef the Old Teataeneni (Tale
iMtues). 1901.
Stadx, B.^~
Oeeehdehte dee roOesIaraa, Tol. i.
1887 (let ed. 1881).
St&aok, H. L.:—
Die BiUker OenetiSt BoBodtu, Levi-
tioue, wnd Nwneri, in " Knrts-
ge&88ter Kommentar," 1892.
JSinlei^wng in da$ AUe TeaUmmi,
1898.
Thatoheb, G. W.:«
Judgee and Sath, la "Ontonr
Kble."
ToMKiNS, H. G. : —
Abraham and hie Age, 1897.
The Life and Timee afJimpk, 2nd
edit. 1898.
WXLLHAVSSH, J.: —
I^roleg&fnena to the Hidory if
Jerael, with reprint of artiele
"Israel" from JSney. BrU.
(cited met, qf Israel), 1886.
JeraeliHeehe wul Jiidiethe Go-
eehiehte, 8rd edit 1897.
Die Composition dee HeuUemek,
8rd edit 1899.
Westoott, B. p. :—
The BibU in the Ohmrdi, 4th edit
1876.
Wbstfhal, A«: —
Lee Sowrees dm Psntaternqfte^ toL L
1888 ; ToL it 1892.
Wmoxuni, H.: —
The TeH-el-AmamO'LeUors, 189e.
Die Babylonieehe KMwr in ihrem
SCBIPTUBB PA88AOS8 KBVXBBBD TO
l.-iL (8) ; 197, 227, 236^ 837, 842;
846^ 403, 40G-7.
iL-iiL 226-7, 347.
ii (4>-i^- 107, 212, 340, 403-4.
L 277, 467 (26-7); 347 (81).
ii 227 (5-21).
iiL 221, 496; 87 (16); 606 (16^
17); 126 (22).
iY. 114, 227 (1); 166 (3, 4); 608
(7); 624 (8); 133 (4, 16); 606
(11-26); 360 (16-24); 899 (16^
17); 223, 227 (26-6).
Y. 197, 226, 347; 337 (1); 349
(32).
Yi-iz. 342, 347; yIL, Yiii. 348.
Yi 217 (1-4); 337 (7); 197, 347-
8 (6-22); 338 (13, 17).
Yii. 112 (2, 8); 197 (11-16); 848-
9-60 (1-23).
YiiL 348-60 (1-20); 41, 112, 166
(20, 21).
is. 337; 197 (1-18); 814 (4); 388,
374 (11, 16); 349, 374 (19, 20);
227, 496 (26); 360, 608, 629 (18-
27).
z. 128, 361; 349 (1); 91 (6, 13 ff.);
351, 400 (6-12); 629-30 (6-16);
231 (16); 232 (18).
XL 226, 402; 197, 360, 608 (1-9);
361 (27-32); 108 (31).
ziL 197, 239, 361, 413; 33, 37 (3);
108, 361 (4-6); 136, 209, 232,
370 (6); 210 (8); 221, 236, 238
(10-20); 238-9, 361 (13, 17).
ziiL 109, 197; 238 (1); 351 (6, 11,
12); 232, 370 (7); 136 (18).
ziY. 107-8-9, 217, 337, 339, 361,
413, 631; 870 (6-7); 136, 231
'13); 366 (14); 276 (20).
ZY. 217; 230; 233 (1); 496 (2, 8)s
337 (14); 232, 470 (16); 231 (21).
ZYi 344; 362 (1-17); 236 (4-14);
93 (11, 12); 848; 861 (16, 16).
ZYiL, ZYiiL 862.
zyUL-zz. 868.
ZYiL 107, 197, 887, 841-8; 44,
114, 868 (1); 878 (8-19); 868
(18).
ZYiiL 362; 136 (1); 130 (14); 87»
86 (18, 19); 41, 44, 126 (26);
604 (26); 81, 8% 496 (27).
ziz. 113 (1, 16); 338, 848; 868
(29); 116 (80); 106 (31 ff.).
197, 212, 817, 219, 836, 838-
9, 842, 361; 880 (1); 838 (3);
109, 823, 604 (13); 231 (14^ 17);
238-9 (18).
197, 217, 861; 219, 868 (1-7);
831, 886-7 (9-81); 833 (18);
113, 834 (17); 124 (82); 186
(26, 80 ff.); 210 (33).
zzii 140, 210^ 220; 233 (1); 118,
230, 233 (1-20); 624 (13); 87 (18);
210 (19).
zziiL 109, 197, 836-7, 848, 363.
496.
zziY. 227, 863; 496 (8-27); 126
(3); 108 (4^ 7, 10); 838 (10); 136
(16); 230 (62).
zzY. 108 (7-10); 197 (7-17); 886
(9); 342 (19, 20, 26).
zzyL 238; 239 (1); 236, 888 (8-18);
864 (6); 361 (6 ff.); 186, 838
(16, 18, 19); 838 (84); 184 (87,
28); 236 (33); 342 (34, 36).
zzYiL 71, 493; 177(7); a09(10ff.);
93. 209, 370 (40); 106 (48);
8^ 363 (46 ff.).
INDEXES
S49
zxTiiL 71; 842, 363 (1-0); il3»
20(m0, 220, 234-«, 361 (10 ff.):
200 (13); 130 (16 ff.); 138, 211,
222, 238, 276 (17-22).
zziz. 231, 342, 363 (24» 29).
zzx. 71; 231 (3).
zxzi 113, 361 (11-13); 342, 363
(18); 261 (14, 16, 23); 124, 142
(10-36); 40, 231 (30^); 230
(37); 138 (46-7).
zxxiL 366 (4, 6, 10); 210, 232
(24 ff.); 209 (30 ff.); 261 (48-60).
xzziii. 230.
zxxiT. 261; 210, 236, 342, 363;
471 (7. 31).
xxxr. 493, 496; 124, 142 (2, 4);
136, 233, 236, 342, 363, 361,
373 (7-16); 232 (10, 21); 343
(24); 108 (28, 29).
zzxW. 373 (39).
xxxTii. 71, 343 (2); 210 (14); 232
(3, 34); 233 (14-20); 237 (27, 28,
36).
xzxviiL 366, 470; 234 (10-22);
867 (20); 211 (22); 471 (24).
TTTJT. 222; 237 (1); 230 (7); 222-
3, 470 (9).
xL 230 (1); 223 (8). xL-zliii. 218.
xlL 124, 223 (16-62); 343, 363, 493
(46).
zliiL 114 (14); 222 (29).
zUt. 822 (16).
zlT. 218, 222; 493 (6); 232 (27, 28).
zItL 366; 166 (1); 282-3 (1, 2); 343
(6 ff.); 363 (8-27); 366 (16); 276
(27).
zlTiL 363 (6-11); 493 (9)» 416 (17).
zlTiiL 230 (1); 373 (2); 363 (3-7);
113 (16-16); 232 (22>
zlix. 138 (4); 363 (1, 12, 13, 29 ff.);
368 (3); 624 (14); 496 (18); 37
(19); 114 (26); 108 (28-33).
L 218; 108 (12, 13, 16).
L 337, 364 (7 ff.); 276-7 (6, 14);
419, 633 (11).
ii. 230-1, 423 (6 ff.); 129, 364
(26-6).
iiL 212, 222, 224, 226; 231 (1);
113 (2, 6, 6); 129, 232 (1»-16).
It. 224, 366 (4ff.); 231 (27); 366
(80).
EZODITS— eOMKfMMl.
▼. 423; 366 (1); 80 (6, 14); 47C
(16 ff.).
Yt 212, 226, 364; 336, 340, 361
(2ff.); 114(3); 177 (12, 30).
TiL-xii. 364.
▼11366 (8 ff.); 73(26-7).
▼iii. 337, 866-6 (1-7).
iz. 366 (10); 366 (27).
z. 366 (3 ff.). xi. 366 (10).
zii 301, 314. 320; 124, 310, 366
(12); 366 (12, 31 ff.).
ziU. 140 (2, 11, 12); 264 (3-6);
222(17-19); 113(21).
ziT. 113 (19-24).
zv. 101; 114, 123-4 (11); 264 (26).
zvi. 404 (22-30). zyU. 231 (6).
