■v: s-v Selected Old Testament Studies. BY J. B. SHEARER, D. D., LL. D., Professor of Biblical Instruction, Davidson College ; Author of Bible Course Syllabus : Modern Mysticism ; Sermon on the Mount ; Studies in the Life of Christ ; and The Scriptures, Fundatnental Facts and Features. RICHMOND, VA.: Presbyterian Committee of Publication. Copyright by R. E, MAGILL, Secretary of Publication, 1909. Bebtcatton. TO THE NUMEROUS FRIENDS AND CRITICS WHO HAVE SPOKEN SO KINDLY OF THE AUTHOR'S FORMER VOLUMES THIS BOOK IS GRATEFULLY DEDICATED. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. Origin of Sacrafices — Cain and Abel Feud, 9 CHAPTER n. The Earliest Civilization, 16 CHAPTER HI. The Deterioration of the Race, 23 CHAPTER IV. The Unity of the Human Race, 30 CHAPTER V. The Covenant with Noah, 38 CHAPTER VI. The Missionary Covenant, 48 CHAPTER VII. The Sabbath, 63 CHAPTER VIII. The Christian Sabbath or Lord's Day, 72 CHAPTER IX. The Religious Institutions of Moses, 81 CHAPTER X. Ministers of Religion — The Priesthood, 89 6 Contents CHAPTER XL Ministers of Religion — The Prophets, 98 CHAPTER XII. The Tithes — How Far Binding, 107 CHAPTER XIII. The Book of Genesis, 120 CHAPTER XIV. The Four Other Books of Moses, 127 CHAPTER XV. The Book of Job, 137 CHAPTER XVI. Job, — Continued — Its Contents 147 CHAPTER XVII. ECCLESIASTES, OR THE RoYAL TEACHING PrEACHER, 162 CHAPTER XVIII. Daniel and His Times, or The Significance of the Captivity, 1 72 CHAPTER XIX. Biblical Criticism, 182 CHAPTER XX. The Bible and the Monuments, 195 CHAPTER XXI. The Bible and the Monuments, — Continued 201 CHAPTER XXII. The Synagogue, 214 PREFACE. The author in several preceding volumes has found it easy to group a number of discussions in each, and to express the unity in each volume by an appro- priate name. It has not been so easy to find a unify- ing name for twenty-two chapters gathered into this little volume. The name chosen, "Selected Old Tes- tament Studies," is not very suggestive without a word of explanation. On what principle have they been selected? Not because they are separately more val- uable, or more interesting, or more original than many others. Every teacher and expounder of Scripture must keep abreast of contemporaneous thought, whether true or false, and he must vindicate the true by differentiating it from the false, rather by careful and accurate definition, than by controversial assaults upon error. The careful reader will perceive that the author aims to show the coherency of all Scripture and its obvious claims, as against the disintegrating and de- structive tendencies of the present day. He seeks to present a number of truths in a common sense way so as to leave no standing for prevalent errors even though they be set forth with a wonderful parade of 8 Preface scholarship, science and philosophy. It is usually sufficient to set forth the truth in its simplicity and then to define the principles and methods of its adver- saries. There is a sense in which truth, clearly stated, is its own witness, while heresy carefully analyzed and defined is its own refutation. Is not the author's aim worthy of all praise even if the execution fall below his ideal ? Davidson, N. C. J. B. SHEARER. Selected Old Testament Studies. CHAPTER I Origin of Sacrifices — Cain and Abel Feud. All ordinances of worship are of divine origin and appointment. They are not only permitted but en- joined in the Scriptures. They are valuable only be- cause so appointed. The whole plan of salvation is ordained of God, and all the steps and means are exactly adapted to that end. It was impossible for the sinner to improve God's plan by adding anything thereto or by taking anything therefrom. Attempted human ad- ditions are called will worship. Christ denounced those who "teach for doctrines the commandments of men." Some assert that the ordinances of religion as we find them in the Scriptures are the outgrowth of man's felt necessities as he emerged into a higher state of conscious religious life. This theory is in the interest of a naturalistic evolution of all religion, as well as doctrine and morals ; for all three are a coherent unit. We shall not formally discuss this theory here. Others think that God found certain forms and or- dinances in use among men in various human systems, and adopted and adapted them to his purposes, with all necessary modifications. These deny that they 10 Selected Old Testament Studies have any sympathy with the doctrine of evolution. Yet they assume that Polytheistic Paganism is older than Monotheism ; they seem to limit the divine re- sources to mere human inventions ; they are pleased to find many Bible ordinances in remote antiquity while they greatly foreshorten the antiquity of Bible ordi- nances in their authoritative form as found in the Books of Moses. The logic of their contention is that Bible religion is a modified paganism. Of course they resent this conclusion. The better view, and the common sense view would seem to be that the religion of the beginning was pure and uncorrupted and of divine origin. When men apostatized from the true faith, the process was gradual, and they carried with them divinely appointed ordinances, modifying and corrupting them in a purely naturalistic way, until most pagan practices, and their teachings also, are but travesties of the good and the true. The Papacy only is consistent in claiming authority for human inventions in worship, because her claimed infalibiUty gives them all the authority of a "Thus saith the Lord." She has also consistently adopted many heathen doctrines and practices into her system until in many parts of the world Romanism is not much bet- ter than a baptized paganism. We propose to consider here the origin of sacrifices, and incidentally their nature. Two classes of sacri- fices date back to the beginning. By sacrifices we mean all offerings made by fire on the altar before the Lord. These are bloody offerings and meat offerings. They are coeval with the race, or, at least, they date back to the Fall. The bloody ofifering was a sacrifi- cial victim whose blood was shed. The meat oflfering Selected Old Testament Studies ii was of the fruits of the ground. In later times these consisted of cereals, and we may fairly conclude that it was so from the beginning. When we consider that Moses notes these two offerings in his brief history in Genesis, we may fairly conclude that they were exactly what he and his gene- ration were familiar with and understood them to be, both in form and significance. Things perfectly fa- miliar require no exposition nor enumeration of details when referred to in a historic way. Abel offered "of the firstlings of his flocks and of the fat thereof" — a clean animal for sacrifice — a lamb of the first year — an atonement for sin. "Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering to the Lord." This was a thank offering in a ceremonial system. We may not suppose that they invented these offerings and that God afterward adopted and enjoined them as necessary forms of worship, and then defined their re- lations, first atonement and then thanksgiving in proper order. They must date back to the very first God-given lessons in acceptable worship. For we read that "God made them coats of skins and clothed them" so as to cover their shame. These skins must have been taken from sacrificial victims for they were not permitted to kill animals for food till after the flood. Gen. iii. 21 ; i. 29 ; ix. 3. If the bloody offering was instituted then, the meat offering must have been instituted at the same time because of their essential relations. And then we find them associated very soon afterwards. Why one was rejected we shall see presently. One or both of these offerings, usually both, are found in all religious systems. We may find traces of them in the very lowest forms of religious culture, in 12 Selected Old Testament Studies efforts to placate or to ingratiate a deity. Altars and victims and sacrificial feasts have been the rule in all ages, handed down by tradition and variously modi- fied. Thank offerings and votive offerings have en- riched the temples and shrines of all ages. Even can- nibalism was first a religious ritual of human sacri- fices and it is even yet a beastly religious festivity. These two offerings carry with them the same sig- nificance of atonement and thanksgiving wherever found. Their true significance is not wholly lost in the most corrupt and depraved systems of paganism, much less in those which are most cultured and intellectual. Their true typical character has, however, been lost out side of Judaism and Christianity, The bloody offering is really typical and prophetic of the Lamb of God. It never was possible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sin. The sole efficacy of the blood sprinkled on the altar, or before the Lord within the vail, was derived from the blood of Christ which it typified. We need not repeat here the discussion of typology except to say that type is pro- phecy, and therefore impossible to human invention. The meat offering was equally a type of Christ, though not so obvious perhaps, nor so often expounded and emphasized. Both these classes of offerings were used along down the ages, down to Moses, and then they were en- joined and emphasized with great minuteness of detail, that they might not be forgotten, but preserved as a great volume of prophecy in elaborate object lessons, against the time of general apostasy. Leviticus and Hebrews need to be studied together if we would know what it all meant to devout and believing Israel from Abraham to Christ. Selected Old Testament Studies 13 The whole system was discontinued by the logic of events after the true lamb was slain, and Christ ful- filled it all. When the substance came the shadows passed away. Col. ii. 17; Heb. viii. 5 ; x. i ; et passim. We are constrained therefore to conclude that all the sacrifices and offerings were of divine origin and ap- pointment. The Cain and Abel feud was based on rival theories of the authority and value of these offerings. The full story is given in Genesis iv. 1-8. "In process of time it came to pass that Cain brought of the fruits of the ground an offering unto the Lord. And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flocks and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and his offering; but unto Cain and his offering he had not re- spect." We note here several points of interest expressed or implied. 1. There was an evident rivalry between the two brothers, and a radical disagreement as to matters of fundamental importance in worship. 2. "At a set time ;" "at the end of days" is the literal rendering of the Hebrew ; at a set time the matter was referred to a divine decision. The decision was in favor of Abel's theory and against Cain's. 3. Each person was accepted or rejected, stood or fell, with his offering, because every act of worship is the expression of the faith and piety of the worshipper. 4. Abel made the atonement offering of blood in faith, as was appointed for sinners, and was accepted along with his offering. Heb. xi. 4. 5. Cain refused to make the atonement offering, but relied for acceptance on a thank offering. He evi- 14 Selected Old Testament Studies dently denied his need of an atonement and denied his own sinfulness. This will appear from his rebuke. 6. Cain and Abel seem to be at the head of two rival parties. Men had evidently begun to multiply on the earth ; for Cain and his followers "went from the presence of the Lord," that is, from the usual place of accepted worship (as the phrase implied in the mouth of Moses) and he builded a city and called the name of it after the name of his son, Enoch. Henceforth there were two peoples, the "Sons of God," of whom Seth was the head, and the "Sons of men" of whom Cain was the head, one orthodox, the other apostate. But to return, "Cain was very wroth, and his coun- tenance fell." He was not satisfied with the test of his creed, and was angry at the Lord for exposing his selfrighteous pretensions." And the Lord said to Cain, Why art thou wroth? And why is thy counte- nance fallen? If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted?" or in other words, if you are not a sinner you and your offering would be accepted. "And if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door," or in words more apt, if you are a sinner, the sin offering croucheth at the door. Sin needs a sin offering. His rejection by the Lord proved him a sinner. If a sinner, then the sin offering. So far the best authorities are agreed. The remaining sentence does not seem to fit and gives trouble. "And unto thee his desire ('shall be' is not in the original) and thou shalt rule over him." This is certainly a mistranslation, for the pronouns "his" and "him" have no possible reference to Abel who is not mentioned in this rebuke and expostulation. The pro- nouns can only refer to the sin offering mentioned just before. We are then shut in to this rendering, "and to thee the need of it" — That is what you need — "and by Selected Old Testament Studies 15 it thou shalt prevail." This certainly comports with and emphasizes the previous part of the rebuke, and opens wide the door to embrace the truth and still be saved from a final rejection. It is the offer of mercy through the proper sin offering. This only drove him to fury and he rose up and slew his brother — the first martyr to the truth as it is in Jesus, the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world. Cain and Abel and their respective adherents are typical classes in all ages — Pelagians in the early cen- turies, and Socinians and Unitarians in our day — as against those who believe in the vicarious atonement of Christ, and who teach that he is our penal substitute. The necessity of atonement by blood is as urgent to- day as when it was decided in the beginning. CHAPTER II The Earliest Civilization. The modern doctrine of evolution has invented and popularized the notion of the "Primeval Savage." They have taught that the progenitors of the human race were but a small remove from the anthropoid ape or from some other form of animal life, from which they descended according to some unknown law. Also that the race improved gradually by a development analogous to the development and growth of the indi- vidual from ignorant infancy to mature manhood and that all civilization has been involved from ancestors so low in the scale of intelligence and morals as to deserve the name "Primeval Savage," far below anything that we now find in uncivilized and savage life. Suffice it to say that science has confessedly failed to prove any such doctrine. We may therefore dismiss this hypothesis and §eek the evidence of the origin of the race and the laws of racial development in such directions as may be open to us. This is the only scientific method. History notes both progress and retrogression of the race. The former is more patent to us from our point of view. The present highest civilizations of the world have certainly sprung out of humbler origins. Norsemen and Druids are found in the beginning of English history and civilization. All the steps in the upward progress are recorded in well authenticated Selected Old Testament Studies 17 history, and this growth is the pride of all English speaking peoples. The culture and civilization of France has grown up on the semi-barbarous Gauls of Caesar's day. The Goths and Vandals and Huns, who overran and de- stroyed the Roman empire, gradually learned the arts and the culture of civilized life, and to-day represent much that is best in the civilization of modern Europe, Rome and Greece with all their glories of literature and art certainly date back to robber chieftains, or to barbaric tribes. And so we might multiply illustra- tions of progression ; and quite a broad, but a partial, induction would seem to teach that this is the law of race development. But history also tells of retrogression. The de- scendants of the ancient Egyptians are a besotted peo- ple who know nothing and care nothing for the glories of the Pharaohs, and so with the present representa- tives of various old civilizations ; so that some, regard- ing such cases, find another law, drawn likewise from a partial induction, that the law of all civilization is to rise, culminate, and then decline till it reaches the low- est levels. We need not expect history to furnish such evi- dence of retrogression as of progression because a sav- age people has lost its history, caring nothing for it; and even its traditions hardly rise above its low level ; while the very reverse is true of a rising people. En- vironment has much to do with the progression or re- trogression of a people. Influences from the outside and conditions on the inside often determine an up- ward or a downward career. Rigorous climates and in- hospitable regions sometimes make living so difficult that there is no leisure for anything else, and people 1 8 Selected Old Testament Studies sink to a corresponding barbaric or savage condition. Misgovernment and oppression sometimes produce the same result; so also wars and subjugations. Our conclusion is that progression and retrogression are the opposite poles of the same more general law that a large number of varied and varying and often diverse forces are at work to make or mar the destinies of any and every people. Comparative philology sometimes assists in tracing the origin of the most degenerate races. We are told of a most debased people in Ceylon called Weddas, nearly extinct — debased physically and intellectually — barely five feet in height — having a very limited memory living in the rudest huts and barely subsisting with bow and arrow. Their language has but two or three hundred words, with only two or three numerals for counting. Yet their language is a degenerate Sanscrit. Their ancestors must have once shared in the highest Aryan civilization of remote antiquity. Nearly all peoples whose origins date far back have their traditions of a "Golden Age." We find it in the Zendavesta, the sacred books of the Magians which were written centuries before Christ. The Greeks, the Chinese, the Mexicans, and the Peruvians have similar traditions of their origins in a golden age. Were a pagan to describe what Christians call the promised Millennium he could hardly improve on Hesiod's im- mortal description of the Golden Age in which the Greeks believed. A consensus of traditions like the traditions of the Flood is valuable for confirmation ; and while details may be wholly unreliable their testimony to underly- ing facts is not to be despised by the student of his- tory. So here ; this general tradition of a golden age Selected Old Testament Studies 19 in remote antiquity must be accepted as true in its essence, though it be dressed in varied and sometimes fantastic garb. If we could find an authentic history of such an age, it would reduce all the variant tradi- tions to coherency. The Bible is the only book that treats of the origin of the human race. We accept the statements of Genesis as genuine and authentic history. It is far briefer than we might desire, but the facts are unmis- takable and the coloring of the picture is vivid. Without stopping to define civilization as distin- guished from savagery, or from several intermediate grades between the two, we shall proceed to note the features found in Genesis. When we have found the intellectual, moral, religious, social, industrial, and constitutional conditions of the first generation, we shall find no difficulty in locating them in the scale of humanity. 1. Man was made in the image of God. This was not a bodily likeness, but was a spiritual likeness. He was like God in "knowledge, righteousness and true holiness." These three are correlative to each other They can not subsist separately from each other. The likeness was perfect and complete except that man is finite and God is infinite. Man was no inchoate moral being, with germinal qualities to be developed into a moral and responsible being, but he was of the full stature of a complete manhood, intelligent in mind, holy in disposition, and righteous in action. So much for his mental and moral constitution. 2. He had dominion over creatures. This required wisdom, tact, and skill. Much of this has been lost. The Weddas have only one domesticated animal, the 20' Selected Old Testament Studies dog, so low have they sunk below the God-g^ven perog- ative of their ancestors. 3. Primeval man started life in the family which had a constitution so fixed and imperative, that all human institutions have grown out of it, or else cluster about it. From the beginning a man left father and mother and clave unto his wife and the "twain were one flesh." There was no divorce from the beginning, but when family life decayed divorce was allowed for infidelity in this sacred and holy relation. 4. Adam was no mean scientist. He "gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field." "And whatsoever Adam called every living creature that was the name thereof." This he did in no haphazard way, for the early recorded names of animals have meanings expressive of their characteristics. The same was doubtless true of all plant life that came under his observation. We infer this from the references to the trees of the garden, to thorns and briars, to herb bearing seed after his kind, and fruits after their kind. 5. His personal and face to face converse with God gave him the greatest possibilities both before and after the sin of eating the forbidden fruit. The Lord was his teacher, presumably on all subjects from coat- making to the plan of salvation. And besides, under the patriarchal system, which dates back to the begin- ning, every patriarch was the priest of his home and as such had access to the oracle. 6. The first generation cultivated the soil and kept flocks and herds. Cain tilled the ground and Abel was a keeper of sheep. Agriculture and stock raising are Selected Old Testament Studies 21 not the pursuits of savages. Adam and Eve were placed in the garden to dress and to keep it. And when the curse was pronounced thorns and briars and failure were doomed to mar the tillage. So also when Cain was cursed. Tillage was the first ordained pur- suit of the race. Cattle were ancillary to it and de- pendent on it as it is to-day. 7. They lived in houses and even in cities as men multiplied on the earth. "And Cain went out from the presence of the Lord and dwelt in the land of Nod." "And he builded a city, and he called the name of the city after the name of his son Enoch." 8. Our first parents had a language adequate for their uses in their social and religious life, and also for scientific and industrial purposes. This language was possibly taught to man by his divine teacher. More probably he got it by inspiration, as when they were inspired to speak with tongues at Pentecost. If he in- vented the language, as some think, this only exalts our opinion of his mental resources, for the earliest languages are the most scientific. 9. Their religious condition required them to under- stand and discuss the profoundest doctrines of revela- tion, such as Deity, providence, responsibility, sin, judgment, atonement for sin, acceptance with God, thr. divine curse. All these things together indicate a modest, real, and substantial civilization. The highest and best civilization is that of the head and the heart. The simplicity or the complexity of the material and aesthe- tic sides of civilization varies widely and cannot be accepted as its sole measure, or its most valuable feat- ure. A mistake is too often made here. The voluptu- ous luxury of the oriental harem, and the aesthetic cult 22 Selected Old Testament Studies of Venus at Athens pointed downward, while the simple life of the Scotch crofter and the Huguenot peasant pointed upward. It has often happened that the highest material civilization has been a godless civilization. We shall perhaps see this illustrated in the deteriora- tion of the race, which came most rapidly among the descendants of Cain and finally overtook the whole antediluvian world. CHAPTER III The Deterioration of the Race. Cain and his adherents "went out from the presence of the Lord," and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the east of Eden. The phrase "presence of the Lord" and its exact equivalents "before the Lord" and "before the face of the Lord," are used in the Old Testament to in- dicate the place of worship or the shrine where the Lord revealed himself to the worshippers both by oracles and with visible manifestations of his presence. It was the rallying place and the centre of the religious life of the people. Cain left this place, partly as an apostate from the true faith, and partly as a fugitive and a voluntary exile. He left the oracle behind him and surrendered the high priviledge of having the Lord as his teacher and friend ready to guide him in all important matters. We might therefore expect the effects of sin to manifest themselves more rapidly among his descendants, and also to find the central forces of the antediluvian apostasy among them. In the fourth generation Lamech took two wives. So far as we know, this was the origin of polygamy and the consequent wreckage of the family. One woman was made for one man that there might be a godly seed. Mai. ii. 15. Polygamy in later times has been a murderous system. It was so then, for Lamech made defiant proclamation to his wives, Adah and Zillah, that he had slain a young man for wounding and injuring him, and declared his determination to be 24 Selected Old Testament Studies avenged seventy fold in such a case. It is generally supposed that it was an insane jealously over real or fancied wrongs in this double family relation. Poly- gamy and murder have been intimately associated all the way down the ages to Mormonism of our times. All this indicates a great apostasy and departure from the righteousness and true holiness in which man was first created. We may also note certain modifications of the original civilization in this family. 1. "Adah bare Jabal ; and he was the father of such as dwell in tents, and of such as have cattle." This was a departure from tillage and from permanent homes into nomadic life, semi-barbarous, and then barbarous. 2. And his brother's name was Jabal : he was the father of such as handle the harp and organ (or pipe)." This is evidently a higher aesthetic culture, adding zest to the dissipations of town and city life, on the one hand, and adding fascination to the rollicking leis- ure of nomadic life, on the other. 3. "And Zillah, she also bare Tubal-Cain, an in- structor of every artificer in brass and iron." This in- dicates a higher material civilization in this branch ot the family. There has always been a self sufficiency in a high material civilization which tends to atheism. Solomon's experience illustrates the corrupting in- fluences of riches, luxury and culture apart from godli- ness. Athens in her later glories, and Daphne's shameless voluptuousness, and the Epicureanism of Rome in the days of the senatorial party, indicate the corruptions and vices of a mere aesthetic and material civilization. We need no pessimism to trace the in- Selected Old Testament Studies 25 fluences of the material civilization of the present day on the social, moral, and religious life. The separation was social, religious and national. The two parties lived each in its own land or country. The Providential intent was to preserve the true reli- gion against the corrupting influences of Cain's apos- tate party. They grew into two distinct peoples, each with its own type of civil and social life. The separa- tion in geographical location prevented any close con- tact, for a while at least. The righteous, or orthodox people were called the "sons of God." The wicked, or apostate people were called "sons of men," and sometimes "men ;" and their daughters were called the "daughters of men." The one stood for the glory of God, the other, for the glory of men. The civilization, the religion and the philoso- phy of Cain's people was at best a proud humanitarian - ism. Seth became the patriarchal head of his people in the place of Cain who had forfeited his birthright by apostasy, murder and voluntary exile. In the days of Enos, the "son of Seth," men began to call themselves by the name of the Lord." This is the marginal render- ing of Gen. iv. 26, and would seem to be correct. Per- haps at this time, Enoch, the son of Cain and the con- temporary of Enos proclaimed himself and his people the "sons of men" in proud defiance. However this may be, the righteous are called "sons of God" both in the Old Testament and in the New. The other name, "sons of men," is not so current after the flood, perhaps, be- cause that particular form of apostasy was destroyed neveragaintoappear in the same dress and name. Here- sies refuted by the logic of events, or better, suicidal heresies have no resurrection after they have perished. This may be abundanly illustrated from history. Sin 26 Selected Old Testament Studies and Satan may and do try similar inventions, but not the same, after failure and exposure, just as an enemy, when driven from one stronghold, or beaten on one battle field seeks to make a stand on another. For the usage of the term, "sons of God" we may quote, Jno. i. 12; Gen vi. i, 2; i Jno. iii. i, 2; and other places. The mischief began with the intermarriage of the righteous and the wicked. Gen. vi. i, 2, "And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose." Some imagine that this was a misalliance of angels and women, as if such a thing were possible, because the term "sons of God" is used twice for angels in the Old Testament. If this were a mere mythological story like some stories of the heathen such an exegesis might be al- lowed, for it would make little difference. But we dis- miss it as unworthy of further notice because we con- sider this authentic history and there are no real diffi- culties in the exegesis, nor in the definition and identi- fication of all the parties. It is easy to imagine that these daughters of men with their aesthetic culture, and meretricious adorn- ments produced a fascination similar to the abandoned daughters of Zion in Isaiah's day. Is. iii. 16-23 ; and as so often happens to-day ; while the modest adornment of a meek and quiet spirit was undervalued and neg- lected. These marriages introduced apostasy into the family life of the righteous, to eat like a canker and to destroy holiness at the fountain. They led also to con- flict of personal ambitions and national interests. Selected Old Testament Studies 2^ Then came wars and violence, and the sons of these marriages became mighty men and men of renown, great military heroes, until the earth was "corrupt be- fore God" and the earth was filled with violence." "And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually." It were easy to fill up the picture of famine, and pestilence, and op- pression, and brutality during the closing centuries of the antediluvian period until actual barbarism and savagery superseded all that was good in the golden age of the beginning. It became necessary to destroy the degenerate race except Noah and his family. He alone remained, "A preacher of righteousness," "A just man, perfect in his generations," "He walked with God." With this one exception the righteous were all extinct by deteriora- tion and other causes. The history of this retrogres- sion is brief, but its lessons are unmistakable and en- during. We talk about the philosophy of history, but there is no real philosophy of history that leaves out God. Among the second causes that elevate or de- grade the nations, good and evil are the supreme forces, for "righteousness exalteth a nation, but sin is a re- proach to any people." The most degenerate races are the farthest away from God and their minds and hearts are besotted with sin. Why then has paganism sometimes produced such marvels of civilization, albeit their civilizations have been one sided? The answer is easy. False re- ligions have in them some good elements that bear ex- cellent fruits. While they cannot save the soul they conserve the family and tone up social forces in many cases. They lay great stress on the heroic, natural 28 Selected Old Testament Studies virtues, and are often a bulwark to the state. This was true of many nations of antiquity Hke ancient Greece or Rome. But when the fear of their gods loses its hold on the faith of the people the downward career is rapid. For nations and peoples false gods are far better than none. Then again, the highest and best civilizations of earth have been and are based on the fear of the true God, and faith in his Son, as revealed in the Scriptures. This is the supreme law, however much other forces may work in connection with it. The intermarriage of the godly and the godless was a leading cause of the ultimate ruin of the race before the Flood. Providential indications would seem to be that such marriages were forbidden then. However this may be, such marriages were forbidden to Abra- ham and to the patriarchs, and then again definitely in the Mosaic economy. Exodus xxxiv. 15, 16; Deut. vii. 3, 4. "Neither shalt thou make marriages with them ; Thy daughter shalt thou not give to his son, nor his daughter shalt thou take to thy son. For they will turn away thy son from following me, that they may serve other gods ; So will the anger of the Lord be kindled against thee and destroy thee suddenly." Disasters always attended such marriages. The case of Solomon is in point, i Kings xi. 1-13. The story is familiar. The division of his kingdom and its final decay and ruin started just here. The case of Ahab also is in point, i Kings xvi. 30-33, "He did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him." "He took to wife Jezebel," the typical bad woman of the Bible. "He went and served Baal." The final apostasy and overthrow of his kingdom be- cran here. Selected Old Testament Studies 29 Such marriages are still forbidden if Paul is right. I Cor. vii. 39, "She is at liberty to marry whom she will; only in the Lord." 2 Cor. vi. 14, "Be ye not un- equally yoked with unbelievers ; for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?" There are ap- parent limitations, i Cor. vii. 10-17, but only apparent. He is not discussing here the right to marry an unbe- liever but he shows that there is no reason for divorce when either the husband or wife becomes a believer. The logic of experience vindicates the rule that for- bids such marriages. They either mar the religious life or bring untold sorrow to the believer who makes such a marriage. Marriages contracted in hope of re- forming a sinner are quixotic and suicidal. A man will seldom marry a bad woman to reform her ; but many a woman har been beguiled into marrying a rake or a drinking man in the vain hope of making him worthy of her love and confidence. CHAPTER IV The Unity of the Human Race. The distinction of man and beast is found in all lan- guages and among all peoples. There is in all living species an instinctive recognition of race distinctions; and natural ties of blood and kinship are so potent that they are classed among Nature's forces. The flocking and mating of birds, herds of grega- rious beasts, schools of fishes of the seas, the more solitary lion, mate and cubs, each and all within the limits of their kind, do amply illustrate these instinctive forces. Swarms of locusts, gnats, and musquitoes il- lustrate the same law, and so on through all animateci nature. If these things are true of all the lower creation which have only instinct to guide their affiliations how much more may we expect to find race recognition in man whose instinct is reinforced by his intelligence. An inerrant common sense recognizes the kinship of man to man. A science "falsely so called" has sought to find man's origin in the lower animals but is com- pelled to take refuge in transmutation of species in order not to stultify this inerrant common sense. Some have held that there are a number of different races of men, distinct from each other in origin and in racial characteristics, distinct creations, but not dis- tinct species. The advocates of this theory have held that the several types in these so called races could Selected Old Testament Studies 31 not possibly have descended from a common parentage. Their arguments are derived from physical variations. This theory has now been abandoned, but some locate a common parentage ages upon ages ago in order tD give time for originating and fixing the types as now found in the eight races of men. Their efforts have been and are still untiring to find traces of man on earth far back in the geologic ages. Their so called facts have failed and their theories are in a case of hopeless collapse. No one will deny that God might have created man in swarms as he did the fish of the sea, or the fruit trees of the earth, or the beasts of the field ; or he might have impressed different types on separate groups as he created them ; or he might have started the race ages on ages ago if he had only seen fit to do so. And we would have been able to construct and elaborate any theory of creation to which present facts and conditions might seem to point, if God himself had not seen fit to tell us the story of creation. When we speak of the unity of the human race we mean that all the nations and kindreds and peoples under heaven have a common origin and are descended from a common parentage. Is this the Bible doctrine? The Scriptures everywhere assume it and sometimes assert it. Acts xvii. 26. Paul tells us that "God made the world and all things therein," and "hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth." We need then only to glance at the story of creation to confirm this statement. We have a summary of creation in the Fourth Commandment and in many other places in the Scriptures in varied forms of statement. We have the entire story in the first and second 32 Selected Old Testament Studies chapters of Genesis. We are now concerned with the creation of man only, except to say that of living things created after their kind, the human race alone owes its origin to a single created pair. In the first chapter we have a succinct and complete story of the creation in six days and the Divine bless- ing on all. In the second chapter we find a number of supplemental details necessary to be revealed. But if they had been woven into the creation story of the first chapter it would have marred its symmetry and sim- plicity. Now man only of living creatures has two part?, body and soul. The body is material, the soul is pure spirit. The two are united in this life. At death the spirit is disembodied, and the body returns to dust until the resurrection. The spirit, therefore, is the real man capable of a separate existence and endowed with aH his God-given powers, faculties, and capacities in full exercise in that separate existence. Christ cited this known and accepted fact when he confronted the Sad- ducees. Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are living persons to-day, though their bodies lie in their graves. Now it would not be difficult nor impertinent to suppose that the creation of man's spirit and the crea- tion of his body were two distinct creative acts, how- ever closely related in time. Now this is exactly what we find in the account of creation. In chapter i. we read that God created man, male and female, in his own image and likeness, "in knowledge, righteous and true holiness with dominion over the creatures." The "image and likeness" are necessarily spiritual, for God is a spirit. The distinctions of sex are rooted in the spirit and not in the physical and nervous organization Selected Old Testament Studies 33 of the body, but on the contrary each body was adjust- ed to the spirit that should occupy it. These things are more obvious when we note that in chapter ii. we have an account of the creation of the body of Adam out of the dust of the ground, and the communication of animal life. Genesis ii. 7 ; "The Lord formed man (his body) out of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life (animal life) and he became a living soul." The two Hebrev.' words, "Nephesh Hayyah" here translated "living soul" are used in Gen. i. 21 ; to describe all sea animals, great and small ; so also in Gen. i. 24 they are used to describe all land animals, great and small, and they are translated "living creatures" in both places. Man therefore became a "living creature" in the same sense. We may remark that the terms Nephesh, Psuche, and soul sometimes mean the animal life and sometimes the spirit, to be determined by the context or prescriptive usage. Then God "builded" Eve's body on the rib taken from the man's side. In Eve's case we find a more appreciable difference of time between the creation of herself (the spirit) and the creation of her body. There is no need here to trace the fortunes of the race descended from this pair, down to the flood. Here again was the race propagated from a single pair and their three sons, whose three wives may or may not have lapped over into other families than that of Noah, In Gen. ix. i, 19 we read, "God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth ;" "these are the three sons of Noah ; and of them was the whole world overspread." In the tenth chapter of Genesis we have a tabulation of the nations of the earth in Moses' day, and it is not diffi- 34 Selected Old Testament Studies cult to trace the most of them down to the present time. Moses adds (verse 32) "These are the families of the sons of Noah after their generations, in their nations ; and by these were the nations divided after the flood." The history of man as found in the later Scriptures signifies but little if the doctrine of his unity be not true ; the Abrahamic covenant, for example, and the historic unfolding of it. In fact all subsequent Bible history and doctrine revolves about this covenant. This unity is necessary to the coherency of all Scrip- ture, and to the pertinency of all doctrine. The great commission implies it, Luke xxiv. 47. Paul's parallel of Adam and Christ means nothing if it be not true. Rom. V. 12-21. It may not be amiss to cite the surface evidences of the unity of the race as found on the spiritual side. The biologist, perhaps, would feel more interest in tracing the unity on the physical side. We cite those only which are obvious, essential, and distinctive of the Genus Homo. 1. His mental and intellectual qualities and habi- tudes are unique and universal. These cannot be con- founded with brute instinct, even though it seems sometimes to approximate the processes of human rea- son. All his mental powers and faculties are found everywhere. 2. His sensibilities are everywhere the same — the emotional nature and its manifestations, the same — the same joys, sorrows, hopes, and fears — the same im- pulses and desires — these all vary in degree and mani- festation, but not in essence. 3. The laws of his activity, determined by his dis- Selected Old Testament Studies 35 positions, choice and motive, are everywhere the same. The relations of intellect, sensibilities, choice and voli- tions are the same. There is but one psychology for all, and the data of consciousness are original, neces- sary and universal. 4. His moral nature is supreme in dignity and im- portance. Conscience sits supreme as the regulative fa- culty, whether man gives heed or not. So teaches Paul in Rom. ii. 14, 15. In Prov. xxvii. 19 we read, "as in water face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man." Law and its sanctions are universal and a sense of obligation is basic in all human institutions. We might well rest our case here. These four essential points of likeness do in a sense cover the whole ground. We may popularize the argument by further citations. 