ZTiii. 162, 222, 278; 404 (16 ff.).
ziz. 231; 116, 126, 264 (3-6).
zz.-zziiL 99, 247-8.
L-zzii. (14), 620.
L-zziii (231).
zz. 40, 102, 124, 134, 268 (^-6);
264 (2-17); 231 (10); 373, 404.
407 (11); 134 (23); 166, 167,
176-6, 273, 603 (24-26).
zzi. 276, 616 (1-7); 470, 616 (7 ff.);
231 (21-23).
zzii. 166, 470, 476 (14-19); 134,
208 (18-21); 600 (29).
zziii. 40 (4); 476-6, 306 (»-12);
134, 176, 268 (13-33); 619 (16);
167, 171. 621 (18, 19); 113 (20);
264(20-3); 126,139(24); 124(32).
zziT. 160; 231 (2, 4, 16); 80, 610
(4-8); 364 (9).
zzY.-zzzL 62^.
zzY.-zzznL (19), 170.
zzY. 160; 161 (10 ff.); 137 (21);
170 (22).
zzYii 161 (1 ff.); 171 (20, 21).
zzriiL-zzzL 170. zzrixi 190 (6).
zziz. 170 (42, 43). zzz. 298 (11-16).
zzzi 310 (13, 14); 373 (17).
zzziL 122, 142, 146, 211, 276, 602;
48 (16); 143 (4).
zzziiL 3-6 (167); 231 (6); 166-8,
170 (7); 161 (9).
zzziT.-zL 336. zzzy.-zzziz. 628.
zzziT. 476 (6, 7); 264 (10-26); 163
(12-26); 137 (13); 268 (14-17);
^ (18-26); 619 (22); 167 (30).
zzzTiL 277 (1). zzzTiii 172 (8).
zL 167 (U 181. 167, 169-70 (34-
37).
S50
INDEXES
LiVlTlOUS.
L623; 157(2,3).
iii. 173 (1 ft.) I 314 (17). ir. 523.
▼iL 172 (16); 314 (26-7); 173
(28 ff.).
iz. 169 (17); 192 (5).
z. 354 (1 ff.); 310 (9, 10).
zL 337; 314-5 (4-20); 310 (43-5).
ziiL-zv. 314-15.
XY. 101; 114, 123, 129 (11).
ztiL-zztL 160, 306, 324, 328, 507.
zviL 176, 297, 311 (1-4); 314-
15 (1-3, 23-26); 276^ 515-16 (15).
ZTiiL-zz. 310.
ZTiii. 314-15 (21 ff.); 470 (24 ff.)-
ziz. 123 (4); 512 (13^ 16, 18); 311,
322 (21, 22); 314-15 (26^ 31);
102(36).
zz. 512 (10).
zzL-zzii. 310.
zzL 183 (10); 311 (1, 17, 21, etc.).
zzii 102 (33).
zzuL 320-2, 621 (4ff.); 324 (20);
311 (27-82); 102 (43).
zziT. 328.
XXV. 305, 314 (2 ff.); 311 (8 ff.);
304» 311 (22, 32-3); 102 (55).
zzTi 254, 309-10, 328» 339-40;
179 (30); 305 (34-5).
NUMBBt.
i. 186, 191-2(47 ff.).
iu. 186(5 ff.); 191 (6, 31); 367 (43).
iv. 191-2 (9-14); 163 (16, 19); 298,
504 (23-35).
Yiii 186 (6ff.); 298^ 504 (24);
191-2 (26).
iz. 321 (4, 6); 504 (6-12); 162;
170 (15-23).
z. 179(16-20); 129(29); 137, 161-
2-9 (3^-36).
zL-zii. 170.
xL 169 (1, 10, 16); 166 (16 ff.);
81, 168, 230, 451 (24-32).
zii. 166, 168-9 (4 ff., 14, 16).
ztiL 356; 277-«0 (1-29); 230 (29);
509(33).
ziT. 279, 356; 161, 169 (10-14);
281 (25); 162, 168 (44).
zv. 364 (2ff.); 161 (6); 172 (8-10);
476 (30-1); 310 (37-41).
ztL 206, 236, 280, 368-9, 361
(2-11, 12-15); 191-2 (9); 168,
318, 476 (24-27).
NuHBBBS— eonHmMJL
zviiL 191 (2); 317, 515 (3» 4); 188»
274r^ 298, 314-5, 516 (20-26,
21-31).
ziz. 192 (17).
zz. 280-1, 359 (1 ff.); 278 (2 ff.,
10, 12); 161 (6); 276 (12); 373
(W).
zzi 142 (8, 9); 132; 179 (22 ff.);
121 (29).
zziL 179 (41).
zziu. 230(16); 168(21).
zziT. 168 (2).
zzvi. 367; 279 (65).
zzviL 278(12, 13); 276(13ff.)^
zzvilL 320-1, 521 (16 ff.).
zziz. 529(39).
zzzL 167 (9); 161 (15).
zzziL 357 (7 ff.); 279, 358 (12); 282
(19).
zzziii. 280-1; 81 (2); 179 (62).
zzzr. 185 (2, 6, 8); 511 (11. 16);
512 (11-34); 183 (26, 28).
UiT. 248, 252-3, 276; 339, 5ia
L-iiL268.
lAr. (9), 510.
L 282 (1, 5); 97, 378 (8); 278 (0 ff.);
276-9 (22-3, 37-8).
E 279 (1, 2); 251, 372; 529-30
(10-12, 20-23).
ill. 276^ 278, 282 (20-27).
iv. 46 (6-8, 32-35); 177, 510 (10 ff.);
268 (19); 276^ 278 (21); 101,
277, 337, 407 (8% 34); 37S
(32, 3f); 281-2 (41-49); 511
(42).
▼.-zL 248, 252-3.
▼! 251, 276, 373; 510 (2); 102, 16S
(6, 16).
vi. 73 (7, 20-5); 97 (10).
▼ii. 269 (1, 2); 267 (5, 25); 517
(6); 325 (13).
viii. 325 (7-20).
iz. 276; 279 (22 ff.); 177 (25).
z. 137, 182, 187, 192, 277, 279
(1-6); 280 (6, 7); 162, 186-7 (8);
373 (16); 276 (22).
zL 277 (4); 280 (6); 177 (10, 11);
75 (19): 325 (14-16); 504 (24);
510 (28); 282 (30).
zii.-zzyi 248, 250, 262-3, 263,
268,276.
INDEXES
551
DmoTMtLOVOKT'-eonHnued,
xiL 276, 826; 126» 267-8, 504 (2 ff.);
274 (6); 167, 176. 187-8, 274,
297, 314 (7-20); 470 (29 ff.).
xui. 270, 476.
xiY. 337; 617 (2); 262, 276, 311,
314, 616 (»-21).
ZY. 314, 170 (Iff.); 47^ (7ffO;
187-8 (11); 616 (12); 276-6»
616 (10, 20).
ZTi. 314, 320 (1-17); 101 (3, 6, 12);
621 (6-7); 324 (8); 137 (21).
xviL 268, 476 (2-7): 466 (10 ff.);
191-2, 326 (12); 262, 264» 186
(9, 18); 314, 615 (14 ff.).
xviii. 186, 187, 191, 270^ 276, 314^
316^ 616-6, 618 (1-8); 267 (9 ff.);
325 (18); 40 (9-14).
ziz. 611(2); 612(6).
zz. 269(1-20).
zzl. 191 (6); 470(10, 14); 368(16,
17).
zziL 476 (1-4); 268 (0-8); 306
(8, 12); 470-1 (13-30); 314 (30).
zziii 260 (2-9); 470 (17).
zziT. 186, 26S2, 618 (8); 476 (14-
22, etc.).
zzY. 326(1»-16, eto.); 269(17-19).
zzvi 181 (6); 277 (6); 364 (7);
274-6 (12-16); 617 (18).
zzTii.-zzziT.611. zziz.-zzziT. 248.
zzTlL 214; 263 (3); 176, 273 (6-
7): 81 (8); 612 (26).
zzTiii. 262-8; 610 (1-46); 186
(9); 132 (36^ 64); 326 (68).
zziz. 610 (1-4); 374 (13); 326
(28).
zzz. 34 (6); 186-7 (8); 49 (10-
16); 610 (11-20).
zzzL 266 (9); 81, 16S^ 169, 248,
26S^ 283 (9, 19, 24-26); 161,
166, 170, 261, 283-4 (14» 16,
23); 618 (14).
zzzii 123 (21); 248, 276^ 278
(48-62).
zzziii 248; 262 (1); 180 (2).
zzziT. 248, 251.
JOflEUA.
i.-ziL216. ML, It. 162-8» 186, 240.
iii-Ti 170.
i. 425 (4); 40, 870 (7, 8).
iL 241 (9, 24).
iii 187 (6); 148 (7).
J osnv A— 'CanHnrnti.
iT. 162 (7, 9, 18).
T. 321 (10, 11).
TlL 476(i0ff.).
Tiii. 162 (23); 81, 214, 370, 379
(30^36).
z. 241-2 (7 ff.).
zL 241 (1-14, 16 ff.). zii 241.
ziii. 240-1 (1, 2, 13). zIt. 186(4).
ZT. 268 (10); 81 (16, 49); 230
(19); 240 (1»-19, 63).
ZTi. 215 (1-3); 240, 600 (10).
XTlL 240(12ff.).
ZTiil 240(2ff:); 380(9).
zz. 612 (3-6).
zzL 186; 186(8).
zziL 176, 216 (9-34). zziii. 215.
zziT. 101, 216-6; 101 (4-7); 241,
243 (11, 18); 138, 370 (26^ 27);
230 (29, 32); 182 (33).
Juson.
i. 240; 171 (1); 384 (7); 242 (8);
81, 148 (11, 14); 130 (19, 22);
380-1 (21, 29); 426 (26).
iL 177,466(1-6).
iii. 143(7); 241 (8 ff., 12 ff.).
iT. 241; 474 (4-6).
T. 76, 129 ff., 131, 143; 388 (16-
17).
Ti. 884; 241 (1 ff.); 265 (7-10);
175 (18-26); 177 (24, 26); 143
(28-32).
TiL 884.
Tiii. 374 (14); 177 (17); 287 (24);
141, 143(27); 81 (34).
iz. 136(37); 384(24,66).
z. 143 (6); 241, 266 (6-16).
zL 130 (11); 177 (12); 121, 131 ff.
(24); 470 (27); 140 (30-40).
ziiL 241 (1 ff.); 176 (16).
ZTiL-ZTiii. 143.
ZTiL 40; 382 (2-4); 142 (3, 14);
144, 177 (3-6); 381-2 (6, 12).
ZTiiL 381-2; 142, 144 (14, 20);
122, 148, 146, 170, 386 (29-81).
ziz.-zzi. 68, 383, 386.
ziz. 381 (1 ff.); 170 (18); 384 (23-
4,80).
zz. 884 (6 ff.); 162, 170-1, 177,
182, 191 (18, 28, 26-28).
zzi. 386 (1-14); 177 (2-4); 171,
821 (19).
ii. 177.
55^
INDEXES
1 Sauuwl.
i.-ii 306. i.-i]i. 172, 386.
iv.-vii 386-7.
i. 172 (3, 7, 9, 21, 26).
u. 189 (11, 18); 171-2 (14-22);
266 (17-36); 182, 190 (27-36).
iiL 189 (1, 16); 162, 171-2 (3);
326 (14); 171, 461 (19-21).
iT. 189(1); 137,161-2-3, 171(3-6).
▼i 323 (3); 162-3, 189 (16).
▼u. 68» 266, 384; 178 (1); 162,
164 (1, 2); 179, 386 (^17); 604
(16).
▼iii. 266, 386; 164(2); 606 (17» 18).
ix.-z. 180, 386. ix. 461 (9).
X. 266(11-27); 386(16, 17-26).
zL, xiL, ziiL (2>-ziT. (46), zy. 386.
XT. 140(33), 179, 604(22); 190(27).
xTi 441 (7). xvii. 441.
xviii 190(4); 441 (6, 7, 14-16).
xix. 68 (18-24). xx. 606 (23-6).
xxi 171, 178, 442; 179, 604 (1-6).
xxii. 442 (2); 806 (18).
xxiiL 442; 190 (6, 9); 448 (7 ff.);
177 (18).
xjdY. 443 (2 ff.); 190 (6, 12).
xxT. 442(16,16).
xxtL, xxyIL, xxix. 443.
xxYi 121, 131 ff. (19).
XXX. 604(31). xxxi. 628.
xxzy. 190(7).
2 SAinnni.
ii. 443 (1 ff., 4, 11).
Y. 443; 242 (6-8).
yL 162, 386, 444; 137, 162 (2^ 7);
190 (14); 183-4 (17, 18).
▼U. 37,444,628; 166(6).
viiL 444,628; 183(18).
ix.-xx. 386. xL 444.
xii 446(10-12).
xiii. 446 (14); 190 (18).
XX. 183, 189, 606 (23-6).
xxi. 140(1-14). xxii. 446; 190(18).
xxiii 390(8).
xxiY. 439(1); 386,390(9); 176(18).
1 KiNa&
i, 601 (9). ii. 182 (26, 27, 36).
iii. 177, 179 (2); 173, 176, 183
(4, 6); 162 (16).
iT. 606-6; 183(6); 390(26).
Ti. 162 (19); 323 (20, 23).
▼iL 146 (29); 323 (48).
TiiL 260, 283, 380; 162, 170 (1-16);
172-3, 183, 186, 370 (4 ff.); 164
(6); 321 (2, 66-6); 184 (3, 6, 10);
102 (12 ff.); 101 (16, 61-63);
183 (62-64).
ix. 416, 600 (16^ 24); 306» 321,
323(26).
X. 390(22); 426, 616(26-9).
xL 317; 144, 616 (1-6); 416 (1, 18,
21, 40); 180 (7, 8); 146 (29 ff.);
146 (40).
xB. 146 (1-3); 321 (9); 143 (28).
xiii 146 (2). xy. 183 (6).
XYi 146(1,2); 146,600(30-4).
XYiii. 176 (31). xx. 426 (34).
xxL 147(21-24).
xxii 68; 426(1); 390(49).
2 Kzvoo.
i. 426 (1). iL 146 (23).
iii. 426(4).
Y. 130 (16 ff.); 132 (18).
Yii, 426 (6). Yiii. 137 (9).
XiL 181-2(10); 322(16).
xiY. 260, 283, 370 (6^ 6). xr. 427.
XYii. 266; 427(1-6).
xyTu. 143,267,600 (4 ff.); 427(13 ff.);
416 (21).
xix. 267; 427(9,37).
xxii. 266-7; 614; 181 (4, 8).
xxiiL 269; 181 (4); 267 (2, 24, 26);
139, 267, 270 (4-12); 321 (21-3).
xxiY. 467(1).
1 0BBOHIQLI8.
Yi. 604 (8, 63). YiiL 486 (1-32).
ix. 487 (1). X. 628 (1-12).
xi. 389, 390 (11). xiL 389.
ZY. 388 ff.; 191-2(2); 183(27).
XYi. 183 (2); 186, 191-2 (4, S7);
460 (7-36); 628 (8-33); 173
(39, 40).
XYiL 628; 166 (6). ZYiiL 606 (6-18).
zziii.-zzYiii. 368.
zziii. 293, 299, 388-9; 440 (6);
298, 604 (24, 27); 192 (30).
zziY. 182, 604 (3). zzy. 440.
zxYii. 604 (17).
xxYiii. 388.
xxix. 186 (6 ff.); 387 (89).
604 (17, 19).
INDEXES
5S3
2 CSBSoviGLn.
L 178 (8). iT. 323 (19)
Y, 178, 186 (6); 388 (4, 6, 11-14).
▼i. 183 (8, 12); 178 (6^ 6).
YU. 183 (4 ff.).
▼ilL 305, 320 (13).
ix. 628 (1-12); 890 (21, 26).
xii 426.
xui. 390 (3, 17); 388 (4 ft.).