5. Man's religious nature is universal. Some one has defined man as a religious animal. This religious nature, though perverted, is universal and distinguish- ing. Religion recognizes supernatural beings and agencies, either real or imaginary, or the product of ignorance and superstition. It seeks to propitiate its god or gods by worship or sacrifice, by vows, by self- abnegation and in many other ways. Some tribes and peoples have sunk so low that careless observers have said that they are destitute of the religious idea ; but more careful investigators have reported even there the lowest forms of fetishism and the basest superstitious practices. Compare Rom. i. 20-23. 6. Articulate language and its universal laws per- vade the race. Students of philology tell us that there is a kinship among languages which indicates commu* nity of origin, and which points back to the time when the whole earth was of one language and of one speech. 36 Selected Old Testament Studies Gen. xi. i. They say that the language of the degene- rate and besotted Weddas of Ceylon, who have not more than 200 vocables, and can count only three, is a residuum of the ancient Sanscrit. Philologists also tell us that many languages dating far back in the ages have been modified by contact, commerce, and con- quest, as well as by internal forces incident to culture and transmission. In this way the sciences of phil- ology and history reinforce each other. 7. The law of man's social and civil life are unvary- ing in their essential details. There is a kinship among the institutions of different peoples that can mean but one thing. The family is the primordial unit of all. Government in all is based on the correlatives, authority and obedience. Merit and demerit, reward and punishment are fundamental ideas and are predom- inant among all peoples. Substantially the same con- servative forces save even the most degenerate laces from absolute anarchy, putrescence and decay, 8. Man's very imperfections and sins are substan- tially the same. There is a universal and congenital dis- location of man's powers, and especially of the moral faculty, which psychologists do not attempt to explain. Sinful self-will is manifest in every individual of the race. Who will controvert it? Ps. xiv. 3 and Rom. i. 18-32 do avouch it. "They are all together become fil- thy ; there is none that doeth good, no not one." These things indicate a common origin. The scrip- tures alone explain it, and it is rooted in the unity of the human race. The sin in the Garden of Eden was the beginning of all this wreck and ruin. Call it impu- tation, transmission, imitation or any thing that you choose, the facts remain. More than this, God has pro- Selected Old Testament Studies 37 vided a remedy adequate to the disease, and its appli- cation is coextensive with the race. We may here cite Paul's parallel of Adam and Christ. Rom. v. 12-21. "As by one man's disobedience many were made sin- ners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous." Thus we see that Revelation, History, Ethnology, Philology, Psychology, Sociology and Biology all ren- der their testimony to the unity of the human race, along with man's moral and religious nature, and a superadd- ed racial instinct which common sense ratifies. Man's sin and ruin and man's salvation are meaningless terms if not correlated to this doctrine. No other genus or species is so well marked or so universally recognized. Skepticism on this point ends in the rejection of the en- tire scheme of revelation. CHAPTER V The Covenant with Noah. A covenant implies two parties and either expresses or implies mutual obligations. One of the parties may- be a beneficiary, and the obligations on his side are the result of benefits received and the relations of the par- ties. On the other side, in such cases, the obligations spring out of covenant promises voluntarily made. In the covenant of Grace the parties are the Father and the Son from eternity, and man becomes a party to it as a beneficiary by special covenant provision. There are numerous covenants found in the Scriptures in which God, in one or more persons, is the party on one side, and man, individually or collectively, is the party on the other side. There are two classes of covenants found in the Scriptures — secular and spiritual. Sometimes both are found in one. Sometimes they are very simple, and sometimes very elaborate and complex. Vows made by men to God are of the nature of covenants though they are not usually so classified. The term covenant is usually applied only to those promises and modes of administration which originate with God and inure to the benefit of man. The creation covenant and the covenant of works, one spiritual and the other secular, date back to the beginning. The Abrahamic covenant is a spiritual covenant spanning the dispensation of grace. The Sinaitic covenant is Selected Old Testament Studies 39 both secular and spiritual, very complex and elaborate, covering all that pertained to the welfare of the chosen people. We may note one prominent feature of later cove- nants ; they recite former covenants, in part or in whole, and then add such new provisions as may be pertinent ; and they often combine, in one, things that are limited and temporary, and things intended to be permanent and universal. The covenants at the beginning were evidently per- manent and universal. Noah and the flood mark a crisis or an epoch and the covenant made with Noah the day he went out of the ark was made for the race after him, as we shall see. It is found in Gen. viii. 20-22, and ix. 1-17. It is a sort of bill of rights, and fundamental law for the race. It guarantees life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and is in force "while the world remaineth." It is in part new, and in part a renewal. Adam's blessing when he was created may properly be called the creation covenant. It was repeated to Noah in identical terms. Gen i. 28; ix. i, 2, 7. "Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth. And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air, upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea ; into your hand are they de- livered." "Behold I have given you every green herb bearing seed, and every tree bearing fruit ; to you it shall be for meat." This creation covenant gave the race all proper vegetable food, dominion over creatures, and prolific increase. These three things are repeated in Noah's covenant and blessing; and several things are added, some positive and some negative. 40 Selected Old Testament Studies 1. Fish, flesh and fowl were given for food in addi- tion to fruits of the ground ; "every moving thing that liveth shall be meat for you ; even as the green herb have I given you all things." This is an extension of the creation covenant in Gen. i. 28; comp. ix. 3. The skins of which God made them coats in the beginning must have been the skins of sacrificial victims. If the flesh of sacrifices was eaten by priests and offerers, as was done afterwards, it was ritualistic, festal, or sacra- mental, and was not a part of their regular food for sub- sistence. Henceforth the race might eat whatsoever they pleased for regular food. It is easy to see that the plea of modern vegetarians falls to the ground here. Man was first vegetarian from the creation to the flood, and then carnivorous by special covenant provision. It is likely, however, that as man deteriorated be- fore the flood, and the earth was corrupt, and was filled with violence, both man and animals became car- nivorous and omnivorous without any divine warrant for going beyond the dietetic provision made for them both in the beginning, i. 29, 30. 2. Blood was forbidden as food. "But the flesh with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eat." The reason assigned is that the blood ia the life. This prohibition was reenacted at Sinai and emphasized in Leviticus and Deuteronomy, and for the same reason. Blood was set apart as a sacred thing, not to be eaten, because the blood made atonement on the altar for their souls, and God had so appointed it, from the blood of the lamb sprinkled on the altar to the blood of Christ which was typified by it. See Leviti- cus xvii. 10-15. The prohibition extended to things strangled and to things that died of themselves, be- Selected Old Testament Studies 41 cause the blood was still in the flesh, and so also to that which was torn by wild beasts. This was not a part of the ritual system of the Jews as some suppose. The reason assigned "The blood is the life," remains in all ages and dispensations. As long as the reason exists the prohibition must needs re- main. The huntsman was required to bleed his game and cover up the blood with the dust of the ground. The prohibition was enforced equally against Jew an -J Gentile, the children of Israel and strangers. The reason is that it was in the covenant with Noah, the second head of the race. Blood was made sacred for the race, because it is by the atoning blood of Christ that Jew and Gentile alike are saved. We find this provision re-emphasized by the council at Jerusalem as set forth in the fifteenth chapter of Acts. Certain Judaizing teachers came down from Jerusalem to Antioch and taught the brethren "Except ye be circumcised after the manner of Moses, ye can- not be saved." The matter was referred to the apos- tles and elders at Jerusalem. Some of the believing Pharisees argued "That it was needful to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses." The quesion at issue was this, whether Gentile con- verts should keep the Jewish ritual. After a full dis- cussion a unanimous decision was reached, the Holy Ghost concurring and confirming, that Gentile converts were free from the yoke of circumcision and the ritual obligations implied in it. They therefore promulgated a decree to this effect, and wrote letters, and sent chosen men to explain it to the churches, who "went through the cities and de- livered them the decrees for to keep, that were or- 42 Selected Old Testament Studies dained of the apostles and elders which were at Jeru- salem." xvi. 4. They promulgated certain apparent exceptions, "It seemed good to the Holy Ghost, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things ;'' "That ye abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication ; from which if ye keep yourselves ye shall do well." These are not real exceptions. While they are em- phasized in the Sinaitic covenant, they did not origi- nate in it and did not pass away with it. Idolatrous feasts, pollutions, and unclean practices were alike for- bidden to all peoples, and always will be from the very nature of the case. The eating of things strangled and blood was forbidden to the race in the covenant with Noah, and was only emphasized in the Mosaic law as against pagan practices. These things seem to hav^ been reenacted in the council at Jerusalem because these practices were common among the Gentiles of that day, and poorly instructed pagan converts might suppose that they were a part of the Mosaic law and not binding on them because the ritual was no longer binding. Whether these speculations be true or not this decree has never been superseded and gentile con- verts are bound by its provisions and will be till the end. 3. Capital punishment was enjoined for murder. "And surely the blood of your lives will I require ; at the hand of every beast will I require it and at the hand of man ; and at the hand of every man's brother will I require the life of man. Whoso sheddeth man's blood by man shall his blood be shed ; for in the image of God made he man." Gen. ix. 5, 6. Selected Old Testament Studies 43 Whether this provision was new or not we do noi know. Cain was spared and protected by a mark that was set upon him "lest any one finding him should kill him." Conscience, and possibly law, made him fear just retribution. Lamech the murderer was not pun- ished, perhaps because he was the patriarchal ruler and judge of his people, and in his jealous rage he took the life of the young man who injured him in his home. This much is certain however, the wars, and vio- lence, and bloodshed of the antediluvian world inflicted capital punishments in a most gigantic and lawless way, exactly as has been done since. The prevalence of wars, and bloodshed, and murders, and assassina- tions, and butcheries in all ages, outside of the admin- istration of law, do amply prove that the doctrine of capital punishment is deep rooted, and based on the conscience of the race. God laid the execution of vengeance for murder up- on the race. "At the hand of every man's brother will I require the life or man." We may not get rid of the responsibility by saying "Am I my brother's keeper? ' God says "The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground." He holds the living to account for the blood of their murdered dead. It would be in- teresting to enquire whether the doctrine of the Goel — the blood brother, the avenger of blood, the redeemer — may not have had a divine origin here ; and whether the failure of society to punish the murderer may not be due to getting too far away from the doctrine of family and personal responsibility for innocent blood. The dignity of human life calls for its protection, "For in the image of God made he man." No mere animal has any such dignity and value. The lives of the lower animals may or may not be taken at the 44 Selected Old Testament Studies pleasure or profit of man, but it is in no sense murder, because no divine image is marred thereby. There may- be needless and wanton cruelty but no murder in such case. But on the other hand, blood for blood is the law for the human race as long as it remains true that man was made in the image of God. It is provided also that vicious animals that take human life must be put to death, "At the hand of every beast will I require it." The principle of blood for blood is found here also. This is more than a mere precaution to prevent further mischief by a vicious animal. But if we put it on this low ground of a mere expediency, it is still evident that the owner is the re- sponsible and the guilty party if the life of the vicious animal is spared and further mischief ensue. 4. The permanency of the seasons was guaranteed. When Noah made his sacrifice "The Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake ;" "neither again will I smite every living thing as I have done. While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease." viii. 21, 22. 5. The Lord covenanted that he would no more de- stroy the earth with a flood. In the geologic records of long ages past, great floods had played a principal part in fashioning mountains, and valleys, and conti- nents, and in terminating great eras, and in determin- ing new epochs. The two last are the best known to us, the post-glacial deluge just prior to the creation of the present cosmos, and the Noachian deluge, as made known to us by Scripture history, by tradition, and bv its vestiges as found over a large part of the earth. Selected Old Testament Studies 45 But the Lord covenanted that this should be the last. The next great change shall be by fire, as we learn from 2 Pet. iii. 3-13. "The heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up." "Nevertheless, we ac- cording to the promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness." 6. This covenant with Noah was ratified by the bow in the cloud. "This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you ;" "I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a token of a covenant between me and the earth," etc. ix. 12-17. While this token is men- tioned in immediate connection with the last provision of the covenant, it is evidently the token of the entire covenant and all its details. This token is of the nature of a seal to the covenant. Covenants have been sealed with some visible emblem or device in all ages, whether they be verbal or written. The signmanual, or the seal, or both are affixed to at- test the validity, of a covenant so that it cannot be broken. It also attests the covenant to all beneficiaries or parties in interest. So the bow in the cloud is Jeho- vah's signmanual and seal written across the heavens in ratification of his covenant and attesting it to its beneficiaries. It has been asked if the rainbow in the cloud had no existence before the flood. The question is irrelevant, for anything either new or old, and more commonly old, may be adopted as a seal. A clod of earth was used in olden times to seal the sale and transfer of a parcel of land ; an olive branch has sealed a treaty of peace ; the tasting of a lump of salt has bound men in eternal friendship ; new and complex devices have been 46 Selected Old Testament Studies adopted to ratify and seal contracts, and even the letter "S" or the written word "seal" is constantly used to ratify and attest a covenant. Human law makes some form of seal, no matter how simple or familiar, neces- sary to important contracts. So it was entirely com- petent to adopt any natural phenomenon like the rain- bow as the seal of this great epochal covenant. It seems possible, however, that there was no rain in Adam land before the flood. Gen. ii. 5 is often so interpreted. There have been many curious specula • tions about rainless regions as the cradle of the race in the antediluvian world. The earliest Post-diluvian civilizations sought the rainless regions of the world as their habitat — Egypt, Chaldea, Mexico and Peru. It is argued that they did this in following out the tradi- tions of the race. It is a curious fact that the rainless regions have been the very garden spots of the world, partly by irrigation, and partly by an atmosphere so freighted with moisture as to produce the best possible results in vegetable and animal life. Be all this as it may, however, the story of the bow in the cloud is h: no wise affected by it. 7. This covenant with Noah was made for the race. "And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you and with your seed after you." ix. 9. The Lord calls it an "everlasting covenant," a covenant "for perpetual gene- rations," ix. 12, 15; "while the earth remaineth, etc' viii. 22. The regularity and the permanence of climatic laws and conditions are guaranteed in such a way that all the pursuits and industries of the race are based on our faith in the provisions of this covenant ; "Seed time and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and win- ter, and day and night shall not cease." 8. Every living creature, of the fowl, of the cattle, and of everv beast of the earth, and the verv earth it- Selected Old Testament Studies 47 self are all made beneficiaries of this great covenant. God has established the interdependence of the human race and the earth with its lower forms of life, for weal or for woe. At the fall the curse fell upon all, and the "whole creation groaneth, and travaileth .together in pain until now." And whatever of blessing is found in this covenant with Noah is shared by the earth and all that is upon it. May we not also look further down the ages to the full redemption of the creature in a new heavens, and a new earth under the covenant of grace? The conclusion to all this is that if we live under this covenant, we live under it all. If we claim to sow and reap under its provisions we must abstain from eating blood, defend human life, and punish the mur- derer. The dietetic rules were slightly modified in a temporary way in the Sinaitic covenant for a purpose specially stated, but they may not be permanently set aside or even permanently modified. Yet men have sought to set aside one feature and another of this covenant. If any part is in force it is all in force. Some have sought to modify the dietetic provisions of the covenant — some eat blood — some eat things strangled — some eschew certain meats as un- wholesome — some claim that the limitation of the Jews to "clean meats" is an improvement on Noah from a hygienic and sanitary point of view. This is wise above what is written and contravenes what is written. Others again have set aside the provision for capital punishment as barbarous and unchristian, sometimes by legislative enactment, and oftener by a mawkish sentimentality in the administration of law. But all such sentimentality proves itself sooner or later, to be cruel and bloodthirsty. The only safe road is to accept the covenant in its obvious entirety. It is the bill of rights for the race. CHAPTER VI The Missionary Covenant. A covenant is an agreement between two parties. The parties need not be equals in any sense. One party may be a beneficiary, the mere recipient of a gift, coupled with conditions and obligations, expressed or implied. The covenants of the Bible are of divine origina- tion, proposed to man and accepted by him. They are all beneficiary, and made with and for the race, except the covenant of grace, made between the Father and the Son from eternity for the divine glory. All the other covenants are subsidiary to this and promotive of it, while the race are made partakers of its benefits in so far as we are members of the body of Christ. The party to all the other covenants on the divine side is the Lord Jehovah, the Second Person in the Trinity, and the Mediator of all the covenants. We shall seek to discover the parties on the human side as we proceed. There are found four covenants in the Book of Genesis — two secular, and two spiritual or religious. The first secular covenant is the creation covenant, giving man dominion over nature, bidding him to mul- tiply and subdue the earth, and assigning him food and his social life. The other secular covenant was made the day that Noah went out of the ark. Here the crea- tion covenant was re-stated in express terms, with cer- tain important additions, and was sealed with the bow Selected Old Testament Studies 49 in the cloud. These two secular covenants were made with Adam and Noah, not as individuals, but as repre- sentatives of the race. They do constitute the bill of rights of the race on the secular side. The two religious covenants were made, one with Adam, and one with Abraham. It need hardly be said that the "covenant of works" was made with Adam as the representative of his posterity, and that all have been materially afifected by it. The Abrahamic cove- nant marks the great religious epoch of the ages, and there is reason to believe that his descendants kept the anniversary of its confirmation for many centuries. We propose to consider this covenant in its trend and scope as made for the recovery of the race from the wreck and curse of the former covenant, the covenant of works. We have glimpses of an earlier covenant, or dispen- sation, or hierarchy, which the Abrahamic covenant overlapped and finally superseded. There was a church, no doubt, before the flood, in which the pa- triarchs were both priests and prophets. After the flood we have evidence of an ecclesiastical system, in which Melchizedek, the great type of Christ, "called of God," was a hierarch ; and perhaps Potipherah, priest of On, and Jethro and Balaam later on. The blight of decay and apostasy was upon this hierarchy, and it be- came necessary, in the economy of grace, to set up a covenant of universal and permanent adaptation. Four hundred years after, the theocratic or Sinaitic covenant was engrafted on it, partly secular and partly spiritual. This was designed to be temporary, worn as a garment till it should decay and wax old, and then be folded away, to be superseded by the new covenant in Christ — the gospel dispensation, itself foreshadowed in 50 Selected Old Testament Studies all the ages by prophet and type. Neither the old nor the new in anywise modified or made of none effect the covenant with Abraham, either by their pulling down or their setting up. In due time the synagogue system arose, overlapping the old and the new, and subserving a purpose to be noted later on. Our theme, therefore, is the Missionary Character of the Covenant with Abraham. Let us examine its terms : "I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: and I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee ; and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed." (Gen. xii. 2, 3.) "And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." (Gen. xxii. 18.) Who are this seed? The natural seed? Hardly. Isaac and Jacob were counted, Ishmael and Esau re- jected. John the Baptist said: "Think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our father, for I say unto you, God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham." And yet partly the natural seed, which is necessary to the right apprehension of history. There is a visible side to all the covenants, just as we talk of the visible church. Who are this seed? The spiritual seed? Largely so, "They which are of faith, the same are the chil- dren of Abraham." (Gal. iii. 7.) "They which be of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham." (Verse 9.) He received the sign and seal of circumcision "that he might be the father of all that believe." (Rom, iv. II.) But who is this seed? Paul says Christ: "Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many ; but as of one. And Selected Old Testament Studies 51 to thy seed, which is Christ." The promises culminate in him and become efficient through him. He is Abra- ham's natural seed and the object of his faith, of the faith of every believer. Paul, therefore, made no mis- take, and did not contradict himself when he added, "If ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." Who, then, are the bene- ficiaries and parties? Believers of each and every age. It were a mistake to suppose that Abraham and hi3 seed were parties to this covenant for their own sakes. The outlook for the covenant is the race, in all the working of it from Abraham to Christ. The benefi- ciary feature has been too much emphasized by poor, selfish human nature. "I do not this for your sakes, O house of Israel, but for my holy name's sake." (Ezek. xxxvi. 22.) "The heathen shall know that I am the Lord, saith the Lord God, when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes." (Verse 23.) But more than this, the beneficiary in receiving a benefit becomes a party to a covenant obligation. It is so in the family. The son who does not lavish on others an hundred-fold the wealth of love and blessing poured into his own bosom is a churl indeed. The daughter whose heart and life are not radiant with a mother's love and blessing is wretched in her selfish- ness and blights the happiness of all around her. This is the true altruism, "Freely ye have received, freely give." It is so in Abraham's family. Prophecy be- comes obligation. "In thee shall all families of the earth be blessed" lays all the peoples of the earth a sacred trust on the hearts of his covenant people. It would be easy to show the liberality and the missionary spirit of this covenant by large quotations from the Law, the Psalms, and the Prophets, though it is not 52 Selected Old Testament Studies always easy to distinguish that which was strictly Mes- sianic from that which was strictly within the horizon of the writer. I prefer, however, in this discussion to ascertain the trend and scope of the covenant as shown by the historic facts discovered in its administration. Let us trace the catholicity of this covenant from the first, Peter summed it all up when he said : "The promise is to you and to your children, and to all that are afar ofif, even to as many as the Lord our God shall call." Abram was a cosmopolite, equally at home everywhere, and a good neighbor to all. His enormous household, of perhaps two thousand slaves, was gath- ered from Mesopotamia, Syria, Palestine, and Egypt. These all were parties to the covenant by circumcision before ever Isaac was born, and equally with Isaac and Jacob. And if you suppose that the sign and seal of that covenant was an empty thing to them, consider the faith of Eliezer, his trusted steward, when he prayed at the well in Padan-aram ; or consider the fur- ther fact that Abram commanded his "household after him," so faithfully and successfully that the Lord as- signed this as the reason for making him his confiden- tial friend and counsellor. Isaac and Jacob were also cosmopolites, rich in men-servants and maid-servants, who were parties to the same covenant by circumcision. Steady manumission and intermarriages made them all a homogeneous people, unified by a common faith and worship. It might easily be shown that the genea- logical tables do not contradict this. Assimilation was the law of their growth, as they expanded into a people, and not purity of blood. Judah's wife was a Canaan- itish woman, and he begat Pharez, by Tamar, the de- frauded widow of his two dead sons. Joseph married Asenath, of unknown blood, and she became the mother Selected Old Testament Studies 53 of the two great tribes, Manasseh and Ephraim. Egypt was a composite people — the centre of travel, trade, and civilization. When the Exodus came, there emerged a somewhat homogeneous people, two mil- lions strong, besides a "mixed multitude" that followed them and cast in their fortunes with them. These all constituted the visible side of the covenant at Mt. Sinai. Forty years in the wilderness completed the assimi- lation, purged away the unbelieving, and made faith the homogeneous bond, sealed with circumcision at Gilgal, and winning its first triumph at Jericho. Just before this, however, God gave them rules to guide them in making war and capturing cities (other than the condemned nations), that the women and children should be saved alive and distributed as spoil. And when Moses punished the Midianites for their agency in the seduction by Moab, thirty thousand fe- male children were saved alive, distributed as spoil, and introduced into the families of Israel. And soon after the fall of Jericho, the Gibeonites, a royal city, with her towns, were incorporated by treaty, and were placed near to the covenant by being assigned to tabernacle service, and were no doubt finally assimilated. The unconquered remnants of the condemned nations were probably assimilated in the time of David and Solomon. Many of the Philistines also became their staunchest and most trusted adherents. During the period of the Asmonean princes, when theocratic faith reached its culmination, the Geshurites, Moabites, Ammonites, and Edomites were proselyted and absorbed into Judaism. It is a most significant fact in this connection that the blood of the Canaanite, Moabite, and Hittite 54 Selected Old Testament Studies flowed in the veins of the Son of man through Tamar, and Rahab, and Ruth, and Bathsheba. From all these historic data we conclude that the covenant was a universal blessing in its earliest unfold- ing. But one will say, What mean the exclusive rites of Judaism, such as meats and drinks? The answer is easy. They were intended to shut the door of pagan- ism against the Jew, while the door of Judaism was left wide open to the pagan to come into Judaism by proselytism and circumcision. The visible side of the covenant reached its meri- dian during the kingdom. Palestine was the seat of the strongest kingdom on earth. For eighty years other great kingdoms seemed to pass into eclipse. By tribute, caravan-trade, and commerce by sea, the choic- est treasures of Asia and Africa were poured into her lap, and Jerusalem became the centre of learning and culture for all nations. Kings and queens sat and learned wisdom from the son of the sweet singer of Israel. If ever the promise is to be fulfilled and all na- tions receive the blessing, surely now is the set time. But no. They knew not that they "came to the king- dom for such a time as this." Instead of saving the na- tions, they are themselves corrupted by the seductions of wealth and luxury, and by contact with the heathen. The failure was most lamentable, and their opportunity was taken away. The kingdom was divided, and the story of decay and punishment is perhaps the saddest in history. It became a question whether the covenant they had betrayed would survive internal treachery and external hostility. There was a prolonged struggle be- tween the two great politico-religious parties, the cove- nanters and the apostates, and orthodoxy sometimes seemed to be doomed. The kingdom of Israel went Selected Old Testament Studies 55 down in darkness in one hundred and eighty-five years, and the kingdom of Judah survived her only seventy- two years. Jerusalem was left in heaps, the land was left desolate, without tillage or vine-dressing. All seemed lost. The hope of Israel seemed perished, save to the eye of faith, confirmed by the vision of the major prophets. When we examine the conditions we find that the apostate party had been largely exterminated and the power of their allies permanently broken. The ortho- dox party were deported and placed in conditions most favorable for fixing their faith and for eradicating the last traces of idolatry, with Ezekiel as their prophet, and Daniel as their friend and the prime minister in perhaps five dynasties. Nebuchadnezzar slew their false prophets, and the idolatrous king Jehoiachin lan- guished in prison for thirty-seven years. By the cap- tivity Judaism was purged of her apostates and took a new lease of life. It was during this period that the synagogue was grafted on to Judaism for worship, doctrine and dis- cipline. Up to this time a modified patriarchism pre- vailed. The church was in the home, and the congre- gation was the family. The patriarchal system was broken up by the captivity, and congregations of four- teen or more were organized everywhere, each with its chosen officers, constituting what Gibbon calls a pow- erful commonwealth. This synagogue system was the catholic or universal feature, adapted to all climes and conditions, overlapping their crippled and waning ceremonial and ritual system, and destined to live, as the dress and form of the covenant, after Sinai's cove- nant should be superseded. So the synagogue, with the Law, Psalms, and 56 Selected Old Testament Studies Prophets, became to the Jews of the dispersion their church home. They built houses as we build churches, and every synagogue was a centre of religious light and life, a mission station among the heathen, with doors wide open to proselytes from every people, both prose- lytes of the gate and proselytes of justice. But you say that the despised and persecuted Jew had scant hope of making proselytes. But was he de- spised and persecuted? Sometimes. Antiochus Epi- phanes, in Syria, and Ptolemy Physcon, in Egypt, tried to persecute and destroy them, but were themselves riven and blasted by him who said, "Him that curseth thee I will curse." The Jews of the dispersion were a favored people and a trusted people. Nebuchadnez- zar's settled policy for his empire was this. Cyrus the Great established this as the policy of the Medo-Per- sian empire against the machinations of all the peoples from the Euphrates to the Mediterranean. Alexander the Great adopted the same traditional policy in the Greco-Persian empire for reasons of his own ; and he left this policy as a legacy to the four consolidated king- doms that sprang out of the ruins of his empire. The same policy prevailed in imperial Rome, if we can be- lieve Juvenal. Strabo, and Seneca. Did they mn'--- • proselytes? When Haman, the Amalekite, plotted the destruction of all the Jews in the one hundred and twenty-seven provinces of the Medo-Persian empire, and was thwarted because Mordecai the Jew sat in the king's gate, and Queen Esther, the beautiful Jewess, lay in the bosom of King Ahasuerus, "The Jews had light, and gladness, and joy, and honor," "And many of the people of the land became Jews." (Esther viii. i6, 17.) "For Mordecai the Jew was next unto King Ahasuerus, and great among the Jews, and accepted of Selected Old Testament Studies 57 the multitude of his brethren, seeking the wealth of his people, and speaking peace unto his people." (Esther X. 3-) During the dispersion, then, from Daniel to Christ, the Jews were missionaries of the covenant to the race for they went everywhere. Immense numbers became proselytes, especially women, who sought rest in Is- rael's hope from the despair of heathenism. The sim- ple monotheism and pure morality of the synagogue served to loosen the shackles of a waning paganism and check a growing skepticism. They prepared the world for Christ and furnished the matrix for the gos- pel. May we not say that the covenant to bless all na- tions had its best Judaic fulfilment in that period of ap- parent decadence and eclipse? When the gospel was preached by apostolic mission- aries, beginning at Jerusalem, the great ingatherings consisted largely of pious Jews and devout proselytes, who were mightily convinced that "Jesus was the Christ" ; the rest apostatized. The synagogue here parted into two streams, to be reunited some day in furtherance of the covenant. The believing synagogue was and is the church, with the same aggressive instinct, stimulated by faith realized, by the charisms of the Spirit and by Christ's last commission. Every believer becomes in the very act of faith a party to the covenant. "If ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise." The promise in its entirety of benefit and obliga- tion belongs to the church and is transmitted from seed to seed for the salvation of men. You and I are only means to an end, links in the great chain of causation. We are not mere beneficiaries of a salvation scheme. 58 Selected Old Testament Studies Was Abraham a party to the covenant to bless all na- tions? So are we. Was Christ a party to the same covenant? So are you. The great commission may be new in its terms, but not in its significance. What says the covenant? "Abraham, go bless all nations; Moses, David, Daniel, go bless all the families of the earth." The Father said to the Son, "Go bless all na- tions" "Thou shalt see of the travail of thy soul and be satisfied." "I will give thee the heathen for thine in- heritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession." He transmits the charge and the obliga- tion to his immediate disciples, and they hand it down the centuries to all the seed. Have you realized that you are personal parties to the covenant, as distinctly so as Abraham or Paul or Christ? The very name of Abraham has been an inspiration in all ages and to all peoples, notably the Bedouins, and Joktanite Arabs, and the Magians of Central Asia. The Shasters of India do him honor; the Mohammedans swear by his beard ; the Jew's only hope is in Abraham his father. Much of this may be superstition, but it is a sponta- neous loyalty to the man that God blessed, and made a blessing to all nations. Christians sometimes forget that he is our father also. Did Lazarus go to his bosom? So shall we, and not alone ; we shall carry the nations with us. But one will say that we have overlooked the secu- lar side of the covenant which promised a land that flowed with milk and honey, a goodly land of rest from all their long and weary wanderings and oppressions. True. And the promise still is, "The meek shall in- herit the earth." "The righteous have the promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come." And "there remaineth a rest for the people of God," of which Canaan was only a type. The covenant still has its Selected Old Testament Studies 59 visible and secular side to us, and all the more if we be faithful to win others to him. You remember the history of the covenanters of Scotland — their patriotism, their fidelity to kings and princes, their adherence to the rights of conscience, their sturdy fortitude in adversity, their bravery in battle, and their heroism. Yet their covenants were largely earth-born. They often made serious mis- takes; but they won the blessedness of him "that sweareth to his own hurt and changeth not." Many of us are the sons of those covenanters by direct de- scent or by adoption. All of us have a heaven-born covenant, God-given and oath-bound. Our only alle- giance is to the Prince of Peace. We have battles to fight for our King; a warfare to endure, persecutions to face, and martyrdoms to suffer. Will we "quit our- selves like men"? "Cursed is he that doeth the work of the Lord deceitfully, cursed is he that keepeth back his sword from blood." "Who is sufficient for these things?" There stands one behind the covenant who says, "Him that blesseth you I will bless, and him that curseth you I will curse." "Lo ! I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world." We have victories to win. The covenant is aggres- sive, and the nations shall be blessed by conquest. But "we do not war after the flesh ; for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds ; casting down imagina- tions, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ." Christ the Lord is our captain and leader, and the triumphal day is coming. Paul says, "Now thanks be to God which 6o Selected Old Testament Studies always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savor of his knowledge by us in every place." A Roman triumph was a proud day for the em- peror returning from successful war with long proces- sions of captives and spoils taken in battle ; and a proud day it was for his veterans, by whose valor he achieved it all ; and a proud day it was for the loyal populations from all parts of the empire, which lined the Appian Way and made the heavens ring with their glad ac- claim. May we not imagine something like this in the final triumph of our Lord and King? But when? The throne has been set, the archangel's trumpet has sound- ed, the dead, small and great, have stood before God ; we who remain have been caught up to meet him in the air; the books have been opened, and the judgment is ended. The wicked are swept by the breath of his ven- geance into chains and darkness forever. And now he is ready to lead his people home, and celebrate the triumphs of his grace along the streets of the golden city, where twelve legions of angels await his coming at the gates, and the walls, and the battlements, and the streets, and all the winged upper air are eager for his appearing. Who will be marshall of the day? Michael? Ga- briel? Hardly. One of his tried lieutenants, I am sure ; perhaps Joshua, perhaps John the Baptist, per- haps Knox or Carey ; we care not who. "Fall into line," a great multitude that no man can number, as the sand of the seashore, as the stars in heaven. First Abel and his mother, and Seth, and all the antediluvian "sons of God." Fall into line, Noah walking almost alone at first, and his following for a thousand years, far more numerous than some suppose. These are the vanguards of the great procession. Selected Old Testament Studies 6i Fall into line, Father Abraham, faithful Abraham ! "His faith is sweetly lost in sight And hope in full supreme delight, And everlasting love." Then Isaac and Jacob, and the twelve patriarchs and all the tribes of Israel, prophets, priests, and kings, and judges, and all their faithful following. But who is this that cometh, "meek and lowly, sit- ting on an ass, on a colt, the foal of an ass? And the multitude about him cry, Hosannah." 'Tis Zion's king, King Jesus, "with garments dyed from Bozrah." "He trod the wine-press alone." Next to him walks John, and Mary leaning on his arm. Fall into line, apostles, prophets, evangelists, teach- ers, and helps, each with their trophies of grace, and the whole army of martyrs arrayed in white — Luther, and Calvin, and Knox, and Wesley, and all the redeemed to our day ; and the procession is only begun. There shall be in line China, Japan, India, Africa, South America and the isles of the sea. These all are His, and shall be His. Imagination fails to tell the story. But methinks that mighty host shall sing, as they march to seraphic music. Psalm xxiv. : "The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof; The world, and they that dwell therein. For the hath founded it upon the seas, And established it upon the floods. Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place? He that hath clean hands and a pure heart ; Who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, 62 Selected Old Testament Studies And hath not sworn deceitfully. He shall receive a blessing from the Lord, And righteousness from the God of his salvation. This is the generation of them that seek a^ter him, That seek thy face, O Jacob. Selali. Lift up your heads, O ye gates; And be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors; And the King of glory shall come in. Who is the King of glcry? The Lord strong and mighty. The Lord mighty in battle." And the assembled universe of God shall catch up the refrain : Lift up your heads, O ye gates ; Yea, lift them up, ye everlasting doors; And the King of glory shall come in. Who is the King of glory? The Lord of hosts. He is the King of glory. Selah." CHAPTER VII The Sabbath. The word Sabbath is adopted from the Hebrew through the Greek and its literal meaning is rest, cessa- tion from work. In ordinary usage it signifies rest for religious purposes, cessation from work for worship. This name was given to the seventh day of the week because in it God rested or ceased from the work of creation. The seventh day was set apart and made holy to the Lord as set forth in Gen. ii. 1-3, and in the fourth commandment. The seventh day of the week is called "The Sabbath" to distinguish it from other sa- cred days which were called sabbaths. All religious festal days were called sabbaths. The first day of the Passover, the day of the first fruits, the day of Pentecost, the great day of Atonement, the first and eighth days of the feast of Tabernacles, the feast of Trumpets and other days were called Sabbaths. No servile work was allowed, and a holy convocation was held, and the days were observed throughout the land as holy to the Lord. Levit. xxiii. 6, 7, 8, 21, 24, 32, 35, 36, 38, 39- These are the days so often referred to as "my Sab- baths" in the plural. Levit. xxv. 2, 4; xix. 3, 30; Ezek. XX. 12, 20. These were to be a sign between them and their God, and were essentially Jewish in their origin and observance. The Seventh Day Sabbath was for the race. In Ex. xxxi. 13, 14, we find the double in- junction — "My Sabbaths shall ye keep ;" and "ye shall 64 Selected Old Testament Studies keep the Sabbath, etc." Keeping the one would not excuse from keeping the other; therefore the seventh day sabbath is re-emphasized and they are both made signs between him and his people Israel. The neglect of either was practical rejection of him. In the same sense the two tables of the law and the keeping of them, as a matter of covenant, were to be a sign between them. Some argue that the Sabbath, i. e. the seventh day Sabbath, was a Jewish institution, originating at Mount Sinai ; that it was a part of their typical and ceremonial system ; and that it passed away with that ceremonial system. This is the Continental view which will be stated more fully later on. The orthodox or Presbyterian view says that the Sabbath dates back to the beginning ; was a part of the moral law ; and is of perpetual binding authority. We shall examine this view first. The Sabbath originated at the beginning. This is the natural interpretation of Gen. ii. 2, 3. The state- ment is in simple historical form — the work of crea- tion, the resting, the blessing and hallowing of the seventh day. These all are found in one sentence or proposition. The institution of the family is stated in the same simple way. We naturally conclude that the Sabbath and the family were given at the beginning as the two fundamental institutions of the race. The exegesis which rejects one may easily be made to reject the other. It is argued however, that Moses injects into the narrative his own reasons for the institution of the Sabbath at a later time, or rather God's reasons. Was the family instituted later also, as the evolutionist claims? If Moses did so, it ought plainly so to appear. In all Moses' account of the history before his times, Selected Old Testament Studies 65 there is not a single place where he introduces himself and his comments on the history, in the way of argu- ment or lesson. The form of statement in the fourth commandment points backwards to a previous institu- tion of the Sabbath, not only in the use of the word "Remember," but also in connecting the same three facts of creation, resting, and hallowing the day of rest. It is difficult to convince a recusant with an exe- gesis, for he will not see it. We must reinforce the exegesis with facts if possible. We note therefore that seventh day periods are mentioned in the account of the flood. The doves were sent out at intervals of seven days. Gen. viii. 10, 12. Hebdomidal periods point back to creation and imply the Sabbath. The wicked antediluvian world may have ignored the Sabbath but righteous Noah retained it. It may be shown that every prominent event men- tioned during the flood occurred on a seventh day, a Sabbath. It began to rain "on day seven," according to the marginal reading, and not "after seven days" as in our translation. Or else the closing of the ark and the beginning of the rain were seven days apart. The date, the month and the day of the month, when the flood and the rain began is given. Now we may con- struct a calendar for the year according to the Egyptian calendar, eleven months of thirty days each and the twelfth of thirty-five days making three hundred and sixty-five days, and then begin the flood and rain on the seventh day of the week. The next six weeks — forty days, or forty-two days according to the mode of count- ing — bounded the rain and overflow. The waters pre- vailed (increased) twenty-one weeks — 147 or 149 days according to the mode of counting and were at their maximum on the 150th day. Then the ark rested, the 66 Selected Old Testament Studies dry land appeared, the doves were sent forth, the earth was dry and Noah went out, all on seventh day periods. The day he went out was a day of worship and God put honor upon it and made the covenant with Noah for the race. These coincidences were not accidental. These were Sabbath days if "day seven" at the beginning was the Sabbath. It may be claimed that all this proves nothing more than seven day periods and the division of time into weeks as well as months. Be it so. It will then be necessary to prove that the Sabbath was observed be- fore the legislation at Mt. Sinai. This is easy. The Hebrews observed the day before they reached Mt. Sinai under such circumstances as to show that it was their habit to do so. Ex. xvi. 9-26. A careful examination of this entire passage discovers the fol- lowing facts. 1. The Hebrews were in the "Wilderness of Sin which is between Elim and Sinai," probably four weeks before reaching Sinai. And they murmured for the bread and the fleshpots of Egypt, xvi. 1-3. 2. God told Moses he would send them bread from heaven; "and the people shall go out and gather a cer- tain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law or no." What law, and how would he prove them ? xvi. 4. 3. The Lord told Moses that on the sixth day they should gather twice as much and prepare it, but there is no mention of the Sabbath, but there is an obvious reference to the usual preparation for it on the sixth day. Verse 5. 4. Moses and Aaron commanded the people to gather every man an omer according to his eating and Selected Old Testament Studies 67 the number of the persons. Verse 16. But they made no mention of the double quantity on the sixth day. Note this. 5. Moses commanded to leave none over till morn- ing. Some did not hearken, and what was left over bred worms and stank, verses 19, 20. They learned by experience that it would not keep sweet till the next day. 6. On the sixth day the people went out and gathered double quantity in the face of their orders to gather only an omer, and in the face of their experience that it would not keep. This must have been the result of a deeply rooted habit to prepare for the Sabbath. But all the rulers went and reported to Moses what the people had done. It was so patent a violation of or- ders and was so counter to their experience in trying to keep the manna till the next day. Verse 22. 7. Moses replied that they had done right and the Lord had so commanded, and there would be none to gather the next day. Then he issued the general or- der to prepare always on the sixth day just as they had already done. And they had another experience that it would not spoil when kept over till the Sabbath. Verses 23-26. 8. Some of the people, however, did not gather on the sixth day for the seventh, evidently pleading or- ders and experience against it. The Lord sent a severe rebuke by Moses, and said further, "For that the Lord hath given you the Sabbath therefore he giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days." 9. We may now see how he proved them whether they would keep his law. The Sabbath law was para- mount against the orders of Moses about gathering 68 Selected Old Testament Studies only for one day, and as against their own experience. This apparent contradiction was the test of their faith and obedience, and they stood the test amazingly well. This test was similar, in the manner of it, to the test that Abraham stood when commanded to offer up his son Isaac. We may now fairly conclude that the Sabbath law was deeply rooted in the faith and practice of the He- brews in Egypt, and that its observance was as neces- sary to their spiritual life as is the Sabbath to-day. Besides, we read in this incident that the type of their faith and piety was far beyond what we would have expected to find. Need we compare it with the habits of many Christians to-day? The Sabbath is not a ceremonial, as some argue. It is no part of a mere ritual. We find in it none of the features of a type. We find in it no form to be ob- served because it represented some underlying sub- stance. The ceremonials of the Jews were forbidden to the stranger or uncircumcised foreigner, but the Sabbath was to be observed by the "stranger in thy gates." Nor was it a mere memorial of God's rest after creation, to be observed by courtesy and in a senti- mental way like a national holiday, or a birthday, or a Saint's day, or a Christmas. ^ It is a great moral law, and not a mere positive pre- cept. Laws, institutions and precepts which are based on a wise expediency are called positive. They may have been otherwise if conditions seemed to allow. Moral laws and institutions are based on the distinc- tions of right and wrong. Positive laws are obliga- tory because they are issued by competent authority. Moral laws arc obligatory from the nature of things. Selected Old Testament Studies 69 The moral obligation of the Sabbath is based partly on man's obligation to honor, worship, and glorify God in every proper way, and especially at such times and ways as God may direct. This obligation grows out of our relations to him. The four commandments of the first table are moral laws in this sense and for this reason. Then again, the moral obligation of the Sab- bath law is based partly on the relation of the Sabbath to both God and man. He blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. He gave to man six days for secu- lar work, but retained a special ownership in the seventh. "The seventh is the sabbath of the Lord thy God." He claims to be "Lord of the Sabbath." But he has given the day to man in a proper sense also. "F'or that I have given thee the Sabbath etc." ; "The Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sab- bath." Now if the day is holy, if it belongs to God in a special sense, and if it is given to man for his special benefit it follows that it would be dishonest sacrilege to use it except as holy. We have a definition of that holy use in the fourth commandment and elsewhere in the Scriptures. It could not be otherwise from the very nature of things. The two moral elements in the Sabbath law are beautifully combined in Isaiah Iviii. I3» 14. It is evident therefore that this law is in its exact place in the decalogue, which is a covenant of univer- sal binding force — a universal moral code. No part of it originated in the Mosaic dispensation, and no part passed away with it — not a jot or tittle. The law of periodic rest seems to be a law of na- ture. It is good for the body as well as for the soul. Every living organism, vegetable and animal, has its periods of activity and repose. The forces in dead 70 Selected Old Testament Studies matter are subject to the same law of activity and re- pose. It is now well understood that machinery in constant use and motion weakens much more rapidly, and its strength is recuperated by rest. The soil also needs rest as the farmer knows. Un- der Mosaic law the land had absolute rest from culti- vation one year in seven, and this year was called the Lord's Sabbath and also the land's Sabbath; and all that grew of itself that year was the Lord's and was given by him to the poor and to the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air. We may note also cessation from agriculture that year, and the occupations of the peoples were changed ; culture, education, study of the Scriptures, and religion, no doubt, occupied old and young. Change also is rest, whether it be every seven days or every seven years. Sabbath rest is necessary to restore the equilibrium of man's mental and moral powers and faculties as well as his body. Add to this the proper exercises of reli- gion and every man grows stronger. Neglect rest and religion in the interest of a material civilization, and inefficiency, recklessness, dishonesty, and vice are the necessary result. Thoughtful students of those indus- tries which require their employees to neglect the Sab- bath, tell us that the losses which accrue from this cause more than overbalance all their Sabbath gains to say nothing of the mischievous reaction upon those who control these industries, and the collateral and in direct effect and results on all other pursuits. How can capital which violates Sabbath law and exacts labors on God's holy day expect labor to render any faithful conscientious service? Traces of a Sabbath for the race have been found in many parts of the world, and especially wherever clivi- Selected Old Testament Studies 71 sion of time into weeks is found. The Sabbath law in Babylon was much more stringent in details than among the Jews, but it had little if any moral and re- ligious value, though a holy day. Taking all these things together we see that the Sabbath, as an institution, is a law of nature and a law of God, belongs to the race, and spans the whole arc of time. We shall consider the continental view in connec- tion with the Christian Sabbath or Lord's Day. CHAPTER VIII The Christian Sabbath or Lord's Day. The orthodox or Presbyterian view of the Sabbath makes it a perpetual institution of universal author- ity; that the seventh day of the week was the weekly Sabbath till the resurrection of Christ; and that the day was then changed by Divine authority to the first day of the week, for good and sufficient reasons The continental view makes it a tempora.ry Jewish ceremonial; that it passed away with the Mosaic dis- pensation ; that the Lord's day is not a Divine institu- tion, and is of no binding authority from the Scrip- tures ; that it was however for edification for Christians to agree upon a day for public worship; that the first day of the week was every way appropriate for such agreement, in commemoration of the resurrection; and that it was also proper that the state should pass Sabbath laws in order to protect worshippers from disturbance in their worship ; and that the remaining hours of the day may be spent in social enjoyments and wholesome public amusements. This view has prevailed largely over the continent of Europe. It was adopted by the reformers generally, and seems to have been a reaction against the galling papal yoke of holy days, saints days, etc., as set forth in their calendar. Dr. Bound revived the orthodox theory in England, and archbishop Laud persecuted the adherents to this doctrine. It finally prevailed in England and was held in Scotland with such tenacity Selected Old Testament Studies yz that it was called the Presbyterian doctrine. It was introduced by the Scotch and Scotch-Irish in the early settlement of this country, and was ardently embraced by English and Huguenot Christians, and the day was rigorously observed for two hundred years. Then when emigrants came numerously from the European continent they brought the continental view which has been steadily gaining ground, reinforced on one side by saloons, beer-gardens, and advocates of a mere holiday for the masses, and on the other side by secular and material interests which claim the day as necessary to a successful civilization. They all make the general claim that we have outgrown Sabbath laws, and that the complexity of our civilization makes their obser- vance impossible. Sabbath laws are becoming more and more a dead letter on the statute books. This ten- dency is the more rapid because the government sets the example in so many ways. The continental view is argued from certain pas- sages in the New Testament which they say set aside the Sabbath law by positive enactment or by neces- sary implication. They quote Christ's Sabbath con- troversies with the Pharisees, as found in Matt. xii. I-I2 ; John V. 1-16 ; Mark ii. 27, 28 etc. A careful study of these passages shows that he expounds the Sabbath law as permitting and requiring works of necessity and mercy. He draws his argument from the law itself; he reinforces it by their own practice ; he claims the right to expound it because he was its author; besides, he was under the law to keep it and expound it, and not to modify it. The Pharisees made the law of none effect by their traditions, and they persecuted him be- cause he taught its true meaning. He set aside their 74 Selected Old Testament Studies teachings and not the law. Strange that this has been so misunderstood. They quote Gal. iv. 9-1 1. "How turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage? Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years." In this epistle the apostle combats the Judaizing teachers who sought to retain the Mosaic ceremonials, which abounded in holy days, months, times, and years. There is no reference here to the moral law which is summarily comprehend- ed in the ten commandments, and therefore no refer- ence to the weekly Sabbath. They quote Rom. xiv. 5, 6. In this chapter the apostle argues Christian liberty in eating, drinking, ob- servance of days, and such like. "One man esteemeth one day above another; another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. He that regardeth the day regardeth it unto the Lord; he that regardeth not the day, to the Lord he doth not regard it. He that eateth, eateth to the Lord, etc." He argues Christian liberty in non-essentials, and does not touch the binding force of any law, much less the decalogue. They quote also Col. ii. 16, 17, and really stake their whole contention upon it. "Let no man judge you in meat or drink, or in respect of a holy day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath days ; which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ." No one disputes that this, like the other passages, signifies the passing away of the Jewish ritual. The revised ver- sion says "In respect of a feast day, or a new moon, or a Sabbath." This does not alter the sense. The only contention is whether the weekly Sabbath is included in this enumeration. The numerous other Sabbaths Selected Old Testament Studies 75 of the Jewish ritual are certainly included, and did pass away. These were designated by the singular term, "a Sabbath," "my Sabbath," or by the plural "Sab- baths," "my Sabbaths," "the Sabbaths," etc., while the seventh day Sabbath is uniformly spoken of as "the Sabbath," in contradistinction to other Sabbaths, and the plural form is used only where there is actual reference to a plural of two or more consecutive weekly Sabbaths — thus the plural form is used to signify a week because it is bounded by two consecutive Sab- baths. These several usages are evident wherever the different kinds of Sabbaths are referred to in the Old Testament and in the New. This exhausts all the claims made for the abolition of the Sabbath law of the decalogue. If, however, it is insisted that the Seventh day Sabbath is no longer binding, we need not fear to grant it within this nar- row limit that the day has been changed from the seventh to the first, and that the first day was hence- forth the Sabbath. To this contention we now turn. The day was changed by Apostolic usage. The. apostles had full power to set all things in order, and their usage carried with it the authority of Christ him- self. The spirit was given them in full measure for this very purpose. This does not mean that they were a senate to enact new legislation, for they set up noth- ing which had not already been provided for in their Scriptures. We shall see later on that this change was provided for in the Old Testament. We note the usage. I. The apostles were assembled on the resurrection day — the first Lord's day — and Christ appeared in the midst of them. Jno. xx. 19-23. He conferred upon them at that time the Holy Ghost to qualify them for y^ Selected Old Testament Studies certain official functions. It certainly was a season of worship and blessing. 2. They met again on the next first day of the week — Lord's day — and he appeared again in their midst and confirmed the faith of Thomas who was absent the week before. John xx. 26. 3. It may be argued very plausibly that forty days in the Scriptures means six weeks ; if so, they were as- sembled on the seventh Lord's day, and received his parting counsel and promises, and then witnessed his ascension, and then returned to Jerusalem and spent the remainder of the day in worship ; and perhaps, they spent the whole of that week in special prayer and supplication preparatory to Pentecost. Acts i. 1-14. 4. On the day of Pentecost which was the eighth Lord's day, they were all with one accord in one place — no doubt the upper room mentioned in Acts i. 13 — not only the apostles but about one hundred and twenty, male and female, i. 14, 15. No one doubts that they were at worship with one accord when they were baptized with the Holy Ghost and with fire. No Lord's day was ever so honored and blessed as that one. 5. Paul abode at Troas seven days, remaining over the first day of the week. The disciples came together to break bread — the Load's supper. Paul preached till midnight and administered the communion and then talked till break of day and then departed. Acts xx. 6-12. 6. John on the Isle of Patmos was in the Spirit on the Lord's day and received that wonderful vision of Christ walking among the seven golden candlesticks, and received that apocalyptic vision recorded in the Selected Old Testament Studies 'jj book of Revelation. Great honor was again put on the day. The aged disciple in exile was doubtless keeping the day holy in blessed worship, as had been his custom for fifty years of his life since the resurrec- tion and Pentecost. 7. Almsgiving was a part of worship in ancient as well as modern times. There was great suffering among the poor saints at Jerusalem. Paul directed the church at Corinth to take up systematic contribu- tions for them on every first day of the week. We may fairly suppose that it was in connection with their regular stated worship. We have then seven references to worship on the Lord's day, and all but one in larger or smaller assem- blies. We find in the history no references to such worship on any other day of the week in Christian as- semblies as such. This fixes the apostolic usage and the usage of the Apostolic Church. But it is claimed in opposition that the apostles preached in the synagogues, wherever they went, on the seventh day of the week. So they did. They thus got access to Jews and proselytes, and preached the gospel to them there till they were driven out and the door was closed against them. Paul went wherever he could get a hearing, in the market place, on Mars Hill, before Agrippa, or in his own hired house, chained to a Roman soldier. But there is no reference to Christian meetings for worship except on the Lord's day. There is evidence outside the Scriptures that some kept both days in the transition period. This change was foretold and provided for in the Old Testament. In Ps. cxviii. 22-24 we read. "The stone which the builders refused is become the head- stone of the corner. This is the Lord's doing; it is 78 Selected Old Testament Studies marvelous in our eyes. This is the day the Lord hath made ; we will rejoice and be glad in it." In Matt. xxi. 42-44 Christ represents himself as this chief corner stone. Peter says, by the Holy Ghost, "This is the stone which was set at naught of you builders, which is become the head of the corner," Acts iv. 11. It was consummated when he arose from the dead the fir<^t day of the week. "This is the day the Lord hath made ; we will rejoice and be glad in it." It is the Lord's day, the memorial day of his finished work — a day of joy and gladness. Such is the Christian Sab- bath. The poet has rendered it "This is the day the Lord hath made He calls the hours his own, Let heaven rejoice and earth be glad, And praise surround the throne." We find a similar warrant for the change in Is. Ixv. 17, 18. "Behold I create new heavens and a new earth : and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind. But be ye glad and rejoice forever in that which I create : for behold, I create Jerusalem a re- joicing, and her people a joy." This is Messianic pro- phecy, as is evident from the context, and from 2 Pet. iii. 13. The former creation was the material creation : the new heavens and the new earth are a spiritual creation, which is so superior to the former that it Is no more remembered. We rejoice in the new creation and are glad. We no longer commemorate the first creation, but the second. We keep the Lord's day — the resurrection day — in perpetual remembrance of it. This exegesis of these two passages is sustained by the very best authorities. It is also to the point that Messianic prophecies so Selected Old Testament Studies 79 specially exalt the Sabbath. Is. Ivi. 2-6; Iviii. 13, 14. It has been argued very plausibly that it was entirely competent to change the memorial day for a sufficient reason, and in doing so to superadd another memorial ; and that the Sabbath day was changed when the He- brews went out of Egypt and that it was thenceforth a double memorial ; and that it was changed again at the restoration from captivity and that the Sabbath be- came a threefold memorial; and that at the resurrec- tion it was again changed ; but that this last super- added memorial of the resurrection so far over- shadowed all the rest as to leave them out of the mind and heart. There does not, however, seem to be suffi- cient Scripture warrant for any of these changes but the last. This question recurs. Is there sufficient evidence to show that the early church recognized the Apostolic usage which we have quoted, and adopted the first day of the week as the Sabbath instead of the seventh day? All post-apostolic authorities agree on this point. Justin Martyr, the earliest of the Fathers, wrote in the first half of the second century. He affirms the change of day, and the usage of the early church, and makes an argument from the Scriptures for the change as against both Jews and Judaizers. Tertullian, Clem- ens of Alexandria, and most of the Fathers mention the change of day as a matter universally recognized and adopted in the usage of the church. Eusebius argues the matter very fully. He wrote in the latter part of the third century and first part of the fourth and is called the father of ecclesiastical history. Th«^ famous letter of Pliny the younger to the Emperor Trajan, describing the "perverse and extravagant superstition" of the Christians, speaks of their strict 8d Selected Old Testament Studies observance of a stated day, "stato die." This was written between 98 and 112, A, D. We have seen that the Sabbath law is coeval with the race and fundamental. It is a moral law in a double aspect. It is in the decalogue which is a uni- versal code. The day was changed at the Resurrec- tion of Christ as is shown by apostolic usage ; and the change was foretold, authorized, and enjoined in the Old Testament. The early church adopted the change, as witnessed and justified by the early fathers. The mode of Sabbath observance is to be gathered from the Old Testament, and is confirmed by the New. "The Sabbath is to be sanctified by a holy resting on that day from all such worldly employments and re- creations as are lawful on other days ; and spending the whole day in exercises of public and private worship, except so much as may be taken up with works of necessity and mercy. CHAPTER IX The Religious Institutions of Moses. Hebrew institutions were of Divine origin. By- courtesy we call Moses the lawgiver, but God gave them to Moses, and he constructed them, as he did the Tabernacle, according to the "pattern showed" to him in the mount. They may be classified into Civil, Social, and Religious. We propose to discuss the Social and Civil institutions of the Hebrews in a separate volume if the Lord will. We propose now to discuss briefly their religious institutions, especially those things which were connected with their worship, their in- struction, and their religious rights and franchises. These studies also embrace their ecclesiastical orders, organization, and revenues. Some of these discus- sions will be found in subsequent chapters. We may premise that while these institutions were promulgated at Mt. Sinai and sometimes modified in their details afterwards by competent inspired author- ity, they seem to have had a much earlier origin, both in outward forms and fundamental principles. Sinaitic legislation promulgated no novelties, but formulated and tabulated in constitutional form the rights, fran- chises and duties of God's people both before and after Sinai, adjusting them all to changed conditions. After the flood the race made a new start, having the same religious rites and forms of worship, and probably along the same lines in which they had failed 82 Selected Old Testament Studies before the flood, with the lesson of former apostasies before them. But they seem to have started on the same road to ruin. Their hierarchy was faUing into decay. God therefore raised up Abram as the starting point of a new dispensation and made a covenant with him to bless all nations and families. His descend- ants grew into a numerous people to whom were com- mitted the oracles of God against the time of universal apostasy. It was theirs to preserve and perpetuate the Abrahamic covenant and also to execute it under divine direction. Before Sinaitic legislation they ex- isted only in the family or in wider patriarchal organi- zations. They had the same religious doctrines and practices as their Father Abraham. At Mt. Sinai the family and the church were adjusted to the state. On the civil side we call them a nation, on the religious side they may be called the church. The Lord Jehovah was not only the head of the theocratic commonwealth, but he was the head of their hierarchy — himself their High Priest, their supreme prophet and teacher, and their Spiritual King. We are not now concerned with the civil side of that people. All their religious franchises started with the father or the patriarch, who was responsible for the teaching and worship in the family. Every family was in close relations to the heirarchy of priests whose functions were well defined. Besides there was a line of proph- ets clothed with special and unique authority. These priests and prophets we shall consider in the next two chapters. Now all the religious acts of patriarch, priest, prophet, public functionary, or private individual may be classed as worship. This worship is commonly di- Selected Old Testament Studies 83 vided into two classes, moral or spiritual, and ceremo- nial or ritual worship. The moral and spiritual is the very essence of all worship and has been the permanent element in all dis- pensations, as it is to-day. "God is a spirit, and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth." Ceremonial and ritual worship was accidental and temporary, and designed so to be. Paul teaches, in Gal. iii, 17, that the covenant with Abraham was spiritual and that its promises were in no wise affected by the law or ritual ingrafted upon it at Sinai, and he tells us again, in Hebrews viii. 13, that the ritual cove- nant of Sinai had decayed and waxed old and was ready to pass away. Only the outward form or dress passed away but the spiritual remains as we shall see more clearly as we proceed. The ceremonial and ritual is given in minute detail, because it is prophecy in symbol. It is an elaborate system of object lessons. It was carefully written out in order to guard against loss or perversion. Just as in written prophecy the smallest word may not be omitted without marring the revelation, so the smallest details of the ritual may, and do have a spiritual and prophetic significance. For this reason the ceremonial seems to occupy too much space and prominence in the record, leading some to suppose that Hebrew institu- tions were almost entirely ceremonial. The ritual consisted largely of types which were used on occasion for worship, such as offerings, sacri- fices, atonement, thanksgiving, intercessions, memo- rials, purifying, instructions, and such like. God has put honor on forms, but not on mere forms. Every religious rite and ceremony was valu- able only because of the substance represented by it, 84 Selected Old Testament Studies and that substance we call the moral and spiritual part of worship. Mere forms were utterly worthless, taught Isaiah. In his day formalism was the great heresy and men shamefully substituted the forms of wor- ship for the substance. They offered sacrifices with- out repentance and faith ; they substituted ablutions for personal holiness; they spread forth their blood- stained hands in many prayers. In Is. i. 10-17 we find the most scathing rebuke of formalism with its hollow rites and heartless worship. It is parallelled only by Christ on the last day of his public ministry, when he denounced eight woes against "Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites," for substantially the same doctrines and practices. The entire discussion of the Old Testament ritual, its types and ceremonies, as found in the epistle of the Hebrews, turns upon the distinctions we have made. It is there assumed and also argued that the blood of bulls and goats could not take away sin ; that the ashes of the heifer sprinkling the unclean furnished no holi- ness ; that the observance of new moons, and feast days and holy days had no saving power ; and so on through- out. But, on the contrary, these were all the shadow of things to come, and derived all their value from the substance which they represented. When the sub- stance came the shadow passed away. A much fuller discussion and classification of types may be found in the chapter on Typology in a former volume, "Studies in the Life of Christ." Some have argued that types and symbols were specially adapted to instruct a rude and uncultured people as a sort of halfway stage from the infancy of the race towards a higher civilization. We reply to this that there is no evidence of the so-called infancy Selected Old Testamejmt Studies 85 of the race, but that the race fell away from their ori- ginal place in creation. We may easily find other reasons for such a system of religious training and worship. Teaching by object lessons is adapted to all ages and peoples. Modern educators are disposed to carry it to extremes. Then again the canon of Scripture was only begun and the volume of written prophecy was yet to be writ- ten and expanded, which was done when the Sinaitic Covenant was falling into disuse and decay. The ceremonial law supplemented the partial canon and kept all its lessons before the eyes of the people. The leading features of the gospel were constantly enacted and reenacted in type and symbol long before the prophets wrote such historic accounts as the twenty- second Psalm and the fifty-first chapter of Isaiah. Once more ; ritual and ceremonial observances and usages were specially adapted to cultivate prospective faith. They served to keep the essential features of the future gospel in constant reminder, just as the Lord's Supper serves to keep all that it represents in the eye of faith, and the partakers do, in partaking, feed by faith upon all it represents. We could almost wish that we had many other similar object lessons under the Gospels. But the Saviour in his wisdom has ordered it otherwise. A retrospective faith relies on testimony. We have an authentic written record of all the facts for our faith to rest on. We have also the benefit of the entire ritual and its inspired interpreta- tion and the historic fulfillment of it on unimpeachable testimony. What more do we need? Now this question recurs. Did the Hebrew people imderstand the lessons of their ceremonial system? Not all. Do Christian peoples understand the provis- 86 Selected Old Testament Studies ions of the Gospel? Not all. But the fault is not in the ritual, on the one hand, nor in the Scriptures, on the other. The provision for faith was ample both be- fore and after the coming of Christ. Still some insist that the rites and ceremonies were not understood and were not expected to be. If not, then they were at best arbitrary forms of remedial power outside of the intel- ligence and their efficacy depended on obedient obser- vance. Was it so? The human mind cannot and will not so stultify itself, and that for fifteen hundred years. If their ignorance was too gross to understand the true significance and value of their typology, they must of necessity invent false interpretations, reducing the whole to the level of mere superstitious conceits. Christ vindicates the absolute sufficiency of those in- stitutions ; "If they believe not Moses and the Proph- ets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead." He stakes all his claims on the Old Testament ; "Search the Scriptures, in them ye think ye have eternal life. They are they which testify of me." Ample provision was made for expounding these rites and showing their true significance and value. Parents and prophets, priests and Levites were the ex- pounders. Inspiration played no unimportant part in popular teaching. Inspired prophets had this com- mission, to vindicate the truth against all comers. The High Priest had the oracle by virtue of his office and the ecclesiastical system culminated in him both for doctrine and practice. We are now prepared to say that Moses' religious institutions can not be called a ceremonial system as opposed to spiritual, but that its sole value consisted in its spiritual import. More than this, the provision Selected Old Testament Studies 87 made by Moses for spiritual instruction and worship vastly preponderated over the ceremonial. The latter was local and occasional. It was limited to the Taber- nacle and then to the temple. The mass of the people had but little concern with the daily ritual. The males were required to attend the great feasts three times a year while the women went as they found it conven- ient. Much of the temple liturgy and its imposing pantomime worship had a national aspect and was not personal except as every man was a citizen. The other forty-nine Sabbaths were kept in the homes. All the details of family religion were found there with no trace of the ceremonial. They rejoiced in the teaching of Levites and prophets, reinforced by traditionary truths and a partial canon. Compare Levit. XXV. 1-7 ; and Duet. vi. 6-9. The spiritual character of the moral law in all its applications is as obvious as in the Sermon on the Mount. The spiritual character of the Psalms is ob- vious to the most careless reader. Some of the critics claim that the intense spiritual character of the fifty- first Psalm would have been an anachronism in David's Day, and was therefore of post-exilic authorship. The prayers of the O. T. Saints are models of spirituality to this day — instance, Solomon's prayer when dedicating the temple. Men have sought in vain to smirch the truth, spirit- uality and holiness of the Old Testament in compari- son with the New. But Christ and his Apostles bring all their teaching to the standard and test of the Old Testament Scriptures rightly understood, or rather to their obvious and accepted interpretation. May we not therefore say that the Old Testament Church was probably as pure, holy, and spiritual and as 88 Selected Old Testament Studies faithful as the Christian Church. At any rate we may safely compare Jewdom for fifteen hundred years and Christendom for the same period. Both dispensations have been sadly marred by the same or similar heresies and evil practices and apostasies. CHAPTER X Ministers of Religion — The Priesthood. The religious system of the race was patriarchal be- fore the time of Moses ; and so was their civil system. The father, the head of the house, was prophet, priest, and king, and was to this extent a type of Christ. He was the teacher of his family and offered sacrifices as we see from the history of the patriarchs, and from the story of Job. He was responsible for the conduct and worship of his family including children, slaves, and guests, as we see from the fourth commandment. Every priest had divine access, revelations and com- munications, as we see also from the history of these family priests. This access we call the oracle. This fact is often overlooked. But it is true historically, from Abraham to Caiaphas, that the oracle belonged to the priest by virtue of his office. We do not see how he could be a mediator without it. There are indications that there was a hierarchy from the beginning and certainly in Abraham's day and later on, in which hierarchy the family priests were subordinate as we plainly see from the story of Abra- ham and Melchizedeck. Paul so understood it as we see from Hebrews vi. It seems evident also that Poti- pherah priest of On, Jethro of Midian, and even Balaam, were high priests in this hierarchy. Under this system the family was the local church and the place of worship was the home, tent or family roof-tree. Each congregation grew larger as the family expanded into tribes with subdivisions along 90 Selected Old Testament Studies family lines. Every firstborn son was holy to the Lord succeeding his father in some form of ofiicial responsi- bility for the teaching and the worship of those under him. It may help us to understand these conditions to note that even among pagans we find, far and wide, altars in every home and religious rites derived evi- dently from a common tradition of that old patriarchal system. We are now prepared to understand the legislation at Sinai. We are not now concerned with social and civil legislation, and the adjustment of the family and the tribe to the state. This presents a study of great importance for a right understanding of the principles of good government and sound statesmanship as em- bodied in God-given civil institutions. We are con- cerned now with the religious institutions of Moses, and the ministers of religion. We learn from Numbers iii. 39-47, that God com- manded Moses and Aaron to number the males of the tribe of Levi from one month old and upward ; and then to number the first born of the other twelve tribes of Israel from one month old and upward. There were twenty-two thousand males in the tribe of Levi, and there were twenty-two thousand two hundred and seventy-three of the first born of all Israel. And God took these Levites in exchange for the first born of Is- rael, man for man, and the excess of two hundred and seventy-three were redeemed with five shekels of the Sanctuary each. This exchange transferred the priestly functions of the firstborn to the tribe of Levi. The priesthood and the oracle which was the birth- right of the firstborn in the family was taken away and lodged in the tribe of Levi. The patriarchal system of worship was modified to this extent and no further, ex- Selected Old Testament Studies 91 cept as the Levites became, in time, religious teachers to assist in the spiritual home worship of all the people. The numbers of each would indicate that the Levites were a small tribe, probably about one fiftieth of the entire people. This change seemed to be revolutionary in the last degree. It seemed to take away the most precious family heritage of the ages. We need not therefore be surprised that the people did not submit to it quietly though they ought to have known that Moses acted by divine authority in making the change. Their dissat- isfaction culminated in the rebellion of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram which was the most extraordinary and protracted struggle recorded in their history in the wilderness. We sometimes overlook the fact that the rebellions in the wilderness were not mere puerile and foolish whims and dissatisfactions, nor were the punishments out of proportion to their offences. A careful study tells of great principles supposed to be at stake, and of the necessity of a powerful vindication of authority and truth. Such was the case in this great rebellion. It was headed by the three men named, and second- ed by two hundred and fifty princes of the Assembly, nearly half of the great National Assembly. They said that Moses and Aaron took too much upon them- selves, and that the whole congregation was holy — had equal right to perform priestly functions. God brought the matter to three several tests before the people were satisfied. We may tell the story briefly. I. Who might burn incense? Aaron took his cen- sor, fire and incense and stood on one side ; two hun- dred and fifty princes took censors, fire and incense on 92 Selected Old Testament Studies the other. While they thus stood burning incense in full view of all the people the earth opened and swal- lowed up Korah, Dathan and Abiram, their families, their tents, their flocks and their herds and all their possessions ; and there came out fire from the Lord (out from the inner tabernacle) and consumed the two hundred and fifty men that burned incense. 