XX. 390(36).
i. 388; 186 (18). zxr. 370 (4 ff.).
-XXX. 388^
191-2(11); 179(34).
321; 179(17,19); 185(27).
xxxiii. 427 (11-13).
xxxiT. 267, 388; 321 (1 ff.); 621
(7-9).
457 (6 ff.).
i. 604 (4).
ii. 298, 439; 299, 439 (41 ff.).
iii. 322 (4); 297-8 (2 ff., 8); 439
(10, 11).
▼i. 370(18); 322(22).
▼iL 247; 296 (6, 14); 439 (7, 24).
▼iiL 298(16ff.).
NwraMTAH.
▼i 296 (10-19).
▼iiL 247, 29a 296; 296 (1. 2-8);
322 (11 ff.).
ix. 291.
X. 439 (28, 29); 296 (32, 89).
xL 439. 448 (22, 23).
xii 192, 439 (44-7).
xiii. 370 (1); 298 (6); 296 (10 ff.);
024(28 2.).
Job.
L 190 (20). iL 190 (12).
▼iL 439 (17, 18). xliL 230 (11).
(DiTisions of PmI&t, 197, 148.)
L 49, 264, 377, 439, 460. U. 438-9.
iii, ir. 446-7.
▼. 447 (7). Tii. 447, 476 (4).
▼iii. 407, 409. x. 439.
xL447(4). xiT. 228, 628
x^. 447. x^ij. 377(4).
PsALMB — eoniinmed.
x^iiL 434,438,446-7,628; 130(7 ff);
377 (21, 23).
xix. 447 (1-6); 49, 264, 377 (7-14).
XX., xxL 438-9. xxiiL, xxi^. 447.
xxY. 377. xx^iL 447 (4r^).
xx^iiL438. xxix., xxxiL 447.
xxxiii. 438-9.
xl. 46 (6); 168, 322 (6); 228 (13-17).
xlL 197 (19). xliL-L 447.
xliY. 436; 101 (1).
xlvL, xl^iu. 438, 448. IL 447.
liii. 228, 528.
Iv. 447. Ivii. 228 (7-11).
Ix. 447; 228 (5-12); 438 (Off.).
Ixi., Ixiii 438, 447. Ix^iu. 130(7 ff.).
Lu.228. IxxiL 438, 448 (20).
IxxiY. 436; 461 (9).
Ixx^iL 101 (12-20).
Ixx^iii. 101; 73(3,4).
Ixxix. 435; 449 (2, 3). Ixxx. 438(1).
IxxxiY. 438, 447(1). Ixxxvi. 438 (8).
IxxxTii. 36. Ixxzix. 195 (52).
xovL 450, 628; 123 (4, 6).
xoix. 438. oL 438, 447.
oiL 436. «▼. 407. or. 460, 628.
o^i. 450; 197 (48). o^iiL 228.
ox. 438.
oxix. 49, 264; 604 (46). oxxi^. 435.
oxxvi. 436. oxxxiL 438 (8).
cxxxY. 438 (6), 804 (20).
OXXXIL 438 (2).
oxxx^iL 436; 439 (3, 4).
oxxxYiii 438 (1).
oxxxix 438, 476.
L 38 (2); 167-8, 324-5 (10-15).
iL 180, 462 (2); 123 (3).
i^. 324 (6); 34 (22). ▼. 38 (1-7).
▼L 158; 461 (11-13).
▼ii. 34, 461 (14). xL 88 (16).
xiiL 458. x^ii. 139, 268 (7, 8).
xix. 416 (11); 139(19). xx. 398 (1).
xx^iiL 35 (16).
xxix. 824 (1); 88, 96-6 (22).
XXX. 416 (2, 3); 439 (29).
xxxii. 34 (1).
xxxiii. 34 (16, 16); 824 (20); 95 (24).
xxx^iL 456 (26-36).
xxx^iii. 461 (5).
xxxix. 457 (5-7).
xl.-lx^i. 95, 436, 458, 536.
xii. 96 (8); 458 (21-8).
554
INDEXES
Ibaiah — cowltmied.
zliii (7, 8, 25-28), xUt. (11, 19, 21),
zIt., zlvi, zlyiii, 468.
zIt. 34 (22, 23).
IL 38, 92, 96, 101 (1, 2, 9, 10).
liiL 33-4. Mr. 374, 407 (9).
It. 46 (8, 9). M. 168 (8, 7).
ML, Iviii. 468; Iviii 168 (13, 14).
Ix. 34; 168(7).
IzL 36, 306 (1, 2).
IziiL 269 (1-6); 98-9 (11); 96 (16).
]X7. 468. IxTi 168. (23).
iL 101 (6); 38 (17). t. 269 (30-1).
▼i 269 (3-8).
YiL 317; 177-8(12); 167, 617(21-
24).
viiL 317; 604 (3); 269, 294 (8).
zL 100 (4). xiT. 294 (14).
zriL 439, 460 (8); 168 (24r-27).
ZTiii 464 (7-10). zzii 461 (18,19).
zziiL34(6); 294(32).
TEXT. 604 (9).
ZZT. 461; 467 (11, 12).
zzTl 178 (6); 464 (17-19).
zziz. 604 (14). zzzi. 34 (31-4).
TTTii. 34 (39, 40); 139, 141 (36).
zzziu. 460; 96 (14-26); 168 (17,
18); 38 (26).
zzziT. 261 (13 ff.).
zzzYiii 461 (14 ft),
zL 604(12). zlm.416.
zUy. 324 (10); 416 (30).
zlT. 604 (5). zlvi. 416 (17).
zlviL 416 (1); 630 (4).
zlviii 132 (7). zliz. 260 (17, 18).
liiL 322 (10).
EnDKb
▼. 308, 324 (6). TiiL 317.
zi. 308, 324 (12).
ziii. 294(6,7,19); 619(13).
zzTiii. 428(3).
zxxi. 416 (2, 18). zzzii. 416 (2).
xxziii. 38, 95-6 (24). zzziy. 604.
xxxvi. 34 (26, 27).
xl.-xlviu. 168, 181, 289, 306-7.
xl. 307, 322 (39), 317, 520 (45, 46).
xlu. 322(13). xliij. 322(19); 619(27).
xliy. 183, 316, 318 (3, 4 ff.); 191-2
(11, 15); 307, 322, 619 (29-31).
xlT. 183(7-23); 519(17).
zlvi 322, 619 (20).
zlTiL 462; 460 (12).
zlyiii 317, 520 (13).
i.-yL 428. L 467 (1 ff.).
ii 536; 458 (31 ff.).
▼. 536 (31). tL 537 (8» 12, 16y.
Tii.-ziL 428.
▼ii. 536; 458 (1 ff.); 637(8, 6-8^ 24).
Tiii 6;» (29). iz. 537.
Hoouu
ii. 325 (8); 100 (15).
iil. 139(4); 180(5).
iy. 471 (2, 10-14); 825 (4, 6); 822
(8); 211 (15).
yiii. 38, 100 (1); 146, 152, 158, 326
(11-13).
ix. 325 (3-5).
xi. 101(1); 38(1-4); 325(8).
xii. 97 (5, 6, 12); 325 (7, 8, IS);
321-2 (9); 98, 101 (13).
xiiL 141, 145 (2); 325 (6).
JoiL.
L 324 (9, 13, 14).
ii. 324 (1, 15-17); 34(28-9).
iiL 269(19).
Amos.
L 180(2).
IL 38, 324-5 (4); 38, 101 (10);
121, 143 (25-6).
iiL 38, 125 (1, 2); 146 (14).
iv. 276 (4).
T. 146, 211 (4, 5); 824 (21, 82);
121 157, 268, 364, 456 (21-7).
▼i 446 (5). Til. 89, 97 (9, 16V.
TilL 146,211(14). ix. 580(7).
JOXAB.
iL 450 (2-10). ft
MXOAB.
iiL 457(12). It, 180(2); 497(10).
▼. 34, 461 (2, 3); 139 (18).
▼i. 38, 96 (3, 4); 44, 140 (7, 8).
TiL 98 (4); 38, 95-6 (20).
INDEXES
555
i. 824 (Iff).
ilL 449 (19).
U. 84 (11).
U. 84 (e, 7).
Nahuv.
Haooiz.
Zbohabiab.
iiL 297 (1); 84 (8). yi 84 (12).
]CaIiA.OBL
L 296 (6-14).
iiL 186 (1); 296 (7-16).
ir. 98, 870 (4).
1 108 (26).
zzTiL 469 (10, 21, 22).
Boiuas.
L 8 (2). iiL 472 (6). t. 467 (20).
xL 469 (28-4). xr. 49 (4).
1 CkntniTBiAVB.
z. 123 (20, 21). xiiL 140 (8).
2 GOBDVTHIAirt.
iiL 8 (14); 179 (6). xiL 462 (1-4).
Matthsw.
T. 8, 88, 477 (17, 18); 470 (48-6).
XV. 8 (8, 6). xix. 467 (3-9).
xzL 8 (42).
xziL 3 (29, 81, 82); 99 (40).
zziiL 464 (37-8).
zxiT. 469; 686 (16).
mil). iT.86(18).
z. 470 (29-87) ; 804 (32).
zziT. 8 (24, 27); 8, 449, 481 (44).
JOHV.
. 8 (86).
49, 61 (81).
L 804 (19).
ziT. 48 (26).
Aoit.
It. 804 (86). TiL79(22).
Iz. 469 (27-80). zzi. 469 (10, 11).
iiL 86 (8, 9).
CoLoaiiAirs.
L 86 (26).
2 THSMALOinASt.
ii. 469 (1-10).
Hbbbbwb.
iz., z. 826. iz. 86, 806 (7 ff.)
z. 36 (1). zL 110 (17-19).
2TIM0TET.
iiL 3, 49 (lfr-17).
U. 36(6).
2PiraB.
L 8 (21). iiL 466 (4)
T. 61 (20).
1 JOHV.
RBVXLATIOir.
L 469 (1-3). iL86(7).
ziz.33(10V zziL86(2).
m
Names and Subjxoh
Aabovxo priesthood, 180 ff., 504, 606.
Abraliftiiiy historioity of, ms Patri-
wohs; oharaoter of, 108-0; aaori-
fioe of Isaac, 110, 476.
Addis, W. K, 64, 56, 68, 70, 74,
108, 122, 18^-6, 153-4, 166, 161,
182, 204» 208, 210, 212, 216, 218,
220, 225, 230-l» 233. 279, 310,
336, 338, 346, 350* 352, 354, 357,
363, 503, 531.
Angel of Jehoyah, 112-3.
AnthroDomorphisms, 125.
Arohsolog^, aiscoTeriee in Afl83rria,
Babylonia, Egypt, Crete, Palee-
tiae^ etc., 7dff. ; 306, 418 ff.,
532-3; at Gezer, 409-500; anoient
libraries, 397-8; relation to tra-
ditions in Genesis, 80, 309 ff.
For details, «ee tabular Contents,
Chap. XL
Ark of coTenant^ 187» 161 ff.
Astmo, 196.
BAMnonr, F., 93, 183; on psalms,
435, 438-9, 449.
Baudissin, W. W. Giaf, 26, 182,
299, 307, 813, 327, 505, 521.
Bennett, W. H., 57, 68, 97. 106,
206, 211, 214-<(, 233, 242, 352,
367, 420, 426, 437, 493, 526.
Bible, organio nnity of, 30, 31;
contrast witii other saored books,
31, 484-5 ; teleology in, 35 ff., 42,
61 ff.; Christ the centre of, 50, 51.
Cf. Contents, Chap. IL
Bleek, J., 57, 73, 198-9, 201-2,
209, 217, 249-50, 260, 288, 302,
333, 841, 374, 381, 385, 388-9,
435, 437, 524, 528.
Von Bohlen, P., 17, 287, 374, 492,
517.
)
Book of CoTenant, 80, 99, 152, 154|
176, 231, 247-8, 254, 268, 274,
276. 370-1, 876, 520.
Briggs, a A., 539.
Bruce, A. B., 45, 470, 472, 475-6,
539.
Brogsch, H. K., 897, 417, 423, 425,
533.
Bndde, K., on Yahweh, 120; on
decalogue, 120, 128; on Kenite
origin of Yahweh worship, 129 ff . ;
on Exodus, 493: 102,119,126-7.
131, 133, 135, 144, 213, 215, 226»
232, 240-1, 347, 350, 879, 882;
404, 409, 485, 488, 509.
Budge, B. A. W., 402, 496.
Cakov, Jewish, 3, 481 ff.; law,
370 ff.; psalms, 448 ff.
Carpenter, J. B., 56, 98, 118, 152,
154, 161, 207-8, 209-12, 214.-6,
238, 261, 268, 277, 809-10, 834,
336, 347-8, 852, 86a ^ssOdord
Hezateuch.
Cave, A., 197...9, 217, 385, 840, 027.
Cheyne, T. K., 2, 5, 17, 56, 58-9,
127, 195, 258, 286, 405, 407, 429,
434-5, 437-8, 440, 442, 446,
448-9, 509. 513^ 527, 531, 536.
Christ and O.T., 4, 38, 523.
Chronicles, Books of, assaults on,
58, 388, 535; credibility of,
389-91, 426-7.
Code of Hammurabi, 79, 115, 128,
154, 263, 410.
Colenso, J. W., influence o^ 57,
362; eritioal positions, 74, 156,
198-9, 200, 202, 218, 834-5,
340-1, 343, 352.-4, 378-4; hia
arithmetical objections, 102,
362 ff., 522-8: 54, 104, 127, 219.
5M
INDEXES
557
285, 827, 237, 260, 254^, 268,
277, 286, 309, 402, 613.
Conder, C. B., 422, 424, 626.
Cook, F. C, 416, 421-2, 404, 633.
OanuU, a H., 88, 213-4, 262, 268,
310, 400, 608, 616.
Corenaat, Moeaio, 100, 491.
OritioiBm, Higher, diffioultiee arising
from, 6ff.; nature and legitimacy
of, 9, 10 ; omoial points in, 26 ff. ;
dependence on presuppositions,
5, 14, 86 ff. ; rationalistic " set "
of, 17, 196; the name, 197 ; stadia
hi deyelopment of, 196 ff.;
sehools of critics, 7, 8, 66, 69,
196; fault of method, 119 ff.;
extravagances in, 488-9; self-
oonfidence of critics, 607-8;
hypotheses m, 626. 8te Well-
hausen, Knenen* Gra^ etc
Cnllen, J., 610.
DAimL, Book of, 428» 468, 481-2,
634, 636.
Davidson, A. B., on prophecy* 33,
459, 461-2; on Israel under
Judges, 131, 383; on Ezekiel,
308, 619: 8, 84, 93, 113, 121,
126, 128, 136-7, 146, 313, 322,
437, 461-2, 464, 467-8, 461-2.
Davidson, 8., 381, 389-90.
Decalogue, 120, 128, 141, 162 ff.,
503.
Deism, 17, 20, 68, 862, 466.
DelitcBch, F., on decalogue, 162-3;
on tabernacle, 166, 173; on
early Elohistio writing, 64, 207,
379-80; on Levites, 297 ff., 304,
317; on Levitical laws, 309,
313-14; on law of king, 616;
on psalms, 436-8, 447-8; on
porophecy, 464: 2, 8, 26, 80, 93,
121, 127, 182, 186, 194, 204, 236,
237, 263-4, 260, 263- -6, 269, 272,
276, 290, 297, 299, 307-8, 323 6,
339, 349, 360, 367, 372-3, 379,
411, 413, 428, 606, 607.
Dditssch, Fried., 397, 404, 408-9.
Deuteronomy, unity and style of,
261 ff., 611-2; decomposition of,
260, 262, 610-1; theory of
pious fraud, 268 ff., 613-4 ; medi-
ating views of, 260-1, 264ff.$
Mosaic daim o( 264 ff.; unsuit-
abiUty to Josiah's age, 266 ff.,
516 1 unity of ssnctuary, 178 ff..
272-3; priests and Levites, 184ff.,
191-2; relation to older laws,
272, 311 ff. ; alleged discrenancies
in laws and history, 273 S. For
details, see Contents, Chaps.