2, On the next day the remainder of the Assembly arraigned Moses and Aaron charging that they had killed the children of the Lord. The divine glory over- shadowed and protected them before the tabernacle, and the plague started and was sweeping across the camp ; and Moses bade Aaron to make haste with his censor of burning incense and stand between the living and the dead ; and the plague was stayed. Fourteen thousand seven hundred perished by the plague. Aaron was again vindicated, but at a fearful cost. 3. Then God offered them a more peaceful test — twelve rods, one for each tribe, and one for Aaron, all laid up before the Lord, within the vail ; and Aaron's rod budded overnight and bore buds, and flowers, aril almonds. So was the Aaronic priesthood vindicated a third time. And the people were assured that all the risk and danger and responsibility of holy things were transferred to the tribe of Levi. All of which we find in Numbers chapters xvi. and xvii. Thus the tribe of Levi became a divinely appointed religious class or caste, divided into two orders, priests and Levites. We might call them a priestly caste be- cause of the intimate relations of the two orders and their respective duties. The priesthood proper was limited to Aaron and his descendants. He was high priest because of du- Selected Old Testament Studies 93 ties and functions limited to him, and also because in him was vested a supreme judicial jurisdiction in mat- ters religious and ecclesiastical. In this capacity of supreme judge he had direct access to God for divine guidance through the oracle ; and so with all high priests after him. The ordinary priest had access to the oracle only through him. To the priesthood was committed the administra- tion of the elaborate ritual, ceremonial, and typological system of worship as found in the books of Moses and codified at Mt. Sinai. In the course of time they be- came more numerous and their duties became more numerous because of the increasing population. David divided them into twenty-four courses, each to serve at the temple, one week, in rotation, distributing their several duties by lot at every return of service. Thus each course served two weeks in each year. Their homes were in forty-eight Levitical cities, along with the Levites. How did they spend the other fifty weeks of the year? Surely not in idleness. They derived their support from the tithe and were not expected to engage in agriculture or commerce or in other secular vocations. There is every reason to believe that they were the educators of the people along with the Levites proper. The high priest also had certain civil functions such as discerning leprosy in persons and houses, and pro- nouncing them clean or unclean, and in diagnosing va- rious forms of disease. From Joshua down through the Theocracy the civil ruler had access to the oracle through the high priest for his instruction and guid- ance. There seem to have been gradations in the Jewish 94 Selected Old Testament Studies liierarchy other than priest and high priest, for we read of chief priests in the later history but it is not easy to ascertain when these gradations originated. There were vestments appointed for priests and high priests which they wore when engaged in official duties — regalia of office. There may have been some distinctions of dress regularly worn to indicate official position, but it is by no means certain. The ephod of the high priest is constantly mentioned in connection with the high priest and the oracle, and the urim, or the urim and thummin was also worn upon it whenever he would stand before the Lord in the performance of his duties. There has been much discussion and needless mys- tery about this breastplate. The surface view is this. The breastplate was a span square of doubled linen and on it were twelve precious stones, all different. On each of these was written the name of a tribe of Israel, all of whom the high priest represented when standing before the Lord. These stones were set in gold and arranged in rows on the breastplate and it was fastened by rings, chains and catches of gold on the breast of the ephod. The name of this most beautiful breast- plate seems to have been "Urim and Thummin," which may be rendered "Lights and Perfections" — a most fit- ting representation of the divine glory reflected in his chosen people. We hear nothing of this breastplate after the captivity, and it does not seem to have been necessary to the oracle. The Levites were far more numerous than the priests. They were primarily the priests' assistants. They had charge of the tabernacle and its furniture, and afterward had charge of the temple area and per- formed many duties in connection with the temple Selected Old Testament Studies 95 worship and administration. They were classified by David according to their families, divided into courses and assigned to many lines of service in a most syste- matic way. They were made singers, porters, judges, expounders of the law, teachers, genealogists and roll keepers, and such like. The whole tribe of Levi was exempt from military- duty. Moses did not include them in his military cen- sus because of more important duties. They had no political status and no tribal allegiance. Their civil rights and duties were reduced to a minimum, and they were appointed to religious service to the twelve tribes. Ministers of religion in most countries have enjoyed similar exemption from military service and many other civil burdens for similar reasons. The support of these religious orders was a divinely appointed, but voluntary, tithe of all the increase of the twelve tribes whom they served. This tithe we shall discuss in another chapter. Suffice it to say here that this tithe was voluntary, not enforced, self-assessed, often withheld or partially paid, and depended, on one side, on the spirituality of the giver and, on the other, it depended largely on the official fidelity and consecra- tion of priests and Levites. Under this system of support priestly domination was prevented, while most other ancient and modern peoples as well, have been sadly cursed with it. We may note here the wisdom of appointing a here- ditary, cultured religious caste, with no civil authority and with a voluntary support. They had ample time and opportunity, "free from worldly cares and avoca- tions," to administer their elaborate ritual and to ex- pound its full significance to all the people. But even more important than all this was the wider teaching and pastoral work throughout the land. 96 Selected Old Testament Studies This hereditary caste, cut off from the industrial vocations and supported by the gifts of the people, had ample leisure for learning and culture to fit them for the duties of their high calling. The distinction of the spiritual and the secular was not exactly as we have it to-day. This cultured class largely filled all the pro- fessions, some of which we call secular. With them education was a soul function and was therefore reli- gious. Indeed this has been the doctrine of the ages and of all peoples, until recent times. No church in Christendom has yet surrendered it in the face of the aggressive doctrine that education is and ought to be 1 purely secular function, and that the State is the true educator. In this competition of church and State the odds are largely in favor of the State with taxation, free education, and public patronage behind her, while the church can rely only on the loyal voluntary support of her sons. Some have criticised this religious caste because it was hereditary and therefore lacked the spirituality of a personal call and recognized qualifications. To this we reply that the evils of a hereditary succession are not so great as might appear. It has been the rule in all ages for the son to follow the father's calling, not in a haphazard way, but he is trained for it under the most favorable conditions. This has been true in all stable conditions of society and permanent civiliza- tions. lUit in the flux of a rapidly changing material civilization like ours the opportunities for personal am- bitions and promotions somewhat obscure the rule ; but it only furnishes a larger number of exceptions. It has been computed that hundreds of the descendants of John Knox have been preachers, hundreds more have been elders and deacons, and hundreds more will yet Selected Old Testament Studies 97 fill these offices under the operation of this rule. Mod- ern science claims far more for heredity than we may concede, but it vindicates the Divine methods of ad- ministration. We have another and a better reply to the critic. The obvious evils of a hereditary system were correct- ed by the prophetical order. These prophets were per- sonally commissioned by God himself, and by their in- spired teaching they corrected as far as possible the aberrations of parent, priest and Levite. Such were the checks and balances of their system. CHAPTER XI Ministers of Religion — The Prophets. The prophet of the Scriptures is one who speaks for God. The Greek word in the New Testament signi- fies one who speaks for another. The Hebrew word used in the Old Testament means a mouth-piece, a spokesman — one who utters an accredited message. Sometimes it means a fore-teller — or a legate, one chosen to speak — or an interpreter, one who expounds and elaborates his message. The prophet represented a God, either the true or a false God. Moses was God's prophet and we read of prophets of Baal. Every prophet claimed inspiration for his message. "Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." 2 Pet. i. 21. Inspiration was the differentiat- ing element to distinguish a prophet from other teach- ers. The prophets^ of false Gods were called false prophets because they had no real inspiration, no mat- ter how much they might claim it, nor how true their utterances might be. The word prophet is used only once to signify a man's mouth-piece or spokesman. God said to Moses thou shalt be my prophet, and Aaron shall be thy prophet, and thou shall be a God unto him. Even here Moses transmitted an inspired message through Aaron as his spokesman. Aaron had the inspiration through an intermediary. Prophets were accredited messengers from the Lord. There was no room for mistake for they wrought miracles of power or knowledge, which could not be Selected Old Testament Studies 99 contested. False prophets could furnish only "lying wonders." Prophets representing false Gods were prima facie false prophets, though they were some- times brought to the test, as when Elijah tested the claims of Baal and his prophets at Mount Carmel. i Kings xviii. Other false prophets claimed to speak messages in the name of the Lord, but were exposed when brought to the test of predictive prophecy. Instance the four hundred false prophets of the Lord on one side, and the one true prophet, Micaiah, on the other side, before Ahab and Jehoshaphat. And Micaiah said, "If thou at all return in peace then the Lord hath not spoken by me." I Kings xxii. 5-38. If it be true that inspiration is the differentiating element of prophecy, and the prophet always needed attestation, and if the Lord always stood beside the prophet ready to certify to the messenger and his mes- sage, then there is scant room for the modern idea that the prophet was a mere religious teacher, and that reli- gious teachers to-day are prophets in the Bible sense. It is true that the modern preacher has a message, a "Thus saith the Lord,' but it is only a quotation from a real prophet's "Thus saith the Lord." The preach- er's exposition of his message is limited by his own in- telligent apprehension of it; but the real prophet ex- pounded and delivered his message with inerrant cer- tainty, whether he comprehended it or not. It is im- possible to show that there were two orders of proph- ets in the olden time, one inspired and the other not. The attempt to make this distinction is only a part of the larger and more vicious attempt to minimize the supernatural and to reduce inspiration to the level of a mere human intelligence and to naturalistic processes. loo Selected Old Testament Studies There were two kinds of prophecy, predictive pro phecy, and inspired teaching, whether spoken or writ- ten. The volume of predictive prophecy, as found in the Scriptures is large, embracing Messianic prophecy in full detail, and also a large amount of predictive prophecy touching the rise and fall of nations and the destinies of the race. It may be rightfully argued that the history of the Jews and the fulfillment of pro- phecies concerning them from their beginning down to the present day, are so conclusive that every candid mind must accept all else that is found in the Scrip- tures. Another word as to the position of prophets in Jew- ish institutions. They formed no part of the hierarchy. They held no official position. They were clothed with no authority, civil, religious, judicial, or social. They were divinely raised up on occasion to discharge certain functions, whenever and wherever needed, un- der divine guidance and direction. The call and com- mission was entirely personal and they had no sort of organization or freemasonry among themselves so as to form guilds and associations. Indeed the service rendered seems to have been sporadic and occasional. Some of them seem to have been regularly engaged in teaching in the schools of the prophets. A succession of prophets was promised like unto Moses, raised up by God, and clothed with authority to speak for him. On them he put the responsibility of speaking, and on the people the responsibility of hear- ing, all enforced by providential sanctions. By comparing Deut. xviii. 15-19 and Acts iii. 29, we find that the line of prophets culminated in Christ. He is the true prophet and all who went before were types of him. They represented him and spake by his authority and in his name. Acts vii. 37-38. Selected Old Testament Studies loi The prophets were sometimes very numerous, or seemingly more numerous than at other times. In some periods of the history there is but Httle mention of them, probably because there was no occasion to mention them. In the same way there are periods of the history when there is small mention of the priests and Levites. This does not prove there were very few of them. This is notably true of the period of the Judges. Some assert that the prophetic order started with Samuel. But Medad and Eldad prophesied in the camp in Moses' day. A "man of God" (a prophet) came to Eli and reproved him for misgovernment of his family, and foretold the punishment. In Saul's day he fell twice into companies of prophets and took part in their ecstacies. Samuel and Saul overlapped each other. Besides this, the schools of the prophets were in full blast as if they were old institutions in Saul's day. These schools of the prophets were at Ramah, Bethel, Gilgal and Jericho. Samuel seems to have kept in touch with them in his judicial circuit. These were permanent institutions though we find no men- tion of them again until the time of Elijah and Elisha. There must have been large numbers of these prophets, "sons of prophets," attending these schools. We read of fifty from one of the schools watching for the trans- lation of Elijah. They seemed to know of it in ad- vance by some form of inspiration. They lived in "Naioth" or dormitories and were in evident training for their lifework. From all which we get this lesson, that God did not ignore proper culture and training in those upon whom he conferred these exalted functions. Christ also prepared the twelve for their great com- mission in three and a half years of training. I02 Selected Old Testament Studies There were at one time five hundred prophets in the kingdom of Israel in its apostate days, for Jezebel slew four hundred, and Obadiah hid one hundred by fifties in a cave, and Elijah was in hiding. We need hardly quote i Kings xviii. 4; 2 Kings ii. 3, 5, 7; iv. i, 38; I Sam. xix. 18-24 to confirm these statements. They seem to have had two functions, Civil and Moral or spiritual. In their civil functions they were the organ of com- munication between Jehovah and the human heads of the theocracy, whether judges or kings. In the theo- cracy the king or ruler was only a viceroy or deputy of the real King Jehovah. There must needs be a means of communication. One was through the high priest and the oracle. A check was needed on both king and high priest. The prophet was, so to speak, a minister plenipotentiary and extraordinary from the court of heaven to its earthly representative — more often sent than consulted. All reproofs, rebukes, and vetoes seemed to come in this way, and also frequent instruc- tions as to duty when the ruler failed to seek them. The king therefore had two sources of securing the divine guidance, prophet and oracle, i Kings xxii. 7; 2 Kings iii. ii ; i Sam. ix. 6-20. In their moral or spiritual function they were in- spired teachers of righteousness and expounders of the law. They added nothing to Mosaic institutions. They were under them, not as law givers, but law ex- pounders, just as Christ was long afterwards. They were "restorers of the old paths" in times of declension or apostasy. We need only read Isaiah, Ezekiel or Malachi to verify this. If there was any provision made for the support of the prophets we have not been able to find it. They Selected Old Testament Studies 103 were only private citizens having no civil or ecclesias- tical status. There is evidence that they were sup- ported in part, at least, by grateful gifts, and private hospitality and charity, as was the case with Christ and his disciples. We may cite the case of Saul the son of Kis consulting Samuel; also the case of Elijah and the widow of Sarepta, and also of Elisha and the prophet's chamber. The prophets then occupied a most important place in supplementing a partial canon with their teaching. They also supplemented the teachings of parents and Levites in ritual and spiritual worship. The Church of Christ no longer needs the prophetic function, because the canon is complete. All heresies have been met and refuted, all apostasies have been exposed and the truth has been amply expounded and vindicated. We have the written record of it all. Some of these prophets completed the Old Testa- ment canon under divine direction. Some wrote his- tory. Some wrote predictive prophecy. Some wrote the prophetico-historical books. Some wrote songs, spiritual and didactic, and songs of praise and thanks- giving. Some discussed the profoundest questions of the ages as found in the book of Job and other places. Some dealt with the most difficult speculations of the skeptic as found in the book of Ecclesiastes ; and some applied the principles of a sound morality to the ethics of every day life as confirmed by experience, as in the book of Proverbs. It may well be questioned if the Christian world has attached sufficient importance to the "Wisdom" books of the Bible, which were so elabo- rated by the prophets that they can never be improved upon and nothing can ever be added thereto. Even then when the prophets were writing it was 104 Selected Old Testament Studies true that there was "nothing new under the sun." They only recovered, redefined, restored, defended, elaborated and applied the doctrines of the ages and wrote them out to insure permanence for all ages to come. Was not their predictive prophecy new? Yes, in some of the details in their historic unfolding. But the substance was only the reproduction in verbal categories of those truths which had been so long ex- pressed in type and shadow and expounded by priest and prophet. The great expansion of written prophecy was made necessary by the permanent dispersion, and by the nar- rowing limitations and the decay of the ritual system soon to pass away. We have already noted that there were many false prophets. There never yet was any good thing that sin and Satan did not counterfeit. There were even many false Christs in the first Century and some since. So there were many false prophets. False religions have abounded in prophets, false ipso facto. Jezebel had four hundred and fifty prophets of Baal and four hundred prophets of the grove. False prophets often wore a "rough garment to de- ceive." Zech. xiii. 4. This indicates that true proph- ets practiced some asceticism. Elijah was an ascetic in dress, and John the Baptist was an ascetic in dress and diet. Nazarite vows were not at all uncommon and were commended. All Jews were forbidden, however, cuttings in their flesh after the manner of the heathen who tattooed their flesh with all manner of devices, suggested by their callings in life, or armorial bearings of the family or clan, or the still more prized symbols of their wor- ship and of their gods. Their priests and prophets Selected Old Testament Studies 105 were largely tattooed with the symbols of their worship, often inexpressibly lewd and base, and were accounted most holy as they excelled in these things. These facts explain the reference in Zech. xiii. 2-6,, The prophet represents that the false prophets, in the day of retribution, would deny their calling and claim that their idolatrous tattooings were nothing but family or clan marks. The punishment for the false prophet was death. The crime was so heinous that neither father nor mother should- spare him, nor should any friend, but should deliver him to death without pity. So Zeche- riah expresses it, xiii. 3. "His father and his mother that begat him shall thrust him through when he pro- phesieth." False prophecy was treason.. Treason is the highest crime against the state. The false prophet sought either to pervert the theocracy to his own usur- pations, or else to overthrow it in the interests of his false god. It was treason on the civil side and had no palliation. He gave himself little concern for the moral or spiritual side. Deut. xviii. 20-22. There was no considerable gap that we can find in the succession of prophets down to the close of the canon. Then they became more rare. Many suppose that prophet and oracle ceased entirely for five hundred years till the coming of Christ. Is this view correct? We think not. We have discussed this point fully in the Chapter on "the cannon" in a former volume. We shall only touch it here. Anna and Simeon were prophets, as is evident from Luke ii. 25-28. They certainly antedated the Christian dispensation and belonged to the intermediate period. Josephus mentions Sameas or Pollio, Simeon and others as prophets and gives some of their prophesies. io6 Selected Old Testament Studies Why reject his testimony? The high priest had the spirit of prophecy by virtue of his office in ahiiost un- broken line down to Caiaphas "who bein^ high priest that year" i. e. in virtue of his office, uttered one of the most comprehensive prophecies concerning Christ, re- corded in the Scriptures. Jno. xi. 45-52, We need not here tell of the revived and expanded prophetic function on the spiritual side in Apostolic times, until the church became an inspired church for three quarters of a century and more. CHAPTER XII. The Tithes — How far Binding. The word tithe means one-tenth. In the Scriptures it means one-tenth of the increase of property from what- ever source derived. It applied to products of the soil, all the products of labor and capital, spoils taken in war, etc. From Leviticus xxvii. 30-33, we read that they were to tithe the seed, corn, wine, oil and fruit — all pro- ducts of the soil. Also in tithing the increase of flocks and herds the tenth was taken of all that passed under the rod. The firstlings of their flocks and herds were the Lord's and were not counted as part of their tithing. Fleece, peltry, milk and butter were released for obvious reasons. Flocks and herds were already tithed. We find in Genesis xiv. 20, that Abraham gave one- tenth of all the recovered spoil to Melchizedek. In Num- bers xxi. we find an elaborate account of the tithing of the spoil taken in war from the Midianites. The Levites gave one-tenth of what was given to them to the priests just as if it were the product of the threshing floor. Numbers xviii. 26-30. The tithes were required for religious and charitable uses. The word tithe often occurs in the singular number and is used interchangeably with "one-tenth" and "the tenth" and "the tenth part." It is also used in the plural, tithes — because there were three different tithes, and not because the tithe consisted of different items, as some suppose. Josephus is a competent witness to the usage of the io8 Selected Old Testament Studies Jew. In his Antiquities, Book iv., Chap. 8, Sections 8 and 22, he tells us of three tithes. The author worked out these three from the Scriptures some years before he examined Josephus on the subject, and he was de- lighted to find his conclusions confirmed by so high an authority. We shall follow his nomenclature. The Le- vitical Tithe, The Sanctuary Tithe, and The Poor Tithe. /. The Levitical Tithe. We have seen in a previous chapter that the tribe of Levi was taken as a religious caste. They had no lands assigned to them, and they had no tribal civil organization or inheritance, as foretold in Gen. xlix. y. They had homes assigned them in forty- eight Levitical cities, with gardens only attached. They were to be supported by one-tenth of the increase of the twelve tribes. They were ministers of religion, divided into priests and Levites. Education belonged also to them as a spiritual or soul function. They need not turn aside to secular callings if properly supported. The generic idea in this tithe was this : it was for the support of ministers of religion. This tithe was paid over to the tribe of Levi. They gave one-tenth of this tenth to the priests so that their part was one-hundredth part of the whole. The priests in turn gave one-tenth of their part, i. e. one-thousandth part of the whole to the Lord for tabernacle and temple service. We find this carried out in full in the tithing of the spoils taken from the Midianites. See Num- bers xxxi. //. The Sanetuary Tithe. A second tenth was taken out of the increase to pay the expenses incident to at- tending the feasts at the tabernacle wherever located and afterwards at the temple in Jerusalem. There were three great feasts, the Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles. All Ihc males from twelve years old and upward were Selected Old Testament Studies 109 required to attend these annual feasts. There were also other minor occasions, such as the feast of trumpets and the great day of Atonement, which they might or might not attend. The females were not required to attend these feasts, but they were glad to go when the exigencies of their families did not require them to remain at home. This sanctuary tithe was not paid over to any one, but was laid up at home to be used for the personal religious expenses of themselves and families when attending these feasts. It would have been a great burden for the people at Jerusalem to support for a week, and often much longer, the countless crowds that attended these feasts — • an impossible burden, however great their hospitality. If they lived nearby, they carried this tithe with them in kind. But if they lived too far away they were enjoined to convert the tithe into money, and then buy at Jerusa- lem what they might need or whatever their hearts de- sired, for those were festal occasions. Deut. xiv. 23.-27; xii- 5t7. 17. 18. 22. ///. The Poor Tithe. This tithe was taken every third year and laid up at home for charitable uses. It was distributed by the giver to the poor around him, and to the poor Levite not otherwise provided for, and also to the poor stranger or foreigner within their gates. This was two-tenths in six years, or we might say one- thirtieth every year for six years, for the poor, and then the seventh or Sabbatical year yielded no tithes because it was the year of rest, and all the spontaneous crops, vintage and fruits were left for the poor to gather. Thus there was unique provision for the poor, extending to other details also, such as their rules in gleaning and reaping, and gathering fruits by the wayside. Deut. xiv. 28, 29; xxvi. 12-15. The advantage in laying aside a tithe for the poor is no Selected Old Testament Studies obvious. The question of ability or will to help the poor and the unfortunate was put in abeyance as against sel- fishness, and one only had the pleasure of distribution, and the experience of making the poor happy, and himself richer for the blessings invoked upon his head by the grateful receiver. On the other hand there is nothing so contemptible, or so well calculated to make a man de- spise himself as to higgle with his selfishness every time a case of need is presented. The man who provides a fund for such uses has already fought the battle and gained the victory over avarice, greed, and covetousness, and given selfishness a staggering blow. Thus we see that Mosaic institutions required three tithes, one to support ministers of religion, one to meet the personal religious expenses of themselves and families, one for helping the poor, making in the aggregate nine- thirtieths of their increase — more than one-fourth and less than one-third. This was no unreasonable burden when we consider relative values. Nor was this all. There were free will offerings be- sides, included in the phrase, "Tithes and oflferings." There was no numerical measure or proportion for these offerings. They were sometimes very large as in their gifts to building the tabernacle and afterward the temple. There was a treasury (a chest or, as some say, thirteen receptacles) in the threshold of the temple where un- counted pious oflferings were cast into the Lord's treas- ury. These offerings were sometimes given on occasion, sometimes the mere product of loyal gratitude and love, and sometimes in payment of vows made to the Lord in time of trouble more often than in prosperity. Ps. Ixvi. 13, 14. Thanksgiving offerings were also com- mon among all peoples and in all religions. We come to consider now whether all or any of these Selected Old Testament Studies hi tithes are binding upon Christians. Some say none. They claim that tithes passed away with the Jewish dis- pensation and that all Christian giving comes under the category of free will offerings. We shall consider this claim later on. We are face to face with this broader question, how far Jewish institutions are binding or even imitable. We shall probably discuss this question in another connection. We can here only enumerate one or two principles. Those things which did not originate with Jewish insti- tutions, but were adopted into them, did not necessarily pass away with them. Then again, those things which were Jewish in their origin, or essentially Jewish and theocratic in form or substance, did pass away, pro forma, at least, and probably altogether. But if the Jew- ish form represented a substance or a principle of older date, then the substance remains though the temporary form did pass away. These principles would seem self-evident. We may now consider these three tithes, taking them up in the inverse order. I. The Poor Tithe. This would seem to be essentially Jewish in form, for it fitted in with seven year periods ending with the Sabbatical year, and it was evidently only a part of a unique system of providing for the poor. We may therefore admit that this tithe passed away pro forma. But the fact remains that the poor must be pro- vided for. There were poor to be helped before Sinaitic legislation, and we shall also have the poor with us al- ways. The obligation to help them remains, whether they be at our own doors or at any accessible point among men. The lesson of the Poor Tithe is well worth learning. Systematic provision for the poor comes under the second great commandment, "Thou shalt love thy 112 Selected Old Testament Studies neighbor as thyself." Modern accessibility has brought the poor of all the earth to the very doors of Christen- dom. There is sore need of more systematic effort to reach both the bodies and souls of the perishing poor of all the earth. The poor tithe furnishes us the hints we need. 2. The Sanctuary Tithe. It was specifically appointed to insure proper attendance on the great feasts of the Jewish system. We must admit that it also has passed away, pro forma. But the principle remains that a man should provide for the personal religious expenses of himself and family. "If any provide not for his own, and especially those of his own household, he hath de- nied the faith and is worse than an infidel." i Tim. v. 8. This principle does not interfere with a large hospitality ; nor does it excuse men of means from assisting the poor in their personal religious expenses, such as food, rai- ment, transportation, personal comfort in places of wor- ship and so on. It was for many years the custom to entertain with the largest liberality all religious gatherings, such as pres- byteries, synods, assemblies, conventions, associations and the like, and it is still the custom in many quarters. But it is passing away and rightly so. They are becoming so numerous and are attended by such crowds both of mem- bers and visitors, that it has become an intolerable bur- den, and it is rapidly becoming the custom and the duty of all to bear their own expenses. The hints furnished by this sanctuary tithe will be valuable to the end of time. 3. The Levitical Tithe. It might be argued that this tithe passed away with the tribe of Levi. The obvious replv is that this tithe was generically for the support of ministers of religion. If it be conceded that it passed away with Jewish institutions the principle still remains Selected Old Testament Studies 113 that ministers of religion must be supported. This is the teaching of the New Testament. We need not quote the proof texts. Christ and His disciples lived on the loving ministrations of His disciples. Paul maintains the principle as a matter of right by quoting Old Testa- ment usages. This principle has been and is still the working principle of all religions and among all peoples, derived, doubtless, from a common tradition, or adopted from a common source. It is so deeply rooted that priestly domination has been easy of accomplishment. The sentiment and the duty are unquestioned. The only question that remains is this, Did this tithe originate in Sinaitic legislation and pass away with those features which were essentially Jewish ? Or does the tithe remain to this day as a divine indication of duty? The fact that all Christian nations until recently ac- cepted the doctrine of the tithe raises a presumption in its favor, but is no proof or authority for it, for there have been Judaizing tendencies in the church in all ages, and the enforcement of tithes in illegitimate theocracies or unions of church and state has certainly been the pro- lific source of evil. The re-action against such abuses of tithing by state taxation has led to a rejection of all tithing, and it is not strange that it should be so. The very name became odious because of taxation, often op- pressive, in the name of tithes. Such a system contra- vened religious liberty and is justly odious. More recent advocates of the tithe by intense protes- tants have made even a worse and more odious mistake in making the tithe a tax to be collected under church au- thority and enforced by church discipline. This is really the doctrine of the papacy. The tithe did not originate at Mt. Sinai. It is men- tioned twice as a rule of life in actual practice several 114 Selected Old Testament Studies centuries before. In Gen. xiv. we are told that Abraham on his return with the recovered spoil of the cities of the Plain, was met by Melchizedek, a great high priest, and he gave him one-tenth of all even though he himself would take nothing for himself. It all belonged to him by right of salvage and the King of Sodom so recognized. But he evidently gave the tenth to Melchizedek as a mat- ter of usage and right. Paul so expounds it in Heb. vii. i-io. His argument would mean nothing on any other theory. The other mention of the tithe is in Gen. xxviii. 20-22. While Jacob lived in his father's house, all the increase belonged to his father under patriarchal usages. When he left home he set up for himself. He slept the first night from home at or near the city Luz, and saw that wonderful vision of the ladder and the angels ; and the Lord himself at the foot of the ladder blessed and com- forted him and renewed to him the Abrahamic covenant, in its fullness. Jacob recalled it all when he awoke the next morning. He attested his gratitude and piety by recording his famous vow that the Lord should be his God and that he would surely give him back a tenth of all that his God should give him. Desperate efforts have been made to show that all this was conditioned on his safe return home, and that he took no account of his vow until his return home twenty years later when he returned to the same spot. There seems to me to be no place for such a theory, but on the contrary he places the tithe on its true basis, a recognition that all his increase would be God's gift; "of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee." But suppose it were true that Jacob took no account of his vow either for material or spiritual wor- ship (a violent supposition) until his return, still it re- Selected Old Testament Studies 115 mains that even then he took up the worship and the tithing of his father Abraham as the rule and law of his life under the covenant renewed to him twenty years before. The date matters little, the substance remains, and it is evident that Jacob adopted the tithe as his rule of life in grateful recognition of God's gifts. This previous existence and practice of the tithe, cen- turies before Sinai's law was given, justifies its prominent place in that law, but raises no presumption that it would pass away with it. Paul emphasizes this principle when defending the permanence of the Abrahamic covenant in Gal. iii. 17. "The law, which came four hundred and thirty years after cannot disannul." These words are equally applicable to the covenant or the tithe. The prin- ciple is sound. The objector says that the tithe was a ceremonial and passed with other ceremonials which were practised from the beginning. Was it a ceremonial — a type — a mere form having a spiritual significance and valued chiefly therefor. If so no one has tried to show it. If it was a shadow, what was its substance? The objector says again that the tithe supported the tribe of Levi who were the administrators of a ceremonial system. We reply that the ceremonies were a very in- significant part of their religious duties and functions, as shown in a previous chapter. But once more, the objector. Why was it not re- enacted in the New Testament? In reply: why was not the Noachic covenant re-enacted, and many other things ? Christ and His apostles re-enacted nothing. However, there would seem to be a reference to a recognized pro- portion in I Cor. xvi. i, 2, "according as the Lord has prospered you." The tithe then would seem to be the exact analogue ii6 Selected Old Testament Studies of the Sabbath — one-seventh of the time and one-tenth of the substance were the Lord's. One-seventh of the time is the minimum of the time, much more is often to be given; so one-tenth of the substance is the minimum, and far more is often required. The patriot citizen of the State bears cheerfully the minimum burdens re- quired of him, but some times he gives his all and even life itself at his country's call. So it is in the kingdom of grace. This is the surface doctrine of the entire Scrip- tures. * The tithe was not a tax. No tithe assessor nor collec- tor visited the homes of the people or made inquisition. It was as purely a voluntary ofifering as were the free will offerings, though determined by different reasons. The tithe was a divine levy, self-assessed, and enforced by conscience. The purse strings, of God's people were never given to any human tribunal. But he has reserved to himself to reward or punish by providential sanctions, or otherwise, in time and in eternity. Malachi's words are pertinent here iii. 8-10, "Will a man rob God"; "Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse"; "Prove me now herewith saith the Lord of Hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven and pour you out a blessing till there be not room to receive it." It may not be amiss to mention that tithe-paying de- pended largely on the fidelity and spirituality of priests and people, and that priests and Levites were sometimes reduced to great straits and their duties nearly abandoned for secular pursuits for a support. We may mention further that tithe receivers were sometimes appointed to make fair and equitable distribution. All of which we learn from Neh. xiii. 10-13. Faithful men were appointed over the treasuries (storehouses) and "their office was to distribute to their brethren." Selected Old Testament Studies 117 It may not be amiss to close this discussion with the following which the author prepared for a different pur- pose and in a different connection, to-wit : 1. The scriptural tithe was one-tenth of the proper product of capital, labor, spoil, or any other form of in- crease, estimated, in gross, and was consecrated to the support of the institutions of religion, and was the divine indication of a minimum to be given for this purpose. Circumstances and the exigencies of the case oft^n called for a much larger proportion in the form of free-will offerings. 2. This tithe is seen in practice before the ratification of the Abrahamic covenant, is recognized by Jacob as the law of his life consecration, and was formally en- grafted on the Alosaic system at Mount Sinai. It must not be confounded with the sanctuary tithe and the poor tithe, which presumably originated with that system and passed away with it. Having none of the features of a type or mere ceremonial, it would seem to be of divine authority as long as there are institutions of religion to support. 3. This tithe was purely a voluntary offering, self- assessed, and collected by no civil or ecclesiastical au- thority, and enforced only by providential rewards and punishments. The enacted and enforced tithes of so many other religious systems have been a usurpation of a divine prerogative and a galling despotism. 4. Nor was this tithe an inexorable law, to be self- enforced in the face of all conditions. All positive in- stitutions which indicate a certain measure of service would sometimes become irksome and cruel if there were no principle limiting their application in actual practice. Phariseeism says, "Enforce at all hazards." Christ says, ii8 Selected Old Testament Studies "Go ye and learn what this meaneth, I will have mercy and not sacrifice," thus quoting and setting up the Old Testament and universal principle of "necessity and mercy," as limiting such positive measures of service. Such plea of "necessity and mercy" in the tither's case is between him and his God, and he must needs be care- ful that he is not moved by covetousness on the one hand, or by weakness of faith on the other. 5. It is left to "prophet" and "teacher" to expound and enforce this duty of tithing as far as he may see his way clear to do so from God's word, and only so far ; and it is also left to the conscience of the individual Christians to determine how far he shall accept and act upon this minimum rule of honoring God with the sub- stance ; but both the teacher and the taught must give ac- count to the same Judge, and to him only. All other question or inquisition about it would be an impertinence and a usurpation. 6. It follows, therefore, clearly that the church courts can pronounce nothing on this subject which shall bind the conscience or the conduct of God's people, even by its moral weight. Besides, such deliverance would be of the nature of promulgating a new article of faith not now embraced in the standards of the church. Such a new article of faith might perhaps be added to the Confession of Faith in a constitutional way, but in that case the con- stitutional duty of enforcement would rest upon the church, and then liberty perishes under ecclesiastical domination. 7. The obligation to support the institutions of religion seems to have been unquestioned in New Testament times by the heresies of the day ; we, therefore, find but two references to it, one by Christ — "The laborer is worthy Selected Old Testament Studies 119 of his hire" — and one by Paul, i Cor. ix. 9-14; and both references are drawn from Old Testament usages and authority. Numerous and urgent arguments and exhor- tations are, however, given to secure generous gifts to the poor, and they were no doubt timely. These exhor- tations contain principles of wider application to the Old Testament tithes, and free-will offerings as well. 8. Many who may not concede the permanent bind- ing authority of the tithe as a minimum for all ages and dispensations will perhaps concede the following proposi- tion : If the tithe was the minimum proportion in a con- fessedly inferior dispensation, the larger graces, wider field and abounding prosperity of a better dispensation do not suggest a smaller proportion when we essay to "honor the Lord with our substance." CHAPTER XIII The Book of Genesis. The first five books of the Old Testament are called the Books of Moses. They were doubtless one book written by him and usually called the Pentateuch. The subdivisions into books, chapters, and verses are of comparatively recent origin. Joshua -seems to have taken up the pen where Moses laid it down and finished the history of the removal of Israel from Egypt and their settlement in the promised land. The six books are sometimes called the Hexateuch. In the arbitrary division into books the mistake was made of putting the account of Moses' death and burial and the tribute to his memory as the last chapter of Deuteronomy instead of the first chapter of Joshua. The division was evidently made, not according to the actual authorship, but according to subject matter. In this way Deuteronomy completes Moses' administra- tion with an account of his death, and Joshua begins with the account of a new administration. The divi- sions of the Pentateuch were evidently all made accord- ing to the subject matter and names given to corres- pond. The present names of these books are not found in the Scriptures at all. Christ refers in general to the Scripture. Once he refers to the Old Testament Canon as "Moses and the Prophets" and once as "Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms." This was the popular divi- sion in his day and is still accepted by Jews and Chris- tians. Selected Old Testament Studies 121 The reader will notice that in this chapter and the next we follow the old fashioned, traditional, common sense, and surface view of these books of Moses. We also assume the Mosaic authorship of these books, as was commonly held in Christ's day, and almost univer- sally in all the ages till this day. We hold likewise that the fifty-eight references to Moses in the New Testament do seem to show that Christ and the apostles believed in the Mosaic author- ship of these books. There is such a variety of state- ment and reference that it would seem impossible to hold any other theory. One or two or more of these references might be explained away by a plausible exe- gesis, but the body of them would still remain unchal- lenged. More than this, these references to Moses are so numerously intertwined and interlaced with the doc- trine and teaching of Christ and his apostles that they cannot be questioned in their integrity without putting the whole scheme of truth in danger. The aim of this discussion will be to locate these books in the canon as a necessary part thereof, and to indicate their coherency with the whole. We shall see that their integrity, both historical and doctrinal, is basic in Scripture exegesis. We may further remark, the uniform tradition in favor of the authorship of these books, which has pre- vailed so many centuries, has the right of way against all comers, unless actual facts be found to the contrary. Presumptions may not be set aside by assumptions. Presumptive evidence may not be set aside by ingen- ious conceits. The book of Genesis professes to give the origin of the race, the creation of the present cosmos, and the 122 Selected Old Testament Studies origin of human institutions, social, civil and religious. It reveals God in his relations to all created beings, and the principles of his government. It gives in the first few chapters a succinct history of the race dow^n to the Flood. Now it is true that all peoples have accounts of origins, especially of their own origin and early history. Legend and story, romance, folk-lore and song, and stories of their heroes and of their Gods have been handed down orally and in written form. In the liter- atures of some, these things are set forth with great beauty. Historians have incorporated them into their books, sometimes with superstitious credulity and reverence and sometimes as mere hearsay and curious traditions. The most of this is easily distinguished from au- thentic history. It was the fashion some years ago to' pronounce all the early history of Greece and Rome romantic, and to remand it to the realm of the legen- dary. But to-day the tendency is to find a historic basis for it all, and to ascertain its real historic value. The argument is this : the Connection between the story of origin and later authentic history is so close that the legendary history is necessarily true for sub- stance, and it is only needful to ascertain the truth and brush away romantic accretions. Now look at the book of Genesis. There are no ro- mantic accretions. The story is told in the simplest historic prose. The actual history has not been dressed up with romantic detail. On the contrary the numer- ous details of its story of origins do bind it to the later history with hooks of steel — or, to change the figure, they do enter into the very web and woof of the later Scriptures, both historical and doctrinal. Selected Old Testament Studies 123 Agnostics have claimed in vain that Genesis is legend, fiction and allegory, even to this extent, that Abraham was the mere product of oriental thought. It is therefore logical when they dispute the historicity of the later books of the Bible. If one be true the other is of necessity true, and vice versa. Others accept the inspired historicity of the book, but they see in it little more than a collection of stories and biographies for our instruction, warning or imita- tion. They value the book almost entirely for the spiritual lessons to be gotten out of it. We have no fault to find with the use of the Scriptures as a means of grace and spiritual improvement. But this hardly comes into the trend of this discussion. We maintain here that this book is a necessary in- troduction to the entire Scriptures. They were a head- less trunk without it. If the book had been lost and the Bible began with the Book of Exodus every reader would feel the want of something to explain the condi- tions, as if a reader were to plunge into a detached chapter of history with no knowledge of previous con- ditions. In such a case we imagine that scholars would search for the missing book and hail its discovery as a very message from heaven. Or they would busy them- selves with trying to reconstruct the missing book out of references found in the other books. This method was used in astronomy to locate and finally discover one of the planets of the Solar System. The same method has been applied to literary problems. Our contention will find its truth vindicated in a brief analysis of the book. Even a careless Bible reader can but see its pertinency at every point to all other Scripture. Nay more, he will find it the key to all the rest. 124 Selected Old Testament Studies Tlie book embraces two periods. The first period extends from Creation to the flood. The second pe- riod extends from the Flood to the Exodus. In the first period we find the story of Creation ; the estabHshment of the present order of things on the earth's surface ; the introduction of plant life and ani- mal life ; the orig-in of man ; his dual nature, spiritual and material ; the divine government over him ; the es- tablishment of the family and the Sabbath ; the cove- nant in the Garden of Eden ; the devices of Satan ; the breach of the covenant; the origin of man's sin; the fact of the fall ; the entrance of death with Sin ; the curse on the several parties and upon all nature, ani- mate and inanimate, for man's sake; the plan of re- demption ; divine teaching and revelation ; the estab- lishment of ceremonial worship ; and the promise of a redeemer from the seed of the woman. All these things cohere with the statements and the expositions of the later Scriptures. Indeed they furnish the key to the doctrine of redemption. If there w-ere no first Adam there could be no second Adam. If there were no curse there could be no redemption from the curse. If there were no spiritual death there could be no quickening by the Spirit. If there be no Paradise lost, there is no Paradise regained. We find also a graphic picture of the earliest civil- ization, and also of the rapid deterioration of the race, and the cause of it; the rapid growth of evil ; the sepa- ration of the righteous and the wicked, social, civil, and religious; the barriers broken down and the rapid con- tamination of the righteous and the universal preval- ence of sin and crime and violence. All of which cul- minated in the necessity of destroying man with the waters of the Flood. The Flood was a great historic fact referred to again Selected Old Testament Studies 125 and again in the later Scriptures, and held by all na- tions as a fact attested by a common tradition. This terrific destruction is amply vindicated in Genesis and nowhere else. It does seem marvelous that the brief history found in the first eight chapters of Genesis tells us, so many things of fundamental importance, both directly and by necessary implication. May we not compare the dignity and the majesty of this brief history with the puerilities of all earthborn attempts to discuss the origins? What makes the dif- ference ? One is man-made and the other is God-given. Milton's great epic. Paradise Lost, is based on a few of the facts found here and a few more coherent facts gleaned from other Scriptures — ''immortal facts wed- ded to immortal verse." After the Flood — the second period — the race took a new start under the new covenant made with the race. Sin and Satan made sad inroads in Noah's family, and the second curse is not ended yet. A second separation at Babel, more far reaching than the first, seemed necessary to prevent the permanent con- solidation of Satan's kingdom and for the better pro- tection of the righteous. As the centuries passed, decay and apostasies set in more and more rapidly. It became necessary to try a new experiment of special covenant dispensation. Abram was called and covenant was made with him and his seed to bless all nations, against the time of univer- sal apostasy. Then we read the history of his family, Isaac, and Jacob, and the twelve patriarchs. We read of their so- journ in the land promised to him and his seed. We read how the twelve patriarchs grew into as many tribes and the tribes into a nation in Egypt — two mil- lion or more. We hardly realize that this story of 126 Selected Old Testament Studies Abraham and his seed covers a sweep of five hundred 3^ears. It was meet that so much more space is given to them in the record because they were central in the divine plan for the redemption of the race. The genealogies in the tenth chapter — The Toldoth Beni-Noah — were necessary to connect the nations with each other and with the Hebrews, and are of supreme value to us in tracing the unity of the human race. This history shows how the Hebrews became God's peculiar people. It was not for their own sake, but for the sake of the race. 'Tn thee and thy seed shall all nations of the earth be blessed ;" "all families of the earth." The seed culminates in Christ. So Paul ex- l^ounds it, and the covenant is yet to be realized in its fulness. The entire scheme was designed to preserve the "Oracles of God," according to Paul, Rom. iii. 3, and to save the elect. The divine oracles were received at Sinai and unfolded until the Old Testament Canon was completed, and have been handed down the ages to us. The divine sovereignty and their lack of special merit are illustrated at every step. Suppose this book were lost. But why make such a supposition? It were as impossible to lose as the eternal truth of God. In hand to hand battle the enemy strikes at the head of his antagonist, and a deadly blow destroys the life of the entire body. So here, the ene- mies of the Bible aim their deadliest blows at this book. Besides this, the warring sects of Christendom, Calvinists, Arminians, Socinians and Pelagians part company in their interpretations of fundamental facts in the Book of Genesis and interpret all the other Scrip- tures accordingly. The reason of this is found in the intense logical coherency of the entire Scriptures. CHAPTER XIV. The Four Other Books of Moses, The Book of Genesis closes with the death of Joseph. His administration in Egypt and his pohcy and influence cover three quarters of a century of petting and pros- perity of Israel. Exodus begins with a change of policy within twenty-five or thirty years after his death. The Hyksos or Shepherd kings were expelled. The worship of Jehovah was abolished as the religion of the State, and the old Egyptian religion was restored. The King or dynasty that knew not Joseph was hostile to the worship of Jehovah and was of necessity hostile to the religion of Joseph and his people. The Hebrews of necessity sympathized with their Hykso benefactors, socially, civilly, and religiously. The king of Egypt was justified in his fears that this rapidly increasing Hebrew popu- lation would, in case of war with the returning Hyksos, join their former friends and also get out of Egypt. Their final expectation of settling in Palestine under the coven- ant with Abraham was no secret. And besides, so thrifty a population as Israel, settled in the garden spot of Egypt, could ill be spared from an industrial and economic point of view. Under the new order of things they were more dis- tinctly aliens than before. Their circumcision covenant and their tribal organization, with patriarchal self-gov- ernment, and a semi-national organization of Seventy Elders, of which we find evidence, and the instinctive racial hostility of the native Egyptians, all contributed to their increasing solidarity. The usual assimilation of 128 Selected Old Testament Studies alien settlers became more and more impossible with them. This then was the problem that confronted the new dynasty. Israel's rapid increase was a source of danger in time of war. The loss of such a population would mean national bankruptcy to the Egyptians. How shall they be humbled and their ambitions blasted ; and above all, how shall they be assimilated into the native popu- lations? David and Solomon grappled successfully with the same problem in dealing with the Canaanitish peoples that still remained in the land, conquered but not yet absorbed. The king of Egypt reduced them to the condition of national slaves under severe taskmasters and for one hundred years or more they were drafted for hard labor in brick and mortar, building treasure or storage cities, and also in all manner of service in the field. They were made to serve with rigor. It proved a dismal failure. "The more they afflicted them the more they grew and multiplied." He added another device. He ordered the midwives to destroy every male child at its birth. This proved a failure also. He then ordered every male child to be thrown into the river, and no doubt his minions made ac- tive search in the land of Goshen to find the hiding places where mothers sought to save their new born sons. This was hardly an invention of pure malice, nor even a mere scheme to reduce the population. This would be better accomplished by destroying the female chil- dren, a thing not uncommon in heathen lands. Could he but destroy one generation of male children he might easily give the females in marriage to native Egyptians, and the work were soon done, and the assimilation com- pleted. What hindered? The God of Providence and Selected Old Testament Studies 129 the faith of the parents were on the side of the Hebrews. There was no lack of wisdom on the part of the king — a wisdom inspired of the devil. He did achieve a partial success and there was much inter-marriage between the Hebrews and Egyptians, but, strange to say, the "mixed multitude," the product of the king's plan, cast in their fortunes with the Hebrews when they went out of the land. and were in due course assimilated and absorbed into God's people. This rapid sketch of the conditions in Egypt will en- able us the better to understand the transitions in the history from Joseph to the Exodus under Moses. A very brief analysis of the Book of Exodus will now be sufficient to illustrate and vindicate the exact place of the book in the canon of Scripture. 1. In Chapter ii. i-io, we have the account of the birth of Moses, his early infancy, his adoption by Pha- raoh's daughter, his rearing at court and his education till forty years old, none too long for "all the wisdom of the Egyptians." 2. "When he was grown" — forty years old — he es- sayed to identify himself with his people for their de- liverance, but they were not ready. Compare Acts vii. 22-28. 3. He fled before the wrath of Pharaoh and made his home with Jethro, the prince and priest of Midian. There he married his daughter and dwelt in simple pastoral life in his family after patriarchal usage. It is a mistake to suppose that he, who was "mighty in words and in deeds" before he left Egypt, spent forty years in Midian as a mere shepherd ; but rather, that his pastoral life gave him oportunity for larger and better preparation for the last forty years of his life. This is the more apparent if, as we think, Jethro was a high priest of the same order 130 Selected Old Testament Studies as Melchizedek. We know that he joined Moses at Sinai later on as an inspired counsellor. 4. We need here only cite Moses' commission at the burning bush in Horeb; his return to Egypt joined by his brother Aaron ; his leadership recognized by his peo- ple and ratified by miracles; his demands on Pharaoh and the refusal; the signs and wonders in the "field of Zoan" for a year of conflict with the obstinate Egyptians ; the battle of the gods in which all their gods were routed and overthrown ; and their very hierarchy swept away in the death of their firstborn. 5. We need barely to note the Passover, the rendez- vous at Succoth, the march to the Red Sea, the miracu- lous crossing and their arrival at Mt. Sinai, having been provided with manna and water for their sojourn in the desert. 6. We read next of the portents at Mt. Sinai; the establishment of the Hebrew Commonwealth with Je- hovah as the civil ruler and king; the delivery of the moral law in the summary of the "ten words"; the ad- justment of the family to the state; and a partial record of civil and ceremonial laws. 7. Then we find an account of the building of the Tabernacle according to a God-given pattern, and its fur- niture ; vestments for Aaron and his sons ; and directions for their consecration. We do not expect to find any rounding up or com- pletion of Exodus, because the Book of Leviticus is but a continuation of it and the line of separation is an ar- bitrary one. The line of cleavage seems to have been the finishing up of the Tabernacle for the close of Exodus, aiid the discussion of the various offerings for the begin- ning of Leviticus. Selected Old Testament Studies 131 Leviticus — This name is given this book because it is mainly con- cerned with the duties of the tribe of Levi — priests and Levites. Social and ceremonial laws are given in minute detail. They seem to be interlaced and put into the most intimate relations to each other, partly because the social and the religious are most intimately related to each other, and partly because it was not the custom of an- cient writers to make distinct classifications where things are closely connected. We may make our analysis un- der several heads. 1. Rules for offerings of all kinds — the bloody offer- ings and the meat offerings, the one for atonement and the other a thank offering. The burnt offering had a civic and theocratic aspect. The sin offering atoned for sin against God. The trespass-offering was required for 'sins against fellow men and it required restitution also. The peace offering was a festal offering. The thanks- giving offering went with all the rest. However, we do not propose comment. 2. Then we have the consecration of Aaron and his sons as previously appointed. And also personal rules for the regulation of themselves and their families, all of which is eminently pertinent. 3. Then we find dietetic laws, modifying the dietetic laws of the covenant with Noah. This was not for sani- tary purposes as some suppose and argue, but the God- given reason was to raise such a social barrier as would protect his people from the contaminations of idolatry. 4. The priests were charged with certain sanitary laws, to discern leprosy in persons and things and to pass judgment on many similar forms of disease, all for the protection of society against contagion. 132 Selected Old Testament Studies • 5. Along with tliis were rules for ceremonial defile- ments and for their cleansing. Some of these were ac- tual and some merely symbolic, but all were a part of a typical system, and their purifications, both by water and by fire, were also typical of spiritual cleansings and per- sonal holiness, which were as important then as now. 6. The book closes with a full recital of the three great feasts, and other festal occasions such as New Moons, the feast of Trumpets and the Great Day of Atonement. We find in full detail all the offerings and other observances pertinent to them. The festal years are also defined and regulated. The whole of this book of Leviticus is pertinent to all that goes before, and no integral part of it could be omitted without marring the whole. And what is more, the later Scriptures cohere with it. Were there no Leviticus the Epistle to the He- brews would have no significance. What mean the two turtle doves in Mary's visit to the temple except as expounded in Levit. xii. 1-8? What meant the official sins of the sons of the sons of Eli if there were no Levitical regulations for the distribution of the offer- ings? Some object to this book because so much space is given to the record of ceremonies and forms and so lit- tle to moral and spiritual teaching. The reply is two- fold. The whole ceremonial law was prophecy in sym- bol and was set forth in minute detail at proper times and places. The other and more important reply is that its substance was spiritual and it was used for spiritual instruction and profit. The forms were not mere forms. This matter has been more fully elucida- ted in a previous chapter. Selected Old Testament Studies 133 Numbers — This section of Moses' book, called Numbers, be-' gins with the military census of Israel made at Mount Sinai and closes with a second census at the end of forty years. It also contains the religious census of the tribe of Levi who were taken in exchange for the first born of the twelve tribes. The duties assigned them are recorded in the fourth chapter. Then chapters v. to ix. contain additional matter that might have been included in the book of Leviticus. The transactions at Sinai close wnth the ninth chapter. The rest of the book tells us of their leaving Sinai; their march to Kadesh ; the report of the spies ; their failure to go up and possess the land ; and their sen- tence to spend forty years in the wilderness. This book tells us all we know of the thirty-nine years until they arrived in the plains of Moab and made conquest of the Amorites and Bashanites on the East side of the river Jordan. In this brief history we are told of several rebel- lions, at Taberah, at Kibroth-Hattaavah, at Kadesh- barnea ; the rebellion of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram ; the plague of the fiery serpents. Out of these things came a better settlement of church and state in several details. This history leaves them on the banks of the Jordan opposite Jericho where Moses laid down his office and his life also because his sin at Kadesh did not allow him to lead his people into the land of promise. We hardly need pause to show how this book fits in with all that goes before it in the historic unfolding as well as in the additional social, civil, and ceremonial legislation. We can spare none of it if we would rightly understand subsequent events, and subsequent frequent references to this period. Compare Ps. xcv. and Hebrews iii. 7-19. 134 Selected Old Testament Studies Deuteronomy — This book is a many sided product and ought to be so considered in our estimate of its place and value. Failure to appreciate this has led to immense contro- versy. 1. Considered from the historic point of view it is a. recapitulation of recent history, Chapters i. to iv. A few new historical facts are introduced now and then such as the naming of the cities of refuge. 2. Considered from the point of view of the law, as previously recorded, it is a recapitulation in briefer compass, adding certain things made necessary by changing conditions from a sojourn in the wilderness to permanent homes. It also emphasizes other things that were liable to be misunderstood or neglected. 3. We may also say that this book is a sort of run- ning commentary on all that had gone before from Sinai to the plains of Moab. This was the more neces- sary because the generation at Moab were less than twenty years old at Sinai. Their fathers had died in the wilderness. More than half the people were born in the desert, and all their experience was limited to nomadic life. 4. From the point of view of the previous books it was a fitting conclusion, a summing up, a peroration, with applications and exhortations. 5. Great emphasis is laid on the moral side of all legislation. Purity, morality, and holiness are sharply set forth as from the lips of the preacher, rather than from the pen of the lawgiver. 6. From the personal point of view of Moses him- self, it is his farewell to his people. He had loved them in all these years. He had led them through Selected Old Testament Studies 135 vicissitudes experienced by none before nor since. He had sometimes faced death at their enraged and re- bellious hands. And yet he loved them. He had asked God to blot his name out of the book of life if he would only spare his sinning people. Now he stands ready to lay down his leadership and go to his great leader whose pillar of cloud he had followed for forty years. From this point of view we are prepared to appre- ciate the tone and spirit of the book ; his paternal affec- tion ; his pathetic memories ; his faithful remon- strances ; his earnest exhortations ; his warnings and entreaties ; his directions for the future ; and his wist- ful look across the river as he goes up the mountain to die, not alone, but holding sweet counsel with his Lord who so tenderly laid his body away in the unmarked grave in the valley of Nebo and Pisgah. The first verse of the first chapter makes Moses the author of all that had gone before and which he had spoken in the wilderness. In the fourth verse we are told that he spake again in the fortieth year and on the first day of the eleventh month all that the Lord com- manded him to say to them. On that day he delivered the first of a series of pub- lic addresses, found in i. 6 to iv. 40. The second ad- dress is found in chapters v. to xxvi. The third em- braces xxvii to xxxiv. They were delivered to "the children of Israel," to "all Israel" whom he called together, i. 4; v. i. Were these addresses delivered to popular assemblies? Hardly. Did all Israel signify any considerable part of the two millions of people? Hardly. They must have been delivered to the representatives of the peo- ple, their chosen rulers who constituted the "congrega- 136 Selected Old Testament Studies tion" so often spoken of, which consisted probably of five or six hundred from all the tribes. Joshua seemed to have followed Moses' example at the close of his life and delivered several addresses. We learn from him Josh, xxiii. 2, and xxiv. i that "all Is- rael consisted of their heads, their elders, their officers and their judges." "All the tribes of Israel" were pres- ent representatively. So it must have been in the case of Moses. He seems to have spent this last month of the fortieth year in teaching and drilling the congrega- tion or congress in the divine statutes of which they were to be the curators and administrators. Towards the last the elders, "the seventy," seem to have joined him in this inspired teaching. We might expect these public addresses to dififer materially in style from the simple historical style of Genesis or the grander descriptions of Sinai's scenes, or the poetic numbers of his songs. Moses was a highly educated man, and he would unconsciously adapt his vocabulary and his forms of expression to the varied occasions, surroundings and themes on which he wrote or spoke. In this discussion we have sought to set forth the obvious and necessary unity of these five books of Moses. The internal evidence seems conclusive of their genuineness and authenticity as against the ruth- less and divisive conceits of critics. CHAPTER XV. The Book of Job. The Book of Job has been a great puzzle to the critics and commentators. They have discussed such questions as these : Who was the author ? Was Job a real person? Where did he live? Who were his three friends? Who was Elihu? When was the book writ- ten? What is its object and scope? Why written mainly in poetic form? What is the value of the several discussions? How far were the several speakers in- spired? Why do we consider the book canonical? Is it not a mere epic poem ? How did it get into the Hebrew scriptures? Why does it contain no references to other books of Scripture ? ' Was the production of such a book possible from a literary point of view at an early period? and other similar questions. It is not our purpose to discuss all these questions categorically in one short chapter. It were not possible to do so. Aside from the destructive critics, some of the ablest investigators and expounders of the Scriptures have wrestled with these questions and advocated a great variety of views. The sole aim of this discussion is to present the sur- face and -common sense claims of the book for the confir- mation of our faith which is mayhap disturbed by so many variant views avouched by such an array of learn- ing. There is an oldfashioned childlike faith which ac- cepts this book just as it does all the other books of Scrip- ture without question or hesitation. This simple faith 138 Selected Old Testament Studies is our starting point and the point to which we return from all our incursions into the realm of learned specula- tion. Call you this prejudice, or credulity, or traditional- ism, it still remains that faith is closely allied to com- mon sense. The claims of Scripture are so simple that they are easily grasped by the unlearned and the ignorant, and they are so expansive as to satisfy the highest in- telligence because they all meet on the common ground of common sense. I. Was Job a real person? Not, was he probably, but was he actually a real person? The destructive critic who is unable to dissect this book into several original units ingeniously dovetailed into its present form by one or more redactors, is obliged to recognize it as itself an original unit, coherent in its several parts, and true in its setting, and besides, a work of rare genius, and the very inspiration of genius, worthy of one of the greatest poets and authors. He calls loudly for facts here as in other cases and then proceeds to build up theories of his own, based on mere assumption and unproven hypotheses, as if there were no facts except his own fallacies. Now was Job a real historic person or a great East- ern ideal, the central figure and hero of the world's greatest epic? "There was a man in the Land of Uz, whose name was Job ?" This literal statement has been accepted by Jews and Christians for several thousand years, unquestioned and unquestionable, and has the right of way against mere suppositions and assumptions. Such acceptance can only be set aside by facts. A few corroborative facts make it impregnable. There are two or perhaps three references to Job in the Scriptures out- side the Book of Job. I. In Ezck. xiv. 14 we read, "Though these three men. Selected Old Testament Studies 139 Noah, Daniel and Job were in it, they should deliver but their own souls by their righteousness," saith the Lord God. If one of these was a man they were all men, so says common sense. Job is named by God himself as one of the three great men of the ages most likely to pre- vail with him. There is then no reason to question the intimate relations between Job and his God as recorded in this book. The only escape for the critic is to say, "I do not believe in Ezekiel, nor in Ezekiel's God." We shall not follow him there. 2. In James v. 10, 11 we read, "Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering, affliction and patience. Be- hold, we count them happy who endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord, how that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy." Common sense would find it as easy to deny the personality of the prophets and of the Lord himself in this passage, as to deny that Job is cited as a real per- son — a most notable example of suffering, affliction and endurance. 3. The name Jobab is found in Gen. x. 29, one of the thirteen sons of Joktan, literally Job father or father Job. Many commentators identify this Jobab and Job. His long life would seem to indicate that he belonged to the long-lived patriarchs and that he lived partly con- temporary with Nahor and grandfather of Abraham. This puts him too early as we shall see. Besides there is reason to believe (as we shall see) that his life was doubled after his trials. If so he belonged to the period in which the ages of the patriarchs somewhat exceeded one hundred and forty years. If then he was a Joktanite Arab he was a lineal descendant of Jobab and named for him just as there are two Nahors. I40 Selected Old Testament Stltdies II. We may now determine to what people he be- longed. The genealogies of the tenth and eleventh chap- ters of Genesis present some difficulties. Some adopt the theory that they are all personal, others say that they are entirely tribal or national, and that they are named according to the order of their geographical location as distributed in Moses' day. The true theory is a happy combination of these two. They are both personal and national. Many of the names are patronymic — the name of the father given to his descendants. Thus Canaanites were descendants of Canaan, Arvadites, descendants of Arvad, just as Levites were descendants of Levi later on. Then some are plural nouns as Ludim, Caphtorim i. e. Luds and Caphtors, just as we say the Joneses or the Smiths. Thus we see that sons became families and fam- ilies became tribes and nations, all named for their fathers. We may note further that Aram and Joktan were not only near of kin but their descendants were located near each other in the Arabian peninsula. Whether Aram's son Uz gave name to the land of Uz we may not certainly say, but we do know that Jeremiah identi- fies Edom and Uz, the border land between Aram (Syria) and Joktan (Arabia). An ordinary antiquarian would now be prepared to say that Job lived in the land of Uz before its name was changed to Edom, and that he was either a Syrian or a Joktanite, or a Horite, or a prominent patriarch of some over lapping peoples of sim- ilar language, social life and religion. III. We are now prepared for a farther indentifica- tion of this man by identifying his three friends and Elihu the fourth. Another branch of the children of Eber, the descendants of Terah and Nahor, settled in Aram of Syria. Nahor had eight sons. The name of Selected Old Testament Studies 141 one was Buz. If Elihu was the patriarch or head of a family or clan of Buzites he is properly called the Buzite and not a Buzite. We may here note that the other three are similarly designated by the definite article in- dicating prominence in their families or tribes. Several peoples were descended from Abraham be- sides Israel. They settled in the same general section, some extending to the Euphrates on the East and some to the Mediterranean on the West and to Egypt on the South. They were largely nomadic and they were gradually absorbed and assimilated into each other and into the peoples who antedated them in those regions. 1. The descendants of Esau. He first settled in the original Mount Seir between Beersheba and the Dead Sea during Isaac's lifetime. Then as* the son-in-law of "the Horite" he and his descendants soon dominated the "land of Uz" an extension of the "hill country of Seir," the country of Job. He and his descendants gave name to the country and it was called Edom. 2. The descendants of Ishmael. They roamed the desert between Egypt and Palestine. The Ishmaelites and the tribes assimilated to them are the Bedouin Arabs of to-day who call Ishmael their father and circumcise their sons at the age of thirteen in imitation of him. 3. Several minor tribes were descended from the sons of Abraham by his second wife. They settled in Arabia. Some of them, Dedan, Sheba, Medan, and others are mentioned later on in the history and their names are still perpetuated and their locations identified in the pen- insula. 4. The Midianites grew to be a powerful people, de- scended from Midian, Abraham's fourth son by Keturah. They extended along the borders of civilization from the 142 Selected Old Testament Studies Siiiaitic Desert to Mesopotamia and had grown into a powerful people in Moses day. It may not be amiss to note here that there are found among the numerous letters discovered at Tel-el- Amarna, some letters from several places of importance in Arabia confirming Biblical names and references. They are written in the Hebrew language in an ancient script, while all the rest are written in the Babylonian language and in the cunieform script. This is most significant. The Hebrew was a literary language more than a century before the Exodus, used by the peoples among whom Job lived and with whom Moses was in contact forty years in his exile and forty years more in the Wilder- ness, he and his people. Now what hinders that Moses wrote the Pentateuch in Hebrew in that same ancient script, or that the book of Job was written there a cen- tury before? IV. Who was Eliphaz the Temanite? Evidently an Edomite who dwelt in the land of Uz. Esau's first born son was Eliphaz. He had five sons. Teman was his first born. The amalgamated Edomites and Horites had twenty-one family or tribal subdivisions — Esau fourteen, Seir, seven. They had military heads called "dukes" named after their grandsons. It is evident therefore that the Eliphaz of Job was a high official among the Tem- anites. We learn from Jer. xlix. 7 that Teman was once fa- mous for their wisdom. Eliphaz the Temanite, there- fore was a typical Edomite prince and we need not be surprised at his utterances as recorded in the Book of Job. Bildad the Shuhite, another peer of Job as well as friend, was a descendant of Shuah, a son of Abraham, and a high official in the family or tribe named for him, whose home was in this same section. Selected Old Testament Studies 143 Zophar the Naamathite, one of the trio, and a friend and peer of Job, is not so easily located. Sayce, how- ever, assures us that one of the letters of Tel-el-Amarna was written from a place corresponding to this patrony- mic in the century previous tO' the Exodus. V. We cannot overrate the importance of the follow- ing items : 1. Job was a patriarch priest of a hierarchy that an- tedated the Aaronic priesthood, and in which all the patriarchs served prior to the universal apostasy outside of Israel. His seven sons and three daughters had set- tled ofif to themselves ; but he continued to sanctify them and their families and offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all. For Job said, "it may be that Ihey have sinned and cursed God in their hearts." 2. Eliphaz, Bildad, Zophar, and Elihu worshipped the Lord and professed to speak in his name. There is no hint of Polytheism or Paganism inside the book. 3. They all discuss the profoundest questions of hu- man experience in an absolutely exhaustive way. They discuss all the questions that pertained to conditions then before them, precipitated upon Job by Satan. These dis- cussions were also final on all the points they touch, and' the questions there settled are nowhere re-opened in the Scriptures except by quotation or by mere categorical statement. In this respect it is the most wonderful book in the Bible. 