VI. and Vm.
Deutsoh, E., 624.
De Wette, W. M. L., 17, 123, 197,
198, 199, 236, 249-60, 264, 260,
263, 266, 286-7, 327, 388, 390.
Dillmann, A., on religion of Israel,
33; on redemptive plan in O.T.,
62; on religious ideas of patri-
archs, 93-4; on written laws, 160;
on early Levitical laws, 300, 313,
328 ; on image - worship, 601 ;
critical theory of, 327, 521 : 8, 26,
43, 69, 66-6, 69, 71, 73, 113, 123,
136, 138, 144, 161, 166, 160,
181-2, 186-.8, 202, 204-6, 208-9,
211, 217-18, 220-1, 226, 227,
220, 232, 238, 263-4, 259, 263,
272, 276, 279, 281, 299, 302, 305,
307, 317, 325, 333, 336, 338, 340,
346, 349-50, 356-7, 371, 374,
389-90, 408, 411, 413, 435, 501-2,
520, 527.
Divine names, 113-4; Jehovah
(Tahweb), 66, 114, 224-5, 495,
497; usage in Pentateuch, 66,
196ff., 221ff., 336.
Driver, 8. R., on canon, 481 ff. ; on
patriarchs, 59, 414 ff.; on sobriety
of Genesis, 105-6; on dates of
J and E, 66-7; on style of J
and E, 219, 230; on style of
D, 253ff.; on priests and Levites,
191-2; on pre -exilian usage
and law, 272, 300 ff., 311 £;
on Law of Holiness, 309; on
discrepancies, etc., 366-7, 493-4 ;
on Heorew writing, 375, 525 ; on
psalms, 435, 535; on Daniel,
536 ff.: 8, 26, 37, 57, 60, 62, 69,
72- -6, 101-2, HI, 114-6, 161,
164, 171, 176, 187. 206, 211, 213,
215-6, 218, 221 -4, 228-33,
252..6, 259-60, 262-4, 269-70,
274, 277, 281, 282, 306- 13, 315,
316, 336, 341, 349, 360, 362, 373,
379, 382, 384-7, 402.-4, 406-7,
409, 412, 421, 426, 430, 440, 448,
458, 475, 483, 498, 505, 509,^15,
520, 527-8, 538.
Duhm, B., 13, 21, 68, 133, 139,
159, 266, 286, 324, 484-5.
558
INDEXES
Jbxnaam^ J. O,, 21» 17» 197.
Bwild, G. H. A., 10. 64, 74, 88,
03, 06, 128, 108, 260, 287, 436,
447, 606, 618.
ExodnSffondameiitftl &ot in lorael'a
history, 100 ff.; witaess of national
ooowsumsoesB to, 38, 87» 100 fl.;
diffionlties regarding, 304 ff.;
eritioal theories of, 103, 482-3;
date of, 104, 422ff.
EzeUel, importanoe ot in criticism,
26, 300 ; relation to earlier laws,
306ff.»619; degradation of priests
in, 181, 184, 316 ft, 620. See
Contents, Chap. IX.
Eda, introdnction of the law by,
2001!. ; critical views on, 66, 291,
206. ^si Contents, Chap. IX.
FiTBiMmTf, A. IL, 406w
nint^R., 460.
QamBZB* Book of^ credibility of,
106 ff.; oontcast with Exodns,
100, 116; P as *" framework"
in, 24, 66, 201, 216, 340 ff., 372;
alleged mirroring of later events,
74,111-2,2007371-2; early date
of,372ff.
Georg^ J. F. L., 26, 160, 287-8, 617.
Gesenins, W., 10, 100, 106, 436, 461.
Giesebrecht, F., on prophecy, 432,
462,466-6,638; on covenant, 401.
Gladstone, W. K, 447, 612.
Graf^ K. H., place in criticism, 160,
100 ff.; on Dent, 248-0; on
** oirole** of criticism, 194; views
on history and laws, 200, 334-6;
on independence of P, 201, 334,
341: 6, 17, 26-6, 66, 06, 104.-6,
171-2, 177, 182, 202, 204, 261-2,
271, 277, 287-8, 301, 307-0,
316, 326, 328, 368, 373, 388, 300,
617.
Gray, G. B., 67, 160, 248, 460, 608.
Green, W. H., 17, 160, 176, 180,
224, 232-3, 263, 260, 337, 603-4»
614.
Chmkel, H., on date of patriarchal
traditions, 74, 111-2, 124, 200;
on critical treatment of prophets,
06; theory of patriarchal history,
112, 404; on creation and flood
stories, etc, 403—11; on mono-
theism of Israel, 118, 124; on
H.T., 478s 13, 21, 61, 60, 70-1,
126, 212, 218, 826, 847, 807, 401,
4ov, oOv.
Hbbriw text, 627-8.
Hengstenberg, K W., 224, 286,
263, 367, 616. 623; his school,
201, 224, 263, 388-00 (KeQ), 436.
Hexatench, the name, 66, 198;
discussions reaarding, 213—6.
8u J and B, P, Joshua, etc.
High places, 178-80, 267, 200.
Hnprecht, H. V., 304, 398-9, 426.
History, revelation in facts of, 46,
486-6. See IsraeL
Hommel, F., 60, 104, 110, 200, 876,
394, 397, 401, 408».12» 421- -4,
497, 626, 630.
Van Hoonacker, A., 168-4, 168,
176, 182^-6, 212, 273, 276» 817.
864, 888-9, 606, 620.
Hnpfeld, H., 67, 198 ff., 202, 817.
218-19, 283-4^ 861, 436.
IifAoa-WQB8Hfp in bnwl, 40^ 128;
141 ff.; prophets and calf-worshipw
146 ff . 8u Contents, Chap. Y.
Inspiration, tests of^ 49-60; re-
lation to its materials, 486-7.
Israel, history of: critical vfow
of, 66 ff., 60, 86-7; teledogical
character of, 36ff., 42ff., dlff.;
trustworthiness of^ see Contents*
Chaps, m., IV.
Religion of: comparison with
other religions, 11, 39 ff., 134;
critical theory of pre-prophetic re-
ligion, 86, 126, 133 ff.; idea of God
in,40ff., 47, 113 ff., 123 ff., 133;
moral character oi, 43 ff.; need
of supernatural factor for ez-
[, 10, 44 ff. 8u tabular
plaining,
Contenti
tents. Chaps. IL to VL
JiHovAB (Yahweh), 66.
Names.
Johns, C. H. W., 116, 164, 410.
Joshua, Book of, relation to Penta-
teuch, 213 ff.; Are J and B
resent r 214 ff.; peculiarities of
in, 316 ff. ; historidty o(, 67,
239 ff., 379.
Judges, Book of, reUgioos charaotcr
^ 131, 143, 384; unity of Imel
hn, 383 ff.; exaggeration •!
numbers in, 386; (me, 886.
559
J And B dooomente in oritioal
theory, 41, 65-6 ; dates of, 66-7,
73-4, 112, 371; paraUelism of,
66, 71, 218; relatioiui to P, 107,
201-2, 345, 372; pre-nrophetio,
67 ff., 07; origin ana extent,
66, 70, 73, 2^ ff.; Btylistic
features, 66, 219, 230 ff.; Are
they two or oneT 190, 208, 216 ff. ;
interrelationfl, 219, 234 ff.; with
P, 346 ff. ; divine names in, 221 ff. ;
aUeged **dnpUoates" in, 236 ff.,
361ff. 8u tahnlar Contents,
Chap. Vn.
Kautzsoh, E., on Talne of O.T.,
61-2, 400, 432, 464-5 ; on Uteratme
of O.T., 76-7, 374; on leds-
Ution of Moses, 09; on Exocras,
102; 491; on early religion of
Israel, 121, 126, 128, 131, 134 ff.;
on imaoe - worship, 153; on
priestly law, 292, 308; on de-
flradation of priests, 318; on
Book of Judges, 382; on Books
of Samnel, S6-7; oh oovenant
with Israel, 491: 68, 78, 84,
126, 128, 135, 137, 154, 182,
209-12, 218-19, 222, 225, 260,
262, 316, 832, 840-1, 350, 360,
379, 519, 53L
Kennedy, A. R. &, 137, 161, 894.
Kirkpatriok, A. P., 82, 54, 93,
227-8, 824, 881-8, 435-6, 439,
44o, vvV, aOtl.
Kittel, B., on recent disooyeries,
79, 582-3; on origin of early
traditions, 408, 530; on written
law, 302 ; theory of priestly law,
827, 521: 8, 69, 66, 72, 122, 129,
131, 141, 153-4, 186, 203-4, 209,
211, 213-15, 253, 259-60, 279,
281, 295, 299, 304, 307, 313, 822,
357, 404, 406, 409-ai, 416^ 419,
505.
Klostermann, A., on divine names,
227-9; critical theory of, 218,
228-9, 345, 522: 72, 74, 93-4,
150, 201, 204, 219-20, 260,
808-9, 332, 388-9, 391, 413, 50&
K5hler, A., 8, 74, 88, 140, 204,
240, 849, 854^ 357-8, 362| 868,
385,422.
K5nig, P. B., on theory of per-
sonifications, 91, 490; on Book of
Joshua, 240»**2s on Book of
Judges, 382-5, 528; on Baby.
Ionian monotheism, 409: 8, 59,
74, 76, 88, 93, 98, 123, 126, 131,
138-9, 142-3, 189, 204, 213,
228, 260, 316^ j350, 413.
Kuenen, A., anti-snperaatoralism
of, 12 ff., 453; on prophecy, ISL
13,453,455-6,538; eargrvJewso^
517-8; relations with Qfi,
200-1, 334-5; on patriarchs as
personifications, 60, 88 ff.; oil
early religion of Inrael, 93, 126 ff. ;
on ark of covenant, 161 ff.; on
Bent., 252, 258-9, 261-% 613;
on prophets and saorifioe, 158;
on use of divine names, 222-3s
4, 17, 21, 22, 25, 35, 40, 47, 56-7,
59, 61, 66, 68, 72, 87, 91, 96,
98, 104, 111, 115, 121-3, 125^
128, 130, 137, 139-146^ 154^
156, 172, 181, 183, 194, 202-6»
209-13, 216, 220--22, 230>-2,
236, 26^7, 269, 274, 276^
287-9, 291-2, 295, 302, 805,
307, 310, 313, 316, 322, 327,
338-9, 340^*8, 35a-2, 854^
360, 362-3, 367, 371, 374, 484^
451-2, 459, 49% 497, BOS, 581,
535,538.
Ladd, O. T., 18, 4Q, 4% 601, 8Q,
118, 264, 539.
Law of Holiness, 160, 806 ff., ZIZ,
328,376. £f6eP Writing.
Levites, 163; in Beat., 184 ff., 191-
2; rilenoe regarding; 804f in
Ezekiel, 316 ff., 520; at Mtmn,
297-9. See Priesthood.
Lohr, 11, 381, 528.
Magaustb, a., 40^
McPbdyen, J. K, 6% 68, fiOQ, 21%
283, 237, 358, 500.
Maine, H. 8., 9%
MargoUonth, D. a, 44% 444^ 447.
Ifaurice, P. D., 44% 445.
'* Modem** view of BiUe and n-
Ugion, 12 ff.
Monotheism, fmidamental in ft-
ligion of Israel, 40ff., 47, 08ff.,
123 ff.; pervades O.T., 41, 1240.;
implied in decalogue^ 12% IS8;
denial of, by critics, 47, 186ff.;
Wellhaosen's theory of^ 127-8;
not the creation of prophetic 6%
133; not Babyloniao, 11% 12%
56o
INDEXES
403-4, 40S-0; ftabstratum of, in
historioal rdigiona, 12S, 400,
496-7.
Moore, O. F., 121, 382, 384-5.
Moral diffioulties of O.T., 406 ff.,
539. See tobnlar Contents, Chap.
xn.
Moaea, personality ot 38, 98 ff.,
116; place in teadition as legis-
lator, 98 ff., 152 ff.; oritioal mini-
mising of witness to, 98, 152,
286.
Mozley, J. B., 84, 110, 472, 474-0.
Mythology, absence ol^ In O.T.,
39, 485-6.
Nbw Testament fulfils the Old,
32 ff., 459-60, 477; stands or
falls' with the Old, 7, 13, 406,
477-80.
Ndldeke,'T., 26, 57, 67, 73, 204,
307, 309, 327, 351, 411.
OiHLEB, G. F., 113, 114, 451.
OettU, S., 8, 59, 93, 204, 253, 260,
264, 268-9, 272. 274, 277, 313-
14, 357, 384^ 401, 406^ 408-9,
510-1, 531.
Von OreUi, C, 8, 33, 37, 235, 324,
428, 452, 457.
Ottiey, R. L., 2, 18, 37, 4% 114,
381, 485, 539.
Oxford "Hexateuoh," 98, 162,
176, 182, 192, 201, 205-6, 220,
239, 250, 353-4, 358-9, 361, 407»
609. See Carpenter.
Patbxasghs, oritioal denial of his-
torioity ot 57, 69-60, 94 ff., 494;
theory of personifications, 60,
88 ff.; tmstworthiness of tradi-
tion, 67 ff.; witness of national
consciousness, 91 ff. ; of prophets,
94 ff.; credibility of narratives,
104 ff.; unity of pietore of, 107-8;
historicity of Abraham, 89-90,
108; witness of archaeology, 80,
90, 400 ff.; religion o^ 60, 93-4,
125 ff., 134 ff., 142, 156. See
tabular Contents, Chaps. IIL-
VI.. XI.
Pentateuch, oritioal theory ot
65 ff.; crucial points in theory,
25-6; stages in orltical develop-
ment, 196 ff., 333 ff.; difficulties
of theory, 202ff., 346ff.; Mosaic
basis ot 80-1, 869 ff. ^esJandE,
Priestly Writing, Deuteronomy,
and tabular tbntents, CSiaps.
VTL-X.
Perowne, J. J. 8., 439, 440, 448.
Petrie, W. M. Flinders, 418, 421-
23, 425, 429.
Pinches, Th., 401, 403, 409, 420,
425, 427, 429, 430, 633.
Priesthood in Israel, Levitioal, 162-
3, 181, 183-6; Aaronio, 180 ff.,
604-5; hiffh priest, 181-3, 311;
nriests and Leviteo, 184 ff., 101-
2, 274; degradation of priests
in Ezekiel, 184, 316 ff.; mieets
and Levites at letnm, 1S)7*»9;
Golenso on duties ot 36^ 62^-3;
in Chronicles, 388. See tabnlar
Contents, Chaps. VL, CC, X.
Ptogressiveness of Revelation^ 33-
4, 466 ff. i9ee Contents^ Chap.
Prophecy, nature of O.T., 452 ff.;
denial of supematimil element
in, 12-3, 453, 538; greatness
ot 432; prediction in, 456 ff.;
canons of interpretation ot
460 ff.; Messianic prophecy, 32-6,
459-60. £ree Contents, (3iap. xn.
Prophets and calf-worslmv 146-7;
relation to ritual, 155 ff., 323 ff.;
Wellhausen on, 64^ 68, 70.
Psalms, Book ot divisiona of
Psalter, 197; divine names in,
277 ff.; theory of post-exilian
oriffin, 434 ff.; prools of pre-
exilian psalms «id psalmody,
438 ff., 450; David as psalmist,
440ff.; Davidic psalms. 446-7;
ooUection of psauns and place
in Canon, 448ff. See taoolar
Contents, Chap. XIL
P Writing in critical theory,
older views, 74, 199; theovy of
exilian or post^exilian ongin,
25, 65, 199 ff., 287 ft, 333 ff.;
age ot 54, 207, 372, 379-8a
The Code : Graf -Wellhaueen
theory ot 288 ff.; difficultiee of
theory, 292 ff.; pre-exiliaB usago,
300 ff. ; proof of earlier existeoce
of laws, 305 ff.; iastitutionft ot
315 ff.; mediatinff theories ot
326 ff.; Mosaic origin, 328.