4. The inspiration of them all, so distinctly recognized in the New Testament, was evidently part of their func- tions as patriarchal priests. The oracle belonged to the priesthood as an official function to be used on occasion, and to the extent of the divine will and pleasure. In other respects they were subject to the same mistakes 144 Selected Old Testament Studies and infirmities as other men, as may be plainly seen in the case of Balaam, a great high priest of the Midianites. VI. We are now prepared to give to Job and the ac- tors in that drama a "local habitation and name." He lived in Edom, South East of the Dead Sea. He was a Hebrew, possibly a descendant of Joktan, though we may not base the argument on the name Jobab, be- cause one of the kings of Edom was named Jobab ; though this king may have been a descendant of Seir the Horite who must have been a Joktanite Arab, hav- ing also the blood of Esau. It is much more likely, however, that he was an Edomite descendant of Abraham, for his three most in- timate friends and peers were descendants of Abraham. They lived about a century before the Exodus. They were of nomadic peoples and their wealth consisted of flocks and herds. They dwelt in houses as well as in tents, and also built towns and cities as they have done in all the ages in the Arabian Peninsula. The Sabeans who fell upon Job's flocks and herds are not unknown to early history. Job and his friends and their immediate peoples had not entered upon the general apostasy from the worship of Jehovah. We need not repeat all the circumstances and hints which all cohere in justifying the location of this book as we have set forth. VII. If, however, there be any flaw in this argument ; indeed, if we had not the materials with which to con- struct any argument, the book is and ought to be a suf- ficient witness in itself, in its internal evidences. Then it is a part of the Old Testament Canon duly accredited to the Jews who have transmitted it to us. That Canon is still further accredited to us in that Christ and his apostles base all their claims on it. The contents of the Selected Old Testament Studies 145 book are of supreme value whether we know anything of its origin or not except what appears in the book itself. VIII. Its poetic form is no objection to its historicity as some suppose. We expect simple narrative to be told in simple prose. So it is in Job. The first part of the book and the last part also are written in simple prose— a narrative of events. The discussion of great and noble themes may be written either in prose or poetry. Miltonic prose is grand when discussing worthy themes. Miltonic poetry is grander still because of its yet grander themes. The world's greatest epic is its first and its themes are the grandest, culminating in the Creator's own account of his handywork. It has been innocently asked if Job and his three friends made set speeches in poetry, replying to each other, back and fourth. Of course not. But they were discussing the most exalted themes which were best re- corded in poetic numbers by the historian. That his- torian was an eye witness and heard it all — a poet of un- rivalled skill and power. Milton wrote under the so-called inspiration of genius. This poet wrote under the super- added inspiration of the divine Spirit, who presided in all the discussions, and stood sponsor for the recording and transmission of His own truth. IX. The question recurs, who was that poet? Who was the author of the book? The book does not say. Tradition for nearly four thousand years says Job him- self. If some one could bring proof from contempo- raneous sources that a sixth man gathered the materials from original sources it would only prove that there was one more great man of the ages than we had known be- fore. It would hardly please any one to substitute Eliphaz, 146 Selected Old Testament Studies or Bildad, or Zophar, or Elihu for Job as the author, though each one of these was intimately connected with all that is recorded. It will hardly do to suggest that Satan was the author in the person of some pious fraud or forger. But why seek another author than Job? It seems strange that any man who has read the book should seek another. It is a thrilling personal record of personal ex- periences, sorrow, bereavement, suffering, slander, and agonies, carried to the utmost limit of Satanic ingenuity and malice. We read his hopes and his fears, his pathetic appeals, his views of death and a future life, his wither- ing sarcasms, his personal vindication and his divine ac- ceptance and approval. He tells the story as no one else could do, who had not drunk the cup to the very dregs. Yet he tells it simply. There is no trace of egotism or pride or self-righteousness or boasting in view of his vindication and subsequent prosperity. We shall consider the book itself and its contents in the next chapter. CHAPTER XVI Job Continued — Its Contents. The first two chapters are simple narrative prose setting forth the conditions and circumstances under which the discussions of the book took place. The nar- rative is kept up throughout in brief interjected lines of prose such as these, "Then Eliphaz answered and said ;" "Then answered Bildad the Shuhite and said ;" "But Job answered and said," and so on till we reach chapter xxxii. where we find six verses of prose intro- ducing a new speaker, Elihu, the Buzite. Then there are several interjected lines of prose dividing his discus- sion, "Elihu spake moreover and said," and such like, five times. These and similar short prose statements, like hooks, bind all the parts together till we reach the seventh verse of the last chapter where we find prose narrative to the end. We discussed in the last chapter the personality and identity of Job and his friends, their location, their offi- cial positions, their religion, their modes and forms of worship, their inspiration and such like, as suggested in the book. We may say of Job that he was a very rich man in flocks and herds and in the peculiar wealth of the East. We see from xlii. ii that his circle of kinspeople and acquaintances was very wide and numerous, so that their contributions of gold pieces and ear-rings of gold gave him a new start in life, and laid the foundations of 148 Selected Old Testament Studies his great wealth — double what it was before. The statement is that he was the greatest of the men of the East. Even down to Solomon's time the children of the East (the Arab peoples, Bedouins and Joktanites) were distinguished for great wisdom, so that Solomon was only "Primus inter pares." Compare i Kings iv. 31. He was so exalted in character that "there were none like him in the earth, a perfect man and an up- right, one that feareth God and escheweth evil." i. 8; ii. 3. This is God's testimony to his character. We need hardly to explain here that these terms do not mean sinless perfection but the most exalted form of human righteousness, signalized by divine commenda- tion and complacency. In i. 6 we read this simple statement, "Now there was a day when the Sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan came also among them." Now who is Satan? The answer is easy, "The Devil." Who is the Devil? Any child will answer. One of the fallen angels — their head and chief. Now what do we know of him? Of his malignity and power? He is the serpent of Gene- sis, the Dragon of Revelation, Abaddon in the He- brew, Apollyon in the Greek, the Destroyer, the tempt- er, a roaring lion, the prince of this world, the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that worketh in the chil- dren of disobedience, an angel of light, the father of lies and liars, the god of this world, the adversary, the deceiver, the prince of darkness, the tormentor, the slanderer, the accuser of the brethren, the deceiver of nations as well as individuals. He is subtle, active, diligent, malicious, plausible and deceitful. He origi- nated sin, ruin, and death in the garden of Eden, and has withstood every step in the divine plan of redemp- Selected Old Testament Studies 149 tion. His power over nature, human diseases, and wicked peoples seems to be limited only by infinite power. His hosts of fallen angels of whom he is the recognized head are called "principalities and powers." This sketch of Satan is gathered from the entire Scriptures and many another touch to the picture might be added from the same source. God and Satan have been enemies from the beginning, as set forth in the protevangelion. The Lord, Jehovah, Christ, on the one hand, and Satan on the other, fought their battles over Job, and we have the record of the struggle and the victory. It is easy now to recognize Satan's de- vices as recorded in this book. No one who believes the Bible at all can stagger at what we read of Satan's malignity, cunning and power in the oldest Biblical record. Some stumble at the statement that Satan appeared before God along with the Sons of God and was treated courteously. Why not? His impudence has ever been supreme. He and his followers had not yet been finally cast out of heaven, if we rightly interpret Rev. xii. 7. We need hardly quote Christ's words in Luke X. 18 as given in the revised version which cohere with John's vision of things to come — Christ only teaches the certainty and suddenness of Satan's overthrow. When the Lord asked, "Whence comest thou?" he answered with characteristic evasion just as his chil- dren do to-day when asked similar questions, i. 7. We may say here that we must make our quota- tions as brief as possible, sometimes for substance, and sometimes merely by chapter and verse because of the necessary brevity of this discussion. We may now take up the story. In reply to the Lords" challenge Satan slandered 150 Selected Old Testament Studies Job by impugning his motives. "Doth Job serve God for naught ?" He could afford it seeing that the Lord had prospered him so. "Touch all that he hath and he will curse thee to thy face." God bade Satan to do his worst upon him, only he could not touch his person. Satan went out and stirred up the Sabeans, and the lightning fires, and the Chaldeans, and the tornado, and in one short day every thing was swept away, in- cluding his seven sons and three daughters and their families. Job rent his mantle in an agony of grief and fell on his face and worshipped and said, "The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away ; blessed be the name of the Lord. In all this Job sinned not nor charged God fool- ishly." So Job was vindicated against Satan's slander, charging mercenary motives in his service, i. 8-22. Not satisfied Satan came again before the Lord, and in reply to a second challenge concerning Job he saiJ, "Skin for skin, all that a man hath will he give for his life." "Touch his bone and his flesh and he will curse thee to thy face." The Lord said, "He is in thy hand ; but save his life." The preservation of his life was necessary to his final vindication. This second asper- sion of Satan was most malignant. It charged him with a low and stupid selfishness, below the brutes even, that takes no account of high and noble senti- ments, if only the precious body can escape suffering, ii. I- 6. Satan did his worst on him because this was a fight to the finish — the vindication or the condemnation of the righteous for all time. He "smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot to his crown ;" and in disgust his wife joined the tempter and bade him "curse God and die.' May we not suppose that Satan Selected Old Testament Studies 151 stirred her up against him? But Job rebuked her folly and said, What? Shall we receive good from the hand of the Lord and shall we not receive evil? In all this did not Job sin with his lips," We need not stop here to solve the theological paradox which ascribes the deeds of wicked men and devils to the directing hand of God. ii. 7-10. Job's three friends and peers heard of his sad plight and came by appointment to mourn with him and to comfort him. When they saw him disfigured beyond recognition they were struck dumb with horror; they rent their mantles and sat down on the ground and spoke not a word for seven days and seven nights, ii. 11-13. I. At the end of the seven days Job broke the silence in a sort of soliloquy extorted from him by his bereavements, sufferings and anguish. We need make no apology, either here or elsewhere in the book, for poetic license and high wrought figures of speech in- wrought and elaborated by the poet who translated these conversations into poetic numbers. 1. Job curses his day, and the night of his birth. Some imagine that in this Job sinned and that so far Satan was victorious. But when we examine what he said we find nothing irreverant, vindictive or profane, iii. 1-12. 2. He praises death, a goal and refuge to be de- sired, "where the wicked cease from trembling and the weary are at rest." iii. 13-19. We may compare Paul's yearning to "depart and be with Christ." Phil. i. 23. We may also cite John's vision of the blessed contrast. Rev. xxii. 3-5. 3. He complains of life — its apprehensions, its fears, 152 Selected Old Testament Studies its realization of sorrow and suffering, iii. 20-26. Paul was no mere theorist when he spoke of "This present evil world." Tit. ii. 12. If any critic is disposed to censure Job for any of these utterances or his utterances later on we refer him in advance to xlii. 7. The critic is sometimes "wise above what is written." II. Eliphaz the Temanite replied indirectly to Job's soliloquy. Chapters 4 and 5. Before proceeding fur- ther we may here note Satan's masterly tactics to drive Job to despair, with a refinement of cruelty worthy of the Arch Fiend. These friends of Job knew nothing of the cause and origin of all this. They could only have gotten it by divine revelation and this had not been given them. They were left to their un- aided human judgment, prophets though they were on occasion, and learned in divine truth. With Satan's help, undetected, they misjudged Job and the signifi- cance of his misfortunes. Their charity failed them, and they turned their batteries of divine truth against him. They preached at him. They preached the truth, but it did not fit Job's case. If they had mis- quoted or perverted the truth or uttered false doctrines their shafts would have fallen harmless on his head. Satan still, to-day, drives the weak and suffering Chris- tian almost to dispair by using the most precious truths of Scripture to prove him God forsaken. What a fearful alchemist the devil is. Oh, the cruelty of it ! I. Eliphaz reminds Job how often he had "instruct- ed many;" "strengthened the hands;" "upholding him that was falling; and strengthened the feeble knees." "But now it has come upon thee, and thou faintest; it touchest thee, and thou art troubled." So they said of Selected Old Testament Studies 153 Christ on the cross," He saved others, himself he can- not save." There must be a reason for it — his rehgion is not equal to the stress, iv. 1-6. 2. He preaches that divine judgments are for the wicked only. "They that plow iniquity, and sow wickedness, shall reap the same." And in Prov. xxii. 8 we read, "He that soweth iniquity shall reap vanity." And in Gal. vi. 7, "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap etc." Solomon and Paul merely cite, even if they do not actually quote, what Eliphaz elabo- rates and confirms out of his own observation. 3. He condemns Job with a vision — a wondrous thrilling vision, which made all his bones to shake with trembling, and the hair of his flesh to stand up : and the spirit passed before his face — an image half discerned — a silence^a voice, which culminated in the same lesson of the divine judgments. How far true? Absolutely and eternally true. Where was the mistake? In as- suming that Job's suffering were judgments. The scriptures nowhere teach that the sufferings of the right- eous are divine judgments sent for their destruction, iv. 12-21. 4. He then proceeds to discuss the providential origin of troubles, just as of all things else, v. 1-16. "Affliction cometh not forth of the dust, neither doth trouble spring out of the ground;" "Man is born into trouble, as the sparks fly upwards ;" "He giveth rain upon the earth and sendeth waters upon the fields." It seems as if Eliphaz half repents of the sternness of his message, or that the spirit guided him unconsciously to utter some precious words of comfort for his suffer- ing friend. 5. To this end he presents and elaborates most 154 Selected Old Testament Studies beautifully the true doctrine of the sufferings of the righteous, v. 17-27. "Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth ; Therefore despise not thou the chas- tening of the Almighty;" "Thou shall come to thy grave in full age, like as a shock of corn cometh in his season." Paul simply quotes, confirms and applies all this in Heb. xii. 5-8. There are beautiful parallelisms to this in the Psalms. III. Job answered. 1. He renews his soliloquy, bewailing his sorrows and his woes under the afflicting hand of God. vi. 1-13. "The arrows of the Almighty are within me ;" "Oh that I might have my request ;" "Even that it would please God to destroy me ; that he would let loose his hand and cut me ofif." 2. He bewails the unkindness of his friends from whom he had a right to expect sympathy even though he had not asked them for help in his extremity. In- stead, they now rebuked his conscious integrity, vi. 14-30. 3. He renews his soliloquy and plaint before God. vii. 1-21, — his wearisome days, his tedious tossing nights ; his broken skin and loathsome flesh ; his hope- less life, his loathing of it ; and his desire for release in death, with the forgiveness of all his transgressions. We need hardly quote. IV. Bildad, the Shuhite, growing bolder, reproves Job and condemns his utterances as an empty mighty wind. viii. i, 2. I. He argues God's justice. "Doth God pervert judgment? or doth the Almighty pervert justice?" "If thou wert pure and upright ; sure now he would awake for thee." viii. 3-10. Selected Old Testament Studies 155 2. He proclaims the doom of hypocrites, viii. 11-22. "The hypocrite's hope shall perish." "He shall lean on his house but it shall not stand," and so on. Christ preached the same doctrine when denouncing the Pharisees. Herein was the difference. They were con- victed hypocrites. Job was not, for he was to be vin- dicated and all God's people with him. V. Job's reply. 1. He admits his sinfulness and personal unworthiness before God, as he had already done. He seems almost to revel in self abasement before his God of infinite power, glory and holiness. This is the exact attitude of the righteous in all ages. But this is not what Sa- tan and his three friends charged him with. One quo- tation may suffice; "If I justify myself, my own mouth shall condemn me ; if I say I am perfect, it shall also prove me perverse." ix. 1-35. 2. He turns away from his friends and expostulates with God, and craves respite from his sufferings, x. i- 22. Expostulation is a legitimate form of prayer. Many and varied are the pleas it makes. Its faith and confidence are based on the mercy, goodness, sympa- thy, love and power of his God. It craves and sooner or later finds the reasons of his mysterious providence. Expostulation? "Return, O Lord, how long? and let it repent thee concerning thy servants." Ps. xc. 12. VI. Zophar, the Naamathite, took his turn, having lost his temper meanwhile. I. He rebukes Job as a liar, xi. 1-3. "Should thy lies make men hold their piece? and when thou mock- est shall no man make thee ashamed?" A brutal charge. How strange that Satan is sometimes allowed to pervert the sober common sense of good men ! 156 Selected Old Testament Studies 2. He cites God as a witness against Job. "O that God would speak and open his Hps against thee." And he gives a splendid tribute to his inscrutable being, wisdom and power, xi. 5-12. 3. He recommends repentance toward God and his forgiveness and reconciliation in terms worthy of Ezekiel or John the Baptist, xi. 13-20. He did not see however that the remedy he offered was not pertinent to the case in hand. Vn. Job is now so thoroughly aroused that he seems to forget his sufiferings and rises to the situation, with all the indignation of conscious innocence and integrity. 1. He rebukes their self-righteousness and conceit with well deserved sarcasm. "No doubt ye are the peo- ple and wisdom will die with you. But I have under- standing as well as you ; I am not inferior to you ; yea, who knoweth not such things as these?" Your doctrines are the merest truisms — the common property of all. He brings against them yet still heavier batteries of Divine truth, which we need not now analyze, until he reached his climax proven, "Ye are all forgers of lies, ye are all physicians of no value." xii. 1-25 and xiii. 1-12. 2. He asseverates his confidence in God in all his afflictions ; "yea though he slay me yet will I trust him ;" "Behold now I have ordered my cause, and I know that I shall be justified." xiii. 13-28. 3. And his confidence would be unshaken in death (Chapter xiv.). We need only say, this fourteenth of Job and the fourteenth of John do furnish consolation to this day to every bereaved and suffering child of God. We may remind the reader that this is not intended to be a commentary on the Book of Job. We have made the analvsis thus far somewhat elaborate in order to find Selected Old Testament Studies 157 the key to the book — its object, scope, significance, and vakie. We may now proceed more rapidly. VIII. Eliphaz' rejoiner. 1. He tortures Job's confession of sinfuhiess before God into a confession of absolute wickedness, and he charges impiety : "Thine own tongue condemneth thee, and not I; thine own lips testify against thee." xv. 1.-16. 2. Then he shows the unrest of the wicked as con- firmed by his own experience, xv. 17-35. No doubt of it, but did it apply to Job? IX. Job's reply. 1. He shows their unexcusable cruelty, such as he himself would not be guilty of. "Miserable comforters are ye all." xvi. 1-5. 2. He shows them his pitiful case, exhausting lang- uage to tell it, and yet the half is not told. xvi. 6-16. 3. He pleads his innocence. "No injustice is in my hands; my prayer is pure." xvi. 17-22. 4. He renews his soliloquy reciting his sorrow and suffering. Chapter xvii. X. Bildad's rejoiner. 1. He charged Job with empty words, impudence and futile anger, xviii. 1-4. 2. He then enlarges on the calamities of the wicked, xviii. 5-21. XI. Job's answer to Bildad. 1. He complains of the cruelty, neglect and scorn, of friends, servants, wife, and the rabble. "Even little chil- dren despise me." xix. 1-20. 2. He pleads for sympathy. "Have pity on me, have 158 Selected Old Testament Studies pity upon me, O my friends ; for the hand of God hath touched me." xxi. 21, 22. 3. His only hope is the redeemer and the resurrection. The doctrine of the resurrection dates far back in the ages. The Egyptians of that period embalmed their dead in hope thereof, and to cheat the worm which Job did not expect to do. xix. 25-27. XII. Zophar, in reply, reiterates, in varied terms, .the doom of the wicked, xx. 9-29. XIII. Job confutes his covert assumptions by citing the prosperity of the wicked, the sufferings of the righteous and the future judgment, xxi. 1-34. Com- pare Ps. xxxvii. 35, 36; Ixiii. 3-12. XIV. For present purposes we need not follow the discussion further except to say in a general way, Job's three friends grew more and more offensive in trying to overwhelm him with assum.ptions of his great sinful- ness until he was driven to recount his abounding works of righteousness, and his watchful control of heart and eyes lest he sin against God and bring re- proach upon himself and his God. He appealed to God to vindicate his righteous life, and he defied them to name a single scandalous sin before God or man. The controversy waxed more and more bitter till he so confuted them that their mouths were stopped. Chap- ters xxii to xxxi. They ceased to answer Job because they said he was self righteous — "righteous in his own eyes" — a far dif- ferent charge from that with which they set out. xxxii. I. XV. Elihu, the Buzite, was evidently present du- ring all these discussions. He was a young man. It Selected Old Testament Studies 159 is probable that he had come into his official position only lately. He was evidently a strong man apart from his inspiration, but impetuous and conceited. His bearing to all parties was rude and even insolent, xxxii. 2-24. He claimed to have the spirit of God and to speak for God. Indeed his discussions and elabora- tions of truth so far exceeded the three old men that some commentators have imagined that he was the second person of the trinity in theophanic presence. It is not out of place here to repeat a former coveat Inspiration was always limited to the divine purpose, both in the matter and measure of the gift. Inspira- tion was never responsible for all the judgments and acts of a prophet. Elihu assumes that Job was self righteous and was for that reason suffering all these judgments. He mis- construes his indignant but gallant and successful de- fense against the aspirations of his three friends, as if he had claimed absolute holiness before God. It was true then as it is now and was in Ezekiel's day and in Christ's day that self righteousness has no real stand- ing before God or man. We may not here undertake to analyze Elihu's masterly presentation of other phases of the same general truths discussed by the others, but with varied illustrations and applications. Chapters xxxiii to xxxvii. XVI. Job made no reply. Why? It requires no stretch of the imagination to see the old man as he sits there in the ashes, and presses and scrapes his boils with a broken piece of pottery. How he turns his bleared and swollen eyes upon the young man with mingled astonishment, scorn and pity, and utters never a word. And how could he reply to the charge of self righteous- ness, trusting in his own righteousness? Assevera- r6o Selected Old Testament Studies tions would not meet the case. He could not lay bare his heart before them more fully than he had done. Who shall decide the issue raised by these four men? Satan had failed to make good his prediction that under certain conditions Job would curse God to his face. He had varied and intensified the conditions, and yet Job had not "sinned with his mouth nor charged God foolishly." But who shall vindicate Job against Satan's further aspersions through these four men? The Lord who had stood behind his servant with grace sufficient for his day in this unequal struggle came to his rescue. The Lord challenged Job out of the whirlwind. In chapters 38 to 41 he recounts his supreme power in creation and his prdvidential control of the whole phy- sical universe — the starry heavens, and the earth by sea and land. His easy handling of the great monsters of the deep, and the wild animals on the land is re- counted in full detail to symbolize his dealings in the moral universe. Twice he challenges Job out of the whirlwind to tell his real attitude toward him. And twice Job in that awful presence, repudiated self righteousness, and stood a repentant sinner — the exact attitude of every righteous man from Abel to the end of time. xl. 2-5 ; xlii. 1-6. XVH. Then the Lord vindicated Job. xlii. 7-9. We need not dwell upon the details. Then the Lord prospered him double and gave him again seven sons and three daughters and added 140 years to his life. Conclusion. — We may now inquire modestly, what is the object and scope of the book. It is plainly the vindication of a man named Job against the slanderer — Satan, the accuser of the saints. His righteousness was vindicated in heaven before the sons of God and Selected Old Testament Studies i6i on earth before men. We may argue that it is a typical case setting forth the vindication of the right- eous of all ages against the accuser and it is recorded for our encouragement. Incidentally, however, the lessons of the book are very numerous. There is hardly a head of divinity, or a theological dogma, or a rule of life that is not stated, argued and expanded into its widest scope and applica- tion in this wondrous book. We sometimes hear the question asked, Why is there so little actual doctrine in the earlier books of the Bible. Some even tell us that the Old Testament saints had a very formal and materialistic religion and knew but little even of God himself. To such we say, go and read the book of Job. No inspired writer has gone bevond it. CHAPTER XVIL ECCLESIASTES OR THE ROYAL TEACHING PREACHER. We will not at this time pause to discuss the questions of the authorship and design of the Book of Ecclesiastes. We are willing to accept the traditional view, and attri- bute it to the great name with which it has usually and for many ages been associated. Adopting this view, we may well say that Ecclesiastes is a most remarkable book, written by a most remarkable man, in a most remarkable age, among a most remarkable people. David had founded a great kingdom on the western Mediterranean with his capital at Jerusalem, extending from the Euph- rates to Egypt. Syria and Edom and Arabia yielded him uncounted tribute. The Phoenicians were his commercial allies. The commerce of Persia and Africa and India passed across his kingdom, and the caravan trade of all Central Asia poured its riches into the lap of Judah and Israel. Egypt, and Babylon, and the Hittites, the three powers of the East which held the balance of power and disputed with each other the empire of the world for a tliousand years, were in eclipse for a season, beaten small by internal dissensions and external foes. David's king- dom stood forth among the nations as the only great and glorious kingdom on earth for eighty years. He and his people saw universal empire in easy grasp, and he num- bered the people and mobilized the entire military strength of his kingdom to this end. But his hand was stayed and his plans were blasted by the plague from the Lord. Selected Old Testament Studies 163 He had a mission of conquest, but not with the sword. He had a promise of universal empire for himself and his seed, and the time seemed opportune. Solomon came to the throne with the arts of peace. It was necessary to consolidate the kingdom with com- merce and culture, with learning and religion. His mis- sion was to consecrate the civilization of his day. It was no mean civilization. There is no place for fashion- able hypotheses of barbaric and semi-barbaric codes and customs in that day. Agnosticism itself now begins to concede the substantial truth of the world-wide tradi- tion of a golden age in the earlier times. The deeper the archaeologist explores into those old civilizations, the more profound is his astonishment at the records. At Jerusalem gold and silver were multiplied as the stones in the streets. Art and architecture, tapestry and needle- work, stonecutting and metallurgy, tillage and vine-dress- ing reached the very climax of excellence. That people had a mission — a God-given mission — first proclaimed to Abraham ten centuries before, 'T will l^less them that bless thee and curse them that curse thee : and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed." The kingdom was unique, with Jehovah, the Second Person of the Trinity, as the civil head of the common- wealth, himself appointed to be universal king. The time seemed opportune to bless all nations of the earth and to prepare the nations for the coming of David's son, in whom the covenant should be completely fulfilled. Only a viceroy was needed with the requisite endowments. Plato's ideal commonwealth was now, if ever, to be realized. Mentor's ideal kingdom, so beautifully un- folded to Telemachus, his royal pupil, seemed about to 164 Selected Old Testament Studies have a realization, of which Mentor nor Appollo ever dreamed. Solomon was raised up and equipped with wisdom — wisdom to rule, an "understanding heart to judge the people," to "discern between good and evil." And be- cause he chose this, the Lord said, "I have given thee a wise and understanding heart ; so that there was none like thee before thee, neither shall any arise after thee like unto thee. And I have also given thee that which thou hast not asked, both riches and honor ; so that there shall not be any among the kings like unto thee all thy days." His wisdom was all-embracing for acquisition ot knowledge, and equally effective for imparting the same to admiring pupils. All forms of learning and wisdom and knowledge met in him. He was a poet, for his songs were a thousand and five ; he was a philosopher, for he spake three thousand proverbs ; he was a preacher, and the pulpits of all ages discuss his themes; he was a scientist, comprehending the whole range of natural history; a botanist and a dendrologist, for "he spake of trees, from the cedar that is in Lebanon even to the hys- sop that springeth out of the wall" ; he was a zoologist and an ornithologist, and entomologist and an ichthy- ologist, for "he spake also of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes ;" and, withal, he was a teacher, for he "spake" of all these things, "and there came of all peoples to hear the wisdom of Solomon, from all kings of the earth which had heard of his wis- dom." Nor did he stand alone, for there was wisdom in the "children of the east country" and in "Egypt." He had peers, though not his proper equals, in "Ethan the Ezra- hite, and Heman, and Chalchol, and Darda, the sons of Selected Old Testament Studies 165 Mahol." Could we find such a man to-day, and plant him at one of our great centres of commerce, or education, we would have a great university, to which learned pro- fessors and eager pupils alike would flock, and wealth would pour unstinted offerings at her feet; so there, kings and queens were his pupils. The queen of Sheba, herself the wisest among women, "came to prove him with hard questions," and "she communed with him of all that was in her heart," and "Solomon told her all her questions ; there was not anything hid from the king which he told her not ;" and her voluntary tuition ofifer- ing was "an hundred and twenty talents of gold, and of spices very great store, and precious stones." Yet his kingdom failed. Alas, alas ! Solomon was but a man ; his head reeled and turned in the very zenith of his glory ; he grew dizzy in those heights ; wealth and luxury did their corrupting work for himself and his peo- ple. His very wisdom became a snare, and both his wis- dom and his power were prostituted to ignoble aims. Lust and sin marred his work and cut oflf his opportunity. We have not the heart to unfold the story of his poly- gamy, idolatry, covetousness, and oppression, fitly ending in the decay of his kingdom and the secession of ten tribes to Jeroboam, and the centuries of decay and curs- ing, of which he himself sowed the seeds amid regal splendor. The Book of Ecclesiastes recounts his experiences of life. He drank at every fountain of mere human good. He tells the story fairly; he tells the story honestly; he tells it sadly, almost bitterly. "Vanity of vanities," you read in the opening; "Vanity of vanities," as the story progresses; "Vanity of vanities," "all is vanity," is the echoing wail at the close. He exhausted every category in search of the sum- i66 Selected Old Testament Studies mum bonum — the supreme good, the chief end of man. Let us trace some of his experiments. 1. He sought it in ivisdom and knozvlcdge. (i. 16-18.) "I communed with mine own heart, saying, Lo, I am come to great estate, and have gotten more wisdom than all they that have been before me in Jerusalem ; yea, my heart had great experience of wisdom and knowledge. And I gave my heart to know wisdom and to know mad- ness and folly; I perceived that this also is vexation of spirit. For in much wisdom is much grief ; and he that increaseth knowledge incrcaseth sorrow." 2. He sought it in riches and in the pleasures tvhich they afford, (ii. 4-11.) "I made me great works; I builded me houses ; I planted me vineyards ; I made me gardens and orchards, and I planted trees in them of all kinds of fruits. I made me pools of water, to water there- with the wood that bringcth forth trees ; I got me ser- vants and maidens, and had servants born in my house; also I had possession of great and small cattle above all that were in Jerusalem before me ; I gathered me also silver and gold, and the peculiar treasure of kings and the provinces ; I got me men-singers and women-singers, and the delights of the sons of men, as musical instru- ments, and that of all sorts. And whatsoever mine eyes desired I kept not from them ; I withheld not my heart from any joy. And behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun." 3. He then sought refuge in a materialistic and epicurean philosophy. He unified man and beast into one category, (iii. 19-22.) "That which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them: as the one dieth, so dicth the other; yea. they have one breath ; so that a man hath no preeminence above a beast : for all is vanity." "All go unto one place ; Selected Old Testament Studies 167 all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again." "Who knoweth the spirit of a man, whether it goeth upward, and the spirit of a beast, whether it goeth downward to the earth?" "Wherefore I perceive that there is noth- ing better, than that a man should rejoice in his own works ; for that is his portion : for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him?" "Then I communed with mirth, because a man hath no better thing under the sun than to eat and to drink, and to be merry." So said the rich fool in the parable, so said they in Isaiah's day, and so in Corinth, and so to-day, "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die." 4. He also stumbled at the inequalities of Providence in this life. (vii. 15.) "All things have I seen in the days of my vanity : there is a just man that perisheth in his righteousness, and there is a wicked man that pro- longeth his life in his wickedness." Also (viii. 14), "There is vanity which is done on the earth; that there be just men unto whom it happeneth according to the work of the wicked; again, there be wicked men, to whom it happeneth according to the work of the righteous: I said this also is vanity." And out of it all he argued a shallow expediency and a colorless medio- crity. "Be not righteous overmuch ; neither make thyself overwise; why shouldest thou destroy thyself? Be not overmuch wicked, neither be thou foolish ; why shouldest thou die before thy time?" 5. He tried fatalism and skepticism, the unfailing refuge of the sensualist, (ix. 11, 12.) "I returned and saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favor to men of skill ; but time and chance happeneth to them all. For man also knoweth not his time; as the fishes i68 Selected Oed Testament Studies that are taken in an evil net, and as the birds that are caught in the snare ; so are the sons of men snared in an evil time, when it fallcth suddenly upon them." "All things come alike to all ; there is one event to the righteous and to the wicked." "A living dog is better than a dead lion." "The dead know not anything, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten. Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy are now perished." "There is no work, nor device, nor wisdom, nor knowledge, in the grave whither thou goest." Oh ! the blank despair offered alike by fatalism and skepticism. Your soul cannot rest in it; no more could his. Such a creed is worse than vanity. The soul re- coils from its hopeless blank of nothingness. A certain annihilation were a sweet refuge compared to it. 6. Therefore, forsaking all these, he sought the chief good in official and professional activity, (xii. 9, 10.) "Moreover, because the preacher was wise, he still taught the people knowledge ; he sought out and set in order many proverbs, he gave good heed." Yea ! "the preacher sought to find out acceptable words ; and that which was written was upright, even words of truth." How he magnifies his office as teacher, preacher and au- thor! "The words of the wise are as goads, and as nails fastened by the masters of assemblies, which are given from one shepherd." But alas, this, the highest of all callings, is not man's chief good. Oh ! how pathetic is his lament, as he adds, "And further, my son, by these be admonished ; of mak- ing many books there is no end ; and much study is a weariness of the flesh." What does he mean? Does he disparage his wisdom, and his authorship, and his teach- ing? Does he discourage academic and scientific learn- Selected Old Testament Studies 169 ing, or put any slight upon the honors which scholastic ambition craves and wins? We think not. These things are not the chief good — the sum of all one's endeavor and the goal of all one's ambition. The royal teacher of Israel has one more lesson, and that is but the conclusion of all the rest. The whole of his argument culminates in this, and the trend of his logic is to exclude all else but this. He differentiates all else but this. "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter, Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man." Or, as the Revised Version has it, "This is the end of the matter ; all hath been heard," etc. He states it in proverbial and aphoristic form, the condensed experience of a life-time of obser- vation and experiment, carrying with it all the self-evi- dencing power of an axiom; and he hurls it at his class with all the power and precision with which his father David handled his weapons of war. 'Tis the last lesson. 'Tis also the first lesson; (Prov. i. 7), "The fear of the Lord is the begining of wisdom." Proverbs ix. 10 reiterates the same. Psalm cxi. 10, "A good understand- ing have all they that keep his commandments." This is the "whole of man." You talk of manliness , why, 'tis godliness. The restoration of God's image is true man- hood. All else but this is folly, mere emptiness and vanity, a "sounding brass and a tinkling cymbal." Was not this your first lesson at your mother's knee, when she taught you to fold your hands in prayer? the first lesson in the catechism? "Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever." 'Tis the inspira- tion of the Christian educator, and the very genius of the Christian school. Literature, science, and philosophy have their place, not supreme, but ancillary to true wis- dom. Education should be the handmaid of religfion. 170 Selected Old Testament Studies l^nsanctified secular learning is a delusion and a snare. Daily prayers, Sunday Bible classes and church attend- ance, throughout childhood, youth and academic life find their explanation here. Even secular associations, colleges and universities dare not neglect them wholly. The study of the Bible, which is rapidly becoming a uni- versal text-book, seeks to unify all sound learning, and is but the emphasizing of this lesson. What other nucleus will one find about which all his heart and life may crystallize? But, why such a failure as Solomon, the wise man so unwise? Was he a failure? Was Job a failure as he sat in the ashes, stripped and speechless? God has given notable solutions of the great problems of the ages. Job in the ashes vindicated the righteous against the slanderer for all time. Solomon also : "Who will show us any good?" is the despairing cry of the ages. He exhausted the problem. He only, of all men, ever had the opportunity, and we may accept his testimony. This testimony is ample for all times and conditions. Call you a hundred witnesses, each a preeminent votary of his own cherished pursuit, and what can they add to this testimony? "Fear God and keep his commandments." This is personal religion, active service, heart service. Here meet faith and obedience. The preacher does not argue its importance. Nor will we. He fastens and clinches the nail with one word, judg- ment. "For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil." (xi. 9.) "Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth, and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart and in the sight of thine eyes ; but know thou that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment." The judg- Selected Old Testament Studies 171 ment is the supreme test of all things — the day of doom. Then let us settle every question in the light of the judg- ment — every question of pleasure, of ambition, of calling, of duty, and of service. Nor dare we forget that in the judgment "we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous." CHAPTER XVIII Daniel and His Times OR The Significance of the Captivity. There were two captivities, one of Israel and one of Judah, culminating in the overthrow of both King- doms and the deportation of the people. There were three stages in the captivity of each Kingdom. The prophets foretold the disasters to both the kingdoms as the just and righteous punishment for the sins of the people ; and they preached repentance all the while, and promised deliverance if they would turn and keep God's covenant. The history of their disasters in battle, of the seige and conquest of their cities, of the desolation of their land, of the butcheries of the people, and of the whole- sale deportations is so briefly told by the sacred histo- rians that it is difficult to estimate the horrors of the situation. These events viewed from a civil and national point of view were certainly dark in the extreme. Israel ceased to be a people in the sense that they were never restored to the land as a civil commonwealth. There was a promise of restoration to the kingdom of Judah after seventy years, and but few could live to see it. The patriot's outlook was well nigh hopeless, and the lamentations of Jeremiah are amply justified by the conditions around him. It has been common to look only on the dark side Selected Old Testament Studies 173 with its horrors, and to suppose that the seventy years of captivity was but the term and duration of the pun- ishment, and that these punishments cured the Jewish people of their idolatries and their apostasies, and that they were restored when they were cured and because thy were cured. We wish to inquire whether this view exhausts all the facts or gives complete and satisfactory interpreta- tion of them. Several questions would seem to emerge here, such as these. Why did the Kingdom of Israel fail so much sooner than that of Judah? Why were the people of Is- rael never restored? Why were alliances with Assyria and Egypt so disastrous? Why did the prophets promise safety in submission and allegiance to Baby- lon? What was the status of the Jewish people during the captivity, civilly, socially, and religiously? Why did so small a proportion of the people actually return to Palestine? What was the influence of the Jewish people upon those among whom they lived? What was the logical and actual status of the Jews of the dis- persion from the time of Cyrus on down to the time of Christ? What was the secret, power, and centre of their religious life during the captivity, and then throughout the dispersion? Were they cured of idol- atry by punishment? Were the idolaters cured at all? Were they not exterminated? What was the wider providential significance of the captivity and the dis- persion? These and other interesting questions are suggested by the facts. We cannot hope to answer them all in this brief discussion. Some of them will be considered in other discussions. Still we hope to answer some of them, and to throw light upon others, and perhaps find the kev to them all. 174 Selected Old Testament Studies We need to study Scripture history just as we study any other history in order to ascertain and trace all the causes and forces that operate to make history. Sa- cred history, however, has these advantages over secu- lar history, an infallible record of the facts, an infallible interpretation of the facts in many cases, and a trust- worthy revelation of God himself as the providential ruler of nations, people and individuals. In secular history, he sustains the same relations to human affairs, but he does not so distinctly reveal himself. In the Hebrew commonwealth God, in the person of Jehovah, the son, was both the civil and ecclesiastical head. There were two coterminous commonwealths, one civil, the other religious or more properly eccle- siastical. Both these were complete in their organiza- tion, franchises and equipment. This is commonly called union of church and state. Perhaps a better definition would be equilibrium of church and state. All other theocratic unions of church and state, of which history is full, are but bungling imitations of the Hebrew commonwealth. Now, history shows that religious and ecclesiastical forces have played a prominent part in making history. This is the more obvious where there is any form of union of church and state. The so-called po- litical parties are politico-religious parties, and the re- ligious and ecclesiastical forces are often the most potent. We need only cite the European struggles that grew out of the reformation, or the Crusades of earlier centuries, or the struggles of the Scotch Cove- nanters in more recent times. Such forces are by no means quiescent to-day. We would expect to find similar alignments of par. ties in the kingdoms of Judah and Israel — politico-re- Selected Old Testament Studies 175 ligious parties. And we actually find such parties in both kingdoms growing in strength and power till they dominate the state and lead to gigantic and sometimes heroic struggles for supremacy. In a republic the mu- tation of parties is often sudden and rapid, and we would expect to find it so in the Hebrew republic. After the death of Solomon the kingdom was di- vided on the purely political issues of retrenchment and reform. But Jeroboam in Israel and his counsel- lors judge it necessary to modify the eccleciastical and ritual system in the interest of politics. This modified religious system was still the worship of Jehovah though seriously corrupt and Israel did not then cast off the Theocracy and become apostate. This modification became the policy of the kingdom as against the conservatism of the best elements of his people, including resident priests and Levites? This conservative element largely forsook his kingdom weakening its moral power and strengthening the rival kingdom. This one thing largely accounts for the more rapid apostasy of the kingdom of Israel and for the longer lease of life to Judah. However, we can but recognize a strictly orthodox party in the kingdom of Israel. We recognize Elijah and Elisha as leaders of this party in the days of the house of Omri. Rehoboam in Judah imitated Solomon his father in patronizing the false and idolatrous reli- gions of other nations, and his liberal policy of tolera- tion postponed political antagonisms a little season. But the worship of Jehovah and the worship of Baal and other idolatries were sworn enemies and could not long tolerate each other. Two politico-reli- gious parties were rapidly formed and developed — the conservative party we call the orthodox party because 176 Selected Old Testament Studies they worshipped the Lord and kept his covenant — the idolatrous party we call the apostate party for obvious reasons. The apostate party grew rapidly under royal patronage, but the invasion of Shishak, king of Egypt gave them a great blow, and gave the orthodox party a prestige and vigor which kept them in power for sixty-six years during the reigns of Asa and Jehosha- phat. In the meantime the moral power of the kingdom of Israel grew weaker and she became the easy prey of several military revolutions and usurpations all follow- ing the traditional policy of Jeroboam, son of Nebat. When Ahab came to the throne he and his wife Jeze- bel developed the idolatries of the heathen in their most odious forms of lust, persecutions, and murders, and all would have been lost but for the prophets Elijah and Elisha. Jezebel seems to have sought to exterminate the orthodox party rather than the corrupt state worship of Jeroboam the son of Neba, for she slew four hun- dred prophets of the Lord, the rest were hidden away from her wrath. The orthodox party was the strictly patriotic party in the earlier struggles with Syria. In Judah the marriage of Joram, son of Jehoshaphat, to Jezebel's daughter enables the Apostate party to se- cure their first real lease of power for fourteen years until the regency of Jehoiada reinstated the orthodox party in power. It is not necessary to our purpose to pursue the history further in illustration, except to no- tice that Israel fell more and more rapidly under the in- competent control of the Apostate party and the end came quickly. In Judah the struggle was much more prolonged. Selected Old Testament Studies 177 This theory of the mutations of parties accounts for the apparent contradictions in the history, and explains why the administration of one king should be typically so good and the next so bad. In the case of two kings, at least, Joash and Manasseh, the mutation of parties took place in the midst of their reigns. The case of Manasseh calls for special comment. He was the son of good king Hezekiah, but the first twenty-two years of his reign were the worst Judah had ever had. He was carried prisoner to Babylon with his prime minis- ter Shebna, the Scribe. He repented and was restored to his kingdom with the orthodox party in power and Eliakim was his chief counsellor, while Shebna re- mained in prison in Babylon. Another point needs emphasis and elucidation. Palestine was becoming more and more the high- way of nations, and its possession, or its absolute independence and neutrality became more and more important to the powers around them. These great powers had their distinctive religious characteristics. The Assyrians and their dependencies seem to have been Sabians who first worshipped the sun, moon, and stars — the hosts of heaven. They had now become idolaters and were the most pronounced polytheists. Babylon and her Eastern dependencies were largely monotheistic, and the Magian religion which finally prevailed for many centuries in Asia took shape from Judaism and adopted large parts of the Jewish scriptures into their sacred books. It is easy then to see why the political affiliations of the Apos- tate party were with Assyria and afterwards with Egypt ; and also why the Orthodox party affiliated with Babylon more readily. These affiliations were not so obvious before the 178 Selected Old Testament Studies time of Ahaz because all parties before this time were too patriotic to seek foreign alliances, or, at least, to rely upon them. We need also to notice that the orthodox party stood true to their treaties and their oaths of alle- giance ; this was a part of their religion. We find in this the main reason why the orthodox Jew was trust- ed, and favored, and petted under all the empires and kingdoms for centuries, beginning with Nebuchadnez- zar, as will be noted later on. But the apostate party was ready to violate oaths and treaties on every plausible occasion. Perjury and treachery were their highest diplomacy, and their doom became a political necessity after their reformation be- came hopeless. In the great struggle between Assyria and Egypt the kingdom of Israel violated oaths and treaties and fell away to alliance with Egypt and was conquered by the Assyrians again and again, and the removal of the remnants became a political necessity under Tiglath Pileser, Shalmenezer, and Esarhaddon. At this period Judah under good king Hezekiah stood for independ- ence against Assyria on the one hand and Egypt on the other. A little later Assyria was conquered and absorbed, by the Babylonian Empire. The Hittites had been eliminated from the balance of power, and Babylon and Egypt began their struggle for universal empire. Palestine became the outpost and granary for one or the other. The apostate party favored Egypt while the orthodox party favored Babylon. The sympathiz- ers with Egypt were dominant, and even the prophets of the Lord were suspected and charged with treason. Twice the armies of Nebuchadnezzar beat back the Selected Old Testament Studies 179 armies of Egypt, conquered the apostate government at Jerusalem and put them under oaths, treaties, and tribute. At this time the best of the people were de- ported to Babylon and among them were Daniel and his three friends. It is more than probable that these captives were the noncombatant orthodox, who would not violate oaths and treaties, the very bone and sinew of the people. Jehoiachin, the apostate king, was shown on favors, but lay in prison thirty-seven years in Babylon. And they rebelled yet again under Zedekiah. His sons were slain before his eyes, and his eyes were put out and he languished in a Babylonish dungeon till he died. The city and the temple were levelled with the ground and all the yeomanry, the more intelligent and self reliant, were carried away. A remnant of the lower classes was left to cultivate the soil, and save the land from universal desolation. But this remnant went to Egypt against the protest of Jeremiah and expressly repudiated all allegiance to Jehovah. Apostasy had so penetrated to the very low- est stratum of the people. What was the significance of all this? The apos- tate party was practically exterminated in the succes- sive struggles and the final overthrow. The remnant that fled into Egypt was put to the sword when Nebu- chadnezzar conquered Egypt. The apostate false prophets that rose up in Babylon to foment discontent and mischief were executed by order of the king. On the other hand the captive populations were set- tled in the fertile plains, and in the populous cities of Babylon, a petted and not a persecuted people. King Nebuchadnezzar instituted a policy that prevailed in successive kingdoms for centuries. i8o Selected Old Testament Studies To whom, under God, may all this be traced? The evident answer is, To Daniel and his three young friends. They were no mere accident or incident in this great drama. He was rapidly exalted to be the head of the aristocracy of Babylon and was evidently chief counsellor, and prime minister to the king, from Nebuchadnezzar to Darius the Mede and Cyrus the Great: and his three friends seem to have been asso- ciated with him in the highest offices of the govern- ment. There is no need to vindicate his loyalty to his people as well as to their God. For seventy years he stood next to the throne, the friend, the counsellor, the guide, and the prophet of his people. When full ninety years old he counselled with Cyrus and planned the restoration of the people to Zion and the rebuilding of the temple. The generous decree of Cyrus and the generous provision to carry it out were but the culmi- nation of seventy years of prosperity and blessing. There is no evidence that Daniel and his three friends did aught to set free Jehoiachin and Hezekiah, the apostate and perjured kings, nor save the apostate false prophets. Idolatry and false prophecy were capi- tal crimes under Hebrew law and Babylon became the executioner from the very exigencies of the case. The historic parallel to all this is found in the strug- gle between the Plebean and Senatorial parties in the Roman commonwealth, in which the hopelessly cor- rupt senatorial party was practically exterminated, and Rome took a new lease on life. So here also, when the apostate party was exterminated Judaism took a new lease on life. There was still much of idolatry among the hetero- geneous peoples of the Babylonish empire, but the pre- vailing Monotheism was a bond of sympathy for the Selected Old Testament Studies i8i further protection of the Jewish people, and they took such deep root in the lands of their captivity that per- haps not more than one fiftieth of the people returned to Palestine. The rich and the powerful, however, gave large contributions to forward the rebuilding of the city and the temple. Ezekiel and Daniel were the prophets of the cap- tivity and during the suspension of the temple ritual the synagogue was developed as the centa'e of their re- ligious life and power, as we have shown in another dis- cussion on the synagogue. It is interesting also to trace the influence of ortho- dox Judaism in moulding and improving the Magian system which soon prevailed in all the East. This also has been considered in a separate discussion. It is de- sirable here to trace in brief the condition of the Jews of the dispersion for several centuries. The policy of Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus became traditional in the East. It was adopted by Alexander the Great who put the Jews into the same rank with the Macedonians in his empire. The same policy was pursued in the four kingdoms that grew out of his empire with two or three notable exceptions. The disasters that overtook Haman's conspiracy against them contributed greatly to their prosperity and exaltation. Antiochus Epiphanes in Syria perse- cuted the Jews and the Maccabean wars ground him to powder. Ptolemy Physcon in Egypt sought to re- verse the policy and even to exterminate the Jews of his kingdom, and he too was taught the meaning of the words spoken to Abraham, "Him that curseth thee I will curse." The Jews of the dispersion were the missionaries to the nations to prepare the world for Christ. CHAPTER XIX Biblical Criticism. In the broad sense of the word every man who reads is a critic. It is entirely natural for him to approve or condemn, to receive or reject, to admire or dislike. We instinctively pass judgment on what we read in books. In this broad sense criticism is almost a fine art in Literature. It is a proper exercise of the intelligence to discern things that differ, to winnow the chaff from the wheat, to point out beauties and excellencies in matter and style and to censure whatever does not ap- proximate an ideal standard. Such volumes as Campbell's Rhetoric and Kames' Elements of Criticism and Ruskin's discussions set forth the rules to guide us to right conclusions when we study history, poetry, oratory, or philosophic treatises. This sort of criticism finds its highest ideals in the literary study of the Scriptures. The terms critic and criticism when thus employed suggest no bad sense and no unwholesome mental atti- tude. Still it is easy to see that the personal element in the critic too often determines his critical conclu- sions and mars the character of his work. Just here the critic becomes odious and his conclusions mischievous. Prejudice and hostility interfere sadly with the value of his work. Aristotle tells us that prejudice, passion and sloth are the three great enemies of a philosophic spirit, i. e. a right attitude to discern truth. However, we do not propose to discuss the critic in Selected Old Testament Studies 183 this broad sense as he deals with literature and the fine arts. The British Essayists are the finest examples of such critics. There is a much narrower usage of the term critic and criticism limiting them to the field of the Scriptures. Here also we may expect to find good and bad, legitimate and illegitimate. Critical processes are so numerous and varied that it is not easy to name and classify them all. Untold work has been done and untold volumes have been written that might properly be called Bibli- cal Criticism. This is the topic of this chapter, a sub- ject of vast proportions. We can only hope to em- phasize and illustrate some clear cut definitions, and to distinguish the species and varieties of Biblical criti- cism. I. Exegesis. — This is a critical process by which we seek to discover the exact meaning and usage of words, phrases, and sentences, either in the original languages of the Scriptures or in an approved translation. It deals with the literal and figurative use of words and phrases and their limitations by the context or by pre- scriptive usage. Translation is largely based upon it, but does not constitute it. It seeks to find out the exact meaning of the writer and to ascertain the minute inosculations of his thought, and to express the same in other forms of speech. Dififerences of doc- trine are born in different exegetical conclusions. Exe- gesis is the battle ground of theologians. We empha- size the fact that it is limited by the laws of language. Grammatical laws and the laws of expression are as inexorable and imperious as the laws of the physical universe. A false exegesis undermines all truth, even when the exegete holds to the staunchest doctrine of inspiration. 184 Selected Old Testament Studies 2. Hermeneutics. — Some writers include exegesis as a part of Hermeneutics, But others make exegesis furnish the materials with which it deals. The distinc- tion, however, is not vital, and it matters little for our purpose if exegesis and Hermeneutics do overlap each other. This critical process deals with certain general principles of interpretation rather logical than gram- matical. It takes a wider view of Scripture than an examination of terms, phrases, sentences, and para- graphs. It deals with the trend of Scripture and the proportion of faith. Traditional Hermeneutics starts with the fundamental proposition that all Scripture is unified by inspiration. Its product is the Commentary which tests Scripture with Scripture and furnishes the materials for systematic theology. It is not our pur- pose here to analyze and set up the various subsidiary principles of this process, but simply to indicate its significance. We need only to say that if we start with a sound exegesis and apply sound hermeneutical principles we must needs ascertain the truth as taught by inspiration. If on the other hand either or both of these be at fault the Bible is just to that extent mis- leading and false, because misunderstood. We are often asked why there are so many variant creeds and so many schools of theology, all claiming the authority of the "only infallible rule of faith and prac- tice." The answer is easy ; they originate in a false exegesis, and false principles of interpretation. Social and political beliefs and practices vary widely from each other for the same or kindred reasons. Precon- ceptions, prejudice, pride, and perversity turn mind and heart from the truth, just as the hidden loadstone turns the needle from the pole. Selected Old Testament Studies 185 3. The Lower Criticism. — There is no need here to justify the term "lower" as applied to this department of Biblical Criticism. It would seem to be a mere mat- ter of convention or agreement among scholars so to distinguish it. Its processes are limited to ascertain the exact text of Scripture. The original autograph of no single book of the Bible has yet been discovered. The written oracles of God were committed to the Jews to keep and transmit to succeeding generations. The New Testament was committed to the early church to transmit along with the other, for Christians became joint custodians with the Jews of the Old Tes- tament. The Scriptures were handed down the ages by human hands. They were copied and translated. The copies and the translations were made, similarly to those found in all transmitted human literatures, but more carefully, owing to the loyalty of the scribes who copied the Scriptures. The lower criticism has collated manuscripts and manuscript translations, and quotations and commen- taries of the earlier Fathers, and by comparison it has sought to restore as nearly as possible the exact origi- nal autographs of the New Testament books. This has been approximated. The number of variations dis- covered is immense. Untold labor and scholarship have been expended on this work for one hundred years past. It has been amply demonstrated that no impor- tant fact and no doctrine of scripture has been put in jeopardy by these variations. It is conceded that we have substantially the originals of the New Testament books. Similar work still needs to be finished for the books of the Old Testament. This work is more difficult, and perhaps less necessary because the Jewish doctors, i86 Selected Old Testament Studies or the Masorites, after a certain period in the history, bestowed unmeasured and even fabulous labor and care in the transmission of the present Hebrew text and there is but little material available, antedating the work of the Masorites. Many prefer the name "Textual Criticism," because it deals only with the text of Scripture and seeks to correct mistakes in transcription and to restore as far as possible the original text. However, we prefer to retain the name Lower Criticism in contrast with the "Higher." 4. The Higher Criticism. — This name has been brought into disrepute by the arrogant claims of some of the critics as we shall see. There as a relative dig- nity and importance among studies and intellectual processes and there is no objection to expressing that relative dignity by a name. The names Lower and Higher may have been adopted for that purpose. After the text has been ascertained and established by the processes of the Lower Criticism, the Higher Criticism approaches the text in a critical wa3^ It seeks to ascertain the sources, dates, authorship, and claims of the sacred books. It examines the style, complexion, use of words, literary character and con- struction with a view of ascertaining, confirming or settling all such matters and such other questions as might arise. There are two varieties of this criticism that part company with each other because of the dififerent genius and spirit of their work and because of their dififerent attitude toward the Scriptures themselves. We call them constructive and destructive criticism. I. Constructive Criticism. — The constructive critic starts with certain convictions concerning the Scrip- Selected Old Testament Studies 187 tures. He is loyal to all its claims. He believes it to be the word of God — "the only infallible rule of faith and practice, teaching us what we are to believe con- cerning God, and what duty God requires of man." He holds to the traditional doctrine of plenary inspiration. He deals with the internal evidences of the genuine- ness and authenticity of the Scriptures. His own faith has already been settled before he undertakes to be a defender of the faith. Prejudice and partisanship have no place in his work. His own faith, however, is fortified more and more as his work progresses. This principle is true in all pursuit and defense of truth, secular or sacred. Paley's Horae Paulinae is a striking example of con- structive criticism. He gathers up all the facts of Paul's life and work as found in the book of Acts, and all references to his work and associations to be found in his epistles, many of which are hardly discoverable by the ordinary reader. He groups them all together so skillfully that it would seem impossible to gainsay any of his arguments for the genuineness and authen- ticity of the book of Acts and the Pauline Epistles. The previous chapter on the books of Genesis and the chapter on the other four books of Moses would be classified as constructive criticism because of their point of view and because the author aims so to pre- sent the contents of those books as to justify their place in the sacred canon and also to vindicate the Mosaic authorship of them all as a unit. And besides, the author seeks to verify these claims by reference to the later Scriptures and also to show that the later scriptures in turn are justified and fortified by their coherency with the books of Moses. Whether the author's argument is satisfactory or not it is to be clas- sified as constructive criticism. i88 Selected Old Testament Stt-dies 2. Destructive Criticism. — This name was g-iven because it is the exact opposite of constructive criti- cism. Its aims and results are the exact opposite, but none plead guilty to "destructive critic." The two are rival schools of Biblical criticism. This school charges the other with traditionalism, dogmatism, creed worship, and a superstitious worship of a fetish called the canon. They also charge narrow, illiberal views and a lack of charity for those who differ, all based on a lack of sound scholarship and aggravated by prejudice. Per contra. — They claim for themselves broad and liberal scholarship, untrammeled by preconceptions, superstitions and creeds. They have abounding charity for everything except old fashioned orthodoxy which is their pet abomination. They make loud claims of scientific methods and processes ; and you would sup- pose that they had invented inductive processes or had applied them for the first time to Biblical criticism. The name "destructive" will be amply justified by a citation of their aims and purposes and their well de- fined attitude towards the Scriptures and towards the creeds of all evangelical churches. They all claim to be devout and independent think- ers with no recognition of authority, each one being himself an expert. Any recital of the processes and conclusions of this school would be accepted by none in its entirety because this science like other sciences 's in a constant state of flux or transition to a higher and more logical form. The inductions of to-day may be greatly broadened and enlarged to-morrow. For this reason you may not quote one of this school of critics against another, no matter how contradictory and va- riant they may be. We may sketch this school, its at- titudes, its works, and its results in several particulars. Selected Old Testament Studies 189 1. They glory in the name "higher criticism." They claim higher scholarship, higher views, higher aims, and higher and nobler results than the representatives of old fashioned Bible study. This is accomplished by depreciating and destroying their conservative rivals rather than by building up substanital structures of their own. 2. They reduce the Scriptures to the level of the literatures of other nations and peoples and they call them a literature to be studied exactly as any other literature and they maintain that the law of its growth was the same as in any other people. 3. They find the Bible to be a naturalistic product, the outgrowth of the conditions, environment, and exe- gencies of successive generations. They make it the product of a growing and expanding civilization rather than a God-given vital force in molding that civiliza- tion. 4. An evolutionary philosophy finds man's low origin, barely distinguishable from his brute ancestors, and seeks to trace his slow and painful struggle up- ward throughout the ages. His mental and moral powers and his religion also were slowly unfolded and coordinated. They adopt this philosophy though few of them are scientific evolutionists. They talk about the infancy of the race passing in its growth through savage, barbarous, and semi-barbarous conditions. They make the Scriptures the product of a semi-bar- barous people and they judge them accordingly. 5. They remand the supernatural to the supersti- tious fancies of an ignorant people. They minimize the miracle even though they may not reject it entirely. The Scriptures make miracles the prophet's testimo- nials. No miracle no prophet; no prophet no miracle; iQO Selected Old Testament Studies therefore no inspiration. The higher critic, the agnos- tic, the sceptic, the atheist are practically agreed in their attack upon miracles. Why? Inspiration is the real citadel to be taken and destroyed. The miracles of the Bible are the outer defenses. Batter them down or betray them into the enemy's hands and the citadel, falls an easy prey. 6. But the higher criticism does not reject inspira- tion. It cannot so stultify itself. It rejects plenary inspiration and considers verbal inspiration an absur- dity. It refuses to call the Bible the Word of God, but says that it contains the Word of God. It denies the inerrancy of the original autographs. These several things mentioned so far, justify the title "destructive critic" though we have used his own preferred title "higher critic." We pause just here to assure the reader that the true higher criticism is the work of the constructive critic and in no proper sense belongs to the destructive critic. 7. The destructive critic denies revelation as a con- scious communication to the prophet — a message from a person to a person. He teaches that only the spirit- ual is inerrant, and that somehow it sprang out of the exalted spiritual consciousness of the prophet and that such truth is its own sufficient witness to the reader or hearer. Accordingly all else is on the level of other writings and subject to the same critical tests. 8. It is consistent therefore when many of these critics deny the possibility of predictive prophecy and say that the prophet is limited by his own horizon and that his prophecies are merely forecasts of the future based on conditions in sight and elaborated with the mspiration of genius. Some concede in addition a sort of divine efflatus. But the whole is the subjective pro- duct of the prophet's inner consciousness. Selected Old Testament Studies 191 9. They tell us also that this form of inspiration was not limited to the prophets of scripture but has been manifested in all ages by the great leaders in hu- man thought and action, who tower above their fel- lows. Such men have challenged the admiration and loyalty of the generations in which they have lived. Thus Moses, and Solon, and Aristotle, and Mahomet, and Luther are placed in the same category. They tell us further that one source of truth to-day is the con- census of Christian consciousness and that this mode of revelation is progressive from generation to generation. Nothing can be more alien than this to the orthodox view of inspiration. 10. They hold that all creeds and church formu- laries of the past are mere inductions modified by the environment and the subjective processes of those who made them. That they were valuable in their day and time, that they are no longer suited, to the advancing conditions of the present day, that their inductions need to be reopened and that the superior scholarship and general intelligence of the present day demand something better. 11. This school of critics professes to test Scripture by Scripture, on the comparative method, by science, by history, and by archaic research. For example. They construe variant statements in the scriptures into contradictions, and exaggerate minor errors that have crept in by transcription, and thereby discredit the his- torical reliability of the Bible. They quote science against Bible teachings ; they find that Christ and his disciples believed in the doctrine of devils, but modern science discredits their superstitions. They discred- ited the book of Daniel because we were not able to locate Belshazzar and Darius in profane history. They 192 Selected Old Testament Studies told us that the writer of Exodus knew nothing of Egypt because he speaks of the making of brick there by the Hebrews. We are not trying now to answer them, but only defining and illustrating their methods. Perhaps their most popular fallacy is "argumentum ab ignoran- tia." 12. They charge compilations, anachronisms, and pious frauds and forgeries. They tell us that all the earlier books of the Bible are made up of several stories spliced together by different redactors or editors as the centuries passed, leaving very little if any to Moses as the author. They rely on a certain critical sense, born of a profound scholarship, to analyze and dissect the books of Moses, and later books also, and assign to a half dozen authors and editors the words, clauses, and paragraphs belonging to each. The result is a Poly- chrome Bible, printed in several colors. According to this theory we have a piece of patchwork in which the seams and joinings are as discernable as in a ladies' quilt, all discerned by a critical sense. They tell us that the Fifty-first Psalm was written many centuries later than David and that its spirituality would have been an anachronism in his day. They tell us that the Levitical and Deuteronomic codes were not only of late origin but that they were palmed off with pious in- tent upon an ignorant and credulous people — pious frauds and forgeries, of which we have so many ex- amples in the middle and dark ages. 13. They trace Scripture statements to legendary sources, to local color, and to the prejudices and igno- rance of the times. All nations have their legendary stories reaching back into the dim and remote past and incorporated into their histories. Hebrew authors borrowed these legends and dressed them up in the semblance of authentic history. Selected Old Testament Studies 193 Then again it sounds plausible to say that in im- parting spiritual truth there was no need to correct the false and inadequate views of the writers in matters non-spiritual ; therefore we need not expect to find their writings reliable on all matters that are not spiritual. The Tubingen school of critics eliminated almost^ all the Scriptures, endorsing the residue as divine truth ; but they were not able to draw the line for the seeker after truth. 14. The latest phase is the Kuenen-Wellshausen theory of the post-exilic origin of nearly all the Penta- teuch. This theory has already been alluded to above. Suffice it to say that scholarship has been met with scholarship, science with science, and archaic research is confirming Scripture in a remarkable and surprising way. If the arguments of the last two chapters are sound we may cite them here in general refutation of the de- structive criticism. The history of Jewish institutions is meaningless without Pentateuchal legislation and the Bible were a headless trunk without the book of Genesis. We may quote in support of the Mosaic authorship of the five books that pass under his name John v. 46, Mark xii. 19, Acts xv. 21, 2 Chron. xxiii. 18. Ezra vi. 18. However, the general trend, the articulation, the unity, the necessary logical coherency, and the organic life of the whole make the argument overwhelming and conclusive. We admire the beauty and strength of the arch be- cause each stone fits in its place adjusted to all the rest. So with the books of Scripture. The Mosaic pattern is beautiful in design, coloring and execution because of its unity and harmony. So likewise the Scriptures. 