The (iociMiieiil .* distmot from
JE, 335-6; Tooabulary and
INDEXES
561
■HK M^ 8S8 ft; panlM to |
ra, 26^ 66, 71, ICn, 344-6;
prarappoMB JE, 26, 66, 166,
MK 347-8, 366, 860-2; ** firame-
work" to GenMlB, 24^ 66, 201,
216, 840 ff., 872; place in middle
book! and Joahua, 216-6, 840-
1; not aa independent doonment,
28-4, 201, 334-6, 341 ft; inter-
relations with JE, 346ft; liia-
torioal oredibiUty oi; 369 ft;
aOeged sOenoe on patriarolial
■aerifioe, 166, 348, 860. See
tabolar Contenta, Chaps. YII.,
IX., X.
RmroiTT, P. le Pege, 128, 406.
Renas, B., teacher of Gra^ 200,
287: 66, 67, 200, 241, 268, 272,
288, 307, 324, 347, 374, 434-6,
438, 440, 613, 636.
Rerdation, ambigoltv in term,
21; daim of 0.1\ religion to
an oritfin in, 20, 44ft; nniqae-
ness of claim, 46 ft
Riehm, B., 8, 34, 66, 78, 168-4,
200, 204, 260, 266, 268, 203-4,
313, 386, 447, 449, 462, 6ia
Robertson, J., on history and
lelignn, 8, 40, 62, 81, 88, 00,
111, 130, 166, 176, 180, 200,
264, 293, 301, 324, 383, 390;
on psalms, 436, 438-9, 446, 448,
460: 486, 489.
Ryle, H. E., 26, 809, 483, 607-8,
610, 624.
SAGBinaB, pre-Moeaic, 166, 168,
860; Mosaic institotion, 166 ft;
law of Ex. zz. 24, 176ft; in
Samuel's time, 178-9; in Bentw,
173-4, 177-8, 273, 314; prophets
and, 166 ft, 324-6; levitical
law unique, 326-6, 618.
Samaritan Pentateuch, 370, 624.
Samuel, at ShUoh, 172-8, 180;
his sacrifices, 178-0; picture
of, in history, 387; founder of
prophetic guilds, 461.
Sayce, A. ul, 70, 397, 404, 409,
412, 414-.. 17, 420-1, 424-6, 427-8,
430, 626, 632-8.
Schools*' of J, E, D, P, in
Hexateuch, 206 ft, 213, 260, 262,
336, 609. 8t$ Contents^ Chap.
VIL
36
u
Sehradsr, B., 67, 78, 202, 204,
209, 211, 213, 307, 400, 404,
406-7, 416, 427, 608.
SchultB, H., 36, 46, 67, 67, 73,
118-4, 138, 188, 141, 148-4^
484, 407, 618.
Seeley, J. R., 470, 476.
Smend, R., 13, 113, 163, 168-0,
267, 806, 326.
Smith, O. A., on Chrirt and O.T.,
8; on revelation in Israel, 8, 10;
on Semitic religions, 41; on
P element in Joihua, 216; on
Isaiah, 487, 636.
Smith, H. P., on patriarchs, 80,
94ft; on ark, I37, 168; on
Samuel, 101; on Books of Samuel,
386-7; on brasen serpent, 143,
600-1; on Bna, 66, 291, 206;
on David, 686: 66, 68, 60-1,
88, 124-6, 141, 182, 218, 267,
427,631.
Smith, J., 88.
Smith, W. R., on WeOhanien
criticism, 66-7, 200; on revela-
tion, 19 ft, 46; on patriarchal
history, 97; on Sfaiaitic legiela-
tion, 100; on Jehovah as tribal
fod, 182; on sacred pillars, 122,
88; on tree-wonriiip, 136; on
totemiBm, 139; totem theory of
sacrifice, 498-9; on Samuel, 172»
178-9, 189-90; on prophets and
sacrifice, 166-7 ; on prophets and
calf-worship, 146-6; on Deut.,
184» 267, 260-60, 281, 611-2;
on origin of Priestiy Code, 291 ;
on psalms, 228, 436-6, 439-40,
448, 460: 16, 28, 126, 138, 141-2,
162, 177, 247, 206, 316-7, 604,
624, 627.
Stade, B., on Israel in Egypt,
66, 492; on the patriarchs, 91;
on presence and power of Yahwdi,
130; on early raligion of Israel,
136 ft: 4, 13, 17, ik, 66,68,73,
01, 119, 122, 126-7, 132-8,
137, 139, 443, 146, 208, 242,
267-8, 824, 484, 486, 631,
636.
SteueruMel, 0., 214, 284.
Strack, H. K, 8, 69, 108, 109, 212,
232, 280, 384-6.
Superstitions, alleged, in Israel:
fetishism, animism, warship of
ancestors, totemism, ete., 89,
$62
INDEXES
IMff. Sm tetekr Ocmteiit^,
GhAp. V.
BwetOb H. &» 528.
TABaBJfAOLi, eritioal theory ot
100, 164-5, 289; in JB uid P»
167 ff.; eTidenoe of harmooT.
168 S.; historidty ot 170-3;
in Code, 289, 297; CkilflDflO <toi*
868-4, 522.
Tel el-Amarna letters, 79, 81, 124,
242, 420, 423-4, 500, 625.
Thatcher, G. W., 121, 143, 382-4.
Tomkina, H. O., 413, 417, 494.
Tato, W., 5, 8, 13, 17, 56. 121,
128, 189, 286-7, 306, 517.
Watsoh, F., on Genesis, 115.
Wellhauaen, J.» relatian to pre-
decessors, 5, 13, 200; inflnenoe
ot 17, 56, 200, 291. 327; on
pfttriarohs, 88 ff., 95 ff., 109, 135;
on early religion of Israel, 126,
129 ff • ; ideas of world and human-
ity, 127; on Ezodll^ 103, 493;
on -decal<wae» 128, 141; on
■aorifice, 157; on tabernade*
165, 172; on Dent., 249 ff., 252,
296; on nnity of sanctuary,
leo, 174ff., 273; on frieathood.
181 iL» 816, 504-5; on pre-ezHian
ooltos, 159, 303; on parallel-
ism of J and E, 218; on paral-
lelism of P with JB, 65, 71,
107, 344-5; on JB and P in
Joshna,214ff.; on Priestly Code,
288ff. ; on Baekiel and law, 25.
316; on passoYsr, 301, 320 ff.;
on psalms, 434-5; on N.T.,
478: 4^ 14^. 57-8, 61. 6a-4,
66, 68, 70, 74-6. 121, 123-4,
132, 145. 151-6, 161, 166-7,
171. 177, 190, 204-5, 220, 222,
23a- 3, 238, 257-8, 267, 270-1,
276, 281, 290, 292-8, 300,
302, 305-.8, 311, 321-2, 826-8,
332-5, 336. 338, 340-2, 847-8,
350, 356-8. 361-2. 372, 379,
388, 405, 411. 440, 455-6, 485
497, 507-8, 518, 531, 535.
Westpfaal. A.. 8. 72, 198, 203, 211,
213. 231. 268. 260, 274, 276. 336.
Wilson. R. D.. 429, 534.
Windder, H.. 59, 90. 897. 406.
409, 420, 424, 488.
Woods, F. H.. 57. 106^ 204. 483.
Writing, Hehcw, 80-1. 263» 865-6,
374-5,525.
ZSoKun. O^ on Obronifllii^ S89--
9a
THE BROSS LECTURES, 1904
THE BIBLE
Its Origin and Nature
BY THB RBVBRBNO
MARCUS DODS, D.D.
Professor of Bzegetical Theology
in New College, Edinburgh ,
i2mo. $1.00 net
Postage, la Cents
CONTENTS
The Bible and Other Sacred Booka
The Canon of Scripture
Revelation
Inspiration
Infallibility
The Trustworthiness of the Oospels
The Miraculous Element in the Gospels
'' He exhibits such good sense and candor in
turning over and over the large problems of
biblical criticism, thought evolution, and the prac-
tical value of Bible truth, that the reader soon
follows him as he would a guide who thoroughly
understands the road. . . . His spirit is not
simply one of tolerance for the other side of the