194 Selected Old Testament Studies It may not be amiss to offer a common sense argu- ment to show that none of these books could have ori- ginated in pious frauds and forgeries. The Scriptures at every stage of their growth have been the magna charta of God's people and have been watched, guard- ed, and transmitted with supreme fidelity. This was especially the case after the captivity, for three great sects were born of the politico-religious conditions. The Pharisees, Sadducees, and Samaritans contended with each other with intense rivalry, and sometimes with long civil wars. The Pharisees held to the entire Old Testament Canon, the Samaritans rejected all but the Pentetauch, the Sadducees long rejected the later, prophets. The great question with all was the inte- grity of Moses. The Pharisees added their traditions to Moses and the other two denounced them bitterly for so doing. This was no ignorant and credulous age. The Jews were in contact with all the learning and philosophy of all the world through the dispersion. How could anybody then concoct, collate, or forge any one or more of these books and persuade all three of these rival parties to accept his pious frauds in the name of Moses? And what is more, the Samaritans date back to the earlier captivity of Israel and no doubt held to the Pentateuch from their origin and they took their final form in Nehemiah's day. The Pharisees and Sadducees took shape as sects somewhat later, but the burning question with them all was the integrity of Moses as if in anticipation of these latter day critics. These destructive critics make no secret of the fact that their conclusions destroy both the foundations and the superstructure of old-fashioned orthodoxy. They advocate a new theology and another gospel. Who will define it and preach it with a "thus saith the Lord?" CHAPTER XX The Bible and the Monuments. It has been customary to divide history into Sacred and Secular. The secular historian gathers historical facts as well he may from all accessible sources, and groups them according to his best judgment. He traces the forces and causes that make history and de- rives such lessons as the trend of events seems to teach. It need hardly be proved that partiality, preju- dice, insufficient data, and lack of logical acumen do often mar and pervert both facts and conclusions. In short, the secular historian has no claim to infallibility in his work. Contemporary history is more valuable for obvious and surface facts, and later historians are more to be depended on for latent facts and for conclu- sions. But the work of neither is final. New discov- ery of facts and their relations is in order at any time, whenever some diligent student of history finds him- self able to give some better rendering of the past. In- ductions are never closed for obvious reasons. Sacred history is to be dififerentiated from secular in this, it claims a divine authorship. Secular history claims a mere human authorship. The distinction is based on inspiration, "Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." If the claim of di- vine authorship is just, then every recorded fact, every application and doctrine based thereon, every lesson and conclusion, partakes of the Divine infallibility. The sacred historian, no doubt, used the same pro- 196 Selected Old Testament Stl^dies cesses as the secular historian, education, study, re- search, eyewitness, tradition, records, written or monu- mental, inductions, and deductions, just as if he were writing secular history with this difference, inspiration. Define inspiration as we may, it implies divine guid- ance in the purposes and processes of the sacred his- torian and even positive revelation of facts if neces- sary to the divine purpose. All the lessons of the sa- cred historian have the Divine imprimatur upon them and are quoted, "Thus saith the Lord," exactly like a prophetic message. Apart from this distinct difference sacred history is a misnomer. The sacred historian is a prophet speaking for God, and transmitting devinely attested facts and conclu- sions. The secular historian includes and treats of biography, social customs and usages, political consti- tutions, legislation, dynasties, the rise and fall of na- tions and all events that may seem worthy of record. These all are so wrought together that they cannot be analyzed into separate and independent histories. They are all interdependent in the life of peoples and they all reinforce and corroborate each other so far as true. Destroy the truthfulness of any considerable segment of these and all are put in jeopardy. It is not possible to analyze the historian's record of these things and say that so much is history, and so much is politics, or sociology, or ethics, or culture, or religion, for it is all history — one history. The history that does not in- clude all these things, either actually or by implication, is just so far partial, inadequate, and probably mislead- ing. The same may be said of Sacred history. In this sense the entire Bible is a book of history. During some periods its brevity is noteworthy, but the details Selected Old Testament Studies 197 are accurate, coherent, and germain to whatever goes before or comes after. All personal acts and activities ; all agencies, human or divine, angelic or satanic ; all forces, physical or spiritual ; the origin and destinies of the race as set forth ; all recorded institutions, their origin and administration ; all ritual and civil codes , all prose, poetry or prophecy ; all the records of proph- ets, priests, lawgivers, judges and teachers; the entire book from Genesis to Revelation are history in a true and proper sense whether authentic or not. It is not competent to divide it so as to distinguish the histori- cal from other elements. Still it has been common to speak of the mere his- torical as distinct from the ethical, moral, spiritual and doctrinal, and the distinction has usually been accepted without reflection. For a time the critic contented him- self with claiming to find inaccuracies and mistakes in certain historical statements and then loyally claiming to accept and believe and glorify the doctrinal and the spiritual. I As criticism became more licentious more and more has been rejected as untrustworthy, and the modicum of true doctrine has become smaller and smaller. The destructive criticism finally denied the historicity of a large part of the Scriptures, remanded the supernatu- ral, both inspiration and miracle, to the realm of super- stition. It has revised the old theology into the new theology, and the old gospel into another gospel. In this the destructive critic is consistent. The Bible is either all inspired or none is inspired. Reduce part of the Bible to the level of pagan literature, and it must all come to the same level. The critic has conceded the truth of Bible history wherever it is confirmed in its statements by secular 198 Selkcted Old Testament Studies history. And whenever they differ the truth of the secular witness has been accepted over the Bible state- ments. Those times which left no secular history have been called prehistoric. The argument is very short; prehistoric times have no history, therefore Bible re- cords of those times are not history. This is logic with a vengeance. Now it so happens that secular history has been pushed back into the ages in a most wonderful manner until the line of the prehistoric has been carried back to the days of Abraham and even earlier if we may be- lieve all that is told us. This new and expansive secular history is found in the monuments. The general name "monuments" is given to innumberable records of nations and peoples cotemporaneous with Biblical records of events, but long since perished. The graves of ancient civiliza- tions have been partially opened and they contain im- perishable records from which their histories are writ- ten and the work has only begun. These records are Egyptian, Babylonian, Assyrian, Armenian, Phoenician, Hittite, Hebraic and Arabian, in divers languages and styles of writing. They are inscribed on literal monuments or pillars of stone, on the face of cliff's, on monoliths, on temple and palace walls and bas-reliefs, on tombs and coffins, on clay tablets and cylinders and steles, on tables of stone and on more or less perishable papyri. They embrace re- cords of every conceivable transaction and event, such as genealogies, merchantile bills, and receipts, daily offerings in their temples, battles, victories, spoils, treaties, social life and usages, and every sort of trans- action common to a busy thrifty civilization. Besides, there are great libaries of books, original, and copied Selected Old Testament Studies 199 from the literatures of other peoples. These records are already so numerous that it has been estimated that it would require three hundred years for the present force of archaeologists to decipher them. Explora- tion in these old store-houses of history is only begun. While these records do often exaggerate or sup- press the truth and betray the grossest superstitions and immoralities, there is a great opportunity for the constructive critic to elaborate valuable histories out of the materials which they furnish. Archaeology is history in its final analysis and is not, as is supposed, a separate science. In its earlier discoveries the higher critic adopted certain working hypotheses, partly archaeological and partly philoso- phic, which soon became assumptions, and by means of these assumptions it was easy to brush aside the claims of the Scriptures. A negative skeptical philosophy which denies the possibility and the credibility of miracles had prepared the way for a positive evolutionary philosophy which finds in naturalistic processes the origin and growth of all human institutions. The critic who adopted these two assumptions found it necessary to account for the Scriptures and to interpret them in accordance there- with. I ^1 iV, ^ It is not our purpose here to combat these premises, but only to indicate why the critic minimizes the super- natural and denies the inerrant historicity of the Scrip- tures. His logical instincts compel him to accept all or none. New sciences, so called, have often been usurpers in the realm of truth, and their advocates have too often given them a jurisdiction which does not belong to novices and parvenues in the fields of knowledge, and 200 Selected Old Testament Studies they have too often brought all truth, human and divine to the test of their immature conclusions. The socalled science of archaeology was no exception. The de- structive critic was not slow to seize upon archaeology as the armory from which to draw his destructive weapons. His facts and assumptions seemed to fit in together so plausibly that much literature has grown out of them ; many perverts from the truth have been made ; and many timid believers have been appalled at the seeming victories over truth. But the tide has turned and the monuments are proving themselves to be the friends of old fashioned faith and the hand- maids of truth. This we shall illustrate in the next chapter. CHAPTER XXI The Bible and the Monuments — (Continued). It was intimated in the last chapter that archaeology- has failed the critics and that the testimony of the monuments shows the futility of many of their most cherished assumptions. The object of this chapter is to illustrate this by a few examples. Just when the destructive critic supposed that he had overthrown the reliability of Bible history and the divine origin of Bible institutions the very earth seemed to open and give up her long hidden treasures for the confirmation of God's truth, and that too in the very form demanded by the critics, secular testimony. We may cite a few ex- amples. I. The critics have pronounced a large part of Gen- esis unhistorical and mythical, and made Abraham a ficticious product of Eastern thought, and argued the improbability if not the impossibility of the invasion of Palestine and the neighboring regions by Cherdolao- mer and his confederates from central Asia. But the spade has unearthed a tablet giving account of the inva- sion and the great spoils and the names of the four confederated kings. And more recently archaeolo- gists have located three of these kings and their coun- tries. Tidal, king of nations has not been located, nor can ever be, if "Goim," translated nations, was an ag- gregation of tribes of Joktanite Arabs who frequented those regions for time immemorial. No record of the 202 Selected Old Testament Studies second expedition has been found except in Genesis, and for a sufficient reason. Kings were not forward to record disasters in their miHtary campaigns. 2. The mysterious Melchizedek, King of Salem, was swept into the receptacle of exploded myths and con- ceits, and with it must needs go that wonderful expo- sition of the priesthood of Christ based on the typical priesthood of Salem's king. Now the monuments make no mention to us of this particular king but among multitudinous documents found at Tel-el- Amarna a number of letters have been found from a priest and king of Jerusalem, an extraordinary vassal and ally and representative of Egyptian authority who claimed divine appointment. He was unlike any of the Egyptian governors in Canaan from whom numer- ous letters are found also. He says, "Neither my father nor my mother have exalted me to this place." He again ascribes his appointment to "prophecy" and to "oracle," which established me in the house of my father." Compare Heb. Chap. vii. It is noteworthy that the tradition of this extraor- dinary priest king was handed down for four hundred years, for the name of the king of Jerusalem in Joshua's time was Adonai-zedek, which is substantially the same as Melchizedek. The name remained though the substance had passed away. 3. The critics taught that the name Salem in Gen. xiv, and Jerusalem in Josh. x. i, 5, are anachronisms, but that the true name was Jebus because it was the city of the Jebusites ; and they claim that the first proper appearance of the name Jerusalem is in Judges xix. 10, "Jebus, which is Jerusalem ;" and that this clause was added by a late redactor or editor, and that the names date from David's conquest of that city. Selected Old Testament Studies 203 Now the early cunieform inscriptions always write Uru-Salem — "City Salem"^ — for Jerusalem ; evidently this is the same name. The criticism loses its sting and Jebus is a new name adopted by the Jebusites until the old name was restored. 4. The critics once claimed that the origin of the Sabbath, as told in Genesis, was entirely mythical and that the Sabbath was of much later origin. But the discovery of a tablet shows that the day was observed in Babylonia at an early period with great minuteness of detail. It was thus made plain that the observance of the seventh day Sabbath was not a naturalistic out- growth of unfolding Jewish institutions. The critic then changed his tactics and showed that this Sabbath observance in Babylonia antedated Moses, and was therefore of Babylonish origin. The word "origin" has two senses and therein lies the fal- lacy. If it means that the Hebrews brought Sabbath observance from Babylonia, there is no objection, for Abraham, no doubt brought all their civilization, social customs, and religious usages from Ur of the Chaldees. But if they mean that Babylonia originated the Sab- bath as against Moses' account of its divine origin, it is a mere assumption, unsupported by a single fact. Two logical fallacies are found in their reasoning — the fallacy of paronymous words, and the fallacy of post hoc, propter hoc. 5. The exact parallel to this is the story of the flood. It had been long recognized that the world wide traditions of a destructive deluge are confirmatory of the historic fact of the flood. The flood tablets of Babylonia do add greatly to its certainty from secular sources. The critics are guilty of the same fallacy in tracing the origin of the story as found in Genesis. 204 Selected Old Testament Studies The more conservative, like Sayce, concede that the monuments in this and in other cases do redeem the Scriptures from the reahn of the mythical and fanciful and exalt them to the rank of history, as creditable as secular history of past ages, and to be tested by the same rules. We may certainly be grateful for the re- buke he gives to the destructive critics for their un- tenable positons, even though it be a small favor. 6. Take the case of the Hittites. The critics for- merly objected to the prominence given to the Hittites in Bible history. Somehow the Hittites seemed to have fallen out of secular history so completely that they pronounced Bible history necessarily false be- cause these peoples are so frequently mentioned. It is now known, however, that the Hittite confederacy held the balance of power for a thousand years between Egypt and Central Asia. Their northern capitals were Kadesh on the Orontes, and Carchemish on the upper Euphrates, and their capital in Palestine was Hebron in Abraham's day, and they built Zoan in Egypt as their most southern capital. Their discovered inscrip- tions and literature bid fair to rival those of Assyria or Egypt. So Bible history is again vindicated. 7. The historicity of the Mosaic account of the He- brews in Egypt has been most vigorously attacked by the critics. But their arguments were assumptions based on ignorance. For example ; they said that the historian of the oppression was ignorant of the most obvious facts in Egypt, and evidently had never been in Egypt. The merest tyro in Egyptology was obliged to know that brick and mortar were not used in Egypt, but their building material was stone, as seen in their pyramids and in the ruins of their ancient cities. Now it turns out that Pithom, one of the storage cities that Selected Old Testament Studies 205 the Hebrews built for Pharaoh, has been identified be- yond all question, and the drifted sand has been re- moved from much of its ruins. The spade has revealed acres of receptacles for grain, all built of heavy brick walls built against each other without windows or doors. They were evidently filled from the top, and may or may not have had roofs and even buildings above. It is more probable however, that these bins were left open to the air above, for the climate was dry then as now. It is now known that the Germanic tribes in Europe stored grain for their armies in heaps in the open air and it was so kept from year to year. An examination of these structures shows that part of the bins were built of brick made with straw; in other places inferior grass and stubble were used; and in other places the bricks were made entirely of mud. So a mud brick has brained that criticism and vindica- ted the author of Exodus. 8. The critics for a long time challenged the gen- uineness and authenticity of the Pentateuch as the work of Moses, because that was a rude and semi bar- baric age, and the art of writing, if not wholly un- known, was inadequate to the production and trans- mission of a permanent literature such as we find in the Pentateuch. Tel-El-Amarna marks the ruins of a city that was long the seat of government in Northern Egypt. In 1887 immense numbers of tablets were unearthed there, of every description ; government archives, uncounted letters, domestic and foreign, commercial transa,ctions, family records and literature of every kind. Nearly all were written in the cunieform script and in the Babylo- nian language. It is beyond question that this was the literary language of that period between Joseph 2o6 Selected Old Testament Studies and the Exodus and was read and used and understood throughout Egypt, Palestine, Arabia, and Assyria. These Hbraries elucidate the history of that period and make the relations of nations and peoples so lumi- nous that we feel at home amid the cities of all these countries. It is also made evident that schools and libraries, the art of writing and reading, were as widely spread as in Europe till recently. When we consider the great difificulty of mastering Babylonian writing and the language itself, and the literary culture that is so obvious, we are astonished beyond measure. The critic is obliged to surrender his theory of illiteracy and lack of culture in the centuries just pre- ceding the Exodus. So far as literary culture goes the , centuries between Abraham and Moses w^re fully equal to the production of the Pentateuch, or the Book of Job, or whatever else might claim its origin then and there. A further result of these literary discoveries is this. The contents of this literature, so far as deciphered, have cleared up many points in early Oriental history and have added many incidental elucidations and con- firmations of the Bible history of those days. It would seem that the critic's vocation is gone, swept away by these revelations. 9. It has long been customary to connect sacred and secular history as mutually confirmatory in the days of Ahab, of the house of Omrl. After this date sacred and secular history have been considered authenic. The critics have found, as they suppose, many flaws in Bible history after this date based partly on the silence of the monuments and on supposed contradictions originating in ignorant assumptions. The controver- sies about Pul, Tig-lath-Pileser, Shalmenezer, Sargon, Selected Old Testament Studies 207 and Tartan have been settled by new records obtained from the monuments. Detailed discussions of all this may be found in numerous handbooks treating of these things. The critics are constrained to admit the re- markable "parallelisms" and "coincidences" found in the Scriptures "confirming the monuments." This is a reversal of the argument. 10. The Book of Daniel has been and still is the battle ground of the destructive critics. If they can discredit the historicity if that book the inspiration and inerrancy of all the rest go with it. This might be true from our point of view but not from theirs. We con- sider the entire Scriptures a unit, but they do not. In this we discover their essential dishonesty. If there is no unity of authorship in the entire Bible, as they claim ; and if the Bible is an aggregation of books by mere human authors, a mere literature bound in one volume, how can the historicity of any one book effect the claims of the others? From the orthodox point of view, however, the repeated confirmations from Gene- sis to Malachi do strengthen the whole. The conflict over the Book of Daniel has been bit- ter, if not desperate, because it is the last stronghold of the destructive critic. Daniel is the key to Jewish and oriental history of that period. His ninety years of life and his official relation to five dynasties make him the great historic figure. About him are grouped the captivity of the Jews, the rise and fall of the Babylon- ish empire, and the rise of the Medo-Persiam empire ; and to him was granted a prophetic sweep of vision to see and record the destinies of nations and peoples to the end of time. Nebuchadnezzar, Evil-Merodach, Belshazzar, Labynetus, the Queen Mother, Cyrus, Darius and Zerubbabel were in a proper sense his satel- 2o8 Selected Old Testament Studies Htes, revolving about him because he, in his person and office, was the representative of Him who has al- ways been "head over all things" for his people. No wonder the Lord mentioned Noah, Daniel, and Job as the three great men of the ages, and the three most likely to prevail with him. Ezek. xiv. 14, Yet the destructive critic does not hesitate to make Noah a rather bungling imitation of Xisuthros, the flood hero of the Babylonian tablets. They pronounce Job the great mythical hero of a great religious epic. They consider Daniel a vastly overrated Hebrew exile, and his historian a pious fraud. Satan still gets in his per- fect work as a slanderer of the saints just as he did in Job's day. There have been three several attacks on the book of Daniel. The first was made by Porphyry in the days of Julian the apostate. Porphyry was a pervert from Christianity to Paganism, He was a very learned man, a bitter enemy of Christianity and a great leader in the reaction against Christianity in Julian's day. He wrote a most learned book against its claims. His book has been lost and all the several refutations of it. In his book was the famous attack on the book of Daniel. Assuming the impossibility of inspiration and predictive prophecy, he showed in minute historic detail the accuracy, of the predictive sketch of the na- tions for several centuries, and argued that it was writ- ten after the so-called fulfillment, because so accurate. The critics to-day adopting the same fundamental assumptions are compelled to find a late date for the book or surrender all their assumptions touching in- spiration, revelation and predictive prophecy. They have, however, been compelled to renounce Porphyry's fallacy that the fulfillment of prophecy is prima facie evidence of fraud. Selected Old Testament Studies 209 The critics made the second attack from a Hterary point of view, an old method of theirs, not yet fully dis- credited. They say that the style, and the use of Greek words, such as the names of musical instru- ments, and other Grecisms show that the book was writ- ten after the conquest of Asia by Alexander, the Great, and the introduction of Greek manners and civilization by him. The reply is easy. The Tel-El-Amarna libraries show the intimate contact of Greeks (Javan) and Babylonians for a century before Moses and the monuments show a continued contact especially in Asia Minor and Asia Propria from that time on. The conquests of Nebuchadnezzar and then of Cyrus em- braced all the Greeks of the mainland, the original seat of Greek civilization ; and what is more, the Phoene- cians who controlled the carrying trade of the world carried Greek art everywhere at an early day. These facts indicate that the empire of Nebuchadnezzar, then of Cyrus, was cosmopolitan, and the Grecisms of the book of Daniel would seem to be both natural and neces- sary in Daniel's day. Here we have another argumen- tum ab ignorantia. The third point of attack is the account of the fall of Nebuchadnezzar's empire, the capture of the city by Cyrus and the establishment of the Medo-Persian em- pire. It was objected that the account of Belshazzar's impious feast is false because Asiatic usage did not allow the presence of women at their feasts. But we learn from secular sources that this usage was set aside one day every year when the entire people engaged in the foul orgies of the worship of Thammuz (Adonis) which were celebrated with universal drunkenness and prostitution. We are further told that Cyrus improved that day to enter and secure an unguarded city. 210 Selected Old Testament Studies For fifty years the critics kept asking, "Who was Belshazzar?" The historians and the monuments make no mention of him as a son and successor in the dynasty of Nebuchadnezzar. But on the contrary secular history tells that Nabonidus (Labynetus) was a usurper, and the last king of Babylon, and he was not in the city when it fell. But the city was in charge of the Queen Mother and the king took charge of the ar- mies in the field and was shut up in Borsippa not far away. How triumphantly the critics kept asking for fifty years, "who was Belshazzar?" Almost any Sunday-school child can now tell you that he was the son of Labynetus by a grand-daughter of Nebuchadnezzar which made Belshazzar his "son,"' It was the custom of a new king to strengthen his kingdom by taking the wives and female relatives of for- mer kings to wife. We now know that Belshazzar was a weak and dissolute prince and that he perished some- how ; Daniel only tells us how. Now the critic keeps asking, "who was Darius the Mede?" He finds no answer either from the monu- ments or from Greek historians who wrote of these things long after the events they record. We ar? obliged to answer that we do not know certainly. No harm can come of the critic's ignorance of his per- sonality. We know this much from secular traditional history. Astyages was king of the Medes and Cyax- ares was his son. Also Cyrus was a Persian and his father's side and that his mother was a Mede, the daughter, or the sister of Cyaxares. Also we are told that Cyrus spent his early life at the Median court. It would seem that the rapid growth of Persia with Cyrus' conquests and his kinship to the Medes gradually ab- sorbed the Medes and grew into what historian call the Selected Old Testament Studies 211 Medo-Persian empire. So then Darius may have been Cyaxares, or as some think, Astyages. There are other pointers in the same direction, but we may not dogmatize about it because we lack positive informa- tion. The critic, however dogmatizes the Book of Daniel into incompetent history because he does not know who was Darius the Mede. The most plausible attack, however, is the most re- cent. There has lately been discovered a cylinder giv- ing Cyrus' own account of the fall of Babylon. This seems to set aside the long accepted account gathered from secular history, and which seemed to supplement Daniel's account. It is claimed that the cylinder sets aside both the story of Daniel and the story of the Greek historians. Cyrus tells us of a peaceful capitu- lation which did not disturb the ordinary business of the city either civil or commercial. He tells also that he continued Labinetus in the civil administration. No mention is made of the assassination of Belshazzar, nor of Darius the Mede. The critic assumes that Daniel is falsified by the failure of Cyrus to mention these two things. The reply is this, about one third of the tablet, about the middle, is so damaged and obliter- ated that it cannot be deciphered, and we have only a part of Cyrus' account. If we had it all it might con- firm all that Daniel says and also cohere with the main features of the traditional historical account. Nothing quoted above, as deciphered, contradicts Daniel's ac- count. II. Our purpose in these brief discussions has not been to confute the critics, nor to vindicate the truth of the Bible in its historical accuracy and credibility. Such a purpose were far too wide to be brought into the brief compass of a single chapter. Our purpose 212 Selected Old Testament Studies has been simply to illustrate the methods of the destruc- tive critics and to show how the monuments and archaeological discoveries have so often and so promptly nullified criticisms, and positively verified the historicity of the Scriptures. Surely an all wise providence hid away the archives of a thousand years in imperishable places and is bringing them to light again just when they are needed to confute the adver- sary. So far their testimonies all agree and we may expect it to be so to the end, 12. There has arisen another school of critics, if it be another school, that we shall only define and clas- sify. Some of the more honest destructive critics have been convinced by the testimony of the monuments and have deserted their fellows and have even turned the batteries of the monuments, bricks and stones, upon their quandam allies, and do show them but scant mercy. For this we are truly grateful. Their posi- tion is easily stated. They concede the general truth- fulness of the monuments and at the same time recog- nize many defects of such records. They find much that is fanciful and puerile, distorted and contradictory, as well as true; and they say that they are to be judged by the same standards as Herodotus or Diodorus Sicu- lus whose histories overlap these ancient periods. Then they tell us that these records are the original sources from which Bible history is drawn ; and that its truthfulness is based on the truthfulness of the records from which it is drawn. The stream can rise no higher than its fountain. They profess to redeem Bible his- tory from the limbus into which the destructive critic had thrown it, and bring it up to the level of ordinary human history. They recognize no inspired historian, no divine authorship, no basic inerrant facts on which Selected Old Testament Studies 213 to build morality and religion, doctrine and practice. Thanks and admiration are demanded by them because of this valiant defense of the truth. Can we allow them to pose as doughty champions for the truth? They are still critics. Shall we classify them as con- structive or destructive? Or shall we call them by their own preferred name, "devout critics?" The con- structive critic may be as devout as they. The de- structive critic claims to be a devout seeker and tester of truth. We cannot therefore classify them as de- vout. Shall we call him a constructive critic who denies the divine authorship of Bible history? Who de- grades it to the level of the records of a polytheistic paganism? Who tells us that the "Most High God" of Melchizedek was the sun god of the Babylonians, and that Abraham paid him tithes because it was the custom? That Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were ignorant corruptions of the names of Babylonish divinities? And so on ad infinitum. "But what's in a name?" How would the name "semi-destructive" fit the case? This much is to be said in his favor, he has looked over the edge of the precipice and has drawn back ; and he is in a more favorable attitude to return to old fashioned faith in the word of God. CHAPTER XXII The Synagogue. As soon as natural religion discovers and recog- nizes the existence of God, and his relations to his creatures, it suggests and enforces the duty of rever- ence, honor and obedience. If there were no revela- tion man would of necessity invent and practice modes and forms of worship. He has done so in all ages, as- sisted and directed largely by traditions which doubt- less had their origin in early revelations. It is plain, without argument, that true worship is heart worship. "God is a Spirit; and they that wor- ship him, must worship him in spirit and in truth." Jno. iv. 24. "To this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit and trembleth at my word." Is. Ixvi. 2. Mere forms of worship can have no real value in any system of religion, natural or revealed. Still there must be forms of worship and modes of intercourse be- tween man and God. Man is not left to invent these and to decide upon their fitness. The difficulty of so doing is enhanced by man's sin and ruin. Revelation alone could furnish a plan of Salvation, and all doc- trine, practice, and worship constitute most intimate and essential parts of that plan of salvation. More than this, all forms and modes of worship, all its ordinances, ritual, ceremonial. Sacramental, and the like, and all the franchises and institutions of the wor- shippers, as given in the Scripture, are the very em- Selected Old Testament Studies 215 bodiment of doctrine, and the expression of the pro- foundest truths. It is therefore easy to see that mere human inven- tions and adaptations, which are usually called will- worship are to be disallowed in religion. Revelation is the only supreme authority. Christ rebuked the Pharisees because they "taught for doctrines the com- mandments of men." Their false doctrines were ex- pressed in false practices ; and their false practices of human invention embodied false doctrine. Every in- stitution of religion was thus made void, and a refuge of lies substituted in its place. We may therefore enunciate this propositon ; the forms, the modes, the spirit, the times, the conditions, and the circumstances of worship are of divine appoint- ment and regulation ; and the very organization, gov- ernment, and franchises of the worshippers are of di- vine origination and authority. This proposition will be elucidated as we proceed. This opens up a broad and expansive theme which calls for a rapid sketch of God-given institutions from the beginning to the rise of the Synagogue, which we propose to discuss in the light of the principles already enunciated. I. The Gospel dates back to the Fall of Man. A plan of salvation was announced and put into opera- tion. The Protevangelion is the promise that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head. A ceremonial and ritual system was oppointed and prac- ticed. It was evidently typical and prophetic. Two oflferings were appointed, the blood offering and the meat offering; one for atonement and the other a thank of- fering. It is a mistake to suppose that these offerings were of human invention because they were typical' and prophetic, to be fulfilled four thousand years later ; 2«t6 Selected Old Testament Studies and besides, these two forms of sacrifice and offering constituted the very heart and core of the ceremonial and typical system enacted and elaborated at Sinai, and practised in all essential features from the beginning. In course of time two rival theories divided the race. Cain and his party rejected the vicarious bloody offering as not needed, just as men do to-day, and ex- alted the thank offering as the sun of all requirements. There is no need here to trace the feud further — Abel's vindication, the murder, the separation and the final doom of nearly the whole race at the flood. Cain's rationalistic will-worship bore its fruits. 2. No doubt there was before the flood some form of organized religious life, and some form of hierarchy as in after times, for the offices or functions of prophet, priest and king were associated in some form in past ages, and were of the very essence of organized reli- gious life. Whatever the form of that hierarchy was before the flood it had failed. It was doubtless patri- archal, as it continued to be for a long time afterwards. After Noah men multiplied on the earth and a nev/ experiment became necessary which gradually super- seded all else. Abraham was called to be the father and head of a new organization, which should live in varied outward form till the end of time. The Abra- hamic covenant spans and includes several and all dis- pensations of organized church life afterward, and to- day, "If ye be Christ's then are ye Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise." We have some indications of an older hierarchy in Abraham's day and afterward, which gradually fell into decay in the growing general apostasy. Melchizedek is the most conspicuous example — a high priest, called of God, having family priests in his district or diocese. Selected Old Testament Studies 217 Abraham lived for years under him and paid him tithes, and Jethro seems to have been a prince, priest, and prophet of Midian. Potipherah, priest of On in Egypt under the Shepherd rule, seems to belong to the same order; and Baalam, of the Midianites later on, seems to mark a stage in the corruption and decay of the system, while the new regime under Moses is taking on its organic life. 3. The first form and dress of the Abrahamic cove- nant was patriarchal. The church was largely limited to the family. The father was the religious head and teacher of his house ; his firstborn was first his subor- dinate and then his successor. The father was ob- viously the civil head of his family. He ofifered sacri- fices and was therefore a priest ; and he was also a prophet because he had the oracle. This last proposi- tion is both logically and historically true. Thus every patriarch was a type of Christ, the true prophet, priest, and king of his people. There seem to have been no ministers of religion in his system outside the family, and for obvious reasons. The tent, the house, the home, was the church or place of assembly; sometimes they assembled under the spreading oak, or under the broad canopy of heaven ; and the hill-top was the place for altar and sacrifice. 4. Four hundred and thirty years after the Abra- hamic covenant was given the Mosaic system was en- graiTed on the covenant. The church has outgrown the family ; the families have grown into tribes ; the tribes have grown into petty states ; and they need to be adjusted to each other into a federal commonwealth. The family, the church, and the state need to have their relations readjusted in infinite wisdom. The doctrines 2i8 Selected Old Testament Studies of the ages were made permanent. The moral law was proclaimed as the basis of all their institutions. The ceremonial law was written and enforced and its de- tails adjusted to changing conditions. The doctrines of civil government were expounded and illustrated. The priestly office was taken from the firstborn and lodged in the house of Aaron. The prophetic function was assigned to the priest's oracle, and to a numerous line of prophets, specially called to the office. The oracles of God were committed to their keeping against the time of universal apostasy among the nations. Rom. iii. i, 2. The government was made theocratic. Jehovah be- came the civil king by formal vote and covenant. The tabernacle was the royal pavilion. The mercy-sea' was his throne, and the shekinah was the visible mani- festation of his presence. Later on the temple was his palace and Jerusalem the city of the great king. There was much of imposing ritual and gorgeous pantomine adapted to civil and national worship in addition to the simpler ritual for personal worship. The tabernacle had a civil as well as an ecclesiastical side, and so also the temple, for the same Lord was head over both the church and the state. 5. Even the provision for strictly moral or spiritual worship vastly exceeded the ceremonial. It is a mis- take to call the Mosaic economy a ceremonial system except that the ritual was an integral part of it. The family was the training school in simple spiritual wor- ship. The universal constitution for family religion for all ages is found in Deut. vi. 6-9. Then the family was assisted by the Levites who were the educators of the people, and all education was religious rather than secular. The prophets were in- Selected Old Testament Studies 219 spired expounders of truth taking no part in the ritual except on occasion. ReHgious assembhes were still held in the home. Proseuchae and synagogues were not yet built. The people were required to spend but three Sabbaths in attendance at the tabernacle, and then only the males were required to attend. The other forty-nine Sabbaths belonged to the moral and spiritual worship, 6. That which was peculiar to the Sinaitic covenant was intended only as a temporary form and dress for the Abrahamic covenant. It must wax old and decay and in due season must pass away. The Captivity marked as distinct an epoch as Sinai. There was change or revolution everywhere. The two kingdoms were destroyed, never to be reorganized. The tribal federation disappeared forever. The tribal organizations were broken down and tribal distinc- tions largely lost with their genealogies. The Levitical system of education was disorganized. The inspired teaching of the prophets was largely super- seded by the expanding bulk of written revelation. The patriarchal system of family religion, including doctrine and discipline, was so disorganized and broken up that it could not be restored. The ceremonial and ritual ser- vice of the temple ceased for seventy years, and when restored was local, limited and temporary. Only a small proportion of the people returned, or could return to Palestine. It was impossible for the Jews of the dispersion to go to Jerusalem three times a year, and their ambition was soon limited to the attend- ance on one Passover in a lifetime. All this indicated that the ritual was waxing old and ready to pass away. What shall take its place? 220 Selected Old Testament Studies 7. The Synagogue system became a necessity. It was engrafted on the Abrahamic Covenant, as the Catholic and universal feature, adapted to changed conditions, and adapted to all nations and peoples under heaven. In the development of the system, it overlapped the waning ritual system for several hundred years and became the final dress and form of the church when the ritual passed away. There are no historic data to show exactly when and how the synagogue originated nor how rapidly it grew. It certainly was not enacted into full existence like the Sinaitic Covenant, but was a development more akin to the gradual growth of the patriarchal system, or rather like societies and churches which have multiplied as oc- casion required. Every separate synagogue was a society, and all were organized on the same model and for the same purpose. Tradition indicates that the synagogue originated during the captivity when the Jews were un- der the guidance and advice of the prophets, Daniel and Ezekiel, and extended to the entire dispersion and served to preserve the traditions and worship, and the organic life of the people under all conditions. Synagogues were extremely numerous after the time of the Maccabees. There were said to be four hundred and sixty or even more in Jerusalem alone, and the sys- tem was developed into a great spiritual commonwealth throughout the world. Some think that the system was somewhat in vogue before the captivity, quoting Ps. Ixxiv. 8, but the exegesis is not conclusive. And if they are right it does not at all afifect the trend of this discussion except to confirm and strengthen it. The organization of the synagogue was very much like a Jewish synagogue or a Christian church of the Selected Old Testament Studies 221 present day. Fourteen persons in any community, ten of whom would engage to attend regular meetings on the Sabbath and two days in the week, were a sufficient nucleus. The officers were a board of elders or rulers who were responsible for the worship, doctrine, and dis- cipline. The presiding officer was called the malak or angel of the synagogue. He seems to have been the pas- tor and the moderator, and the responsible head, like the Rabbi of to-day. There was also one or more ministers or servants or deacons who had charge of the buildings, books, and other secular interests, with oversight over the poor. Their worship was simple, and consisted of prayers. Scripture reading, preaching and expounding the law, and collections for the poor, and also the singing of Psalms. The synagogue therefore was the place for simple, spiritual worship, and the cultivation of intelligent piety and good works. They built houses every where, and every house was the rallying place and the centre of Jewish life, and their drill place and armory in their war- fare with paganism. The Jewish people were scattered every where, and devotion and piety were saved and pro- moted. Immense numbers of pagans, especially women, became members, and in the fullness of time Christ came. The temple was destroyed and the ritual ceased by the logic of events rather than by any positive enactment. The synagogue remained. The synagogue was the ma- trix and protecting sheath for Christianity. The Gospel was preached every where, first in the synagogues. The Jews were by no means all apostates. Many were de- vout and pious, waiting for the "Hope of Israel." Large numbers of Gentiles were trained in the same faith and hope. The devout, both Jew and Gentile, believed and 222 Selected Old Testament Studies rejoiced when convinced that Jesus was the Christ. Others were hardened. BeHeving synagogues became churches. In other cases believers withdrew or were cast out and were or- ganized in private houses or elsewhere. The sj'nagogue system was parted into two streams, Jewish and Chris- tian, and will come together again when the fullness of the Gentiles shall be brought in. The synagogue became the church without upheaval or revolution. The Abrahamic covenant moved on un- der this form and dress as the ritual system gradually fell away. What were the true relations of Judaism and Chris- tianity? Was it antagonism, rivalry, hostility, and war- fare? By no means. Christianity was the flowering out and full fruitage of Judaism. The century plant grows with its massive succulent leaves, green and vigorous, for nearly a hundred years. Near the close of the cen- tury a central shoot or stalk starts slowly upward. As it mounts up, its head is crowned with a gigantic bud that has, folded in it, the hope of the century. Those great leathery leaves in the mean time have yielded up their fatness to the central stalk and lie withered and shrunken around its base, and at last the gigantic flower at the top has unfolded all its petals and stands the pride and glory of its hundred years, the fulfilment of its promise and destiny. So Judaism was the great millen- nial plant of the ages, and Christianity grew out of its protecting sheath and fulfilled all its promise. We may close this discussion with three propositions. I. The synagogue model is the Scriptural church and finds best expression in Presbytcrianism, for which we claim jure divino authority besides, on a fair exegesis of the Scriptures. Each unit is a complete and perfect or- Selected Old Testament Studies 223 ganism, and the whole constitutes a spiritual common- wealth of tremendous power for good. It is opposed to Prelacy on the one hand and Independency on the other. 2. Independency disintegrates the commonwealth and makes each church independent of all others, and the final judge of all questions of doctrine and discipline. 3. 'Prelacy centralizes into a despotism, destroys the autonomy of the unit and takes away the franchises and liberties of the people. Besides, it seeks to restore the shrunken and wasted foliage of Judaism, its temple, its priests, its alters, its vestments, its candles, and its gor- geous pantomime worship. ^llllJ^miiiiW^^iF.^' Seminary Librar 1 1012 01208 0836